Today was the first day of “work” at the lab (classes start tomorrow, although I don’t think I’ll have any Wednesday courses). It looks like there are 7 members of my group, which is called “Information Ecology.” We spent the first half of the day discussing registration and completely rearranging our lab space (I’ll take a picture and include it for tomorrow).
It was great fun, and it brought me back to my Undergraduate days because I got to eat free pizza. As of now I am signed up for three courses, although I will only end up taking two of them:
- How to Make (Almost) Anything – Yes, that’s the real name; Yes, they teach you how to make almost anything; Yes, everyone wants to take it. I’m not sure what my odds are but I feel like it is something I should try to do. Creating things in the physical world is not something I have experience in and this will take me out of my comfort zone. We will learn to use fancy expensive tools like the 3D printer and the water cutter and other things I have no clue about. If I get in, though, I am told there will be many a sleepless night.
- Tangible Media – This one is also popular and there is a chance I won’t be able to get in, but it seems like a pretty interesting course. The focus appears to be designing and creating interfaces that involve physical interaction. This means the computer physically changes something about the world, or that the computer responds somehow to other people physically changing the world.
- Pattern Analysis and Recognition – This would be a much more theoretical course but is one that I think would be able to help me create things that intelligently analyze and organize data that isn’t explicitly organized. I get the impression that it is more focused on signals (i.e. sound or visualizations) but there may be some theory that could apply to more semantic-type-patterns. We’ll find out!
I’m exhausted. I wanted to include pictures of the apartment so far (which is still in shambles because we are waiting for the landlord to repaint a bunch of the walls) but that will have to wait until tomorrow.