What society needs is more free time

August 9th, 2014

We go to school for 12 years, then we go to college for another 4 to 8 years. We are already in our mid-20s by the time we can become a productive member of society. On average we die at age 80. We spend almost 1/3 of our life just getting ready, doing nothing but homework. How are we going to spend the rest? We can do what society wants, get a nice paying job, get our 2 weeks of paid vacation a year, buy some expensive toys (we’re making […]

Living with less == Living with more

June 25th, 2014

You might have heard the saying: “Enjoy the little things in life!”. This is a passive thought. The fact that you should enjoy things that are small in your life implies that your life already contains such moments, that they may be rare, that you should be on a hunt for them. You might be at the point in your life where all such moments have vanished, caught by the rules and expectations of a heavily industrialized society. I would […]

Funniest Electronics Quiz

December 15th, 2012

This was my Thanksgiving take home quiz for my electronics class. My professor sure has a sense of humor.

Limitations of mobile devices

September 12th, 2012

I have been busy designing a new application for Glassomium. I’m not sure of how I’m going to call it, but it’s going to work as follow: A user places his/her phone on the table. The table recognizes the phone, confirms the identity of the person. A menu pops out, providing the user with the ability to pull out pictures, videos, contact information and a business card. The menu responds to movements of the phone on the table. Other users […]

My interview experience with Amazon

May 2nd, 2012

I’m not a person that gives up easily. Soon after my interview experience with Microsoft I applied for a position in software development at Amazon and my resume was able to catch the attention of the people from HR. My first phone interview happened sometimes in December 2011. The usual technical questions that you would expect from big technology companies, given a problem go through the solution, do complexity analysis, write the code. I don’t actually remember how I did […]

Where do babies come from?

December 27th, 2011

Great explanation.

Are we teaching math the wrong way?

December 13th, 2011

I’m hoping somebody will comment on this post to help me understand why math is taught the way it is and start a constructive discussion on the matter. So, here’s how I have been taught math from 1st grade all the way up to college: You learn the basics of whatever part of math you are studying (theorems, formulas, basic algebra, etc.) You solve hundreds of exercises to strengthen your skills on the part you’ve learned the basics of. This […]

My interview experience with Microsoft

December 8th, 2011

On early October of this year I submitted my resume to the Microsoft University Careers website. After a few weeks I received an e-mail from a Microsoft representative to schedule a phone interview. The phone interview was quite brief (a little more than half an hour). The person on the phone seemed very nice and asked me a series of questions that sounded a little absurd, but I guess they are useful to them to figure out how you think. […]

Cheers!

December 1st, 2011

I’ve been thinking about opening my own blog for quite a while. In fact I published my first website back in 2003 (https://www.pierotofy.it) and I thought that would have been enough. But the number of people contributing to that website which receives several thousands of hits a day has become impressive and I don’t consider it totally mine… sure, I check it daily to make sure there is no spam and to answer the forum, but the contents of it […]