Author: Carl Setzer

A blogger blogging from just north of Seattle.

Data, Greek Love, Choices

Carl Setzer

Today: another day where I sit amazed at the information stream I’ve set up for myself. Emails, website, tweets, etc, tons of stuff I WANT to process. Add to that the stream of stuff I “should” read. It’s really mind blowing.

I consider, though, “why?”  It’s hits me that is rather new. Must of my life, getting access to information required more effort. I needed to subscribe to a magazine or journal, go to a library, etc. Plus, editors and publishers weeded the irrelevant (ostensibly, at least). I never needed to invest time in determining whether I was investing in worthwhile information.

Now, knowledge races towards me. Things that would’ve required hours, of not days, of research I can now access from my bed. And it’s all there… ALL, good, bad, useful and not…all. And I value that, democratizing information, even with the added burden.

I’m working on the control skills. Really, though, the challenge is gluttony, on my part. I love knowing stuff, especially the eclectic, unusual. Perhaps a little showing off, but also it just makes me giddy. And that’s really my challenge: I want to read it all. How do I prioritize it, chose which this to ignore? Hmm… indeed…

Moleskine Day

Carl Setzer

As a productivity and effectiveness junkie, I found this clever little bit from my chums at Moleskine a gentle little reminder about the importance of planners and planning. And a nice nudge to grab a new paper planner. More on that soon, though.

Thoughts on Capitalism

Carl Setzer

Can capitalism respond to our various global crisises?  Can it respond to global warming, income gaps, etc? Or is it’s very nature corrosive? By us all being competitors, does that destroy out ability to collaborate? Or are we able to find that third way, a path where we’re all equal, not undercutting and seeking for everyone to benefit? Is there a way for win-win to be globalized, scaled across cultures, countries, et al? 

Godzilla – Official Teaser Trailer [HD]

Carl Setzer

Well, another attempt at the Godzilla franchise. This one looks pretty powerful, though.

Swedish House Mafia – Don’t You Worry Child (Khushnuma) – ft. Shweta Subram

Carl Setzer

Just stumbled upon this piece. I really like the Swedish House Mafia’s piece, and this cover of it simply brings chills. I’ll be exploring Shweta Subram’s work next.

Facing Fear

Carl Setzer
One must face that which brings fear; not with rage, rather, compassion. For such demons only bear the power of deception. Face the fear, deny deceptions, then act upon what’s left. 

Stranger Elements of Thanksgiving

Carl Setzer

As an antidote for the sentimentality of the next few days, I offer you these images.

Bon appetite!

This is mildly disturbing. A kiss before the slaughter? I guess that’s biblical…

I expect this really is Sebastian the Crab from Little Mermaid, but I still love it:

My personal favorite so far:

Though this comes in close second:


And I’ll leave you with this artistic joy:

Some thoughts on platforms and stuff

Carl Setzer

Had an interesting chat with some Twitter chums about whether I should port my iPhone number to Google Voice. The responses got me thinking about dependence upon one company or platform. Having all one’s proverbial eggs in one basket opens up serious risk should a) the company go under, b) reconfigure their offerings or, c) simply decide on a focus change. Any of those scenarios open you up to data loss, productivity gains, and other delights.

Oddly, through my love of things techy, I find myself well diversified. Should, say Google, decide to ax a key component, I can easily shift over to MSFT or Yahoo or Apple or… Puts me on a safe place.

I think I’ll stay that way, thank you.

WordPress vs. Blogger, Porting Between Platforms and Other Fun Thoughts

Carl Setzer

I’ve been exploring WordPress over the last few months (see my blog NotJustSeattle.com). I really, really like the platform and have found so many benefits over Blogger. Plus, watching the demise of Google Reader a few months back makes me wonder about the long-term status of this. With Google+ garnering the lion’s share of Google attention and public focus, I wonder how long they’ll continue to support the platform. Blogger seems like a neglected stepchild.

With all this, I commenced planning out my migration. It’s not appearing as clean as I’d hoped, but the research is pretty early on. It seems my URL might be the biggest challenge. Plus, I need to decide if I will just move this to a site hosted by WordPress.com, or pony up for something hosted by BlueHost or GoDaddy (or….).

So, taking a thoughtful and well planned approach on this. It’ll be interesting to see where it leads.

Any ideas, hints or tips? Just leave me a comment. I’d be quite happy for advice.

A Sci-Fi Geek Confession

Carl Setzer

One key weakness of mine of late has been time. Time for such things as film watching. Though I watched such gems as The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, I must admit to a key geek failure. One that might strain my geek-cred to a near breaking level. So, here goes: I hadn’t watched the J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboot until yesterday. Yep; took me 4 years. FOUR! Sigh…I hang my head in geek shame.

That said, I actually like the film. [Spoiler Alert: (Ok, come on, if you haven’t seen it by now, you really shouldn’t be put off by plot revelations)] I know that will annoy some, and delight others. I liked the way the characters were recrafted. The time-continuum disruption theme was pretty cool. I wondered how they would reconcile the story-line when they killed Spock’s mother. Clever. I particularly like the edgier, closer to human Spock.

I admit that the lens-flare business was a bit distracting at times. However, it’s hard to extract Heisenberg from this (I was familiar with this before seeing the film. I’m sure awareness impacted my attention.) Didn’t negatively impact the film for me, just provided a bit of distraction.

What really caught me, though, was the Leonard Nimoy role. I didn’t know. DIDN’T KNOW!!!! Nope, no idea he was in the film. Yes, that would’ve made me see it sooner. And I’m sure I just missed some obvious marketing message somewhere. But I’m quite disconnected from the mainstream media stream at this point.

I shan’t wait so long to watch “Into Darkness”.