All posts by Richard

NorthStar Nerd, Now Bird Brained!

Android | iPad | Kindle Fire, China, College Search, Economy 2.0, Legos, Northern Life

This blog, NorthstarNerd.Org is a maintained as an archive to my 28+ years as a web development / software project manager with Honeywell. My projects stretch back to the earliest days of the internet, and I often blogged about the world wide web and knowledge management.

In the Spring of 2014 I decided to retire at the early age of 57. I have never looked back. I am now a northern Minnesota based naturalist. I have been publishing since January 2014 at my web site: 365DaysOfBirds.Com.

For the moment please use these links to the WayBack Machine from the Internet Archive. During the Fall of 2025 I will be bringing back online at this site my archival content. Please note, the WayBack Machine can be slow to load content …

Northern Hawk Owl After the Storm

Here are the first posts from the old NorthstarNerd.Org archive.  An additional 500 in PDF format will be added in the near future.

  • eContent (chronologically the last posts)
    • One
    • Two
    • Three
    • Four
    • Five
    • The remainder will be categorized by the these topics
      • Android | iPad | Kindle Fire
      • China
      • College Search
      • Legos
      • Northern Life

An Aurora Borealis Social Media Case Study

Android | iPad | Kindle Fire, Economy 2.0, Northern Life

This case study starts in the wee hours of the morning on St. Patrick's Day 2015. Yours truly was on the frozen ice of a remote lake in northern Minnesota (Boulder Lake … 25 miles north of Duluth). During the cold night I was watching what would turn out to be one of the strongest Northern Lights Display of the last ten years. I was recording the event with my camera.

Actually, this story / case study started at 1:45 am as I lay fast asleep in bed. Although NASA and NOAA had forecast for an Aurora to start the following night, it was not expected the night of March 16/17. Suddenly the quiet of our bedroom was broken by a fierce alarm … Bing Bong, Bing Bong, Bing Bong! My Android smartphone app, Aurora Alert from Eagle's Orbit was sounding off. Groggily I check my app which I had customized based upon my exact location on the planet Earth to ring if the Aurora was expected to exceed a Kp of 4.33. I woke up quickly when I read the Kp was expected to reach 8.0 in one hour!

At this point I reached for my Google Nexus 10 tablet and logged into Facebook. Please understand I am a member of the Great Lakes Aurora Hunters. Thus Facebook enters into the equation. This group which now exceeds a membership of 4,000 gave me an easy place to check what was happening in real time. Yup, several members from near Ely and Grand Marais, Minnesota were already outside and reporting great displays. It's now 1:50 am; I bound out of bed and throw on my long johns! Remember, this is northern Minnesota in the winter time. I am about to head for a frozen windblown lake on a cold winter night, and stand for hours. In short, I will have a fantastic time!

After 3+ hours of watching one of the best displays I had ever seen, I head home. Arriving at the old homestead I wake my wife up at 6:00 a.m. with a tale of "wows"! Read Molly's tale of woe via her blog, Superior Footprints, "An Aurora Hunter's Wife"! At this point, you may be thinking … okay Facebook, but why a case study?? Take a look at the photo taken that night, and then read on below …

Northern-Lights-St-Patricks-Day-Aurora-05-Selfie

Getting home I naturally processed my photos. Now remember it was St. Patrick's Day. Realizing that a photo showing the heavens as green would have some traction, I now posted the image via the following methods:

By 1pm that afternoon, I know that my photo had already been posted (with my premission) on Destination Duluth, The Pioneer Press (St. Paul, Minnesota newspaper) and the Smithsonian website! By Thursday the combined groups had been combined groups had been kind enought to let me know the St. Patrick's Day Aurora Selfie had been seen by over 250,000 people!

Now you should understand the power of social media … thus a case study. Some important items to remember. I had content that fit the day / news (green in the heavens on St. Patrick's Day), and I took action quickly upon realizing the value of my image.

Here are more photos from that morning.

Northern-Lights-St-Patricks-Day-Aurora-04

Northern-Lights-St-Patricks-Day-Aurora-06-Backlit

Northern-Lights-St-Patricks-Day-Aurora-03

 

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If you're still reading, and would like to see a few photos from the second night out, browse to my other blog, 365 Days Of Birds. Yup! The Aurora lasted for days, and I kept going out at night to watch nature's fireworks!

Review: Canon SX60 Super Zoom Bridge Camera

Economy 2.0, Northern Life

Tired of lugging around your DSLR and all its lenses? Perhaps you may wish to consider the purchase of a super zoom camera. Many manufacturers have entered this market, including both Nikon and Canon. I recently completed a 365 day bird photography project where my camera was either a Canon sx40 or Canon sx60. The SX60 gives one a 60x magnification, which is very helpful when trying to get close enough for bird photos. Our fine feathered friends often spook quite easily. See my full review via my 365 Days of Birds web site.

Here is just one photo I took with the SX60, a Northern Hawk Owl.
Y2-D001-Northern-Hawk-Owl-Perched

New Mobile Friendly Design for NorthStarNerd.Org

Android | iPad | Kindle Fire, Economy 2.0

Long time readers of my blog will notice a different design implemented as of today. As in the past, my design is simple without much "frills". Under the hood of the implementation is a design which will automatically adjust to render the best experience for the reader depending upon the device they use to browse the web … a full sized computer, tablet, or smartphone.

I hope this design works. It is likely that I will tweak the design over the days and weeks ahead as I better understand its features.