Tom Merritt's Blog, page 1210
February 22, 2012
Triangulation 40: Steve Martin
Hosts: Leo Laporte and Tom Merritt
The famous Steve Martin joins us to talk about, Habits of Very Organized People, twitters influence, an artists viewpoint of piracy, comedy, bluegrass music, and more.
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Running time: 54:21
East Meets West 278 – Cloud trust
We talk about trusting cloud for data, robots in cars, and a little more about container homes.
Tech News Today 441: OG 4G
Hosts: Tom Merritt, Sarah Lane, Iyaz Akhtar and Jason Howell
PlayBook gets it's update a year late, Comcast squares off against Netflix, is MS Office coming to the iPad?, and more.
Guest: Mark Milian
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Running time: 43:07
February 21, 2012
Tech History Today – Feb. 22
In 1857 – Heinrich Rudolf Hertz was born in Hamburg, Germany. Hertz made key discoveries in optics but also transmitted and received electromagnetic waves and gave his name to the common unit of frequency, Hz.
In 1995 – Chicago stock broker Steve Fossett completed the first hot air balloon flight over Pacific Ocean. At 9600 km it was also the longest baloon flight.
1995 – President Clinton signed an Executive Order directing the declassification of intelligence imagery acquired by the CORONA, ARGON and LANYARD U.S. photo-reconnaissance satellites. More than 860,000 images of the Earth's surface, collected between 1960 and 1972 were made public.
February 20, 2012
S&L Podcast – #92 – The Lies of Locke Lamora Kick-off
WHAT ARE WE DRINKING?
Veronica: 2010 Hogue Cellars Pinot Grigio
Tom: 2009 Les Portes de Bordeaux
QUICK BURNS
Aspiring sf writers: Clarion workshop closes to applications in two weeks
2011 Nebula Awards Nominees Announced Thanks David!
Developing World: Beyond the Frontiers of Science Fiction
BARE YOUR SWORD
TV, MOVIES AND VIDEO GAMES
Joseph Conrad's HEART OF DARKNESS going scifi
TRAILER: 'Doomsday Book' – SciFi Anthology Film with Sentient Robots, Meteor Collision and Zombies
BOOK KICK-OFF
The Lies of Locke Lamora (Gentleman Bastard, #1)by Scott Lynch
Purchase The Lies of Locke Lamora
Tom finished MORAV by Fon Davis
Updates on Blue Remembered Earth and The Coldest War.
Dear V & T,
I've been catching up on a few weeks of podcasts, so feel free to ignore this if you've moved on from the ""is listening to an audiobook really reading?"" issue.
My relevant background is that I am a cognitive neuroscientist and an avid audiobook listener (I joined audible.com in 2001…)
Anyway, from a scientific perspective, all the claims that brain handles audio differenetly from the written word are true but entirely meaningless to this debate.
The problem is that unless you have some well-formed argument about what a difference in neural patterns signfiies, its meaningless to base any claim by stating simply that the ""brain handles x differnetly from y"". The reason for this is that, at some level, the brain handles nearly everything differently from everything else.
For example, reading aloud and reading silently activate the brain in different ways. As does reading reading in your native tounge vs. a newly learned langauge. Same with braille vs printed words. Or with reading off paper vs. off a computer monitor (neural activity can actually get entrained to the refresh rate). Brain activity in ""fast readers"" can differ from that of ""slow readers."" Kids' brains handle reading differently from adult brains. Brain activity during reading can change following a stroke… And so on. If there is one ""right"" kind of brain activity for reading, there is probably only one person who has ever really read (my money is with Jonathan Franzen….)
Point being: saying that brain activity is different when listening vs. ""reading"" tells us nothing particularly useful.
On the other hand, much more meaningful questions could be asked, like:
Do people remember the text better when it is read to them vs. when they read it themselves?Are details remembered better?Does the author intent come through better in one medium vs. another? Are people more likely to ""skim"" in one medium vs. another?After some time do people forget how they ""read"" the book? (that is, years afterwards, is the content stored seperately from the delivery method).
These are actually answerable questions and it would be interesting if someone did this research. But I can say from my own experience that there are times when audio is clearly the ""better"" method. One obvious example, is that I know how to pronounce character names and places.
Anyway, love the show,
Jordy
—
Hi Tom and Veronica,
Love the S&L podcast, keep up to good work.Brandon Sanderson posted a blog entry about the release date of A MEMORY OF LIGHT
As a Wheel of Time fan, I can't wait, hope it doesn't get delayed but i respect the need to finish this off right.
BTW: are my recommendations for an S&L book pick
Sword: The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch.
Laser The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi
Veronica, thanks for introducing me the Alex Craft series in your new book club, looking forward for more good stuff.
Lastly here is book rec I think you will both enjoy immensely but probably doesn't fit the book club profile, it takes place in a post Zombie outbreak world in which civilization didn't collapse largely thanks to bloggers and the lessons learned from George Romero! the book is called Feed by Mira Grant (Newsflesh Trilogy #1) it's a clever, intelligent book, just look at the cover.
Arroyo Kay
NEW MEMBER HELLOS
Tim, Drew, Lou, Hisham, Shaun, Steven, Anthony, Lisa, J.L., Gene, Doryen, Stu, Ben, Karen, Jared, Terry, Atle (AT-luh), Dan aka Skipper, Adam, Andre, Peta, Michael, Luke, Gord, Chris, Andy, Emil
ADDENDUMS
This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com the internet's leading provider of audiobooks with more than 100,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Best Sellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook, to give you a chance to try out their service. For a free audiobook of your choice go to audiblepodcast.com/sword.
Tech History Today – Feb. 21
In 1937- Waldo Waterman flew the first test flight of the Arrowbile, and found the aircraft easy to fly and virtually spin and stall proof. It is considered the first successful flying car to actually fly.
In 1947 – Edwin H. Land demonstrated his one-step instant camera and film at a meeting of the Optical Society of America. The first Polaroid camera was on sale within two years.
In 1986 – The Legend of Zelda, the first in the ongoing series, was released in Japan for Nintendo's Famicom console.
February 19, 2012
Tech History Today – Feb. 20
In 1962 The United States became the second nation to put a man into orbit. John Glenn piloted the Mercury-Atlas 6 Friendship 7 spacecraft to a successful conclusion of the mission.
In 1986 – A Soviet Proton launcher boosted the base block of the Mir space station into orbit.
In 2004 – Apple's first iPod Mini arrived in Apple retail stores and online. It was the first variation on the original iPod.
February 18, 2012
Tech History Today – Feb. 19
In 1856 – Professor Hamilton L. Smith of Gambier, Ohio received the first U.S. patent for the tintype photographic picture process. It described a method for "the obtaining of positive impressions upon a japanned surface previously prepared upon an iron or other metallic or mineral sheet or plate by means of collodion and a solution of a salt of silver."
In 1878 – Thomas Edison received a patent for the phonograph. His first recording was of "Mary Had a Little Lamb" spoken into a large horn which transmitted vibrations to a needle that cut the recording on a hand-rotated cylinder. (US patent No. 200521)
2002: Odyssey, the first of six current operational Mars vehicles began its mission to map the planet.
February 17, 2012
Tech News Today 440: I Feel So Very Windows
Hosts: Tom Merritt, Sarah Lane, Iyaz Akhtar and Jason Howell
Windows new logo, Google web tracking explained, Android's unlock patent, and more.
Guest: Darren Kitchen
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Running time: 51:02
Tech News Today 439: A Delicious Dish Of Spectrum
Hosts: Tom Merritt, Sarah Lane, Iyaz Akhtar and Jason Howell
Mountain Lion OS X comes to Mac devs, is Android 5 coming? Facebook verifies famous people, and more.
Guest: Martin Giles
Download or subscribe to this show at twit.tv/tnt.
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Thanks to Cachefly for the bandwidth for this show.
Running time: 42:46
