User Gauis Caecilius is posting pics of Jerash (Gerash) in Syria on his Flickr page. Beautiful stuff if you’re interested in the Roman Empire and it’s reach into Palestine and Syria.
Category: Technology
Having a Daughter is Tough These Days
My pal Jim Kukral made this vid about a Bratz doll that his daughter received for Christmas. I just hope Mary Hudson is able to make it through the marketing messages and find her own inner beauty when she gets of “doll age.”
If you are a Digg user, please give Jim a digg here.
Ryan Adams – “These Girls” Rawk Version
Cloverfield is a Rejection of “Social Media”
Amen…
“Most of all this is a movie about how the young’uns have no tools for moral discourse and that all they can do is utter banalities and take endless pictures of each other and record their lives for no apparent purpose.”
Cloverfield is a fantastic movie for all the wrong reasons and makes you scratch your eyeballs/head/logic and reconsider who you’d go back for. Go see it for your own benefit and realize what Abrams, etc are trying to express.
Hunter Thompson on Macs
Awesome.
Then came this gem: In the mid-80s, tired of getting Hunter S. Thompson’s column copy late, by snail-mail, the editors of the San Francisco Examiner took the plunge and sent Thompson a new gizmo called a “Mac.” The relationship between the fabled journalist and his electronic tool was reportedly troubled from the beginning. It ended shortly thereafter, when Thompson called his editor screaming in frustration, grabbed his shotgun, and blasted the youthful Steve Jobs’s creation to smithereens. Then he sent back the pieces.
Silicon Alley Insider: Hunter S. Thompson Reviews Apple’s New Mac
GeekCast Episode 1: 3 Guys, 1 Cup
Shawn Collins, Jim Kukral and I discuss political affiliate programs, what we hope to do with GeekCast.fm, problems the affiliate networks aren't solving and innovation in the affiliate space.
What Do the Smurfs, Robert Heinlein and Dura Europos Have in Common?
Twitter Nostalgia
Twitter is like an indie band that did well and now is selling out stadiums across the world.
It’s interesting to me that when I first started using Twitter in 2006, the amount of “in-twitter” replies using the @ sign were low. If I came across someone using the @ sign more than a few times a day I tended to not follow or unfollow them because, at first, the platform wasn’t about conversing. Twitter was about answering the simple question of what we all were doing. It was interesting and amazing. The music and giddiness of something new was there.
Now, in 2008 and with 700k members, Twitter is less about telling people what we are doing and more about the “conversation” and follows the aesthetics of an IRC chat. Twitter has become a Rolling Stones-esque performance show with lead singers prancing around on the social stage clad like Bono and jubilant like Mic Jagger. It’s fun to watch, but after a few hours, I’m ready to go home and put the headphones on so I can enjoy the music like I did years ago.
I follow around 600 people, and now seeing a tweet without the @ sign is a rarity, but always gets my attention and makes me nostalgic for the good old days before Twitter made it to the cover of Rolling Stone and we practiced in a garage.
Then isn’t better than now, and the opposite is true. However, now is different than then. I don’t necessarily want Twitter to become a social network because I don’t need or want another social network. I do want to see what other people are doing, though.
Perhaps someone will make an @-less platform where we can just play our music and not have to worry about the crowds or the groupies or the roadies.
How about an acoustic Twitter album?
Desiderata
Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story…
Finish the rest here. It’s short but good.
And here’s some background on the Desiderata.
Cat Powers Jukebox
Cat Powers’ new album Jukebox comes out next week, but it’s available for streaming and listening pleasure exclusively on Rhapsody. I highly recommend it.
For all the beatings that Rhapsody takes, I do love the service and have been a subscriber for a while. If you don’t mind “renting” your music and have a constant internet connection (and about $12 a month to spare), I highly recommend it as well.