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Ok, folks - I pose a challenge to the geekdom out there. How to disable, permanently, these obnoxious speaker boxes that are attached to every friggin’ gas pump I’ve been to in the last 6 months. The MUTE buttons are worn out (”dimple collapse”) so you gotta sit there and listen to the bloody things go on, incomprehensively, about worthless crap inside the stores. It was some brilliant marketer’s idea - I can hear it now “We need to bring people into the store from the pump, ’cause that’s where the profits are. ” I know a few out there think it’s a great idea. Muzak was bad enough, but, it was in the distance, and didn’t drown out your cell phone or NPR on the car radio. And next it will be video, where we’ll need a different solution (I am so absolutely sick of TV everywhere I go - yes I own a universal TV-off keychain. ) And finally, Google Gas Pumps will surely be next.

How about an opt-out feature where I can pay you five freakin’ bucks for a year of peace and quiet? It’s unlikely. Nielsen media reports a 70% brand recall for gas station TV. Damn, that’s good. But I wonder how many are remembering the brand so they can avoid any product annoying them at the gas pump. “Never, ever buy friggin’ Dr. Pepper again.”

So I call out to you, the Hardware Gods of the Interweb….

I figure if we can mess with the electronic voting systems, we should be able to fk with these things a bit.

So, electronics wizards, how do you disable them without opening them or beating them with an object or getting electrocuted (and starting a large fire.)

Electronic pulse?
Handheld High Output Laser?
Freon-freeze+ gentle tap?
Secret series of keypresses? (that would be ideal!)

All ideas welcome.

Required Disclaimer, Of COURSE I am not condoning vandalism in any shape or form. This is just an academic discussion.

 

Sometimes It’s Just a Little Overwhelming

The weather was crappy this last weekend, we were all a bit under the weather, and I wanted to leave the TV and video games turned off.  So headed into the electronics graveyard and pulled some CDROM drives.  And the fun begins.

Those old electronics parts are fun to disassemble, and it is a terrific teaching experiment for kids. But the key to me is that it takes the “mystery” of out technology. I see that as one of the major obstacles to the professional advancement of so many out there. “I don’t like computers” or “I don’t understand those things” is such a common excuse for people who are stuck in today’s economy. Get a small electronics screwdriver set before you start.

I don’t have an agenda with the kids. They can stop whenever they want. I don’t do lectures. I just answer questions. Like… what a belt drive is for. What’s amazing is how many questions there are. It’s a terrific bonding experience.

In many cases, you should seek out a recycling solution for working computers. I know which parts are going to be useful and which are not, and if they ever get a decent recycling program here in Kentucky for PCs you bet I’ll participate! As for now, they want you to take stuff for >1 hour drives unless you live in Louisville. Someone chime in if I missed something.

If you have good stuff to get rid of, use a Manufacturer’ Take-Back Program

Dell Corp. - Dell Recycling
Gateway Corp. - Trade-In Program
HP/Compaq - HP Planet Partners
IBM Corp. - IBM PC Recycling Service for individuals and businesses.
Toshiba - Trade-In and Recycling Program

Oh yeah, don’t forget. Some things have hazardous materials in them. especially monitors and batteries (yes, even flat screens.) Other things are sharp and so forth. So use common sense in what you take apart. Look online for information about this. And never, ever break hard plastic or do any hammering without safety glasses on. This you knew, but I had to say it. Be smart about this stuff. And if you’re smart enough to do this with your kids, you’re smart enough to know that little bitty parts do not belong in toddlers’ bellies, right?

I wrote a simple bot to micro-syndicate Fark stories.

http://twitter.com/farktweet

Just follow “farktweet” to get them in Twitter.

Improvements later if there’s interest:

• Improved condensing of content.
• Totally SFW version.
• Category-by-category tweets.

Farktweet links may link to adult content depending on the story you click on.  This is a part of Fark, not the tweetbot.

I try to keep my air pressure perfect in my car. Tires are expensive and gas is, too.

Shell Gas Stations offer free air to paying customers… “Free to Our Customers” it says. So I assumed they must hit some kind of magic button to dispense with the $0.50 vagrants have to pay.

But alas, no special process. You just have to know where to look for the secret button. I’m guessing they got tired of turning it on for people.

I’ve found this now on at least three machines. Is it on yours?

As the Holidays approach, shutters are going to be ‘a clickin’. Being able to spread smiles digitally is truly a magical use of web technology. Grandmas and Grandpas, Aunts and Uncles can all keep track of family members’ special moments effortlessly thanks a few tools, including FrameChannel.com. Geeks have long aggregated feeds from photo sources for display using special software, such as Yahoo Pipes and Greasemonkey Scripts, but getting Grandma to run through that is not always simple. But now at least one new tool, FrameChannel allows building a photo channel from multiple web sources for distribution to various display surfaces:

• One or more RSS feeds
• emailed photos
• manual uploads to framechannel

RSS feeds are by far the most powerful. Emailed photos can be handy (e.g. after a field trip. ask parents to send photos to you@framechannel.com and they’ll appear in this source.) Manual upload is slow and probably not best.

Let’s say you have a digital camera or hard-drive of photos that you’d like to distribute to friends and family members “live.” Here’s how to push the photos in a nutshell. (more…)