stuffthought: adi's blog

I had saved this image a while ago and came across it again. It’s originally from ilovetypography.

This quote really hit home:

“If you don’t accept the recommendations of your most able and well-trained scientists, if you reject research results that have been endorsed heavily by dispassionate experts, then where do you end up? Once we start rejecting facts for fiction, does it really matter which facts and which fiction?”

From “Obama’s Science Fictions” in the New Yorker blog.

Squeezing some pickle juice out

Late Saturday night, I found out that my friend, Ilya Zhitomirskiy, passed away. He was one of the most joyful individuals I knew, always welcoming and full of energy. Though his presence will be sorely missed, I wanted to supersede the recency of his death with some of my favorite memories of him.

Gimme Shelter

This past summer, I was working in San Francisco… and I was homeless. To call it a struggle to find a place to live would be putting it lightly. And yet, even before I stepped foot off the plane into my new summer locale, Ilya was there to help me. He connected me with people, tried pulling some strings here and there, and—most helpfully—let me crash at his place for weeks at a time. Even while he was gone on a trip to Berlin, he let me take over his room, largely unbeknownst to his other roommates. Many weeks passed before I finally found  a place, but I could always count on having a home at Ilya’s, being able to crash on the big black beanbag couch and admire his newest acquisition of curry sauces.

Tom Cruise, FUCK YEAH!

San Francisco was a new world to me—new people to see, new places to go, and a new mindset to adopt. To help accelerate that process, Ilya decided to throw a party in his backyard in honor of me and my friend Parker Phinney. Sure, this was a month into my stay in SF, but the idea for having this party had germinated long before then. He kept pushing it, we found a date that worked, and he came up with a name: “Tom Cruise, FUCK YEAH!” “What?” we thought, but our confusion didn’t last a second. Knowing Ilya, this made perfect sense. He was spontaneous, he was silly, and he loved to have fun. Most importantly, though, he took it upon himself to make Parker and me feel welcome—and that meant so, so much.

The party was a great success: Tom Cruise themed drinks (including my secret cocktail, the “Top Gun”); a small crowd of great, fun, interesting people; and, of course, a projection of a Tom Cruise Scientology interview on the roof of the tent in the backyard. That was Ilya’s idea. Throughout the night he was laughing, dancing, socializing, introducing me to people… he brought life to every moment, every person. He truly made that night one of the highlights of my summer.

The Hive, as his apartment complex was called, was always host to amazing parties, get-togethers, barbecues, and kickbacks that really colored my summer. I spent many days and nights just hanging out with Ilya and friends, having conversations that ranged from fixing deep societal ills to discussing girls while trying to hula hoop. He was truly a connector, bringing people together through music, food, conversation, ideas, and sheer joy.

Slaying Dragons

Ilya was a visionary. Besides his work with Diaspora, he was always championing some very high-minded ideas. One of his more frequent plans was to slay the dragons. And what were these dragons? Well, mainly the content industry and the networks. I had heard Ilya explain the slaying of dragons at least twenty times throughout the summer, and each time he detailed how the RIAA and MPAA were going to fall with such vigor and enthusiasm that you couldn’t help but be riled up alongside him.

Yes, and…

In the improv world, we have a maxim called “yes, and…” that represents the acceptance of and building off of ideas. This, I feel, could define Ilya perfectly. He was always on board with new adventures and always willing to help. When Parker began pursuing his dream of setting the record for longest barrel-of-monkeys chain, Ilya showed immediate enthusiasm and offered his apartment as a testing ground. When Parker and I planned on hosting a silent rave in the heart of San Francisco, Ilya was the first person we contacted when it came to fleshing out the idea. Heck, even when I was in San Francisco briefly for my cousin’s wedding a few months ago, he immediately reached out and tried to schedule a brunch with me. We could always count on Ilya to be that much needed support; it is that fact that makes his passing so much harder.

This is the Ilya I want to keep in mind. Ilya the supporter. Ilya the socialite. Ilya the goof. Ilya the idealist. Ilya the connector. Ilya the friend.

Rest in peace, buddy. Thanks for the memories.

I kinda take issue with how people use Facebook. Yes there are lots of great things and awful things about Facebook as a social network (and that’s a huge different discussion), but the thing that irks me the most is when people post private or out-of-context things on public walls. Frankly, some things are better suited for private exchange: email, texting, phone calls, letters, whatever. Sure, the public nature of walls may not be something people are conscious about when posting. And sure, at the other end of the spectrum, the public nature of walls may add to the sort of performative identity one has on Facebook. (I may post inside jokes on someone’s wall because it’s a public forum, showing the world that John Doe and I have this special connection.) Whatever the rationale, it still bothers me.

So here’s what I propose:

Facebook Statusbombing

Once a day/week/whatever, go down your newsfeed and comment on every status update or wall post that shows up. Your comment can be relevant or irrelevant, helpful or snarky, etc. The point is to make it clear to the Facebook community that their actions aren’t just limited to a sender and receiver; there’s a whole audience who is being invited to interact!

This may serve as a nice reminder to people of the public nature of Facebook. Or it might just be annoying. My hope is that it’s a little of both. Happy statusbombing!

Here’s an interesting post by author Lemony Snicket about Occupy Wall Street. I don’t necessarily agree or like all of it, but a lot of it is very effective.

Oh hey this blog!

found this via laughingsquid

Zombie ABCs

I would be totally okay with buying this someone getting this for me for the holidays.

It’s clear I don’t post as often as I did or should or tell other people to do. Should this blog become more like a tumblr then, where I post random links and pics and videos I find?

The issue is, that seems to be what I use my twitter for. Hmm.

I guess, in the end, I’m probably not going to blog as often as I should. Yes, it’s hypocritical… I keep telling people to blog, but I won’t really myself. So, in that vein… YOU SHOULD BLOG and MAYBE I’LL STOP BEING LAZY AND BLOG TOO.

The other day, I couldn’t for the life of me remember Bill Cosby’s name. Here’s an instance of when my dependence on the internet as an extension of my memory was not helpful at all… followed closely by an instance of when the internet as an extension of semi-logical thought was ridiculously helpful. I couldn’t search for him because I didn’t remember his name. I couldn’t think of the show he was on because… well… it’s called The Cosby Show. In fact the only thing I could think of related to him was…

Jell-O.

So I decided to do something a little out of the ordinary, although it made perfect sense in my head at the time.

I searched “jello” in Google Image Search.

Then I used Google Image Search’s new filter-by-color feature, and… well, I chose “brown.”

And lo and behold… there he was.

This process was quick, efficient, and it got me what I wanted to get. (Although, I’m realizing now from the screenshots, one of Google’s related searches was “jello cosby.” Despite pointing out my inattentiveness, it’s nice to know more people associate Jell-O with Bill Cosby, and vice versa.)

For some reason, though, this made me feel a bit… icky. I mean, I filtered “brown” because, well, that’s his skin color. Most of the pictures that showed up weren’t of him, but a few more did show up in the search results. Was this luck? Was this actually efficient? Should I be feeling morally questionable?

On February 11, a few of us co-wrote an op-ed in the Yale Daily News about Yale’s potential transition to Gmail. (“Lux et Veritas et Gmail“)

On February 17, I got this:

On February 18, I was interviewed (mp3) on Up All Night on BBC Radio 5 Live about this subject.

On April 12, one of the co-authors appeared on NPR regarding the same subject.

I love how they had to contact me via Facebook. Privacy is important, but I do want myself to be somewhat visible. Is that bad?