Monthy Archive: March 2009
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March 02, 2009

Books , Life : The Kindle 2

For those who do not know, the Kindle (now the Kindle 2) is Amazon’s eBook reader – a device that allows you to download files that contain the text and images from a book and read them on a screen that mimics the behavior of paper (unlike computer or cell phone screens, it doesn’t “glow”; but rather reflects light in shades of gray like a printed page – making it much easier on the eyes).

Various eBook readers have been around for years (including some nice models made by Sony); but they have always lacked one important feature – books. Their advertisements might talk about having “over a million books” available; but the catch is that 99% of those books are public domain works. Now I like to read the occasional classic; but most of the books I am interested in have been published more recently and still have active copyrights. When you look at the books available for most of the eBook readers out there, recent books are significantly underrepresented. The fact is that while Sony might have relationships with companies that produce music and movies, they clearly lack relationships with the print industry (and other eBook developers fair even worse).

That all changed when Amazon decided to get into the market. Clearly Amazon had relationships with almost every book publisher and distributor out there, including fairly small printing houses; and they have managed at last count to get the rights to sell nearly a quarter of a million recent books (you can also download and read those million+ public domain books to a kindle; but Amazon doesn’t bother counting those). I was already using my “wish list” at Amazon to track the books I was interested in, and currently almost 40% of the books I plan to buy are available on the Kindle (compared to 2% at the Sony store that has been around much longer).

So, when Amazon announced the Kindle in November 2007, I was instantly interested. Unfortunately, as readers of the blog know, that was also about the time I had made the decision that my collection of paper books I had purchased but not yet read was out of control and that I needed to spend at least a year focused on clearing out that backlog. Clearly buying a Kindle would be counterproductive to my reading my existing collection of paper books. So I made a deal with myself – I set specific goals for the size of my to-be-read collection and I would allow myself to buy a Kindle as soon as those goals were reached. What’s more (in a move that helped me keep my new book buying in check) I also committed myself to not buy any new books over the year that were available on Kindle. When I did reach my book-backlog goals this past December, rumors of a new model of Kindle were already floating around the industry and I decided to wait to see how they panned out (and to keep working on my existing books until then).

Thus I ended up buying the new Kindle 2 the day it was announced and it arrived last Thursday. I have now finished reading my first book on it (more on that in my next post). The verdict on the Kindle 2– Thumbs very much up!

The bottom line on any eBook reader (beyond the availability of books) is the quality of the screen. I am quite satisfied with the Kindle 2’s. It is very much like reading something that was printed on a very light grey paper. The contrast is good and the fonts are clear. What’s more, you can adjust the font size as you read. Normally, I use the smallest size, which puts about as much text on the screen as a normal 4x6.75 paperback page; but a couple of times when the lighting was poor or my eyes were tired, I switched to a larger font. I hadn’t considered that advantage when I bought the device; but it really gives an advantage over printed books. The pictures in the books are also quite clear since the technology Amazon used does 16 shades of grey per pixel (color e-Ink is still a few years off).

A few other key features of the Kindle – it includes a wireless connection using 3G cell phone technology, so you can access the Amazon store from anyplace you could make a cell phone call. What’s more, you can Email eBooks and documents to the device (so if I wanted a public domain book, all I need to do is find it online and Email it to my Kindle). The Kindle also includes a primitive web browser – not something I would want to use for my everyday surfing; but useful when I want to look something up because of something I read in the book. The Kindle also allows you to set up bookmarks and write notes on passages in the books, and those annotations are backed up to Amazon’s servers, so if your Kindle ever breaks down or is lost, you can recover all of that data from them on a new device.

Is the Kindle2 perfect? No. The user interface would be much nicer with a touch screen (you use a small joystick to navigate menus and to select parts of the text). The biggest weakness is that while it comes with enough storage to hold “1500 books” in the device, the tools they provide to organize the content on your Kindle2 are almost non-existent. You can simply list (at 10 books per page) all of your books sorted by Title, Author, or how recently you access it – the latter being useful to find the few books you most recently looked at. No “folders” or other organization tools. So with 1500 books, you might have to run though 150 pages to find some book in your collection. This has to be fixed.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

March 04, 2009

Books : Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship With God

Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship With God

by Dallas Willard

As noted in my previous post, I have been holding off purchasing any books that were available for the Amazon Kindle for over a year now, so the initial books I purchased were ones I have been very anxious to get to read. The first one certainly did not disappoint.

This book is the latest addition to my list of books that I think EVERY Christian should read.

I have written before on this blog that I believe a normal part of Christian life is God communicating personally and individually with each Christian on a fairly regular basis. When I speak of Christianity as being a “relationship with God”, I mean a real two-way relationship where both parties are active and involved.

Dallas Willard’s book “Hearing God” is a fairly comprehensive examination of this truth.

He first justifies the claim that this should be an expected part of every Christian’s normal life – that we are all meant to each be receiving communication from God and recognizing it for what it is. He then goes on to explain the role of this communication in the context of the larger purposes of God. And finally, he talks about how to learn to recognize how God communicates with you and how to avoid being misled in the process.

Not only do I agree with his analysis; but I also find myself agreeing with many of his side comments about the faith and the misunderstandings that some Christians have been led into. I am definitely going to look for other books by Dallas Willard to pick up in the future. And will be purchasing a paper copy of this book so I can lend it to people.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

March 06, 2009

Life , Writing : Thinking of starting a separate blog

So I am planning to do more serious writing – the kind of stuff that may eventually get put into books I will want to get published. I am also interested in “beta testing” some of it on the web – putting it out there and getting some feedback on it. Now here’s the catch – I made a very deliberate decision when I started THIS blog to publish it under a “non commercial, for attribution” creative commons license. Essentially people are free to republish anything I say here as long as they don’t make money off it, they give me credit, and they preserve those rights in their copy.

But I am thinking that may not be appropriate for prose I hope to eventually publish.

So I am debating starting a parallel blog which is kept under a more traditional copyright. I would post my more serious writing there, and would also put up notices on this blog when I post anything “over there”. An imperfect solution; but it is the best compromise I can think of.

If I do this, it wouldn’t happen very soon – I would want to make sure that the new blog is visually distinct, and right now I have no interest in playing with MovableType templates. But I wanted to put the idea out there in case anyone has an alternative suggestion.

Any thoughts?

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

March 09, 2009

Life : An Interesting Week

Last week proved both exhausting and informative with respect to churches in San Francisco.

On Sunday, at her knitting group, Anne heard that there was someone in our neighborhood who was looking to plant a new church in San Francisco. We didn’t get a lot of details; but expected to hear more in a couple of weeks. This was after we had gone to the church meeting we have been attending (at least until God is clearer about how he wants us to server Him in the city). The church we have been going to is called “The Journey”.

On Monday night we want to a book club meeting at our apartment complex. As I have previously noted on this blog, I believe relationships are the only thing of eternal value, so Anne and I have been looking for new ways to meet people; and a book club sounded like something worth trying. The book we had all read was Mortenson’s “Three Cups of Tea” (interesting book about a man who has been starting schools in rural Pakistan). The meeting was interesting, although the views expressed were rather polarized. There were however some people we thought we might want to get to know more.

Tuesday evening, thankfully, we had a chance to rest.

Wednesday night, we went to a gathering of people who were thinking about starting House/Organic/Simple Churches in San Francisco. There were about 14 people there (including us). Some were seriously committed to starting a house church, while others wanted to understand the concept better. Many were students at a local seminary. A few wanted to start ministries focused on some specific ethnic groups in the city. One of the people (who encouraged the meeting) was someone who provides support and advice for individuals who want to start House Churches in the Bay Area. He is someone our old pastor has been in contact with as well, so it was good to meet him. There was no one else who was in quite the same position as Anne and I; but the plan is for this group to get together monthly so it may serve as a support group for us in the long run. Just as important, we seemed to connect with a few people at a personal level, so some friendships may come out of this.

By Thursday we had heard a bit more about the people Anne heard about Sunday. Turns out the couple who are leading the effort to start the new church live in our building. We arranged to have them over Friday night to get to know each other. Given that (and given how busy we had been the rest of the week), we decided to punt on home group sponsored by The Journey that we have been attending Thursdays.

So Friday, we had the church planters over to share dessert with us. Turns out the wife was one of the people at the Book Club on Monday (and another from Monday was part of their team). They are certainly interesting people, and regardless of whether God leads us to join their church, we hope to be friends with them (that the husband is a Chicago Cubs fan pleased Anne). In the process of talking, they invited us to their monthly team meetings on Saturday.

So, Saturday morning, Anne and I went to the meeting of the team that hopes to plant a new church in San Francisco – over a dozen people. They are starting their small groups this week, and hope to start Sunday meetings in the Fall. Turns out, about half of the team are currently going to The Journey (the church we have been going to) so lots of familiar faces; and the leader of this group has even preached at The Journey when the pastor was away. We still have no clear guidance if we are supposed to join in on this (it is intended to be a more traditionally structured church, so not exactly what I had been hoping for; but I serve at the pleasure of My Lord).

So, lots more cards on the table, and much more for Anne and I to pray about. Plus a few nascent friendships formed. A good week.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

March 11, 2009

Life : 27 days without a car

So I drove down to my employer’s Mountain View office today for some meetings. Prior to today, the last time I had used our car was February 11, a month (well, 27 days) ago. I’ve been down to Mountain View several times in that period; but I have been taking CalTrain down and walking from the train station to the office (and back at the end of the day). The main reason I drove today is that Anne had some errands to run in the South Bay, so it made sense for us to come down together. I normally expect to have to drive 2-3 times a month; but it just worked out to be a long stretch this month.

I’m really enjoying life without a car – it was one of my main motivations for moving into the city. I like being able to walk and take public transportation to get around – it had been one of the things I have missed from my time living in Boston. I’m getting good exercise and exploring the city in the process. Sometimes Anne and I get on a bus and ride it to the end of the route just to see where it goes. We’ve found some interesting neighborhoods in the process.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

March 13, 2009

Movies : Watchmen, the movie

Last Saturday I saw the movie that was made based on the Watchmen graphic novel, and enjoyed it quite a bit. I have written here before about my appreciation of the graphic novel; and I believe that the movie is a fitting tribute to the book.

There has been much debate as to whether Watchmen was filmable, with the writer Alan Moore taking a strong stand that it was not, and the artist Dave Gibbons actively supporting this film. In some sense they are both right.

In the book, Moore and Gibbons really tried to take advantage of the medium of the graphic novel – using the format as fully as they could (and certainly more than any western writers & artists had done before them). There are aspects of the Watchmen graphic novel that could never be translated into film, most obviously the way that many panels are packed with subtle details. Graphic novels allow the reader to linger over each frame to extract all that detail. There is a lot of the same detail in the background of the film; but no way (until the DVD comes out) to pause and enjoy it.

Still, I felt the movie did manage to capture the story, the look, and the feel of the novel, which is no small accomplishment. The movie is both ugly and beautiful, both depressing and hopeful, just like the book. Many of the performances were outstanding (particularly Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach). I have no idea how someone unfamiliar with the novel would react to the movie; but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

March 16, 2009

Books , Faith : Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith

Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith

by Rob Bell

Another “been waiting until I had a Kindle to buy it” book that has proven to be worth the wait.

Rob Bell is pastor of the Mars Hill church in Michigan, and is in my opinion one of the best poets in Christianity today – not that he writes poetry (that I know of); but he has a poet’s eye and heart for metaphor and uses that skill in his prose to explain Christianity in new terms that are both fresh and accurate. Where Christianity too often gets bogged down in traditional language which has lost its meaning because it has in fact acquired so many diverse meanings over the years, Bell comes up with new ways to explain the faith that are clear and compelling.

Bell also brings Christianity back to its roots - discussing how the Jews viewed scripture as an inspiration for how we Christians should view the Bible; or a long explanation of how rabbi’s operated in Roman occupied Palestine and how that illuminates certain aspects of Jesus’ ministry. I have often said that the starting point for understanding the Bible must be to understand what it would have meant to the original hearers/readers in their culture and language. Bell consistently follows that dictum while providing modern language to describe the same ideas for contemporary readers.

I have previously read his collaboration with Don Golden “Jesus Wants to Save Christians: A Manifesto for the Church in Exile” which explores how the church in America has gone off track; and I certainly plan to look into his other works..

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

March 18, 2009

Books : The Sandman

The Sandman, Volumes 1-10

by Neil Gaiman

Whenever people talk about great graphic novels, the three works they tend to point to as archetypical examples are Moore’s “Watchmen”, Spiegelman’s “Maus” and Gaiman’s “Sandman”. Last week I (finally) finished reading all 10 volumes (over 2000 pages) of Sandman and can report that the praise is well disserved.

Sandman can best be described as a literary graphic novel, and one which probably takes advantage of the medium even more than Watchman (and is therefore even less “filmable”). Gaiman is extremely well read over diverse areas of interest, particularly world mythology; and that feed well into Sandman which is a kind of meta-mythology which incorporates characters from Christian, African, Greek, Roman, Indian, Persian, Russian, and Norse mythology, and does so with fidelity to the original material (he received praise from Norwegians for his depiction of Odin and Thor who match they way they are described in legend as opposed to the more American way they are typically shown).

While "Watchman" is clearly a single story told in a consistent style, "Sandman" is a collection of stories told in a variety of literary and visual styles (from dark horror to light fantasy to historical drama to a modern road trip) and deals with a variety of themes. Yet there is, threading its way through all of the stories, a single larger arc – a bigger story of which all of the smaller stories are a part. The degree to which Gaiman has managed to accomplish this only become apparent when you get to volumes 8 and 9 when all of the separate threads come together and you can see where it is headed. I feel sorry for people who had to read this as a serialized story over 6+ years, who are likely to have forgotten some of the earlier details that make up the bigger picture. Just as there are some TV series that are better watched on DVD, this is a comic title that is best read in its collected form.

I have repeated the observation before that "Fiction is stories where the characters are unaffected by what occurs, while Literature are stories where the characters are changed by events". I'll not argue whether that is in fact true; but simply say that by that definition, Sandman is very much literature. The big overall story is explicitly about how the character Dream (a.k.a. Morpheus, King of Dreams, King of Stories, Lord Shaper, etc.) is affected by the events of the first issue, and eventually becomes someone quite different. In the process of exploring Dream's transformation, the collection explores a variety of themes – identity, meaning, change, destiny, death, desire, destruction, despair, and delirium (the latter 6 being the names of Dream's siblings but are also topics heavily discussed in the series). There were many times I paused in my reading to consider some of the profound observations made in the series.

An impressive work, and one I would recommend even more highly than Watchman.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

March 20, 2009

Life : Boston

If all goes according to plan, I will be in Boston today, recovering from Anne and I celebrating our 21st wedding anniversary last night. We decided to go back to where we met, courted, and married for our anniversary this year (we might have done it last year for our 20th if we hadn't had the opportunity to go to Sydney instead).

Actually, if you are reading this blog post, it means that I was too busy (or had too poor connectivity) to write a post from Boston. I'm leaving this one set up for auto-post in case I don't get a chance to write one on the road.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

March 25, 2009

Life : Phrase of the week: "Used To"

So as I noted in last Friday's post, Anne and I spent a large part of last week visiting Boston where we both lived 19 years ago. Before that I lived in the Boston area for a bit more than 12 years, Anne for about 5.

So as we wandered around our old home towns, the phrase which most often passed our lips was "used to" as in "Didn’t that used to be a book store?" or "Isn't that were we used to eat pizza?" The number of places we used to frequent that still exist are in a distinct minority. In fact, I had wanted for us to eat our anniversary meal at some restaurant (any restaurant) we used to go to when we were dating, and had to settle on Bartley's Burger Cottage near Harvard Square. Definitely a place we have always enjoyed eating at (and did again); but not exactly the romantic anniversary meal I had hoped for. We enjoyed ourselves regardless.

One thing I did find interesting is that for all the changeovers in individual businesses, the overall feel of the city was largely unchanged. On Newbury Street (a high-end shopping area that we always enjoyed window shopping on), most of the businesses have changed; but they were replaced with the same kind of businesses, so Newbury Street still feels like Newbury Street. Same with Harvard Square – lots of stores and restaurants have come and gone; but the kinds of establishments remained unchanged and so it still feels like the Harvard Square we remember (the only real change to the feel of Harvard Square being that there are fewer book stores). Same was true almost everywhere, although Downtown Crossing felt different – more run down. It is not the central shopping district that it once was. I think that has moved to the two urban malls that have opened up in Boston and Cambridge.

This whole "things have changed but remained the same" is worth noting as it contrasts with our experience in Silicon Valley over the last two decades. In our time here, we have seen a major tech boom followed by a major tech bust, followed by a smaller building boom and building bust. The net result is that beyond grocery stores and movie theatres (which seem to be fairly stable, although there have been some changes to those), it is hard to think of someplace we frequented when we first came here that still exists – that either hasn't been replaced with something "bigger and better" or gone out of business in one of the downturns.

But what's more, many of these changes were part of larger changes to the "look and feel" of the valley. Orchards plowed under to build shopping plazas. Shopping Plazas torn down to build malls. Malls torn down to build apartment complexes. Anything and everything torn down to build office buildings. Many of the places we used to go to not only no longer exist; but are now completely different kinds of buildings than they used to be. Places we used to go for walks are either no longer walkable or are at least less interesting to visit. Even the neighborhood where we live now in San Francisco was mostly warehouses as recently as 10 years ago.

So for all its changes, it was nice for us to see that Boston has managed to maintain its identity over the years. That's not something that can easily be said of Silicon Valley. Perhaps one of the reasons we found ourselves drawn to San Francisco is that many of its neighborhoods have managed to stay true to themselves over the years.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

March 27, 2009

TV : The end of BSG 2.0

Last Friday, the final episode of the new "re-imagined" Battlestar Galactica aired; and so what has been one of the greatest series on TV has come to and end (although at least one made-for-DVD movie and a prequel spin-off series is on the way). It has been interesting to see how many professional television critics have been willing to call this a "great TV series" and not just a "great Science Fiction TV series". Certainly I think that BSG 2.0 compares favorably in terms of writing, acting, and significance with series like "The West Wing".

An interesting indication of the significance of this series is that last week, the Deputy Director of the United Nations Human Rights Commission invited the cast and writers of the series to come to the UN and serve as the panel for a discussion of the human rights issues raised by the series. I can't think of another TV show that has been asked to present their views to the United Nations.

This is however quite fitting for BSG 2.0 – a series that dealt with both sides of issues like torture, terrorism, racism and many others. At its most basic level, it is a series that asks: at what point do the actions of the human race render us no longer worth saving; or as Commander Adama says in the pilot-miniseries:

You know, when we fought the Cylons, we did it to save ourselves from extinction. But we never answered the question "Why?" Why are we as a people worth saving? We still commit murder because of greed and spite, jealousy, and we still visit all of our sins upon our children. We refuse to accept the responsibility for anything that we've done, like we did with the Cylons. … Sooner or later, the day comes when you can't hide from the things that you've done anymore.

That's what the series was all about – answering Adama's question "Why are we as a people worth saving?"

Of course what everyone has been talking about this past week is if the final episode was a worthy conclusion to such a great series. On that topic, I can say, for me, it worked; although I do understand why some people were disappointed.

Heading into this last half season, a few things were clear to me. The first was that that there was some third party at work (in addition to the Humans and Cylons). Particularly with the re-appearance of Starbuck and some of the benevolent coincidences which occurred, it was clear that events were being manipulated by some unseen party or parties who's agenda was different from either the Cylons or the Humans. In the original 1978 BSG series there were the episodes "War of the Gods" parts 1 & 2, and "Mission to Terra" in which the existence of the "ship of light" was established (with its crew of highly evolved beings). I kept expecting for some re-imagined version of the "ship of light" to appear and to be shown to be behind some of these events (in the 1978 series, they were even responsible for bringing Apollo back to life, so it would fit for them to be behind the return of Starbuck).

The other thing that was clear to me was that the gods/god that the Humans/Cylons worshiped were real beings. The stories the Humans/Cylons told indicated that they weren't talking about some ancient mythological abstraction; but rather beings who were quite evident to a technological culture. As an example the "god" named Hera committed suicide by jumping off a cliff after the Humans started to leave Kobol in spaceships and was buried in a very real tomb that had technology beyond that available to humans. That's doesn't sound like myth; but rather something that was actually observed (ignoring for a moment whether the term "god" can reasonably be applied to a creature that can commit suicide that way).

So in the end, my sense was right; but the writers chose to keep things vague. The bottom line is that there was a third party at work behind the scenes – "god" (although we are told he doesn't like to be called that). However, details on who and what "god" is (or even if there are more than one) was left unanswered. Now there seem to be many who object to this as "Deus Ex Machina". I think that is an unfair characterization – that term is generally used where something that does not flow from the rest of the story is added at the end to wrap up the loose ends. Yet as I have argued above, I think saying "god did it" is in fact one logical conclusion from what has been presented in the rest of the series. All that is missing is an explanation of what god is, and I can appreciate the writer's decision to leave that question unanswered.

I may not agree with the theology of the series; but as a presentation of what humanity is, it has few equals.

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

March 30, 2009

Faith : Church: House, Simple, Organic

For the past year I have been dragging around the phrase "Organic/House/Simple Church" (or some permutation thereof) like a ball and chain because the terms "Organic Church", "Simple Church" and "House Church" seem to be used almost interchangeably by many people.

Almost interchangeably.

The more I read books and blogs, the more I have started to see some slight trends in the use of these terms. Not that they are to the point of meaning different things ; but that different people seem to be attracted to different terms. This observation isn't reliable – I can come up with counter examples in each case; but I think it is worth noting.

There are some people who are attracted to this movement because of their desire for deeper relationships within the church. They want to stop being anonymous members of the audience and instead find a church where they can get into mutually supportive relationships with other Christians. For these people, the small size of the meetings is paramount (allowing for people to get to know one another), while the structure and leadership is less important. My observation is that people for whom this is important tend to use the term "House Church" more often than the other terms.

There are other people who are attracted to this movement because of their desire to get rid of the accumulated baggage of the institutional church. They don't want programs or pastors or pews or liturgy or any of that stuff – they want a church experience that gets back to basics. For these people, the structure of the meeting is paramount (eliminating anything that is not required by Christianity), while the size and leadership are less important. My observation is that people for whom this is important tend to use the term "Simple Church" more often than the other terms.

There are yet other people who are attracted to this movement because of their desire to see every member contributing as God leads them. They want to get rid of the artificial church/laity divide and instead have everyone invested in using their gifts in the church. For these people, the leadership model is paramount (God is the only leader, everyone else is equal before Him), while size and structure are less important. My observation is that people for whom this is important tend to use the term "Organic Church" more often than the other terms.

In all of these cases, I think the people are headed in the same general direction and that there is a common model for church which would satisfy them all. Yet because their motivations are all slightly different, I think each group would be willing to "settle" for something less than that ideal, and what they would settle for would probably not meet the needs of the others.

Of course, most people are some mix of these motivations and in fact tend to use multiple terms as they discuss how they view church. Considering my own interests and motivations, I would probably categorize myself as being 45% "Organic" (all-member functioning under God's leadership), 35% "Simple" (get rid of the accumulated baggage), and 20% "House" (looking for real relationships in The Body).

Posted by Steven at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)