Because much has changed in the year and a half since I wrote that first epic post comparing my DROID2 with an iPhone 4 – for starters, my iPhone 4 now runs the new iOS 5 operating system and my DROID2 now runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread — I thought I would revisit the comparison, having had over a year to use both devices in various capacities.

Long story short: I still prefer my DROID2 (although to a lesser extent than before).

So, what were my big observations after using the iPhone 4 for two weeks and then switching back to my DROID2?

• Apple continues to blow me away with how good they are at
  • UI slickness: There’s no way around it – with the possible exception of the 4.0 revision of Android Ice Cream Sandwich (which I now have and love on my Motorola Xoom!) – no Android operating system comes close to the iPhone/iPad’s remarkable user interface smoothness. iOS animations are perfectly fluid. Responsiveness is great. Stability is excellent (while rare, my DROID2 does force restart every now and then — my iPhone has only crashed a handful of times). It’s a very well-oiled machine and free of the frustrations I’ve had at times when I. just. wished. that. darn. app. would. scroll. smoothly.
  • Battery life: I was at or near zero battery at the end of every day when I was in Asia – so even the iPhone needs improvement in that category. But, there’s no doubt in my mind that my DROID2 would have given out earlier. I don’t know what it is about iOS which enables them to consistently deliver such impressive battery life, but I did notice a later onset of “battery anxiety” during the day while using the iPhone than I would have on my DROID2.
• Apple’s soft keyboard is good – very good — but nothing beats a physical keyboard plus SwiftKey. Not having my beloved Android phone meant I had to learn how to use the iPhone soft keyboard to get around – and I have to say, much to my chagrin, I actually got the hang of it. Its amazingly responsive and has a good handle on what words to autocorrect, what to leave alone, and even on learning what words were just strange jargon/names but still legitimate. Even back in the US on my DROID2, I find myself trying to use the soft keyboard a lot more than I used to (and discovering, sadly, that its not as good as the iPhone’s). However:
  • You just can’t type as long as you can on a hard physical keyboard.
  • Every now and then the iPhone makes a stupid autocorrection and it’s a little awkward to override it (having to hit that tiny “x”).
  • The last time I did the iPhone/DROID comparison, I talked about how amazing Swype was. While I still think it’s a great product, I’ve now graduated to SwiftKey(see video below) not only because I have met and love the CEO Jonathan Reynolds but because of its uncanny ability to compose my emails/messages for me. It learns from your typing history and from your blog/Facebook/Gmail/Twitter and inputs it into an amazing text prediction engine which not only predicts what words you are trying to type but also the next word after that! I have literally written emails where half of my words have been predicted by SwiftKey.

     

• Notifications in iOS are terrible.
  • A huge issue for me: there is no notification light on an iPhone. That means the only way for me to know if something new has happened is if I hear the tone that the phone makes when I get a new notification (which I don’t always because its in my pocket or because – you know – something else in life is happening at that moment) or if I happen to be looking at the screen at the moment the notifications shows up (same problem). This means that I have to repeatedly check the phone throughout the day which can be a little obnoxious when you’re with people/doing something else and just want to know if an email/text message has come in.
  • What was very surprising to me was that despite having the opportunity to learn (and dare I say, copy) from what Android and WebOS  had done, Apple chose quite possibly the weakest approach possible. Not only are the notifications not visible from the home screen – requiring me to swipe downward from the top to see if anything’s there — its impossible to dismiss notifications one at a time, really hard (or maybe I just have fat fingers?) to hit the clear button which dismisses blocks of them at a time, even after I hit clear, I’m not sure why some of the notifications don’t disappear, and it is surprisingly easy to accidentally hit a notification when you don’t intend to (which will force you into a new application — which wouldn’t be a big deal if iOS had a cross-application back button… which it doesn’t). Maybe this is just someone who’s too used to the Android way of doing things, but while this is way better than the old “in your face” iOS notifications, I found myself very frustrated here.
• Cursor positioning feels a more natural on Android. I didn’t realize this would bug me until after using the iPhone for a few days. The setup: until Android’s Gingerbread update, highlighting text and moving the caret (where your next letter comes out when you type) was terrible on Android. It was something I didn’t realize in my initial comparison and something I came to envy about iOS: the magnifying glass that pops up when you want to move your cursor and the simple drag-and-drop highlighting of text. Thankfully with the Gingerbread update, Android completely closes that gap (see image on the right) and improves upon it. Unlike with iOS, I don’t need to long-hold on the screen to enter some eery parallel universe with a magnified view – in Android, you just click once, drag the arrow to where you want the cursor to be, and you’re good to go.
• No widgets in iOS. There are no widgets in iOS. I can see the iOS fans thinking: “big deal, who cares? they’re ugly and slow down the system!” Fair points — so why do I care? I care because widgets let me quickly turn on or off WiFi/Bluetooth/GPS from the homescreen in Android, but in iOS, I would be forced to go through a bunch of menus. It means, on Android, I can see my next few calendar events, but in iOS, I would need to go into the calendar app. It means, on Android I can quickly create a new Evernote note and see my last few notes from the home screen, but in iOS, I would need to open the app. It means that on Android I can see what the weather will be like from the homescreen, but in iOS, I would need to turn on the weather app to see the weather. It means that on Android, I can quickly glance at a number of homescreens to see what’s going on in Google Voice (my text messages), Google Reader, Facebook, Google+, and Twitter, but on iOS, I need to open each of those apps separately. In short, I care about widgets because they are convenient and save me time.
• Apps play together more nicely with Android. Android and iOS have a fundamentally different philosophy on how apps should behave with one another. Considering most of the main iOS apps are also on Android, what do I mean by this? Well, Android has two features which iOS does not have: a cross-application back button and a cross-application “intent” system. What this means is that apps are meant to push information/content to each other in Android:
  • If I want to “share” something, any app of mine that mediates that sharing – whether its email, Facebook, Twitter, Path, Tumblr, etc – its all fair game (see image on the right). On iOS, I can only share things through services that the app I’m in currently supports. Want to post something to Tumblr or Facebook or over email in an app that only supports Twitter? Tough luck in iOS. Want to edit a photo/document in an app that isn’t supported by the app you’re in? Again, tough luck in iOS. With the exception of things like web links (where Apple has apps meant to handle them), you can only use the apps/services which are sanctioned by the app developer. In Android, apps are supposed to talk with one another, and Google goes the extra mile to make sure all apps that can handle an “action” are available for the user to choose from.
  • In iOS, navigating between different screens/features is usually done by a descriptive back button in the upper-left of the interface. This works exactly like the Android back button does with one exception. These iOS back buttons only work within an application. There’s no way to jump between applications. Granted, there’s less of a need in iOS since there’s less cross-app communication (see previous bullet point), but when you throw in the ability of iOS5’s new notification system to take you into a new application altogether and when you’re in a situation where you want to use another service, the back button becomes quite handy.
• And, of course,  deluge of the he-said-she-said that I observed:
  • Free turn-by-turn navigation on Android is AWESOME and makes the purchase of the phone worth it on its own (mainly because my driving becomes 100x worse when I’m lost). Not having that in iOS was a pain, although thankfully, because I spent most of my time in Asia on foot, in a cab, or on public transit, it was not as big of a pain.
  • Google integration (Google Voice, Google Calendar, Gmail, Google Maps) is far better on Android — if you make as heavy use of Google services as I do, this becomes a big deal very quickly.
  • Chrome to Phone is awesome – being able to send links/pictures/locations from computer to phone is amazingly useful. I only wish someone made a simple Phone-to-Chrome capability where I could send information from my phone/tablet to a computer just as easily.
  • Adobe Flash performance is, for the record, not great and for many sites its simply a gateway for advertisements. But, its helpful to have to be able to open up terrible websites (especially those of restaurants) — and in Japan, many a restaurant had an annoying Flash website which my iPhone could not open.
  • Because of the growing popularity of Android, app availability between the two platforms is pretty equal for the biggest apps (with just a few noteworthy exceptions like Flipboard). To be fair, many of the Android ports are done haphazardly – leading to a more disappointing experience – but the flip side of this is that the more open nature of Android also means its the only platform where you can use some pretty interesting services like AirDroid (easy-over-Wifi way of syncing and managing your device), Google Listen (Google Reader-linked over-the-air podcast manager), BitTorrent Remote (use your phone to remote login to your computer’s BitTorrent client), etc.
  • I love that I can connect my Android phone to a PC and it will show up like a USB drive. iPhone? Not so much (which forced me to transfer my photos over Dropbox instead).
  • My ability to use the Android Market website to install apps over the air to any of my Android devices has made discovering and installing new apps much more convenient.
  • The iOS mail client (1) doesn’t let you collapse/expand folders and (2) doesn’t let you control which folders to sync to what extents/at what intervals, but the Android Exchange client does. For someone who has as many folders as I do (one of which is a Getting Things Done-esque “TODO” folder), that’s a HUGE plus in terms of ease of use.

To be completely fair – I don’t have the iPhone 4S (so I haven’t played with Siri), I haven’t really used iCloud at all, and the advantages in UI quality and battery life are a big deal. So unlike some of the extremists out there who can’t understand why someone would pick iOS/Android, I can see the appeal of “the other side.” But after using the iPhone 4 for two weeks and after seeing some of the improvements in my Xoom from Ice Cream Sandwich, I can safely say that unless the iPhone 5 (or whatever comes after the 4S) brings with it a huge change, I will be buying another Android device next. If anything, I’ve noticed that with each generation of Android, Android devices further closes the gap on the main advantages that iOS has (smoothness, stability, app selection/quality), while continuing to embrace the philosophy and innovations that keep me hooked.

(Image Credit – Android text selection: Android.com) (Image Credit – Android sharing: talkandroid.com)

The tradition of making a wrapup blog post continues… so what did I do in 2011 as reflected by my blog posts? Well, I…

• Foolishly made a list of 7 resolutions, the 3 easiest of which I completed… (I’ll let you decide which one those were) – hence learning not to do such a thing again
• Made a web-based tool to help glaucoma researchers compute AGIS visual field scores
• First ever trip to China and first ever trip to Tokyo
• Watched a movie about a certain social network which made me somewhat nostalgic for college
• Visited 1800s London, bought a new hat, and found out about my savage ancestors
• Made an impassioned plea to capital-seekers to stop sending horrible pitches to my inbox
• Continued my paper a month streak
• Was very thankful that nobody I knew personally was injured seriously during or immediately after the massive earthquake in Japan
• Changed web browsers (it’s a big deal!)
• Helped my firm kick off our Android focused A-Fund
• Found out I wasn’t the only one who adapted Hamlet into another format
• Said goodbye to a TV show that has kept me company since high school
• Bought a Android Honeycomb tablet and became a tablet convert
• Did some “serious thinking” at the De Young
• Made some recommendations for newbie comic book readers
• Started watching a new cartoon which scratched a certain superhero itch
• Bid farewell to Steve Jobs
• Mourned the loss of Google Reader’s social functionality and thus began using Tumblr (http://tumblr.benjamintseng.com/) as my poor man’s Google Reader substitute
• Read a military biography of one of my childhood heroes

All in all, a good year .

Happy New Year everybody! Here’s to a great 2012 and thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading (and continuing to read) my little corner on the internet!

(Image credit – Nassau Happening))

What is the Dickens Fair, you ask? Apparently, it’s a Bay Area tradition dating to the 1970s where a group of performers, businesses, and cooks set up an imitation of the London which famous author Charles Dickens (1812-1870) wrote about and lived in.

And, like with Comicon, costumes and cosplaying are not only tolerated, but encouraged!

The entire experience was very fun. The shops were all period – selling period crafts and clothing and food. It was fun to just walk around and check out what people were dressed as, what they were doing, the accents they were assuming, and the various performances by singers/dancers. Feeling a little out of place, I decided to buy a hat to better blend in:

Another thing which turned out to be a fascinating experience was the antique book shop. While I didn’t buy anything, my girlfriend dug up a guide to the Japanese Empire written in 1914. At the time, the island of Taiwan was a part of the Japanese Empire so the book dedicates an entire chapter to describing it. While it was nice to hear good things about the island (about its beauty and nice climate), I was a little amused/shocked to hear the enormous amount of time the writer spent covering the “savage” aboriginal tribes and their practice of decapitation, and the extents to which the Japanese colonizers kept those practices at bay. Not really believing the writer, I turned to Wikipedia – and lo and behold, there apparently was widespread practice of headhunting amongst the aborigines!

That must explain why I’m so fierce and aggressive

I tried using Google+ as a means of sharing for two weeks – I really did. But it didn’t stick. First, the sharing from within Google Reader was clunky at best – I had to hit the “+1” or the new “G+ share” button, then select the Reader circle I had made, and then do another click to share – awkward process. Secondly, Google+ just didn’t cut it with what I used Google Reader’s social functionality for. I use Google Reader to read. Google+ is great for sharing snippets and pictures and thoughts – but its not a reading platform, so treating it like a replacement for Google Reader’s sharing functionality was never going to make it. Lastly, the point I brought up from my previous post on different levels of interest on different types of content still rings true – the people who I shared with on Google Reader were opting in to my content shares – most of my friends on Google+ are opting in to my personal shares. The two aren’t always the same.

So, ultimately, I threw in the towel and decided to use Tumblr as an alternative. As you may know, Tumblr is a popular and fairly versatile mini-blogging tool – it lies somewhere between Twitter (where you are limited to 140 characters) and WordPress in terms of simplicity. But, it packs a ton of cool features to make it, from what I can tell, an okay substitute for Google Reader’s sharing functionality:

• a full-length RSS feed so that folks can subscribe to my “shares” from a reading platform like Google Reader
• packs a lot of compelling sharing features (liking, “re-blogging”)
• a browser bookmarklet pretty similar to what Google Reader had (so I can share things as I go)
• support for custom domain (so my Tumblr is now officially http://tumblr.benjamintseng.com/)
• support for Disqus (so it can do comments)
• pretty versatile HTML/CSS templating system so I can do further customizations later

Its not perfect. Its not integrated into Google Reader anymore – so all sharing/interaction will need to be done using the bookmarklet or on the site directly. But, the full-length RSS feed means we can keep reading and the sharing/Disqus functionality means we still can like, re-share, and comment.

I’m hoping my friends who once used Google Reader will join me on Tumblr, and I’m hoping my friends who were using Tumblr all along will welcome me to their world . I just started with the integration, but I am hoping to play around with the templating system to more tightly integrate the two sites in the near future.

(Image credit)

So, when I found out that my girlfriend needed some help with her glaucoma research and that writing software was the ticket, I decided to go out on a limb and help her out (link to my portfolio page).

The basic challenge is that the ophthalmology research world uses an arcane but very difficult-to-do-by-hand scoring system for taking data on a glaucoma patient’s vision (see image below for the type of measurements that might be collected in a visual field test) and turning that into a score (the AGIS visual field score) on how bad a patient’s glaucoma is (as described in a paper from 1994 that is so old I couldn’t find a digital copy of it!).

So, I started by creating a program using the C programming language (developed by the late Dennis Ritchie, and explained in the seminal programming book to the right, who was also one of the two leading brains behind the UNIX operating system) which would take this data in the form of a CSV (comma-separated values) file and spit out scores.

While I was pleasantly surprised that I still retained enough programming know-how to do this after a few weekends, the programming was an awkward text-based monstrosity which required the awkward step of converting two-dimensional visual field data into a flat CSV file. The desire to improve on that and the hope that my software might help others doing similar research (and might get others to build on it/let me know if I’ve made any errors) pushed me to turn the tool into a web application which I’ve posted on my site. I hope you’ll take a look! Instructions are pretty basic:

• Sorry, only works with modern browsers (Internet Explorer 9, Firefox 7, Chrome, Safari, etc) – this simplified my life as now I don’t need to worry about Internet Explorer 6 and 7’s horrific standards support
• Enter the visual field depression data(in decibels) from the visual field test into the appropriate boxes (the shaded entries correspond to the eye’s blind spot).
  • You can click on “Flip Orientation” to switch from left-eye to right-eye view if that is helpful in data entry.
  • You can also click on “Clear” to wipe out all the data entered and start from scratch. An error will be triggered if non-numeric data is entered or if not all of the values have been filled out.
  • Note: the software can accept depression values as negative or positive, the important thing is to stay consistent throughout each entry as the software is making a guess on depression values based on all the numbers being entered.
• Click “Calculate” when you’re done to get the score

Hope this is helpful to the ophthalmology researchers out there!

(Image credit – example visual field) (Image credit – C Programming Language)

A few weeks ago, I did a little farewell tribute to Apple CEO and tech visionary Steve Jobs after he left the CEO position at Apple. While most observers probably recognized that the cause for his departure was his poor health, few probably guessed that he would die so shortly after he left. The tech press has done a great job of covering his impressive legacy and the numerous anecdotes/lessons he imparted on the broader industry, but there are a few things which stand out to me which deserve a little additional coverage:

• Much has been said about Jobs’s 2005 Stanford graduation speech: it was moving the first time I read it (back in 2005), and I could probably dedicate a number of blog posts to it, but one of the biggest things I took from it which I haven’t seen covered as much lately was the resilience in the face of setbacks. Despite losing his spot at the company he built, Jobs pushed on to create NeXT and Pixar. And, while we all know Pixar today as the powerhouse behind movies such as Toy Story and Ratatouille, and most Apple followers recognize Apple’s acquisition of NeXT as the integral part of bringing Jobs back into the Apple fold, what very few observers realize is that, for a long time, NeXT and Pixar were, by most objective measures, failures. Despite Steve Jobs’s impressive vision and NeXT’s role in pioneering new technologies, NeXT struggled and only made its first profit almost 10 years after its founding – and only a measly $1 million despite taking many tens of millions of dollars from investors! If Wikipedia is to be believed, NeXT’s “sister” Pixar was doing so poorly that Jobs even considered selling Pixar to – gasp – Microsoft as late as 1994, just one year before Toy Story would turn things around. The point of all of this is not to knock Jobs, but to point out that Jobs was pretty familiar with setbacks. Where he stands out, however, is in his ability and willingness to push onward. He didn’t just wallow in self-pity after getting fired at Apple, or after NeXT/Pixar were forced to give up their hardware businesses – he found a way forward, making tough calls which helped guide both companies to success. And that resilience, I think, is something which I truly hope to emulate.
• One thing which has stuck with me was a quote from Jobs on why he was opening up to his biographer, Walter Isaacson, after so famously guarding his own privacy: “I wanted my kids to know me … I wasn’t always there for them, and I wanted them to know why and to understand what I did.” It strikes me that at the close of his life, Jobs, one of the most successful corporate executives in history, is preoccupied not with his personal privacy, his fortune, his company’s market share, or even how the world views him, but with how his kids perceive him. If there’s one thing that Steve Jobs can teach us all, its that no amount of success in one’s career can replace success in one’s personal life.

(And, yes, the title of this post is an homage to the Jobs’s trademark means of introducing new products at the end of each of his speeches)

(Image credit)

So its with that context when I say that I think the new cartoon The Avenger’s: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes (which is also available on Netflix!) is really good. And the approach is quite clever: they have found a way to take the core team of Avengers from the comics (Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, the Hulk, Giant Man, the Wasp, the Black Panther, and Hawkeye) and seamlessly weave together both classic (i.e. Kang’s attempted conquest of the earth, the original battle with Ultron, etc) and modern (i.e. the big Marvel prison break which led to the founding of the New Avengers, Secret Invasion, etc) storylines and make it kid-friendly! The result is something which is modern in its approach, but fairly epic in its scope.

While the show has left (and will probably continue to leave) out things less suited for children, like some of its predecessors, it doesn’t shy away from the richness and complexity that these stories can provide. If you enjoy superheroes, or if you want a fun introduction to the Marvel universe that is on par with the quality from Batman: The Animated Series, or even if its just that you can’t wait for these guys:

to take on this guy:

then I’d highly recommend checking this series out.

(Image credit) (Image credit – Avengersite) (Image credit – Avengersite)

Pow!

Want one? Check it out (and more) at Fat Rabbit Farm’s website.

And, of course, no blog post about myself going to the de Young is complete without pictures of me acting like a two year old. Here’s me supporting the de Young’s sister museum the Legion of Honor (also worth a visit if you’re in the Bay Area – it is gorgeous!):

Be thoughtful indeed .

More so than in TV and movies, there are a lot of really terrible comic books. Even from star writers, output can be uneven in quality, and plot holes and weird, forced character development are fairly common. The forced pace of comic book publishing, and the whole insider-only, boys-only nature of how comics are produced, is often the culprit, leading to bad or crippled stories and shallow characters, especially with female characters. Superhero comics especially bring out the worst in the comic book industry.

One thing that’s often hard for beginners to grasp is that usually there is one ongoing “canonical” universe in comic books, but many stories (and most of the best ones) over the years have accumulated in “alternative” universes, where some details can vary. Don’t get hung up on the variations or contradictions. Continuity (comic-book-nerd speak for preserving and referencing years and years of backstory baggage) is severely overvalued in the comic book industry, and the best stories are often timeless and stand on their own two legs. There’s a reason why many of the books Ben and I both picked are often origin stories or stories set in “alternative” universes outside of the mainstream “canon” of comic books.

It’s worth your time to look around, cherry pick the best stories (which are often not the most marketed), and ignore the impulse to “read the whole story”. Quieter, smaller stories are almost always worth more time than the huge, universe-wide, pack-every-reference-you-can-think-of comic book stories that seem to be the trend these days in superhero comics.

In summary, seek out the gems as best as you can, and skip the oceans of bad stuff.

All very true – I’m extremely proud, not only of getting the shout-out, but to see a guy I helped bring into comics doing the same .

*High-fives Eric*

Check out more of his recommendations/thoughts at his Tumblr

Of course I do – who do you think you’re talking to? Here’s a quick list of things I’d recommend to a new reader who’d like to see what is out there in the comic world:

• Not really about superheroes
  • The Watchmen : Written by Alan Moore and considered to be one of the best graphic novels/comic books of all time, it’s a fascinating look at how the world might have played out differently had super-powered beings and costumed heroes existed. And, heck, they made it into a movie too! Warning: it is a little disturbingly dark.
  • V for Vendetta : Another one by Alan Moore that was also turned into a movie, this is about a 1984-esque dystopia run by an all-seeing, all-powerful government and how an anarchist-minded terrorist could bring it all down.
  •  The Sandman : This beloved series is by fan-favorite Neil Gaiman and while I’ve only linked to the first volume, if you have any love of the medium and want something more than just a superhero slug-fest, you have to read the entire collection. Its poignant and beautiful all at once.
• About DC superheroes (think Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, the Justice League)
  •  DC: The New Frontier : This set of stories (of which I’ve only linked to the first volume) is a favorite of mine, not only because it touches a huge swath of DC comics superheroes, but because I am a huge fan of the deco-style art. The first story may leave you a little confused (it doesn’t star any prominent DC superheroes), but read on: its an important setup and helps the story span a few decades!
  • Batman: The Long Halloween : This is one of the quintessential Batman stories, where you get a taste not only of the richness of Batman’s “Rogues Gallery” but also his ongoing war with the Gotham mob.
  • Batman: Year One : Frank Miller is very hit-or-miss with me, but there’s no doubt in my mind that he had a solid hit with this one. Its probably the quintessential origin story – and its probably *the* comic which pushed DC’s depiction of Batman towards the grim-and-grittier version that you’ve seen Christian Bale play.
  • Gotham Central : Gotham Central was one of my favorite comic runs ever. Written by two of my favorite comic writers (Ed Brubaker and Greg Rucka), it stepped into the shoes of the police officers who operate in Gotham, home of the Batman, and goes over the difficulties of operating in a city with a vigilante and his Rogues Gallery. Very unique vantage point for character development and for seeing a different side of Batman and his world. I’ve linked to the first volume, but I’d recommend reading the entire series.
  •  Kingdom Come : This is a “what if” storyline which provides some interesting commentary about the role of heroism in society. Set several decades into the future, it shows what happens with a world which has seemed to move past the morals of the DC superheroes we all know and love. And, unlike your traditional inked-and-penciled art, Kingdom Come was all about Alex Ross’s gorgeous painted scenes. This book is especially significant for me as it was the first trade paperback I ever bought!
• About Marvel superheroes (think Spiderman, X-men, Iron Man, the Avengers)
  •  Marvels : This is another set of stories illustrated with Alex Ross’s paintings, but it takes you on a crash course through Marvel Comics history. Like with Gotham Central, instead of seeing the world through the lens of a main character/superhero, this is told from the perspective of a photographer (and hence, the “common man”) who grows up from photo-kid to photography veteran.
  • The Ultimates : Like with Kingdom Come, this is another “what if” storyline which takes a look at what the Avengers, Marvel Comic’s superhero team, might look like in today’s world as a government sponsored superhero group. Full of modern references and gorgeous art from Bryan Hitch and some interesting twists on the traditional Marvel comics, this one is definitely worth a once-over.
  •  Marvel 1602 : I promise this is my last “what if” storyline, but this storyline, by Neil Gaiman of The Sandman fame, asks what would Marvel superheroes have looked like had they been around in 1602. The art is very well done, and Gaiman does a great job of translating the Marvel characters of today into 1602 (and I got a chuckle that mutants were the target of the Spanish Inquisition – those guys never catch a break)
  • New X-Men : I’ve mentioned Grant Morrison on this blog before, but in addition to being a weird, bald Scottish guy, in a single run he helped to redefine the status quo of the X-Men. Mr. Morrison’s efforts made the character of Emma Frost one of the X-men “regulars”, and unlike many of his predecessors in the 1990s, he was focused quite a bit less on arbitrary mutant-phobia as he was on what it truly meant to have a large population of another species co-existing with humans. Very interesting run and, if you want to dive into some of the richer tapestry of comics, this is a good one to dive deeper into.

(Image credit – Sandman) (Image credit – DC New Frontier) (Image credit – Kingdom Come) (Image credit – Marvels) (Image credit – Marvel 1602)

I particularly like the “gratis wye fye” and the “Wikye-Leakes Latest: Josephine Bonaparte’s emails” .

On a more substantive note, the special report on the future of news which inspired the cover was quite interesting and I’d recommend any one who’s interested in the future of journalism and the news business to take a look.

(Image credit – Economist)

On the advice of one of the members of the little investment club I am a part of, I picked up David Moss’s book A Concise Guide to Macroeconomics. I wasn’t expecting much, having taken a few introductory economics courses in college and being a casual economics aficionado, but I gave it a shot.

And, I think that the subtitle “What Managers, Executives, and Students Need to Know” is simultaneously very appropriate and a dramatic underselling of the book. Moss’s writing style and his very direct, conclusion-oriented (as opposed to “scholarly”) overview of basic macroeconomics makes the book not only accessible to people who need a working understanding of economics but not the extra academic theory, but also a great reference.

Now, if you’re an economic genius, or have even just taken basic economics, then you’re not going to learn anything earthshattering from the book, but what you may get out of it which could be just as valuable is a different way of thinking through or of explaining macroeconomic concepts.

Case in point: I had never thought of “the job of a pension system is to divide national output between active workers and retirees.” While this is a simple and obviously true statement, Moss uses that underlying “framework” to explain why moving existing Social Security/pension plans to an IRA (stock-based) retirement system is unlikely to fundamentally solve anything:

Although all of us are accustomed to thinking that we can sell our financial assets for cash at a moment’s notice and then use the cash to buy goods and services, this obviously wouldn’t work if everyone tried to do it at once. If a large number of senior citizens liquidated their financial assets at the same time, in order to buy needed goods and services, they would soon find that the proceeds were much smaller than they had expected. Simply giving the elderly more pieces of paper – more stocks and bonds – does not guarantee that there will be more output for them to consume in the future …

The key question from a macroeconomic standpoint, therefore, is not whether the senior citizens of tomorrow have IRAs or traditional Social Security benefits, but whether they (or others) reduced their consumption to prepare for their eventual retirement. Unless savings are increased today, the division of output between active workers and retirees will be no less onerous tomorrow, regardless of whether we have a fully funded pension system based on individual accounts or a traditional pay-as-you-go system based on payroll taxes …

The amount of output a country produces is its ultimate budget constraint, regardless of how many stocks or bonds or Social Security cards may be floating around. Unless its output grows, a country cannot give more to its retirees without giving less to its workers.

Maybe you didn’t hear anything new there – and if so, pat yourself on the back as you are far smarter than I am – but I was blown away by the simplicity of Moss’s explanation of what is a very complicated problem. Mind you, he doesn’t have an answer to out-of-control entitlement programs like the one the US has, but being able to break this down only pages after explaining the different things that make up and affect GDP (national economic output) was impressive to me. And the cool thing is that Moss does this several times, explaining, for instance, why boosting monetary supply (i.e. when the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates) may have a certain effect on the exchange rate in the short-term but a different one in the long-term and how an “unsustainable current account deficit” (i.e. huge trade deficits) might look like a “high degree of investor confidence” at first.

If you’re interested in macroeconomics casually or as a business-person who needs a better grasp of it in his or her job, I’d highly recommend the book.

• Epic heroic scope: Taking on the embodiment of all human evil and a misguided movement to outlaw vigilantes count? And how about the little touches: picking up the glasses/nerdy Clark Kent disguise and helping to convince Booster Gold to act like a hero?
• A real challenge: Did I mention Darkseid? Or a movement to outlaw superheroes?
• Awesome guest stars: You could say that: Jonathan Kent, Martha Kent, Lionel Luthor, Hawkman, Stargirl, Brainiac, Black Canary, Aquaman, Mera, Booster Gold, Blue Beetle, Rick Flagg, Deadshot, Supergirl, Superboy, Deathstroke, Granny Goodness, Desaad, Glorious Godfrey, Mad Harriet, and … coming up in the last couple of episodes of the season: General Zod, the Toyman, and …
• Lex Luthor: Yup

While I’m a little bummed we didn’t get more Green Arrow bad-assery or Justice League/Justice Society action with the season, I have been very pleased with season 10, and I can definitely point to a number of episodes this season as among the best in the series (“Luthor”, “Homecoming”, “Booster”). Its definitely great way to send off the series.

And, while I’ll be sad to say goodbye to a show which has been with me since high school, through college, and through my first two jobs, its been one heckuva ride, and I can’t wait for the two-part finale of the ultimate coming-of-age story; one that ends with Tom Welling’s Clark Kent in that suit

This particular crisis hits very close to home not only because my employer has a significant presence in Japan, but because of all the people I had the opportunity to meet on my last trip to Japan. There was quite some time where I looked at every IM/Facebook message/email I received as a potential omen– and if my psyche had such a negative outlook, I can only imagine how shaken up and stressed out the people actually living there are.

Thankfully, nobody that I am acquainted with in Japan has been seriously injured and, while I still worry about the nuclear situation, that realization has given me enough calm to try to look at what happened through a more dispassionate lens.

A few thoughts/takeaways:

• It is amazing to me that the situation did not play out significantly worse. That the number of lives lost was not greater in the immediate after-math of the disaster and that Katrina-like mob behavior & chaos did not result is a testament to the high quality of Japanese engineering, the effective training and discipline of the Japanese transit workers, health officials, police, etc., and the investments Japan has made towards preparation. If this doesn’t convince you of the value of investing in disaster preparation/training/prevention, I don’t know what will.
• As smart and resourceful as we humans are, we are still “small fry” relative to massive geological phenomenon. We are reminded of this all the time (especially during hurricane season), but seeing one of the most populous, wealthy, and technologically advanced countries be knocked off its feet in the matter of hours is a striking reminder.
• Make sure your backup/redundant systems are truly independent and de-coupled. the initial earthquakes and subsequent tsunami, one of the main causes of the current nuclear crisis was the incorrect assumption that diesel generation could be a fairly independent redundant system versus relying on the main power grid to power the coolant system. This isn’t to say that I necessarily ascribe moral blame to the engineers/planners – quite the contrary: in the vast majority of circumstances, there is no reason to believe that diesel generators can’t function as a good, independent backup to the electric grid. It should also be pointed out that its easier to be insightful in hindsight, but in practice – its hard to tell with absolute certainty what is too dangerous and what is overkill. Regardless, in this case, the mistake was not recognizing that a massive geological event could knock out both the electric grid and create a big enough tsunami to take out the diesel generators. Its important for all of us to remember that as we plan our own risk mitigation strategies.
• The internet and new social media technologies are amazing. Although phone lines were quickly overwhelmed following the initial earthquake, networks such as Twitter, Facebook, and email kept going. Facebook actually became my primary means of reaching out to the friends I had made in Japan! I can definitely see this as a major turning point for the promise of new web technologies for communication and  potentially even when carriers/consumers start looking at those services more seriously.
• The public needs greater scientific literacy. I can’t pretend to be a nuclear reactor expert, but given the great amount of confusion I hear/read about from both average American and Japanese people about even the most basic things like “what is radiation”, and I think its sad — and almost comical if it weren’t so sad – as it creates a panic where there shouldn’t be and fails to create a stronger urgency where there should be.

I just want to end this post with two thoughts. The first is that despite the tragedy, I hope countries and companies out there will study what happened in Japan and plan appropriately. The second is a sincere hope that the authorities and the IAEA find a way to restore some semblance of normalcy to the nuclear situation as soon as possible.

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Having been in venture capital for only a measly six months, it may be a stretch to say I know how to pitch a VC properly. However, I have seen enough email pitches to tell you how not to pitch a VC. Pay attention, aspiring entrepreneurs, because these happen a lot more often than you’d think:

• Don’t make your pitch email sound like a Nigerian scam email – Before you send an email, ask yourself: does this sound like a Nigerian scam email to someone who doesn’t know me? Does it start with “Dear Sir/Madam”, or have “GREAT BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY” in the subject line, or have anything that would make a rational human suspicious? Then chances are, you should re-write your pitch email.
• Don’t ask me to invest in things which have nothing to do with what a venture capitalist actually invests in. Oil? Gas? Real estate? Bonds? A movie? Listen people, VENTURE CAPITALISTS INVEST IN STARTUPS, not commodities, not real estate, not bonds, not Nigerian princes. (Before you laugh, in the past month, I have seriously gotten emails asking me to invest in all of the things I just mentioned)
• Don’t send me an email that is not remotely personalized. Are you sending the exact same email to multiple people? Then let me ask you a question: what makes you think I (or anyone) is going to care what you send if you don’t take the time to at least type out my name and say something semi-tailored to me? Answer: unless your life was featured in a movie starring Justin Timberlake as a paranoid, drugged-out version of the Napster founder, your chances are pretty slim.
• Don’t denigrate or blow off a junior VC team member (associate/analyst) just because they’re not a partner. Yes, the higher-ups make the final decision, but guess who drives a lot of the actual analysis/diligence on your company? Guess who has the ear of the too-busy-and-is-juggling-fifty-other-things-at-once general partners who you want to side in your favor? You wouldn’t insult your boss’s spouse, so don’t insinuate that the junior team members are beneath your concern.
• Don’t leave me unable to understand/explain your business concretely by the end of the email. I’m amazed at how often this happens. If I don’t have a concrete understanding of your business by the end of the email, to paraphrase an internet meme, “ur doin it rong”. Even if I were motivated to pass the idea on for investment, I wouldn’t be able to explain it in a compelling enough fashion to rally others to be supportive.

Paying attention, class?

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I did it last year, the year before that, and the year before that. So, here’s another post dedicated to the past year of my life:

• Publically made a list of New Year’s resolutions and even did a mid-year check-in. So, how did I finally do?
  • Finish rev 1 of Benchside: incomplete, this resolution I have no excuse for as our team had made a fair amount of progress even at the mid-year point, but unfortunately we didn’t progress far enough for me to consider this even remotely in the green.
  • Read and blog one scientific paper a month: (mostly) complete, I have one last paper left to blog for the month of December (which will be posted soon), but so far I’ve kept it up.
  • Read Pawn in Frankincense and Checkmate by Dorothy Dunnett: success, I was able to finish this at the mid-year point, courtesy of audiobooks and long commutes.
  • Meet at least 3 new people per conference I attend: (mostly) complete, I didn’t quite hit this target at every conference I attended (especially the one-day events where, for work reasons, I may have showed up late), but I will consider my foray into networking a relative success. I’m no social butterfly, but I’m no longer completely petrified in social settings.

  Not too bad, if I do say so myself. There are definitely areas for improvement, but I think I did all right for 2010

• I joined a petition to bring a little Northern California lingo to the scientific community
• I began a subscription to the Economist.
• I met a cute robotic seal at the Northern California Cherry Blossom festival.
• I bought a shirt to fight for at Forever 21
• I experienced the power of combining wifi-on-a-plane with Google Voice
• I visited and “participated” in the gorgeous Grounds for Sculpture museum in New Jersey
• I started the final season of Smallville with wide-eyed optimism
• I finally watched Joss Whedon’s beloved Firefly series and Serenity movie and became a browncoat
• I did my first job change, moving from the world of consulting to the world of venture capital
• I found out about a very cute homage from an old Batman comic to Snoopy
• I was very flattered to make the acknowledgements list on my good friend Mike Lee’s policy paper on healthcare policy. Who knew blogging and chatting about healthcare when I should be doing other things at work could be so rewarding?
• I finally joined the smartphone generation and did a deep comparison of the DROID2 and Apple’s iPhone 4
• I found out I had something in common with Calvin & Hobbes
• I started listening to podcasts on my commute
• I disassembled an Apple TV just to see if I could
• I moved – into a place with internet connectivity issues which … eventually… sorted themselves out

What a year! Here’s to next year being as awesome as this past one. Happy new year everybody! And thank you for reading my little corner on the internet!

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And hopefully, I’ll get around to posting more substantial updates in the days to come…

• Work has really picked up over the last week or so as our fund pushes into an end-of-year annual meeting
• I just moved in to a new place (which has no internet yet )

Will be back once all of this is over…