I am still amazed anytime I see a website that has a script or functionality that requires Internet Explorer to work right. It’s so…1999…Sure, Prince sang about that far-off future date that would user in amazing (maybe bad) changes. We were, for the most part, indeed ready to party like it was 1999 all through the 80s. We felt very forward-looking and modern when doing so.
But that was 1984.
What would we have made of IE in 1984? It would have been GREAT! If I had been transmitted to that year from the ‘84, and given a demonstration, I would have watched, fascinated, and then begged for a ride in a flying car.
Today, however, anything IE is just anachronistic. I don’t even have IE on any of my Macs anymore. My main XP machine at home is missing it for some reason, too. At work though, I have a couple work sites that require the piece of crap. Fortunately, if you use Firefox, you can use the Firefox Extension IE Tab, which gives you a tab that acts like and looks (to websites you are visiting) like you’re using the same browser the Ingalls family probably would have used in Little House on the Prairie. IE Tab isn’t available for Mac, but if you use a PC, it’s a great tool.
Others extensions that I love:
Do you use TinyURL? You’ve probably had someone send you one. Web addresses can be so long and complicated, when sent in an email, they can sometimes get corrupted, spread across multiple lines and other wise screwed up. TinyURL is a fantastic free service that creates a special…well…TINY URL that makes them easy to share. the TinyURL Firefox Extension, is one I’ve recently fallen in love with. You put it in your Firefox toolbar and you can have TinyURL.com do its thing for you without your having to visit the site.
The party is most definitely over. A hedge fund manager, Andrew Lahde, has lost his appetite for the endless chase of ill-gotten dollars and has quit the business.
I will no longer manage money for other people or institutions. I have enough of my own wealth to manage. Some people, who think they have arrived at a reasonable estimate of my net worth, might be surprised that I would call it quits with such a small war chest. That is fine; I am content with my rewards. Moreover, I will let others try to amass nine, ten or eleven figure net worths. Meanwhile, their lives suck. Appointments back to back, booked solid for the next three months, they look forward to their two week vacation in January during which they will likely be glued to their Blackberries or other such devices. What is the point? They will all be forgotten in fifty years anyway. Steve Balmer, Steven Cohen, and Larry Ellison will all be forgotten. I do not understand the legacy thing. Nearly everyone will be forgotten. Give up on leaving your mark. Throw the Blackberry away and enjoy life.
Lahde then goes on a strange promo for hemp, citing the fact that both the Constitution of the United States and the first American flag were made from hemp, and suggesting that hemp is outlawed for the benefit of both the Petroleum and Pharmaceutical industries.
Hell of a “seeya, wouldn’t want ta beeya” email, though.
I’m a huge fan of Ian Rankin’s Inspector Rebus series, and am a little sad to order the 17th and final installment from Amazon. I’m happy there’s a new Rebus novel, as reading one makes you feel very much like you’re in Edinburgh, Scotland, a favorite city of mine. I’ve been to pubs Rebus haunts, and remember vividly reading a passage from Naming of the Dead that was set along the backside of Waverley Station and flashing back on walking that same sidewalk up to my destination hotel in 2003.
I’m also strangely happy that I was able to, with one click, order the book sent directly to my Kindle e-book reader.
I really don’t know what to make of this commercial.
I like Jerry Seinfeld, and as much as I’m an Apple user and anti-Windows advocate, I like Bill Gates, and don’t blame him (or Microsoft for that matter) for the mess that is Windows. I know, that’s probably bewildering, but I’ll explain in a post in the next couple days.
But this thing…Very strange.
Somebody got paid a lot to conceive it, work it and produce it. As a commenter at MacUser (where I saw it) says, “I would have like to been in on the pitch meeting for this…”
It’s a battle between two different shows, 24 and Battlestar Galactica. Come on! Think about it!
The Dems:24
A progressive, black candidate runs with a snakey, white, Beltway insider who you just know is going to screw him over first and every chance he gets, because he’s run for the nomination a bunch of times, has been in the Senate for 36 years, and is pissed that he has to smile and appreciate that he’s on this one-term guy’s ticket, even though he and everyone know’s he IS on the ticket because the Candidate knows, you keep your friends close and your enemies closer.
The GOP:Battlestar Galactica
A nice, smart, unknown white woman is plucked out of obscurity, through a series of unfortunate betrayals, accidents and attacks to become the unlikely President of a rag-tag fleet of the survivors of a once great civilization running for their lives. The only question I have is, is General Petraeus tough and uncompromising enough to be Adama in our little drama?
Nah, this race isn’t big-screen. It’s definitely TV.
One of the unintended consequnces of the writer’s strike last year (for the record, I was for the writers), was the opportunity for creative people to create content on the web that had a better chance of being discovered. Though the strike’s effects will be discussed for years, I’m not sure it was the best idea for the people who finance content creation (the studios and networks) to lock their doors when YouTube’s doors were wide open.
The strike is over, of course, but the non-traditional TV concept was proven, and is starting to thrive. Two really excellent examples of creative people creating compelling content are Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog and The Guild (both star Felicia Day). Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion, both big stars in the “traditional media” world round out the cast of Dr. Horrible, and though I don’t recognize any of the other Guild regulars, they’re outstanding.
Buy Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog on iTunes, and watch The Guild free from their site or YouTube.
I absolutely love them both. The monopoly that the Hollywood “machine” has over video entertaining is evaporating. Shows like The Guild and Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog make this very clear.
Ah, I remember the good ol’ days of blogging. Well, actually the days when the contraction ‘blog’ hadn’t yet been widely used. Blogs were just ‘weblogs’ back then (for me, circa 2000) and I took quite a big of loving (at least to my face) ridicule as I tried to spread the word about the coming phenom. I knew that blogging (or weblogging) would change the face of journalism and the way we communicate forever.
No, that’s a lie. I never thought that. I thought blogging was a kind of fun thing I did on the web, primarily of interest to computer nerds like myself. When it entered the mainstream, I was less surprised than my formerly ridiculing friends, but not by a huge margin.
The interesting thing about those days, is the traffic you’d generate with a mostly uninteresting collection of your thoughts. Sure, my blog was occasionally interesting and I’d get the occasional bit of flow (traffic via links) from the A-list, but for the most part, it was of little interest to readers who didn’t know me.
Didn’t stop me from getting hundreds of visitors a day, however. But, sadly (or maybe happily), those days are over. To get a lot of traffic blogging today, you have to both write really compelling content and publicize it well with an assortment of tools, good design and SEO. And for me, that’s revitalized the industry and makes it even more interesting.
I’m a huge fan of Ian Rankin’s Inspector Rebus series, and am a little sad to order the 17th and final installment from Amazon. I’m happy there’s a new Rebus novel, as reading one makes you feel very much like you’re in Edinburgh, Scotland, a favorite city of mine. I’ve been to pubs Rebus haunts, and remember vividly reading a passage from Naming of the Dead that was set along the backside of Waverley Station and flashing back on walking that same sidewalk up to my destination hotel in 2003.
