Your Writing Sucks Less

Gar's Tips on Sucks-Less Writing.
via [ Poor But Happy ]

Half Full

A roundup of the past two weeks' good news from Iraq.
This is a refreshing article about good things that are happening in Iraq.

Let's see how long it takes the Boston Globe to report some of these stories.
via [ samaBlog ]

End Bush

protest, originally uploaded by brundlefly.

haacked has a cool HTML discussion about this sign, if you think discussion about HTML are cool.
via [ boingboing ]

DRUDGE REPORT: Wrong on MTV Video Awards

This just in from Drudge - THE BOOS THAT ROCKED THE VOTE: KERRY DAUGHTERS RECEIVE RUDE AWAKENING AT MTV AWARDS :

"From the moment Alexandra and Vanessa started speaking, the boos outweighed anything close to cheers, and the reaction turned worse when the daughters asked the VIACOM youth to vote for their father. So shocked by the reaction, the taller of the two daughters tried to 'shhhhhh' her peers to no avail."

WRONG!

The booing started when the BUSH twins were introduced, or maybe it was when the BUSH twins said they wanted people to vote for their father.

Whatever it was, people were all thinking in their heads, 'Hmm... which daughters are hotter? I like that Bush twin on the left.'

Let's go to the tape.

Comcast to market new video recorder

Today's Globe has this article, Comcast to market new video recorder.

In in, there are a couple of misleading statements:

Comcast will charge $9.95 a month for the system with no upfront installation charge, a steep discount from TiVo, which charges at least $99 for a stand-alone recorder plus $12.95 for monthly service.

Actually, you can get a TiVo Lifetime subscription which costs $299. So after 30 months, TiVo is a better deal.

And then there's this:

Besides requiring a separate box in addition to the cable or satellite box, TiVo devices have to be plugged in to a phone jack to get updated programming schedules.

Nope. You don't need a phone jack, you can just hook up to your home network.

Mark Frauenfelder hates the Explorer 8000 digital video recorder.

Comcast DVR (Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8000) review.

Scrap Electoral College

Scrap Electoral College, Says New York Times

The United States should abolish its electoral college because it creates the possibility that the president will be a candidate who loses the popular vote, the New York Times said on Sunday.

I've been a proponent of this for years.

Not The Amazing Race

My wife and I went for a hike at hike at the Blue Hills Reservation located just outside of Boston.

We're always talking about how we'd make a great team on the Amazing Race TV show, so for this hike we imagined ourselves in competition in a race to get to the top first.

Made the hike a lot of fun.

You should see us when we're driving. ;-)

Here's an out take of me doing my Jerry Lewis running impression.

Blue Hills Photo Album

I have no friends

The only way to check out the new Apprentice cast on Friendster is to join .

So I joined, and my profile comes up and says, "'You have 0 friends."

Maybe they could think of a better default message.

Downhill Battle - Downhill Battle Labs - Blog Torrent

Battle Tottent is now Blog Torrent and I still don't understand it.

Play movies on your Palm powered Treo 600

The Kinoma Player let's you play movies on your Treo 600, directly from the internet.

Gotta go save one of my movies in the Kinoma format.

PalmPixels is a good source for media on a Palm info.

Robby Road Steamer in the Phoenix

Metal gone mad: The macho bombast of Robby Road Steamer

Robby Road Steamer is much more than macho metal bombast. He’s also a sensitive lover man... on the Springsteen-esque "Finger Blastin’," Robby remembers tender moments: "Your hair danced softly, just like it did in Latin class. We went to Friendly’s, got grilled-cheese sandwiches. Your dad was at work. Your mom was out shopping. We played Nintendo" — his voice drops to a sensual whisper — "and we started something."

Lyrical gold in the same vein as Don White's "I'm From Lynn."
via [ The Kvetch Board! ]

I'm on the radio

I'm on WZBC 90.3 FM in Boston: Friday from 4-6.

There's a stream too.

Steve is a DJ.

I think it's time for a redesign

These Sukahs have cool blogs:
Jennarator.
Nedward.
Presley.
Tbone.
Albany Dan.
Macy Me.

If nominated, he will not run

John Cusak For President.

And the nominees are

2004 Boston Music Awards Nominees.

My picks:

ACT OF THE YEAR
Aerosmith

ALBUM OF THE YEAR (MAJOR LABEL)
Fountains of Wayne (Welcome Interstate Managers)

ALBUM OF THE YEAR (Indie)
Rubyhorse (Goodbye to All That)

LOCAL DEBUT ALBUM OF THE YEAR
Dresden Dolls (Dresden Dolls)

LOCAL ALBUM OF THE YEAR
Ad Frank (A Lotta Devotion)

OUTSTANDING POP/ROCK BAND
Aerosmith

MALE VOCALIST OF THE YEAR
Steven Tyler (Aerosmith)

FEMALE VOCALIST OF THE YEAR
Kay Hanley

SONG OF THE YEAR
Fountains of Wayne (Stacy's Mom)

LOCAL SONG OF THE YEAR - TIE
A Little Devotion (Ad Frank)
Coin Operated Boy (Dresden Dolls)

LOCAL MALE VOCALIST
Mike Gent (The Gentlemen)

LIVE ACT
The Dresden Dolls

LOCAL FEMALE VOCALIST
Amanda Palmer (Dresden Dolls)

LOCAL ROCK/POP BAND
Waltham

Not Steve Garfield

Eric Rice is Not Steve Garfield.

Blue New York

Like many New Yorkers, we are very unhappy that the Republican National Convention is being held in our great city.

All New Yorkers should put blue in their windows. Simple as it may be, the image of an entire city blanketed in blue, building to building, window to window, will be a powerful and poignant protest.

They've decided to focus on Greenwich Village now.

Go Blue!

Adam Curry Hits The Big Time

Check out Adam Curry's Daily Source Code - August 25, 2004 where talks about the spoof of his show that I did:

I thought that was pretty good... I know there's gotta be something there... if now I'm already being spoofed by Steve Garfield then you know you're hitting the big time.

Cool!

Thanks Adam.

Here's the audio excerpt of Adam Curry [ mp4 ]

Dogs and Fawns Living Together

Soo cute.
It's like a cute kitten picture without the cute kittens.

Not the Source Code

Adam Curry loved my spoof of his Daily Source Code audio blog.

Cool!

Imogen Heap, Dido, U2, Elvis Costello: Together

musicplasma : the music visual search engine.
I think I linked to this once before, but just came across it again.

It's cool.

A Golden Moment

Celebrate Good Times, come on!
USA's Kerri Walsh, bottom, and teammate Misty May celebrate after beating Brazil in the gold medal beach volleyball finals during the 2004 Summer Olympic Games.

I just knew that this was going to be the top photo on Yahoo!

Sights and Sounds of Millennium Park

The serene scene at Millennium Park was broken by the screams of a baby. I guess the baby didn't want to go back into the van.

A woman was nearby, lying down on a blanket, laughing to someone on the other end of the phone.

A little girl was trying to learn to ride a bike, despite the help of her father. Well, I'm not sure that she was actually trying to learn. Everytime she tried to steer, the bike started going off the path. I think her father needed to give her a lesson on steering first. The idea, as I understand it, is to keep the bike going in a straight line. She didn't seem to care much about steering, or keeping her balance either, for that matter. Her father kept holding her up all the time, and didn't let her go.

It reminded me of when I learned how to ride a two wheeler. At first I had a bike with training wheels. You know they are uneven on purpose, don't you? That's so the rider can practice trying to ride on two wheels, and if you start to fall, one of the raining wheels will catch you.

This was never explained to me. That's why you could see me riding down the street, tilted to one side or another.

One day my best friend Paul Tombeno, got a wrench out of my cellar and took off my training wheels.

He got me on my bike, ran along side, and then just let go.

I was riding.

That's how I learned.

Paul Tombeno should head on over to Millenium Park and teach that little girl to ride.

On second thought, maybe he shouldn't. She'd just ride right into the bushes.

How to put a link on someone's mail

My mom wanted me to look at an interesting web page, but didn't know how to send it to me.

On the Mac, you just click on the URL and drag it into the body of your email.

This took a visit over to my Mom's to explain.

Now she can show you how to do it, on her new video blog entry, How to put a link on someone's mail: The Movie.

The Bachelor is moving in

After the first Rose Ceremony ends there'll be once last initial twist with, for the first time ever, the selected Bachelor joining the women in their move to the Ladies' Villa, where he'll also reside for the duration of the series, creating an environment that should allow for the development of more immediate and stronger relationships between the Bachelor and his suitors.

Alrighty then. ;-)

It's a Video Blog Roll

Check out this cool Video Blog Roll.

Here's how to add it to your blog.

Be a Hero. Beat Cancer.

Be a Hero. Beat Cancer.
This is a follow up to my earlier post, to remind you to donate to the Dana Faber Cancer Institute.

World's Largest Pink Ribbon

3M is making the World's Largest Pink Ribbon out of 75,000 pink Post-it notes. If you follow this link and enter your name, city and state, 3M will donate $1 to City of Hope Cancer Center.

Michael James Dunn is funny

Michael James Dunn is a funny audio blogger.

At this rate, pretty soon I'll be listening to and watching more blogs than I'm reading.
via [ Eric Rice ]

45 years of his life, on the web

Documented Life - An Autodocumentary by Miles Hochstein.

The water is hilarious

Halley changes from her white T-Shirt into her blue Blogger one and dives in:

The water is warm and wild and pummelling and up and down and hilarious as it tosses the two of us around. I guess I needed to be in there -- it feels so good...

Nice.

Let Go

.
Zach Branff writes on his blog:

First of all, I cannot believe how many of you are responding to this blog. Second, I can't believe how many of you are responding to the film. Our little baby Garden State is blowing up. It makes me very proud to tell you, that due to the overwhelming response to the movie, Fox Searchlight plans to open the film up on over 600 screens this coming weekend!! That's crazy for this little movie. I just am so thrilled that so many of you are connecting to the story.

Just saw Garden State in Framingham in Digital! Whoa.

I laughed, I cried, I went to John Harvard's Brewhouse afterwards for some beer and calamari! They've got a great Marzen on tap. I took home a growler.

Using Frou Frou's Let Go in the soundtrack was amazing. Perfect placement.

Anti-Kerry vets not there that day. Neener neener.

Chicago Tribune | Anti-Kerry vets not there that day:

Feb. 28, 1969: ON THE DONG CUNG RIVER

Anti-Kerry vets not there that day

By William B. Rood
Chicago Tribune
Published August 21, 2004

There were three swift boats on the river that day in Vietnam more than 35 years ago—three officers and 15 crew members. Only two of those officers remain to talk about what happened on February 28, 1969.

One is John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate who won a Silver Star for what happened on that date. I am the other.

Thanks BugMeNot for the username/password to read this article.

My lightswitch says no0P

The automatic timer on my lightswitch displayed a message this morning:

no0P

Hmm.

Not the greatest error message.

I figured that it had something to do with the power going on and off. So I reprogrammed the timer, and set it to run.

no0P

D'oh.

Next, I changed the battery.

That worked.

Message to Gary Gulman

Call my mom.

I'll be on the radio

I'm on WZBC 90.3 FM in Boston: Friday from 4-6.

There's a stream too.

Steve is a DJ.

Do Macs Really Cost More than Windows PCs?

Macs are cheaper (price wise, not quality) than Dells!
via [ Information Leafblower ]

Rejected

The Paper Napkin email rejection service.

If some hot girl gives you her email address, and the domain name is papernapkin.net, she wants nothing to do with you.

Email her and you'll get this email reply:

Subject: Nice to hear from you

Ha ha, just kidding. Actually, this is a rejection letter. The person who gave you this email address does not want to have anything to do with you.

Sorry.

Bill Murray is Steve Zissou

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou: A Yahoo! Movies Exclusive - New Trailer.

Adam Curry's Daily Source Code

An excerpt from today's Daily Source Code by Adam Curry. [ mp3 ]

Check out stevegarfield.com, He blogged the Democratic National Convention. Really funny. I like the way he did it... It's good stuff.

Thanks!
daily source code august 19 2004.

Track eBay auctions with RSS

Custom eBay Searches Delivered by RSS.

RSS Feed for my current Off On A Tangent Text Ad auction:
http://rssauction.com/cgi/rssget.cgi/411.rss

Here's another RSS Feed to search for 'Text Ad Blog'.

Hitchhikers Blog to the Galaxy

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Movie - Official Blog.
via [ Micro Persuasion ]

Couchable Videoblogging

Guide to Ease: Almost there - Couchable Videoblogging.
A new meme is forming in the living room.

Knoppix is Free

This website is about Knoppix, a Free and Open Source Live Linux CD. Knoppix is a GNU/Linux distribution that boots and runs completely from cd. It includes recent linux software and desktop environments, with programs such as OpenOffice.org, Abiword, The Gimp, Konqueror, Mozilla, Apache, PHP, MySQL and hundreds of other quality open source programs.

Cool.

Won't You Be My Neighbor?

I just found a new website created by people from MIT.

It's a free site for neighborhoods.

Looks interesting. You can take a look at:

http://www.i-neighbors.org/home.php

It has areas for the following:

Communicate with your neighbors.
Find neighbors with similar interests.
Share information on local companies and services.
Organize and advertise local events.
Meet new people from your neighborhood.
Carpool with your neighbors.

I just created a Pondside neighborhood at:
http://www.i-neighbors.org/02130/Pondside

Might be fun to explore.
via [ Marc ]

Eugene Mirman CD

Eugene Mirman's CD/DVD "The Absurd Nightclub Comedy of Eugene Mirman" on 'Suicide Squeeze Records' is completed and will 'drop' October 19th.

You can pre-order it now at amazon.com.

Eugene Mirman is a Russian born comic who started out in Boston and now makes his home in New York. I think he is the funniest story teller I've ever seen. I met him back when I was working at FNX Radio in Lynn. Eugene is very quick witted. Back then, before he was big medium, he needed a ride into town after the show. I drove him into Boston. I've seen him perform when he comes back to Boston. Still funny.

TypePad: How to add code to the sidebar

Jay got this cool info from TypePad on how to add code to the sidebar.

It's a cool trick. You just use the TypeList Notes field:

Create a new TypeList. Use the Configure options to set the Notes to Display as Text.

Then paste your search code into the Link Notes. You can leave the Link URL and Link Title blank.

Then make this TypeList show up on your Weblog by going into the Weblog: Design: Content area.

Here's a cool example.

Banana seats still rule.

My favorite bike as a kid is back, the Stingray.

Mine had a really high Sissy Bar on the back. That was so cool. Why it was cool and had a name like that, I don't know.

We used to play bicycle tag in our neighborhood. We'd ride and ride and ride until the streetlights came on. Then we had to go home for dinner.

We took our bikes everywhere. We'd go for long trips in to the woods. One time we went to Dungeon Rock to try to find the rumored pirate treasure that was supposed to be burried there. We had our littlest kid, Bobby Murray, crawl into the hole and try to get down as far as he could. No treasure was found.

One day while playing in the woods we found a cash register! Whoa! No cash though. We went home and told our parents and the police came. Exciting times.

Apple iTunes Tip

Apple's iTunes rocks with a 12 second crossfade.

To set it up, from iTunes, go to the iTunes menu, choose preferences, click Audio, and then check off 'Crossfade Playback' and set it to 12 seconds.

Not seen on BBC America

The Go Team.

Just added to the playlist at WZBC 90.3 FM Boston.

As seen on BBC America

The Dead Pets.

The leader of this band is the kid with the mowhawk from the BBC America show 'Faking It'. He's a punk rocker and was transformed into a orchestra conductor.

Maria Sharapova Likes It

Speedminton.

Maria Sharapova Speedminton Page.

Jagshemash, I like you!

The Unofficial Borat Homepage - Sacha Baron Cohen and Ali G - Jagshemash, Pepsi Max.

Borat Soundboard - Wow Wow Wee Waa!
via [ The Ultimate Insult ]

Why Politicians Need Weblogs

My friend Tim Ireland in London is spearheading an initiative to have politicians start weblogging. Something we should be doing here too.

Here's his site:

Why Politicians Need Weblogs

It has some good examples.

Here's the most famous one Tom Watson.

He's also taken it a step further by getting people to start up weblogs for their local MP's:

How To Run a 'Proxy' Weblog on Behalf of Your MP

It's a great tutorial on how to get a weblog going.

Do any Massachusetts politicians have weblogs?

Use you Simon Gift Card, or loose it!

If you have a Simon Gift Card lying around the house, you'd better use it. If you don't, by the time you decide to use it, it could be worth NOTHING. Check out their Service Charges

Your gift card expires on the date printed on the front of the card. There is an administrative fee of $2.50 a month, which is waived for the first 6 months. Beginning in the seventh month after the card issue date, the administrative fee will automatically be deducted from the card balance on the first day of each month until the balance reaches $0.

If you try to use it at either Filene's or Bloomingdales, they've got to have you buy a store gift certificate first. Then you can use the store gift certificate. Weird huh? Simon says, "The Simon Gift Card can be used anywhere Visa Debit is accepted."

Easy to Use, No.
That leads you to think that it's easy to use. Well, not exactly. First of all you need to know how much is left on your card. That takes a phone call which costs 50 cents.

Point of Purchase Problems.
I think the problem is not with the Simon Gift Card itself, but with the retail point of purchase systems. They are not set up to handle these cards. these point of sale systems need to be able to query the Simon Gift Card host and determine your remaining balance, and then let you use that balance towards your total purchase price, allowing you to make up the difference with cash, check or credit card.

The systems at Filene's or Bloomingdales don't allow that.

Good for 7 years?
The Massachusetts Gift Certificate Law states:

Gift Certificates must be good for at least 7 years.

How can a gift certificate that looses $2.50 in value per month be good for 7 years, if for example it starts out worth $25. At the rate of a $2.50 administrative fee per month, after 10 months it'd be worth nothing.

UPDATE
I got a response from the Massachusetts Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation:

Thank you for contacting us regarding your dispute. The
Massachusetts Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation is
charged with monitoring the marketplace to promote fair and honest
competition.
Unfortunately, Simon Malls found a way to circumvent the gift
card law. Because those particular gift cards operate in conjunction
with credit card companies, they are not covered under the law, and
therefore, can legally lose value. If you want to address this further,
I would suggest contacting the Attorney General's Office at
617-727-8400.

My Old House

The house I grew up in is for sale, and my mom writes about it on her blog.

An Indiana Jones Moment

British journalist kidnapped by Iraqi thugs and then released tells his amazing story:

Putting my fingers through a crack in the wooden door, I loosened the rope and tugged at the door - only to realise that someone outside the room was holding it shut. I wrenched it open and saw a woman in a nightshirt standing there. I felt cold, clinical and desperate to escape at all costs. In an Indiana Jones moment, I grabbed her by the neck, slammed her against a wall, pressed my knife to her throat and hissed at her: "Help me, or I will kill you."

Whoa!

VideoBlogging.info

VideoBlogging.info just went live to teach people how to get video up on their weblogs.

I've written an article for them called Citizen Journalism and Video Blogging.

I've got a fast internet connection, a computer and camera. It's time to make some videos and share them with the world.

Up until a few years ago, the tools of video production were out of reach for the average consumer, people were still using dial-up modems to access the web, and creating a web page required learning HTML.

Everything has changed.

Free Movies

Free Cinema is an experiment with two goals: 1) To introduce independent filmmakers to the ideas behind the burgeoning free-culture movement. 2) To see if applying those ideas to feature filmmaking will result in something new and interesting.

There are two rules of Free Cinema:

Rule One: No money may be spent on the production
Make a film for free, and suddenly giving it away is a lot easier.

Rule Two: The film must be copylefted
A "copyleft" means that you let anyone copy and/or make new things from your film--as long as they promise to release anything they make from it with the same terms.

You can talk about Free Cinema.
via [ J-Walk ]

My new favorite radio mp3 show

Adam Curry's Daily Source Code.

How to Save the World

A Prescription for Business Innovation: Creating Technologies that Solve Basic Human Needs:

Hierarchy and Autocracy are the Enemies of Innovation: There is a strong creative tension between individuals and the communities they elect to or are asked to be part of, caused by divergent needs, drivers, and behaviours. Each individual and each community needs its own space. Flat, small, responsive, democratic organizations are inherently more innovative.

via [ FC Now ]

Google in my mind

PLAYBOY INTERVIEW: GOOGLE GUYS:

PLAYBOY: Is your goal to have the entire world’s knowledge connected directly to our minds?

BRIN: To get closer to that—as close as possible.

PLAYBOY: At some point doesn’t the volume become overwhelming?

BRIN: Your mind is tremendously efficient at weighing an enormous amount of information. We want to make smarter search engines that do a lot of the work for us. The smarter we can make the search engine, the better. Where will it lead? Who knows? But it’s credible to imagine a leap as great as that from hunting through library stacks to a Google session, when we leap from today’s search engines to having the entirety of the world’s information as just one of our thoughts.

You're not welcome

RNC Not Welcome.

Bush's nominee to head the CIA: "I am not qualified"

Filmmaker Moore Quotes Goss on Lack of CIA Credentials:

U.S. Congressman Porter Goss, President Bush's nominee for CIA director, could be his own worst enemy when it comes to making the case that he deserves to lead the U.S. intelligence agency.

"I couldn't get a job with CIA today. I am not qualified," the Florida Republican told documentary-maker Michael Moore's production company during the filming of the anti-Bush movie "Fahrenheit 9/11."

A day after Bush picked Goss for the top U.S. spy job, Moore on Wednesday released an excerpt from a March 3 interview in which the 65-year-old former House of Representatives intelligence chief recounts his lack of qualifications for employment as a modern CIA staffer.

"I don't have the language skills. I, you know, my language skills were romance languages and stuff. We're looking for Arabists today. I don't have the cultural background probably," Goss is quoted in an interview transcript.

"And I certainly don't have the technical skills, uh, as my children remind me every day: 'Dad you got to get better on your computer.' Uh, so, the things that you need to have, I don't have."

via [ Jim Gilliam ] the guy who produced Outfoxed

Terror Free!

Halley Suitt writes about Jeff Jarvis on Nicholas Kristof's article in The New York Times today about the likelihood of a nuclear device being set off in Times Square. She says:

You can't tell me we don't live continuously with a very depressing, low rumbling feeling of completely insecurity and terror under every day we simply try to get ready for work, take care of our children, just go about our lives. And this Bush administration doesn't add to any warm fuzzy feelings of security. They add terror to terror it seems to me. Some "new normal" -- I can do without it.

The Statue of Liberty Gang is here to promote living a Terror Free life. Check out the video.

A comparative study

iPod vs. The Cassette.
via [ David Pogue ]

Upscale Comedic Programming for Boomers

Stand-Up Comedy Television.

Resources for web developers

HTML Kit for more than editing HTML.

FavIcon from Pics is cool.
via [ Presurfer ]

Bittorrent (BT), RSS and some other letters

Buttress - Bittorrent RSS application.

Buttress will be a application to automatically download and run .torrent files from RSS feeds, without user input.

I'll understand this someday.
via [ PVRblog ]

They're Dead Jim.

The Blog of Death.
Interesting obituraries with hyperlinks.
via [ Leagacy Matters ]

Bush Leak

Bush Leak Allowed Terrorists to Escape.
via [ New Media Musings ]

Joe Conason: 'Latest Bush blunder: A mole made public':

"The whole thing smacks of either incompetence or worse," said Tim Ripley, a security expert who writes for Jane’s Defense publications. "You have to ask: what are they doing compromising a deep mole within al Qaeda, when it’s so difficult to get these guys in there in the first place?"

That is the pertinent question, and the answer is all too obvious.

via [ Today's Papers ]

Demetri Martin's Diary

A weeklong journal from a comedian and writer. By Demetri Martin:

"Before leaving the gas station, I took out my electric toothbrush and tried to clean the scratch off my car."

Ha!
via [ Dangerblog ]

Demitri Martin - Official Website.

He saw comet-tails on every pitch.

The LSD No-Hitter:

When the subject of baseball and drugs comes up, the story of Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Dock Ellis and his celebrated 'LSD No-Hitter' stands out above all others. On June 12, 1970, the 25-year-old pitcher was between starts, so he stayed back in his Los Angeles hotel while his team flew on to San Diego to play the Padres. Ellis invited his girlfriend over, and they dropped hits of acid around noon.

As he tells it in his autobiography, In the Country of Baseball:

'I had taken LSD ... I thought it was an off day. That's how come I had it in me. I took the LSD at 12 noon. At one, my girlfriend looked in the paper and said 'Dock, you're pitching today'.'"

Whoa!

Comcast Cable Installation Nightmare

Brian Lewandowski - How I Got Cable Installed in My Ass.
I'm just happy that all my cables are installed in my walls, and that my only problem is with On Demand not really being able to show me shows when I demand it to.

Try watching a Sopranos episode from this past season.

You can't.

Voted for Bush, Now voting for Kerry

Check out this new MoveOn PAC Real People ad:

http://www.moveonpac.org/morris/?ad_id=13

MoveOn PAC asked their members who voted for Bush in 2000 to talk about why they are voting for Kerry in 2004. Academy award-winning documentary film director Errol Morris interviewed these former Bush voters on camera, and cut seventeen ads that tell their stories. These stories of disaffection are powerful statements about the failed Bush presidency.

Go to the link above to vote on this ad, or any of the other ads. The highest-rated ads will be aired during the Republican convention.

Testing a new video blogging tool

I made up a new site called vSpan, to use for testing a new video blogging tool.

Text Ad for the 'Off On A Tangent' blog

Bid now on eBay.

Hulk Hogan, Mr. T and You vs. Bush

The Anti-Bush Video Game.
via [ sLop ]

iTune Crossfade Playback

I'd like to find out how to burn a CD in iTunes with a 12 second crossfade between songs.

In iTunes I set my Crossfade Playback to 12 seconds.

Works great in iTunes, but when I burn my playlist to CD, it defaults to the Burning 'Gap Between Songs' value, which only goes to 'none', and does not allow entry of a number like -12.

There's also a check box labeled 'Sound Check'. What's that for?

Videoblogging is the new steamboat

Over at Guide to Ease, Peter Van Dijck takes a look at the state of videoblogging in: Videoblogging and the co-construction of users and technology.

The videoblogging challenge is both technical and social. Not separately technical and social, the two are intimately connected. You cannot develop the technology without developing the community.

... Empowering people. Simple technology. No high production values. Back and forth community video. Moments and conversations. Getting to know each other.

... Clearly, we’re still figuring out the language of videoblogging. This is a time of experimenting, of pioneers.

Peter goes on to list the pioneers of videoblogging. I got a kick out of who he has chosen as videoblogging's posterboy. ;-)

Cheers!

Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Forget the bloggers, it's the vloggers showing the way on the internet.

An excerpt:

"Steve Garfield, a video producer from Boston, Massachusetts, has no problems with the medium. He uses his website to be a 'citizen journalist', which he describes as 'anyone who decides to tell a story and share it'.

Mr Garfield posts about two vlogs a week, on everything from beer and local human interest stories to an off-beat daily report from the recent Democratic convention. There are still only a few hundred
vlogging sites on the web - compared with literally thousands of blogging sites - but Mr Garfield predicts that more internet users will get involved in vlogging once the technological barriers come down.

'As tools come out that make it easier, more people will start creating video blogs,' he says. 'The barriers to entry now are the number of steps it takes to get a video published on the web. You've got to shoot the video, digitise it, edit it, compress it for web delivery, upload it to a host and post it to your blog.'"

Your fruit smoothie is ALIVE!

Silk Live!

A blog list for media guys

Suggested Blogs by Jeff Jarvis.

Life Lessons from Dave Barry

Sixteen things it took me over 50 years to learn:

9. You will never find anybody who can give you a clear and compelling reason why we observe daylight savings time.

Worth taking a look at.

It's a movie made on a Mac.

Radius - Official Site.

DVD release of sci-fi film Radius shows indie ingenuity.

Kopel fact Checks Farenheit 9/11

Fifty-nine Deceits in Fahrenheit 911, Dave Kopel, Independence Institute.
Not Ted, but after reading the first section, I'm impressed with his research.

I wonder if he's going to correct the false impression that George W. Bush enjoys digging in the dirt looking for worms.
via [ fark ] where there are a gazillion comments about it.

Kerry Wins!

Current Electoral Vote Predictor 2004.
via [ Sean Bonner ]

Hey Diane Farr, wanna hang out?

Diane Farr writes in her book, The Girl Code:

... anyone who can hang out with someone who's fifteen years younger than him is a loser.

Wrong!

Anyone who can hang out with someone younger than him is a winner.

W I N N E R!

Take a few steps back

KODAK: Beginnings of Photographic Composition.

BitTorrent Made Easy?

Downhill Battle - Downhill Battle Labs - Battle Torrent.
If I could understand BitTorrent I might use it.

List-o-Links!

WebGardi - Interesting Links.

More Bandwidth For Free!

This is a good deal.

My hosting provider, 1&1.com, just increased the monthly transfer volumes on three of their packages and it doesn't cost extra:

1&1 Home Package: Was 5 GB — Now 25 GB
1&1 Business Package: Was 15 GB — Now 50 GB
1&1 Developer Package: Was 30 GB — Now 100 GB

Sweet!

They are studying blogs in college!

Into the Blogosphere:

"This online, edited collection explores discursive, visual, social, and other communicative features of weblogs. Essays analyze and critique situated cases and examples drawn from weblogs and weblog communities. Such a project requires a multidisciplinary approach, and contributions represent perspectives from Rhetoric, Communication, Sociology, Cultural Studies, Linguistics, and Education, among others."

I hope I get an A!

Time Goes By - What it's really like to get older

Ronni Bennett writes about my mom today on her blog, Time Goes By - What it's really like to get older:

The tagline on My Mom’s Blog is “Thoroughly Modern Millie” and she will be 79 years old later this month. Millie Garfield is billed as the Internet’s oldest blogger and what I like best about My Mom’s Blog is that while Millie covers a wide variety of topics – from movies to Mah Jongg to politics to dieting and even a little marriage counseling - she also tells us what it’s like to be her age.

It's a great post that says a lot about my mom.

Imogen Heap is Video Blogging

She writes on her blog:

So i stuck together a load of little video clips i made on my mobile phone while i was on that cycling trip following the River Thames with the original version of "lonely little petunia" i did. Some of you saw it lst night on the "Six feet under episode "the dare" last night. I had a few emails to hear it again. This is the version i did that I like the most

Nice.

Portman by Degas

PLUS EQUALS
via [ boing boing ]

People Like This News

I'm starting to hear that Topix.net is a good place to go for news.

Hmm... They've got Blog News, Boston News and Beer News.

Vote Gary Gulman

Just a reminder to everyone that Tuesday (8/3/04) at 8 PM is the airing of Last Comic Standing (on NBC)… the remaining 6 comics compete for the three finalist spots. As soon as the show is over the voting begins, and ends pretty swiftly (explained below).

When that show ends the voting begins... you may vote 3 times per email address AND 3 times per phone line AND 3 times by text message... Here are the rules.

Gary Gulman's voting codes will be:
Phone: 1-866-FUNNY-92 (ends a maximum of two hours after show)
Text Message: text 2 to 45278 (ends at 4:00 a.m. EDT the following morning)
Vote On-line at www.VoteNBC.com (ends at 1:00 p.m.
EDT the following day)
via [ Rick Jenkins ]

Be a Hero. Beat Cancer.

Click Here to donate to beat Cancer.
Cancer is bad.

Research is good.

My mom is currently being treated by the doctors at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute for a rare form of cancer called GIST.

She was down in Florida when they found it and I was up here in Boston. I did some research on the Internet and found out that the experts on GIST worked at Dana Farber. They encourage doctors from all over to contact them for consulations. We did that, and they agreed with my mom's doctors in Florida to do surgery. She had the surgery and they removed it all. Now she's going into Dana Farber regularly for checkups.

It was conforting to get that second opinion from them.

The doctors at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute are leaders in the world for their research into this rare type of cancer.

Please click here to donate and help my team reach and surpass our fundraising goal for this year.

It's easy to click and donate online, you don't even have to walk.

Thanks.

My Unexpected "Appearance" on HBO

James Broadwater ended up, being interviewed by Borat, on the Ali G show and writes about it on his blog - My Unexpected "Appearance" on HBO

Several people have expressed concern over my statement that Jews will go to Hell. That was direct response to a direct set of questions about who God will let into Heaven. John 3:16-18 clearly states, as do many other Bible passages, that everyone who accepts Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior will spend eternity in Heaven, while everyone who rejects Him will spend eternity in Hell, because he has rejected the Only Begotten Son of God. Maybe I should have refused to answer such a pointed question that was designed to cause conflict, but to say that everyone goes to Heaven would be lying, and it would be heartless, giving people a false hope. Jesus is the Jewish Messiah, and millions of Jews over the past 2,000 years have accepted Him as such. It is my prayer that many more will do the same.

Ah, so that's what the John 3:16 guy was saying all those years at sporting events. [ Note: They even made a movie about him ]

Broadwater goes on to talk more nonsense:

As far as the entertainer on HBO goes, I think he could still make money without hurting people or attempting to damage good causes. I hope he will re-think the direction of his life.

The Bible says, 'Silence the mocker and strife will cease,' and this stunt pulled by HBO is just one more reason why I believe that the liberal, anti-God media needs to be brought under the strict control of the FCC, and that as soon as possible.

Hey Broadwater, Babba-Booey! Babba-Booey! Babba-Booey! Babba-Booey! Babba-Booey! Babba-Booey! Babba-Booey!


"The 'liberal anti-God media' is more of a free speech pro-choice type of group."
-Steve 8:2.

Ha!

REPUBLICANS PLAN PUSH FOR ELIMINATION OF IRS

A domestic centerpiece of the Bush/GOP agenda for a second Bush term is getting rid of the Internal Revenue Service, the DRUDGE REPORT 2004® has learned.

Taegan Goddard has more on this.

Hey John Kerry, if this is true, I suggest that you propose the same thing, with the addition of FREE BEER FOR EVERYONE.


It's a great way to get people to register to vote too.

The Olympic Press Badges Have Photos

Stuart Hughes writes in his blog, BEYOND NORTHERN IRAQ, that he'll be covering the Olympics.

He shows us his press credentials.

Now that's a secure looking press pass. At least it has a photo, unlike the DNC passes that were swapped between people.

Read more about that fiasco over on Taegan Goddard's Political Wire.

Steve Garfield is famous!

Check out my star on the walk of fame in Hollywood.