Went to the Florida Forum last night. It's a fund-raising program for Wolfson Children's Hospital. Mitzi bought the tickets, I'm not sure I would have. I am glad I went. Of course, we talked about wearing masks, which we had in the car. Somehow, after finding parking, it completely slipped our minds again until we found our seats. So I'm hoping I haven't contracted COVID.

Surprise bonus, Apollo astronaut David R. Scott was in the audience and was recognized by the moderator before the interview started. He stood up and waved at the audience, which gave him a standing ovation. He was in the expensive seats and I tried to get a shot, but it wasn't great. As heroes go, he's perhaps the closest I've ever been to one. Pretty cool. Though I did speak to Senator John Glenn in 1987. He visited STEPHEN W. GROVES after STARK was hit, and I described the FFG-7 detect to engage sequence in CIC for him and Senator John Warner.

Anyway... At the opening they announced that photography was strictly prohibited. But I'd brought a camera and so I made a calculated decision to be "one of those guys" and take a couple of pics anyway. I understand the nature of the prohibition. Some folks can't figure out how to turn off their flash. Some would bring monster gear that would be distracting. There'd be focus confirmation beeps, focus-assist lamps, LCDs glowing everywhere, shutter sounds, etc.

Well, I brought the little Olympus Stylus 1s. 1/1.7" sensor (smaller than a 1" sensor, bigger than 1/2.3" which is typical on most compact super-zooms). The big attraction is a constant f2.8 aperture throughout the zoom range which extends to 300mm effective focal length. It has a tiny leaf shutter which is for all practical purposes silent. I turned off the LCD panel and relied on the electronic viewfinder. I also turned off the focus assist lamp and confirmation beep. Unless they were looking directly at me, I doubt anyone would know I was taking a picture.

The result seen above is straight out of camera, cropped a little. Not a "professional" image by any stretch, but enough to share.

Woz was fascinating. He rambled a bit, and occasionally forgot what he was originally responding to, but he was very entertaining. Mitzi said he sounds like me when he was complaining about how we don't own anything anymore, and they keep changing everything. He said something like, "In the old days, you'd buy a tool and it'd do the same thing it did on the first day, the whole time you owned it." Today, they keep changing our tools. And not always for the better.

The moderator asked him what his favorite device was, and after "the computer," it's his Apple Watch. He interacts more with his watch than with his phone. He doesn't like the e-sim in the iPhone 14. He said that Apple caused a Denial of Service attack on a cruise he was on. The ship had "adequate" internet access until 100 or so people with iPhones all tried automatically downloading a 1GB software update! When he pulled into port, he bought a data sim for his iPhone 13 and he had high-speed internet while everyone else basically had none.

He mentioned a few times that he decided very early as a young man that he would never be political, and that he'd never voted in an election. This was dismaying to me, as there were a lot of young people in the audience and Jacksonville already has an indifferent and disinterested electorate, and the faithless, feckless, Republican-dominated city council to prove it.

Toward the end of the conversation he mentioned it again, "I've never voted in an election..." Adding, "Until the last one."

He's not big on AI. He thinks it may be another dot-com bubble. He does appreciate that technology empowers the good and the bad alike. He's in litigation over a deep-fake that had his voice calling people about a bitcoin scam, "You send me one, I'll send you two."

My impression is that he's every bit the very nice guy that everyone I've ever heard talk about him has described. Very humble. He wants to be happy and "Happiness is smiles minus frowns." Don't do the things that cause frowns. He said he doesn't like blaming people when things go wrong, he just wants to fix them. Which is admirable, unless there are a bunch of powerful people who rely on things being broken to keep their power.

All in all, a very pleasant evening.