I’m switching my blogging system over to Habari ( I’m a sucker for technologies that have a version number less than 1 ( Plus, the dude who made the theme for this blog has made the switch, I may as well follow ) ), which has resulted in some transition pains.
So, if you don’t mind, please switch your feeds over to Moot Mots, where I plan to keep my blogging going for some time.
The beginnings of an online guitar game. Add some drums and vocals, and we’re really getting somewhere, you know?
Exciting stuff from Mozilla Labs: Ubiquity. Those crazies have taken what researchers are straining to implement in the real world ( ubiquitous computing ), and applied it to web browsing. While it may not quite hit the level of activity-based ubiquity quite yet, its certainly a step forward. In a nutshell, it allows you to call other websites from your current browser page by typing in a preset phrase. So, need a quick map to give someone? Type “map” and the location, and Ubiquitous will pop up what you need… Giving it a download right now, though I sadly don’t have the time to play around with it and give it a justifiable review.
The new class blogs for CGT 353 and CGT 356. I am taking it upon myself to try and get some fresh air to the students, and clean out the stuff that is regurgitated by the professors teaching every semester. Ours is a world of technology, and somehow, someway, what is taught must keep up with its ever-changing form. Interested in helping inform a new generation of web multimedia designers? Have some advice for the blogs? Want to talk?… Drop me an email and we’ll set something up.
Before Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad, and Guitar Hero… I really didn’t care about guitars.
I think it was when Koyuki fell in love with his first guitar at the shop that I said to myself: “Holy shit, guitars are awesome!” As they described the guitars there, I singled out the Les Paul as the best of the bunch. I think it was due to the resemblance it bore to the standard acoustic guitar. At that point, I really wanted to learn guitar, but time constraints were too overbearing to pick anything up. Schoolwork was on the verge of killing me, and continued to do so.
I’m not sure what sparked it exactly, but as school rounded to its end, the desire to learn grew back. Maybe it was my wife’s investment in a dog, maybe it was me being totally sick of sitting in front of computer screens, but when our business plan team won ourselves a bit of cash from the Burton-Morgan competition, I felt justified in buying myself a guitar to learn.
I did research, went to guitar stores, and tried to stay within my limit of $200 for a starter guitar. Had I stopped by a Meijer or Best Buy, I would have seen one of their guitars and left with it immediately. Instead, I wound up with something much better when a friend approached me with a guitar he wanted to sell. It was a Telestar Mona. when he pulled it out of his car and opened the case, I thought ‘wow’. This was a guitar that wasn’t even on my radar. But, for the price ( $250 ), I ‘knew’ I wasn’t going to get a better guitar. A week later, the guitar was mine. It was a great purchase. Sure, I paid twice the price of what it was selling for 8 years ago. But I also got a guitar with a story behind it, that few own. This is not a stock Les Paul, and the difference has made it the better.
I think this echoes the 37signals mantra, but it was a good listen anyway: The power of slow .
I’ve always been a huge fan of getting away from the computer and taking it easy. This merely reiterates how good an idea that really is. Now, if only I could hold to it better =(
37signals sometimes blows me away with the stuff they write. This is probably wonderfully old news, but I just came across Getting Real their book on creating a small and effective web-based startup, and it is awesome.
Makes me want to grab a couple of friends, a good idea, and trek into the realm myself.
Man, when did Scott Card snap? I used to be a big fan of his work ( until the “I want you baby inside me” incident ). I even forgave him his unfounded anger against Star Trek.
But an armed uprising against our government over something like same-sex marriage? That’s just a bit extreme. I guess if he made it into a book, it may at least be a bit humorous.
ecmascript4, the scripting language that actionscript 3.0 ( which is awesome, btw ), is dead. It was ‘merged’ with its littler brother, leaving future web developers with less power in their javascript, and adobe with an awesome language that isn’t at all where they strategically wanted it to be.
At least, that’s what I gathered from Hank Williams post on the matter. Seems to boil down to the old refrain of “Blame Microsoft”.
Life philosophies are great aren’t they? One of my favorites to pick up on was from my Business Law teacher, Mr. Gothard. He had this peculiar way of viewing life: either you were a winner, or a loser. Now, that’s not to say that one always had to be a winner in his world. Quite the contrary. What made it so odd, and so refreshing, is that he was quite able to accept that sometimes you’re the winner, and sometimes you’re the loser.
It is quite straightforward when one adheres to such a philosophy. One can easily tell clients: “you’re a looser”. Because they are. No big deal really; losing this one isn’t losing the game. Tomorrow you may be the Winner.
Even to this day, when things haven’t gone quite the way I want them to, I can easily laugh it off by saying “Travis, you’re a loser.” It gives you that hope that, loser as you are, it is a temporary thing. Being temporary, the real meat of the philosophy hits: being the winner is not important. If the winner was always the winner, maybe. But we live in a world of wonderful grays. You just have to Win enough to keep yourself out of the pitch black, and you’ll do ok for yourself. So next time you’re feeling defeated, say “I’m a loser”, and get over it; the faster you do, the faster you can play your luck next time at being a winner.
One final quote from Gothard that may tickle your fancy ( and I think explains life quite nicely as well ), “Stupid: It’s a legal term”.