While “carpe diem” is normally translated as “sieze the day”, this is actually not an accurate translation. “Carpe” is better translated as “to pick, pluck, pluck off, cull, crop, gather”, so it would be a better (though less catchy) definition to say “Pluck the day”. Of all the possible days you could pick for the day you might have, try to choose the best one you can. Or, in this case, do your best being careful with picking your gadgets.

See also: The Six Stages of Gadget Grief 

San Francisco Bound

For those in the San Francisco area, I’m leaving tonight with cohorts of the Super Art Fight crew to head to Macworld | iWorld, to participate in our first ever west coast Super Art Fight appearance. If you’re attending Macworld, be sure to come by and check us out! If not, you can watch it LIVE. Details on the show and how to watch live here. Basically, at 2pm PST / 5pm EST on Friday, go to the Macworld uStream feed here (until 6pm): http://www.ustream.tv/macworld

While I’ve been to SF before, it’s been a while and I’m looking to find some good coffee, have some In-N-Out, and generally have a great time with the rest of the SAF crew. If you want to follow how that’s going, or share any local insight, be sure to follow along on Twitter as we post under #superartfight and #SF_SAF. Or just follow my general hijinks on Twitter @rosscott.

Another week, more comics! Just a reminder, I’m heading off to SXSW at the end of this week to bum around, geek out, and party hard with all the other Film/Interactive/Comedy types. I’m going to put up a post about all this later today, but if you’ll be there, let me know! I’d love to meet up with some friends and Systemics.

Also, SUPER ART FIGHT IN DC! March 18th! I haven’t done a good job keeping up with the hype train, but if you’re in the area please help me make this a hit!

Still here in Austin, TX with a quick update. While there are not any official webcomic panels or events, I have managed to meet up with Rob and Kris from Explosm / Cyanide and Happiness who have been great to bum around with. Currently we’re all huddled around a table at a bar working on our respective comics, drinking beers (because that’s how we roll). Seriously, why aren’t more bars conducive to this sort of thing?

Anyway, SXSW has been fun (as you might imagine). Of course the other big news is that the infamous “Beard Shirt” has finally launched, and will be in preorder for a short while at a lower price. MORE INFO HERE »

Until next time, Systemics.

Yes, I know most of you are sick of hearing about it, but here is some insight into the SXSW Interactive Experience. I’ll post more of an update here soon, but for now this is about what I’m seeing. Of course, this is what I’m doing right now as well so who am I to talk.

UPDATE: I wound up on TWiT live for about 30 seconds during the DiggNation party the other night. I went up to Leo Laporte to thank him for linking to the Singletasking comic. Of course, I was in the middle of trying to get some friends into the party, but wanted to say a quick hello. This is when he turned the camera on me for a quick interview. I was off my game, and therefore only mentioned the web address twice. It was a live feed, but some amazing Systemics managed to swoop in and got some screen shots. PICS THAT IT HAPPENED. If anyone can find a video feed of this freakish occurance, please do let me know.

UPDATE-UPDATE: I know what you’re thinking. The equation is crap! Here’s how you can help me fix it!

Everything you need to know to calculate the true size of the gadgets you carry. There are way more factors than you may have considered. I invite you to calculate yours, and post in the comments. Use standard metric system for all measurements. As for Planck’s Apple Constant (based on his original work on Planck’s Constant), everyone knows that’s a physical constant used to describe the size of the smallest iPod available used in the pricing of running arm bands and quantum mechanics.

Systemic Harris has helped us better define the Full Gadget Ratio, with an equation that has now been reflected in the above image. Here’s his breakdown:

On the FGR of Mobile Devices:

Clearly, FGR should be a measure of how bulky/inconvenient the object is, amortized over how useful it is. So:

FGR, the base term at first glance should be affine in S,A,B, as these all contribute more or less additively to bulkiness. T is an issue, though for now we can add it in as well. I see lots of people use S*T or some such, which is clearly not right, though my S+T isn’t much better. Really, the question is whether S is a volume, or the bulkiest dimension, or maybe, it’s the largest face divided by the opposite direction (screen size divided by thickness, say). The question is whether S should be a measure of useful dimensions vs. non-useful dimension, like the latter, or a general matter of how bulky something is to carry around, so a simple volume, or the bulkiest dimension. The interaction w/ T then plays into that. Not sure the best way to handle it. The most accurate would be to break S into the three dimensions and apply T directly, recomputing the volume, but that will complicate the device enormously. So for now we leave it linear.

If a device is twice as useful, it’s clearly functionally half as bulky, so divide by U.

Higher H makes it more useful, but how? On the one hand, H should essentially contribute to higher U, as you can’t use it if the battery is dead, so will use it more. But only past a point, as if it can do, say, 24 or 48 hours w/out recharge, it’s not an inconvenience to recharge every so often. So replacing 1/U by (1 + 1/H)/U is good for bulkiness, as low H decreases effective usefulness a lot, but past a point high H is diminishing returns.

Additionally, though, H plays off against A, as the longer it lasts w/out power the less you need to carry the power adapter around. So perhaps replace the A term by A/H, that is, the bulk of the adaptors is reduced by you maybe not needing to carry them around. Really this should be a threshold effect of some kind, though, where either you are carrying the adaptors around or you aren’t, so maybe multiply A by an appropriate shifted Heaviside function of H. Still, the linear approximation is ok for now. And of course, that you rolled chargers & adapters into the same category muddles the issue.

The worry factor increases bulkiness, presumably linearly. But, if newer versions are out, you don’t mind it breaking as much because you want to buy the new one. So there should be a W/N factor in there (where obviously we must count N as the number of generations at least as new as this one, to avoid division by 0). Again, though once it is old enough you don’t worry at all, but this shouldn’t go to 0, so it should be (1+ W/N).

And the constant should definitely be used as a multiplier, to get the units (whatever they are) to come out right.
So maybe:

FGR = (S + T + A/H + B) * (1+1/H)/U * (1 + W/N) * h, or reordered to look a little nicer

FGR = h(1+W/N)(1+1/H)(S+T+A/H+B)/U

This is why I outsource the really mathy stuff. It’s just easier that way.

UPDATE: As always, if you want a print of this comic (or any comic), they are all only $10 at our online store, Hilariawesome.com!

Did you know you could buy a print of this comic? In fact, all the comics?  Crazy!  Check out the new online store for The System, Hilariawesome.com!

In honor of today’s Apple keynote from WWDC, comes this comic about upgrading your technology and gadgets. NOTE: It was really hard to decide when to use the word “dammit”, since it fit so well into every panel.  Obviously, this one kinda picks up where the one about upgrading iPods leaves off.

This was sent to me through The Twitters, and I’m sorry to say I’ve lost track of who sent it.  Still, it’s awesome.  It’s a mouse with a mug mounted on top.  Link.

As I said, NSFW but too hilarious to not post. Put on headphones first, then laugh your ass off.

Link.

Yes, it is that time again.  Time for Apple to announce something that makes my old gadgets look crappier in comparison.  Steve jobs isn’t in on it this year, but I’m sure he played a big part leading up to it.  He’s no Steve Ballmer, but we’ll see what Phil Schiller has to say.  Liveblog link here.