Steve Jobs 2005 Stanford Speech

I love my MacBook Pro and since having it for a couple of years am a bit of a convert to all things Apple. I love that they look so nice and work so well. These things are not at odds! I know that the niceness of the looks doesn't make it work any better, but why not have something that does both!

Anyway, Stephen Fry tweeted this YouTube video of Steve Jobs delivering the commencement address for Stanford University from 2005.

I found the speech very inspiring even though I don't agree with him on everything. For instance one of his messages is to pursue your dreams, and if you are not loving what you are doing then change it. Now there is some truth in this, but I think there must be some boundaries. If I followed all my desires, without holding them in check then I'm not sure it would make me a very likeable person! As a Christian, holding them in check means measuring them up to the demands of Jesus and the bible.

I found his honesty very engaging, and his creative energy inspiring.

Hand-animated v computer-drawn

An interesting thought is why are hand-drawn images often more engaging than computer-drawn?

This cannot always be the case, otherwise we wouldn't be wowed by films such as Pixar's Toy Story 3 and Up, and how realistic they look. Although these still maintain a cartoon quality, perhaps unlike Avatar with which I didn't really engage.

But there is a something in it, that the rougher something is drawn then it often appears more engaging, more human. This article got me thinking. I suppose I wonder how it applies to images I may use in my work at school, and in any graphics I use in sermons and talks.

I wish I could draw!

Carbon Footprint

I've been thinking about about looking after the environment, and I wonder how my consumption of the earth's resources matches that of parents when they were my age. I guess we are more than them (on account of having more gadgets) but as we try to live simply, I wonder if it is much more?

Google's published carbon footprint caught my eye in this respect. They have taken drastic steps to minimise their impact, which seems to me to be a laudable thing to do.They are employing three simple strategies to do this: saving energy, using green energy and offsetting the carbon they use. I would like to implement these strategies in my life too.

We try to minimise the amount of energy we use by turning things off, using energy efficient lightbulbs, only running one car and cycling where we can. I'm sure there is more we can do, especially with the latter.

We were on a green tariff, but my energy company stopped that ages ago and we've not switched to another yet. To this end, I came across Energy Share and would like to use their services, I just need to get it sorted out.

I haven't offset our energy yet, because I'm not convinced of the value of it, and I'm not sure of the reputability of the companies offering that service.