Twitt-o-Scope

Found this cool visualization tool online called Twittoscope from this guy, Quasimondo.

As the site explains:

This little widget analyzes the lengths of a Twitter user's tweets and maps them in the form of a histogram. [...] The interesting result is that there are indeed different patterns of user types to be found. Many have a peak of lengths around the right side which is the 140 character limit of Twitter. Others have a peak rather on the left side which marks short tweets with just a few words. Robots or automated news services often have a very small distribution of different lengths. People who have just a few tweets will show a rather erratic pattern with many holes whilst oldtimers or people who tweet a lot will have a more continouus look.

As an additional info I've added the follower/following ratio as a horizontal bar below the histogram. The bigger the left yellow bar is the more followers a user has compared to the users he or she is following.

I thought it was pretty cool - here's our results:


Interesting, eh?

You won't believe this

1. NASA interns steal moon rocks. Yes, that's right - they snuck into a secure NASA facility, donned white neoprene suits, hacked some codes on the doors, and walked out with a 600-pound safe containing moon rocks that had previously undergone scientific tests. The FBI has their report is HERE.



2. The artist's code even the CIA can't break. There is a sculpture in the yard at Langley that has an inscription written on its wall.

   It's part of a sculpture called Kryptos, created by DC artist James Sanborn. He got the commission in 1988, when the CIA was constructing a new building behind its original headquarters. The agency wanted an outdoor installation for the area between the two buildings, so a solicitation went out for a piece of public art that the general public would never see. Sanborn named his proposal after the Greek word for hidden. The work is a meditation on the nature of secrecy and the elusiveness of truth, its message written entirely in code.

   Three out of the four sections have been cracked, but the fourth remains elusive. (See Kryptos I, Krypots II, and Kryptos III.)



3. While you're at it, take a tour. The CIA has a "public" museum, with declassified artifacts. However, as its website notes:

   Please note that because the Museum is located on the CIA compound, it is not open to the public for tours.

   So, click through the link above and take a tour of DC's only free museum to which you can't actually go.



4. Themed Wedding of the Year?, AKA "Jedi Do".

   Groom Duncan Thomson dressed as space hero Han Solo while Sammi Gardiner turned out as Princess Leia.
   
   Sammi’s meteorite ring was engraved: “May the 4th be with you” — in tribute to the line: “May the force be with you.” A supporting cast of 50 Jedis and Sith Lords saw Chewbacca as best man, while Darth Vader made a speech.

   And, to top it off, one of the kids in the wedding was dressed like R2D2. @jill636 pointed out the good C3P0 in the pic, too.



5. Under the Sea!

   When the new 3D Ocean was added to Google Earth 5 back in February, my first impression was that the experience of going through the ocean was like being in a submarine. A week ago, André, the author of WikiSailing, let me test his latest creation: a submarine simulator for the Google Earth plugin. You can now try out André's sub simulator at: www.Sea-Seek.com which is an on-line nautical guide which provides information and photos about coastal navigation and ports. Just scroll down and look on the lower right for "Virtual Dive".

   The kicker? "You can choose to be a submarine or a killer whale." Sweet.



6. Other Interesting Links Some of the links here came from this post. More to see here.



7. And don't forget: my new TV You won't believe it, but I got a new TV for our condo. Now if we only subscribed to cable TV... Guess we'll have to suffice with HDMI or S-video out of the laptop.

Weekend Reads: 05/09/2009

Google Updates

• Latitude Apps, check out my location badge (I added one to this page)
• Contact Manager, import from your other applications

New Search: Wolfram Alpha

• Search, graph, and analyze, all in one spot. A review can be found HERE.
• The actual website is HERE.

I think this has the potential to be game-changing in the online Search arena. I wonder what they will do to promote the site, get early adopters, and spread the word. I just happened to stumble across it through a feed I read, and I'm pretty sure none of my friends have heard of this. I'll post an update when it goes live. For now, click through the screenshots CNET posted (first link above)

Weekend Reads: 04/25/2009

Cybersecurity
U.S. Under Cyber Attack
Beware Tainted Electronics Products
The FBI as the Ethical Hacker?

Gadgets
President Obama to get his Blackberry upgraded, rated for Top Secret Communications
U.S. Soldiers to get Cool Camo like the James Bond invisible car?

Misc
The Ultimate Geek
Cool Data Visualizations

A Different Search

You know how to search with ASCII characters, but what if you're looking for something else?

Visit THIS SITE to search for Unicode characters. And, BONUS!, here's the ability to convert from Unicode to HTML.

3D Search Results and Re-Tweet Me Button

Search Cube provides an interesting take on how search results are displayed, creating a cube that you can rotate and select your search results from. Right now, I'd say this isn't much good for anything except for graphical searches - how can you tell what's on the page that made up one of the spots on the cube? Maybe someone out there can help me understand how to use this better ... but for now, it's just a fun way to display results, but it doesn't help me search any better.

For all you Twitter fans out there, add some simple script language to your blog or webpage and let people easily "retweet" your stuff. And- the site says there's some tracking features. Cool. I'll have to let you know how some trials go. Check out ReTweet Me HERE.

An Easter Egg For You

David Ramel over at ComputerWorld collected 10 "Easter Eggs"** - fun programs hidden inside operating systems.

My favorite is for the Windows XP crowd:
Star Wars Episode IV in ASCII

All I can say is - Wow. That's the Mittness.

OK- one more. If you have Chrome (which you should try), type "about:internets" in the address bar. If you're not sure what the tab title and next screen means, let me know...

**not all are true Easter Eggs.