Why isn't technology really making our life easier

So, the theory goes like this. Technological advancements have provided us with the tools to achieve much more than a human has ever been able to throughout the history. Vehicles transport us over long distances very fast, digital networks allow sending and receiving information even faster, computers extend our ability to remember and process data in volumes previously unimaginable. All in all, we get our job done faster, easier and in every other respect more efficiently, leaving a lot of time for the family, fine arts, or anything else one might enjoy.

So why is it the case that we actually have less time, more work and need antidepressants to fight burning out? The answer is paradoxical -- the same need for efficiency that motivates us to produce all these tools also prevents us from using the freedom obtained by using them. Oh, you got your work done thanks to our brand new software package? Cool, there's some more! You did not have to fly overseas and were able have your business meeting over Skype? Excellent, let's schedule 10 Skype meetings for tomorrow. You bought a faster car? Nice, then you can get to the office 15 minutes earlier and write one more report.

Hence I ask all the technology salesmen -- please do not advertise your product as something that makes anyone's life easier. It does not.

How are Garage48 projects doing 10 months later?

Garage48 is a series of events targeted towards creating technology startups in 48 hours. This far, four events have happened, two in 2010 and two in 2011. It seems to me that it is still too early to say anything about the success or survival of the projects of the three last events, but the long-running results of the first development weekend held in April 2010 have pretty well settled by now. I thought it would be interesting to go through those projects and analyze their current status.

I present my findings in the list below, where I describe the projects, their last recorded activities, some comments and my verdict, whether the project can be considered live, dead or something in between. It is not always very easy to say, whether a project is dead, if the website is still up and the original content is still accessible. Since almost all the projects are also represented on Facebook and Twitter, I mostly took the decision about liveness based on recent activity on these sites.

So here it comes.

Garage48, Tallinn, April 2010

1. Kratid.com. The last Facebook entry comes from October 17, 2010, the last Twitter entry from February 10, 2011, but its message is "We are hibernating" and the last entry before that one was on August 30, 2010. My verdict: almost dead.
2. Wannalunch.com. Last activity on site December 31, 2010, last activity on Facebook October 10, 2010, last activity on Twitter November 7, 2010. My verdict: dead.
3. Coctailroulette.com. Last activity on Facebook July 6, 2010, last activity on Twitter April 22, 2010. My verdict: dead.
4. Iseehitaja.ee. The forum has 0 posts, last blog entry April 27, 2010, last activity on Facebook November 6, 2010, last activity on Twitter April 27, 2010. My verdict: dead.
5. Localvortex.net. Last activity on site February 21, 2011, last activity on Facebook February 24, 2011. My verdict: alive.
6. Talepath.com. The website redirects to http://crapwall.com/, last activity on Facebook April 19, 2010, last activity on Twitter April 18, 2010. My verdict: dead.
7. Namefy.com. Last activity on Facebook August 7, 2010, last activity on Twitter April 28, 2010. My verdict: dead.
8. Prygikast.ee. Last activity on Facebook February 25, 2011, last activity on Twitter February 25, 2011. My verdict: alive.
9. Keepatouch.com. The weabsite is dead, last activity on Facebook October 10, 2010, last activity on Twitter June 22, 2010. My verdict: dead.
10. Mysocial.name. Last activity on Facebook June 5, 2010, last activity on Twitter June 5, 2010. My verdict: dead.
11. Poliitik.eu. The website is contentless, last activity on Twitter April 18th, 2010. My verdict: dead.
12. Seenele. Last activity on Facebook September 21, 2010, last activity on Twitter September 21, 2010. My verdict: dead.
13. Subtuutor.eu. Last activity on Twitter April 18th, 2010. My verdict: dead.
14. Off The Couch. It is a Facebook app without a Facebook or Twitter page. It looks running but no-one seems using it. My verdict: practically dead.
15. TwistList. Website is not responding, last activity on Twitter May 13, 2010. My verdict: dead.
16. MyShopping. The website promises a soon-to-come service called LetsMeetHere, no further information about MyShopping. My verdict: dead.

We can see that the only two surviving projects are map-based applications for finding some services. Is there a pattern here? I think I will wait for a few months and analyze the outcome of the second Garage48 event as well. Stand by.

Facebook teeb õnnetuks

Eks see ole midagi, mida me kõik kusagil kuklasagaras salaja juba natuke aega teame. Nüüd siis ka ametliku teadustulemusena: kasu, mida Facebookis sidemete ülalhoidmisega saavutada võib, jääb palju väiksemaks kahjust, mida pidev vajadus Facebooki lahti klõpisda meie närvisüsteemile põhjustab.

Milline on kiiruskaamerate efekt?

Alates 2010. aasta maikuust on Tallinn-Tartu maanteel käigus kiiruskaamerad, mille eesmärk on kihutajate ohjeldamine. Ühe hiljutise projekti käigus avanes mul võimalus küsida endalt, millist efekti kiiruskaamerad annavad. Sellele küsimusele vastamiseks võtsin ette järgmised sammud:

1. Tõmbasin Ametlike Teadaannete portaalist alla kõik sinna üles pandud kiirustrahvide teatised ajavahemikul 10.05.2010 (st päevast, mil kaamerad tööle rakendati) kuni 28.09.2010 (sest teatiste jõudmine Ametlike Teadaannete portaali võtab umbes kuu).
2. Sorteerisin välja unikaalsed kirjed (sest sageli saab üks inimene trahvi mitme kaamera all järjest).
3. Joonistasin kumulatiivse diagrammi, kust on näha, palju teatisi antud päevaks üles riputatud oli.

Tulemus tuli niisugune, nagu näha juuresoleval pildil.

Enne selle graafiku oma silmaga nägemist ootasin, et ta peaks ajapikku allapoole kaarduma, aga tema ei teinud seda mitte. (Statistikahuvilistele: lineaarfunktsiooniga lähendamisel arvutatud korrelatsioonikordaja ruut on peaaegu 1, mis tähendab, et sõltuvuse lineaarsus on praktiliselt perfektne.)

Sellele lineaarsusele on mitu võimalikku seletust.

1. Mingil põhjusel jõuab Ametlikesse Teadaannetesse enamvähem konstantne arv teatisi (kuigi kaine mõistuse järgi peaks neid sinna jõudma proportsionaalne osa).
2. Kogu kiiruskaamerate efekt saabus nende paigaldamise hetkel ja need, kes kihutasid maikuus, jäävadki seda tegema ning kiiruskaameratest pole kasu liikulskultuuri edasisel parandamisel.

Ootame-vaatame, kui Maanteeamet järgmise satsi kaameraid üles saab, ja analüüsime siis uuesti.

Kas inimene peab ise oma turvalisuse eest seisma?

Füüsilises maailmas on ise enda turvalisuse eest seismine norm, mida meile juba koolis selgeks tehakse. "Ära hulgu öösiti kahtlastel tänavatel. Vaata sõiduteed ületades paremale ja vasakule. Kasuta kondoomi."

Digiruumi sukeldudes aga ei peaks Andmekaitse inspektsiooni peadirektori hinnangul inimene ise oma turvalisusest enam ei ööd ega mütsi jagama: "Andmekaitse inspektsiooni ... peadirektori Viljar Peebu sõnul ei tohi E-tervise Sihtasutus kohustada inimest ise enda jaoks turvameetmeid looma."

Link Eesti Päevalehe artiklile: E-tervise portaalis on turvaauk.

Niisiis tuleb jälle kord tõdeda, et e-lahenduste areng on inimevolutsiooni jaoks natuke liiga kiiresti käinud. Kas me tõesti ootame nii kaua, kuni evolutsioonilised mehhanismid läbi loodusliku valiku ja nõrgemate hukkumise meid digieluks paremini vormivad, või kasutame ikkagi juba enne oma aju?

Kas arvuti on olemuslikult kuri?

Ei. Arvuti on ainult hunnik traati ja plastikut.

Ka inimene on ainult paar ämbritäit biokeemiat ega ole olemuslikult kuri. Aga kui ta metsa viia ja tema arengut mitte kuidagi juhtida, läheb inimene kurjaks.

Mulle tundub järjest rohkem, et me oleme maganud maha selle hetke, kui hunnikust traadist ja plastikust on saanud midagi rohkemat, mille arengut oleks tulnud väga varases staadiumis hoopis teistmoodi juhtima hakata, muidu muutub ta olemuslikult kurjaks ning hakkab inimesi väga halvasti mõjutama.

Arvutisõltlastest noored langevad kergesti masendusse.

MacOSX - yet another average Linux distribution

Already for some time I have known that I am physically incompatible with Microsoft's products, including Windows operating system. For years I blamed Microsoft for it, but it was only a while ago when I started to realize that there must be something wrong with me. After all, there are many people who use Microsoft's software day by day and are happy with it, it's just me who is able to crash vanilla WinXP in 5 minutes after the first boot.

One way or another, I can't use Windows. I have been a devoted Linux user for 10 years, but this only means I know it's shortcomings all too well. I can say I've had enough of it for a while, especially after the last upgrade, when my fonts started to disappear pixel by pixel.

And since my good old IBM T42 needed a replacement anyway, I decided to by a MacBook Pro. I have numerous colleagues who have switched to Mac more or less recently, and all of them share a common characteristic -- they are all happy about their computer. So I thought I might get happy as well.

I was wrong.

Of course I had done my homework. I knew that some older versions of MacOSX shipped with a non-standard Estonian keymap, e.g missing the circumflex symbol (^) badly needed for TeX typesetting. I had some hope that this would have been fixed in Snow Leopard, but I was of course too optimistic. Luckily, I have a good friend and colleague, a long time Mac-happee Sven Laur, who pointed me towards a keymap modification tool called Ukelele. That did the trick. So far so good.

Another peculiarity of MacOSX I was somewhat prepared for was the absence of a decent package management system. Of course, it is very convenient to install programs by just dragging them to the Applications directory, and later uninstall by dragging them onto the trash bin. But what happens if the package does not really contain an executable program?

For example, when looking for a solution for my above-mentioned problem, I found an Estonian keymap prepackaged for MacOSX on the Estonian Mac user forum. After downloading and installing, it of course turned out that it was packaged for some older version of the OS and that the old keymaps do not work any more. Oh well, let's try something else and uninstall this one first ... but uninstalling something that was not dragged onto the Applications directory turned out to be impossible! I asked for help from our local Mac store and the canonical way of resolving this issue was just deleting one file from the file system. But what happens if there are more files spread around everywhere, configuration files, dependencies ..? Steve only knows.

Then all of a sudden, the lot-advertised 3- and 4-finger trackpad gestures stopped working. I did some forum digging and it turned out that this was a known bug that can be resolved by logging out and back in again. Indeed it was. Is this the standard way of work of an operating system that is born ready? I don't know. You tell me.

But my latest-and-the-worst experience on MacOSX is connected to the fonts. I knew that it was very hard to change the fonts that Mac designers have chosen for you. I asked about this issue from our local Mac store before buying my laptop. The guy behind the desk did some googling (!) and calmed me down saying that there exists something called TinkerTool, a program that reveals some hidden configuration options, including font configuration.

Since my eyes get tired quite fast when I need to read small fonts, I downloaded the tool and tried turning every single font listed there to 14pt. The only visible difference was increase in the window title text, everything else remained the same!

Yes, some applications allow increasing some fonts independently of the system settings. So I was able to play with the display font of Safari and text output field of Skype, but not with the Safari UI font nor Skype's text input field! The worst of all is Thunderbird with the UI font so ridiculously small that it hurts. Browsing the forums reminded me of the good old times under Linux some 5 years ago, when one manually had to change the contents of userChrome.css file. I searched for it -- no such file exists in Thunderbird distribution for MacOSX as of the end of 2009. I created it in the correct directory, but it did not have any effect. And by the way -- I did not buy a Mac to start fiddling with the configuration files by hand!

Oh well. There are many other things to tell about (how Cyberduck FTP client hanged so badly that it even blocked shutdown, or how you have to go through 32 (thirty-two) easy steps in order to get MSN working under iChat), but I guess it is a good time to end this post here. What can I say in conclusion? MacOSX really does not work out-of-the-box, and as such, it is as good as your average Linux distribution.

It's only that exactly half of the Linux distributions are above the average.