Monday: March 15, 2010
- The ten drawbacks of naming your city, state, or country to 'Google'.
2. Finding Pizza : Till date Google Search has enabled some awesome results when you search Pizza and your city name. For example – “Pizza in Jaipur“. For Topeka it will be now “Pizza in Google“
- Have a gander at twenty-six gigapixels worth of Paris, France.
Turns out that twenty-six gigapixels can make for some interesting aerial photography with some astounding details. For instance, try zooming in on that speck off in the distance, it's probably a building.
- Netflix decides to cancel new contest amidst privacy concerns.
The retreat announced Friday settles a lawsuit alleging Netflix's plans to release millions of movie-rental records that could have illegally exposed sensitive information about its subscribers' tastes and lifestyles.
- The folks at Digg would like you to know that a redesign is coming in the near future.
Wow, I haven't used Digg in a long, long time (reddit ftw) but I'm quite curious to see what new 'radical features' they have in store. One of the key changes according to the source article is an unlimited number of topics (aka subreddits). How original.
- Have a peek at the world's largest labyrinth recently constructed over in Buffalo, New York.
Recently built over in Buffalo for a winter festival, this maze consists of 2,200 blocks of ice which weigh about 300 pounds each. The maze itself m easured in at 12,855 square feet beating the previous record-owner by a whopping 4,575 square feet. Wow.
- This time around Apple says if your iPad battery fails, you get a brand new iPad.
Sure, it's a minor inconvenience when the battery in your Apple device won't hold a charge but in this case at least you'll be getting an entirely new device when and if it actually fails. The swap will set you back $99 bucks (plus shipping).
- The age-old art of blogging may have peaked thanks to introduction of Twitter.
Blogs are meant for people for whom being a writer, being a creator, is a passion, or perhaps a requirement of life. They're meant for people for whom Facebook's 'What's on your mind?' question can't always be answered in 500 characters or less.
Thursday: March 11, 2010
- LucasArts announces special edition of Monkey Island 2 coming this summer.
This should be a happy day for all fans of the Monkey Island franchise. The previous special edition of Monkey Island for Xbox 360 (and practically all other major platforms) was a joy to play. Guybrush even has a new haircut this time around.
- Sony finally pulls the curtain back on their new Wii-like motion controllers.
I like how Sony's marketing department is billing this a way to 'graduate' for respective owners of the Nintendo Wii console. Upgrading your current PS3 setup with these new motion controllers (with video camera) will set you back a hundred bucks or less.
- A list of ten useful website analytics tools for your analytical pleasure.
You may not have known but Google isn't the only game in town for getting some decent web statistics. This post covers some of the non-Google tools you can try out to gauge performance of your beloved web site or web apps.
- New survey shows that 12% of employees knowingly violate IT policies.
With 12 percent of those people actively working outside of stated IT policy (and plenty more who do so out of ignorance), IT admins certainly have their work cut out for them if they want to maintain a tight ship.
- Miniature cities, towns and things through the minuscule eye of Photoshop.
Remember that episode of The Simpsons where Lisa inadvertently grew a tiny city as a science project? This is kind of like that. Yes, it seems that I can relate any post to some kind of Simpsons episode. Now bring me some shoes.
- CNN lists out the top ten geek anthems of all time.
Slow news week eh, CNN? It's nice to see that they are tailoring articles that happen to be relevant to my specific interests. Coincidence or targeted advertising? All things considered (and to my surprise) this is actually a pretty well rounded selection of songs. Go ahead, get your geek on.
Wednesday: March 10, 2010
- World's first jetpack for consumers officially on sale over in New Zealand.
Welcome to the future, here is your jetpack. Oh, we'll need to make sure that your check in the amou nt of $86,000 clears before we can let you just fly away. Buy now and get a free a ballistic parachute with purchase.
- The top ten movies that should never, ever be converted to 3D.
It wasn’t bad enough that he made Greedo shoot first; now he wants to mess around with the whole look and feel of the movies. If we haven’t made our case yet, we have but three more words for you: 3D Jar Jar.
- It's probably not a smart idea to throw hot coffee at a parking enforcement official.
The next time you happen to witness the writing of a ticket on a vehicle you happen to own and find yourself agitated with coffee in hand - remember this little article. As it turns out, tossing a cup of hot liquid substance at a person of authority can in fact land you with an assault and battery charge. Who knew?
- Five must-see museum exhibits to give you an added dose of culture this Spring.
Looking for something different to do on those otherwise boring Spring days? Try stopping by a museum or two this Spring to catch up on some of the finer things (as it relates to art) that you may have been missing.
- Google pulls the curtain back on brand new app marketplace for business.
Yes folks, the Google App Store is officially open for business - specifically your business. And by business I really mean your enterprise business. There are apps of all shapes and colors ranging from customer management all the way over to workflow management.
- Three reasons as to why the iPad won't see a quick price drop after it's release.
This should be pretty easy to figure out especially if you happened to be an early iPhone adopter (such as myself) from way back in 2007. One would conclude that Apple y wouldn't repeat the same mistake although it was nice quite nice to get some free Apple money.
- Large Hadron Collider to officially shut down for one year due to safety concerns.
Dr Myers said: 'It's something that, with a lot more resources and with a lot more manpower and quality control, possibly could have been avoided but I have difficulty in thinking that this is something that was a design error.'
- Rock Band 3 to arrive just in time for this year's holiday season.
Details are scarce at this point but a posting on Rock Band's Facebook page promises to 'innovate and revolutionize the music genre once again, just as Harmonix did with the original Rock Band'.
- Cities across America continue to duke it out for Google's attention.
Duluth, Minnesota's mayor Don Ness jumped into a 35 degree Lake Superior as a dual-purpose media event for Google Fiber and the Special Olympics; and 1,000 Morgantown, West Virginia residents last week held up signs saying 'We Want a Gig' at the WVU-Georgetown basketball game.
Tuesday: March 9, 2010
- Physicists find brand new way to achieve Superman-like X-ray vision.
In addition to allowing us to peer through paper or paint, and into cells, the technique opens up the possibility that opaque materials might be good optical elements in nano-scale devices, at levels where the construction of transparent lenses is particularly challenging.
- A handy tutorial on how to use the almighty power of curves in Photoshop.
Never used the curves pane in your beloved copy of Photoshop? Still playing with those brightness and contrast settings? Do you even know what a curve is? Read through this thorough writeup and you'll be a better photo manipulator as a result.
- Stride Rite offering up new line of Star Wars sneakers next month (younglings only).
Sorry to build your hopes up with that headline Star Wars fans, but these kicks are for kids only. However, if the comments on the source site are any indication - an adult line of these sneaks would probably sell too.
- Daily Grind: Nerdy
Name: Vin (aka levelup+1)
Occupation: Webmaster / Procrastinator / Dad
How Vin feels today: Nerdy @ 2:55:41 PM
What Vin really wants today: Finish up remaining work tasks and attempt to get some time in playing a certain RPG video game that sounds vaguely similar to 'Shminal Shmantasy' at some point this evening. Insert traditional battle victory theme here.Music Stuck in Head: Call it Love / God Street Wine
Continuing the celebration of the recently announced GSW reunion. You can have a listen to this rare jazzy track over on archive.org.Stuff to do today:
- Purchase Final Fantasy XIII from semi-local NYC area Best Buy
- Semi-local = four subway stops from work location (meh)
- Ignore reviews complaining about PS3 versus Xbox 360 quality
- Finally post new photo to photoblog
- Toy Story attraction over at Disney adapts for seasons and/or new movie releases.
That's right, when you go inside to ride Mania after Toy Story 3 opens there will be whole new games to enjoy. The Imagineers have created a whole new collection of things to shoot with those pull string cannons for you to enjoy.
- Location services might be coming to your Facebook account in near future.
Soon you'll know exactly where all of your friends are and where you can find them. Isn't it great when mystical items from movies and books somehow make their way into real life? It's almost like magic.
- Amazon to start working on a better web browsing experience for the Kindle.
Engineers are hard at work, or will be hard at work once the position is filled, to bring you a richer web browsing experience on your beloved Kindle device. Maybe you'll even get to see some media (like images) when all is said and done. Images on the web, what a concept!
- Photoblog: Sunshine Yellow
Another quick macro shot snapped up while doodling with the kids using an obvious assorted array of crayons. Taste the rainbow.
Location:Eastchester, New York
