I’m from Bergamo, Italy, but I currently live in Zurich, Switzerland.
In high school, I ran a Youtube channel called ScienziatopazzoTV and made live-action short movies with special effects using Adobe After Effects. It never really became popular or successful, but it left me with nice memories.
Travel
I like traveling. Sometimes I just yearn to go out and embark on an adventure, see things with my own eyes. Here are some destinations I consider memorable.
Burj al Babas
Burj al Babas is a massive abandoned residential complex near Mudurnu, Türkiye. After planning this trip for almost two years, I finally went there in April 2022 as part of a road trip from Istanbul to Cappadocia, both of which were also great.
I also made a video montage out of my drone footage.
Iceland
I went to Iceland in New Years’ Eve 2023. The place is simply stunning, it can’t be quite put into words. Highlights of the trip involved snorkeling in -17C temperature at Silfra, visiting a half-frozen Gullfoss waterfall and witnessing majestic seals at Jökulsárlón.
Italy
I also recommend everyone to visit my country. Here’s a video from a road trip I did to Naples in 2021.
Books
I mainly like sci-fi and non-fiction, but I am generally slow at reading. I always feel like I have to read too much stuff for my day job already.
I love the Culture series of sci-fi novels from the late Iain M. Banks. It’s powerful, it’s lyrical, it has the Gravitas of literary fiction that happens to be set in post-scarcity. But, most importantly, the author dares to be utopian. My favorite from the series is Surface Detail, followed by The State of the Art novella from the short story collection of the same title.
I also have a real weakness for Charles Stross’ writing style, and no instance of him acting like a boomer on Twitter will make me change my mind. I am talking about Accelerando and Glasshouse.
As for non-fiction, I’m going to go with a classic for Computer Scientists and recommend Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid.
Video Games
I wasted spent much of my teenage years playing video games on PC. See my Steam profile for an overview of my old gaming habits. I also own a Valve Index and consider myself to have pretty well developed VR legs.
I don’t think I have a favorite game, but some notable mentions are:
- Disco Elysium – Ok, if I had to pick one, it would be this.
- Half-Life: Alyx – The most “wow” I’ve ever felt playing a game for the first time. I’ll never forget Jeff.
- Beat Saber – I am pretty good for a casual. Expert+ only.
- Caves of Qud
- XCOM 2
- The new HITMAN series from 2016
- Garry’s mod – I have a TTT server setup that I sometimes host and play with friends, with custom playermodels, weapons and everything. It also has a VR Mod.