04.22.2010 – My cats battle for window ledge supremacy, unconcerned with other issues of the day.
¶ It’s been a busy winter but recent Smackerel projects are currently under wraps. We should be able to show what we have been doing by the summer. Meanwhile I’m gearing up to try and capture the current state of the city blocks of Queen West, waiting for leaves to come out.
05.26.2009 – The Cat in the Blue Sedan would not forget.
¶ The Cat in the Blue Sedan had been driving for days, only pulling over to the shoulder for cat naps. He’d close his eyes and memories would flood back. Sleep was hardly restful.
¶ It was only when he let the road hypnotize him that he could keep the memories at a comfortable distance, but The Cat in the Blue Sedan would never forget.
02.23.2008 – This is a screen from Version 3 of Rosetta Stone language learning software, released last fall. The new version is a significant upgrade to the popular product and is already available in nearly a dozen languages.
¶ My design company Smackerel and I are part of the version 3 team, responsible for the final look and feel of the interface. With so many great people contributing to the project — writers, editors, photographers, coders, cleaners, testers, etc. — it has been a joy to help bring it all together.
¶ Rosetta Stone is the most worthwhile interactive multimedia project I have been involved with. To prove that it works I will use the program to learn French, and then I will try a language I have had less exposure to, like Russian or Chinese.
¶ Smackerel continues to be busy with Rosetta Stone and one of these days we will be updating the Smackerel site with the story of our contribution.
¶ A couple of my pictures of Xena made it into the final release. That’s my world famous tabby in the screenshots.
¶ Xena helps people learn languages, inspires discussions of quantum physics, and in my dreams she can fly.
02.23.2008 – One of the things I did this winter was rediscover symmetry, exploring various sides of each of my cats. Please check out my Fearful Symmetry slide show on Flickr.
¶ And that is almost the end of this first website update for 2008, full of cats and streets and software, oh my. As well I have added a few updated notes to older posts later down the page.
¶ The site remains hand-built, although I know how much simpler life would be if blog software was generating this page. There are other irons in the fire, including a project with my cousin Adrianna, but news of that can wait for later.
02.23.2008 – Not willing to be outdone by Xena, Toby has a new greeting card! It is from Avanti Press, who found the picture on Flickr and licensed it. They were great to work with and the card puts a smile on faces.
¶ If anyone sees one on the racks, could you snap a picture for me? When I know how people can order them online I will post the information here.
06.05.2007 – Recently, while I was away from the internet, a photo of mine (above) was lolcatted. Lolcat is the term for combinations of cat pictures and odd captions that are currently popular on the internet. (Wikipedia entry)
¶ I’ve secretly hoped that one of my pictures would be turned into a lolcat, and it’s been a mostly fun experience.
¶ I made the picture above of Xena, added the text one cat to the box in Photoshop, and posted it on Flickr a year ago, where it has been popular. It’s been my buddy icon on Flickr, and I have considered using it as a personal trademark. It was also my first cat picture to make the cover of a magazine! You probably did not see it on the newstands:
¶ The Canadian Journal of Family Physicians used it on the cover of their March issue for an article called Uncertainty Principle, making official the association with Schrödinger’s cat.
¶ Justin Wick and Dan Lurie were chatting online about quantum cryptography, you know, like everyone does, and they hit upon an instance of the notion of Schrödinger’s lolcat.
¶ When Dan went looking for a cat in a box he could look no further when he found my picture. Xena’s expression is perfectly indeterminate while the textures and shapes suggest the mathematical precision of an Escher print. Combined with a lolcatspeak caption suggesting Schrödinger’s cat-threatening thought experiment, it would prove irresistable to lolcat fans.
¶ Friday morning, June 1st, the lolcat came to the attention ofAccordion Guy Joey Devilla, who was amused and reposted it to his very popular blog. By then the lolcat was already travelling the internet unattributed. Coincidentally, Joey and I were working together at Mackerel back when the web was brand new and not so shiny.
¶ Another friend of Mackerel, Cory Doctorow, saw Schrödinger’s lolcat on Joey’s blog and posted it as an anonymous lolcat atBoingboing where it’s been seen by thousands of people, and picked up by dozens of sites. Meanwhile, a Digg user noticed Joey’s post and linked to it.
¶ My little Xena was really getting around! This is about where I found out about it (thanks, Rob!), although I was away from my email — or even a modern web browser for web mail — for at least another day.
¶ There was some frustration along with the excitement because at first so many were seeing the image without proper attribution, but that situation has been remedied. The big sites now have proper attribution (thanks Rob, Cory, Joey!) so no one should assume the work is anonymous. While I did have to ask one person to take down a commerical product with this lolcat, it was not a serious problem.
¶ Inevitably the lolcat was found by lolcat aggregator I Can Has Cheezburger where it was properly attributed. Fans of lolcats rate this one highly.
¶ Some geeks will never be satisfied, of course. At Digg a number of posters eventually soured the comment thread by arguing scientific inaccuracies and suggesting that anyone that gets the joke and laughs does not actually understand quantum physics.
¶ I think I have some other pictures that will make good lolcats, but nothing that will capture the geek imagination like Xena in a box. That won’t stop me from tossing a lolcat out there:
¶ The bulk of my photos are available for some Creative Commons uses. To use one of my CC photos for a lolcat, please email me. I will most likely approve the change in CC license necessary to submit to some sites.
¶ Dan Lurie has my permission for the non-commercial lolcat. I do wish to assert that my picture of a cat in a box remains ©all rights reserved. This one has been special to me.
UPDATE 02.23.08 – My lolcat was a hit at I Can Has Cheezburger which was satisfying. I have put a few more out there and probably have more lolcats in me. The phenomenon has not lost any momentum. New people are still discovering lolcats.