Usernames are bad for the net

Last night I tried to order a pizza from Pizza Hut via their web page. If any industry was perfect for the web, it’s food delivery. Pizza Hut made me create an account and a username before I could order a pizza. If I want to order another pizza there, I have to remember my fucking Pizza Hut username again.
This is just getting ridiculous.
Do the people at Pizza Hut really expect me to remember a specific username to order pizza with?
In fact, the use of usernames to log into web sites is completely and utterly wrong.
Every time you create an account somewhere, they need your email address, mainly for the purpose of having a way to contact you. Many times they also insist on creating a username that you use to log in with as well. There is no reason at all for the creation of a username.
Let’s think about this for a minute:
Cons about usernames for people

    The username you want is already taken
    You need to remember a gazillion different usernames
    If you forget your username, you need to wait for an email to be sent to you
    It leads to using the same username/password everywhere

Pros about user names for people

    None

All a login username does is create yet another roadblock between you and the information or task you want on the net. Why can’t all sites use your email address as the login name? It can’t be fore security reasons, web sites trust the email address implicitly and will send your username or password to you via email without hesitation. It can’t be for identity reasons, logging in with a email address still allows for displaying a username.
Cons about using email address to log in

    None

Pros about using email address to log in

    You only need to remember your password
    Someone can’t take your email address

Web designers are you listening? Stop with the usernames already. They are a huge pain in the ass to everyone and serve no benefit. Just stick with email addresses and be done with it.
On a side note, the wings from Pizza Hut sucked as well. I should have gone with Papa Johns. Not only is their food better, they let you log in with your email address.

Getting scratches off my iPod

When I received my video iPod last year, people warned me, “Put a screen protector on your iPod.” Of course, I didn’t listen.
Sure enough, the face of my iPod got covered in scratches and gouges in short order. Daily life in a pocket or briefcase is far too tough for a dainty iPod and I doubt anyone can avoid scratches without protecting it somehow. The iPods scratch so easily, there is an entire industry devoted to protecting them from the harsh world.
With several large marks on the screen, I decided to do something about it. I knew that I could polish the clear plastic with a gentle abrasive and remove the scratches and get back to a clear face. The question was which polishing product to use. Google searches ended in a confusing knot of conflicting advice between household products and specially made iPod polishes. Overwhelmed, I dropped the idea for a bit.
A couple weeks ago, when on vacation, I had some time to spare and discussed the idea with Cousin James. We agreed that most light polishes would work. On a trip to the nearby Walmart, James grabbed a bottle of Kit Scratch Out for $2. I think the polishing cloths were another $2. Much cheaper than the special iPod polishes going for $20-30 on the net.


When we got back to the beach house, I started polishing the iPod. There were several significant gouges that you could feel on the surface. I rubbed and rubbed and rubbed. And sure enought the scratches started to come out.
I probably spent 2-3 hours polishing the screen. This is process takes some time. My fingers were hurting and at points I thought that maybe all the scratches wouldn’t come out. But sure enough, in the end, the screen looked great.

There is a limited to the Kit polish I was using and it would not get the screen completely flawless. To get it flawless, I’d probably need to get a even lower abrasive plastic polish. But since the screen scratches so easily, trying to keep a screen flawless is the road to insanity. Even if you get the screen flawless and cover it in a protection of some sort, the protection will get scratches. What are you going to do, polish the protector?
To protect my work, I’ve order a screen protector and skin from Gelaskins. Their use of art on the skins looks great.
When the protector arrives, I’ll probably do a quick repolish to pick up the scratches that have appeared on iPod when a gentle breeze blew across it. Once looking good, I’ll put on the protector, like I should have in the beginning, and be done with this silliness.

Mini-review – Buzz Bites

Just a quick post about Buzz Bites. Michele picked these up a few days ago. She rocks and is always on the look out for things I am interested in trying


Caffienated chocolate?
This morning I dragged my tired butt into the office after a long weekend of sun, children, and fixing a faucet. The line for coffee downstairs was long and I decided to give the Buzz Bites a try.
The taste was like a soft Tootsie Roll with a hint of bitterness. Not terrible, but not delicious either. After about 5 minutes, I could feel the caffiene and what not hitting my system and I was buzzing sure enough.
Rarely do these kind of gimmick products live up to expectations, but this things do. So if you need a burst of energy to kick start you, the Buzz Bites do work. You can buy them at Thinkgeek for a bit less than the Buzz Bites site.

Too much email

Too much frickin’ email.
Home inbox stuffed with unread and unanswered email.
Work inbox @ 29 unread and 414 read emails in my inbox. Yesterday’s incomng email count was 247.
Y’all just stop sending email for a few weeks to give me time to catch up…

Wisdom from our First President

Around Independance Day, I’ve been reading a bit about America’s founding and what the actual founders said.
Here are a few quotes from George Washington, our first President.
“If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.”
“The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government – lest it come to dominate our lives and interests.”
“Government is not reason. Government is not eloquence. It is force. And, like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.”

Two by Charles Stross

I’ve been lax in my reviewing duties. Over the last several months I’ve read several books and only reviewed one. Last night I finished my latest and finally have taken the time to review it. The book, Iron Sunrise, is actually a sequel to Singularity Sky, which I finished back in December.
Singularity Sky by Charles Stross
Charles Stross is Scottish writer that is very tuned in to the ideas and concepts out there being discussed on the intraweb. He has a good idea how to interleave some of these ideas into traditional science fiction stories while acknowledging the long tradition of space opera style fiction.
In Singularity Sky, Stross introduces us into his universe, in which a artifical intelligence know as the Eschaton has scattered the human race around the local part of the galaxy, creating various civilizations on various planets for some reason unknown to Man.
Stross tosses the reader into the deep end without a lot of exposition as to what exactly is going on. A long term sci-fi reader will likely eat up, but a some may find the jargon hard to follow.
The story basically follows the collision of two cultures and our heroine’s attempt to avoid disaster. One of the cultures intends to circumvent the Eschaton’s rule on not changing the past. To avoid this, it leads the characters on a merry chase across varied planets as various subplots unfold.
This book wasn’t what I was expecting and I liked it immensely. Very similar in tone to Vernor Vinge’s work regarding post-singularity socities.
Iron Sunrise by Charles Stross
This book continues in the same universe that Stross created previously. In this book, we get a lot more exposition to let us know what is going on. Some good hard SF stuff in the beginning to reel you in to the story. A complete who-dunit from the beginning.
Back, central to the story, are Rachel and Martin the heroic troubleshooter couple we saw bond in the first novel. Along with them are a nice cast of characters that Stross brings together in eventually to a nice climax. Most of the motivations are believable, but the villains in the story are almost too evil. Stross tries to bring them back in toward the end with a speech by one of th ebad guys, but we aren’t given enough to understand their twisted motivations.
I liked the surprises that popped up along the way. It was pulled off well, with me saying “Of course!”.
The one thing I didn’t buy was one of the romances that blossoms late in the novels. It didn’t click in my mind.
Other than that, I thought Iron Sunrise was written better than Singluarity Sky and shows Stross honing his craft. I look forward to his new novels.

Fireworks Remains


Here I am with the remains of the fireworks.
These are the lessons learned this year:
1) Do not let someone place the mortar shell upside down, the explosion is far too close and ruins the launcher.
2) Bring a good flame. Matches, incense, or lighters don’t cut it on a windy beach. Next year we are considering a road flare or a butane torch.
3) Individual rockets are a pain. The multi shell mortar launchers are the best. They shoot 25-50 bursts into the air from one fuse. The crowd is happy and it is easy on the fire team.

Update: Some of you are a bit confused. We are vacationing in North Carolina, where fireworks are legal. Also, our dog is in California, far from the display of fireworks on the beach. We love both our pets and the law (although Michele did get a speeding ticket here).

Eye Update

I had my one week check in with the eye doctor today. He says my eyes have healed up and I can wear my contacts again. Woot! I’ll be able to see on vacation next week!
There’s a new kind of contact for my condition from SynergEyes for my problem. There is a big waiting list to get the diagnostic kite (whatever that is) so that I can be fitted. Not one to wait patiently, I called up Synergeyes and simply asked for them to send the kit to my doctor. They were helpful and are going to call him directly and see what can be done to speed things up.
Who knows if it will help, but if you don’t ask, you never know.

Out of commission

I knew this day would come sometime. After wearing my contacts for 18+ hours a day, everyday, my eyes have finally rebelled and decided not to cooperate any more.
Bright light had been causing me pain and I finally went to the eye doctor yesterday. My eyes have been injured a bit a nd need time to heal. What that means is no contacts for a week or until everything is healed up.
Due to my condition, keratoconus, this is a big deal. The condition does more than just make me nearsighted, it creates a smearing of what I see. Kinda like permanent double vision.
Special contacts basically give me 20/20 vision by correcting for the myopia and the optical bending that causes the smears. Most people wouldn’t know that I’m legally blind without my contacts. Without my contacts, I need to hold things about six inches from my face to have any chance to read it. Even then, I need to squint to see anything. I do have glasses, but they can’t correct for the smearing or fully for the near-sightedness. As a result, the glasses extend my reading range out another foot or so.
To write this on the computer, I need to lean far forward and increase the font size on the computer pretty high. Spending more than 45 minutes or so trying to read or use the computer guarantees a headache and sore eyes from squinting.
While this sucks and all, I have it good compared to some people and their eye problems. There are many people that never get a chance to see well at all. In that respect, I feel very lucky that I get to see normally most of the time. Of all the maladies that people suffer, I got off easy compared to many.
So what does it mean? It means I can’t drive or really work. Work involves a lot of reading and computer work. I can’t watch TV, it’s all a blur, even with my glasses on. So while my eyes heal, I basically need to walk around with my glasses off and do nothing.
Too top it all off, the dog chewed off the end of my glasses where they rest on your eyes, so I need to go out and get new frames for the lenses.
So I will see you all in a bit. Until then, do good work.