Blogging and a Reflection on this Blog

Blogs are ubiquitous. Online space is a lot cheaper than print mediums, and it's easy to distribute to people, as long as they have internet access. In fact, blogs have become so ubiquitous that social media websites actually help users filter blogs (e.g. http://technorati.com/ or http://www.blogpulse.com/) to the identify the most relevant. Blogs make it much easier to get "published" (ie. have work accessible to a large number of people).

One of the successful uses of a blog is to keep its readers informed of a particular area of information. Political blogs, scientific blogs, and business news blogs are some examples, where knowledgeable people can share information and references with their readers. Another successful use for blogs is to use it as a marketing tool to announce product releases and promotions. And lastly, there is the blog to keep friends and family updated on your activities.

The topic of this blog is the appreciation the craftsmanship of the work I see around me. This means that I am not necessarily knowledgeable in the topics of my posts and that it's not a summary of my activities for my friends and family. So, who am I writing for and why write a blog?

One of my initial (unmentioned) intentions with this blog was to write regularly so that I may improve my writing. Part of making this available publicly was to have people reading my work and encouraging me to write more. Blogs were good for this--a way to publish text quickly and share it with people. After, a while, I dropped this blog lower on my priority list, I still will not update it regularly.

Although I initially thought this would be interesting to the general reader, I have come to the conclusion that this is a personal blog and a personal project. The blog format is still useful to organize my work (chronologically and with tags) and to have it easily accessible from location to location, so I will continue to write as I make time to. But now, especially due to the infrequent posts, this should be considered a private blog, not a public one. This blog will be left publicly viewable for the occasional casually interested reader.

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Note: http://www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/000493.html reports over 70 million blogs tracked by Technorati as of three years ago and that the growth had been increasing.

Getting to Know People

I've been away from blogging for a month, which means that at some point soon, I'll reflect on my blogger experience thus far. After all, I want to know if this is valuable fo me.

I haven't been blogging because I've been busy. I've moved from Quest University Canada to Bennington College and started my spring term. I've finalized my senior projects (finally). Oh, and of course, I am starting to figure out my soon-to-come post-graduation life. But enough about me. Let’s get to know people.

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Ever had awkward "get to know each other" activities? I've certainly had my share and even inflicted a few of those upon high school clubs I participated in. But recently, I participated in an excellent activity where I actually got to know other people.

Context: Every year, a bunch of offices at Bennington College collaborate to put on the Senior Conference, an extended weekend of activities and workshops designed to situate ourselves to the way of life outside of school. (And yes, this means hearing people say that working for corporate America is not, in fact, "selling out" on your true self.)

There were only sixty people on campus at this time, and if we were going to spend the conference with them, we should get to know them. Surprisingly (for a school the size of Bennington), there were other seniors that I had never met before and could not recall ever noticing. The coordinators of the conference knew this, of course, and planned several "get to know each other" activities.

The one I liked best was an introduction of someone you didn't know to the rest of the group. This involved several steps: 1) finding someone you don't know, 2) taking the effort to initiate conversation with them, 3) knowing the person well enough so that neither of you is embarrassed during the introduction, and 4) actually giving the introduction to the entire group.

Why was this so successful? On the surface, it seems like any other kind of activity, where you find out a bunch of stuff about someone else. But, reflecting upon it, the introductions were less artificial than most activities.

First, we had to find someone we didn't know well and speak with them. Unlike other activities, we weren't assigned someone else, so there was less of that "Alright guys, we're in this together. Let's just get it over with." attitude. Navigating the frantic eye contact game to select a partner, we had to choose who we wanted to get to know.

Secondly, we weren't just having the conversation for the sake of the conversation. Some activities ask you to find "One thing they learned in the last three months." But unless you're in a social mood (and some people are all the time) or unless the person is particularly insightful, that information hardly matters.

Here, though, we had a responsibility: we were introducing this person to the group. There was a goal in mind, and I was going to work toward it.

I wonder if this is obvious to a lot of people, but it certainly wasn’t obvious to me: conversations, at least initial ones, work better with a goal. A goal might be “What can I learn about computing from this person?” or “What does this person think of my latest ideal for a novel?”. They could just be “What kinds of things does this person do?” in the hopes of finding some leads for what you’re interested in.

It doesn’t even have to be a different goal for different people. Certainly, that last question about what people do (occupation, where they live, hobbies, etc.) is a part of what we consider when getting to know someone. We can’t know everyone well, but the more people we know more about, the more we can choose who to spend time with later on.

Back to those “getting to know” activities, though, whenever I participated in one, I would never have thought of treating those “conversations” as goal-oriented (and therefore good for me). These introductions, on the other hand, provided an excellent goal to work toward.

Nevermind that goal was short-term (within the 30 minutes of the activity). It was the first time I had done this activity with any sort of goal in mind. And it got me into the rhythm of actually wanting to know more about my partner, where I could ask more, even unscripted, questions.

Lastly, there was the reinforcement system in play. If I didn’t get to know my partner, we would both be embarrassed. So I had to be sure I knew at least the basic info about my partner by the end of the conversation. And yes, this even meant reviewing, which turned out to be a nice thing to do.

In conclusion, I was surprised that I enjoyed the activity. I’m normally not a social person, but this activity actually worked for me. Having to introduce the person to other people made all the difference. This reflection might even change the way that I meet people. If it worked for me, it might work for you.

Open Source Software and Drawing on a Computer (With and Without a Metric)

Recently, I’ve adopted an open source hunger: every time I want some software made, I figure someone has already made it and someone has already made it open sourced. For those that don’t know, open source basically means that the software’s underlying code is openly available and can be changed and redistributed. (Software like Microsoft Word or Microsoft Vista does not have its code available for anyone to use.)

It so happens that many developers of open source software also want to distribute their software free-of-charge. This is where I come in.

I’ve been thinking about the power of visualization, inspired in a large part by Tufte’s The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. I thought to try and visualize all sorts of things, from my academic schedule to geometry problems. (Actually, this came up for a project I was working on at school.) So I searched for open source and free-of-charge software to do so.

Two of them worked out particularly well: GeoGebra and XMind.

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As you can imagine, GeoGebra is a software for mathematics users, particularly those interested in geometry and algebra (the kind taught in high schools). I just recently used it to solve a puzzle posted by Jason Zimba. But don’t worry, I don’t want to go into the math, just the story behind drawings. So, why is this software so great?

Well, in geometry, we’re concerned about lines, distances, and shapes. If it’s a circle you’re drawing, it has to be curved like a circle. If it’s a line, it needs to be straight. And, if it’s too small to see the details, you need to redraw it again.

I had I hated this part of geometry. It seemed like a waste of time. Couldn’t you just calculate it somehow? There must be some other way besides drawing. I avoided drawing the diagrams every time I could get away with it (and often more).

What this really meant, though, was that I didn’t know how to draw nicely, and I hated having to redraw a diagram because I messed up one part. I just thought that I hated the diagrams because that process of drawing and revision was tied into the use of the diagrams.

Thanks to GeoGebra, I am now able to happily make geometric diagrams, and enjoy their use, without having to worry about the details of drawing. You could say that I’m a supporter of the separation between drawing and visualization.

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XMind has a different intention. Billed as a “mind-mapping software” it is supposed to help you organize your thoughts. You know those “bubble” charts that you’re taught to make to brainstorm or take notes? That’s what this is supposed to do.

How is this different than geometry? Certainly, in both cases we care about drawing, and it’s in the visualization that we retain the information. But, instead of preserving specific distances and shapes, it wants to preserve relationships, ie. connected or not connected.

As you might guess, I hated using bubble charts. I always struggled to organize it so that my ideas would fit on one page. Some branches would take up more space than others and it was hard to keep items of the same level of importance together. Why not just make a list? Or even better, an outline?

Well, I decided to give XMind a shot anyway. It couldn’t hurt, and it was free-of-charge.

As it turns out, once I learned the keyboard shortcuts, I thoroughly enjoyed using the program. The computer managed the spacing and hierarchy for me. I could delete or undo instantly. And the keyboard shortcuts actually made this process faster than drawing on a piece of paper. Lastly, I was able to add or remove a bunch of different smaller symbols, such as relationships, surrounding bubbles, or labels that might name the priority level or status of completion.

And here it was again, the separation between the visualization and the tedious drawing. The computer took care of all the incidental actions, such as differentiating levels of information with different size and font. I just typed in what was important—the items and their relationships.

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What does this mean? Well, I decided not to review either software above in terms of its own genre. I didn’t seek out other geometry software or other mind-mapping software. What I did want to pay attention, though, was the place of computers in visualization.

I think a lot of people have used Excel to make visualizations such as bar graphs, but there are other sorts of visualizations as well. Before using either software above, though, I didn’t think I’d be convinced of their usefulness in their own visualizations.

But after using both, I’ve been able to separate the tedious activities from the substance of the visualization and gratefully letting the computer take care of the tedious work. Then, both visuals seemed natural and intuitive.

I wonder what place the computer has in future kinds of visualizations. Can we design machines the way Tony Stark, the protagonist in the movie Iron Man, designs his powerful machine suit? Can voice commands and 3-D motion be incorporated into a program so that a user has even more flexibility in design? What tedious work can we weed out next, so that can we can focus on the essentials? And how much more productive and creative would we be?

Museum of Making Music

Looking to discover American pop music through the 1900’s? That’s what the Museum of Making Music promises to help you do, located in sunny Carlsbad, California, near San Diego. I went there in late August 2008, and this raised for me some interesting questions on how to communicate information in a museum setting.

(Alright, I know that there’s more time going back to summer 2008 than there is time until summer 2009, but I took notes.)

I’ll describe what I saw first, and then I’ll close with my own reflections.

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I thought I’d go when I was in the area because of my own interest in music. I have played a few instruments and even composed a few pieces of music myself. Also, it was only $7.

As we moved past the greeter, who was incredibly friendly and gave an overview of the exhibits, I found myself in the 1900’s area. They had audio samples, including the John Philip Sousa Band and music from dance halls. This was great, and naturally, expected, for a museum of music, and they were scattered about in all the different sections.

There was actually a fairly cohesive narrative throughout the entire museum. Each section moved decade to decade, and there were instruments, information panels, as well as sound samples.

The greeter had failed to mention the special exhibits advertised on the website on violins and guitars (separately), but they were in there. The violins were separate from the main narrative, but what I think was the special guitar exhibit was integrated pretty seamlessly.

I think all of this was fine, with sound, visuals, and text information. Certainly, I got my money’s worth. But that was it, the museum just seemed “fine.”

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The first thing I noticed was that in the 1900’s the audio samples conflicted with the sound samples of instruments just twenty feet away. It was distracting when listening to some of the ballads, especially since one of the instrument sounds was a tuba playing a really active bass line. As I moved through the museum, I found that there were several audio samples that didn’t play at all—including the ones for an entire section on early jazz music.

Visually, the arrangements were confusing. In the early decades, from the 1900’s-1920’s, they would put violins with trumpets with banjos in the same case without any real explanation. I suppose for the non-musician, there wouldn’t be much of a distinction, but that’s part of the problem: there is a distinction between violins, trumpets, and banjos. They sound different, and are used in very different musical settings.

Some exhibits were a bit tedious. There were maybe 40 violins on display of different styles in their featured exhibit. A video panel was on the side, visually showing the differences in violins. I thought the video was okay, but it seemed like the expectation was then to take the new knowledge and explore the violins in the case. That seemed like a bit much, even for a musician (who doesn’t play the violin, however). I really only wanted to hear any differences between the makes

Lastly, visitor participation was strange. While I took my time in all of the areas, absorbing the information that was available, families with children would just rush through. The children would push the buttons without waiting for the audio track to finish, and the parents, naturally, would follow along. The children were given a worksheet to complete, and even their parents would just ask “Did you find the answer yet?”

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Where does all this leave us? I had some thoughts on museums in general.

Narrative. I appreciated the narrative that the museum weaved for us, and while there doesn’t have to be a straight narrative in every museum, there should be some sort of organizing structure. There was one path through this museum with clearly labeled sections and recurring themes in the information panels. That allows us to digest the information in reasonable chunks and even trace different themes across the sections. This is true for every sort of communication, but I hadn’t realized it was also true of museums.

Participation. While I got to choose which audio samples I listened to or not, there didn’t seem to be too much activity on my part. In the end, I almost felt as if I had to wade through the information, as if trying to finish a long article. There was too much to read (although maybe that is to be expected), and not enough to pull me from reading to reading. I didn’t have in my head too many guiding questions. Instead of actively searching for information, it was passive skimming. There weren’t any guiding themes explicitly proposed by the museum either. I only caught on after three or four decades. (Perhaps I am slow…)

Balance of medium. Since this was a museum about music, that should have been the main focus. Instead, there was way more visual information than audio information, including way too many displays of instruments without audio samples. And in general, a museum should have as its medium the focus on the subject matter, not just displays or expository material. I can go to the internet for those.

Information elsewhere. I could have found images of a variety of instruments put together, just by looking up "musical instruments." I could have enjoyed the violin video on youtube without having a case of 40 violins waiting for me. I wanted the museum to give me something that I can't find elsewhere. This means more than providing information, but combining selected bits with engaging activities.

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These are just some starting points for me to think about museums in a structured way. I’ve skipped over a few aspects like location and advertising because at this point, they seemed less instructive.

Overall assessment of this museum: Lots of information is nice, but not enough to make a museum. The content must be filtered until it creates a graspable experience by the visitor. In other words, “just show me the good stuff, and I’ll look up the rest later.”

Quick Note, The Ending of a Brass Quintet Concert, and Toilet Paper Roll Holders

I recently re-discovered Uncle Orson Reviews Everything, and I’d like my blog to follow in his footsteps. He reviews all sorts of things, from book releases to restaurants to maps. In each post he has several, perhaps unrelated topics. You should check it out.

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Friday evening I attended a concert by the brass quintet, A Touch of Brass. I might write a fuller review later, but I just want to talk about the end of the concert.

This concert took place in at the St. John Anglican Church, which meant that for the performers to get on and off stage, they had to walk across the entire length of the room—through the audience.

After they played their last number, they stood up, took a bow, and then started to leave the stage. Some people started to give a standing ovation, and soon almost everyone was standing, before the performers had made it across the room.

After they had finished leaving the room entirely, they then marched on back in for an encore. It was lively too, with a jazzy feel.

Afterwards, I wondered about the whole procedure. I haven’t gone to too many small ensemble concerts myself, but I have seen encores. Most notably in my memory is the OBDA Select Band concert where the high school band led by Jerry Junkin played the “Overture to Candide,” much faster than before. Very flashy.

My friend Héctor told me that he doesn’t clap for performances unless he truly enjoyed it. That seemed like a fair deal. You wouldn’t want to lie to anyone, and when he claps, you know that he actually liked it.

I was wondering about the standing ovation. Was this concert with a standing ovation? What are the standards for a standing ovation anyway?

But as the performers were walking out, I decided, “you know, I’d like an encore. I want to see what else they have.” So I stood up and clapped along with everyone else.

Is the standing ovation the cue for an encore? Or does a standing ovation mean more?

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I don’t normally think about them, but aren’t toilet paper roll holders convenient? Think about the other options. We might have to carry around our own toilet paper—and what if you forgot it at home today?

Or, establishments with restrooms could still provide them, but in different ways. We could have toilet paper coming out sheet by sheet like tissue, or we might have to crank them out ourselves like paper towels. Automatically dispensing toilet paper roll holders seem a little excessive at this point (but who knows what will happen in a few years).

We currently have toilet paper roll holders which take a roll, and you can pull however much you need and rip it off. Sometimes, when using the economy-sized versions, the toilet paper gets stuck, and you struggle to get enough. Other times, you accidentally pull harder than you need to, and you end up with a whole wad of toilet paper. Sometimes, you might even pull the roll off the holder.

Well, Quest University Canada uses a brilliant solution to all of your toilet paper frustrations. In their Academic Building, they have twin toilet paper holders where the tube across the middle fits snuggly into the toilet paper roll, and the tube itself is an oval and is held up off-center.

The “twin” advantage is obvious, you get more toilet paper without big bulky economy-sized rolls. The tube in the middle fitting snuggly means you’ll never have the roll slipping off. But what of the oval?

When you pull on the toilet paper, the roll makes one turn, and then sinks back to the bottom without rolling over multiple times. The roll acts just like a pendulum, bringing the weight (ie. the roll) back to the center, and you’ll never have to worry about an excessive amount of toilet paper again!

Welcome! My first blog post

Hi Everyone. Welcome to my blog, “Revealing Refinement.”

My goal with this blog is to share my observations on the details in life. I will write about various experiences, both ones I like and ones I dislike. Like a personal yelp.com, I’ll take a look at what made it enjoyable or not. Basically, I want to ask the question, “What can I get out of this experience?”

This idea started from a trip to Alberta, Canada about four years ago. We had gone to what was then the world’s largest mall, and naturally, I had some spending money. But I don’t go shopping. So my friend Jaren insisted that I spend a lot of money on food.

On food? I had never done that before. But the money wasn’t going anywhere else, so why not? After experiencing how food could have so many levels of quality, I have slowly become convinced that we can most enjoy the moments in our lives by paying attention to the details.

This won’t necessarily be a blog of my life, since I think there is only a small number of readers interested in that. (Although, if friends and family want to follow it for this reason, it couldn’t hurt.) But this is to help us enjoy life. And, if nothing else, serve the same purpose as the conversation, “hey man, guess what? I found this cool __(item/restaurant/etc.)__the other day!”

So please feel free to leave comments about what you like and what you dislike. I don’t pretend to be an expert on any of the topics I write about, so I’m open to new ideas. Discuss and enjoy!