Weird: Google+ and Facebook both have serious but opposite limitations in changing page names.  It was effortless to change my Facebook page address (custom URL)…but changing the NAME of the page is really looking problematic.  Exactly the reverse on Google+: changed the name in about 10 seconds, but the address is off limits!

GAWD I love the Internet when it's smart and sassy #OzInBox

It’s quiet … TOO quiet

One of the best and toughest puzzles in the cosmos, described and illustrated effectively at waitbutwhy.com:

“If 1% of intelligent life survives long enough to become a potentially galaxy-colonizing Type III Civilization, our calculations above suggest that there should be at least 1,000 Type III Civilizations in our galaxy alone—and given the power of such a civilization, their presence would likely be pretty noticeable. And yet, we see nothing, hear nothing, and we’re visited by no one. Welcome to the Fermi Paradox.”

It’s all so tantalizing! What I like best about the Fermi Paradox is that the universe will be a scrumptious, dizzying mystery no matter what: while I’d prefer galaxies bustling with life, it would be just as existentially bizarre and intriguing if humans are completely alone.

A review from the archives:

“So that’s the War of the Worlds for me: with guitars, the battleship Thunder Child, crazy priests, and by far the best Martian tripod artwork in the history of this great story.”

Accelerated podcasts are great, but they can jangle my nerves, like caffeine. That’s why I use new “Smart Speed” by @OvercastFM, for smoother, creamier accelerated audio, without that annoying chipmunk vibe…

I really want fresh links to my new domain right now—www.PainScience.com!—to help the move go smoothly. But I really hate begging for links, I’m idealistic, and I truly believe that a link to my site actually MATTERS. That it’s not just good for me. That it’s information activism, a “vote” for good content that really helps people. So although I will probably still hit up a lot of people for links (because reality), my impulse today was to finally write THIS, an idea that’s been rattling around my brain for ages…

Big day. SaveYourself.ca is no more. Long live www.PainScience.com!

Thumbs up? Fresh or rotten? Five stars? Here’s a new metric for movie quality: ‘Honest Trailer proof'!

"We literally tried to Honest Trailer-proof the movie." — The Winter Soldier co-director Joe Russo

If only more genre filmmakers would.

Disclaimer: I haven’t seen The Winter Soldier yet, so I have no opinion on whether it was, in fact, honest-trailer proof. 

Waves crossing with geometric precision at the tip of a gravel spit in the Strait of Georgia.

Hyperlapse

Really getting a kick out of Hyperlapse, an iOS App that does stabilized time-lapse video.

I’ve always loved time-lapse photography — it’s like a time telescope, revealing what cannot normally be seen because it unfolds too “far” away in time. (And slow motion is a time microscope, just as cool.) Hyperlapse makes reasonable smooth time lapses possible without any special equipment (e.g. tripod, steadicam). So great!

Example:

Kim and I took a walk out on a looooong, snakey peninsula of gravel bar exposed by the low tide. The tip was really way out there. Felt like we were hiking straight into the ocean!