Jonathan Hitchcock - Vhata Vas Hyah

Well, another GeekDinner has come and gone. The July 2007 GeekDinner went off fairly smoothly last night, and I think everybody was fairly pleased with how it turned out.

The venue (Krugmann's grill) wasn't completely organised: they had people eating in part of our part of the venue right up until about 6:45, and then had to ask us all to go and stand by the bar while they rearranged all the tables, as they hadn't realised we had projectors and equipment. To be fair, our booking was for 7:30, although I don't know why, as we've said that the dinner was at 6:30 for 7:00 from the beginning. Anyway, that said and done, everything else went off fairly smoothly: the food was decent, the service was not bad, and there was plenty of space for everybody to sit where they could see the speakers and screens.

We were quite worried at first about the venue layout: there was a big partition halfway across the venue which cut the two sides off, and meant that anywhere that we put the screen would only be visible by half the attendees. In the end, it worked out fine, because we had two screens and two projectors, with a split, and the speakers stood in the middle where everybody could see them. There was still a sense of "us and them" in terms of the two sides of the venue, but it wasn't too serious.

That brings me to the awesomeness of Antoine and Ryan, and the guys from SimplyAV. They donated a screen and projector each, and the splitting equipment to enable the two-screen system, and came and spent an hour or so beforehand setting up and testing everything.

The speakers were pretty good. Dave Carman gave a good (if a little too long and technical) talk on the community wifi mesh down in Scarborough, which was very inspiring. Ian Gilfillan gave a nice talk about his experiences in writing a technical book. Alan Levin stood up and started a discussion about whether peering was actually needed in South Africa right now, and managed to let Andy's heckling slide right past him. Then came a talk I had looked forward to, but been somewhat worried about: Johan Wegner and Sam Paddock from GetWine. I invited them to come along to the dinner, and asked them if they'd like to speak about their experiences selling wine on the internet in South Africa's current technological climate, but I wasn't sure whether they would just give us a marketing blurb, or what. As it turns out, their talk was perfect. Johan gave us an overview of the business and its history, and how it got to where it is today, and Sam talked about the technical side of the business, and ended with lessons he'd learned from trying to sell things over the internet. It was very interesting, and prompted some good questions. It certainly didn't hurt that they had generously sponsored the wine for the event (and offered to sponsor future events too!). Finally, Aslam Khan gave a really good talk about Behaviour Driven Development. It was engaging and interesting, for both the non-technical and technical listeners, in spite of the fact that it was basically about writing proper unit-tests for your programs. (Update: he has written about the dinner and linked to his slides.)

I was very pleased with how the evening turned out, and as I said, I think everybody enjoyed it. We didn't have as big a turn-out as last time, and I would have preferred to have a few more non-technical talks than we did (for those in the audience who don't know what all the acronyms mean), but I think it was a success for all that. Photos will be up sometime this weekend.

Now, of course, we have to start thinking about the next one...

Well, I fixed my spam problems, it seems. I am now using CAPTCHAs on blog comments. A CAPTCHA is a way of checking whether the person accessing a web page is a "real" person by asking them to do something which computers find it hard to do. Traditionally, this has involved asking them to type out a word in a picture, because computers have always had trouble with image processing. However, software has improved at reading images, and this approach has started failing. Some other ways to determine whether the user is a real person have been suggested:

In order to prove your authenticity, please provide the answer to the following formula:

And then there's:

I am using neither of these methods, unfortunately. Brad pointed out ReCAPTCHA to me, which is now the recommended implementation of the CAPTCHA system. As described on their page, people perform word recognition all the time when they answer CAPTCHAs, and ReCAPTCHA uses this to assist in scanning the world's library archives into digital format. When some pages of some books are scanned in, the software can't always work out what the words are supposed to be, so these words get used in CAPTCHAs, and we let the people of the world work out what they are. If you're wondering how unknown words can be used in a CAPTCHA, go and read the link above.

Anyway, the point is, we're helping to digitize humanity's knowledge, and fighting spam at the same time. It's like hitting two birds with one stone. I notice that Facebook also uses ReCAPTCHA in its sign-up form. I think it's awesome.

Please let me know if there are any issues using the new CAPTCHAs when submitting comments?

Update: More captcha amusements and yet more.

I got an SMS today.

If this surprises you, read this and this.

The SMS was from UTi couriers, telling me that they would be delivering my card today, and I should have proof of residence, proof of income (bank statements or payslip), and a copy of my ID. This led to a frantic search for my passport, which I could not find for a good half an hour. It turned up inside the bag that Tom used to wrap the bottle of Jack Daniels that he gave me for my 21st birthday in 2001. Obviously. (Okay, I can hear you all judging me, I've learned my lesson.) As it turns out, I have a copy of my ID anyway, so I didn't need it.

Anyway, the UTi chappie arrived, and I signed all sorts of bits of paper, and now I have my card. Remind me to put any other problems I have up on the Intartubes, too.

(I'd just like to add that, once the problem had actually been sorted out, Virgin Money were very efficient and apologetic and all that. So, good on them and stuff.)

I got a phonecall today.

If you missed yesterday's gripping read, go read it now.

So, ja, I got a phonecall today.

Unfortunately, I missed it, because I was in Pick'n'Pay getting lunch, but I got the voicemail afterwards:

Jonathan, this is (somebody) from Virgin Money, I've just been reading your blog, and I'm slightly embarrassed. Somebody will phone you this afternoon to sort it out and have your card delivered to you in Cape Town in the not too distant future. Have a good afternoon.

I would have really liked to talk to her (and find out why she'd been reading my blog).

Anyway, I just got another phonecall from Ntsoaki at Virgin Money, who was great, and she's going to reel the UTI people in and put a redirect order on the card, so that it actually gets to me this time. Unfortunately, I'm going to need my ID card to take possession of the credit card, and as I mentioned earlier, I lost it. I need an affidavit from Mr Policeman saying it's lost before I can use my passport or driver's license. So that's another mission to make.

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There's a type of wasp called Sphex, or "the Digger Wasp", who lay their eggs in burrows in the ground. They then sting other insects, paralysing them, and leave the insects in the burrows, for the larva to feed on when they hatch. However, before they drag the paralysed insect into the nest, they nip back down into the burrow to check the place out, make sure it's all clean and tidy or something, and then go back outside and drag the insect down.

If, while the wasp is inside, inspecting its nest, you move the paralysed insect a few inches away from the hole, the wasp will come back up, have a look around, and see the insect some distance away, and go and fetch it. However, when it gets the insect back to the hole, it has to perform the next step in its pre-programmed dance: it has to go down and inspect the burrow again. If you keep moving the insect away every time it inspects the burrow, it will remain stuck in its preprogrammed loop forever, never noticing that anything is wrong.

We use the Sphex wasp in philosophy as an example of behaviour which seems sensible and rational (it's a good idea to check out the nest before dragging a paralysed insect into it backwards), but turns out to simply be a set of hard-coded rules. One hypothesis is that all human behaviour is like this - it seems rational and it seems like we have free will, but if you alter the parameters enough, it'll turn out that we're just obeying the physical rules of our nervous systems and vastly complex brain.

What's my point? The good people at UTI have a set of rules which they follow, which makes the whole system run smoothly, and it seems to be a pretty clever way of doing things. But if you break the system slightly, alter the parameters, and do something unexpected, the whole system gets stuck in a loop. In a way, I rather wish I hadn't told the Internet that they were stuck, and just let them run until the world wound down. Just to see, you know?

Update: Here's the end of the story.

On Wednesday the 16th of May, I was having a beer at Banana Jam while waiting for the railway boom to open, and messing about on my laptop, when Adrian pointed out the Virgin Money website. After idly checking it out, I filled in the application form and sent it off, to see what would happen - there are no fees, so it couldn't hurt. I don't really need another credit card, and don't plan to use it, but what the hell.

Two weeks later, I was informed that I had been approved, and that my card would be delivered to me by a courier, and I should have some form of identification ready to receive it. A few days later, I got a phone call:

Hi, is that Mr JD Hitchcock? This is Nametag from UTI on behalf of Virgin Money. I have your card, and I'd like to make arrangements to deliver it to you tomorrow. Can I confirm that your address is in Fourways, Johannesburg?

When I filled in the form, they asked for my work's physical address, so I gave them the address of the head office in Johannesburg. Anyway, I corrected them, saying that I worked down in Cape Town, and they said:

Ah, okay, I see. I will make arrangements for the card to be couriered down to Cape Town, and we will contact you when it gets there so that we can deliver it to you.

---

A week later, I got a phone call:

Hi, is that Mr JD Hitchcock? This is Nametag from UTI on behalf of Virgin Money. I have your card, and I'd like to make arrangements to deliver it to you tomorrow. Can I confirm that your address is in Fourways, Johannesburg?

I explained that I was in Cape Town, not Johannesburg.

Ah, okay, I see. I will make arrangements for the card to be couriered down to Cape Town, and we will contact you when it gets there so that we can deliver it to you.

---

About a week later, I went up to Johannesburg for a week, to do some work at the head office up there. While I was there, I got a phone call:

Hi, is that Mr JD Hitchcock? This is Nametag from UTI on behalf of Virgin Money. I have your card, and I'd like to make arrangements to deliver it to you tomorrow.

Now I was feeling like an idiot, because after making a fuss about them getting it down to Cape Town for me, I was in Johannesburg when they wanted to deliver it. However, the call continued:

Can I confirm that your address is in Fourways, Johannesburg?

They cocked it up again. What a relief! However, as it turned out, my schedule and their schedule wouldn't allow them to deliver it to me while I was up there (I was on a course for much of my time), so I resorted to my old tactic of telling them that I was in Cape Town.

Ah, okay, I see. I will make arrangements for the card to be couriered down to Cape Town, and we will contact you when it gets there so that we can deliver it to you.

Cool, man.

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About a week later, when I was safely back in Cape Town, I got a phone call:

Hi, is that Mr JD Hitchcock? This is Nametag from UTI on behalf of Virgin Money. I have your card, and I'd like to make arrangements to deliver it to you tomorrow. Can I confirm that your address is in Fourways, Johannesburg?

I explained that I was in Cape Town, not Johannesburg.

Ah, okay, I see. I will make arrangements for the card to be couriered down to Cape Town, and we will contact you when it gets there so that we can deliver it to you.

---

Look, I'm going to cut this story short. The fifth, sixth and seventh times, when they phoned to ask if they could drop my card off in Fourways, I explained that I was in Cape Town, and said that they had phoned me four/five/six times before, and that I had had exactly the same response from them each time. When I told them that this was the nth time they were phoning me, they started getting a bit embarrassed, and said they'd elevate it to their supervisors, so I thought that things might start happening.

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Today, I received a phonecall:

Hi, is that Mr JD Hitchcock? This is Llewellyn from UTI on behalf of Virgin Money. I have your card, and I'd like to make arrangements to deliver it to you tomorrow. Can I confirm that your address is in Fourways, Johannesburg?

Now, I know I should have been keeping track of their names, and the dates, but I wasn't. I'm pretty sure that I've had this Llewellyn guy before, though. Also, from email/instant messaging logs, I have managed to nail down four previous dates that they've phoned me:

• Wednesday, June 13
• Thursday, June 21
• Friday, June 29
• Monday, July 9

So, today was the eighth time they phoned me. From now on, I shall keep a detailed record of my correspondence with them, and see how it goes.

---

Frankly, I don't actually want the card. I don't need more debt, it would just be a useful backup to have. So, I'm not at all annoyed that they haven't given it to me. I'm more faintly amused by how badly they're screwing it up. What could be happening is that every time the card gets to Cape Town, they check to see where it's supposed to go, find my work address, and send it back to Johannesburg. I don't know. I'm debating not telling them how many times they've phoned me, and just saying "no, Cape Town" each time, to see how long it takes them to sort it out. Maybe I need a hobby.

More details as events warrant.

Update: Here is the second installment, and here's the final chapter in the saga.

When I listen to music on my computer, my music player automatically submits every song I play to last.fm, which keeps track of everything. This means that I can see on my profile what my favourite artist/song has been for the last week, or ever, and so on. It can be quite disturbing to have conclusive proof that your favourite song is not what you thought it was, but it's interesting nonetheless.

Not only is it interesting, however, it is also useful. The site has a very useful and clever feature: it can suggest new music to you that you will like. Since it has complete information about the music history of all of its members, it can compare your listening habits with everybody else's and make comparisons. If you listen to 90% of the same music as somebody else, your musical tastes are probably very similar - the site can thus suggest that you try out some of the other music that the other person listens to. Scale this up to thousands of people and thousands of songs, and you get a remarkably accurate method for gauging music taste.

I'll leave it to you, if you're interested, to find out the other nifty features of the site (it streams music to you if you want, for example). What I wanted to share right now is lastgraph.

I have been submitting my music (on and off, mostly on) since April of 2004... I can now use lastgraph to draw a graph of my complete listening habits. Which I did. And you can look at it, if you want. It's available for download here in PDF and SVG forms, or you can see a PNG rendered version of it below (click to enlarge).

The third in the new series of Cape Town GeekDinners, "Carnivorous Cantaloupe", will be happening on Thursday the 26th of July, at 18:30 for 19:00, at Krugmann's Grill, at the Waterfront.

Details can be found on the wiki page.

Please put your name on the wiki if you are going to attend the dinner, or if you are willing to give a talk.

In addition, feel free to sign up to the geekdinner-announce mailing list.