Humor4u

When dogs howl at night, it's not the full moon  that sets them off. Dogs are communicating  for all sorts of reasons. We're just not all that good at understanding what they're saying. We make so many mistakes about attributing cause and effect  for so many reasons , that it's almost surprising we get it right as often as we do. But all those mistaken beliefs we realize we have, don't seem to teach us a lesson.  Pretty soon after catching ourselves out, we're at it again, taking mental shortcuts, being cognitive misers . It's so pervasive, you would think we would know this about ourselves, at least, even if we don't understand dogs. Yet we commonly under-estimate how much bias is affecting our beliefs. That's been dubbed the bias blind spot that we (allegedly) tend to live in. Even taking all that into account, "effect" is an astonishingly over-used word, especially in research and science communication where you would hope people would ...

The mission of the 2045 initiative is the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity. Remember when specie, yes even us, would evolve in response to prevailing conditions and the mystical union of genes? Well apparently we are not shaping up as quickly or as sophisticated enough for at least one group of "thinkers." Given their preference... the messy business of being a biological life-form is far from satisfactory and we need to be "developed" away from that unpredictable state apparently. They may be having control issues with us, or anticipate foolish resistance? I don't know anyone off hand personally... who wishes to be developed into something other than a regular human individual This makes me wonder who and what these "developer" folk are? What is there driving motivation and should they really be in charge of steering our next iteration when I see no urgent call to be morphed into techno-critters from the gener...

Like my previous DevBytes episode, Anticipation and Overshoot, Part I ," this episode covers cartoon animation techniques for making UI elements more engaging and playful. The code in this episode shows how to change and animate how a button is drawn to make it seem more alive and organic. This and other cartoon animation techniques were discussed in the talk A Moving Experience at Google I/O 2013. Code: http://developer.android.com/shareables/devbytes/Anticipation.zip YouTube: DevBytes: Anticipation and Overshoot - Part 2

Since we just released Android 4.3 yesterday, I thought I'd wax poetic about one of the features I worked on in the release: Overlays. Android devs Come out to play: Use the new ViewOverlay. There are many ways to get custom graphics (drawables) to appear in a view. You can set a background drawable if that's what you want, or you can use an ImageView, or you can create a custom View subclass and override onDraw(). Or if you want to draw them over the children in a layout, you can override the layout and override dispatchDraw() to draw them after all of the children (after a call to super.dispatchDraw()). But sometimes you just want something simpler: ViewOverlay . Here's how it works: You call View.getOverlay() , which returns a ViewOverlay object. Then you call add(Drawable) on that overlay object... and that's it. You can also call remove(Drawable) to get rid of the drawable or clear() to get rid of everything in the overlay, but that's the entire API. The only o...

If you are a benefactor of larceny this post will be of little interest to you, unless you are curious as to coming fate. For the rest of us, forgive us if we seem cynical, deceived and violated. In more equitable times, you the scofflaw would be subject to prosecution if not persecution. Today however... you... the cheat, thief and liar have gained control of justice and ride high above the reach of the law. You are backstopped by compromised government and corrupt politicians and hide within the skirts of corporate fortresses. That is today... tomorrow may be a different kettle of fish, for the light of right and the weight of might are taking notice and your fun on the sunny side of the street may well soon expire.   You have become brazen and sloppy with your crime spree. At the moment your scurrilous antics are described by corporate owned media as those of naughty children, words such as scandal, rigging, rascally and tainted substitute for...

Some principles of cartoon animation can be used to provide more engaging and more interactive experiences in applications. This episode demonstrates principles of anticipation and overshoot with a simple button click, showing how to animate changes in the button's appearance to make it interact more playfully with the user. This and other cartoon animation techniques were discussed in the talk A Moving Experience at Google I/O 2013 Code: http://developer.android.com/shareables/devbytes/LiveButton.zip YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQ7PTe7QMQM

Pizza Politics--Your pie is wrong! Too bad. In days gone by I thought I understood democracy... at least the base principles of it. It seemed simple enough, Guided by wise constitutional laws, citizens elected their representation, the representation implemented and guarded the wishes of the people, and everyone lived happily after. For the past few years I have increasingly had qualms about the integrity of today's pale version of democracy. Day by day as alarming events unfold... I have nagging doubts about the sanctity, purity and intent of the uses for "our" democratic shield and its spear. It seems the new world order version of democracy is 180 degrees counter to the genuine "articles"... and THAT is what I am now subjected to. Over time something sadly and badly has transformed wholesome pie to inedible swill ... an insidious creeping blight of perversion and corruption, the crust is mouldy, the toppings, withered, sparse or wrong! Formally, one had the s...

Repercussions of global economic collapse are many... mass unauthorised migration of displaced citizens is one, it may be the least spoken of, yet the most potent in terms of societal effect. What distinguishes today's economic depression is scope, depth and penetration... it being worldwide. In past times depressions and hard times were often a faraway, distant event, happening elsewhere. Somewhere, someplace... things weren't so bad and eventually regional "have's" tended to be a shock absorber for the struggling region and over time balance and equilibrium restored some sort of normalcy to the afflicted region. Today's depression represents a true frontier... it is probably unprecedented and so pat solutions are theoretical, untried and untested. So far the writhing of NWO inspired elitist governance to address issues... has quickened the descent into the quicksands of collapsed global economic folly, hastening ultimate demise, not arresting it. The world w...

Depending upon where you live and which elevation you have achieved in the socioeconomic strata, you may have had a nagging feeling your liberty, prosperity and economic freedoms have become somewhat pinched of late. This will not be noticeable if you happen to be in the 1 percentile club of privilege, but for the rest of us who come by our daily bread honestly, the row to hoe seems to be getting longer, the weeds thicker and the heat of the day more oppressive. It turns out it is not just our imagination. For over a decade, The Wall Street Journal and The Heritage Foundation, Washington's preeminent think tank, have tracked the march of economic freedom around the world with the influential Index of Economic Freedom. The Index covers 10 freedoms – from property rights to entrepreneurship – in 185 countries. It turns out the things which govern our chance at economic freedom and personal opportunity to thrive... have been gradually whittled away. What is economic freedom? Econ...

Penny Ur was awarded an OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire ) for services to English Language Teaching earlier this year and as my last gig for the British Council I organised an event in her honour at the annual summer  ETAI conference in Jerusalem. Knowing that events of this kind can easily slide into a sentimental outpouring of endless congratulations and knowing that Penny is not the kind of person who would like that, we were keen to keep it professional, elegant and not too gooey (Amanda Caplan, personal communication, 22 March 2013). The event opened with footage from Windsor Castle showing Penny receive her award from the Queen. At this point, quite unexpectedly, the packed house broke into a rapturous applause. We wanted to avoid soppiness but this was indeed very emotional and I swear quite a few of us had tears in our eyes. After the standing ovation had subsided, Caron Sethill, Deputy Director of the British Council Israel officially opened the event wi...

This is a demo that +Romain Guy and I showed in our A Moving Experience talk at Google I/O this year, showing how to use the existing TypeEvaluator and Animator APIs to get curved motion for your animations. In the real world, things don't move in straight lines. Moving items around on the screen should feel as natural as possible; sometimes curved motion can help. This episode shows how to use the existing animation APIs to get easy curved motion for your UIs. The helper classes come from an article I posted on my blog last year: http://graphics-geek.blogspot.com/2012/01/curved-motion-in-android.html YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVGg4zPRHNE Code: http://developer.android.com/shareables/devbytes/CurvedMotion.zip

The reason for this post is not for the folks who have been caught in the first wave of personal economic hard reality, but the next wave. Regardless of the optimism espoused by grinning leaders and sycophant press, we are entering the final stage of global economic collapse. It began in 2008 and was forestalled for five years with fudge putty, but the weight of global indebtedness cannot be propped any longer and the final crunch is imminent. Austerity measures herald the final throes.  Indications of coming austerity.   Austerity measures are the final last ditch effort, futile or not! Back in the day many of us old-timers went through periods of "hard-times". In retrospect I realize there is no comparison to yesteryear hard times and today's version. Back then, expectations were never very high for the working class, there were no sophisticated systems or conveniences anyway. In fact the difference between being "set" or not was about having treats or not. Si...

We all know how extraordinarily disastrous all things global turned out to be. For a few select elitists, not so much, but in the overall scheme of things, by and large... the world finds itself a smoking, scraped out shell of its former self with no known way to recuperate.. The reasons are well documented so do not need a lot of examples, you will find them throughout this site. One of the continuing idiocies still in play--is an ability for one country to come into another country and literally bye the assets, many of which represent key security concerns for the inhabitants. Some commercial enterprise lends itself well to foreign interest purchase, some... decidedly not. Any domestic service, resource or product representing core reliance or national advantage needs to be exempted from foreign ownership--period! The list should be well thought out and extensive. Imagine, a group who probably loathes you and your culture, lifestyle and aspirations is able to own and operate things ...

Is your personal "fear list" short and sweet? Have recent events expanded it? Do you have the nagging thought... "It may be time for review?" Generally people are interested in their own welfare, this is perfectly natural and it inspires interest in potential personal threats. Perceived personal threats range widely and often include things like loss of freedom, injury, loss of income, loss of domicile, sickness and any number of unwanted life altering risks. For some it is a mindboggling list of recently coined phobias, designed to map onto pharmaceutical profit opportunity. Risks to personal welfare are many and sundry but most of them can be avoided using sensible risk avoidance habits and lifestyle, so many of us tend to do risk analysis subconsciously or on the "fly" keeping ourselves out of harms way. This applies to almost all the obvious threats posed by a roaming lifestyle. Being safe is a product of being careful and being aware of immediate surr...

Those of us who see humanity gradually sinking into the clutches and influence of a self-professed higher order whose intent is subjugation ... and who would resist this tyranny in the name of individual rights and freedoms... are rapidly becoming phased out by a different mind-set, a generational planned obsolescence. Fact is... we accept what we are born into, as will they. Where you and I may have had the benefit of knowing and understanding a concept of a fair and equitable system positioned to offer individual opportunity, the past few generations have not. In fact quite the opposite  has transpired. Expectations have been set in young minds that individual rights and freedoms must be parked in favour of the common good. The common good of course... is a state predefined for them, replete with twisted reasoning and outlandish justification. Notwithstanding they are receptive, they have been shaped that way. The ideals of competition have been eroded, replaced by the notion of...

I find the concept interesting. When one delves into current events and wonders "How so?" An often overlooked causal component can often be found... if looked for. Finding the missing bit can explain much about what mainstream media neglects to mention--they are more inclined to face-value or vetted press release pap or agenda spin. The reporting of "far-away" events... seldom associate prophecy as being a motivating factor in the affair. If it did, comprehending the event and its sometimes confusing mix of participants and their motivation could be much more clear to a sense seeking reader. That overlooked component of news... is a product of various faith "belief" systems often known as prophecy... and as much as many disdain the concept... prophetic edict still plays a huge role in many regions political affairs. The supplicants of various faith belief systems often adhere literally to their tenets and are apt to be motivated to respond and react to sit...

In 2013 many formally content nations are now fighting for survival while Parasitus Extraordinaria is fat, content and bloated, Sovereign nations have become abject victims of Parasitus Extraordinaria. If establishing global economics networks did nothing else, they did create the most wondrous environment and habitat for the Corporate Parasitus Extraordinaria, a financial corruption blight which if not contained spreads faster than Floridian black mold in damp walls. It came to light readily--global scope commerce and regional economic meshing provides the idyllic, quintessential parasitic paradise ever intentionally conceived. In more sensible times, infection spread was somewhat contained by naturally formed, robust regional economies which served as containment to wild outbreaks of far reaching corruption, a barrier or firewall of sorts. Removal of containment produced an epidemic of corruption never seen by humanity in the annals of commercial activity before, not entirely a surpr...