June 2009
55 posts
Moments you realise that the Bay Area is absurd
Ben: And as you get within sight of San Francisco, you see this swirling mass of cloud and fog just over the city
Ben: It's quite a sight
Nathan: A prime photographic subject?
Ben: Potentially. Not sure what set up you'd want for it, and I've no idea where you'd take the picture from — I've only ever seen it from the highway
Nathan: A blimp
Ben: Oh, hmm, that's actually a real option here…
May 2009
52 posts
“FUCK YOU SHAUN SMITH, I HAVE PLAYED AT BIRMINGHAM CARLING ACADEMY ALREADY, WELL...”
– Gareth Campesinos!
This ‘Britain’s Got Talent’ has, thankfully passed me by, thanks to being in the US. There appears to be a programme here called ‘America’s Got Talent’, but I don’t watch television to know whether it’s a real programme or scheduled broadcast for penis...
“• Wave is an open network: anyone should be able to become a wave provider and...”
– Still quite a lot to consume concerning wave. Whether it’s the email/IM/Facebook killer mega-protocol for the 21st century or not remains to be seen.
But, these first two points from the Community Principles are important. At the very least, from these to intentions they are trying to build...
Fonts available for @font-face embedding -... →
“The story posted by the Web site was based on an unnamed tipster. No inquiry was...”
– CBS
You may be aware that this weekend TechCrunch reposted their bullshit ‘OMG Last.FM are sharing data with the RIAA’ story. Last time around I lost my mind and spent about three days blogging all sorts of anger about TechCrunch and how much of a vindictive, manipulative, trolling, industry...
“The great thing about it is when you start seeing it in places like China and...”
– Simon Cowell, referring to the spread of celebrity-judge toting TV talent shows into the far reaches of the world.
Simon Cowell is laminated onto my list of five.
… That’s five people that I’m allowed to punch in the face without breaking my commitment to being a passive, non-violent...
“Google’s co-founder, Larry Page, admitted today that the company has been...”
– Interesting to see Google concede this sort of thing, for starters, but also that, in light of recent events, it’s very difficult to assert what Twitter is at this point. Or more, what Twitter think Twitter is, and what they want it to be.
At the heart of it lies this whole change-to-replies...
“The Internet search giant recently began crunching data from employee reviews...”
– Good grief.
(Google Searches for Staffing Answers - WSJ.com via. Doug Bowman)
DingoAccess » Refreshable Braille and the Web →
Fascinating demonstration of a refreshable braille peripheral used to read content from the computer. I can see how being able to actually read the content in your head is vastly preferable to a synthetic screen reader, and watching reinforces the importance of good mark-up structure which provides a far more significant navigation aid than in the visual rendering.
As ever, it’s assistive...
“It also features a bit of a novel subscription feature, where you can pay £35...”
– New subscription feature for all of God Help The Girl’s output this year. Very clever, and rewarding for fans.
(From David Emery Online: Busy in a good way)
“European pressing: Near the inner groove of the Outside is etched in script:...”
– Joy Division’s “Unknown Pleasures” on Wikipedia
Sat up at 1:30am listening to Joy Division’s ‘Closer’ again and got curious as to its precise age. Incredibly, Joy Division’s albums (being only a year apart in release) are about to turn 30 years old. Wow.
“We definitely want to have music recommendation,” Mr Ek said....”
– BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Spotify spells out expansion plan
Regarding a Spotify/Last.FM recommendation hook-up, which is cool in itself, but I love the quote. Hypothetical, pie-in-sky “I’d love to work with someone like Last.fm” in one breath, and “you’ll see an announcement in a...
“It’s basically infinity dollars.”
– Argumentum Ad Verecundiam · Penny Arcade! . Concerning the cost of a Zune music pass.
Introduction to Wolfram Alpha by Stephen Wolfram →
Wolfram Alpha is looking pretty stunning. But, it’s still going to trigger in a million simultaneous “WTF?” reactions when it launches later this month. Stephen Wolfram has tried to emphasise it as a very different tool from the search engines we already have, and he’s right. This new screencast hits it out of the park to make that clear.
I have a niggling sense that in the...
“And don’t get me started on the whole “you don’t need to know html/css/js”...”
– David Emery, in response to me regarding that whole Cappuccino framework thing last month. Missed this rather fine quote at the time.
Quoted now as a small prompt to conclude an ‘Expectations of Web Frameworks’ post that I’ve had in draft in for over a month. If you too would like to see it...
WatchAngela
Promo widget for Jarvis Cocker’s last single. However, this is not your regular music-video-in-a-box. It’s, subtly different; brilliantly so.
It’s also hilarious, and strangely compelling to watch. (I ♥ Jarvis.)
(via. David Emery)
WatchStephen Fry on MPs expenses (BBC Newsnight)
Worth watching wherever you are in the world just for his opening remark, but interesting in general.
Watching political scandal unfold from abroad is interesting. By which I mostly mean, much better. I’ve been able to avoid the soul-sucking impact of twenty-four hour exposure to journalists getting overexcited to smear and humiliate MPs, and I...
Song of the Day: Four Tet - Everything is...
“It’s like, you’re both into the same music, and you have loads in...”
– Me, on the user experience of iTunes. Obviously.
“As you know, we are committed to delivering quality game experiences on Xbox...”
– When branding ruins copy
This example provided by the Microsoft Gaming division, forcing the phrase ‘Games for Windows - LIVE’ into Major Nelson’s blog four too many times..
How much of your cerebral cortex has to be flaking off to take responsible for this butchery of communication?
Am I write?
<script type="text/javascript">
document.write('Hello, you either have JavaScript turned off or an old version of
Adobe\'s Flash Player. <a href=\"http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer/\"
onmousedown=\"urchinTracker(\'/Events/VideoWatch/GetFlash\');\">Get the
latest Flash player</a>.');
</script>
YouTube
document.write....
“As both its function and form suggest, the ampersand is a written contraction of...”
– &
File that under ‘things I never knew but now seem completely obvious upon revelation’.
“Our Middle Name” · Hoefler & Frere-Jones
“It’s tempting to recognize the symbol as a “P for paragraph,”...”
– ¶
A wonderful post all about the form and origins of the pilcrow at Hoefler & Frere-Jones
Relax
I’m laying in bed, flat on my back without pillows because I’m trying not to put any weird strain on my neck, having spent the day in some pain.
It’s not very comfortable.
I can feel the tension across my shoulders, and I long for someone to reach out and touch them, and make all the muscles relax at once.
Trouble is, I don’t know who could do that any more.
