Were it not because Gao, Yuan sent me the nerd test two weeks ago, I wouldn’t have realized how nerdy I am. I scored 75% in the test, but I can be much nerdy than that. Simply because some of the questions are so obvious that you know the result will show you’re nerdier if you choose “you know it” than you don’t, so I escaped some, pretending that I don’t know about it. O well.

But, I should have known that I am nerdy without taking any tests. It’s just that I’ve been so used to the lifestyle I have and never thought about it.

• First of all, I don’t watch TV. If I like a particular series, I’ll download as many seasons as I can find off the Internet and watch them whenever I feel I want to, in particular, when I am having dinner. That doesn’t sound too bad, but the problem is, the TV series available for download out there, are usually at least a year behind the latest ones. That means, I live in a world a year behind others’, on average.
• Secondly, I don’t make new friends, or rarely do, in real life. That’s probably not quite precise, since every time I get into a new environment, I got to know a lot of new people and faces. But, 99% of chances are, the relationships will limit to saying hi when met in the hallway and not a word more than that. This is a big problem though, but I’ve been so used to it, probably for years that I just don’t feel lonely at all. It might also be why I haven’t been sent to a mental hospital, yet.
• Kind of followed from above, I cannot speak fluently, either in English or my mother tongue. So there is no wonder why my spoken English got hardly improved in the last few years. Because I just couldn’t speak logically or consiously, not even in the language I am more familiar with!
• Another thing is I bite nails when I feel nervous. Yep. To be a nerd you gotta have some bad habit.

There are a bunch of other symptoms on me though, but the killing one is, I wanna to be nerdier, a researcher!

A list of my other symptoms (not exhaustive):

• I don’t drink
• I don’t clubbing
• I don’t smoke
• I don’t call friends
• I don’t read literature
• I don’t know politics
• I don’t watch sports nor care about the results
• I don’t recognize a lot of celebrities nor know the buzz
• I can stay home all alone without feeling lonely
• I don’t know how to bargaining

First saw the news from 晨钟暮鼓, and traced back to the source Google Earth in 4D.

The Timeline Based Infomation Visualization

Shortly after the first person coming up with the timeline visualization skills, no matter if it was Danlife, SIMILE of MIT, or Google Stock, google has taken it steps further — adding a billions years long dimension in its once-stunning-now-being-ripped-off Google Earth 3D.

The feature

In the latest “beta” version, the software added the world’s landscape as far back as 1710. The old maps are not Satellite Photos obviously, but are more likely to be transformed from those parchment maps you see on screen of theaters. Adventurers, sitting around a table covered by an old, yellow, faded treasure map, lit by dim candle light, yelling/killing each other. Ya. Well, there is probably no dried blood though.

Might be useful to?

Ok, back to topic, I am interested in seeing flat old maps to be integrated to Google Map (the web based one) though. Even though there is hardly anyway (until scientists figured out how to overpass the speed of light) to get significantly more maps of the earth, the existing ones could already extend the mashup-ability to a much greater scale, and improve the logic of mashups.

Just an example, the no-too-long-ago launched Flickr Geotag, which allows user to associate photos and the places they are taken at, now could easily allow visitors to filter the pictures on a particular location based on the time. There are usually millions of pictures available for attractions, and from time to time, it grows into a virtual world history.

A bit more “fiction”

Sounds so much like a fiction, your grandson goes to The Great Wall fifty years later from now, and when he gets home and uploads the image he has taken, he happens to see your pictures in the 2010 pile. More interestingly, the kid mistakenly got into the background of the photo is then the president / prime minister(depending on your country). What a magic. (Hmm…I still cannot help controlling my wild imaginations, sigh…)

Buzz

O well, I am not the only one who will be thought as unrealistic though. Check out Yahoo Capsule too. As a personal comment, the thing is really hard to use and badly designed.