Etc: October 14
So I’ve been doing at alot of traveling and running about and the site has gotten a little neglected. But here are a few things to keep you guys entertained:
Flight Aware:
Ever want to really know where your flight is, not the airline’s “update” but the actual real location of the plane (6 minutes delayed). Try Flight Aware:
http://flightaware.com/
Ever want some “Cool Software“, well Intel has decided that they want to apply the Digg model to software apps. Go take a look:
http://coolsw.intel.com/
For you intellectual reader types, if you’ve ever needed to track down a book, magazine article, journal, music, etc … You can now search all your local (participating) libraries from the comfort of your own home using WorldCat. Type in the search and it will show you the nearest library that has the resource. The site is: http://www.worldcat.org/
And here is a direct link to their browser extension page:
http://www.worldcat.org/toolbars/default.jsp
While I’m talking about readers, Discworld is a series of books I have heard much about but never had a chance to read any of the series. But I stumbled upon a guide on how the 30+ book interrelate and a loosely coupled reading order (at the very least it’s literally a nice big picture) if I ever get a chance. Check out the guide here:
http://www.lspace.org/books/reading-order-guides/
I’m not sure how they get away with this but here is a MickyDees video game which I am pretty sure is not sanctioned by the actual corporation. Ever want to run the empire:
http://www.mcvideogame.com/
(Actually I guess this is that whole satire use of trademarks thing … although I’m not a lawyer. )
And finally if you have ever wanted to make one of those still picture talking image things, similar to what Conan does on his talk show … at least I think it’s Conan’s show… Blabberize is here to fill that need for you. Go ahead and make one, you know you want to:
http://www.blabberize.com/
Harry Potter in the Hood
I should have Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows sometime tomorrow but in the meantime, Enjoy!
7/23: Updating youtube link
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Release Date
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows’ release date of July 21st has been announced.
You can pre-order it now from amazon :
Standard Edition
Deluxe Edition
The Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix movie is due out in theaters on July 13th.
Hmm … I think I’m not going to get much done on the weekends in July.
Musharraf on Daily Show
Here is Pakistani President Musharraf in a interview on the Daily Show. Pay special attention to Jon Stewart’s first and last questions.
Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 3:
The memoir Musharraf was plugging :
From the reviews I have read, the contents of the book seem a little sensational and a little more fiction that fact at points, but it should be interesting to see if there is resulting fallout in the US or Pakistan especially if any the sensational portions turn out to be true.
Update 2/12/07 : Updating Video using comedycentral embedded links
Quickmuse
As seen on TechCrunch :
Quickmuse is in their own words “a cutting contest, a linguistic jam session, a series of on-the-fly compositions in which some great poets riff away on a randomly picked subject.” Basically 2 poets are given 15 minutes and a quote as a topic and they proceed to write a poem. On the site you can see the live action, or once it is over you can see the finished work, or you can “replay” the whole thing against a 15 minute timer and watch as the poem and its revisions evolve. It seems like a pretty neat site. There are also forums where you can discuss the poems themselves. Check it out.
Write a Story and get asked for you fingerprints and DNA by UF police
According to this article on Boing Boing, a University of Florida English graduate students was asked to provide fingerprints and DNA after publishing a story involving a murder on his blog where he publishes his stories. The murder as well as his stories are fiction. To make the story even weirder, apparently this seems to be some kind a backlash for his use of his admin blocking priveleges on Wikipedia.
Davinci Code Lawsuit Judgement Contains Secret Code
Apparently the judge who presided over the Dan Brown plagiarism trial decided to have a little fun in the wording of his judgement. The Judge decided to embed a secret code in it. An article concerning this can be found at :
If you would like to take a crack at decrypting the code embedded in the 71 page ruling, you may find it at :
Davinci Code Lawsuit has no merit
A British court has thrown out the lawsuit against Dan Brown. Here is more info from the LA Times.
A must read : Dan Brown’s Statement for Lawsuit
You may or may not have heard of the lawsuit concerning possible “plagiarism” for for “The Davinci Code”. Here is a USA Today article on the suit (no pie charts included) :
http://www.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2006-03-26-da-vinci-main_x.htm
What is really cool is that as part of this case Dan Brown went through and has written up how he puts together a novel as his witness statement. I think it’s very interesting to see the thought process and methods that he goes through. Dan Brown’s witness statement can be found at the London Times website here :
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,923-2085827_1,00.html
I’m pretty sure that this is not a publicity stunt. But coincidentally, “The Davinci Code” goes for sale in paperback form on Tuesday, and it is also the same day that the new book by Michael Baigent, the author suing Brown, comes out with a sequel to “Holy Blood, Holy Grail” (the allegedly plagiarised book), titled the “The Jesus Papers”.
Publicity stunt or not, read the “witness statement” if you’ve read Dan Brown’s books or are at all interested in writing.
Lord of the Rings – The Musical
A musical adaptation based on the J.R.R Tolkien trilogy just openned in Toronto :
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4840278.stm
Reviews have not been very good so far.
Grok WordPress
Well if you made it this far, you are looking at my brand new and still under very much construction site.
Welcome!
It’s going to take a little bit more elbow grease but so far WordPress (blogging software) rocks! At first glance the picture behind the blog name looks like it may have come as part of a theme, it didn’t, it is actually one of the Clocks in the Orsay museum in Paris (a former train station) which I gave a slightly more bluish tinge in Picassa. I took that pic while on my honeymoon, here is what the original looks like (well a web-ized version anyway):
Well enough for now … must get to sleep.
My last blogger post
Well I went and got myself a domain , two, actually so please start looking for new posts over at http://www.netfarious.net/ and http://www.netfarious.com/, they are mirrored for now. Right now my new blog is up and running other content is still TBD but with lots of space and bandwidth, who knows where it will go. It is still a work in progress, though, but it will be looking alot spiffier as work and life allow.
See you on the flip side!
Now Reading
Planned books:
None
Current books:
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The Shadow Rising (The Wheel of Time, Book 4) by Robert Jordan
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A Storm of Swords (A Song of Ice and Fire, Book 3) by George R.R. Martin
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1776 by David McCullough
Recent books:
- Lamb by Christopher Moore
- The Demonata #6: Demon Apocalypse (Demonata) by Darren Shan
- A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, Book 2) by George R.R. Martin
- The Demonata #5: Blood Beast (Demonata) by Darren Shan
- Demonata #4, The: Bec: Book 4 in the Demonata series (Demonata) by Darren Shan
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