Today is Halloween and I am in the Bay Area staying on my sailboat this evening. I would much rather be at home welcoming trick-or-treaters. Fortunately my 22-year-old daughter is home in Utah taking care of all the little monsters that come to my house. My wife and son are there as well but this year my daughter really caught the spirit of Halloween.
I have to say I am a bit jealous. As a kid, I loved Halloween. Being able to go door-to-door and collect candy is a great tradition. More importantly to a child, it signals the beginning of the Holiday Season. We make a mad dash to Thanksgiving and then the month of December is magically filled with Christmas. I am hoping to have a number of reviews over the next couple of weeks should you be interested in finding gifts for the overgrown boy in your life. This means more about PlayStation VR and the games to go with it. I also ordered my PS4 Pro today and will let you know if you should spend the money or pick up the less expensive Slim. Now if it was only 30 degrees colder outside and the rain turned to snow. Then I could sing, "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas."
Monday, October 31, 2016
Sunday, October 30, 2016
Meeting Celebrities
This morning I visited with one of my friends who introduced me to Jeff Clark, a famous big-wave surfer. I knew I had heard his name before and his face looked familiar. I used to surf back in my early college days but I haven't followed the sport in quite some time. Naturally my curiosity got the better of me and I wanted to find out more about him. So this evening I pulled out my trusty laptop and did an Internet search on his name.
I am always asking how we survived before the days of the Internet. If you ever need to know anything, the first place to look is your favorite search engine. Have a question about some random fact? Search the Internet.
My friend that introduced me to Jeff this morning is my old surfing buddy that knew I have been away from the sport so long I might not know who he is. He wanted me to ask Jeff about his celebrity status. Fortunately Jeff is very self-effacing and not caught up in his own fame. He told me about his surfboard shop but didn't mention his many exploits at the big-wave surfing mecca known as Mavericks. I had to find that one out on my own. Sometimes celebrities are just cool like that.
I am always asking how we survived before the days of the Internet. If you ever need to know anything, the first place to look is your favorite search engine. Have a question about some random fact? Search the Internet.
My friend that introduced me to Jeff this morning is my old surfing buddy that knew I have been away from the sport so long I might not know who he is. He wanted me to ask Jeff about his celebrity status. Fortunately Jeff is very self-effacing and not caught up in his own fame. He told me about his surfboard shop but didn't mention his many exploits at the big-wave surfing mecca known as Mavericks. I had to find that one out on my own. Sometimes celebrities are just cool like that.
Friday, October 28, 2016
Timing Airport Pick-Ups Correctly
My wife wanted to spend the weekend in San Francisco and so instead of flying home at the end of a week, I just stayed in the Bay Area and used frequent flyer miles to bring her out. Waiting for her to arrive on Friday felt strange as normally I am not in the office. When it came time to pick my wife up at the San Francisco airport, I had to figure out how to get the timing correct. Airports don't like it when you pull up to the curb and wait for an hour or two for a flight to land.
Fortunately my boat that I stay on in the Bay Area sits at the end of the San Francisco airport runway. I decided to try something new just to see if the timing worked out. My wife gave me her estimated arrival time as the plane took off and then I hung out on the boat waiting for her to land. As the time got close for her arrival, I sat out in the cockpit of my boat playing my guitar, and watching planes land. I saw my wife's aircraft fly by and had that confirmed when she texted me immediately upon touchdown. Then I carefully put my guitar away, closed up the boat, and started the short drive to airport.
I pulled into SFO just as my wife called from the curb. Timing worked out perfectly. I pulled up and my wife immediately got into the car without either of us having to wait more than 15 seconds.
There are a number of smartphone apps that show when flights arrive. You can also use the phone to tell your ride when you are leaving. Unfortunately neither of these take airport congestion into account. Nothing beats sitting at the end of the runway on your sailboat watching planes land.
Fortunately my boat that I stay on in the Bay Area sits at the end of the San Francisco airport runway. I decided to try something new just to see if the timing worked out. My wife gave me her estimated arrival time as the plane took off and then I hung out on the boat waiting for her to land. As the time got close for her arrival, I sat out in the cockpit of my boat playing my guitar, and watching planes land. I saw my wife's aircraft fly by and had that confirmed when she texted me immediately upon touchdown. Then I carefully put my guitar away, closed up the boat, and started the short drive to airport.
I pulled into SFO just as my wife called from the curb. Timing worked out perfectly. I pulled up and my wife immediately got into the car without either of us having to wait more than 15 seconds.
There are a number of smartphone apps that show when flights arrive. You can also use the phone to tell your ride when you are leaving. Unfortunately neither of these take airport congestion into account. Nothing beats sitting at the end of the runway on your sailboat watching planes land.
Thursday, October 27, 2016
A New Company Benefit: Identity Theft Protection
My company had a meeting today where they rolled out next year's changes to our benefits package. For the most part, things are better than in years previous and I can't complain about anything. One interesting new perk is that of identity theft protection. Interestingly enough I have been thinking about picking this up for myself and am happy to see I don't need to.
There are a number of companies providing identity theft protection with Lifelock being the most popular. If you go to their website, you will see that 1 in 4 people are victims of identity theft. Those are pretty high odds and I don't want to take that risk.
I am one of those people that prefers not to store credit card numbers with my online accounts. While it takes a bit more time as I have to manually add my payment information for any purchases I make from a website, it reduces the chance of a bad guy getting my financial information. Unfortunately there are a number of sites that insist on storing that information for me and so I am glad to have this new benefit. Hopefully other companies are following this trend and making it part of your benefits package. If not, now you know what to ask the next time your human resources department requests feedback.
There are a number of companies providing identity theft protection with Lifelock being the most popular. If you go to their website, you will see that 1 in 4 people are victims of identity theft. Those are pretty high odds and I don't want to take that risk.
I am one of those people that prefers not to store credit card numbers with my online accounts. While it takes a bit more time as I have to manually add my payment information for any purchases I make from a website, it reduces the chance of a bad guy getting my financial information. Unfortunately there are a number of sites that insist on storing that information for me and so I am glad to have this new benefit. Hopefully other companies are following this trend and making it part of your benefits package. If not, now you know what to ask the next time your human resources department requests feedback.
Friday, October 21, 2016
Virtual Reality
Last week Sony PlayStation released their virtual reality (VR) hardware. I ordered one for myself and finally got it set up today. Being in the video game industry I have seen countless VR demos and had the chance to share some of them with my family members today. If you haven't had a demo yet, I understand you can get them at Gamestop and several other retailers. I highly suggest seeing them first-hand as there is no way to do VR justice without a live demo.
It has been interesting to watch VR games evolve over the past several years. A few months ago I participated in a demo and it amazed me how immersive the experience is. I wondered if a game that might be rated for teens (T) suddenly becomes a mature (M) game because you feel so much more a part of the game. Specifically I am thinking about violence. When you have a first person shooter or action adventure where you shoot people but there is not graphic blood, you can get away with a T rating. Take that same game, put it in a VR environment, and suddenly certain elements deserve a much more adult rating.
I know that the adult entertainment industry is eager to adopt VR which is why I opted for the PlayStation VR over the Oculus Rift or HTC Vive. Sony can exercise some element of control over what content appears on their platform. While they do allow nudity in their games, they would never allow and adults-only (AO) title to appear on their console. However, this does bring up a good point. God of War, The Order 1886, and several other games from Sony studios do contain nudity. While that has only earned a mature rating in the past, will it now deserve an AO in VR?
It has been interesting to watch VR games evolve over the past several years. A few months ago I participated in a demo and it amazed me how immersive the experience is. I wondered if a game that might be rated for teens (T) suddenly becomes a mature (M) game because you feel so much more a part of the game. Specifically I am thinking about violence. When you have a first person shooter or action adventure where you shoot people but there is not graphic blood, you can get away with a T rating. Take that same game, put it in a VR environment, and suddenly certain elements deserve a much more adult rating.
I know that the adult entertainment industry is eager to adopt VR which is why I opted for the PlayStation VR over the Oculus Rift or HTC Vive. Sony can exercise some element of control over what content appears on their platform. While they do allow nudity in their games, they would never allow and adults-only (AO) title to appear on their console. However, this does bring up a good point. God of War, The Order 1886, and several other games from Sony studios do contain nudity. While that has only earned a mature rating in the past, will it now deserve an AO in VR?
Wednesday, October 12, 2016
No Substitute for Paper
Recently I headed out with my family for a day of rock climbing. As a fairly novice rock climber, I usually make sure to purchase a guide for the area I plan to climb. Then I just throw it in my equipment bag and reference it before starting the climb. On this particular trip, we arrived at the climbing area just after two guys from California. They started pulling out their climbing equipment and I wanted to check that we were in the right area. They confirmed it and so we parked the car. Next I pulled out my trusty guide book to determine where we should set our equipment to begin our climb. Our new friends from California took a peculiar interest in the book.
A lot of people rely on smartphones to provided directions to specific locations. Rock climbing is no exception. Unfortunately we all decided to climb someplace so remote, none of us had mobile phone reception. The guys from California drove to the correct location based off of stored GPS coordinates but didn't have the rest of the information needed to start the climb. They consulted my guide book and found a nice place to go so we would not interfere with each other. They also took a picture of the guide book page for the area in case they needed more help.
Smartphones and the ubiquitous Internet have really cut down on how much printed information we need on a daily basis. However every once and a while you may find that there is no substitute for paper. I am not sure what our new friends would have done had I not come along with my trusty guide book.
A lot of people rely on smartphones to provided directions to specific locations. Rock climbing is no exception. Unfortunately we all decided to climb someplace so remote, none of us had mobile phone reception. The guys from California drove to the correct location based off of stored GPS coordinates but didn't have the rest of the information needed to start the climb. They consulted my guide book and found a nice place to go so we would not interfere with each other. They also took a picture of the guide book page for the area in case they needed more help.
Smartphones and the ubiquitous Internet have really cut down on how much printed information we need on a daily basis. However every once and a while you may find that there is no substitute for paper. I am not sure what our new friends would have done had I not come along with my trusty guide book.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
