Author Archives: skierpage

About skierpage

As you might guess, my site is mine. My Schema.org info is at .

computers: put the screen above a laptop

Posted on 2022-12-31 by skierpage

If you search for “external laptop monitor”, most images show a screen beside the laptop. So you have to look sideways at it, or use a separate keyboard. Some even show a tray raising the laptop to the screen height … Continue reading →

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music: Havona is a penthouse on the Mount Olympus of bass

Posted on 2022-12-20 by skierpage

Dirty Loops’ Henrik Linder (best Justin Bieber cover evar!), Vulfpeck’s Joe Dart, and YouTuber Charles Berthoud are all bass monsters in a golden age of musicianship. But “Havona” by Weather Report is a different level. In my memory Jaco Pastorius … Continue reading →

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AIs making images of music!?!! 🤯

Posted on 2022-12-19 by skierpage

Hi music fans. OpenAI’s Jukebox was generating music waveforms from scratch way back in 2020 (as I wrote). Since then, silence from OpenAI. I suspect half the music in Spotify’s “contemplative acoustic music for yoga/Pilates” and “mid-tempo EDM for hip … Continue reading →

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crypto exchanges are a predictable disaster

Posted on 2022-11-12 by skierpage

FTX and 130 related companies (!!) declared bankruptcy, losing billions in customers’ money. Wait, what? I thought the whole point of crypto is only you know the password (the key) to the string of numbers (the wallet), for which the … Continue reading →

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music: a chorus of Blackbirds

Posted on 2022-09-10 by skierpage

Did Paul McCartney know he wrote the greatest jazz standard since the golden age of the American songbook? The supremely confident moving bass line, the single note “Blackbird singing in the”, the early “dead of” leap in the melody, the … Continue reading →

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food: complex smart delicious vegan pizzas

Posted on 2022-08-30 by skierpage

Millennium Restaurant vegan pizza Monday! On the left, Masala Pizza: Miyoko’s cashew mozzarella, roasted corn, garlic & potatoes, rich tomato-curry cream, pistachio & curry leaf chaat; the latter two sauces debate in your mouth with the potato and corn refereeing. … Continue reading →

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software: making it safer to run random programs

Posted on 2022-08-29 by skierpage

I was dubious about Google’s new Fuchsia operating system, but it has some very interesting ideas, including capability-based execution. Programs that can do nothing until you grant them capabilities are so much better – I hate downloading some Windows .EXE … Continue reading →

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music: so much great instrumental guitar

Posted on 2022-08-16 by skierpage

All the tired old people complaining about “the music today” just aren’t trying. With nearly all recorded music a click away, today’s musicians are building on the best in every genre. My journey through modern instrumental guitar from Vulfpeck to … Continue reading →

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cars: electrics eat supercars

Posted on 2022-08-09 by skierpage

There was a lot of coverage of the Goodwood Festival of Speed. More noisy $1M+ supercars that don’t even pretend to be anything other than garage queens that the ultra-rich trailer to the race track for catered racing experiences; more … Continue reading →

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eco: the latest on gravity energy storage

Posted on 2022-08-05 by skierpage

A year ago I wrote “eco: energy storage is hard, gravity storage as a game”, using physics and a units calculator to show how hard it is to profitably store energy using gravity. Gravity storage isn’t a scam, but nothing … Continue reading →

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