Wholeness

Death by beauty?

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 11:55:10 +0200

As I ride my bike every day to and from work, my senses are constantly captured by the beautiful architecture, or that beauty that inhabits the fairer sex. Deep down inside I know that it’s an accident waiting to happen as my eyes scan continuously my surrondings, not including incoming traffic.

This could end in a bad way.

Quand le jeu donne des armes contre la maladie

Wed, 13 Aug 2008 13:01:32 +0200

Quand le jeu donne des armes contre la maladie: Games get bad rap. And while there is a lot of trash out there, there are also examples of games having a real positive impact on people. This is one such example (link to french page)

Today I saw Hancock (the flick with Will Smith as an unlikely superhero). Turned out to be not as...

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 21:50:24 +0200

Today I saw Hancock (the flick with Will Smith as an unlikely superhero). Turned out to be not as bad as I was expecting. I wouldn’t go quite as far as recommending it. In the movie featured a plate of scrumptious meat-ball spaghetti. For some reason that made me real hungry and on my way back home I stopped by the market to pick up some minced meat and tomatoe sauce. I sliced some parsley and challots, mixed it up and got cooking. I then filled my belly to the seam with delicious home made meat-ball spaghetti. You should see me: content, grinning, and slouched like a beached whale. Ah, the simple pleasures…

Today is a special day. After a couple of months of searching and two interviews, I got a phone call...

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 01:35:13 +0200

Today is a special day. After a couple of months of searching and two interviews, I got a phone call for a job offer with a video games developer. This day is the beginning of my second career. And I am majorly thrilled. So, more about the company as soon as I’ve signed my contract :)

ps: I habve been listening to Stereophonics non stop for the past 24 hours. go figure.

Awesome. Thanks Eric for sharng with me!

Thu, 26 Jun 2008 14:03:54 +0200

Awesome. Thanks Eric for sharng with me!

I just sat through 6 hours of a BBC documentary called “the death of yougoslavia”. I...

Sat, 14 Jun 2008 01:56:52 +0200

I just sat through 6 hours of a BBC documentary called “the death of yougoslavia”. I don’t even know where to start to describe the horror, pettiness, brutality, treachery and madness of that conflict. It does my head in to watch all the key players sitting comfortably in a chair and talking about it as if it had all been good sport, a geopolitical game with no consequence. We, the human race, are really fucked up.

Sometimes people of courage and great humanity tell you stories...

Thu, 05 Jun 2008 15:15:22 +0200

Sometimes people of courage and great humanity tell you stories that are real lessons in life. This is undoubtedly one of them. Watch, it is worth every second of your time.

It's true, I am a geek

Thu, 29 May 2008 13:20:00 +0200

If anything has to be said about the last 12 or so months, it is that I have become more tuned with my inner geekness (from the land of geekdom). In the sense that I actually think that being a geek is one of my redeeming features.

It’s not just that I help out friends with pc problems, or play video games (only the good ones, with compelling gameplay, storyline and challenging… well most of the time), or build my own systems… I actually enjoy the intellectual challenge and creativity (yes you read me: c-r-e-a-t-i-v-i-t-y) of programming.

I learned some basic php this year working on the campagnes francophones project, and it has been one of the year’s highlight.

ahh, weaving code….

function delta_r ($coord_in, $coord_out)

{

global $debug;

// calcul de la distance maximale parcourue par tous les navires lors de la rotation

while (list($key, $nested_arr) = each($coord_in)) {

list ($x_in, $y_in) = $nested_arr;

list ($x_out, $y_out) = $coord_out[$key];

$delta_j = sqrt (($x_out-$x_in)*($x_out-$x_in)+($y_out-$y_in)*($y_out-$y_in));

$delta_r_table[$key] = $delta_j;

} // end while

return $delta_r_table;

}

Hokusai: an animated sketchbook (via cartoonbrew). I’m a...

Mon, 26 May 2008 23:55:00 +0200

Hokusai: an animated sketchbook (via cartoonbrew). I’m a big fan of Hokusai. As it turns out there’s an exhibition at the musée Guimet which I will be going to tomorrow. Tony White, author of this animated short, used to work for Richard Williams, who as every animator knows is one of THE great masters of animation, and wrote the bible on animating walks (not forgetting Preston Blair, don’t worry…)

Dawn Landes

Fri, 23 May 2008 11:17:41 +0200

Dawn Landes

Lo-Fi Folk Festival

Fri, 23 May 2008 11:16:00 +0200

This wednesday I got me a ticket to the lo-fi folk festival at la Maroquinerie to see Dawn Landes. I discovered Dawn 12 months ago at an Andrew Bird concert (opening act). She’s from Cincinnati, Ohio, and I love her stuff. She’s produced by a very cool french label Fargo - great lineup, check them out. Dawn has a great voice, sounds as cool strumming her folk guitar as she does on her Gretsch, incredible legs, and great contact with the crowd, she actually speaks to you in concert!

Needless to say the concert was awesome, and very intimate as there couldn’t have been more than 50 people in the room. I kind of feel bad for the artist, but it’s great for us fans enjoying that intimacy.

Now it wasn’t all just about Dawn. I had the pleasure of discovering a very talented act, brother and sister Angus and Julia Stone. They created a beautiful bittersweet universe. Angus does wonders on guitar, with that soft innocent voice. Julia has a strong voice, and great presence. She can also play multiple instruments to great effect (keyboard, guitar and trumpet, at the very least). You should definitely listen to them, their awesome.

Finally, the Young Republic also played that night. They are young alright, and no shortage of talent… but, dunno, something missing. Their best act was a cover by Neil Young (can’t remember the title), and the stuff they write is ok-ish but it just didn’t yank my dangle (just made that up, sounds real corny verging on the pathetic).

Paris, contrary to popular belief, hasa very very cool music scene for small relativeley unkown acts. We likes it!

What's wrong with organisations (extracts from article by Simon Caulkin)

Fri, 09 May 2008 15:53:00 +0200

It’s a weird paradox. Despite management’s obsession with hard numbers, many organisations are a fact-free zone, swirling with untested assumptions. Horrifying sums of money are committed on superstition or whim. Thus, fact-based management is really triple-distilled common sense. It’s hard. It requires judgment, practice, help, humanity and wisdom. It needs scepticism and experimentation. It needs reasoned optimism and learning, and, as F Scott Fitzgerald put it, the ability to function while holding two contradictory ideas in your head at the same time.

It’s no use putting good people to work in a crappy system; conversely, putting people in a...

Fri, 09 May 2008 15:52:00 +0200

It’s no use putting good people to work in a crappy system; conversely, putting people in a good system and expecting them to improve increases their individual and group capabilities - another example of the (ignored) self-fulfilling nature of so many assumptions.

They overestimate power, fail to cut losses, underestimate cost and difficulty, and ignore the...

Fri, 09 May 2008 15:51:14 +0200

They overestimate power, fail to cut losses, underestimate cost and difficulty, and ignore the lessons of failure. They put too much faith in superficial impressions and repeat what worked in the past. Or they fall back on unexamined but deeply held ideologies. (An unqualified belief in anything, except the likelihood of being wrong, is a certain predictor of tears ahead.)

The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:39:17 +0200

The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard

"Il n’est pas nécessaire d’espérer pour entreprendre, Ni de réussir pour..."

Fri, 28 Mar 2008 16:54:38 +0100

“Il n’est pas nécessaire d’espérer pour entreprendre,
Ni de réussir pour persévérer…”

- Le Prince d’Orange (quoted by Designer Pierre Paulain at a recent exhibition)

Internet Power - A 1995 Video Explaining the Internet

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 00:26:30 +0100

Internet Power - A 1995 Video Explaining the Internet:

leelefever:

Via Laughing Squid and Andy Baio at Waxy.org, who is creating digitized version of old VHS tapes.

This makes me wonder if people, 12 years from now, will look…

I just had to keep this one under my arm. Nothing show better the passage of time than old infomercials…

TED | Talks | Jill Bolte Taylor: My stroke of insight...

Mon, 17 Mar 2008 21:43:00 +0100

TED | Talks | Jill Bolte Taylor: My stroke of insight (video)

Thanks to Peter Flaschner for sharing this link with us. What an extroardinary account.

munich4: a couple of shots from my recent trip to Munich for...

Wed, 27 Feb 2008 16:15:32 +0100

munich4: a couple of shots from my recent trip to Munich for RTSF

munich3

Wed, 27 Feb 2008 16:15:29 +0100

munich3