Ploafmaster General

A piece on The Morning News posits that email, sometimes, can be entertaining to read. I really enjoy the lead-in: "Emails have about as much room for nuance as Post-It notes, and less staying power. But sometimes they’re pure poetry."

Reading this page made me pause and consider what's been lost since with the rise of email and instant messaging. With the ability to respond and communicate around the world at the speed of electrons, less thought is required in our written correspondence. The result is an ocean of thoughtless thought passed back and forth with little-to-no consideration of how the message is delivered or perceived.

Of course, this is likely my romanticized notion of the world. I'm sure the world was filled with plenty of trite and careless handwritten (or type-written!) letters long before The Internet changed things irrevocably. Still, it's pleasant to be reminded, as by TMN's article, that the quality of the writing is not dictated by its medium.

Compared to the veritable ocean of garbage job listings on all the major job websites, this posting for Greenview Data is a heaving sigh of fresh air.
(I don't know how long the listing will persist, so check it while you can.)

What happens when summer blockbusters collide? McSweeney's imagines the answer with Jill Morris' SEX AND THE CITY AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL.

Blankenship blogged about Plainview. Gruber blogged about 280slides. I decided to see how it would work putting the two together.

The result is a little slow on my 2006 Macbook Pro, but the concept and the possibilities are pretty amazing. Combining the two tools, you have a (so far) totally free solution for creating and presenting slide shows by way of a web-based tool and a small desktop application. Both Plainview and 280slides only released this week, so there's plenty of room for improvement, but they each seem to be off to good starts.

Have you ever wondered what would happen if four vegans were lost while hiking on a mountain of meat? No? That's okay, because David Henne, writing for McSweeney's, lets his imagination answer the question that nobody asked.

This is, hilariously, for real...and not the first year his has happened, either:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITq-38X2UTY&hl=en&w=580&h=485]

My boss, as he so often does, passed along an incredible clip from YouTube. This one shows a HUGE radio controlled B-29 Superfortress with working detachable X-1 (the rocket plane which broke the sound barrier). Absolutely amazing, and worth all seven minutes and change.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RVxSn9P568&hl=en&w=580&h=485]

Pure awesome sauce. Enjoy.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkDBlEvfbgg&w=580&h=485]
(via Kamen Lee)

Okay, so Weezer has fallen out of my favor because of everything they've spewed from the Green Album forward, but this video is actually pretty sweet - a sort-of YouTube retrospective of the last several years:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muP9eH2p2PI&w=580&h=485]
(via Adam and Jeremy)

The New York Times website is featuring an advanced post of a NYT Magazine article by Emily Gould, former Gawker employee and formerly obsessive blogger.

The whole article, while tragically paginated (TEN pages? Really?!?), was a fascinating read and an excellent window into the mind of somebody taking a hobby too far. I'm certainly in no danger of reaching even the minor celebrity dealt with by Gould. I can, however, empathize with her concern for too easily sharing private detail in a public forum, regardless of the parties, feelings, or consequences involved.

For your viewing pleasure, Zach Galifianakis interviewing Moby:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sjdvyh2UJWQ&hl=en&w=580&h=485]

Related: New York Magazine has their own YouTube channel with a few more gems as well.

So I'm going to stop using Twitter Tools to hit up Twitter every time I write a blog post. I've given this some thought over the last several days ever since Blankenship tweeted about it. I agree with his sentiment vis-a-vis "pimping" my blog - at least on Twitter. I'll certainly keep my blog listed on RVABlogs.com - if only because I do frequently write about Richmond-related topics (my short little write-up of deLux is more popular than I thought it would be) - but Blankenship's essential premise makes sense. If you like my blog, you'll read it. Pimping may bring visitors, but it won't retain readers.

It's just that for posts after this one, you'll actually have to come here (or check your feed reader) to see if I've posted something new.

I visited Reuters' website because I was trying to find more info on a New York Times article with a broken link.

I was arrested by the image which greeted me on the front page, which I'll not link to or display here.

At the time of this writing, the most visible item on the home page is the foot of a dead Chinese student sticking out from beneath the rubble. I was horrified when I saw this...but I'm not sure exactly why. I also don't know that I'm offended - it seems like relevant journalism to me. I think it's just the shock of seeing part of a dead child displayed in such a way.

Any thoughts?

WARNING: This video will simultaneously make you laugh really hard and want to claw your eyes out.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vasc8ghyu1g&hl=en&w=580&h=485]

I think the song's lyrics are freaking amazing as well.
(via Autoblog)

So reading through USA Today's website, I found out about some other online mixtape service called "Mixwit."

This thing stinks of venture funding and dreams of monetizing.

Sure, Mixwit beat Muxtape to the punch by several weeks, at least based on each app's blog. But Muxtape has developed into a clean, easy to use system of musical discovery and serendipity, while Mixwit, with it's TOS clearly written by an expensive lawyer, is full of shine, gradients, and more Flash than you can shake a stick at.

You see, Muxtape was created as a project by a photographer and seems to have grown organically as it was picked up by the Internet cognoscenti and lauded for its clean minimalism and ease of use. Mixwit, on the other hand, has some seed funding through Y Combinator and hopes, eventually, to be a complete online media hub. Add to that all the shine and tired (also sometimes cluttered) visual design and you may start to see why I'm not as readily warming to this web app.

I think there's another fundamental difference between Mixwit and Muxtape, though, which casts the latter in a more favorable light for me. Mixwit uses music you search for online, and Muxtape uses music that you (in theory) own. This means that Mixwit doesn't have to be representative of your actual music collection - it can be just your flavor of the moment at the time. Muxtape, on the other hand, adds to the feeling of nostalgia by forcing me to peruse my personal collection and and assemble that perfect mix of songs to represent my mood, personality, or something I'm trying to tell someone.

Sweet mercy this is hilarious. Perfect blend of cheapness factor and cheap humor.

http://flash.revver.com/player/1.0/player.swf?mediaId=874984
(via Engadget)

I seriously almost peed myself laughing at this. I actually drooled on my keyboard, and the afterlaugh^TM is so strong that I'm convulsing in my chair.

Just try watching this without a simultaneous laugh and WTF? moment:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8NOxoZ3rZc&hl=en&w=580&h=485]

As if Google Maps wasn't already useful enough, they've decided to integrate Street View with their driving directions:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgJSXrkwshg&hl=en&w=580&h=485]
(via Ze Frank)

MacNN is reporting that Paypal claims they won't block any modern browser, including Safari. Woohoo!

I've known for a little while now that Paypal is planning to block browsers that don't have anti-phishing measures built in.

I've given this some though, and I think this is a stupid idea. I understand phishing is a legitimate security threat, but it's one which requires user interaction at a higher level than most exploits. To prevent me from intentionally going to the Paypal website directly or from eBay is off-putting. It's not a crisis for me to open Firefox when I want to use eBay, but it's pretty crappy user experience if I have to remember to open one browser for one use case when I'd otherwise rather use Safari. I think this really boils down to me not liking a website/company telling me which browser to use.

I guess there's naught that I can do but hope Apple includes support for Extended Validation certs in a (near) future version.

Well, well, well. Flickr now has video.

While the interface, on the surface, seems to borrow heavily from Vimeo I must say that their implementation concept is pretty interesting. They only allow clips up to 90 seconds so as to maintain the idea of "long photos" or "slices of life." I'm not too happy with the default auto-playing behavior (which CAN be switched off) or how long it takes to make the clip full screen, but it DID just launch. As a Pro member, I'll be keeping my eye on this...

Matt Boulton put the above picture of this righteous creation on Flickr. He has, in fact, an entire set devoted to objects made from dry goods, commissioned by the Vancouver Food Bank as part of an event called Canstruction.
(via Serious Eats)

I guess everybody's gotta post about a comic from Married to the Sea, so here's one of my favorites in a long time.