Introduction

As you may already know, the elevator in the computer sciences department has been broken since Friday and will remain unfixed throughout the weekend. Although we have a backup elevator, it gets overloaded even on a Saturday morning. When I went to grab a cup of coffee, someone else had already ridden it, so I had to take the stairs.

We strive to create systems with high availability. A loss of three days (averaging 0.9% throughout the year) is hardly acceptable. This brings us to today’s main theme:

We present a proposal for a new type of elevator that utilizes blockchain technology to achieve high availability.

The idea behind this proposal is to create an elevator system that never goes down. By using a decentralized blockchain network, the elevator system could potentially achieve 100% uptime, with no single point of failure.

Design

The elevator’s control system would be connected to the blockchain network. Every time a passenger boards or exits the elevator, a new block would be added to the chain. The blocks would contain information about the elevator’s current position, direction, and speed. You can think of it as a transaction: validators (a new name for blockchain miners in this context) will include it in the chain. Once six blocks are validated on top of it, we will consider it confirmed, and the elevator will move toward the destination. The confirmation of the transaction on the Ethereum Mainnet takes approximately 84 seconds. However, faster confirmations can be achieved by using private chains.

Thanks to the decentralized nature of the system, the elevator will continue to function as long as most validators are online. Even if a hacker tries to tamper with the system, the blockchain’s consensus mechanism will ensure that the elevator’s history remains accurate and unalterable. If you take a two-hour coffee break on the sixth floor, everyone in the department will know about it.

In addition, the immutability of the blockchain guarantees that there will be no disputes over the operation of elevators, which can occur with traditional elevator systems. For instance, people often disagree on how long the doors should remain closed if no button is pressed, and it is often unclear whether the “close door” button accelerates the closing. With blockchains, these rules are enforced by the system, and there is no room for interpretation.

Conclusion

Elevators powered by blockchain technology have a lot of potential. We highly anticipate that they will replace the current broken elevator in the CS building.

Happy April Fool’s Day!

Comment and share

最近电影四连

in writing

因为Notion的字体看起来很不爽(黑体宋体夹杂),就在word上写了。在word上用的是霞鹜文楷。想不起来名字的时候就会想起来原神的可莉,这个字体的原型是名叫可莉的字体。 二来word也有所谓的focus mode,会隐去一切无用UI。windows更新以来也有了focus session。可以做到一种二重buff。在加上平时会开的focus assist,就可以聚焦到烧焦了!火,生命之火。燃烧,生命的意义。果然只有燃烧的时候,蜡烛才在证明自己的存在。SM?不SM。

闲话少叙。果然,最想分享的还是,最近无意之间连续看了三部meta电影。Meta电影只不过是我心里的说法,如果要说人话,那就是三部关于电影的电影。

第一部看的是《Nuovo Cinema Paradiso》(天堂电影院)。看的原因的话,果然还是《我想成为你的眼泪》(君の涙になりたい)这部小说。书中提到的是电影最后的片段,再者好像是名作,于是就看了。我也是按照书里的推荐,没有看3小时的版本(导剪版,反而越剪越长,真是疑惑),看的127分钟的原版。……是127分钟吧。讲的是一个人随电影成长的故事,然而电影没有伴随着人成长,而是默无声息地消失了。至于问题的场景——或者说问题的场景的剪辑——如果那些电影我都有看过就好了,我是这么想的。如果没有看过,就会像我现在这样,试图从干燥的海绵上硬挤出一两滴水。如果看过的话,就会像主人公那样,既失笑又怀念,笑着笑着不禁眼泪流下来吧。所以可能还是生错时代了。

第二部是《映画大好きポンポさん》(最爱电影的庞波小姐,或者是别的称呼)。讲的是围绕新电影制作,新人导演Gene Fini,新人女演员Natalie Woodward等人如何活跃的故事。一个特点,就是将电影制作,从一开始的剧本、选人,到最后的剪辑都有涉及。所以论meta程度,这部应该是最深的了。虽然Gene想看《天堂电影院》,但是Pompo小姐显然不是很有耐心看完,甚至暴言道,超过90分钟的电影都没意思。而这也是这部电影有意思的一个地方。因为涉及剧透,我就不想提及了,但是这种meta发言也是让我眼前一亮的地方。最近在看的《ユア・フォルマ》(Your Forma,中文不知道)(我讨厌word的地方:日语输入法切换 Alt+`,会调出听写)里,插图里有很多QR码,按文中的说法,是电子毒品的信息,不能直视,因为会脑内自动扫描。如果真的用手机扫了,其中一个QR码还会说“明明告诉你不要看了”。

第三部,其实不是第三部。是《Bullet Train》(子弹列车),大概1小时40分钟。听同学说的于是打算看,正好发现附近的AMC有上映,于是就去看了。说是附近,骑车也要40分钟。回想起来,还是不清楚这是好事还是坏事。去程是坐公交去的,这里的公交,前面有自行车架,可以放两辆车。因为去的时候是中午(中午的电影能打7折,加起来只要10刀),于是开映前在附近的Hyvee吃了顿饭。不知为什么少算了4刀左右,告诉了员工,员工也不在意。到场之后发现虽然场子很小,但是根本没有人来,只是之后来了两三人,四舍五入就是包场。内容,就是一般的好莱坞动作片,没有字幕所以有时候会听不懂。虽然之后也有枪林弹雨,但是子弹列车字面上指的是新干线。讲的是一群特工在新干线上从东京打到京都,最后死了几名特工,整列车都被整脱轨了。不仅仅是三方一两损的程度了。大家都亏大了。回来的路上才发现,自行车的前灯没了,只好重新买了一个。所以,到底是值不值呢。一说,是经验千金难买,但是问我想不想再经验一次,我大概也很难给出个肯定答案了。

之前打完金恋的时候也是这样。跑到湖边,看了夕阳。相较于游戏里的满目金色,现实里湖面只有一缕一缕的闪烁。然而就凭波光粼粼一词,恐是难以形容其刺眼。就算说是秋天的太阳照亮的湖面,哪怕是带上墨镜,也不愿意去直视吧,像我这种阳光下只会稍微变暗程度的眼镜,更是难抵其耀眼的光芒。触目难忘,讲的就是闭上眼睛,也能看到光斑。回想起来,如果少看手机的话应该更好了。我是为了丰富自己的内心,才去选择跟自己对话,跟大自然对话,跟自己心中的大自然对话的。写这篇博客,也是为了跟自己对话。正因为如此,才应该摒弃外界的骚扰,而直视自己的想法。不然,夕阳就只是夕阳而已了。之前去黄石国家公园,也感觉到自己想法的浅显,到了一个地方,只能拍拍照,感受一下大自然的鬼斧神工,就没有了。半点想法也挤不出来。明明自然在我面前展现自己的千姿百态,有美的一面,比如羚羊谷里暴洪冲刷出的各种图案,比如路上绵延的草原,有丑的一面,比如散发刺鼻气味的间歇泉。但是大自然不告诉你含义。含义需要自己汲取。黄石之旅有机会再详说。

说了这么多之后,第四部。是《Singin’ in the Rain》(雨中曲)。这是我分享了看完《子弹列车》之后,在频道里看到别的人最近看的作品,心血来潮在亚马逊上租了,当晚(说是当晚,其实是昨晚)麻将打了一半走人回家看的。大概也是1小时40分钟。嬉笑舞蹈之间讲述了电影业从无声到有声的迅速变迁。《La La Land》也是很久以前看的了,所以这种音乐剧特有的,二话不说跳起舞来的风格,让我首先想起的是印度的电影。可没想到上世纪的好莱坞就有了。我看到“call me a cab”“hey cab”这样的冷笑话也会禁不住笑起来,所以整篇看完非常愉快。挺喜欢男二的Cosmo,尤其是他的《Make ‘Em Laugh》。名作,也不一定就是深沉的,大概吧。

电影大概就是这些,游戏或者书的话,就下次再说吧。

Comment and share

写在前面

不用说也知道,本篇会有很多剧透。以前我大概会放一个大大的警示框在这里,列举一下包含哪些作品的剧透。但是我忘了怎么写的了。不过话说回来,提前告诉读者有什么剧透,难道不也是一种剧透吗?

那么,本篇大概包含金恋(金色ラブリッチェ)的剧透。

Continue reading

This is written to memorize the discord channel Twitter 2.

Some Random Ranting

Not for everyone, but people recently are getting increasingly prone to anger, and cancel culture and exclusionism are prevailing. The world is going into pieces.

Yet the Internet itself is just a system which was invented decades ago for connecting computers. It’s always the human that is the problem. Originally to obtain social interaction, a person must blend into a group that they share little similarity with. This is getting less and less true with the introduction of social media, where people can find those who share great interests with them, share the same political stance with them, and share the same worldview with them. The same applies to receiving information, people now can easily find news that they love to see, views that they are supporting, or videos that they enjoy watching. “Why bother to watch things that I dislike? Why bother to talk to people that I dislike?” And they push themselves into a comfort zone, surrounded by only things they like. I’m doing it, for sure, and many people are doing it.

Also, tech companies behind social media are pushing this further in the name of “personalization”, because they know that this is the best way to make people stick with them, hence the best way to make money. As a result of this push from both sides, a person is more likely to only get to know a group of people like them, watch news that only say things they want to hear. Everyone lives in their own tiny world now.

Ridiculous it is, that the Internet was designed to connect people, but now it is segregating people.

Let me now imagine an extreme scenario, where Ant runs into Bat on the Internet. The problem is that Ant likes a film called Eekum, but Bat doesn’t, and thinks another film called Bokum is better. Tech companies are good at separating people due to their tastes, but they are not perfect, so understandable. It’s not like Ant doesn’t try to get along, Ant tries, to tell Bat how good Eekum is, and Bat does the same: tell Ant why Bokum is better. After some futile attempts, Ant can’t make Bat agree what Ant thinks. Because Ant hasn’t have a friend that loves Bokum, Ant thinks “maybe I just cannot get along with this type of people”, and by “this type of people” Ant means people who like Bokum. So, Ant just gives up. Later, Ant runs into Cat who also like Bokum as well, instead of talking with Cat, Ant thinks — “I can’t get along with someone like Bat”, so Ant walks away and never talked.

And sometimes I feel like I’m Ant, constantly under the influence of bias. Bias is the assumption of something we don’t know. We may assume the best or the worst of someone before even getting to know them. I understand that bias naturally happens, but oftentimes still falls into its hands, and make judgment based on bias. Why bother to learn more about someone I may hate, if I have plenty of people that I know I’m more probably to love? In such a way, people divide themselves into smaller and smaller groups. The segregation, in return, may fuel the bias, and mob mentality, to make people offensive against disagreements, in desperate attempt to defend their belief.

The Inception of Internet 2

Above is just my personal view, and Nyarla also feels tired of wars in the Internet. He comes up with the idea of Internet 2 in the book with the same title in 2019. In Internet 2, Nyarla imagines the outrage in Internet being overwhelmed by kindness, sympathy, and harmony.

優しさがインターネットを支配する時代となる。 It will become the era when kindness dominates the Internet.

NyarlaInternet 2

I use the word “harmony” because the whole idea of Internet 2 reminds me of the book Harmony by Project Itoh. Harmony portraits a dystopian world where everyone’s body is deemed the possession of humanity, and people’s minds are monitored to prevent any damage done to anyone including themselves. There is no dictator, but the collective mind is dictating everything.

Internet 2 might be something similar: everyone is forced by everyone to be kind, although “that kindness may not correspond to kindness in real life”. But in return, in Internet 2 there is no dissonance. People are happy.

But when it comes to Twitter2, things are a bit more complicated.

Twilight of Twitter 2

In Jan. 2021 Nyarla set up the Twitter2 discord server, dubbed “a truly happy SNS where everybody does not talk about politics or society, but watch anime and play games all day”.

In the short manga that introduces Twitter2, people are depicted as brains in jars, and Nyarla, depicted as a little girl, is taking care of them.

In the post Nyarla wrote that Twitter2 started from a joke. And he created it partly because someone asked him to do it and he’s interested in running Discord server, partly because “it’s interesting to make such a dystopian-like [Discord] server and have a community of otakus”.

Therefore, although Twitter2 shared some dystopian (or utopian, YMMV) nature with Internet 2, it was nowhere as extensive as the Internet 2, and was just a discord server of otakus. From a larger perspective, Twitter2 is the reflection of the Internet instead of Internet2, where people are in a smaller circle.

Nyarla’s note told a little about what’s in Twitter2, so I think I may also write something different.

Channels

Aside from hobby channels, like anime, game, manga, movie, books, etc., there are also channels that people share pics of animals, landscape, food, and talks about life, religion or private things.

Religion was one of the recently established channels. It probably spun from a discussion about whether God exists. I didn’t look into the channel very much, but it is interesting to see people talk about belief in a more open and objective way.

Liminal space is another one of the new channels. Pictures of empty space were posted there. Nyalra sometimes would repost liminal photos from twitter. He still does this sometimes. I also took a photo or two to post there but couldn’t find a good shot here where I live. Some photos there are interesting. Empty hallway, or even an empty room (not so liminal by definition, which confuses me a little), but I enjoy all the pictures there.

Some channels I visited most:

General: of course, most talk happens there.

Monologue (ひとり言): sometimes I’d like to write my thoughts there. There’s another channel called the wall (かべ) where harsher monologues were written. I couldn’t distinguish the difference until I learned about the phrase hitting wall (壁打ち), one of its meanings is to let things out alone.

Poison radio (毒電波): People were writing random things there. Most of them sounded crazy, which made me a little nervous and anxious. And that made me feel interested. The one I can remember most clearly is “the earth is targeted” (地球は、狙われている from Ultraman), because there was a person (nicknamed erson, with an icon P, if I got it right) posting it almost everyday. There’s a saying that if someone keeps repeating something it will be hard for you to get it out of your head. Here it proves itself again. “Poison radio” came from Leaf’s first visual novel Shizuku (1996). I took the English translation from the song INTERNET OVERDOSE, whose lyrics was by Nyalra.

Books (本): As I read books (lightnovels) much more than watching anime or comics. Sometimes a message popped up with a photo of newly bought books, or about a book recently read. There, I came to know Kazuki Sakuraba’s other works, and before then I only read GOSICK by the author. One of them being A Lollypop or a Bullet. It’s a story about a girl that grows up, with a girl that doesn’t have the chance to grow up. I also learned about Nobel Laureate Kazuo Ishiguro’s new book, Clara and the Sun, although I hadn’t read it until the server shut down.

The Sudden Sunset

Around the end of 2021, griefers appeared in the discord. Though I started writing it during Nov 2021, it is now May 2022, and I couldn’t remember things clearly, so I’ll try my best.

First there were spamming discord invites. Come join us to spam other servers, it said.

And another time, all channels were spammed with defecating GIFs. Because discord plays the GIF by default people are forced to see it. The server is down for a while, and it came back with bot administration to counter spams.

And finally, the server just disappeared. I didn’t know what happened until a friend told me attackers got it down.

From Nyarla’s post, the attackers used the below method to get the server banned:

  1. Use anonymous accounts to spam access tokens in the server
  2. Report it to Discord
  3. Discord bans the server due to TOS violation

From a third person’s perspective, I’d say it is an incredibly elegant method, which achieves the most destruction with the least effort.[1] And Discord’s lack of scrutiny before banning users and servers make this attack possible.

As a member, I wanted to say something, but surprisingly found myself at a loss for words. And at this time, 3 months after Nyarla set up a new server, and half a year after Twitter2’s disappearance, there’s nothing I can say about it any more. Some time it went just like that: people find themselves attention via the social network, but at the end, they don’t really need it.

And with that it concludes Twitter2’s short life.

Footnotes


  1. I thought this kind of method is more often done in China, where ill-minded people utilize other’s careless words to get them banned, especially if they something remotely bad about the government. ↩︎

Comment and share

Memory Order

in writing

大家好,这里是很懂C++的BlancJpg。

Memory order是什么?哎呀怎么这个都不懂。Memory order不是很简单嘛!Memory是记忆,order是顺序。理所当然,memory order是记忆的顺序!当然,我记性不是很好,经常记不清顺序——卡特列夫库——是什么的库?

拿昨天的早饭做例子吧,我吃的是面包夹肉饼——好吃吗?嗯……还行吧——我记得很清楚,我先吃了面包再吃的肉饼的。

……什么?原子化?对对对,我的牙齿是先碰到面包,再碰到肉饼的分子的。所以从分子层面上来说我是先吃的面包。你呀,明明是分子说什么原子化。难道是要把分子劈开吗?想裂变吗?

就说是先吃面包了!麦当劳的肉饼比较x……好了好了换个例子!拿前天做例子吧,我是先吃的早餐然后吃的午餐。——我说吃早餐了就是吃了!别多管闲事!所以从正常人的眼里来看,我肯定是先吃的早餐然后吃的午餐,除非有人在超光速运动。啊不对,如果是超光速运动的人,那就不是吃了,大概会看到我先吐出午餐,再吐出早餐。像小红帽故事里的大灰狼一样。所以是小红帽在超光速运动。谁也没看见大灰狼吃奶奶的场景对吧?没看见就是一切皆有可能。

大灰狼记不记得自己点了什么菜呢?毕竟是order……哈哈!

讲到哪里了,讲到晚饭了。前天的晚饭吃得比较快活。吃的羊肉串加牛肉面。饿了一天的肚子也填饱了。——所以讲吃早餐了!话真多呢这家伙!走了!

Comment and share

Author's picture

NoirGif

A progamer.

(click me to see some )


Student(probably)