infobong.com the absurd courts the vulgar

• InformationWeek: How Your Creepy Ex-Co-Workers Will Kill Facebook
  Cory Doctorow argues that YASNS go through boom-and-bust cycles as people you don’t like find you on the services and try to add you as a friend.
  (del.icio.us tags: privacy Web2.0 yasns facebook)
• Knowmore.org: American Apparel, LLC
  This wiki page discusses the misdeeds of trendy clothing label American Apparel. Although it makes much out of the fact its shops are in the US, AA’s labor relations are problematic.
  (del.icio.us tags: wiki clothing labor)
• When Pigs Fly: The Death of Oink, the Birth of Dissent, and a Brief History of Record Industry Suicide.
  This impassioned article argues that the record industry alienated fans in copyright wars and deserves to go out of business.
  (del.icio.us tags: law music business file-sharing copyright)

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• Load OSX 10.5 Leopard on the eeePC
  This is so geeky I’m a little scared.
  (del.icio.us tags: gadget linux OSX hack)
• ASUS eeePC
  I want one of these little Linux machines for the sheer dork factor.
  (del.icio.us tags: linux geek gadget)

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• Internet Archive: Texas Knife-thrower Louella Gallagher throws knives at her daughters
  This is the greatest newsreel clip ever.
  (del.icio.us tags: video texas whoa)

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• TinkerTool: Details
  This little package allows users to tweak the appearance and functionality of OS X UI widgets. Sadly, it does not turn off the curved Dock menus in Leopard.
  (del.icio.us tags: useful OSX)
• living-e AG: MAMP
  Here’s an installer for Apache, MySQL, and PHP for OS X.
  (del.icio.us tags: webdesign useful MySQL OSX)

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• TLF: What EarthLink’s muni wi-fi announcement tells us
  The Philadelphia municipal wi-fi project always struck me as silly, and now it seems to have folded. This post describes some of the reasons it failed.
  (del.icio.us tags: business utilities wifi Philadelphia)
• NYTimes: Decline of the Tenure Track Raises Concerns
  Reading these articles about PhDs who work multiple temp jobs diminishes my interest in the academic life.
  (del.icio.us tags: labor scary education)
• stylephreak: colormatch redux
  This color picker gives you complementary tones.
  (del.icio.us tags: useful webdesign color)

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Hi, I thought I would blog.

Comparing the iPod to Amazon’s Kindle eBook reader, Nick Carr argues “The market for digital music players existed in 2001 because the content for the players – the digitally compressed music file – was already ubiquitous,” while “There is no big, readymade supply of content for the Kindle.” Leaving aside Web pages, I would have a use for a standalone device for reading PDFs. I’m reading more PDFs as the years go by; journal articles for grad school, technical manuals, and government documents are frequently packaged as PDFs, and it would be nice to have a separate device to read them without printing them on paper. Carr is right when he points out that Amazon charges a fee to convert PDFs to a Kindle-compatible format, which limits the appeal of the device.

His iPod comparison seems a bit strained since he bases it on an issue of content, but I think the stronger comparison is to the content business models. The iPod would play regular mp3s, but Kindle does not “play” regular PDFs or Web documents. I would be very interested in a Kindle if it were a PDF-display device, but a few other things leave me turned off.

• The price tag is too high. I might pay $200 for such a device, but twice that is too much.
• I can’t touch it. Amazon doesn’t have any retail outlets – at least near me – and I would want a sense of the fit-and-feel of the device before I slice off a chunk of my paycheck. Since one of the prime features is its e-ink display, Amazon is also losing an ability to sell because customers can see the cool new display technology.
• It’s also kind of ugly.

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• Reading Tea Leaves and Campaign Logos
  Cartoonist Ward Sutton analyzes Presidential campaign logos in fourteen panels
  (del.icio.us tags: branding politics design comics)

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• St. Charles Journal: A real person, a real death
  A Missouri teen committed suicide after a friend’s parents created a fake MySpace profile to pose as a cute boy and harass her.
  (del.icio.us tags: scary yasns myspace)

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• FOX News Porn
  Robert Greenwald has collected tacky moments on Fox News, suggesting its content is indecent.
  (del.icio.us tags: FCC indecency journalism cable)
• Tank Books: Tales to take your breath away
  I would like to get one of these for my sister as a Christmas present, but I don’t think they have US distribution. The titles they have lean toward the macho side, with Conrad and Hemmingway.
  (del.icio.us tags: literature neato print humor design)

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• Digital Tampering in the Media, Politics and Law
  This has been all over the blogosphere, but I’m posting it here for future reference. The Kent State example is particularly interesting.
  (del.icio.us tags: epistemology thereal history journalism photoshop)
• The Harveyville Project
  This former school in rural Kansas has been transformed into an artist’s colony. I sort of know one of the people involved in the project.
  (del.icio.us tags: rural neato kansas art)
• Seattle Weekly: Austin Cantina Delights in Lone Star Specialties
  Austin Cantina is an Austin-themed restaurant in downtown Seattle. Living in Austin, this seems like a strange idea, but, from reading the review, it doesn’t sound like the recipes are very true to Austin.
  (del.icio.us tags: weird review food Seattle austin)
• How-to: Derailer Adjustment
  Maybe this will save a trip to the bike shop. It’s been almost five years since I’ve had a tune-up, so it’s probably about time.
  (del.icio.us tags: DIY useful howto cycling)
• iPod Nano Skins | GelaSkins
  Cool arty skins for your iPod.
  (del.icio.us tags: design shopping iPod)

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