Note to self
Do not leave your Gmail In box open in your browser window, as it inevitably will consume mass amounts of real and virtual memory. Get in, do what you have to do, and get out.
Pulling the plug on Info-Mac
Adam Engst details the plan for retiring the Info-Mac Network, noting that it has outlived its usefulness given the Internet's current climate. The retirement will not be immediate, though the ceasing of new software acceptance will be. The Info-Mac server will remain online for a few months, as mirror sites make the necessary decisions regarding supporting the now-frozen archive. If you want your very own mirror of the Info-Mac archives, you'll need a mere seven gigabytes of storage and a simple Unix command.
So I Have a Blog
You have to love the ode to Douglas Adams on Tim Berners-Lee's new blog. (Hint: bottom of the page.) [A wave of the phin to John.]
And the Macworld Eddy goes to...
Given this news, John Gruber makes an excellent point:
This puts Macworld in an awkward spot if they ever again want to review or compare RSS aggregators. If they say NetNewsWire is the best (which it currently is) they’re wide open to accusations of bias; if they say it’s not the best, then they’re stuck admitting that their readers who use the bundled version of NNW are getting something less than the best. Does anyone else remember when the press, in general, was not burdened by corporate ownership? I just turned 35, and I can recall it being a near-industry standard not that long ago, in my lifetime, where press bodies operated independently. John is dead-on in his analysis: how are we ever to take seriously any review Macworld conducts of any news reader from this point forward? The fact notwithstanding that a large amount of the Macintosh news reader community, this author included, agrees that NetNewsWire is, in fact, the best news reader out there, on any platform, and, the fact notwithstanding that said Macintosh news reader community likely applauds Macworld's decision to go with NetNewsWire, given that same would likely ridicule Macworld for choosing what it would perceive to be a lesser application if something other than NetNewsWire was chosen, one has to wonder what the thinking is amongst the editorial staff of Macworld to essentially paint themselves in to a corner when it comes to an ever-increasingly important segment of the software arena.
Not wanting it both ways
Jeff does an outstanding job of showing the flip side of the coin the press doesn't want to admit:
Yes, the President is responsible for making the decision to go to war based in part on intelligence that turned out to be incomplete. But the President is also responsible for acting with swift resolve to unseat a brutal dictator, terrorist and friend to terrorists. He’s also responsible for having the sheer guts to go it alone when a great many of the West’s liberal democracies shirked their responsibility both as leaders of the world and as members of the Security Council of the United Nations. He’s also responsible for bringing Saddam Hussein to justice, for capturing or killing his cohorts in crime, for cutting off a huge source of funding to Palestinian murder gangs, for shattering Ansar al-Islam, and for freeing the Shiite people of Iraq from decades of illegitimate rule by a Stalinist political party. And in many ways, President Bush is personally responsible for bringing liberty to Iraq for the first time ever, and for changing the history of the Middle East, and the Arab and Muslim worlds.
Who are the surrender monkeys now?
The Democratic Party's national leadership has plumbed a record depth in its search to score points against the Republicans. In the past week and a half, both House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean have called for the United States to surrender in Iraq. Not since George McGovern in 1972 has one party called for the United States military to surrender to an enemy during wartime.
Some will object to the word, "surrender," but there is no other word to describe the immediate withdrawal of troops from the war zone in Iraq. The simple fact is that two of the nation's three highest-ranking Democrats are advocating an enemy victory over U.S. forces in a foreign land. That not only is appalling in its contempt for the troops who have died to liberate Iraq, it is astonishing in its brazen disregard for the lives and well-being of the Iraqi people. [Via Political Diary.]
del.icio.us joins y.ah.oo!
Now that Yahoo! has absorbed another social-software site, maybe del.icio.us's import feature will get fixed. I'm hesitant to really dive in to the service, or Furl, until one of them can import all of the bookmarks I have loaded in my browser.
How you know you're a parent #1,487
While testing a new product for review, you set your iPod on shuffle, and hear Hootie & the Blowfish, dc Talk, King James (old Christian metal group), Petra (the Aerosmith of Christian rock), and then VeggieTales. Just kind of throws that whole rhythm off to have Junior pop in to the middle of the mix with "Come over to my house and play!"
Donate to the Angel Tree
During the Christmas season, one sees Angel Trees nearly everywhere: at work, in the malls, at church; you can hardly go anywhere without running in to an Angel Tree. Between church and work, we've already picked a few angels ourselves, and I'm sure many of you have, too. There is a group of children that are often overlooked this time of year, and those are the children of prison inmates. Prison Fellowship started its Angel Tree ministry in 1982, and has been going strong ever since. It's not these kids' fault their parents are behind bars, and they deserve to get something for Christmas as much as any other child. This year, a generous donor is matching all Angel Tree contributions up to $100,000, which means a normal donation that would give one child a gift will now serve two kids. So please consider making a donation that can turn what is often a lonely time for these kids into one of joy.
<i>Walk the Line</i>
Last night, for my birthday, my wife and I went to see the Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line. Wow. In my opinion, Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon nailed Johnny Cash and June Carter. No wonder the latter hand-picked the former to play them. My wife, who isn't familiar with Cash's music beyond "Ring of Fire" (written by June Carter, in case you didn't know, which my wife did not), thoroughly enjoyed the picture. She discovered she likes Cash's music, too. I'll have to load some up for her on her iPod Shuffle. Sidebar: My wife told me that Rosanne Cash, Johnny's oldest child from his first marriage, was not thrilled with the portrayal of her mother, Viv, to the point of having walked out of the screening she attended. My wife and I agree that Rosanne has nothing to worry about. I don't think Viv came off as hysterical or unhinged at all. I think she came off perfectly as what she was: a woman who realized that she was not her husband's true love; a woman who knew her husband was unfaithful, and that her life was not the least bit what she had expected it to be. Given that, I don't think Viv's actions, as portrayed in the film, are the least bit out of line. I thought the movie was great, even if they had to gloss over some more intriguing parts of Cash's life due to the time constraints of a major motion picture. This was not only a story of a man's dream to record and perform his music, it was the love story of Johnny and June. Days before we saw the film, I signed up for an account with eMusic. If you sign up now, you get 50 free downloads. Unlike the iTunes Music Store, the MP3s you download from eMusic have no DRM attached. You can burn them to a CD, load them to a music player, pretty much do whatever you want to with them, just as if you had ripped them from a CD of your very own. I used a little over half of my free downloads to get Cash's The Complete Sun Singles. This was very timely, given the material is heavily featured in the film. (Consequently, after using my 50 free downloads, I've since cancelled my eMusic account; they don't have anything else I want.) What's sad is that, at 35, my wife and I were the youngest people in the theater, and that's a real shame. Walk the Line is highly recommended, even if you're not a fan of Cash's music, and especially so if you know little about the man or his career.
Still no respect
Apparently, all common sense has left NCAA Divison I-A football rankings. Like we didn't know that already. Let me see if I get this straight: LSU begins the year with a new head coach; overcomes the fallout of Hurricane Katrina; has its season opener rescheduled to an off-week later in the season; has its second game, originally scheduled as a home game, played on the road, with a spectacular fourth-down play to win the game as time expires; has its third scheduled game of the year, now the first actual home game of the season, moved from Saturday night to Monday night, thanks to Hurricane Rita; loses said game to Tennessee in overtime, sloppily giving up a 21-point lead and allowing the Volunteers to tie the game; then wins every single game for the rest of the season, including beating Auburn, Alabama, and Florida, to clinch the SEC West. The Tigers lose--and rightfully so, given the way they played--to Georgia in the SEC title game. So going in, LSU is the #3 or #4 team in the country, the #1 team in the SEC, but fails to clinch the championship. So this means a drop in the rankings for the Tigers, and they become the #2 team in the SEC, with the same record as Georgia, right? That would be a no. Not only did LSU fall out of the Top 10, to the likes of Notre Dame, Oregon, and Miami, because the loss--in the championship game--to Georgia gives them two conference losses, somehow Auburn--you remember Auburn, the team LSU defeated earlier in the season?--becomes the #2 team in the SEC and gets the bid for the Capital One Bowl. LSU goes to the Peach Bowl instead. Not that I have anything against the Peach Bowl, seeing as how it's sponsored by my favorite fast food chain. But it's no Capital One Bowl. (NCAA football trivia: give the name of the Capital One Bowl before it was co-opted by corporate interests.) So the trend continues. The Tigers got little respect, if any, in 2003 when they won the national championship, and given all they have been through this season, they get none at the end of the season either. Michael, Eric, my empathy with you deepens every year.
ATPM mentioned in NYT
I don't often link to The New York Times, but when the publication I work on gets a mention, well, I have to throw the Times some link love. James Fallows notes the plethora of Macintosh thought-organization applications (free registration required), and About This Particular Macintosh gets a mention in the last paragraph. This is due to the incredible work of Ted Goranson, and his About This Particular Outliner series. Thanks, Ted, for all of your hard work! [From Michael via e-mail.]
I think Congress has better things to do
Let's see: renewing the Patriot Act, the Senate needing to confirm Bush's judicial nominees, as well as a Supreme Court nominee, et cetera, et cetera. So what do they turn their attention to? Why, the Bowl Championship Series, of course. Pay attention, because this is likely one of the few political issues Lawson and I will agree on: Representative Barton, you're wasting your time, your colleagues' time, the time of BCS board members, and taxpayer dollars. Congress has no business sticking its nose in to the BCS mess. I wouldn't go as far as Barton in saying the BCS is "deeply flawed," though it has made some whoppers in the past few years: picking Oklahoma over USC to face LSU in 2003, and picking Oklahoma over Auburn to face USC in 2004 immediately spring to mind. The solution to the problems of the BCS is not a Congressional investigation. Rather, the football bigwigs at the NCAA need to get together with the various bowl organizers and sponsors and develop a playoff system for Division I-A football where the championship game will be rotated among the bigger bowls. As the ESPN article notes, there's a lot of money in the bowl games, particularly the BCS bowls, and a playoff system would theoretically kill off some of those dollars. I don't believe that would happen; look at March Madness with NCAA Division I-A basketball. Nevertheless, the overriding issue is money. If it wasn't, then the cadets and midshipmen wouldn't be crammed into the corners of the stadium for the annual Army-Navy game, but would be seated, out of respect, directly behind their teams' benches. (We wouldn't see that awful swoosh logo on those classically minimalist uniforms, either.) Until the NCAA and the bowls figure out a way to not lose money, we won't see the much-needed playoff system--for the only sport in Division I-A without a playoff system--for college football, and we will continue to have controversy over whom should play for the championship, and which team is truly number one.
What a difference a couple of hours can make
This morning, we took the little phisch to downtown Dallas for the annual Neiman Marcus Adolphus Christmas Parade. He had a gas, and I hope to have photos up soon. Before the parade began, I was 34. By the time the parade was over, I was 35. My wife--who, for the record, is six months older than I--has found it fun today to refer to me as "old," and to remind me that it's "all downhill from here." Actually, looking at average age statistics for non-smoking males in the United States, I believe I have another two to three years before I reach the top of the slope and began the descent. Tonight we're going out to see Walk the Line, and once again, the Tigers are playing for the SEC Championship on my birthday. (Thank God for TiVo.)
Killing them with kindness
Hugh notes Kevin McCullough's campaign to send Christmas cards to the ACLU. Ever since the little phisch was born, the Christmas cards we've sent out have been the kind where a photo of the youngun was part of the card. So we have a few boxes of Christmas cards that will likely never be used. Kevin's campaign sounds fun, and I have the materials. So the ACLU can expect a Christmas card from me this year. Probably two. Maybe three. Alright, four. Let's just say, when I get tired of signing them and filling out the address info on the envelopes, okay?
ATPM 11.12
The December issue of About This Particular Macintosh is now available for your reading and downloading pleasure. Our continued thanks to Bare Bones for their sponsorship of the publication. ATPM is an all-volunteer effort, and any monies made from sponsorships or ads go to support the ever-growing hosting costs for our eleven years' worth of issues. If you are a hardware or software developer for the Macintosh community, and you would like to become an ATPM sponsor, please contact the editors. Rob reminds us of December issues past, present, and takes a peek at the future. Ellyn notes how the gadgets of Star Trek are slowly appearing today. As usual, you can depend on Paul for an eclectic mix of sites to explore: tractors, Mac browsers, sudoku, Lowe's library, and a porcelain throne in a pear tree. Ted wraps up some loose ends in this month's ATPO, and puts the call out to the outlining community for users to help out with future ATPO columns, as well as proposing something of a formal gathering of the outlining community: an e-mail list, forum, or web site. If you're a hard-core outliner, and any of Ted's proposal strikes you, [drop him a note](mailto:tgoranson@atpm.com?Subject=ATPO/Outlining community). Johann delivers a column on how a formerly-derided technology is now changing the way he interacts with his PowerBook and mobile phone. Tom provides a quick how-to on Apple's PhotoBooth, and Sylvester offers part deux of his music server series. Tom weighs in on Docktopus, which I'm still trying to figure out if I like or not. Lee convinces me the iFM, in its current state, isn't for me given my listening habits. Eric reviews a book I will have to take a serious look at, as well as the tome Rob read for this month's issue. Andrew delivers a double-shot of trackball reviews, with the X-Arcade, and my trackball of choice, the Logitech Trackman Wheel. (I have the corded version.) I'm not a gamer (and if I were, I'd probably use a console), so Andrew's concerns on using the Logitech for games is moot for me. Yours truly contributes some shots from the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone National Park, taken this past June on a family vacation, for this month's desktop pictures section. In this month's Cortland, the Lisa turns on her creators, while Cortland is rewarded for his forward-thinking when it comes to backups. Frisky talks about one of my favorite media apps, VLC, which I've been using to watch those episodes of Joey I've missed and had to download from the 'net, because the TiVo is recording someone else's shows during that time slot. As usual, you can download the latest issue in one of three flavors. Just don't spill the egg nog.
Error and trust
Jeff points to Lorie Byrd's recent column, and correctly notes how voters should want their elected officials to err: on the side of caution. What really stood out for me when I was reading Lorie's piece, was this:
[I]t must be pointed out that Democrats are not to be trusted with the nation’s security. They have shown that not only will they endlessly debate until it is possibly too late but that after a military action has been initiated, in the face of difficulties and waning public support, many will back out and abandon the mission and the troops. The approach of the Democrats to the threat posed by Saddam Hussein as outlined in all of the intelligence reports available prior to the war in Iraq stands in stark contrast to that of the Bush administration.
Retrophisch™ Read Redux
So I decided the whole blog post thing regarding my book reading was taking up more of my time than I wanted to devote to it. I have a stack of books on my desk that are in the queue to be blogged, and quite frankly I cannot muster the willpower to write said posts. So, back to a static list, which is now also part of the navigation links in the banner at the top of each page.
I've always said, "If you want to play games..."
[N]ext-generation consoles seem set to surpass the PC as the premier platforms for gaming, which means anyone who’s resisted switching from Windows because of the lack of games for the Mac will have one less reason not to switch. I think there a lot of guys out there who are starting to think they’d be better off with a new Mac and an Xbox/PS3 than with a new Windows PC. Years ago, when I was more fanatical about evangelizing the Mac, whenever the gaming argument came up my reply was always along the lines of "If you want to play games, go buy a Nintendo." (Update the phrase with the console of your choice.)