Wednesday, November 30, 2005

Boing Boing: Man gets 5,000 channels on 12 dishes

Cory Doctorow at Boing Boing introduces us to Al Jessup, a Beckley man who gets 5,000 channels on 12 dishes.
Al Jessup of Beckley, West Virginia, has 12 cheap satellite dishes stuck to his house, which pull in over 5,000 free-to-air channels from satellites all over the sky.

The original Register-Herald story is here.

Attention tapers, your free ride is over

New York Times: Deadheads Outraged Over Web Crackdown
The Grateful Dead, the business, is testing the loyalty of longtime fans of the Grateful Dead, the pioneering jam band, by cracking down on an independently run Web site that made thousands of recordings of its live concerts available for free downloading.

The band recently asked the operators of the popular Live Music Archive (archive.org) to make the concert recordings - a staple of Grateful Dead fandom - available only for listening online, the band's spokesman, Dennis McNally, said yesterday. In the meantime, the files that previously had been freely downloaded were taken down from the site last week.

For years the Dead would let tapers hook their recording equipment directly to the soundboard.
Dissent has been building rapidly, however, as the band's fans - known as Deadheads - have discovered the recordings are, at least for the time being, not available. Already, fans have started an online petition, at www.petitiononline.com/gdm/petition.html, threatening to boycott the band's recordings and merchandise if the decision is not reversed. In particular, fans have expressed outrage that the shift covers not only the semiofficial "soundboard" recordings made by technicians at the band's performances, but also recordings made by audience members.

To the fans, the move signals a profound philosophical shift for a band that had been famous for encouraging fans to record and trade live-concert tapes. The band even cordoned off a special area at its shows, usually near the sound board, for "tapers" - a practice now followed by many younger jam bands.

Further down:
"One-to-one community building, tape trading, is something we've always been about," Mr. McNally said. "The idea of a massive one-stop Web site that does not build community is not what we had in mind. Our conclusion has been that it doesn't represent Grateful Dead values."

I don't know what to say other than: Dude, this sucks.

Update: Here is a direct link that doesn't require registration.

Buy a billboard, that will show her

I received a email this morning from Howard Dean, you know the scream guy, trying to raise money to buy a billboard attacking Republican Jean Schmidt right outside her district office in Portsmouth, Ohio.

The site is http://www.democrats.org/billboard.
Jean Schmidt is only the latest Republican leader to cross this line of civility and respect for our veterans -- it's time to say enough is enough.

Republican leaders use these tactics to distract people from the simple fact that they have lost credibility on national security and foreign policy.

They abandoned the hunt for Osama bin Laden. They manipulated intelligence to sell the war in Iraq, and failed to plan adequately for the war before it started. They destroyed the moral authority America built up over five decades of Democratic and Republican presidents, and they alienated the universal support for our cause after September 11th.

Americans deserve to hear an exit strategy in Iraq and a plan to restore our moral leadership in the world. And questioning the patriotism of those who demand these things is absolutely out of bounds.

Thank you for standing up.

Governor Howard Dean, M.D.

Buying a billboard outside her district office sounds rather sophomoric to me. Why don't they TP her house or egg her car while they're at it. So much for raising the level of the debate. The DNC is getting in the mud with the pig on this one.

Single-letter domains

CNN.com: Single-letter domains might earn seven figures

I don't see how anyone would want a single-letter domain for marketing purposes: q.com, x.com, z.com, i.net and q.net doesn't ring a bell, but are currently being used. The only one that rings a bell is x.org, but you wouldn't know that one unless you are a Linux hack.

For more on single-letter domains see this Wikipedia entry.

Monday, November 28, 2005

Brentcast with music by me

The new Brencast features music by me:

The inaugural appearance of Vic (the wife)


http://brencast.blogspot.com
http://feeds.feedburner.com/brencast

Friday, November 25, 2005

Using the Internet creatively to Teach a Bank a lesson

A retired guy brings down the bank's computer by making hundreds of micropayments to protest their privacy policies.

read more | digg story

Thursday, November 24, 2005

No more Alias

John Cole at Balloon Juice reports Alias has been cancelled.

Law Firm IT: Oncee vs. Blogger, round 2

Law Firm IT: Oncee vs. Blogger, round 2

Blogger has marked Law Firm IT as a spam blog. I've requested review. I wrote about my previous fight here and here.

The First Thanksgiving

History class was a long time ago for most of us. The First Thanksgiving to the rescue. This site from Scholastic, you know the text book people, includes links to a picture timeline, a virtual voyage on the Mayflower, and a Thanksgiving CyberChallenge.

Best Black Friday Deals

This is a breakdown of the best deals for Black Friday. I don't shop the day after Thanksgiving, but I'm sure some of you brave souls do.

read more | digg story

Wednesday, November 23, 2005

Free Online Multiplayer Games

A list of some of the best free online RGP games. Some look pretty darn good, and some of them don't look all that great.

read more | digg story

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

This is sad

Feud closes downtown’s Mykonos
The Mykonos Café in downtown Charleston closed abruptly over the weekend because of a dispute between the building’s owner and the restaurant’s operators.

Landlord Spyros Stanley locked Mykonos’ doors at 218 Capitol St. on Friday night after learning that the husband-and-wife team that runs the Greek restaurant, Manoli and Aoleen Stavrulakis, intended to open a new restaurant in Nitro.

Monday, November 21, 2005

Now that's hot barbeque

Sunday, November 20, 2005

Free wi-fi vs fee-fi

The Doc Searls Weblog : Sunday, November 20, 2005: "One more lesson in why fee-fi is the online equivalent of pay toilets."

A Good Review of Flock

Since I'm too lazy to write my own review, here's a pretty complete review of the Flock. Talks about its shortcomings as well as its plus sides, mostly to users who keep Weblogs, Flickr collections, or del.icio.us bookmarks.

read more | digg story

Saturday, November 19, 2005

Interesting Web 2.0 projects

Yellowikis: Open Business Listings - a Yellow Page wiki.

Voice over Email: WaxMail - allows you to attach mp3 audio files to an email.

digg - always wanted to be a Slashdot editor? Here's your chance. User edited tech stories.

Flock - tagging, social bookmarks and blogging tools built into a web browser built on Firefox code. This thing will rock once it's finished.

Unix in JavaScript

A scaled down version of Unix all written in JavaScript.

read more | digg story

Thursday, November 17, 2005

Intel Macs might be very Cheap

Detailed specs are not available, but the rumor sites hint the iBook might see a price drop of $200. Did PowerPC chips really cost that much?

The rumor is we will see an Intel iBook in right after the first of next year. I still lust for a PowerBook, but an Intel based iBook would be very cool.

read more | digg story

Spam blog no more

I got this nice message from a human at Google:
Hello,

Your blog has been reviewed, verified, and whitelisted so that it will no longer appear as potential spam. If you sign out of Blogger and sign back in again, you should be able to post as normal. Thanks for your patience, and we apologize for any inconvenience this has caused.

Sincerely,
Blogger Support

The ads will not go back up. Mainly because they add nothing to the blog, and they didn't make more than a few dollars a month.

I have already sent the five or so bucks the ads made in the past couple of months to the Red Cross.

For now, enjoy the blog with no ads, and thanks to Blogger Support for reviewing the blog and taking it off the blacklist.

Digg gets the wired treatment

A great story and a brief history from Wired about the creation of Digg.
A hot new social-bookmarking site is deluging web servers all over the net with a tsunami of traffic -- and is starting to make Slashdot-size waves.


read more | digg story

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

All your base are belong to Google

TechCrunch: Google Base Launched. Yuck.
This is not a very interesting application in its current form. It’s like a 1985 dBASE file with less functionality. It’s ugly. It’s centralized content with less functionality than ebay or craigslist. The content is not integrated directly into Google search results, but “relevance” can bump it up into main and local search (and froogle).

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Happy Birthday Raging Red

Raging Red is 29 years old today.

Sunday, November 13, 2005

MySpace Gets Wormed Again

Someone found another way to use javascript on myspace and using a modified version of Samy's original worm, did it again.

read more | digg story

MS Anti-Malware Engineering Team blogs about the Sony DRM Rootkit

Sony shows off new PlayStation 3

Sony has unveiled its new PlayStation 3 console, calling it "a supercomputer for computer entertainment".

read more | digg story

Flock test post

Also testing using Flock to add tags to blog posts.

technorati tags: ,

4haks 2.0: Stacey fixes Flock bug

What the Flock is Web 2.0 Anyway?

One man's search for a definition to Web 2.0. After a brief examination of others attempts at defining the term he comes to his own unique conclusion.

read more | digg story

Web 2.0: Is it that bad?

The term 'Web 2.0' has been called overrated, over-hyped, VC-hijacked, irrelevant, misleading, among many others. But we have to ask ourselves -- is it really that bad? And also, if there is no alternative term and nobody steps up to create or brainstorm an alternative term, why do we continue to badmouth it?

read more | digg story

Saturday, November 12, 2005

Critical vulnerability found in Flash Player

A critical security vulnerability has been discovered in the Macromedia Flash Player commonly used to provide multimedia content on the Internet.

read more | digg story

World of Warcraft Free Trial!

Free taste of World of Warcraft, AKA crack. Includes downloadable playable game interface and access to the Wow server for 10 days.

I've removed it from my computer recently. I'm already addicted to GTA.

read more | digg story

Goodbye Google Ads

Google has marked Oncee@Blogger as a spam blog. I've requested it be reviewed, but the email is bouncing back. As a protest I've removed the Google Ads from both my blogs.

Firefox Extensions recommended by a Google engineer (Matt Cutts)

Matt Cutts show his Must-Have firefox extension's list.

Extension SessionSaver .2 saved my life! (and tabs) :)

read more | digg story

PC to Mac keyboard equivalents

Javiso Lime Sunday: PC to Mac keyboard equivalents

With all you PC to Mac switchers out there this might be useful.

Friday, November 11, 2005

BusinessWeek: How digg Uncovers the News

Kevin Rose & Jay Adelson were recently interviewed by BusinessWeek about the growth and history of digg. As you might notice I've been using Digg for some of my posts today. Digg is a great site, part of the Web 2.0 deal, and has replaced Slashdot as my daily geek news site.

read more | digg story

Chapelle Show GTA Vice City mock up video

Video on how GTA Vice City would look in real life. One of the best thing Dave Chapelle ever did.

read more | digg story

Must Have Games

cNet's list of must have games for all of the different consoles and PC's.

read more | digg story

Tarragon Room closing

Tarragon Room closing

The Charleston Daily Mail reports, "The Tarragon Room, Charleston's only four-diamond restaurant, will close Jan. 27 because of a shrinking customer base and the growing number of other area eateries."

I've never been there; but then again, I'm not sure I've ever been to a four-diamond, whatever that means, restaurant.

OS X x86 on a Toshiba laptop

Slashdot reports ZDNet has tested Mac OS X x86 on a Toshiba laptop.

Sony Secures Exclusivity For The Next GTA For PS3

It seems like Sony and Rockstar are joining forces to promote PS3? A gaming site has found out that The next generation of GTA will be launched exclusive for PS3.

read more | digg story

Thursday, November 10, 2005

Doom for iPod

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW): Doom for iPod now works on the nano

I'm holding out for GTA for the iPod.

Charleston lawyer accuses another Charleston lawyer of hitting him with a beer can

Don Surber has the story.

Wednesday, November 09, 2005

Live.com Safari Support

I agree with Deborah Rothberg over at Microsoft Watch: Live.com Gets Firefox Support. Now what about Safari?

More WV blogs

The Joy of Being Melonie

West Virginia Political Sweatbox - I think this one was once on my blogroll, but got lost.

Standing In the Shadows of Music

One Stack Mind

mildred's hubblisms

Girl Named Michael

If I've missed any in this list or in my blogroll, please let me know.

Run Linux and Windows on your Mac?

Apple Preparing Full Assault on Microsoft - Virtual Machine War?

This would be very cool, but the cooler rumor is with some killer code you might be able to install Windows apps on you Mac using the native Intel instructions.

I've seen OS X on Intel, and I was amazed at the speed. Apple will take over if these rumors are true, and I can get some of my desk space back at work. One machine to rule them all. We'll see.

Thursday, November 03, 2005

Web 2.0 echo chamber

The best thing about Windows Live

Instant Messaging & VOIP - Make calls over POTS with the IM client.

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

Why Windows Live sucks

There is no Mac support at all. I tried Safari, Firefox, Flock, and even IE for the Mac. None would load live.com.

Update: This morning (Weds.), it works in Flock.