Bummer

Google has dealt yet another savage blow to my fragile ego. The primacy this author once enjoyed at the top of a certain heap has been taken away, probably by pixies or gnomes.

Certainly one of the fey folk.

Pod People

Here we find one more of those new-fangly expressions that I just don't like. Podcast. Wretched word. A sort of portmanteau combining "broadcast" and "ipod". Disgusting. It just doesn't work. Both parts come from the latter half of the donor words. "Icast" would be better, but it probably violates some Apple copyright. "Broadpod" rhymes, at least.

Etymology aside, calling an online audio RSS feed a podcast is like calling an adhesive bandage a band-aid. Or a refrigerator a frigidaire. The popular lingo is confusing a brand name for a product. What a horrid thing to do. I, for one, have never owned an IPod, subscribed to ITunes, or bought into any of Steve Jobs's electronic fashions. Yet, I can and do consume these so-called podcasts. They play just fine on QuickTime.

Wait, isn't that an Apple product?

Well, yes, but.

But what, exactly?

But it's free, you see. One need only suffer through endless requests for updates and friend requests from ol' Steve himself and the world of free audio is open!

Besides, it would probably work fine on WMP or RealPlayer if I asked it to.

I did subscribe to the Penny Arcade podcast. Those two are nuts! N-V-T-S - nuts!

Scroll down. You'll find it.

The System Works, or Something About Wheels

There's an update on a previous post. It turns out that the rotational ground effect device that generates the highest decibels in audible sound does, in fact, receive more lubricant.

A Series of Tubes

Unless I've missed something, this installment is stuff I've done before. Embedding YouTube vids was an early habit of mine on the MySpace. I've since cleaned them all up, so I can focus on important things, like music playlists.

So, I once again set out into the vast landscape that is YouTube in search of cool videos that speak the words I cannot. Only this time, instead of Leonard Bernstein, I found James Burke. Without further ado:

Enough with the Flickr

I have reached my Flickr level limit. All I want to do is sit down and enjoy a nice cream soda. Opposed to my own ambitions, however, we find this Thing. Now I'm supposed to have fun with Flickr? Wonderful! Up until now, I've just been using it for practical purposes. Finally, I get to cut loose and see what joy I can squeeze out of strangers' photos!

The Flickr Colr Pickr is actually pretty cool. The rest of it, not so much. The map doodad probably is really neat, but I just don't trust it, somehow. And trading cards? C'mon, most of the so-called librarian cards don't look like proper trading cards. The template for the card resembles something from Magic: The Gathering but none of these goofballs bothers to put any effort into replicating the form of a card. Where's the damage? What are the effects? These are just captioned photos on a silly background. Do some research, people!

Okay, now that that's done, may I please return to creating a visual catalog of my possessions?

Deja Vu

This thing seems familiar somehow. If only I could remember what it resembles. It is as if an earlier concept, one which had been laid to rest, has returned from the grave replete with the accoutrements of the Undead (those consisting primarily of rotting flesh and a frightening demeanor).


Okay, so it's not as bad as all that. The stuff I read as "research" came primarily courtesy of Michael Stevens, of Tame the Web fame. This guy is, shall we say, very enthusiastic in his adoption of the whole "2.0" phenomenon. I never did like that term. I spoke about it in some detail here, but I want to say more now. Given that the current state of networked computers represents a fundamental shift away from an earlier paradigm, it is certainly not the second iteration. Unless one counts ARPANET as "Web 0.x" or something. And what ever happened to "Web 1.1"? "Web 1.3.153"? Even Windows had a 3.11. Either way, we've got to be up to "4.x" by now.


I seem to have lost my focus. Tags, right? On Flickr?


As previously mentioned, tags allow regular people to find things based on a common idea. Take, for instance, the Platonic ideal of a table. That's a tag, isn't it? The photos uploaded that carry the tag "table" vary widely in form, but all nevertheless display some recognizable table-ness that allow the tags to work. They also allow you to find pictures of tables. Or birds. Or whatever. And also find and possibly connect with the artists (term used loosely) who took the photos.


Is this important? Sure, if you're a voyeur. Or a stalker. Otherwise, it's just kinda neat.


I'm more a fan of deviantART anyway.

Um, Already Had One

Before
Originally uploaded by bryan.wetterlin

I started using Flickr a while back as a means of cataloging my possessions for insurance purposes. No, you can't see them. They are private, and fit only for the eyes of myself and my claims adjuster, should I ever make his or her acquaintance.

Sadly, I was delayed working on this thing because I had forgotten my Yahoo account password and security question, and the new password was sent to my Gmail. If you follow the link from a staff computer, you'll see my dilemma. Personal email is verboten, as you may expect. Then it turns out I have to give Flickr access to Blogger and transfer my thoughts from Blogger's Composer (which is miserable) to Flickr's Composer (which is worse - no spellcheck) and do my final edits after the words have already been posted. I find that distasteful and sloppy. I also can't seem to find a way to remove that horrid indent in the first paragraph. I may have to go back and create a similar indent in each of my other posts, just to make it right.

Thus my delay. Here is the end result, a pic I snapped back in August for our branch's annual Teen Volunteer Appreciation Party. We had a "fiesta" theme this year. Uploading to Flickr is remarkably easy, actually.

UPDATE: The indent doesn't seem to appear on Firefox. I'll have to double-check later.

Blocked 2.0 Awards

Sorry, I wasn't able to explore the site I chose. As much as I'd love to tell you all about the cool things happening at Pandora, I can't. I've filled out the form, let's keep our fingers crossed. It is very simple, really. If I am unable to do the work at work on a work computer, I'll need overtime.

UPDATE 2008/01/18: The system works! After requesting access, it was granted. Not sure if it was just for review purposes (which will later be revoked) but, still! Pandora is pretty cool. First, it asks you for a song or artist you like (I picked The Police as a test bed) and then it starts playing similar songs. Right away, I was listening to U2, The Cure, and (of course) The Police! A simple and intuitive rating system (thumbs up, thumbs down) let me fine tune my station. Live versions and B-side tracks were included, offering a nice change from commercial radio's "Top 10" playlists. The trial was only three or four songs long, but when the option appeared to create an account, there was no debate.

My Lack of Education Hasn't Hurt Me None

Online Payday Loans

So Far Behind It Is Not Even Funny

Yep. 2008. The latest post from the Powers That Be is numbered Thing 25. This is about Thing 18. Technorati. Didn't I already say something about this? Ah, yes. Right here.

But that was a different age. A happy time. A time when I was right there on the cutting edge of Virginia Beach's experiment with The Information Superhighway®. Now, I'm pedaling my bicycle along the service road, jealous of all those fancy-pants with their expensive automobiles.

Sorry, what?

Technorati. Riiight. This time I signed up and claimed my blog, for what it's worth. I was supposed to watch a tutorial or something, but those always put me to sleep. Besides, I'm usually at a public service point when I work on this stuff, so donning headphones and rocking out is not an option. I did search for blog posts and such containing "Learning 2.0". The results confirmed most of my suspicions, that this whole thing is by librarians, for librarians. Take a gander at the people making videos on the subject. Yup, librarians.

I noted another interesting trend. There has been a serious drop-off on posts mentioning Learning 2 point 0. Take a look at this chart. Telling stuff. September and October seem to have been the "Learning 2.0" season. Now, the levels have dropped off to below their pre-August 11 numbers. What happened to make such a flurry of activity? Is it related to our own program, which started in October? I doubt that VBPL accounts for any significant percentage of those posts, rather that the sheer volume of Learning 2.0 related material provided fuel to the Sparks in our department who gave rise to this conflagration.

Too much?

Technorati is very nice, by the way. Real cute, what with the hearts and all. It even has that cutsey name. Like a cross between technology and literati. Double plus good!