Monthly Archives: February 2014

by | February 7, 2014 · 7:57 pm

Around the Web February 7, 2014: Kickstarter Edition

This week Around the Web is doing things a little differently. Instead of the usual interesting finds from all over the internet, I’ve decided to share a number of projects looking for funding on Kickstarter. Some of these projects have already been fully funded and are working towards various stretch goals, while other are in need of our help to get there.

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Games

Kombat Kittens – I like cats and I like combat card games so this one feels like a natural fit. Also the card art makes me laugh.

Los Cthuluchadores – I am both disturbed and fascinated by the idea of combining H.P Lovecraft’s classic horror creation and Mexican Luchadores.

Rhythm Metal Gaming Dice – These are high quality gaming dice for those of you who take your D&D seriously.

Customizable 3D Printed Tabletop Miniatures – Again, for those of you hardcore role-players out there, now you can have your own, unique minis. This is a great use of an emerging technology.

Tiny Epic Kingdoms – I like the idea of a game that will fit in the pocket of my cargo pants.

Fief – An update to a French board game that has the potential for games on the same scale as Monopoly or Risk.

Zeppelin Attack! – Who doesn’t like the idea of being a 1920’s super villain in a zeppelin? I know I love the idea.

Film

Brian Remus: Science Genius – This strikes me as Bill Nye meets Office Space.

Audax – These guys are working on a micro-budget and personally I want to see exactly what they can pull off with that. Who knows, maybe we’ll be impressed.

Outerlands: Season One – I’ve already seen several video game based documentaries which were fascinating and this looks like it will be great.

Restore the Rialto Theater – This is a very serious dilemma hitting thousands of small movie houses. We need to help as many as we can. My local theater has been among the lucky ones to successfully make the transition to digital.

Video Games

Stellar Praxis – Grand scale RTS games are kind of my thing. I love Sins of a Solar Empire and would really like it if Sins had some “friends” out there.

Galactic Wars – Big ships beating the crap out of each other.  What’s not to love?

Comics

Psychonaut – Thanks in part to the comic publisher Image, the science fiction comic is making a comeback. This book has a solid look and premises.

Sidekicks – This book looks and feels a lot like Invincible which isn’t a bad thing. Hopefully it will match that look with a good story and some humor.

These are the projects that caught my eye, but there are a ton more available. Let us know which projects you think are worth while and should be spotlighted. And don’t forget to put your money where your mouth is by helping to support some of these folks. I will be.

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by | February 6, 2014 · 7:36 pm

Geeks You Should Know: Elon Musk

empicThis month’s Geek You Should Know is billionaire entrepreneur and engineer Elon Musk. Born in South Africa, he began his career by selling computer code for a video game at age twelve.  By age seventeen he had moved to Canada to pursue a college degree, eventually graduating from the University of Pennsylvania with a degree in economics and physics.  During the Dot Com boom in the mid 1990’s, he founded Zip2, which was later bought for just over $300 million—not bad for a guy in his 20’s. For most people, these accomplishments would be enough, but that same year Musk co-founded X.com, which we all know now as PayPal.  Three years later Musk sold PayPal to Ebay, and moved on to even bigger projects. Lately he has been making waves with both SpaceX and Tesla Motors.

Why We Should Care

This guy is basically Tony Stark without (at least as far as we know) the Iron Man suit.  While he has been fortunate to get involved in tech companies at just the right time, Elon Musk has also made a startling habit of taking on industries dominated by monolithic companies and revolutionizing the business right in front of them.  Before PayPal, banks and credit card companies were the only way to make payments on the internet.  Musk challenged that and forced the industry to play by his rules.  Many of the services that have come about in online banking since 1998 are directly or indirectly a response to PayPal.

Not only is PayPal on their with all the big name credit card companies, but they're name is the biggest. That's impressive.

Not only is PayPal listed with all the big name credit card companies, but their name is the biggest. That’s impressive.

Musk’s current projects are taking on two industries at once:  automotive and aerospace. Currently, wannabe astronauts have to spend years training, studying, hoping and praying that they can get accepted into NASA and get to be part of a mission.  If Musk has his way—and there is every indication that he will—NASA’s monopoly on space travel will quickly become non-existent.  SpaceX has recently announced its desire to construct a permanent space port in southern Texas where they can launch commercial space flights.

As for the auto industry, Musk’s Tesla Motors has been making huge strides in the electric car market. Although Tesla has had a few high profile incidents lately, their cars are miles ahead of the competition. With Musk’s vision leading the company, Tesla is not only looking at the cars themselves, but also at the infrastructure required to make these cars viable while still maintaining their green designs.

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Tesla has also been involved in some legal battles recently due to its business model. Most states have laws requiring that cars be sold from dealers who buy from the manufacturer. Tesla would like to remove the middle man, and sell the cars directly to the general public. This fight has been particularly rough in Texas, which has deeply entrenched laws.  I’m pretty confident that Tesla will win in the end, though it may get messy before it’s all done.

The world needs more people like Elon Musk.  Men and women like him are the kinds that drive industries to do new and different things and that’s why Elon Musk is a Geek You Should Know.

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by | February 5, 2014 · 9:18 am

Winning Science February 5, 2014

Hey, everyone!  This is Tracy taking the helm of Therefore I Geek for this week’s Winning Science, since it is Andrew’s birthday today.  Hang on!  It’s going to be a wild ride.

It turns out that some massive events in history may have changed humanity at its most fundamental level.  A group of geneticists, biologists, and other scientists now believe that European genetic DNA was modified by the Black Plague.  Researchers point to changes to twenty different genes that probably occurred when the Bubonic Plague’s bacteria interacted with the proteins in the genetic sequence.

A little of this would have done the trick.

Apparently a side affect of the genetic modifications may be more susceptibility to autoimmune disease, so I believe science has now explained Wolverine.

This new website has a beautiful model of the wind and weather patterns on the earth’s surface.  The model is completely interactive, allowing the user to zoom in and out, interchange between wind and current patterns, and even look at patterns that occurred in the past.

This still doesn’t explain why it seems so much windier when it is cold outside.

The James Webb Space Telescope, the planned replacement for Hubble, is on track to be launched in 2018, and Astronomers have pretty high hopes for it.  The last of the pieces have arrived at the Goddard Space Flight Center, and now must be assembled–a task which will take up to three years.  Scientists say it is possible that this telescope will be able to see back to the beginning of time.

Yes, yes, but will it catch a glimpse of this ship?

Maybe this will render the current hoopla over the Ken Ham vs. Bill Nye debate moot?  Too much to hope for?

That’s it for this week’s Winning Science, and I hope you all will join me in wishing Andrew a very happy Birthday.  Leave a message for him in the comments!

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by | February 4, 2014 · 6:04 pm

Dragon’s Loyalty Award

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We were very excited to be nominated for the Dragon’s Loyalty Award by Gene at The Sourcerer, and since it’s the first time we’ve had any acceptance into the blogging community, it has taken me a little while to calm down and compose my thoughts.  This time around I’ll post some facts about myself and maybe next time I’ll let Tracy have all the fun share my misery. 😉

  1. I spent four and half years at a military college and then have worked for the Navy for the last six.
  2. I have a bad habit of collecting stuff.  I use to collect card games and have sixteen 800 count, full card boxes still sitting in a dresser drawer. Now I collect comics, and they don’t fit in a dresser drawer.

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    So many cards…

  3. My sister and I look so little alike that when she lived with me for six months people thought we were dating. However, once they spend some time around us, most people discover that we have very similar mannerisms and even use the same turns of phrases.
  4. I tend to name my pets after characters from things I like. My cats are Spider (Transmetropolitan) and Kaylee (Firefly).  In high school I had a cat named Mara (from the Star Wars expanded universe).
  5. I once blew off Geraldo Rivera. He was with his nephew on a tour of my college while I was pulling onto campus. I honked my horn and waved to a friend who was standing behind him and Geraldo got excited because he thought I recognized him. With a couple of quick hand gestures I made it clear I was trying to get the attention of someone else. He looked very disappointed. I didn’t find out who he was until about an hour later.
  6. I’ve played four instruments in my life:  piano, alto sax, tuba and guitar. I’ve never been great at any of them, but I was best at tuba and would pick it back up if they weren’t so damned expensive.
  7. For years friends of mine have been threatening to record my rantings and post them on the internet. I started the blog after a similar conversation with Tracy got me thinking on the long drive down to southern Georgia. The blog kept me sane for the two months I was in Georgia for work.

I don’t really have a great method for picking other blog nominees, aside from the fact that these are ones that I have found interesting, inspiring, or are written by people I’d like to get to know better.

  1. The Thousand Lives
  2. The Verbal Spew Review
  3. The Geeky Hooker
  4. Comparative Geeks
  5. A Guide to Geekdom
  6. The Brotherhood of Evil Geeks
  7. Bag & Bored

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