Monday, June 30, 2003
In the [web] news...
A few new browsers were just released (today?). Mozilla 1.4 and Netscape 7.1 are now both available for download.
Also, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of web loggers gaining libel protection. Sweet, now I can spread rumors and steal quotes like this one:
"One-way news publications have editors and fact-checkers, and they're not just selling information — they're selling reliability," said Cindy Cohn, legal director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "But on blogs or e-mail lists, people aren't necessarily selling anything, they're just engaging in speech. That freedom of speech wouldn't exist if you were held liable for every piece of information you cut, paste, and forward."
I guess I was already stealing quotes and spreading rumors anyway... But now I can do it with impunity. Well, at least I can until the Ninth Circuit gets overturned again.
Sunday, June 29, 2003
Hackbot update...
Hotbot recently (not sure when) announced the winners of Hackbot, their CSS redesign competition.
Although it would have been nice to win the big screen television, I was pleased to find my name in the honorable mention category.
Guess who?
Can you guess the identity of this high school thespian? We'll see...
Friday, June 27, 2003
Suggested reading...
The WaSP has issued a challenge to Microsoft: End of Free IE Not the End of Web Standards.
Thursday, June 26, 2003
Surfin' Safari...
Apple announced the first non-beta release of their Safari web browser this week. Yesterday, my work received the first official complaint that a Safari user could not access one of our web applications. Maybe now we'll get that Mac testing box I've been asking for since I was hired.
Wednesday, June 25, 2003
What is this, a shoe meat market?
Every day at lunch, I walk past a one-hour laundromat. There is a shoe-shine chair in the laundromat that I notice occasionally because the toes on my black shoes are very scuffed. However, I've never gone in.
Perhaps it's that I'm too cheap to pay someone eight bucks to shine my shoes but I'm might also be too lazy to shine them myself. Or probably it's the old shoe-shine man who eyeballs... er... ogles my feet every time I walk past him. He's got this creepy look and he chews his dentures in a way that makes me a little uncomfortable.
I get the strangest sensation that this is the type of thing attractive women go through all the time. I can almost see him thinking, "Ooh, if I get my hands on those smooth toe curves... I'd rub and polish the shine out of 'em... oh baby." All he's thinking about is meat and money, like some kind of toothless shoe-shine gigolo. What a creep...
Saturday, June 21, 2003
Ninjai's back...
As I mentioned back in March, the Ninjai animations were taken offline because of bandwidth limitations, but I got an email this morning saying that the first two episodes of Ninjai were back online and more will follow soon. Ninjai.com worked out a hosting agreement with Atom Films where a brief commercial is shown before each episode.
Disclaimer: Be warned that most of the episodes are pretty violent and one (episode 2) has a gratuitous amout of cursing. Flash plug-in required. High bandwidth recommended.
Digital DJs...
Some of you may be familiar with Native Instruments Traktor, a two-channel, DJ-style, MP3-mixing software application. It was a fantastic product, but was still too physically seperate from the DJs touch to have a serious chance at replacing real turntables for a skilled mixer.
However, Patrick Fox just sent me a link to the latest release by Stanton and Native Instruments: Final Scratch for Traktor.
Final Scratch is a physical interface, using real turntables and a mixer, to control the Traktor program. Custom records (probably with a digital click-tone) send signals to the interface to control any song in the computer's MP3 library. Pretty sharp. The real test through, will be to see how well it handles turntablism techniques like scratching and juggling. It is named Final Scratch, after all. We'll see...
Monday, June 16, 2003
Farewell, Mac IE...
Microsoft announced last week, to mixed opinions, that they would no longer be developing Internet Explorer for the Macintosh operating system. I was surprised to hear this since I knew they had been working on Mac IE 6 for at least a year and probably longer.
The official explanation is that it would require close development between the browser and the OS, something to which only Apple has access
. While this is a valid reason, Arlen Walker from the webdesign-L list had another theory today.
I don't see it as ironic as much as pre-emptive. It accomplishes two things:
- It prepares the ground for the inevitable complaints from Windows browser developers when the rendering engine is built into the OS. "Nobody complained when Apple did the same thing, so we have the right to do it as well!"
- It's a shot across Apple's bow; "You finish that productivity suite you're working on and we'll pull the plug on Office, too."
Arlen Walker
Is he paranoid? Maybe... but it's an interesting idea... Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?
Sunday, June 15, 2003
Older, yes... but wiser?
Jessie and I got back from our trip to California on Tuesday. We started in San Francisco, went down to Yosemite, and then spent about a week in Los Angeles and San Diego.
We celebrated our three-year anniversary (June 1st) and my 27th birthday (June 9th) while we were gone.
I've posted some pictures from the trip for your perusal. My favorite picture is this one of Jessie by a fallen redwood tree.
Wednesday, June 04, 2003
Vacation...
I'm in California this week. See you on the flip side. We just left Yosemite and are headed down to Los Angeles tomorrow.
