Here’s a great talk from the last Ignite to warm you up for tonight’s Ignite 7 event.
Why does software suck so bad? Is it possible that a lot of us really smart computer programmers are, in fact… incompetent? Ron Burk, with his wry style, asks the hard questions about hiring, firing and working with incompetence in the software industry in this talk that went viral on YouTube.
About Ron Burk
Ron is the former editor of Windows Developer’s Journal and author of the upcoming book “The Pop Psychology of Programming.” You can find Ron Burk on his blog.
We grew up watching medical droids, tricorders and stasis chambers as mainstays in futuristic medicine but it wasn’t that long ago that bionics, the hypospray and telemedicine were also merely science fiction. While there aren’t many open APIs or much rapid product development, the IT revolution hasn’t left the medical industry behind completely.
Chris DiBona takes us on a tour of the near future with his visit to the annual American Telemedicine Association Exposition and talks about the state of IT in the latest medical gear.
About Chris DiBona
Chris DiBona is the Open Source Programs Manager for Google, which includes running the Summer of Code, releasing open source software on Google’s Code website and contributing to several og Google’s blogs. He also helps plan the annual Sci Foo Camp with Tim O’Reilly and Nature’s Timo Hannay.
You can find Chris writing on his personal blog, Egofood or on Twitter @Cdibona in his spare time (spare time?).
Drawing from her real life as a stay at home mom, Jen Zug shares her parenting hacks to staying sane when the majority of her day is spent discussing the merits of Optimus Prime over Buzz Light Year.
Parenting may not be for everyone. Staying home may not be for every parent. But everyone makes choices they’re willing to sacrifice for, and we all find ways to cope when it’s no longer glamorous.
About Jen Zug
Jen Zug is a writer and a stay at home mom.
You can find Jen Zug at @jenzug on Twitter or her blog, This Pile. She is the boss of Ruthie and Thomas (and often Bryan) no matter what they tell you.
Scotto Moore takes us into a digital fairy tale about a young woman who realizes that first person video footage from her own life is being posted to YouTube – before the events actually occur in real life.
Surreal fantasy or could it really happen? You’ll not want to miss this gem from one of Ignite Seattle’s recurring cast of characters.
About Scotto Moore
You can find Scotto Moore on his Web site at scotto.org.
We geeks love our personal tech. iPhones, Kindles, and netbooks – these are the things we are quick to buy, and quick to trade up to stay on the bleeding edge. But in our wake we leave mountains of discarded, useless, and toxic ex-electronics. We have accepted this cycle of perpetual desire, momentary fulfillment, and discarding to chase new desires as the inevitable cost of technological life. But must this necessarily be the case?
Humblefacture is a movement to better understand how the way we make things affects our society and the environment. Using this understanding, practitioners of Humblefacture aim to make things more safe, useful, and accessible to more people.
Dominic Muren shows us how modular design, biologically-inspired construction, and user fabricated components can be used to create consumer electronics which go beyond “green materials” to create truly sustainable manufacturing.
About Dominic Muren
Dominic Muren is a full time lecturer in Design Studies in the Department of Design in the School of Art at the University of Washington. He has written extensively on design and how it relates to society, both online as a writer for Treehugger.com, and on the weblog IDFuel.com.
It seems Nature has beaten man to almost every “invention” : Helicopters, Submarines, Electricity, Video Cameras, Supercomputers, etc. For the longest time Mike Tyka thought the one notable exception was the wheel. Recent discoveries in biochemistry proved this to be false as well.
Nature has invented a full blown, reversible, proton driven turbine engine, many tens of thousands of which churn away in every one of the billions of cells in a human body. Join Mike Tyka as he takes you on a journey of discovery inside your body and the wheels that make you tick.
About Mike Tyka
Dr. Michael Tyka is a senior fellow at The Baker Laboratory at the University of Washington’s Biochemistry department.
Yesterday’s breakthrough solutions are today’s historical curiosities. Such is the case of stick charts, which were once used to navigate the Marshall Islands.
By observing the waves, wind and stars, select Marshall Islanders were able to find their way across the water. In 1898, Captain Winkler of the German Navy began decoding the stick charts, allowing us to understand how and why the charts worked.
Using his experiences as a lens, Ken Beegle asks us to look at what we’re building today and ask what type of historical curiosities they will become.
Eye shadow and code don’t mix? Despite a sea change of attitudes and an influx of women in the male dominated field of technology, issues of inequality and discrimination remain.
Through humor and anecdote, Maya Bisineer’s Ignite talk shows you how to create role models that will foster the next generation of geek girls. She encourages people to think hard and respond differently to gender issues – be it with respect to introducing math to little girls or being more accepting of the tech women in their lives.
Maya’s talk mixes her own life story with tips about how to meet or be a geek girl and shows that yes, eye shadow and code can and do mix.
About Maya Bisineer
Maya Bisineer is the founder of Memetales, a site created to “democratize creation, sharing and marketing of children’s picture books.” She also serves as the Director of Education for the Social Media Club Seattle.
You can find Maya at ThinkMaya on Twitter, on her blog and she is a regular contributor to the SimpleMom blog.
Money tight? Want to save more for a rainy day? If you aren’t fully utilizing your public library, you might be wasting thousands of dollars a year! Learn how to get share books, DVDs, CDs, magazines, articles, audiobooks, and much more…without overloading your budget or your storage space.
Librarian Dawn Rutherford will give you a quick trip through all that your public libraries have to offer, and how to make the most of it, using tricks and tips gleaned from someone who has spent over half her life working or volunteering in them.
About Dawn Rutherford
Dawn is the Teen Services Coordinator for Sno-Isle Libraries. You can also find Dawn on her blog.
Remember the joy of writing your first Hello World application? Do you still have a copy somewhere so you can gaze upon your coded baby steps into the world of binary goodness? In knitting, creating something beautiful is just like binary, with a series of knits and pearls you can dream up the most sophisticated of patterns.
In the spirit of hi-tech meets hand-tech, Beth Goza will show you how to convert your binary Hello World app into a pattern of stitches (think knit =1 purl = 0), so that you can create, mount, frame and hang your Hello World genius for all to see.
Ron is the former editor of Windows Developer’s Journal and author of the upcoming book “The Pop Psychology of Programming.” You can find Ron Burk on his blog.
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