mountain_peak

First off, congratulations on the sale - sounds like the right time and the right reasons for you, and you're 100% right on the seemingly 'backwards' nature of incentives and rewards when working for a large org. I was somewhat saddened when the logo changed (I suggested an alternate), but completely understand your rationale.

As a side project, I'm currently working with a hardware founder (I'm primarily software) who exited twice before having his "clock cleaned" by overseas competition steal and undercut his patented products on his third venture, which caused him to all but close shop and retire early. He's back I think due to boredom, but I'm seeing just how difficult hardware is. Why do you think hardware doesn't generally have the same level of 'respect' as software? From what I can see, it should be held in much higher regard with a correspondingly higher level of compensation. Is it literally just the current ability for hardware to be reverse-engineered and undercut?

Well said. I've likened technical hobbies to Joel trying to hide memories of Clementine deeper and deeper in the recesses of his mind - away from Lacuna's eraser. Somehow when what hobbyists love to do becomes "for the masses", it becomes less interesting, which means digging deeper for hobbies that are largely shielded from the public. I think that's partially where innovation comes from.

Indeed! Great magazine...

I also recall playing a black-and-white space game (top-down scroller) for the original Macintosh where the instructions asked you to tape a piece of cardboard to the middle of the display such that each eye had a separate image of the split screen, which ended up providing a 3D effect without special glasses. I can't seem to recall what the game was, but I could play without the cardboard using the same vision technique (the 3D effect was very pronounced when playing in a dark room).

When my kids were younger, they used to subscribe to a children's magazine that featured a monthly "spot the difference" puzzle. They were amazed when I used to glance at the image and rattle off the one obscure difference they missed.

My trick was based on "magic eye" images I used to enjoy. When I saw the side-by-side drawings used by the puzzle, I wondered what would happen if I "fuzzed" my eyes as if I was looking at a magic eye photo. To my surprise, all of the items that were different between the two images "vibrated" or "shimmered", while the rest of image stayed steady. I repeatedly fuzzed and focused to spot all the differences in a matter of seconds.

I've been addressing my glucose intolerance issues through an ultra-low carb diet for over a decade, and while I've cut out almost all products with natural or artificial sweeteners, my two remaining sweeteners of choice are stevia and aspartame. I use a combination of those for the occasional baked good, such as almond cookies or pudding as per diabetic recipes from the 1800s [0]. The recipe calls for saccharin tablets, which were used as a sweetener for almost 100 years; the question I always ask is, "Did bladder cancer rates increase in diabetics using saccharin over almost 100 years?" If the answer is no, then why replace an inexpensive sweetener with Aspartame? If Aspartame has not created a wave of new cancers in its user base, then I ask myself, "Why replace another inexpensive sweetener with sucralose?" When I started my new way of eating, I ordered sucralose drops (because at the time, I wanted to "test" all sweeteners), and while the drops themselves did not increase my blood glucose, to me, sucralose left a very sickly-sweet, unpleasant feeling at the back of my tongue. My pedestrian understanding of the process used to make sucralose is that it takes tons of sugar to create pounds of sucralose – not sure if that contributes to it being sickly-sweet. The WHO is right in cautioning the use of any sweetener (natural or artificial), but it seems silly to single one out at this time. I'm confident that in 40 years, sucralose will be explicitly added to the list (and industry will switch yet again to the latest artificial sweetener).

0: https://archive.org/details/dietinsicknessa00hartgoog/page/n...

My youngest child knew the other two could catch-up to him when being chased, so he "threw" stuff in their path and closed doors to slow the others down and stay ahead. Houdini famously started a rumor that he had a natural ability to dislocate his shoulder to discourage competitors. AI corporate moves are obviously littering the path for healthy competition and trying to convince others that the resources required at too great for any other company. People here have claimed that the best way forward would be to develop SETI-like AI shared global compute, but other people are claiming that's impossible. Developing a shared global network of compute may be the only "open" way ahead for many challenges, and it certainly makes for interesting times.

I used APL in university and later on during Y2K conversions (fun stuff), but found out much later on that APL was the de-facto language and interface to of one of the first microcomputers - the MCM/70 [0]

[0] https://www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php?id=4340

N=2 10+ years of ultra low carb diet, but not quite as high fat as the study (obviously a greater percentage of protein). My BMI has been ~18 and I've been a runner my whole life, but (like my father), had neuropathy and 'fuzzy' vision in my 30s, and eventually found out that I was glucose-intolerant with large 'spikes' in my glucose levels after meals with carbs. Two weeks after cutting out carbs, vision fuzziness went away, and pins-and-needles subsided (although I still can't tolerate heat or cold in my feet).

Never looked back. Never went on any drugs, running is slower, but can last much longer. Don't really feel hungry - just eat to my activity level and snacks.

Eating is simple - if it has more than 2g of carbs per serving, then I don't eat it. Only supplements required are chlorides: sodium - that's easy, potassium - from NoSalt, and magnesium - an occasional capsule.

It's a work of art because it was created by someone with a great sense of art - Johnathan Gay, who developed Dark Castle using tools that would end up becoming Flash/Director. [0]

[0] https://quorten.github.io/quorten-blog1/blog/2019/05/18/sili...

Another comment alluded to this, but small-minded people will always find a discriminant - toys, clothes, shoes, hair, height, weight, university, degree, house, cottage, trips, car, yacht, private jet, donations, endowments, and so on. Explore what your heart says to, make, buy and enjoy the things you love, and don't sweat the 'bullies'.

First time I've heard of this series, but it sounds like something I'd really enjoy - thanks for the tip! I guess I'll know the episode you're referring to when I come across it.

I've seen studies where Google broadly 'categorized' personality types from certain time periods (e.g., a decade) and from a similar area (e.g., the US) as having very similar experiences. I know HN is a microcosm of the general public, but even here, I find dozens (maybe hundreds) of people who were exposed to the same 'input' as me tend to have the same long-term views and interests.

Certainly that doesn't help 're-imagine' someone as unique as Angela Merkel, but if her Google searches were known, maybe her humourous personality would shine through if they were combined with traits common to Germans born in the 50s? Maybe someone asking questions to a digital ghost would also have to specify whether they want to speak with Angela the person (limited information) vs. Angela the politician (lots of information)?

Much of what I've discovered and correlated on the people I'm researching would have remained undiscovered unless someone had the time to sift through literally thousands of physical journals as opposed to a month of Archive.org queries on my part. The digitization and open access to old books uncovered new connections and information. It's fascinating!

For the past month, I've been buried in Archive.org to collect data for an alumni article I'm writing up. The historical figures I'm researching seem to have 'come to life' for me based on their own writing and how others described them. I'm pretty much convinced that with a large enough corpus, we'll be able to have a decent conversation with historical figures, ask questions, etc. For anyone participating in social media since 2010, we'll likely be able to interview their digital "ghost" in the not-to-far future for all sorts of insights - maybe even for clues in solving crimes. If they have a large enough audio and/or video presence, we'll be able to see them and hear their own voice as well.

I think following the long tail will lead you to what I witnessed with my kids in grade school; mischief is now akin to a disease - it's treated, counselled, made an example of, and sometimes medicated. I had to work hard with my kids to overcome this 'vilification' of anything against the norm.

I've been reading some old (early 1900s) diabetic recipe books from archive.org and it was a bit of a surprise to see how many recipes used saccharin back then (and almond flour, bone broth, etc.). I remember seeing saccharin tablets everywhere as a youngster, then they all suddenly went away. As it turns out, researchers found a higher incidence of bladder cancer in rats fed a diet of saccharin (20x the expected human dose, I think), which caused the production of saccharin to drop off dramatically. Up until that point, it was cheap, relatively easy to produce and plentiful.

Further research eventually proved that saccharin reacted with a compound in rat urine that caused crystals to form in the urine, which 'scraped' the bladder wall, causing injury, increased cell repair, and (therefore) an increased incidence of bladder cancer in rats. The researchers proved that this compound did not exist in human urine and crystals did not form, therefore the increased incidence of cancer should not exist in humans - and analysis of bladder cancer rates for lifelong saccharin users backed-up the new findings.

Still, the damage to saccharin had been done and I think there's only one plant in Europe that still produces it. I'm not sure how large the artificial sweetener market is (it seems to be growing exponentially), but every decade an old sweetener appears to fall out of favour and is replaced by a new one (or is added in combination with others). I'm not sure we're much further ahead than we were in the early 1900s!

Ah - thanks for having a look and responding with a nice comment. I suspected what you wrote after I posted, since I have many people asking for the the next iconic "f" or "G" or Apple, and I usually tell them that the logo should instantly recognizable as your own (for whatever that's worth). Paul Rand's (I think I wrote Rand Paul above!) "Thoughts on Design" is a great short book where he says, "...[a design] is not good design if it does not co-operate as an instrument in the service of communication."

Above all, it's important that you love your new design (you mentioned that you do), which is great and positions you for growth in your target areas as opposed to "preaching to the converted," which is what I think you're implying with the chipmunk.

I think someone else in the thread from a design studio said it best: (roughly) "You pay a design firm to filter through all the designs and present a maximum of three to the client." The three should be wildly different, tested to some degree, but each compelling in their own way. Then you take the one that resonates with the client and tweak.

Unfortunately, I have to agree with the parent that something "fun" was lost in the transition from the original logo to the new one. From the mock-ups, I can tell that the client definitely wanted to maintain the green cursor, which is good, but likely trusted the designers to know the market for remote KVM (which I've used for years), which doesn't conjure a physical plane - more of you being a pilot - in control. It's possible the client wanted to keep the logo really simple to make it 3D-printable.

What's done is done, but just for fun, I mocked-up a logo [0] (posted on another response as well) that reflects the original character of the company in a modern format - at least to me. Corporate branding is critical, and nailing the logo has traditionally been a difficult task.

[0] https://imgur.com/a/OEk8IUL

Thanks for sharing your story; as a developer/designer (more developer than designer; love C, no love for JavaScript), I hear stories such as yours practically everyday.

What I really wanted to say is that I love your aviator gopher and the designer should have at least taken a shot at incorporating your gopher in the logo.

I mocked-up a negative space [almost] one-colour logo with a close-up of a stylized gopher nose and teeth wearing aviators on a CRT green background with a brighter green cursor reflecting in the glasses. That ties in your history for continuity, modern pilot with aviator glasses, a cursor for remote control, and the green background as a nod to the past.

Growing up on green and amber CRTs, I'm a huge sucker for retro designs, and try to incorporate Rand Paul's philosophy wherever I can, which captures the essence of a company in a clean and easily recognizable design.

Edit: here's just the gopher for the curious: https://imgur.com/a/OEk8IUL

Surprised the article doesn't mention the artist Anish Kapoor owning worldwide exclusive rights to Vantablack [0], much to the chagrin of the art community. While I admire Kapoor's sense of 'hustle' within the art community, society may be deprived of some interesting art because of the license.

[0] https://www.wired.com/story/vantablack-anish-kapoor-stuart-s...

I personally don't find Toronto or Montreal subways unbearable (warm, but not crazy), while my time in the London Underground was absolutely miserable - I'm not sure how locals handle that kind of stifling heat. Actually, there was one time I was in the old Toronto Osgoode (pre-opera house) station with a -30 degree wind blowing through - that was chilly!

Actually, I'm kind of sad that Montreal has so few cars left that play "Fanfare" [0]

[0] https://web.archive.org/web/20090823173621/http://observator...

Great answer and definitely in keeping with the original vision of what computing should be - open and accessible.

Maybe people here haven't lived through 68K to PPC migrations, or to DEC Alpha, or Sun SPARC to Intel, or PPC to Intel, or any number of platforms and platform shifts - some lasted longer than others, but all had their ups and downs. The largest 'down' was predatory business practices in the 80s and 90s, which set computing back a decade (and still apparently continues today). It's unfortunate that many of these FUD-type articles pop up whenever a new platform/chip is announced. I'm excited for technological progress and think that every new announcement is another small miracle that I'm happy to be around for.

Oddly enough just yesterday, I was thinking of why alcohol and foods with low nutritive value haven't suffered the same fate as tobacco.

If you advocate for universal healthcare (like my country has), then it's ultimately in society's best interest to keep everyone as healthy as possible to avoid burdening the healthcare system, which does mean that government needs to step in and place limitations on advertising, sales to minors, laws, etc.

Just as a few examples, we (my country) currently has: no advertising to children under 13, seat belt laws, helmet laws, smoking packaging laws, alcohol advertising laws, and so on. It's odd that communities are spending millions on active living infrastructure, and simultaneously allowing companies to run ramshod marketing unhealthy and addictive products. And by 'odd', I mean that these organizations have enough backing to influence politicians to the detriment of society.

As I recall, tobacco companies only took action when laws changed or when they started losing lawsuits - given how destructive alcohol is for society it wouldn't be a stretch to make it less socially-acceptable to consume 'empty' calories. Some industries are mandated to spend part of their advertising budget on 'preventative' campaigns, but in almost 100% of the cases, these 'anti-whatever' messages are cleverly disguised to sell even more of their product (e.g., anti-gambling, soft drink recycling). There may be no perfect solution, but doing nothing isn't an answer either.

> dogs that grew up with humans and get lost (in nature) are known to change behaviour very fast

This is especially true in Northern Canada, where abandoned and neglected pets have (for decades) formed roaming packs that, on average, kill one person per year - usually a child - and leave many others with disfiguring injuries. [0] (An old reference since media has generally pulled way back on these stories, but recent firsthand accounts indicate that there's still an issue.)

Many communities have an annual cull to keep the stray/pack population at bay, but residents from 'southern' cities travel north to adopt and rehabilitate the animals - usually with limited success.

The remoteness and unpopularity of the subject unfortunately hasn't brought about many solutions for the affected communities, and fear even more people abandoning their pets as they return to work may exacerbate the issue.

[0] https://www.rcinet.ca/eye-on-the-arctic/2014/10/17/struggle-...

Music groups tend to have the same issues; it's rare to find a band like U2 that equally shares credit regardless of who is doing what, which normally builds resentment when one or more members are seen as sole contributors (or 'stars').

It's also equally rare to find a group where each member can split off and form their own successful group (e.g., The Beatles, Genesis). The 'right' answer is that's it's usually somewhere in between. Freddie Mercury and Mick Jagger failed at solo careers because they didn't have their friends to tell them that their music stunk. Of course Top 40 has been broken into a formula that primarily benefits music companies, but that's different story.

In the same way, you and your business partner may have relied on each other to achieve a whole that is more than the proverbial sum of the parts. Your partner's new venture may fail without someone such as yourself, since it really is a common blunder by technical people to underestimate the value of sales and other soft skills, and your venture may fail without strong technical backing.

As usual, you can throw money at the problem to see what works, but in my experience when people 'grow up' organically as opposed to in a lab, the resulting bonds are much stronger.

All of that said, my former business partner surreptitiously formed another company and lost interest in our shared venture, which ultimately killed what was a great niche product. I consider myself a fairly average coder, but he was brilliant, and although I could have bought him out and maintained and expanded the codebase, it wasn't fun anymore, so we sold to another company and went our separate ways. Regardless, I had fun and learned a ton along the way, and that's part of the journey.

Apologies - I just looked for the software and can't seem to find it on my machine - may have been on an old iPad, but not likely to have been your excellent software.

The PolyEvolver is one of my favourites - the sounds haven't 'aged' much, unlike most of the 90s synths; would be difficult to let that one go!

Woah - you wrote and maintain Edisyn? Excellent software, and pretty much vital to the productivity (and sanity) of synthesists worldwide; thanks very much for your work!

I use Edisyn for my Kawai K3 (which has an unusable button-and-dial interface for wavetable editing), although it's not on your list in GitHub for some reason. I have the SoundTower PolyEvolver editor, and it's quite functional (albeit within a quirky interface). It also 'unlocks' custom user wavetables, which is helpful. Not sure if that influences your decision to tackle another editor, but I'm sure it would round out your DSI list (and the MonoEvolver would be a natural leader/follower).

A BOM would be lovely and glad that you include a link right on the board, but isn't a showstopper - most components are fairly obvious on inspection/testing (not so much when manufacturers sand off/exclude/obscure IC identifiers), but a list would definitely be a huge timesaver. A schematic is almost essential though - I think the PolyEvolver board is 6 layers and would take ages to map out.

Oddly enough, someone else mentioned the other day that Sequential started a cloud-based service for converting wavetables to a usable format for the new Pro3 [0] - it's free now, but maybe a service after DSI was bought out by Focusrite?

As for source code, updates are still downloadable from DSI, plus the microcontroller has an I2C or JTAG interface and isn't protected AFAIK; wouldn't be overly difficult to extract the source (albeit in machine code). I think I previously ordered backups of the DSP and microcontroller when they were still available - just in case, but there are a bunch of components that aren't available from DSI or supply shops anymore (e.g., the custom CEM chips). I think that's an aspect of the right to repair that may be overlooked - component availability.

[0]: https://www.sequentialwaves.com/

Funny, I have a DSI PolyEvolver, and when one voice decided to go on the fritz with an intermittent issue, I couldn't find a schematic anywhere (that's because DSI hasn't made a technical service manual available for years). Not that other synth manufacturers are more forthcoming with service manuals, but they are at least "available", which helps immensely when troubleshooting. DSI was very helpful, but in the end, the issue turned out to be a lead-free solder joint issue on one the DSP legs (early lead-free solder was prone to cracking under repeated heating and cooling cycles).

Not sure what the article is implying by saying the Prophet has interesting silkscreen designs or instructions - that may help remove the right components to send back to DSI, but doesn't help someone diagnose and repair the board themselves. Oh, also, I have successfully replaced the battery in a Sonicare toothbrush without destroying it - still working to this day.

> but 3/4 is exceeding rare in popular modern music.

So true, which is a shame, since 3/4 songs such as "Suspended in Gaffa" by Kate Bush or "All in All (This One Last Wild Waltz)" by Dexy's Midnight Runners are great to listen to and stick with you. Not to mention "Golden Brown" by The Stranglers - although that one is apparently in 12/8 and 13/8 for the riff [0].

My favourite modern waltz would have to be "Paristocrats" by Gonzales [1].

[0] https://www.goldradiouk.com/news/music/stranglers-golden-bro...

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNVzS3p8KKU

My personal favourite is the McLeyvier Amadeus [0][1] - a synth that just barely made it out of the garage. Timing was key, as the McLeyvier was a digitally (full-fledged computer)-controlled analog synth released just around the same time as the Fairlight CMI, which was a game changer. The company that backed the synth (Hazelcom) subsequently used the parallel processing technology to develop the GIS industry with PCI Geomatics [2], so the development of a synth that was doomed from the start turned out to be a game-changer in another field.

[0] https://collections.nmc.ca/objects/275/mcleyvier-amadeus

[1] http://retiary.org/ls/writings/cmj_mcleyvier.html

[2] https://www.geospatialworld.net/article/first-person-dr-robe...