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Actualizado el January 25, 2006 08:00 PM

SpycyRoll

January 18, 2006

jpg : Sad Wednesday wayan:

Poem to Wednesday
By Poet Lawyerette

sad wednesday.
you make me so blue.

the pinnacle
of work-week despair,
not able to look ahead,
yet...

not yet clear of my case
of the mondays.

somebody's got a case of the mondays...
on wednesday.

Comments (0)

Comments on this Entry:



gif : Ask the Staff - General Fishing Questions :: RE: The great fin clip debate. Author: BrianD
Subject: Speaking of dorks...
Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 9:44 pm (GMT -5)
Topic Replies: 3

Hey Brian,
I'll pay good money if you can post an old picture of Eric wearing his way-cool "patched-up" fishing vest! Laughing

Best,

Brian
_________________
Quest Outdoors Web Monkey
& Spey Fishing Addict



gif : Center Pin / Float Fishing :: RE: Quest Gear (Hat's etc.) - Who Wants It? Author: BuzzFloatman
Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 9:59 pm (GMT -5)
Topic Replies: 6

How about a Chromebuck or PEte poster with those Thompson giants Laughing

I'd be proud to own some Quest gear. It's by far the best run fishing site on the web...

B
_________________
I don't know why they call it hamburger helper, I think it does just fine by itself



gif : Center Pin / Float Fishing :: RE: Hello, New pin guy here... Author: Steelieboy4life
Subject: THAT MAKES TWO!
Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 10:28 pm (GMT -5)
Topic Replies: 2

Well EZ Floater that makes two of us! I love fishing the pin!!! Laughing


gif : Center Pin / Float Fishing :: RE: Quest Gear (Hat's etc.) - Who Wants It? Author: PEte
Subject: Re: Quest Gear
Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:16 pm (GMT -5)
Topic Replies: 6

Westcoast Chrome wrote:
I'm wondering if you have Quest toques cause that would be great for early mornings on the Thompson.
WC


WC,
I like the idea of toques or also maybe hoodie sweatshirts. The last thing many guys need is another adjustable hat. I like well fitted hats like fullbacks of flexfits.
PEte

PS, Buzz you are outta control Laughing Laughing Laughing



gif : Center Pin / Float Fishing :: RE: Quest Gear (Hat's etc.) - Who Wants It? Author: SageDrifter
Subject: Re: Quest Gear
Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:53 pm (GMT -5)
Topic Replies: 6

PEte wrote:
Westcoast Chrome wrote:
I'm wondering if you have Quest toques cause that would be great for early mornings on the Thompson.
WC


WC,
I like the idea of toques or also maybe hoodie sweatshirts. The last thing many guys need is another adjustable hat. I like well fitted hats like fullbacks of flexfits.
PEte



agreed...how 'bout Quest Beanie's ?

*cough* still waiting for the hat i asked for at a certain Spey Clave last year *cough* Laughing
_________________
www.laphroaig.com



gif : Center Pin / Float Fishing :: RE: Hello, New pin guy here... Author: downtime
Posted: Wed Jan 18, 2006 1:08 am (GMT -5)
Topic Replies: 2

Once you get used to fishing a center pin you will never turn back!!! Had to fish about 45min today with a spinning reel, felt like a cute defensless bunny at the wolf convention. Embarassed


jpg : Mark My Words.

Mark Twain
photo credit: litmuse

“A person with a new idea is a crank until the idea succeeds. ”

- Mark Twain



jpg : Spinnaker Trust files SEC Form 13F-HR Spinnaker Trust files SEC Form 13F-HR Quarterly report filed by institutional managers, Holdings



jpg : Bigfoot! http://www.bigfootencounters.com/files/mk_davis_pgf.gif

Remember that really old footage of bigfoot in the 70's? Someone has stabilized it and made an animated gif out of it and it's really cool. -Is it real? Who the heck knows, but the image fixing is superior!



gif : Magnetosphere Sounds http://www.astrosurf.org/lombry/audiofiles-geomagnetosphere.htm

Here are audio files related to the Earth magnetospheric activity. They were recorded on ELF or VLF bands where you can hear lightnings whistling and dawn chorus of a great purity.

Some really incredible sounds here - also some great samples to use for sound effects or loops.



gif : Wireless Laptop Warning http://www.theage.com.au/news/breaking/lurking-threat-for-wireless-laptops/2006/01/16/1137259984121.html

If you are using a Wireless Laptop with either Windows 200 or XP you had better enable your firewall.

=>



jpg : Secure Linux Live CD http://www.wired.com/news/technology/internet/0,70017-0.html?tw=wn_tophead_1

If you're into checking out Linux Live distros -here is a nice variation...

a secure crypto-heavy operating systems on a bootable CD: a disk that would offer the masses the same level of privacy available to security professionals, but with an easy user interface.



jpg : Mouse Phone http://www.akihabaranews.com/en/news-10932-The+mouse+phone+by+Sony.html

It's a Mouse - it's a phone! Sleek little voip device.



jpg : Bill Gates Runs Like a Girl http://www.g4tv.com/g4blog/blog/G4Blog/post/545718/Bill_Gates_Runs_Like_a_Girl.html#readmore

Heres another one for you Apple users - oh and I guess Windows haters as well.



jpg : Cubefield http://technicallyoverboard.com/cms/index.php?option=com_forum&Itemid=50&page=viewtopic&p=6387#6387

Newest game added to our flash archive in the forums.



jpg : Constitution Research & Management files SEC Form 13F-HR Constitution Research & Management files SEC Form 13F-HR Quarterly report filed by institutional managers, Holdings



jpg : New fragrance from Burberry

Burberry will release Burberry London, a new fragrance for women, in February with an ad campaign featuring actress Rachel Weisz:

The fragrance itself was created by Dominique Ropion of IFF. The elegant and sophisticated floral jus features top notes of rose, clementine and honeysuckle. Heart notes comprise tiaré flower, peony and jasmine with base notes of sandalwood, musk and patchouli.

Look for the men's Burberry London fragrance in the fall. (via cosmeticsinternational)



jpg : Been Back...


but have been too busy @ work and sick to post hardly anything. also had to weed through hundreds of photos, which i tell ya, is very tedious if you ask me. but i do have things to say...you'll just have to wait.

one thing's for sure...i got my mojo back, and part of my self confidence.


gif : Vimpelcom Acquires Two Uzbek Mobile Carriers (VIP, MBT)

In the race to acquire mobile assets in the Former Soviet Union, Reuters reports that Vimpelcom (VIP) announced its acquisition of two Uzbek mobile carriers, Buztel and Unitel. Vimpelcom shelled out $60 million for Buztel plus $2.4 million of debt and $200 million plus $13.4 million of debt for Unitel.

Russia’s second largest mobile company, Vimpelcom’s entry into the Uzbek market exposes the company to 25 million additional people with a mobile penetration rate of only 4.5% at the end of 2005 according to Reuters. In a company press release Vimpelcom CEO Alexander Izosimov said:

We are very pleased to announce these acquisitions in Uzbekistan, a large market that we believe has the potential for substantial growth. VimpelCom’s entry into Uzbekistan will bring our licensed population coverage to a total of over 230 million people. This is the fourth market outside of Russia that VimpelCom has entered as the Company continues to execute its CIS growth strategy.

This is Vimpelcom’s second major acquisition in three weeks. On December 29th, Vimpelcom announced that it would acquire 60% of Tacom, a cellular operator in Tajikistan, for $12 million and reached an agreement with the remaining shareholders of Tacom to acquire the outstanding 40% interest in the company.

VIP 1-yr Chart



gif : TITHING: DISCOVERY OF CHIRSTIAN EMBEZZLERS ...
... reveals criminal element in church pews!
Giving to Protestant churches drops to 2.6% of income, study finds ... If American Christians tithed, churches could gain $156 billion a year, a recent study found. [ABP]

HT: ABP News




jpg : (No Title)

Which 70's staaa-aaah-umm has been arrested...?

 

The Rolling Stones / AP

Plus the 'Stones in Australia...

 

Michael J. Fox on Boston Legal.

Do you really waant to see MJ Fox back on TV...?

 

Chris Carter is suing Fox.

"See you in court bitch..."

 

Plus PETA's animal cruelty allegations agains MJ...

Patrick Swayze in Australia...

FINALLY Oz iTunes adds music from Sony/BMG....

And Rogue Traders to do D& D balls? WTF...?

 

SEVENTIES teen idol Leif Garrett has been arrested and jailed for investigation of narcotics possession and not having a subway ticket, officials said.

Garrett, 44, was arrested by sheriff's deputies on the platform of the Pershing Square Red Line station in downtown Los Angeles for allegedly not having a ticket to ride the train. Deputies during a subsequent search allegedly found suspected narcotics on the musician-actor, officials said.

Sandi Gibbons, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County district attorney's office, said Garrett was being held without bail because he had allegedly violated the terms of his probation for a previous offence. He pleaded guilty in March to attempted possession of cocaine-based narcotics and was placed on probation, Ms Gibbons said.

A judge last month issued a bench warrant for his arrest for an unspecified reason, she said.

An email sent to a spokeswoman listed on Garrett's website was not immediately returned.

Garrett has appeared in three dozen films, mostly in the 1970s and 1980s, and has released 10 music albums.

 

 

THE Rolling Stones could stage the first rock concert at Melbourne's Flemington racetrack.

Promoter Paul Dainty has asked Flemington officials if the rock legends can play to a crowd of 30,000 in April.

A Victoria Racing Club spokesman confirmed talks were being held with Dainty and the Stones.

"We would be guided by them as to what they require," he said.

"Whether or not the Stones opt for Flemington depends on whether we can fulfill what those requirements are."

On their last visit in 2003, the Stones played at Rod Laver Arena but their 1973 tour included shows at Randwick, Kooyong and the WACA.

Stones fan James Young was excited by the choice.

"Racing is the sport of kings and the Rolling Stones are the kings of rock'n'roll, making Flemington a natural choice of venue for these thoroughbred stayers," Mr Young said.

"Flemington racecourse makes sense to me. Jagger loves wearing bright silks, Charlie's an incredible stayer, Ronnie's finally on the straight and Keith's no stranger to a drug test."

While representatives for the VRC and Dainty said venue and dates were in discussion, a Stones tour is not yet confirmed.

But the Stones' authoritative European fansite, iorr.org, yesterday listed Flemington as the rumoured venue for an April show.

That information is said to be confirmed by Stones insiders.

The fansite suggests the Stones will visit Wellington, NZ, on April 8, before stops in Auckland, Sydney and Melbourne.

The tour's Pacific Rim leg opens in Tokyo on March 22.

Flemington's grandstand capacity is 24,000 people.

From news.com.au

 

 

Michael J. Fox says that acting for him, these days, is "like being a right-handed painter and being forced to paint with your left hand."

"You go, 'Yeah, I'm artistic, but the lines aren't straight anymore. I have creativity, but I'm not staying within the lines'."

Since quitting acting full-time in 2000 because of the debilitating symptoms of Parkinson's disease, first diagnosed in 1991 but not revealed to the public until 1998, the Family Ties and Spin City star has only occasionally acted on TV.

In 2001 he returned for several guest appearances as Deputy Mayor Michael Flaherty in US ABC's Spin City, and in 2004 guest starred as a surgeon with obsessive-compulsive disorder on two episodes of NBC's Scrubs.

Now the 44-year-old Fox guest stars in three (and a bit) episodes of ABC's Boston Legal. He plays a business tycoon, Daniel Post, a cancer sufferer who hires the notorious legal firm Crane, Poole and Schmidt to defend him. Post's been sued for corrupting a study for a new cancer-fighting drug by using his insider clout to ensure he was given the non-placebo. Amid the court case he becomes romantically entangled with his attorney, Denise Bauer (Julie Bowen.)

Fox's first episode The Cancer Man Can, has just aired. His story arc concludes on February 7.

The producers of Boston Legal knew since last season of Fox's interest in the show, but it wasn't until now that a suitable role came up.

Executive producer Bill D'Elia says the actor was "number one on a list of one," because "the character was someone that had to have irresistible charm."

"It was kismet - a combination of several events occurring to create perfect karma," says D'Elia, delighted that Fox signed on for the David E. Kelley series, which "often creates these spicy roles" for guest stars.

Fox says he is a fan of Boston Legal for a number of reasons, including its "so smart and so funny take" on ethical and moral issues. He also likes the way the show understands the complexities of human nature and that it is not afraid to recognise that "sometimes people are likable and they are corrupted, and sometimes they are incorruptible, but kind of off-putting."

He particularly enjoyed working on Post's brief encounter with Denny Crane, the most notorious of the ethically challenged lawyers, played by William Shatner, a "fellow Canadian."

"I was really pleasantly blown away by him. First of all Denny Crane, is, I think, one of the great creations of television in the 21st century ... and then there's Shatner's artistry, which I think is a lot misunderstood," Fox says, during a phone interview from New York.

Fox - once the cute young Marty McFly in the Back to the Future trilogy of feature films - says, "What I loved was being part of the creative process again. Something as simple as being in a night shoot and smelling the smell of carbon lights in the cold air. 'Wow, the smell of the grease paint!' It was nice, and nice being involved with other actors."

Because of the Parkinson's disease, Fox says he "can't show up with a game plan." He expresses sympathy and understanding for veteran showman, Dick Clark, who, though not fully recovered from a debilitating stroke, had gamely co-hosted ABC's New Year's Rockin' Eve.

"I am not in such a bad position as he, just given the nature of our separate challenges, but I can see what he was going for, and I felt bad for him that he's gotten such a mixed reaction," says Fox.

Because Fox doesn't know how extreme the symptoms of his illness will be on any given day, he had to wing it in suggesting Post's own health problems. "I just show up and do what I can do, and stay true to the emotional arc of the character."

Fox, who won three Emmys for portraying Alex Keaton on Family Ties and a fourth for playing Flaherty on Spin City, says he loved it that Boston Legal provided "the chance to do one those courtroom speeches - a soliloquy in front of the judge - which in my long and assorted career I've never done. It was so much fun."

Fun though it was, he admits it was physically "pretty taxing," and he doesn't plan to return to acting full-time. Instead, he says, he's always "finding better things to do," particularly spending as much time as possible with his four kids and wife, Tracy Pollan.

He also devotes himself to The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research, founded in 2000, which has already raised millions in hopes of finding a cure.

Additionally, he's working on a book, a "kind of follow-up" to his memoir Lucky Man.

It's theme?

"I'm exploring the idea of optimism in all it's forms ... What is optimism all about? It's kind of something I've been playing with," he said.

 

 

X Files creator Chris Carter has sued 20th Century Fox television for breach of contract of his hit show, the Hollywood Reporter reports.

Carter filed the lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court in December, the trade paper said on Tuesday.

The lawsuit claims that 20th Century Fox reneged on previous agreements, refusing to pay Carter an original profit deal or later cable advance.

Carter brought the case through his production company, Ten Thirteen, seeking unspecified damages.

Telephone messages left at his lawyer's Los Angeles office and at 20th Century Fox television were not returned.

Carter said that in 1998 he made an agreement with 20th Century Fox affiliate Fox Broadcasting to give him a "profit guarantee" for a sixth and seventh season of the X Files.

Negotiations for a ninth season led to Carter urging 20th Century Fox to cancel the show's domestic cable deal for repeat rights with the FX network.

Carter's suit claims the agreement with FX was handed over to networks USA and TNT.

The suit also alleges Carter negotiated for a cable advance equal to 25 per cent of the gross licence fee paid to 20th Century Fox in excess of $300,000 an episode.

The Hollywood Reporter wrote that Carter said in 2001 that 20th Century Fox asked him to reduce the cable advance because it would result in a benefit too large for him.

From smh.com.au

 

 

Michael Jackson cruelty claims

MICHAEL Jackson is being accused of cruelty.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals told the US Agriculture Department he has been neglecting giraffes, elephants and crocodiles at his Neverland estate.

He has been in Bahrain since being cleared on child-sex charges.

 

 

DIRTY Dancing star Patrick Swayze is writing a movie based in Australia.

"I'm looking to shoot a movie in Australia," Swayze said. "You've got to look outside of Hollywood if you want to find people with passion.

"I've actually got an idea for this friendship that happens with a couple of Australian natives and an Australian guy and an American guy."

Swayze, best known for his roles in the blockbuster hits Dirty Dancing and Ghost, has visited Australia many times.

"I love it there. I love all of Australia," he said in an interview to promote his latest film, the black British comedy Keeping Mum.

Swayze, 53, is moving into film production with his own company.

Keeping Mum -- co-starring Rowan Atkinson and Kristin Scott Thomas -- opens in Australia next week.

From heraldsun.com.au

 

 

iTunes Ahoy! Sony BMG Catalogue Now Available in Australia...
Yep, that's right - The Sony BMG catalogue has now been added to the iTunes Music Store in Australia, which means that you can now download all your favourite local and international Sony BMG artists from iTunes including Foo Fighters, Rogue Traders, Shannon Noll, Bob Dylan, Franz Ferdinand and Anthony Callea.
"We're delighted to join the iTunes Music Store in Australia," said Denis Handlin, Chairman and CEO, Sony BMG Australia and New Zealand. "There is a great opportunity for digital music to explode in 2006 and we look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with iTunes."

The addition of the Sony BMG catalogue to iTunes equals lots more music for fans! You'll be able to download the latest stuff from local stars like Shannon Noll, Anthony Callea and Human Nature, international artists such as Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan and Avril Lavigne, and music videos from the likes of Anastacia, John Mayer and Alicia Keys.

Additional Sony BMG local favourites coming to iTunes include Pete Murray, John Farnham, Alex Lloyd and Delta Goodrem, and international artists like Destiny's Child, Franz Ferdinand, Oasis, The Strokes, Kelly Clarkson, Bruce Springsteen, Jamiroquai, Eurythmics and Shakira.

The iTunes Music Store will be featuring the exclusive video catalogue of Foo Fighters, a Celebrity Playlist from Delta Goodrem and exclusive tracks from Eurythmics and Rogue Traders.

Stay tuned for lots more exciting Sony BMG exclusives hitting iTunes soon!
 
 
 
 
Rogue Traders - Desperate And Dateless?
Wanna get your freak on with Rogue Traders? The so-hot-it-hurts electro rockers are hitting the road for some shows, including d&d balls in Hobart, Perth and the Gold Coast, so you can get out there and watch them! Grab all the details here...
Get ready to rock big time with the Rogues! The drums are coming to a town near you, along with Nat, James and the Trader boys. If you're one of the lucky people who caught the Rogues supporting Kelly Clarkson on her national tour or at Homebake, then you'll know that this is one band that seriously kicks it live.

Tickets to all shows are on sale now, so grab yourself one and start preparing for one helluva night!

Rogue Traders Live Shows

January 26 - Seagulls Club, Tweed Heads
Tix: 07 5536 3433

January 27 - Great Western Hotel, Rockhampton
Tix: 07 4922 3888

January 28 - Brothers Leagues Club, Cairns
Tix: 07 4053 1053 or www.brotherscairns.com.au

March 4 - d&d ball, Derwent Entertainment Centre, Hobart
Tix: www.ddball.com.au

March 18 - d&d ball, Dreamworld, Gold Coast
Tix: www.ddball.com.au

March 25 - d&d ball, Challenge Stadium, Perth
Tix: www.ddball.com.au

From sonybmg.com.au



jpg : (No Title) Fox Winter TCA Party

Willa Holland
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us



Frankie Muniz
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Wentworth Miller
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Wilmer Valderrama
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Ryan Seacrest
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Randy Jackson
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Simon Cowell
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Justin Berfield
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Bruce Jenner
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Eric Christian Olsen
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us


gif : Contextual buttons Confusion with context buttons ...

"I have noticed a trend in virtual interfaces that exploits their ephemeral nature, where a single button is used today where two buttons used to be used in the past. The button label is used to both clear a state of the system and the action the button can do. Who else finds they pause slightly in these contexts even after becoming “experts” in these systems?

Of course I’m going to use the covetted champ of design, the iPod, and critique it. I mean it is so easy to nitpick “perfection” b/c it gives us clear lines, with the distractions of too many interrelated mistakes.

So here is the mini view of iTunes while playing a song:"   continued ...   (Via Synaptic Burn)

iTunes Pause. - User Interface Design, Human Computer Interaction (HCI), Ergonomics

iTunes Pause.



gif : Websites are dead, long live Flows

Say I have a website
and I turn it into a weblog
and I decide to let Blogger host it for me
and Blogger offers me commenting and trackback and a feed
posting every day, I start writing in Ecto
my digital snaps are on Flickr, but also on my site
Flickr offers feeds of many aspects of their site
I combine it with that from my site with Feedburner
and I use Uploader to get images to Flickr
but sometimes also my phone
the resulting RSS feed may be viewed in a newsreader
or on Bloglines
and oh, IÂ’ve started using del.icio.us

websiteflows.gif

Perhaps a question: do I still have a website, or do I maintain a series of flows, in an ecology of services?

More…



gif : Assassinando o Portuga!

Estava eu andando pela rua, quando me deparo com isso:

Sim, sim, é verdade, não é montagem!
Agora me responda se uma pessoa que escreve "DAR-se aula" tem condições de ensinar alguém?
E nem adianta dizer que a culpa é do carinha que fez a placa, porque se eu estou pagando, eu exigo um trabalho perfeito!

Nessas horas eu amo mais ainda a minha cam. :D



gif : Santa árvore!

Será que essa cara tem sorte?

Clica aqui

Tenho certeza que depois disso o cara virou protetor e criador de árvores!



gif : Netgear y Skype crean el primer teléfono móvil para Skype

skype
Ambas compañías presentarán el nuevo dispositivo en la feria Consumer Electronics Show (CES) que se inaugura en Las Vegas.

DIARIO TI: Netgear y Skype anuncian su acuerdo de colaboración para crear una nueva e innovadora familia de productos que incluye el primer teléfono móvil Skype que irá acompañado de un router que optimizará el uso de la tecnología Skype.

El teléfono Wi-Fi de Netgear, hará realidad la telefonía móvil a través de Internet para los usuarios de Skype, el teléfono Wi-Fi de Netgear funcionará en cualquier lugar en el que el usuario pueda conectarse a un punto inalámbrico de acceso a Internet, ya sea en casa, en la oficina, en un cibercafé, en un hotspot público o en cualquier acceso wireless abierto disponible.

“Ahora los usuarios de Skype pueden llamar de forma gratuita, a otros usuarios de Skype, en cualquier lugar del mundo, en cualquier momento, con tan sólo estar conectados a una red wireless. Estamos muy orgullosos de haber creado el primer teléfono móvil que permite a los usuarios disfrutar de todos los beneficios de Skype” afirma Patrick Lo, Presidente y CEO de Netgear.

Además del anuncio del lanzamiento de este teléfono Wi-Fi para Skype, ambas compañías colaboran para que el Router inalámbrico RangeMax de Netgear WPN824, esté totalmente equipado para optimizar el rendimiento de Skype.



gif : appeal on behalf of the mari people!

APPEAL ON BEHALF OF THE MARI PEOPLE

We the representatives and friends of the Finno-Ugric peoples of the world call on the Russian authorities at all levels to take immediate steps to end the attacks on members of the democratic opposition in the Republic of Mari El. We urge international human rights organizations to join us in this cause.

In recent months, the local government of Mari El has done nothing to stop the rising tide of discrimination and attacks against the Mari people, thus creating the impression that it supports or may even be behind them. We note with regret that the authorities have done nothing to identify those who earlier this month attacked Vladimir Kozlov, editor-in-chief of the Finno-Ugric newspaper Kudo+Kodu and head of the all-Russian movement of the Mari people, Mer Kanash, beating him nearly to death.

The Mari people are an important part of the Finno-Ugric world, and this summer they are scheduled to host the next world congress of Finno-Ugric studies. Consequently, it is especially important now that the Russian authorities in Moscow and in Mari El do everything possible to end the abuse of the rights of the Maris.

http://www.ugri.info/mari/




gif : Fast spreading email worm - Email-Worm.Win32.VB.bi

A new mass mailing worm is spreading fast.  This is called Email-Worm.Win32.VB.bi External Link and it has been written in Visual Basic.

Update your virus definitions and be careful with email attachments!

Technorati Tags: , ,


png : 2005 - The Year of the Tag

In an interesting synopsis, Tagsonomy reports on “The Year in Tags” with a review of the expansion and development of tags in blogs, search engines, and more.

2005 has proven that tags are both big (in the financial sense) and useful. Whether or not tagging is a game-changer will, I think, depend on what Yahoo, Amazon and Google do with tags in 2006. But with three big players in the tagging game there’s a lot of opporunity for innovation.

Highlights of tags over the past year:

Technorati introduces tags (January)…Yahoo buys Flickr (March)…Yahoo launches My Web 2.0 (June). Yahoo integrated search, social networks and tags in its My Web 2.0 product…Flickr adds interestingness and clustering (August)…Hurricane Katrina (September). Tags not only helped keep people connected during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, they tethered together many disparate pieces of content so we could make sense of complex, evolving, intertwingled events…Google adds tagging. Kind of. (October)…Amazon launches tags (November)…Google Base launches with tagging. Kind of. (November)…Yahoo buys del.icio.us (December)…Folksonomy makes the NY Times Magazine “Year in Ideas” list (Decemember).

Tags have come a long way in the past 12 months. Rumors were flying around early in the year that Yahoo was after Technorati, which created quite the backlash, so it was surprising that the announcement of the purchase of del.icio.us by Yahoo, rumored to be USD $30 million, a hefty chunk of change for a brand new concept, was a minor upset in the blogging world now accustomed to tags and buyouts.

So tags are with us and I’ll be having a series of articles about tagging to help you understand more about how it works and how to use them better. To help get you started, here is a review of recent posts I’ve written on tagging:


Site Search Tags: , , , , ,
Copyright Lorelle VanFossen



gif : Pilot the Morning Fall
Well, I guess bloggin' was just not enough for me.  I've decided to construct a music label as well.  Why not?  I mean, I put up songs by artists and labels I respect, but why not put up music by 4F friends?  Visit 4F Records.



I present to you a new ep by Farhad Parsa and Joel Arquillos (me) who create music under the name Pilot the Morning Fall.  Here's how we rationalize it:

At a time when garage space is at a premium and internet space is at an all time low, it's easy to understand why musicians like Pilot the Morning Fall prefer the rental rates of online digital space.

Here's how it works:  Somehow, in between Farhad's life as a photographer, film maker and composer, he sits down with his guitar, keyboard, dulcimer, stuffed rabbit and lays down some dirty tracks.  He then e-mails them to Joel who has to stop teaching his high school students to listen.  Joel usually digs it and rushes home on his bicycle and loads the tracks onto his laptop, opens up MS Word and starts verbalizing his vocalizations.  After a few hours of this he begins to create his own vocal tracks (he loves adding wah-wah guitar to everything, but Farhad usually deletes it).

Oh, and most importantly, we talked the amazing Grady McFerrin into creating the beautiful album cover you see above.  Thanks Grady!

Check out these samples:

Pilot the Morning Fall : June

Pilot the Morning Fall : December
here.

Listen and, if you like, purchase here.



png : Get Rich Quick! Go Freelance! Successful Entrepreneur! NOT!

Want to make money with your blogs? Want to have the public racing to your blog to find out what you are going to say next? Want to live in a big home with lots of electronic toys and know that you don’t have to worry about your kid’s college bills? Want fame and popparatzi standing outside of your home? Want to ring the bell on Wall Street?

If you become a successful entrepreneur and go freelance, there may be no end to all you can do, accomplish, create, and make. You can make the world a better place, make yourself happier, or just make yourself richer.

Are you up to it? Do you have what it takes? Are you willing to jump off that cliff?

In an interesting and very well described position, Business Pundit describes “Why I Quit Entrepreneurship and Got a Real Job and what I learned from the experience” in a way that should help you determine whether or not you want to go freelance and entrepreneurial and try to get rich quick.

Entrepreneurship is difficult. No matter how smart you are, how well you plan, or how hard you work, there is still lots of luck and timing involved. If you ever consider making the jump, here are some things to think about.

Money Matters - Lots of people will say you don’t need money to start a business. That’s true, for some businesses you don’t. But it helps… A LOT!…I’ve learned that more than anything else, money gets you a chance to play the startup game…

…Nobody cares that you are smart or knowledgeable (and you need to know if you really are) - Why not? Because everyone thinks they are smart and knowledgeable. Everyone is convinced they are good at business. Everyone thinks they can hire a talented team. Everyone thinks they can sell. Everyone thinks there is something special and different about them that will make them successful. But accruate self-evaluation skills are critical to entrepreneurial success. You have to know what you are good at, what you aren’t good at but can learn, and what you will probably never be good at. I think this is a major reason businesses fail…

…Short-term thinking can kill your company…It’s even more true for startups. Sometimes you will accept a customer on which you will barely break even, just to get some money in the bank to meet payroll. All you do is push your problem off another month, in hopes you can find a solution, or that business picks up…

…Know how you make money. Ideas are great, and I’m all for doing cool things, but cash is still king. How do you get cash?

Your estimates are wrong - Yes, even your worst case estimates.

You aren’t your own boss - Your customers are way more demanding than any corporate boss could ever be…

You don’t have any free time - If you want to start a business for a certain lifestyle, save your money and buy your way into it. Otherwise, face the fact that it will be a long time before you can step away…At a corporate job, things can usually wait until tomorrow. At a startup, you are perpetually behind, so they can’t…

…Acknowledge your mistakes - A startup is no place for silly issues of pride. When you do something wrong, and you will, admit it and fix it…

Keep your integrity - It’s easy to be a good honest person when you have a steady paycheck. It’s much more tempting to let it slide when a customer overpays and you need the money for rent. You have to stay honest, as hard as it may be. Honest failure is more noble than dishonest winning.

Deal with the possible consequences - If you fail, what will you do next? Can you deal with starting over?…Come to terms with what will happen if you fail.

A very critical point also brought up is that if you want to be successful in an industry, make sure you know people in the industry. And not just any old someone in the industry, the key buyers, movers, and shakers that you can use to help you make your business a success.

A couple point snot brought up that I think is important is mentoring and listening. If you are new to freelancing and entrepreneurship, then you need to have one or more advisers you can consult for advice, opinion, and friendship. These need to be people you look up to and respect, the kind of business people and personalities you want to emulate. Follow their examples and leads to help you stay on the right track, and if they take you to task because you screwed up, shut up and listen.

Listening is very important. A lot of get-rich-quick wannabes think they are the expert and so they do all the talking, trying to prove the world that they are indeed the experts, whether or not this is reality. Get humble and learn to listen. Listen to what others are saying in the industry, listen to your customers, listen to your competitors, listen and learn from what you hear as it may help you make the next decision better and stronger than blindly going forth uninformed.

And remember, no business, blogging or otherwise, is a success without a strong plan and road map. Without a clear path, you will stumble around, and success, if it comes, will be by sheer luck more than determination, and the odds are that it won’t last.

If you do want to get rich quick by becoming an entrepreneurial freelancer, read this article to get a much better and realistic perspective on what it really takes. Then bring your parachute with you when you jump of the cliff.


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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen



gif : Bon appetit 
 "Blog" seems too crude (and too English) a word for Chocolate & Zucchini, the beautiful and delicious buffet served by Clotilde Dusoulier. If you love food and France (as do I), it's a delightful discovery. Even if (as am I) you're late to the feast.
 Tip of the link to Edward in China for the pointer.
 
Taller tales 
 sunset contrail series
 Perhaps a million miles of contrails have trailed in my wake. I've taken 1159 photos tagged aerial and hundreds tagged with labels like jfklax (for New York to Los Angeles) and bossfo (for Boston to San Francisco).
 Yet I've always felt a bit suspicious about what high altitude aviation does to atmosphere, and to climate. Contrails lace the sky with clouds that nature otherwise would not put there. Often they go away. Often they do not. They spread into a high lacy haze that drifts across the globe, reflecting sunlight out into space and cooling (or is it warming?) the Earth below. (Dig this picture from space.)
 Look up contrails on Google and most of your luckiest results are sites that, to put it politiely, don't like the things. AEROSOL OPERATION CRIMES & COVER-UP is the top result. Next (and best) is simply Contrails, from the University of Wisconsin. Next is a site from the American Patriot Friends Network that says, in bright red type, MILITARY BEHIND MYSTERY CHEMTRAILS. Next is contrails.nl, with the title Contrails and Aviation Smog filter the sunlight and are a source of water vapor and condensation particles. After that, Wikipedia's page on the subject. From that one:
 Sept. 11th, 2001 Climate Impact "Experiment"
 It had been hypothesized that in regions such as the United States with heavy air traffic, contrails affected the weather, reducing solar heating during the day and radiation of heat during the night by increasing the albedo. The suspension of air travel for three days in the United States after September 11, 2001 provided an opportunity to test this hypothesis. Measurements did in fact show that without contrails the local diurnal temperature range (difference of day and night temperatures) was about 1 degree Celsius higher than immediately before (Travis et al., J. Climate, 17, 1123-1134, 2004); however, it has also been suggested that this was due to unusually clear weather during the period (Kalkstein and Balling Jr., Climate Research, 26, 1-4, 2004).
 I remember that. In fact, I wrote this on 9/13:
 I've watched a few contrails here in Santa Barbara spread out to cover nearly the whole sky. And guess what that contributes to? Try global warming. Well, at least some folks think so.
 Wacko or not, the absence of commercial aviation in the U.S. is at least an invitation to all kinds of interesting science. When the current news trails off, don't be surprised to hear about some interesting discoveries made in the absence of airplanes.
 While that jury stays out on the whole subject (for some of us, anyway), I had a fun time shooting pictures of contrails spreading across the sky at sunrise and again at sunset yesterday. (That's the series above.) I also have a third set of plain old sunrise shots, assembled without regard to the avaition without which the pictures never would have happened, because the sky would have been cloudless and clear.
 The most interesting and beautiful contrail shots start on this page here.
 
Conspiracy 
 Steve says, is the latest Gillmor Gang subject.
 
To the manner taught 
 Britt Blaser: Thanks for the F-Bomb. A sample:
 Manners are the outward and visible sign of an inward and justifiable aspiration. We mimic those whom we admire in hopes of achieving their station. Only in that sense does the trickle-down theory actually work. There are only two explanations for the manners meltdown: 
 
  1. The well-mannered are not admirable.
  2. The well-mannered are not really in charge.
 In either case, they will fail to inspire polite behavior. 
 Unless manners aren't really melting down. Or melted a long time ago. Since I'm still being corrected by admirable people, I suspect melting is a localized phenomenon: it only happens when I cause it.


gif : Still embarrassed 16 years later WFY:

Lots of cities have events that they can never, rightly or wrongly, completely live down. Cleveland's river caught on fire, JFK was assassinated in Dallas, and Philadelphia had the MOVE bombing and they booed Santa Claus. The District's great shame happened sixteen years ago tonight:

Mayor Marion Barry's arrest for smoking crack (The Post) and subsequent prison sentence reflect the lowest point in the modern history of the city. Despite that, Barry has been elected to public office three times since then. He is currently the Ward 8 councilman, but continues to have personal problems.

When will Barry or his constituents say enough is enough?

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png : Wedding Crashers

rev. 1.00

Wedding Crashers PosterI've been scared shitless about Wedding Crashers all the time, I kept avoiding it when it screened in the theatres and I even kept pushing it further back once it hit the dvd marked. Why? Because the storyline sounded very shallow and boring, also I am a little afraid of Owen Wilson. Looking at the IMDB rating of 7.3 at 21,388 votes a couple of days ago made me reconsider and push it up a few places in the to-watch stack. So yesterday, after I had seen The Forgotten for a second time as my girlfriend didn't knew it, we also found the time to see 'Wedding Crashers'.

I have to admit that I was pretty surprised about it after I had seen the first 30 minutes. It actually was pretty funny and the storyline turned out quite different than I thought. The trailer always semed to me like 'Wedding Crashers' would be a movie about two guys that attend to one wedding after another to pick up girls, which isn't correct. There is a 5 minute time warp in which the characters get introduced, in those 5 minutes they crash about a dozen weddings, but after that the movie is mainly about crashing one specific wedding - one wedding at which one of them actually falls in love.

'Wedding Crashers' is more about a romance movie than anything else and that's something I'd never have expected. It's obviously funny aswell, but it has something you can call a storyline. Sadly it doesn't manage to maintain the strength of the first 50 minutes throughout the whole movie. The most important thing to notice on the weak side is that it's way to long. The last 30 to 40 minutes could have been cut easily and did nothing but hurt the movie. There is no reason for any comedy or light romance to be more than 90 to 100 minutes and this one is 120 (there is even an uncut version that has 130).

Rachel McAddams
Other than that I don't have any too bad things to say about it. Surprisingly Wilson did alright and I enjoyed the roles of Vince Vaughn and Christopher Walken. I even thought that the role of Rachel McAddams was an absolutely wonderful one. She contributed a lot to the success of the movie and I'm not only saying that because I thought she looked absolutely gorgeous.

I think I am going to give 'Wedding Crashers' a 4. This is a little tough I have to admit, but the movie isn't very special and the overtime does make it a little annoying. I also thought that with the movie having such a strong touch of romance, there wasn't enough emotions between McAddams and Wilson. I really don't think that this is a movie not to be missed, there are plenty of better ones out there and I don't have the slightest clue where the 7.3 at IMDB comes from.

**ooo


gif : Jeder quakt auf seine Art

War es tatsächlich die Nachtigall und nicht die Lerche? Für manche Menschen ist es fast unmöglich, Vogelstimmen eindeutig zuzuordnen. Gänzlich scheitern aber würden wohl die meisten, wenn es um das Quaken von Fröschen geht. Dabei verrät auch der Frosch durch sein Rufen, zu welcher Art er gehört. Wissenschaftler beweisen dies jetzt eindrücklich mit einem Soundguide: Auf drei Audio-CDs sind die Rufe von rund 250 Arten madagassischer Frösche aufgezeichnet.

Eine Kostprobe des Soundguides und Bilder finden sich unter:
http://www.fonozoo.com
Wer es gerne komplett hätte, bemühe die Fernleihe: Soundguide:Vences, M., F. Glaw & R. Marquez (2006) (Hrsg.): The Calls of the Frogs of Madagascar. Soundguide, 3 Audio-CD. Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales, Madrid & Alosa, Barcelona. ISBN 84-609-8402-8 ;-)
Quelle: Volkswagenstiftung



gif : Brutal Deluxe: 2005 Week 19: Divisional Playoffs

News

34.4MB 64kbps Stereo MP3 1h 15m 09s (Courtesy of Nitevilla.net.)

This is the 24th Brutal Deluxe football podcast of the 2005/2006 season. Scott and I review the NFL divisional playoff games and look at the conference championship matchups. We rant and rave about the most exciting and most horribly officiated game of the season so far, the Steelers' win over the Colts. We also take a look at the BDFL Top 100, which accurately predicted the NFL MVP again this year. And you BDFL owners should definitely tune in; Scott has a great scoring idea for getting more WR's in the top 20.

Links:

Credits:

 

 



png : Brighthand's Predictions for 2006

I may have missed this last week but Brighthand have written down their predictions for the year ahead. "A new year is starting, and Brighthand is going to carry out its long-running tradition of making some predictions for what's going to come down the pipe in the next twelve months.

Just like last year, contributing writer Shawn Barnett has chimed in with some of his thoughts.
The Penguin Is Coming At You

There's no doubt that the big news in the Palm OS world will be the version of this operating system based on Linux which will be released around the middle of this year. " [SAMMY] Personally I think it's going to be a great year for Palm especially with the new Treo range of handhelds.



png : iGod

Continuing on the religious tip, you can now Chat with God at iGod



png : 10 Jahre www.bundestag.de Author10 Jahre ist das Internetangebot des Deutschen Bundestages alt. Im Januar 1996 ging bundestag.de online. Seither können Bürgerinnen und Bürger Informationen aus dem Parlament abrufen.

Nach Angaben aus der Pressemitteilung stieg die Zahl der Nutzer in den vergangenen Jahren erheblich an: "Waren es 1997 noch 780.000 Nutzer, so sind die Zugriffszahlen seither stetig gestiegen. Inzwischen sind fast 10 Millionen Nutzer pro Jahr zu verzeichnen, die sich auf den Internet-Seiten des Deutschen Bundestages über die Parlamentsarbeit informieren."


png : A butterfly-watching system with WiFi PDAs

Chen, Y-S, Kao, T-C, Yu, G-J and Sheu, J-P (2004). A mobile butterfly-watching learning system for supporting independent learning. Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Wireless and Mobile Technologies in Education. JungLi, Taiwan: IEEE Computer Society, 11-18

It’s a butterfly-watching system implemented and tested at an elementary school in Taiwan aimed at being used to teach the different kinds of butterflies in the region.

The proposed BWL system was designed using a wireless mobile ad-hoc learning environment. In our designed system, each individual learner has a wireless handheld device, which is a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) with an IEEE 802.11 wireless network card and a small-sized CCD camera. One instructor has a notebook computer with a Wi-Fi wireless LAN card which serves as the local server. The notebook has a complete butterfly database. All learners’ wireless handheld devices and the notebook constitute a mobile ad-hoc learning environment. During the butterfly-watching activity, each learner takes a distinct butterfly picture, and wirelessly transmits the picture to the local server. A content-based butterfly-image retrieval technique is applied
herein to search for the most closely matching butterfly information, which is returned in real time to the learner’s wireless handheld device. To illustrate the effect of the BWL system, an outdoor BWL activity was actually performed at elementary school in Taiwan.

Why do I blog this? I am looking for references about mobile learning applications for a paper I am currently writing.



png : RSS Ad Stats

With RSS traffic and RSS reader adoption booming, ad impressions on traditional sites will inevitably go down. Web publishers will need to work out how to make money off of the RSS r/evolution via embedding ads in RSS.

For some very useful statistics on RSS advertising click-through-rates and RSS reader behavior, check out Pheedo's blog - Pheed Read #1 and # 2.

The feeds are instructive and suggest that RSS ads significantly outperform traditional web advertising wrt CTRs. Furthermore, given RSS subscriptions allow for more effective targeting and segmentation it is likely that the CPCs will be higher than with traditional on-line ads. Web publishers may find that driving RSS usage increases ad-related revenues despite a decline in "home site" web-site page views.



I would love to talk with people working actively in this area. Thanks to Pheedo for the data.



png : Read Only if You Care: rev2.org Design Update

Ok, so I’ve finished the design (at least the preview) but, I’m not sure if it looks fine now or I should change some stuff or start all over again. This is the real hold up. I want to release it so that I’m 100% happy with it and would love your feedback on this. Here’s the design preview (with stolen text from an [unnameable] blog for preview — don’t sue me :)):

new_rev21.PNG

As you can see, I’m confused. The design is 101% original (e.g. mine) but yet I feel like its a 2nd class WordPress theme based on something from a content management system. I can assure you it’s not. But, to make it look anti-theme, I have some changes in the works. So, feedback is much appreciated (sid@rev2.org) and as always, comments are open.



png : DIVX vs. DivX

It's ironic that the popular DivX codec has all but obliterated the identity of the ill-fated DIVX pay-per-view rental system.

DivX logo vs. DIVX logo

So what was DIVX?

DIVX (Digital Video Express) was a rental format variation on the DVD player in which a customer would buy a DIVX disc -- physically similar to a DVD -- at a low cost, which would be able to be freely viewed up to 48 hours from its initial viewing. After this period, the disc could be viewed by paying a continuation fee, typically $3.25. DIVX discs could only be played on special DIVX/DVD combo players that needed to be connected to a phone line. DIVX Viewers had to set up an account that additional viewing fees could be charged to. The player would call an account server over the phone line to charge for viewing fees similar to the way DirecTV and Dish Network satellite systems handle pay-per-view. Viewers who wanted unlimited viewing of a particular disc could pay to convert the disc to "Silver" status for a special fee. The physical disc was not altered in any way. The viewer's account kept track of the status of each disc. The Silver disc could be kept for future viewing, resold, given away, or discarded.

This particular bad idea was intensely unpopular online. In 1998 and early 1999, it felt like you couldn't visit a website without seeing an anti-DIVX banner plastered on it somewhere.

Free DVD! Fight DIVX!

The format barely lasted a year.

The DivX codec was introduced in 1998 and intentionally named to parody the besieged DIVX format:

Early versions of DivX included only a codec, and were named "DivX ;-)", where the winking emoticon was a tongue-in-cheek reference to the failed DIVX system.

The DivX codec has a rather storied history itself:

1998 3.11 Alpha Codec created from an illegally hacked MPEG-4 video codec
2001 4.0 DivX corporation formed; clean room codec "created" from OpenDivx project*
2002 5.0 Codec improvements
2005 6.0 Codec expanded to full media container format (eg, *.divx)

The name replacement is so complete that the divx domain has been subsumed as well. You can watch it change hands via the internet archive wayback machine. The last DIVX snapshot is in October 1999; the site goes dark throughout 2000, and reappears in February 2001 as DivX.

It sure is funny when a little hacked codec name joke turns into a multi-million dollar business under the same exact name.

* The ethically questionable 2001 commercial DivX fork of the OpenDivx project is where the open source XviD codec originates from. It's DivX backwards, naturally.



January 17, 2006

gif : En Viajes Ecuador te regalan el vuelo Logo Viajes Ecuador Si estabas buscando tomarte unas vacaciones en las islas Viajes Ecuador te lo pone en bandeja, en esta ocasión no te rebajan el precio, te regalan el vuelo.

Algunos destinos son:

- Lanzarote desde 224 euros
- Tenerife desde 133 euros
- Fuerteventura desde 108 euros

Las condiciones de la oferta son las siguientes:

- Venta del 14 al 20 de Enero.
- Salidas del 17 de Enero al 28 de Febrero (último regreso)*
- El cliente sólo pagará la estancia en régimen y hotel elegido y las tasas (18 euros por persona).
- La estancia mínima permitida es de 7 noches (el cliente sumará tantas noches extras como quiera pero siempre partiendo de 7 noches).
- Los traslados son opcionales aeropuerto/hotel/aeropuerto: 18 euros por persona ida y vuelta.

* Tenerife (que será último regreso el día 21 de Febrero. Limitaciones por Carnavales).

Ver oferta


gif : Rebajas 50% en Viajar.com Logo Viajar.com En Viajar.com nos ofrecen unas rebajas del 50% de descuento en paquetes vacaciones para olvidarnos de la cuesta de enero por unos días. Haz tu reserva lo antes posible y disfruta de estos precios rebajados. Las plazas son limitadas. Éstos son algunos de los destinos ofertados:

- Tenerife hotel 3*/4* desde 255 euros.
- Riviera Maya hotel 5* y vuelo desde 690 euros.
- Túnez 8 días en hotel de 4* MP desde 179 euros.
- Estambul vuelo y hotel 3*/4*/5* desde 347 euros.
- Milán 4 días, vuelo y hotel 3*/4*/5* desde 351 euros.
- París vuelo, hotel, visita guiada y crucero por el Sena desde 307 euros.

Ver oferta


gif : Semana Increible en Terminal A Logo Terminal A Terminal A nos invita a aprovechar esta semana increíble en la que podemos conseguir vuelos a Europa teniendo como punto de partida Madrid y Barcelona. Los vuelos son de ida y vuelta:

- París desde 48 euros desde Barcelona y 79 euros desde Madrid.

- Amsterdam desde 59 euros.

- Copenhaghen desde 89 euros.

- Berlín desde 89 euros.

- Munich desde 99 euros.

- Francfurt desde 79 euros desde Madrid.

Las tasas y gastos de emisión no están incluidos en los precios. Cambios, cancelaciones y reembolsos están sometidos a las condiciones o no permitidos. Para cualquier duda confirma las condiciones antes de reservar.

Ver oferta


jpg : Three Interesting Films I know I haven't been posting alot lately; things have been busy. Once I start writing a bit more for class, I'll have more content, I promise.

I do want to recommend a few films for you to watch, though:



The first is The God Who Wasn't There. It's a film by Brian Flemming, whose last work of genius was Batboy The Musical. "The God Who Wasn't There," however, is a bit more irreverent and more controversial, in that it discusses the following:
"* The early founders of Christianity seem wholly unaware of the idea of a human Jesus

* The Jesus of the Gospels bears a striking resemblance to other ancient heroes and the figureheads of pagan savior cults

* Contemporary Christians are largely ignorant of the origins of their religion

* Fundamentalism is as strong today as it ever has been, with an alarming 44% of Americans believing Jesus will return to earth in their lifetimes

* And God simply isn't there
It's gotten great reviews, and I definitely enjoyed it.



The next film is The Yes Men.
"The Yes Men, a movie, follows a couple of anti-corporate activist-pranksters as they impersonate World Trade Organization spokesmen on TV and at business conferences around the world.

The story follows Andy and Mike from their beginnings with GWBush.com, and on to their tasteless parody of the WTO's website. Some visitors donÂ’t notice the site is a fake, and send speaking invitations meant for the real WTO. Mike and Andy play along with the ruse and soon find themselves attending important functions as WTO representatives.

Delighted to speak for the organization they oppose, Andy and Mike don thrift-store suits and set out to shock their unwitting audiences with darkly comic satires on global free trade. Weirdly, the experts donÂ’t notice the joke and seem to agree with every terrible idea the two can come up with.

Exhausted by their failed attempts to shock, Mike and Andy take a whole new approach for one final lecture.
Now, The Yes Men isn't just a movie. There is a ton of content on their site about approaching globalization in a light and humorous way.

The third film is one I haven't seen yet, but it looks very promising. It's called Why We Fight. It takes a hard look at the "military-industrial complex," as mentioned by Dwight D. Eisenhower in his farewell speech:
" In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Eugene Jarecki, the director, was interviewed on The Daily Show last night, and he had alot of great things to say. When you can get a chance, I'm guessing this will be worth your time and money.

Tags: dirtygreek


gif : Eric Mack to present findings on his paperless challenge

Eric Mack has been living the paperless life for a number of weeks and he is ready to present his findings about the challenge on his blog. In typical Eric fashion he is going to podcast about the experience and is looking for a co-host to help him do so. He is also taking questions from his readers about the experience that he will answer on the podcast. Head over to his blog to post a question or to apply for the co-host position. There is a picture of Eric on his blog with his Tecra M4 that made the paperless challenge possible. He is wearing a jacket and tie and I must ask Eric to forego that for the podcast- we don't want him to set the bar too high.



jpg : VNUBlogs España

VnublogsQue el nuevo periodismo se beneficiará de la colaboración entre lectores y redactores es algo que Dan Gillmor o Juan Varela llevan tiempo pregonando. Yo también lo creo. Por esa y otras razones me complace anunciar que la editorial VNU ha lanzado en nuestro país su plataforma de blogs: VNUBlogs España.

«¿Quieres crear contenidos con tu propio enfoque y compartirlos con los demás usuarios de la web? VNUnet te plantea la posibilidad de asumir la inciativa escribiendo sobre temas tecnológicos, creando tu propio blog de forma gratuita. No podría ser más fácil de utilizar, se puede publicar desde Internet, desde el correo electrónico o incluso desde un teléfono móvil».

VNU es principalmente conocida por ser la casa madre de las revistas PC Actual y Computer!dea que desde hace un tiempo también tienen sus blogs. Por eso es un orgullo que VNU haya confiado en Six Apart para utilizar TypePad como motor -no solo en España, sino también en otros países europeos.

Cualquier persona puede abrir blogs gratis en vnublogs.es,  y si se les queda pequeños hay varios niveles de pago. También han puesto en marcha un blog de ayuda en el que irán explicando cómo sacar el máximo jugo a los blogs. ¿Todavía no tienes uno? ¿A qué esperas?



gif : Urbae.com pratnerski program - prva iskustva Nakon par dana korišćenja Urbae partnerskog programa u mogućnosti sam da iznesem i prva iskustva.
  • proces registracije je relativno lak i pregledan, ali se na odobravanje čeka 1 radni dan
  • postupak kreiranja-definisanja reklame je nejasan, jer nema jasnog izbora CPC/CPM programa, ili tačnije, generiÅ¡e se uvek CPC kod (gde je CPM deo programa?)
  • kada ste definisali reklamu i generisali, re postavili kod u stranice, opet ćete morati malo sačekati
  • sledeći problem, server koji opslužuje pojavljivanje reklama je vrlo često van funkcije tako da se na stranicama ne pojavljuju definisane reklame (i u trenutku kada piÅ¡em ove retke, reklame se ne pojavljuju)
  • na postavljenja pitanja "Servis klijenata" daje nedovoljno promptan i neadekvatan odgovor (čekate na njega 1 ili viÅ¡e dana)
Ovo su samo početni utisci, a za dalje, videćemo.


png : Office 12 u praksi Par nedelja koristim Betu Office-a 12 i neprekidno se iznenađujem naprednim mogućnostima nove verzije najprodavanijeg MS paketa. Kolaborativni rad je značajno poboljšan, a mogućnosti pregleda, revidiranja dokumenata, komentarisanja i upoređivanja su dosad neviđene, a sve to preko funkcionalnog interfejsa koji vam ostavlja punu radnu slobodu.

U modu za unos teksta, kada "uklonite" sve funkcionalne trake sa alatima, čitav ekran se prepušta "hartiji" tako da vas ništa ne ometa i odvlači pažnju. Dosta kod nas korišćeni makroi za konverziju raznorodnih karakter setova (kao i svi ostali) rade bez ikakvih podešavanja u novoj verziji, kao i ostali add-in dodaci proizvođača drugih softverskih paketa.

Ukoliko vaš računar podržava Bluetooth, moguće je direktno se iz Office-a povezati na neki od dostupnih prenosnika (na slici možete videti moj T68i aparat), i direktno razmeniti podatke i fajlove. Naravno, preko potrebno za rad sa Outlook-om, ali i vrlo korisno za rad sa ostalim aplikacijama iz paketa.


jpg : Biznis vs. Business - borba za internaute Neosporno je da Hrvatska u oblasti Interneta prednjači u odnosu na Srbiju, a doprinos ovom "jazu" je svakako i aktuelni sukob dva hrvatska biznis-portala sličnog naziva.

Naime, vlasnici domena www.biznis.hr podneli su prijavu tamošnjoj Agenciji zaštitu tržišta protiv pokretača sajta www.business.hr (sajt nedeljnika "Business.hr"), zbog toga što ovaj drugi "narušava tržišnu poziciju" ovog prvog, jer se "nastalom situacijom stvara zbunjujuća atmosfera za korisnike Web sadržaja". Nema šta, "mala bara, a puno krokodila".


gif : Korporativni identitet vredan 1,5 miliona evra Jedan od najvećih hrvatskih telekom provajdera VIPnet, koji svakodnedno opslužuje oko 1,5 miliona korisnika, nedavno je promenio korporativni identitet što je inicijalno bio trošak od 1,5 milion evra.

Ova cifra ne uključuje sve potrebne izmene i apliciranje novog korporativnog identiteta na prodajna mesta, vozila i druga mesta "kontakta za korisnicima", što bi onu probitnu moglo drastično uvećati. Sličnu izmenu je prošle godine napravio i ovdašnji MT:S, ali "cifra" tom prilikom nije objavljena.


gif : Broadband 2006 Prva broadband (telekomunikaciona) konferencija za jugoistočnu Evropu, održaće se od 10. do 12. Aprila 2006. u Beogradu (Sava Centar), Srbija i Crna Gora predstavlja pravo mesto za dobijanje najnovijih informacija o tehnologiji i proizvodima vodećih svetskih kompanija, za upoznavanje sa stručnim mišljenjima poslovnih i tehničkih stručnjaka, sagledavanje najnovijeg stanja u primeni broadbanda, kao i objašnjenjima pravne regulative od strane predstavnika vlada, regulativnih agencija jugoistočne evrope i industrijskih vodećih osoba.

Sve dopunske informacije o Broadband 2006 možete naći na www.seebb2006.org.


jpg : Pegasus One NoteTaker- digital pen for OneNote users

Digital pens are an alternative for taking digital notes in ink for those who do not have a Tablet PC. There are a number of pens to choose from but the Pegasus One NoteTaker is the only one I have seen that imports the notes directly into Microsoft OneNote. The Pegasus uses a scanner that tracks the pen on regular paper and translates the text and sketches taken on the page into digital notes for OneNote. The scanner connects to a PC via USB and the whole package is small and light. The One NoteTaker will work on any paper up to A4 size and the scanner resolution is 100 dpi. The Pegasus comes with software to bring the notes into OneNote on the PC which is localized in the following languages:

  • English
  • German
  • French
  • Italian
  • Spanish
  • Swedish

The Pegasus web site lists the One NoteTaker for just $59 so this might be an economic alternative for those interested in digital pen technology for taking notes.



jpg : (No Title) A hidden goatse, or is it just me? Wonderfully meaningless diagram. I love the way that the web is this little puff of dust at the bottom.


jpg : Teany is going Back to the Future Dhaval Mehta:

teany.jpgTeany, a favorite tea spot of mine (pun so intended), is going back to its roots. I went to the spot two days ago and discovered unfortunately that it was closed. Baffled, I had to know what was going on - so I went to the site.

Here's what Kelly - one of the co-owners (along with artist Moby) had to say about the situation:

dear teany customers and teany fans,

firstly, teany is not closing, and secondly, moby will still be involved with teany.

we've had to do some serious restructuring of teany, and we've decided to make it more of a teahouse (yes, that means less food, sorry!!!) and have myself (kelly) be the lone "decision-maker" on all teany teahouse matters. moby will basically be loving teany, and coming in regularly to enjoy his gyokuro (#41) and vegan turkey club, while playing scrabble or rummy.

i will be present during all operating hours (which are now only going to be friday