After listening to an interview with Sir Dyson (the vacuum cleaner guy) on The Hour, I felt compelled to MAKE something. This is unusual, because I'm so very, completely unskilled, but I was definitely inspired to CREATE.
I'm quite pleased with the results.
Introducing the Low-Tech iPod Nano dock for car audio.
All in all, the setup it pretty sweet. It's easy to change songs, the whole show is stable, the display is even clear thanks to some trimming of the cover-flap. I used some scissors to give me access to the iPod controls and still leave a sun-screen.
I'm quite proud of this. Simple, but something I found engaging and rewarding. The photos were taken on my camera phone while I was out getting coffee.
Net Neutrality is something I think is incredibly important. However, it's a hard concept to explain. This video does a nice job putting neutrality into perspective. It is an easy-entry into the debate around the freedom of the internet. Please watch it, re-post it and leave whatever comment you feel is important.
Save the Internet | Rock the Vote
My friend Chris has started his own business. Black River Paddle Company is going to sell quality, handmade canoe paddles. His website is pretty slick and his paddles are gorgeous.
I love the fact that he's rooted his company name in a sense of place. The Black River runs beside Chris' family farm, and his paddles are a reflection of his childhood experiences on the river.
He's not taking orders just yet, but I'm definitely going to replace my current paddle with a Black River Paddle.
Former NBA Star Tim Hardaway made awful, hateful comments on a radio show last week.
As a response, George Takei (Star Trek's "Sulu") made a PSA Video. It is hilarious.
Love the Flash Mobs.
I need 100 friends to conduct this very serious social experiment.
Actually, I'm very interested in this stuff. Social norms, conformity, influence, mob mentality...it's all pretty interesting stuff.
Today I found out that ESPN, that big sports company in the sky, agrees with me. ESPN now allows readers to comment on every story on their website (even the "wire" stories...associated press, Reuters, et al.). It's called ESPN Conversations.
I love it. The news stories become conversations. They take on life and meaning as we (the public) add our two cents.
If you forgot my "vision for the web", here's a link to the original post.
I love the "reply" feature for news stories. Now it's just a matter of time before e-mail and RSS seamlessly integrate.
I admit, at first Yahoo Pipes seemed interesting. But it also seemed useless.
However, I've put together 3 pipes of my own, and I like the process.
Yahoo Pipes allows you (or me) to manipulate RSS feed results. So far, I've only used it to troubleshoot. That it, I use it to fix things I don't like about my current feeds.
Here they are. Feel free to use these pipes for yourself. You can also change them to suit your purpose, though you'll need a YahooID.
This one filters Fark results. I now get nothing about Florida, photoshop contests, etc.
http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/plu9Yha92xGB_motdrq02Q/run?_render=rss
This one filters my Reuters News results. Reuters was sending me 5 or 6 copies of every feed item. This stops that problem.
http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/xOtfRBG92xGsKmWSIBeTaQ/run?_render=rss
This does the same "remove duplicates" for Toronto Raptors News.
http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/yiip_RG92xGoen2xFG_cUw/run?_render=rss
I got a new cell phone today. My contract expired and I renewed with Bell Mobility here in Ontario.
Why Bell? Well, why not? Rogers gets no reception outside of Toronto and Telus' rate plans looked pretty brutal. Bell offered me a poor selection of phones, but I found one I'm excited about.
The Nokia 6275i is pretty, slim and has a 2.0 MP digital camera that works nicely. The phone is supposed to do many other wonderful things, but Bell has crippled it's capabilities to try to make me spend money on their ringtones and other crap.
I will likely post again about my workarounds for all the "limits", but I now have a working version of both the Opera Mini Browser and Google Reader. Each had some special challenges, but I feel good having figured it all out. Expect some fancy pictures soon.
I was looking to load up on snacks for the coming OCA Conference, so I visited www.bulkbarn.ca. I was looking for store hours (never found any), but what I discovered was pretty magical.
Bulk Barn has one of the nicest websites I've seen in a long time. It was so weird. I spent 15 minutes clicking around this crazy site.
It was just a shock to see the ugly Bulk Barn logo done in such pretty flash animation.
Check it out.
Usually I'm a fan of video podcasts. However, with some long distance driving in the near future I've looked pretty hard at things to listen to.
Here's a list of my favourite audio podcasts.
- CBC Radio: The Best of Ideas
- This Week in Tech (TWiT)
- This Week in Media
- Craig Cardiff: Thank you for your ears
- CBC Radio: The Best of As It Happens
My favourite video podcasts:
- the show with zefrank
- Ask a Ninja
- Diggnation
- dl.tv
