Waiting for AlphaGo vs. Lee Sedol
DeepMind's AlphaGo beat European champion Fan Hui 5-0, but the real test is the March match against Lee Sedol, plus some personal griping about how bad I still am at this game.
Tech News
Tech News
Minsky, Perceptrons, and a Machine That Finally Played Go
Marvin Minsky died this week, three days before DeepMind revealed AlphaGo had already beaten a European Go champion. Some thoughts on the strange timing and what got lost in the AlphaGo coverage.
Snowed In and Not Trusting My Nest
Snowed in during the East Coast blizzard, I can't stop thinking about the Nest thermostat bug from a few weeks back and whether I actually trust my smart home right now.
Why My Thermostat Doesn't Get Software Updates
A software update quietly drained Nest thermostat batteries and left people's houses cold last week. Here's why that pushed me further toward keeping my dumb thermostat around.
Goodbye IE9/10, and a Website Meets Its Match
Microsoft cut off support for old IE versions this week, and between fixing a client's ancient intranet app and watching lottery sites buckle under Powerball traffic, it's been a week about creaky infrastructure.
Oculus Rift Preorders Are Open, and $599 Stings
Oculus opened Rift preorders this week at $599, and after three years of hearing "as close to $350 as possible," the number stung more than I expected.
China Trips the Breaker Again and My Stock App Won't Shut Up
China's brand-new circuit breaker rule tripped again this morning, halting trading in minutes and dragging Apple and other tech stocks down with it. A few thoughts from someone whose RSUs just had a bad Thursday.
The Rocket Landed Upright While I Was Standing in a Return Line
A personal take on SpaceX's December 21 Falcon 9 landing, watched half on a phone in a Target return line and half on a laptop that night with cold pizza.
A Week Late on OpenAI, and I'm Still Not Sure How I Feel
A week-late take on the OpenAI announcement, why "for humanity" pledges from billionaires make me a little skeptical, plus a Force Awakens tangent I couldn't resist.
The Heart Thing Still Isn't Right
Almost a month after Twitter swapped the star for a heart, I'm still fat-fingering favorites into public likes, plus a Cyber Monday site-crash rant.
Nobody's Reading The Fine Print On That Rocket Landing
Blue Origin landed a rocket booster upright yesterday and it's a genuinely great video, but the internet is mixing it up with a much harder problem SpaceX is still failing to solve.
Adele Says No To Streaming, And I Kind Of Get It
Adele's "25" dropped Friday without a single streaming option anywhere, and it's got me thinking about what that says about the state of streaming economics in 2015.