Two of the million faces

[controlarms.org](http://controlarms.org/) has a funny campaign: upload a picture of you saying “no to the arms trade”.

Then the website places your face searchable by country. Currently there are 12000 faces from Denmark.

Here are my friends Jeppe and Michala at Vega. I uploaded an image myself, but it seems it’s not ok’ed yet. I’ll keep you posted.

**Edit:** How are these images going to be shown to Kofi Annan, who (I suppose) is the recipient of the message? A fast marquee-like display? A random selection of top three?

And the obvious: Since the only thing the site visitor can do is watch face images – when is there a data-mining app for Rate This Protester? Perhaps a [Ning](http://www.ning.com/) mashup. Or, worse, an NSA mashup.

Tobias meets Gunnar (of Tennstopet)

This guy will serve [Tobias Wrigstad](http://blog.wrigstad.com):

Tobias is defending his paper today, and he was finished an hour ago – I have no knowledge on how it went; whether Gunnar in the picture’s going to be a Kind Therapist, or a Hearty Reveler.

My money’s on the latter.

Update: **Doctor** Wrigstad’s luncheoning with his grading committee. He passed, and he sounded a bit giddy. Good on him.

Finished reading the Baroque Cycle

A trilogy of brick-shaped paperback books: that is what the Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle is. Having conquered it feels good. It’s been a part of my list at 43 things (which as of now only consists of 12 items, when the “Finish the Baroque Cycle” is checked off) for a long time.

Now I look forward to other reading accomplishments. Next up is another, less fictitious account: Gödel, Escher, Bach aka G.E.B. by a Douglas R. Hofstadter. It’s referenced in Stephenson’s earlier work, and I borrowed it from my good friend, the Fortran expert. “I never finished it,” he admitted. We’ll see how I fare, in meeting Hofstadter’s work.

**Update:** Review – If you read Cryptonomicon, and G.E.B. and feel like re-reading it, in an historical re-hash, then the Cycle is for you. (It was *for me*.)

**Update again**: [Thorbiörn](http://www.allconsuming.net/person/trurl) (in Stockholm, link to Allconsuming profile) has begun reading G.E.B. a week before me! [G.E.B. page at Allconsuming](http://www.allconsuming.net/item/view/14256).

**Update a third time (June 4, 2006):** [Peter Rukavina](http://ruk.ca/) was here in Copenhagen for a visit, saw my book said “My father had that book on his coffee-table, all of my childhood. I tried reading it, but it baffled me. You are most probably more equipped now, to enjoy it.”

Ruby: Local Club to Join

This WednesdayTuesday, 23th of May 2006, is the second [meeting of SSRUG](http://www.rails.se/rails/show/SSRUG+Meeting+2). A _Clubb_ for you to join, and meet with other Ruby enthusiasts in the ‘hood.

Time: 1900 hours.

Place: see the above wiki link.

Lennart (of _Lund Agile Languages User Group_ fame) will be there, and we’ll try and get as many heads as possible in there.

OK, then, Tuesday, in Lund (or Copenhagen, if enough people decide to show up for us to be the Majority).

Bad hat? Just wrong genre




Bad hat

Originally uploaded by Macmcmac.

**Dogs in the Vineyard**, the Early-West Mormon gunslinger role-playing game has not yet larp-ified, to my meagre knowledge.

The picture here, snipped from Flickr, is an excerpt from something completely different. For which the player’s outfit might be outright wrong.

But: for a Mormon Judgment game, this would be just the character. Just right. Especially the ears. And the suspicion.

Peter Brodersen creates GoogleMaps with streets for Denmark

Us Euros have been envious of the US/Canada GoogleMaps situation for quite a while. The option “satellite image” has been all we had for a while, and the other choices “map” and “hybrid overlay” have been missing for our part of the globe. [Peter Rukavina](http://ruk.ca/)’s tales of integrating GoogleMaps with existing data have been riveting, if a bit frustrating reading, since the European GoogleMaps still lacks city mapping capabilities (does it? I’m unsure – please tell me if I’m wrong). On the outside looking in, in Smokey Robinson’s immortal words.

In Denmark, the name [Peter Brodersen](http://pe.ter.dk/) is synonymous with deep MySQL-fu (i.e. he’s a database demi-god) and sharp web programming. Peter’s been making web toys for as long as anyone cares to remember. They include the Danish roleplaying game scenario database (“IMDB for scenarios”) [Alexandria.dk](http://www.alexandria.dk/) and his “very-beta” [PDF Workshop](http://pdf.ter.dk/). “See them all at [ter.dk](http://ter.dk/), and see if you find anything exciting,” Peter says over IM.

His latest addition to his ever-growing pool of web toys is perhaps the most useful: [findvej.dk](http://www.findvej.dk). “Find-the-way” lets you enter a placename in Denmark, and you get a full-screen map of the place, with the street names on it.

The app caused quite a stir. [Reports](http://borsen.dk/650.88247) from [many places](http://www.computerworld.dk/art/33749?a=rss&i=0) on Peter Brodersen’s mashup of GoogleMaps + street data from Danish Mapping Authorities. Hyperbole is rife in these journalistic texts, but it’s nice to see reports of mashups in “more mainstream media”, and some credit where it’s due.

Peter’s work is for hire, and you can get in touch with his one-man outfit [Korruption](http://www.korruption.dk/).

Denmark has a roleplaying game school

A Danish school with a very cross-disciplinary approach to education, [Østerskov Efterskole](http://www.osterskov.dk/), will open its doors this fall. [Malik Hyltoft](http://alexandria.dk/data?person=66), winner of this year’s Honorary Otto Award is part of the staff.

The school needs materials, and have assembled a wish-list. If you have anything you wish to donate to the school, send an email to “osterskov” at their domain “osterskov.dk” with the subject “Donation”, and they’ll contact you to make out the details. All donated materials will be labelled, and the benefactor will be named, unless otherwise is specifically noted.

This is a chance for you to get rid of a load of “perhaps-useful stuff” (aka useless junk) from your library, and your games collection. Here is a translation of the wish-list in bulletpoint shape.

* Danish fiction
* Atlas
* Books on history
* Encyclopedias, old and new
* Thesaurus (in plural)
* Works of popular science
* School books for grades 9 and 10
* Fantasy literature
* Science Fiction
* Roleplaying game books (rules, scenarios, compendiums, source books)
* Volumes of Illustrated science, National Geographic, and such
* Comics: albums in good condition
* Books in English in all of the above categories
* Easy-to-read books in German, Swedish and Norwegian

Test games, help this academic

Anders Højsted, Danish role-player and game researcher, needs a hand.

A few good gamers are needed, to test some game-related things for his final paper. If you know someone who fits these requirements, or fit them yourself, don’t hesitate to phone Anders: 50 53 15 38 or email andersh@itu.dk.

> Testere søges!

> Vi er i testfasen af vores speciale som omhandler analoge metoder til at teste computerspilskoncepter.

> Vi har brug frivillige testere som kan være med til at afprøve testene. Dette er IKKE en digital spiltest, men indebærer vurderinger af æstetik og historie i et computerspilkoncept. Testene finder sted pÃ¥ IT-Universitetet i København torsdag-søndag mellem 10-21. Du skal være computerspiller, men mÃ¥ ikke have spillet Surreal Games’â„¢ spil “The Suffering”. Hver testen tager cirka 2 timer; du mÃ¥ gerne MEGET melde dig til mere end en.

> Hvis du er interesseret i at opleve hvordan man tester digitale computerspilkoncepter med analoge metoder, så skriv til
andersh@itu.dk eller ring på 50 53 15 38.

> Mvh., Anders

See, he really needs you. Go ahead, call.