brit:
Introducing the Street View snowmobile - one of the coolest Google Maps innovations I’ve seen.
Apparently not everyone knows my grandmothers mailing address.
100 Years of Scouting
Being an Eagle Scout, I’d just like to say Congrats to the Boy Scouts of America for celebrating 100 years today.
Went looking at houses this weekend and found this in the backyard of one.
Last week was the annual GTF - Spring Training event. Here are some photos from the event.
… and more on my flickr.
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
For those of you playing along at home, yesterday at around 6 pm I received a hilarious wrong number voicemail from a girl heading to her ex’s place to pick up her stuff.
I tried to call her back but the phone just rang and never went to voicemail. Likewise a text I sent went unresponded to. So she calls around 11 am this morning and I miss the call because I’m hardcore nocturnal and went to bed at 9 and slept like a baby until 4 this afternoon.
Now, thanks to the power of Google Voice, I present to you:
The Greatest Voicemail Ever Pt. 2
be sure to listen to the first part… first. Totally awesome!
@twtfelipe: “Here’s me right after the surgery #wisdomteeth” on Twitpic
Mary, they are getting closer to the teleporter you asked for…. (via davemorin)
Former Vice President at Microsoft discussing how Microsoft internally stifles it’s own innovation:
For example, early in my tenure, our group of very clever graphics experts invented a way to display text on screen called ClearType. It worked by using the color dots of liquid crystal displays to make type much more readable on the screen. Although we built it to help sell e-books, it gave Microsoft a huge potential advantage for every device with a screen. But it also annoyed other Microsoft groups that felt threatened by our success.
Engineers in the Windows group falsely claimed it made the display go haywire when certain colors were used. The head of Office products said it was fuzzy and gave him headaches. The vice president for pocket devices was blunter: he’d support ClearType and use it, but only if I transferred the program and the programmers to his control. As a result, even though it received much public praise, internal promotion and patents, a decade passed before a fully operational version of ClearType finally made it into Windows.
While to most is seems like “fanboy-ism” to love Apple, and hate Microsoft, in reality it’s just that we Apple “fanboys” noticed the shift in the way products were developed / executed long before normal computer users.
For a while there Microsoft was developing new / cool products that were superior to anything else on the market. Windows 95 was huge. Microsoft Office was coming out with newer better versions regularly. Then for whatever reason, possibly for the reasons mentioned in this article, they just stopped. You saw other companies coming out with the new cool product or software. You saw Firefox come out with tabbed browsing (no longer had to minimize 5 windows, just one window with 5 tabs) and wondered why when IE would come out with something similar (several years later). Apple was releasing cool hardware and software that didn’t require a computer science degree to keep from slowing down in 3 months. Microsoft was left in the dust.
People often stick up for Microsoft when I start Apple praising and I think it’s because for so long, they were the game changers. It just happens that now they are not, and someone else has stepped into that role. Who knows, in 10 years it may be Apple that has become stagnant and Microsoft is the innovator.
Is it a coincidence that right around the time that I discovered something new on Tumblr, three of the Tumblr employee’s post? I think not, I smell testing.
New Tumblr Feature?
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Auburn students Kyle Humphrey and Carla Niknejad have also decided to help, but they are doing so through entertainment.
The two are holding “Help Haiti: Music for a Cause” this Friday, Feb. 5.
“It was really just an ‘aha’ moment I had over lunch,” Humphrey said. “A Red Cross commercial was playing on a nearby TV, and I thought to myself, ‘I want to help, but what’s a unique way I could attract more people to donate as well … music!’ ”
Humphrey added that he knew it was a good idea because he knew the people of Auburn would support such an event.
“We love good music, and we can show love better than any,” he said.
The show will be held at 146 Bragg Avenue in Auburn.
“Courtney Starr was generous enough to lend us his house as a venue,” said Niknejad, who is in charge of social media advertisement for the show. “He has held shows there before.”
Humphrey said that they were guessing that between 70 and 80 people would attend, but the guest list of the Facebook event has nearly 300 guests confirmed.
“If more people show up than the said house can handle, we’ll have a back up house on hand,” Humphrey said.
Five bands that include Jay Haywood, Abstract Disaster, The Quiet Words, Blame Sydney and Man Made Sea are all confirmed to perform.
“Each band has its own style,” Humphrey said. “I would tell people to expect a variety ranging from good ole rock ‘n’ roll to ska to some folk to indie rock.
The show will start at 8 p.m. There will be a $5 cover that will be donated to Doctors Without Borders.
