Time flies
Posted: Wednesday, June 13, 2007 11:59 AM by Will Femia
Filed Under:
Games
Yes, I realize it's already hump day and I haven't posted a Clicked entry yet this week. I have no excuse other than that I've been busy at work and tired at home. I have no idea why I've been busy when the parking lot is empty and my e-mail is barely pinging but somehow my to-do list has been backing up. Anyway, I'm catching up today.
YouTube DIY political analysis:
- Folks think this shows French president Nicolas Sarkozy drunk at his press conference.
- The watch story is everywhere now but by some accounts it was first raised on the Web. Can you spot who stole W's watch? Given his popularity poll numbers of late I'm sure he'd have gladly given his watch and more for such a gratifying reception. The Olbermann blog was the first place I read that Tony Snow said the president had put the watch in his pocket himself. That's very hard to see from the angle of that YouTube video but this article has the video from the other angle. It looks like seconds 11 and 12 may show him removing the watch with his right hand and putting the watch in his right pocket before returning to Albanian-nuzzling.
I did my surfing yesterday with the new Safari for windows (beta) browser. I wasn't going to bother downloading it even though everyone seems to be buzzing about it because frankly, everyone buzzes about new Apple stuff, but page load times are something I struggle with on my work machine and since that seems to be the main selling point of this browser I'm going to give it a try. Then I read this and decided to switch back to the devil I know. The change in speed wasn't all that remarkable anyway.
...Then, I was playing with the new weather.com animated weather map (which is an improvement - and I'm not just saying that because it's what you get when you click the weather tab on MSNBC.com's navigation) to see when there might be a break in today's thunderstorms for me to sneak home relatively dry (on the motorcycle) and the app crashed IE and took all my tabs with it. There's no winning. P.S. The map animates with updates every five or ten minutes, which is really handy for almost real time storm tracking. I still got home soaked, however.
Speaking of new browsers, I was reading about Me.dium that is basically about collaborative surfing. It reminds me of Swarm the Dot, which is temporarily down but described well here. I always think of surfing as a solitary activity. Can it really become something people do together, like watching TV?
Blondes have more fun in pageview war - This is sort of about stock picks but he tells a story about how people mostly click on pictures of blond women. I'm trying to think of how to test this on Clicked. Maybe I could put up identical posts but in one I'll include a photo.
Watch your car crash. Pick from a menu to see your car's crash test.
I avoid those dancing/singing/talent shows like the plague but folks are really jazzed about this ordinary guy who blew everyone away with his opera singing on "Britain's got talent." The piece is edited for maximum drama so it's a little hammy, but it's an uplifting four minutes. If you're curious, a little ways down the list of related clips is Pavaroti's version.
Speaking of non-United States events getting more attention on YouTube than on mainstream US media, Robert Kubica not only survived this crash but wants to race this weekend.
Interesting perspective from the stands. I have to think that part of the popularity of this video is that you can play it as many times as you want.
Among the non-Clicked tasks I've been working on this week is helping compile a list of links to ranked items (like Amazon's bestsellers). I found this cool research blog in the course of doing so. For example: Shape wiki? It's about the shapes of zones on maps. I didn't even know that was a thing.
Hitting stupid people on the back of the head with a metal spoon is pretty funny.
Glenn makes an interesting point about "identity politics" that I hadn't heard presented this way before. "Back before identity politics, and the notion that "the personal is political," the idea of a rich guy representing poor people was entirely plausible. ... But now that we have identity politics and the like, that's impossible: If only a woman can represent women, only a black person can represent blacks, etc. ... then obviously only a poor person can represent poor people. And since there are no poor people in American political office, poor people perforce go unrepresented." I chopped that quote up for the sake of length but his entry isn't too long to read.
Speaking of too long to read: Commuter Click: The truth about recycling
I thought the Sopranos finale was perfect - or at least, the last scene was. The show itself was a little too funny for my taste and I don't like they way Carmella turned into a ridiculous character this season ("If there were children playing in those leaves, you would have run them over.") when last season I would have sworn her character was being prepped to lead the family. I had a hard time understanding the people who felt ripped off by the ending, but a lot of folks online were linking to this bit of outrage. Most revealing are these two lines in the conclusion: "The Nielsen reality is that people don't watch TV anywhere near that closely anymore, much less remember what goes on from week to week, to give such a subtle ending its proper due. Besides, The Sopranos was not a show that went on inside your head." I disagree with both. The people I know study the heck out of the TV they watch and The Sopranos was absolutely a show that went on inside your head. But if you don't think so then I completely understand why you didn't like the ending.
David Chase speaks - Apparently Chase had agreed to an interview with the NJ Star Ledger some time ago. You already know my preference for interviews is to present the entire raw Q&A so I found this one a little annoying in how it's composed, but if you're trying to suck up every last drop of Sopranos you'll appreciate it.
Learning design lessons from the Sopranos.
Like many people, Don't Stop Believin' was in my head after the Sopranos finale so I went to Napster looking for a free listen. They only had a 30 second clip so I tried a new service I'd heard about, Lala.com. They also only had a 30 second clip (C'mon Journey, what's up with that?) but their business model/gimmick is interesting:
"You are entitled to receive one CD from another lala user for every CD you successfully ship from your Have List."
"Lala will issue you a starter kit after you register and agree to ship your first CD. The starter kit will contain five (5) reusable plastic CD cases and five (5) envelopes (collectively, the "Shipping Materials")."
So they've taken file trading back to its literal roots.
Now that Sopranos is finished and most of the shows you watch are on summer hiatus, you could go outside for a walk after dinner but that's crazy talk. Instead, take advantage of this time to watch some Web. Four Eyed Monsters is a 71 minute movie put on YouTube entirely for free. The idea is that they're accepting donations to pay for the film, and they've got a deal with a movie review site that they get a dollar for every new (free) sign-up they recruit. It's a cool idea and a cool opportunity, but a cynical part of me, way in the back of my mind noted that this would also be a pretty clever marketing ploy by the review site. Regardless, I'm going to give the movie a try.
"Shutter life" isn't a stat that's usually advertised with new cameras. I'm not even sure how to find out how many pictures my camera has taken in its life, but after looking at this I'm wondering if cameras should come with odometers.
Paris Hilton parody. I think that's the tune of one of the songs on her CD.
Biophemera is probably best described as a science art blog. Among the links there: Nikon's Universcale
Today is Blog Like It's The End Of The World Day. "The idea is that your posting for that day is written as if a zombie uprising were taking place - around the world, and in your home town." The link has a list of participating blogs.
27 Skills Your Child Needs to Know That She’s Not Getting In School - Or at least, 27 skills that aren't part of the 3 Rs of a traditional school curriculum.
The Web's designers had a good time with this set of graphics from the NY Times. It's a visual report on a recent series of Bright Eyes/Conor Oberst concerts.
And in case your week is slower than mine, let's end this entry with a Ralph Recommendation:
Pootris
Taking a dump just got a little harder. Connect the pipes from the toilet to the sewer to prevent a smelly overflow!
Trust me --- this game doesn't stink!
-Ralph
The premise is kind of gross but Ralph's right, the game is pretty good. It's like advanced Tetris with shaped pipes instead of shapes and with extra toys thrown in.
