John Montagu was an accomplished person. In his lifetime he held various posts in English government. He was First Lord of Admiralty three times (accused of extreme incompetence the third time), an ambassador to the Dutch Republic, staged musical performances at his estate and was the heel in this famous exchange between himself and John Wilkes:
Montagu: "Sir, I do not
know whether you will die on the gallows or of the pox."
Wilkes:
"That, sir, depends on whether I embrace your principles or your
mistress."
Great stuff of privilege and drama. But, you know Montagu because when you put two pieces of bread together with something in between them, you get a sandwich. Montagu was John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich.
Given a choice, I doubt he'd pick his eating habits as the touchstone of his life's work. But, we don't get to choose that, do we? For me, I doubt I'll reach Montagu's zenith, but his tragedy does remind me that no matter how hard I try, the only "index" that I've invented that stands a chance of getting remembered is one that I can't repeat in church. It has something to do with sitting, effort and laziness.
Anyway, my newest index is much more family friendly. JJ, John Reilly and I were leaving the Apple store with John's new Mac Pro. The Rosedale, Minnesota Apple Store is in the middle of the mall, so the three of us were lugging this monstrous computer down the hall way. I thought it would be funny if two of us ran down the hall with the Mac while the other yelled "GO! GO! GO!"
This thing had no fewer than eight processors! Eight! It had more RAM than the first 20 hard drives that I have owned, combined. The shear power of this thing was staggering. It isn't anymore because it sits under John's desk and he doesn't do anything all that crazy with it—I have yet to see him affect the weather in any significant way.
If you could zap John's Mac Pro back to 1960, it would have been more powerful than the combined power of the world's computers, which leads me to an interesting question: What year would that computer be equal to all of the world's computers? Answer that question and you have Andrew Starks's Simulated Worldwide Operational Computing Power Index (ASSWOCPI)!
Think of it… The computer that you are reading this ridiculous blog post on was much more powerful than the world's first computer, Conrad Zuse's Z1 in 1936. Therefore, it can be said with certainty that your computer was much greater than all of the computer power in the world, circa 1936. That statement is also true for 1946, probably true for 1956, maybe even 1966, but almost certainly not in 1976. What point did your computer achieve ASSWOCPI?
The ASSWOCPI attempts to rate a computer by estimating the date at which that computer was equal to all of the computing power in the world.
TODO: Refine acronym. Still can't say in church.
TODO2: Find chart of worldwide computing power over time.
TODO3: Find acceptible method for rating computing power.
TODO4: Get people to use ASSWOCPI in casual conversation.
Andrew Starks’s Simulated Worldwide Operational Computing Power Index (ASSWOCPI)
John Montagu was an accomplished person. In his lifetime he held various posts in English government. He was First Lord of Admiralty three times (accused of extreme incompetence the third time), an ambassador to the Dutch Republic, staged musical performances at his estate and was the heel in this famous exchange between himself and John Wilkes:
Montagu: "Sir, I do not
know whether you will die on the gallows or of the pox."
Wilkes:
"That, sir, depends on whether I embrace your principles or your
mistress."
Great stuff of privilege and drama. But, you know Montagu because when you put two pieces of bread together with something in between them, you get a sandwich. Montagu was John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich.
Given a choice, I doubt he'd pick his eating habits as the touchstone of his life's work. But, we don't get to choose that, do we? For me, I doubt I'll reach Montagu's zenith, but his tragedy does remind me that no matter how hard I try, the only "index" that I've invented that stands a chance of getting remembered is one that I can't repeat in church. It has something to do with sitting, effort and laziness.
Anyway, my newest index is much more family friendly. JJ, John Reilly and I were leaving the Apple store with John's new Mac Pro. The Rosedale, Minnesota Apple Store is in the middle of the mall, so the three of us were lugging this monstrous computer down the hall way. I thought it would be funny if two of us ran down the hall with the Mac while the other yelled "GO! GO! GO!"
This thing had no fewer than eight processors! Eight! It had more RAM than the first 20 hard drives that I have owned, combined. The shear power of this thing was staggering. It isn't anymore because it sits under John's desk and he doesn't do anything all that crazy with it—I have yet to see him affect the weather in any significant way.
If you could zap John's Mac Pro back to 1960, it would have been more powerful than the combined power of the world's computers, which leads me to an interesting question: What year would that computer be equal to all of the world's computers? Answer that question and you have Andrew Starks's Simulated Worldwide Operational Computing Power Index (ASSWOCPI)!
Think of it… The computer that you are reading this ridiculous blog post on was much more powerful than the world's first computer, Conrad Zuse's Z1 in 1936. Therefore, it can be said with certainty that your computer was much greater than all of the computer power in the world, circa 1936. That statement is also true for 1946, probably true for 1956, maybe even 1966, but almost certainly not in 1976. What point did your computer achieve ASSWOCPI?
The ASSWOCPI attempts to rate a computer by estimating the date at which that computer was equal to all of the computing power in the world.
TODO: Refine acronym. Still can't say in church.
TODO2: Find chart of worldwide computing power over time.
TODO3: Find acceptible method for rating computing power.
TODO4: Get people to use ASSWOCPI in casual conversation.