old news |
3.19.00 |
It never ceases to amaze me how generously people share their stories online. To everyone who wrote in with condolences and stories of their childhood pets, thank you. Now I know Scarlet is in good company. |
3.18.00 |
I'll miss you, Mrs. Scarlet. |
3.17.00 |
Today I clipped the rose bushes outside with my downstairs neighbor and scratched my hand on a thorn. The problem with computer work is it doesn't leave cool physical reminders - just dull aches. Someday when I'm old I'll be a gardener. |
3.15.00 |
I'm home! And thank goodness. One more day of all those great conversations (not to mention the drinking and smoking) would have turned me into a permanent Austinite. I'm still processing everything I've learned, both professional and personal, from SXSW. I'll post some stories and photos soon. In the meantime, talk amongst yourselves. The weblogs panel went quite well, btw. It walked the line between love-fest and flame-fest, so I think I did my job as a moderator. And Meg, Jason, and Matt were just fabulous. It looks like we even got some press. I have a new piece of silver on my wrist that fills me with hope. |
3.13.00 |
Austin, Texas. 3am. Too stoked to sleep. It's good to be back in Austin. This is my fourth sxsw here, but it feels like the first. So many new faces. So many smiles. I've been here enough that I still get lost, but everything seems strangely familiar. There are a lotta ghosts here for me. But the people, man, the people have made it all worthwhile. There are too many of them to list (and link to) right now. But trust me. The people are the best part. The freelancing panel today was great. I had a blast and probably talked too much. The weblogs panel is not until Tuesday, which is good. By then we will all have met and hung out a bit. It's so much fun to watch the virtual fade away in the bright light of Real Life. Austin is a Real Life kinda town. |
3.11.00 |
At last! The secret project is revealed. It's ... the new and improved Blogger! This was the most fun I've had designing a website in a long time. (Just look at all the cool people I got to play with!) I can't believe how fast we whipped this thing together, but here it is in all its black-backgrounded, liquid-tabled, blue note-ish beauty. (And if you like the look of the site, wait till ya see the t-shirts!) And with that, I'm finally off to Texas. If you're gonna be there, be sure to come say hi. You can find me on the Freelancing in the New Media Landscape roundtable on Sunday (1:30-3pm) and I'll be moderating the Weblogs roundtable on Tuesday (11am-12:30pm). Oh, and pray for sun. Thanks. |
3.10.00 |
Thanks to a few great lessons from one friend, and a less-than-gentle nudge from another, powazek.com has been dragged into the css-enabled future. Like the new fonts/sizes? Lemme know. |
3.9.00 |
As a reward for finishing my work on the super secret project that will stop being secret tomorrow (!), I'm going to sit down and ... do my taxes. Ugh. |
3.8.00 |
The secret project I've been slaving away on is almost ready to not be secret anymore. Phew. My fellow Californians: you suck. I mean, you really really suck. Sigh. |
3.7.00 |
Yaknow, maybe it's just me, but that doesn't look like fun at all. [via ev] Happiness is a brand new mouse. Hey Californians - get out there and vote today! Thanks, Alan. |
3.6.00 |
Public service announcement: My astrologically wise friend Betty tells me that Mercury will be in retrograde until the 14th, which causes havoc in all sorts of personal communications, as well as anything electric. She recommends the following: "The wise human thinks clear, positive, loving thoughts at his/her computer. Lovely computer. Smart, beautiful, happy, functioning computer. Love love love!" (And the 14th just happens to be the day of the weblog panel. Coincidence?) I seem to have taken the pic of the day over at evhead today. "They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. I think thats a pretty low figure." -Isaac I miss my songs. On Friday I actually did go to the beach. And there I saw the most beautiful thing. I can't help but wonder about the symbolic importance of thirteen kites flying in unison. |
3.5.00 |
Out last night eating and drinking with the Pyramaniacs, the subject of first computers came up. If there's one sure fire way to get a group of geeks talking, it's to bring up pirating computer games on five-inch floppies back in the day. |
3.3.00 |
When it's this beautiful outside, and this nasty inside, there's only one thing to do: turn off the computer and go to the beach. |
3.2.00 |
Sometimes hope is all I need. And sometimes it's all I have. |
3.1.00 |
March. Sigh. It's a beautiful day in San Francisco. |
2.29.00 |
Today the final tested story goes up. Be sure to check out all 29. Frame-based, window-happy weblogs of the world unite! Hang in there, Keith. A very convincing argument for going Green this presidential election. New in link: a short list of cool sites by nice folks I try to visit every day. |
2.28.00 |
what I learned in school today: rockin the home office today: "The most amazing thing about the internet is not that it's an easy way to buy stuff, but rather that it is a whole new communications medium that has given birth a new form of community." -Jamie Zawinski. Amen! |
2.27.00 |
I think Homer said it best. |
2.25.00 |
This is why I love the web. Yesterday (see below) I posted an off the cuff question. Today I have responses:
|
2.24.00 |
Of all the places to sleep in my apartment, why would my cat Spoo choose the computer keyboard? |
2.22.00 |
It was so beautiful out yesterday, I just had to take some pictures. Unfortunately, I happened to be driving at the time. Fortunately, nobody got hurt. I love Keith's new design. James posted: Draggable pals make me happy. |
2.21.00 |
I spent all weekend offline. Bliss. The unbearable lightness of being Seemann. "Grandpa Horsman used to tell me that when they turned this nation on its side, everything loose fell into California. I guess that's why I ended up here." It's great to see you online again, Julie. Secret meetings at Pyra HQ! |
2.18.00 |
powazek.com special: Lance Arthur could be the Hunter S. Thompson of new media. Yes! the {fray} shop is the about.com/web design site of the day today. "If you're tired of stores with tab navigation, check out this slick and easy-to-use interface." Greg Knauss' Interview with the Spampire is the funniest thing I've read in a long time. Anyone remember how they defeated the runaway computer in War Games? I do. |
2.17.00 |
And she's only 17. I'd like to say it gets easier when you're older, but I'm not sure that's true. Newsflash: Pyra taps Powazek Productions for revolutionary project. Details at 11. |
2.16.00 |
There's a new Kvetch of the Moment up today. Come on, let it out. I fully support this modest proposal. I think it's really tacky to tell other people how to run their personal sites. Don't you? |
2.15.00 |
Fight Club was only nominated for "sound effects editing?" I am Jack's raging sense of injustice. (There's a great thread going in MetaFilter about this. Join in!) What do you say when someone puts you on their list of heroes? Thank you. (And maybe a gentle reminder that inspiration is a cycle, like everything else in nature. The inspired of today become the inspirators of tomorrow.) |
2.14.00 |
And then, on valentines day, my amaryllis bloomed. It almost makes me wish I had something to do tonight. It's over, thank goodness. The better man won, though I was rooting for Chester. Everything old is new again (fwiw, powazek.com has existed in this format for over a year). Still, I appreciate the encouragement. That was encouragement ... right? |
2.12.00 |
It works. :-) |
2.11.00 |
I think that this press release pretty much sums up the entire web biz right now. Derek's recipe for chasing away the rainy day blues:
I'll let you know if it works. |
2.10.00 |
New in {fray}: Christian Roselund learns the rules of carpentry. There's a new Kvetch of the Moment up today. How could I resist? The scary part is, he totally nailed my character. (This whole thing will be over soon, thank goodness.) Attention authors! Amazon is sponsoring a short story contest. The winner gets ten grand, a swanky party, and their story published. And ten grand. |
2.9.00 |
Are my 15 minutes up yet? |
2.8.00 |
Paul cracks me up on a regular basis. This site seems to be walking an awfully thin line. It's automatically sucking content off four well-known websites and slapping an ad on top of it all. Maybe everybody gets traffic and nobody gets hurt, but still. It seems kinda icky to me. |
2.7.00 |
More nikon silliness theatre over at Megnut! I still love the web. "Q: I've been getting this warm fuzzy feeling down below, what's with that? I hope these fanatics paint themselves into a tiny corner all the way on the right and the voters tell them where to stick it come election day. |
2.6.00 |
I love Sundays. what makes me happy: Finding things like this in my email: "Web designers that use the word wrap option on text form boxes turn me on." what makes me sad: People too lazy or uncreative to design for themselves. Greetings from fuckertown. |
2.4.00 |
Last night I saw Boys Don't Cry with Meg. I knew nothing about the film going in. I haven't been so shocked by a movie in a long time. It's hard when you see characters from your own past in a film, and they turn out to be the bad guys. You know, being a jerk is just so easy. It's a pity someone so talented is wasting it in a sad attempt to annoy everyone. Pissing in the pool does not make it a hot tub. |
2.3.00 |
"New Media" run through babelfish from Spanish to English comes out as "Average New." That must mean something. Lust! My film camera is a Canon SLR and I just love it. Looks like they're finally gonna make a digital version. Where do I sign? Speaking of, I've been playing with my new Nikon 950 a lot. It rocks. But before it even arrived, Nikon annouced the 990. Sigh. The funny part is that the exact same thing happened to me when I bought my Olympus D-600L almost two years ago - the D-620L came out the following month. |
2.2.00 |
All this month, Day Without Art's Daily Dispatch features posts from Michelle Compton's "Tested" in {fray}. I even did up a little graphic and an introduction for it. I'm proud to devote my time and energy to this good cause. (And special thanks to all the fray posters who agreed to share their stories there.) Well Keith, since you asked, one of the things I love about California is that the law protects pedestrians. Not that it helps - 29 people died in San Francisco crosswalks last year. |
2.1.00 |
Jason is wearing a fray shirt at work today! Must be casual Tuesday. My nikon silliness theatre seems to have worried Emma. There is no cause for concern. Please continue browsing as if nothing has changed. Got meta? I've been conned into moderating the weblogs panel at South by Southwest in March. It's either ironic or outrageous, depending on your sense of humor. In any case, Ev has taken it upon himself to create a multi-user sxsw interactive weblog. It's gonna be fun to watch it as the conference approaches. And we're already going meta: we're using a weblog to discuss the weblog panel. I love it. So join in the fun! What do you want me to ask Jason, Meg, and Matt? Tell me! Crushes are good. I like crushes. I could easily have a crush on anyone who draws like that. So I got my new Nikon yesterday. It rocks. One of its nifty features is the 16-shot mode, where you hit the shutter button once and it fires off 16 shots, one right after the other. Of course, all I can think to do with that is make goofy animations. |
1.31.00 |
It's turning into a good week for the old ego. I seem to have been entered into a hotties of the web contest. You can even vote for me, if, uh, you thought I was, um, hot. Or something. (Personally, I'm just glad Halcyon is missing, or I wouldn't stand a chance.) Song lyric of the day: |
1.30.00 |
Today I can't help but think back to my UCSC days, when super bowl meant something else entirely.... |
1.29.00 |
I'd just like to say that in real life I have a deep, booming voice. Really. |
1.28.00 |
Ask and you shall receive: metababy is back. I moved into my new apartment almost four months ago, and somehow I still haven't managed to unpack my scanner. |
1.27.00 |
Only two days left to buy my camera! You'll never guess where genitals.com goes. (Okay, so I was curious. Does that make me weird?) Sigh. Not even a goodbye? |
1.25.00 |
Giggle. Fidget. Blush. |
1.23.00 |
I went to a ravey party last night and didn't get home until 9am. I can't believe it took me until I was 26 to figure out how young I am. It was my pleasure to serve as a judge for the High Five / A List Apart Web Design Contest, which announced the winners today. Sorry to say it, old friend, but I'm with Christopher on this one. |
1.22.00 |
Joy! The spiralgirl is back. I've been thinking about why the word redesign bothered me so much, and I think the thing that's most galling, aside from the publicity stuntedness of it, is that Yoshi's letter seems to imply that there's no middle ground between over the top, non-compliant, gratuitous design and bare bones Yahoo simplicity. And that's just bunk. That middle ground is where I've always strived to put {fray}. |
1.21.00 |
It's raining. I'm cranky. You've been warned. A ripoff is a ripoff, no matter the defense. And a publicity stunt is a publicity stunt. Yoshi, you're the best at what you do. Quit fucking around and get back to work. You can throw around words like "anarchist" and "punk" all you want, but when you take a kitten and throw it through a window, there's only one word for you: "Asshole." Thanks to the SF fog, I totally missed the eclipse last night. |
1.20.00 |
Attention fellow Megnut fans! She's having dns issues. For now, here's where you can get your fix. How do I know I'm a geek? Because the idea of small, green batteries gets me all excited. If you're into digital photography, be sure to check out the rest of dpreview.com - it's the best resource I've found. They've got everything: news, reviews, discussions, and a personal voice. You can tell it's somebody's labor of love. But be careful, dpreview plus mySimon equals credit card debt. My new Nikon arrives in a week. (Joy!) Which reminds me. Anyone wanna buy a slightly used Olympus D-600L? |
1.19.00 |
Please welcome ScowlZine, the newest advertiser in kvetch. Remember, you could be a kvetch advertiser, too! |
1.18.00 |
I did give Lance a good pout, but I was only joking. |
1.17.00 |
Because I'm a lucky boy, my friend Jon took me to see the Kids in the Hall live show on Saturday. They were a riot. Of course I snuck my digicam in. Wanna see? I'm no lawyer, but isn't this just asking for a lawsuit? |
1.16.00 |
The sutrocam is alive and kicking and sometimes quite trippy. It's cool to see someone taking their fray posts so seriously. |
1.15.00 |
A good day for webbing: Prol redesigned and 9flights is back! Bliss. My teenage years were pretty hectic, full of the usual rebellion and hardships. I often wonder how my life would have been different if the web had existed during those trying times. |
1.12.00 |
Yesterday I got my box from X10 in the mail. Last night I tried it out for the first time and realized that I'm just not cut out for the life of a cam star. So, for now, I've found a better target for it. Forty-two pages of posts to the new fray story - and they rock! |
1.11.00 |
Emma has sent me two recipes now. Next time I get sick, I'll be prepared. Rain rain go away. |