Evan Lovely's Site

The real world has been recreated online, can the reverse happen?

Evan Lovely — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 03:14:21 +0000

I find the online world emulates the real world in so many funny ways. What we humans see in our world is often re-created by us in the online world. We've taken the resume and turned it into LinkedIn, we've taken the classifieds and turned them into Craigslist, we've taken poker games and turned them into online poker games, we've taken pinboards of cool stuff and turned it into Pinterest, & photo books into Flickr. Obviously newspapers have their online sites, movie rentals are moved towards Netflix, funniest homes videos are on YouTube, and even journals are now blogs.

I wonder if the reverse will ever happen. If the communities and concepts that get created in the ever changing online world will get recreated in the real world. We've seen TV news start to display Twitter comments on screen (although I wonder if that's them attempting to stay relevant and seem like they are aware of the newest trends and fads of the Internet generation) and also they run YouTube videos as "user submitted videos". I'm falling short at being able to think of anything that is truly unique to the Internet and not just an extension of the real world that could potentially get re-created in the real world. Have any ideas?

My Thai Sunset Photo got Featured!

Evan Lovely — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 05:18:07 +0000

Wow! One of my photos I took of a sunset in Koh Lipe, Thailand was surprisingly featured in Stuck on Earth, a iPad photo app made by my photography hero @TreyRatcliff! I was browsing the the featured photos section, and came across a photo where I thought "Wow, I took a shot just like that!", and then my eyes drifted down to the photographers name to elatedly discover that is was me! I'm honored and amazed :)

photo_apr_25_9_38_30_pm_1.jpg

Exploring the Parisian Catacombs

Evan Lovely — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 21:13:24 +0000

I was recently asked what my favorite travel story is, and this is it. I didn't take my camera with me as I was told we'd be getting wet, but I wish I did. Oh well. Makes the memories that much more savored. I did just jump around the webernets and have featured several pictures to share what it was like.

Paris ~ Summer 2006

My travel buddy and I were being shown around Paris by a native friend, and after a standard tour of the standard sites, I look over to my friend and ask: "Well, what do YOU do here? I know you don't go to the Eiffel Tour, hang out on the Champs Elysees, and gaze off the Arch di Triumphe in your spare time. What do you do for fun?" He turns to me, and gives me a sly look and says something I'll never forget in a purely Parisian accent: "Well, we go to the catacombs." He goes on to describe the underground network of caverns, tunnels, and caves that lie underneath Paris. How the tourist destination, the official Catacombs is a mere 5-10% of what is down there. How he has a map of what is called the Carrières de Paris or the Quarries of Paris. How he knows of several illegal entrances. And how it is awesome.

He tells us that we'll start at about 11pm and get done around 7am. Mentioning that we'll get wet, we dress accordingly, but we not nearly as prepared as our host: he comes out to the living room to collect us wearing waterproof fisherman bibs that protect him up to his lower rib cage. And we've got sandals and shorts. Right. This should be interesting. It's my first sign that this is going to be more intense than we realized. It is.

We take the bus (and bounce off the weird looks our group is getting for going through the fancy city of Paris with someone who looks like they're about to go fishing in Montana), climb under a fence to some rail road tracks that lead us into a tunnel, then eventually get to our destination: a hole in the wall leading down. Alright, here we go. We follow our guide. Having already seen the map earlier in the evening, I know it's a maze (280 km/178 miles of tunnels). Our host reassured us he knew it like the back of his hand. Still, I decide that I'll try to keep mental notes of turns. Left here, right, right, another left, straight passing several turns we don't take... I try to recal my list of turns in my head 10 minutes in and realize it's going to be impossible. I'm already lost. And then this thought sets in: "If I lose him, I'll most likely die." Gulping, I tell myself: I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. Let's just not lose track of him.

A sample map, image found here

We start walking through calf-deep water. And out of it. And back in it. The whole time it fluctuates on what is flooded. Knee deep was about as bad as it got frequently except the one time it got hip deep! His fishing bib clothing choice was obviously born out of experience. Certain entrances are so small that we have to shimmy on our belly and to get through we even have to take off our backpacks to have enough space.

What it looked like, images found here and here.

We pass a skeleton sticking half way out of the wall that is holding a curled up note that my friend translates it's meaning as "Money has no value down here." We visit caverns where you can sit in a circle around a table. We share hot tea and stories. We visit multiple hang out spots. Some have micro cities carved out of the wall that are amazing and highly detailed. We end up in one spot where it's just huge. Like so huge we're told they hold raves down there. The parties must be kind of awesome. It looks like this:

Image found on this post about the 10 Most Terrifying Places on Earth, where it holds the number 1 spot!

And then we hear voices. I have no idea what they are saying: it's French. After following them, we end up upon another party of explorers. We proceed to hang out, share drinks, and stories. I'm amazed that we can even stumble upon others down here. After a while we part ways, never to see one another again.

Image Credit

As we are walking down a tunnel, my guide, my friend, my lifeline out of this maze starts running away from us. Not only is he the only one that knows how to get out, he's the only one with a flashlight. And to add audio to imagery: his backpack has a pair of speakers screaming the intesity of Prodigy. What sticks out in my memory of this moment now is strangely reminsicent of a music video. We start running after him, but he's got a head start. The tunnel dims as the sole source of light has turned a corner ahead, telling us where we need to go, but giving us little info to deal with the inconsistent ground. A few stumbles and a full on trip into mud follows. Eventually we catch up to him and he's just laughing. Bastard.

After what seems an enternity, we pop out of a hole in the ground to faint daylight. It's around 7am. We make our way back up to the street. Muddy. As. Hell. You can only imagine the looks we get as we take the bus along with all the people looking fancy, clean, and druggingly going to their desk job. We cap off the adventure grabbing some damn good french pastries and pass the hell out hard.

Cool Video about the Catacombs

Coding a Better Govermnet

Evan Lovely — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 17:58:20 +0000

What a great talk. Really demonstrates a mindset that is very similar to mine about how technology can really, really help and heal a lot of things. Love her line about the digital generation not being a generation of talkers (because every single one can talk, and be heard), but a generation of doers. We don’t want to take credit for it, we just want it done.

Original Article

Setting up arrow keys on your home row

Evan Lovely — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 21:34:03 +0000

For Mac, I find this to be AWESOME (seriously): Go into System Preferences > Keyboard > Modifier Keys, then change Caps Lock to Control, which is helpful because Control is hard to hit, then install KeyRemap4MackBook, then enable the Diamond Cursor, which makes it so:

Control+J is your left arrow
Control+L is your right arrow
Control+I is your up arrow
Control+K is your down arrow

Basically, you hold caps lock, and then your right hand's default position on the home row is now sitting on your arrow keys. This way, you can use arrow keys without leaving the home row, which greatly increases speed. I'm now to a point where I cannot use another Mac without this installed.

Evan Lovely — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 06:30:47 +0000

Environmental Neglect in Thailand

Evan Lovely — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 03:35:45 +0000

I just watched 2 construction workers take a payload of glass panes from their site up to the edge of the jungle and toss pane after pane into the jungle. It was really sad to watch. No concern given to the beautiful area they live in, Railay Beach in the gorgeous area of Krabi, Thailand. Or maybe no better way to dispose of it and I just don't understand the way things are. However, I simply refuse to believe that it is OK. It was obviously know as wrong at some level to them since right after I walked up drop jawed and started to pull my camera out, they stopped and took a couple steps back. After I walked on I looked back to see them resume their environmental neglect. I came back about 10 minutes later and took some pictures of the glass landing zone and then another shot of them filling up another payload of glass to be thrown into the "pristine" jungle. Boo!

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Monkey Drinking in the Sunset

Evan Lovely — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 13:27:46 +0000

I love technology

Evan Lovely — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 10:10:35 +0000

I love technology. Quite possibly the greatest tool humanity's created, it allows me to learn about my environment as I walk through it, creates the situation where work is something I do not someplace I go, allowed me to teach myself a profession I didn't graduate college for, lets me see my mothers face smile a half-world away, helps me not waste a library's worth of paper, and disperses ignorance through collective wisdom. It's all in how you use it. Use it well.

Goodbye Portland

Evan Lovely — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 04:35:13 +0000