augh

This entry unintentionally left blank because of the shitty nature of the iOS LiveJournal app. There was actually text in here, except it was completely truncated when I clicked "Post" because according to the people who wrote this piece of dung when you write an entry and click post you actually meant to press command-a->delete. Top job, you jerks.

(no subject)

If today is the first day of the rest of your life; is tomorrow the first day of the end of your life?
That'd be interesting, because of tomorrow never coming and all.
Since I'm slightly delirious, I'm currently wondering what is professional incompetence worth? Would charging for ineptitude be some sort of false economy?

Additionally, if you're using the iOS LJ app and have a keyboard connected, you CANNOT POST (an entry with any content) until you disconnect the keyboard... wow. I blame Apple and their ludicrous UI decisions regarding iOS HCI's. >_<

(no subject)

Today I set up a writing nook, where I can create lovely documents such as this journal entry.
Really all I mean is that I've cleared a space where I can put my iPad, because turning on my computer would be far too much effort while I feel this unwell.
I haven't been this sick literally in years. On the way to the medical centre this morning I was wondering aloud when the last time I needed transport to a doctor's appointment was -- my mother and I agreed it was five years ago. So I suppose that's a good run without any infections.
Mind you this is a doozy. I'm taking 500mg Amoxycillin 3 times a day for the next ten days in the hope that will help evict the micro-organisms squatting inside my head.
Also another disbelief from Apple. The Apple Wireless Keyboard CAPSLOCK key. Good grief, cruise control for cool is OFF when the LED is ON?
*facepalm*->*headdesk*->*cornercry*
I suppose this is just par for Apple's course. I've described the experience of buying Apple products as akin being suckered:
"Buy this hardware; it's ever so sexy!"
"Wow, so sleek... so expensive... I must own you!"
"Did I mention, the very instant you unbox me, you'll be punished?"
"Perhaps I can live with that, because of your incredible look and feel..."
"As soon as you turn me on, you'll discover impaired functionality, with no way of fixing it, improving it, or complaining about it."
"Don't worry baby, we'll stage a jailbreak. It'll be just you and me, sipping Mohitos on a secluded beach somewhere."
Richard Stallman mentioned that Apple was the pioneer company of putting their users into what he describes as "software jail" and even with Google coring the functional elements of iOS by releasing their own free products on Apple's App Store, Apple just can't seem to get out of their own road.

Apple's iOS design mentality is the equivalent of the guy who was drinking whiskey while cleaning his gun, and predictably shot himself in the leg. Then kept cleaning his gun, and shot himself again. THEN called an ambulance, kept cleaning his gun, and shot himself a third time before it arrived.
Every time Apple releases an iOS update I'm reminded of the Canadian newspaper headline "Woman hits moose driving to visit sister who hit moose", the avoidable mistakes they continue to make at the HCI design level are repeated so much.
So why am I still using their hardware?
Well, because it's ever so sexy, and the outlaw life beckons its crooked finger in my direction.

An alternative Ten Commandments

George Carlin did a skit as part of his impressive live comedy act "Life Is Worth Losing" where he distilled the essential nature of the Ten Commandments down to, I believe, only three.
I think that as society matures, our concept of deity ought to mature in parallel, so it's probably long past time to update a list of ten things to do or not do which make everyone feel better about living in society. These sorts of oaths aren't just in the commandments, they're mirrored in the teachings of Asclepius and Hippocrates, who also have their own oaths pertaining to the medical profession which are somewhat older than the Ten Commandments given to Moses when he visited the mountaintop, and it'd be good to get a decent dose of their philosophy into a new set of ten easy to understand rules everyone can follow relatively easily in today's crushingly modern world (and I mean to avoid the verbosity and oversupply of misinformation and irrelevancies generated by long lists of rules such as "The Rules Of The Internet").
So here goes:

Rules for Living Well In Times of Post-Scarcity:
1. First, do no harm.
2. Be good; don't be bad!
3. Know your flaws and learn to love yourself anyway--or nobody else will either.
4. Enjoy life; eventually, the only person you will have to justify your existence to is yourself.
5. When faced with doing something against your better judgement, it's better to do nothing.
6. Use technology appropriately.
7. Try to stop any bleeding before it stops by itself.
8. Human emergencies constitute no urgency on the universe's behalf.
9. Reason is the only faculty capable of solving problems reason creates.
10. While some harms are forgivable, there is no justification for evil.

Addendum: Failure to comprehend, understand, and uphold such simple rules makes you suspect of being an inhuman monster. Humans have no compunctions against killing evil monsters and dumping their unconsecrated bodies unceremoniously into the ocean, so beware of being evil.

Now this segues well into something I've been saying for well over 10 year now which is that we're living in a post-scarcity economy. How do I know this? Well, society has so much control over everyone's life that in these times everyone's personalities are undeniably shaped by the pressures of society and our reactions to them. What's more, society has such an iron grip of control over it's citizens that we cannot get out of the system! Eventually we will have frontiers again, but for now only the most dedicated, most extreme survivalists can exercise any reasonable degree of control over their own destinies if they choose to exist apart from society. In a seethingly civilised world of more than seven billion humans, the number of "wild people" probably numbers in the thousands, and it's likely that if you're safely ensconsed on the couch you'll never ever see them.

Wow. I just lost almost a thousand important words to myself because of this shitty LJ iOS app. Because of task-switching. Darn. I don't want to re-write all that. I am so annoyed. Prepare for a one-star review on the App Store, LiveJournal!