BenSchmidt
@benschmidt
PEng, MBA • Technology Sherpa • Digital Strategist • Stargazer
Dear Ottawa, « March comes in like a lion… » is an expression — it’s not an actual law 🤷♂️ 😜
Imagine highschool geometry classes where students used 3D printers to perform experiments like these… #ReuleauxTriangles Video via Science Girl, twitter.com/gunsnrosesgirl3
My AI Learning journey: new addition for a gentle, page-turner intro to genAI: You Look Like a Thing and I Love You: How Artificial Intelligence Works and Why It's Making the World a Weirder Place (2019) by Janelle Shane—a look at how AI works & why it often behaves unexpectedly.
My AI Learning Roadmap: 1st reads… •Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking Humans (2019)—Intro to neural networks, learning algorithms, & natural language processing •Prediction Machines: The Simple Economics of Artificial Intelligence (2018)—how AI’s predictive power impacts business models
Age is just a number — Curiosity has no expiry date. Grace Hopper began computing at 38, completed the first compiler at 46, helped shape COBOL at 53, kept developing COBOL for the Navy in her 70s, retired at 80 & then became a consultant for Digital Equipment Corporation. Credit: @MIT_CSAIL
Taking off your shoes when visiting someone else's home is a small gesture that reflects well on your daughter's visitors — showing respect for your home and consideration not to bring in dirt. Even more so, given the entertainment media we are immersed in, infrequently models this consideration.
IIn the late 90s, 🇨🇦's mobile scene was dominated by Bell & Rogers selling locked CDMA phones. Fido was the 1st 🇨🇦 carrier to offer GSM, enabling SIM swaps. This Nortel handset (1997) added cutting-edge audio developed by BNR/Nortel’s Ottawa acoustic lab, under David Cuddy. #mobilephones #TechHistory
The animation detail in #HayaoMiyazaki / #StudioGhibli productions is amazing! 👏 #TheWindRises (2013) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Win... Video: x.com/anime_twits/status/1938424656647659735
Consumers Distributing (1957–1996), a nostalgic 🇨🇦 experiment in “Internet shopping before the Internet”: •flip through catalogue at home—circling toys, electronics & jewelry •grab a clipboard & stubby pencil to fill out a form w/ item numbers •wait for the conveyor belt to bring items from the back
This morning’s philosophical reflection: «No man ever eats the same cookie twice, for it's not the same cookie and he's not the same man.» —Heraclitus
TheMarginalian, by mariapopova.bsky.social, shares advice for writers, from author johngreensbluesky.bsky.social #TFIOS #EverythingIsTB www.themarginalian.org/2014/01/14/j... #writing #creativity
A decade ago, Toronto doctor & uToronto.ca prof, 🇨🇦 Dr. Danielle Martin, schooled a partisan U.S. Senate committee on Canadian health care, and on why private (or as #NeverPoilievre promotes it) "hybrid" healthcare exacerbates waittimes, diverting resources to the wealthy. www.cbc.ca/news/world/d...
If you are not wearing these boot covers, the only other way onto the Jupiter 2 is as a stowaway—I'm looking at you, you trouble-maker Dr. Smith! 🛸 🪐 ✨
A total LUNAR eclipse on March 13-14, 2025, starting just before midnight Thursday, with totality, in Ottawa, between 2:30 a.m. & 3:30 a.m. EDT. Don't bother w/ eclipse glasses from April 8, 2024's SOLAR eclipse. LUNAR eclipses are safe for eyes or binoculars 😄 credit: @museumofscience.bsky.social
We ❤️ and support our American neighbours. It's bullying and attacks on our right to exist as a country 🇨🇦 — by Trump, his handlers, and his GOP enablers — which we cannot abide. 🇨🇦
Thank you @anniefortruth1.bsky.social. We ❤️ and support our American neighbours. We abhor the bullying and attacks on our right to exist as a country 🇨🇦 by Trump, his handlers, and his GOP enablers. 🇨🇦
Good riddance. And no thanks for: - blocking Obama's SCOTUS nominee, Merrick Garland - blocking 2016 Russian election interference investigation - blocking Trump's 1st impeachment - blocking legislation to improve election security - acquitting Trump on his 2nd impeachment - blocking multiple bills
Thank you @thedailyshow.com #Trade #Tariff #Tarif 🇨🇦 …Convicted felon and president, Trump, wonders who made the terrible deal with Canada 😉
Very nice. You’ve clearly mastered the challenges inherent in cellphone photography of the moon. Congratulations on capturing planets too! 🤳 🌒 spaceandtelescope.com/conjunction-...
As per @ajamesmccarthy.bsky.social's request, if you post or see Andrew's "Planetary Parade" photo be sure to indicate or comment that it is a *composite* of individual photos -- the planets were not that near each other in the night sky. Illustration credit @skyandtelescope.bsky.social
Thx to @ajamesmccarthy.bsky.social, for sharing his image of the entire "Planetary Parade," using his 11" telescope, combining everything into one composite photo that stays true to the angular scale of these objects. PS. An illustration by Sam Brown, "How to use your Telescope" (1959) #astronomy
A powerful graphic on housing affordability across Canada, shared by @abetterottawa.bsky.social. Minimum wage also varies across Canada. www.retailcouncil.org/resources/qu...