Hacking

I love to hack.  Love it.  I love making things do the things that they were never made to do; or even better- removing limitations and freeing the device to do more things.  I love the dark secrecy.  I love understanding things.  I love to hack.

It always impresses me that all things can be hacked.  It is like a mini war- the tech and media giants are frantically trying to preserve their eroding control over digital media vs. the hackers who work as a collective to reverse their efforts.  

Enter the iPhone.  Great little device- I adore it.  But, Apple has chosen to lock out many features that would seem obvious to include.  Things like real bluetooth transfers, custom ring tones, remote access of your itunes....  Within a week, the entire iphone OS was decrypted, and hackers were actively once again developing forums to share information learned.  

While one may argue the legalities of hacking- I see it as one of the purist of freedoms.  If you purchase a product, you should be allowed to do anything that you wish to it.  

Hack on.

The tooth has left the mouth

Julia lost her tooth last night.  The tooth fairy myth never captured my imagination as a kid- I still think it is lame.  The Easter Bunny HAS to be the worst myth ever.....but anyways.... My kids have put together that there are different fairies for different kids.  This works out well, as apparently they have a friend who gets letters with each tooth.  I had a hard enough time staying awake to slip the money under the pillow...

I met them half way and folder the bill in a funky way and signed it "Tink."  I am trying hard not to let all of these fleeting childhood moments race by... It sure made m smile to wake up with my daughter racing around the house with the news that the tooth fairy came.

Sometimes your kids will say something, and you try to figure out where they picked it up.  Today, Julia told me that the money was going to the poor people.  She told me that she does no need anything.  I guess hat we are doing something right as parents.

Loose Tooth.

Ah, the small excitement that a first loose tooth brings.  My youngest daughter has her first loose tooth.  She has been jumping for joy, giving us detailed updates.  And it made me think....  a simple wiggly tooth can make a 5 year old jump out of sheer delight.  The tooth fairy, the anticipation....  The simple things in life that are so easy to look past.  I try hard to realize this and appreciate the moment.

My daughter has devised a plan for me to rig a video camera so that we can film this "fairy" and try to figure out why she wants teeth anyways.  She has a whole studio set up in her mind.  I most likely will set something up when it does happen for her.  The lengths that we go through to propel an myth: a bad one at that...

So the bigger issue: what is the common rate a tooth fetches.  On one had, you don't want to drop a $20, but you also want to make sure that it is in line with all of their friends.  God forbid they think that somehow their tooth is less, which would lead to couch therapy 30 years from now.  "It all started when I only got $2 or my first tooth..."

Life at the Cape

We are at the Cape this week with the kids and Anne's family.  I set up a rig to use neighboring wifi in the house.  What I did was:  Mount an antenna on the side of the house, and run it to an old PC.  It picks up a weak signal 4 houses down.  It drops, but is available 90% of the time.

Next, I needed to figure out how to redistribute the signal so the whole house would have it like it was our signal.  I hooked up an old dlink router to the ethernet, hoping it would "just work."  It didn't.  After fiddling around for a few hours, I went into the pref of the connection, and changed the sharing to allow the pc to share its internet- whala.... we know have high speed on the Cape.  

Of course the whole reason to get to the cape was to escape daily life.  But, I have reached a point where giving up internet access does not make me feel relaxed.  It just makes me grouchy.

There is a project under way to bring high speed access for everyone on the Cape in the next 3 years.  Until that happens, does anyone really care if I mooch a bit of wifi on vacation?  Thanks.

iPhone

Well, I waited in line for over 5 hours on Friday for the iPhone.  I am an Apple fan, but not to the point where I do not see any faults and drink the Steve Jobs coolaid strait.  

First impressions:

It feels like a product from the future.  It really does.  It does the whole multimedia/internet/phone in your pocket thing.  Like the origional os back in 84', I think this is going to have a huge impact on future technology gadgets and computers.  The touch screen works well, and like many Apple products, it is real fun to use. 

My wife jokes that this thing is a chick magnet...everyone who sees you using it wants to try it.  Everyone has the same reaction..."I am getting one..."  We were at a minor league baseball game the other day the woman next to me asked if she could touch it.  I smiled and said only if it is ok with me wife....  She did not get it.

Apple stock: buy.

At&t stock: buy.

Apple seems poised to once again change the rules, and drag the entire industry into a new and better way of doing things.  As for faults, I just don't see them.  Edge is much faster than I thought, the keyboard is easy to use, and everything "just works."

Most of all....it is fun to use.  But isn't that what Apple always seems to pull out of it's Willy Wonka factory of delights?