Gratitude Day 11: Lossy Compression Algorithms
For the next couple days, I'm going to take a look at lossy compression algorithms, what makes them so amazing, and how they enable the internet experience that we all know and love today.
Especially when dealing with video formats, we would be extremely limited if not for lossy compression. Even assuming a dedicated, pure gigabit connection for every single device on the internet, the most we would be able to enjoy at 60fps would be a resolution of 1110*624 without compression, maybe 720p using lossless compression, if you're lucky. And lossy compression gives us 4k (nearly 12x as many pixels) for one twenty-fifth of the bandwidth.
Gratitude Day 10: GIF
Continuing my "Unsung Heroes, Human and Algorithmic" subseries in my September Gratitude series, I want to talk about GIF, the venerable and stalwart Graphics Interchange Format.
First of all, a little housekeeping: It's pronounced JIF, like the brand of peanut butter. If you insist on pronouncing it like you're having …
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Gratitude Day 9: Run-Length Encoding / PackBits
I'm taking this little detour within my gratitude series because I want to explore some of the very basic algorithms that are an essential part of our daily lives, for which we have little awareness, and to which is given little thought or thanks.
Data Compression has always been a …
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Gratitude Day 8: Unsung Heroes, Human and Algorithmic
I was thinking today about some of the algorithms that shape our world today, which are largely unknown and unsung, and some of the people behind them.
Now, I do not have a CompSci degree, so my knowledge of the subject is very limited, but I thought I'd take the …
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Gratitude Day 7: The Art of Translation
A decade ago, I took a graduate course called "The Art and Craft of Translation" that really opened my eyes to just how beautifully messy and interpretive the act of translation actually is.
Like a lot of people, I had very surface, black-and-white preconceptions of what translation is. I thought …
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Gratitude Day 6: Music
I wrote about personal music libraries on Day 2, but I'm just talking about music in general now.
I think music is so commonplace and accessible that we often forget what a strange miracle it is. How would you explain music to a completely alien being that had no concept …
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Gratitude Day 5: Dates
(I mean the fruit)
I know there are all kinds of amazing tropical fruits that I've never had an opportunity to try, but among all of the fruit I have had, I think dates are the most underrated.
Incredibly sweet and just a little chewy, with a vaguely mollasses-like taste …
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Gratitude Day 4: Virtualization / Emulation
I think I first heard about emulation in the early 1990s. Some kind of magical software could make your Mac pretend it was a PC, albeit quite slowly. It was very niche and expensive software, but it allowed folks to run software designed for a completely different architecture. Black magic …
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Gratitude Day 3: Cats!!
Ok, seriously forget that supposed rule about the internet being for, uh, "spicy media." Forget that exploitative nonsense. Seriously. Call me a prude, I don't give a rip.
The Internet is for CATS. I sense that Vint Cerf, Bill Joy, Kirk McCusick, Al Gore, and the other parents of the …
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Gratitude Day 2: Personal Music Libraries
Over the past few years, I've been on a journey of migrating from streaming services to personal music libraries. I haven't yet made the jump from streaming video services to personal video libraries, but it's definitely on my radar.
I got an Apple Music account right about when it first …
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