Delicious Links for 12-26-07
Every week around this time del.icio.us delivers these links to my blog on my behalf. They are links to articles, web sites, videos, or whatever I came across this past week that I wanted to share but felt wasn’t worthy enough to warrant a space on my ‘favorite links’ column to your right. Let me know if you find them as interesting as I did.
- How to Make Eggnog - wikiHow
- I love eggnog, but… is it really just eggs, milk, and cream? Cuz that’s kinda gross.
- Missing Ludington man has NMU ties
- Went to school with him, I think. I’m Facebook-friends with one of his friends. How do people just go missing?
- Teens charged in ‘Mortal Kombat’ killing
- Don’t get me wrong… this is horrible. But Mortal Kombat will be blamed, and that’s not fair. The kids are just crazy, and I’m sure they imitated “moves” from Mario Kart, too.
- Apple lawsuit: ThinkSecret.com shutting down
- Apple sues a website and they “mutually” agree to be shut down. Hmmm. Bad Apple.
- The Chappelle Theory - What really happened to Dave Chappelle and his show.
- Wow. Could this be true? I’d believe it. Read this when you have some time.
- Hello, I’m a Mac. And I’m a Cheapskate.
- Mac users are more likely than PC users to pay for music downloads. Methinks it’s because if you can afford a Mac, you can afford a .99 cent song? What are your thoughts?
- NewsTimes.com - Danbury mall Santa claims woman sexually assaulted him
- Do you ever wonder when stuff like this happens? As in, what time of day? For example, when you’re driving to work, half way across the country, Santa is being felt up and is not enjoying it.
- Will moviegoers buy ‘Charlie Wilson’s War’?
- I’ll tell you right now: NO. Star power + current events = flop. FLOP FLOP FLOP.
- Britney’s Teen Sister Jamie Lynn Spears Pregnant
- Part of me thinks she did this just to add to the now infamous family name. This is the first and last time I will bring this up.
- Amie Street - Music Lives Here - Independent Music Download Website
- Pay-for-music site, except you pay what it’s worth (even free). Discover new music.
- America’s Best Young Entrepreneurs
- Get some ideas from these guys.
- Y: The Last Man (Complete Issue #1 - LEGAL!)
- Y: The Last Man, one of my favorite comic series, is coming to an end next month and this is the first issue. One of my favorite comic series by Lost writer Brian K. Vaughn. Good story, easy to follow. I’ve posted this link everywhere.
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Stuff I Did 2 Years Ago
In 2005, I graduated from college with a degree in Media Production. I had to do a senior project so I made a ghost documentary.
Back then, internet video was just starting, so I had no real means of putting it online. I remember trying to show a few friends by sending it to them but the file was over 100mb and would have taken days. Anyway, I just learned how to encode using Flash so the file size is finally acceptable (still big–I mean, I wouldn’t try this with dialup.)
Since, so far, it’s the apex of my creativity and education, I’m finally putting it up here in case you’ve got 20 minutes to spare.
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Y’know, feel free to click the full screen button.
Chappelle’s Show Classics #2
See Chappelle’s Show Classics #1 for more info.
Today…
“Black Bush”
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“Now A Major Motion Picture!”
I hate, hate, hate, hate, hate books that have the phrase “Now A Major Motion Picture!” plastered across the cover. What’s worse is when the original cover is completely redone to show the beautiful face of the lead actor.
It’s the equivalent of defacing the book to me. I could take a pair of scissors and cut out the offending slogan and I’d be happier with the quality of the cover. Ripping the cover off all together and replacing it with a piece of white cardboard with a big black X would be better.
Why do I hate it so much?
Three reasons.
First, it’s a slogan right out of the 30s. I’m not sure about you, but I’ve never asked my friends if they wanted to go see a picture this weekend. It’s a fucking movie.
“Ya wanna makea pictcha?!”
Second, what makes a picture major? I’ve never seen a book that said “Now A Minor Motion Picture.” If all movies are major, just say “Now a Motion Picture.” Or, “Now a Movie!” But I guess that’s not as catchy.
“Maja! It’s a maja motion pictcha, see!”
Third, I hate how it’s like the publisher is telling us “it’s okay, this book is good… see, somebody liked it enough to make it into a movie!”
Yes, sometimes I’ll read a book because it’s being made into a movie. Oftentimes I’ll try to track down the book ahead of time as soon as I hear the news so that my impression of it is not skewed by the movie (and in order to avoid the defacing of the cover). I did that with “The DaVinci Code,” and “I, Robot,” to name two.
I made the mistake of not being on top of my game for “I am Legend.” I ordered the book after I saw the movie, and in order to not end up with a cover like this…
…I had to dig. Eventually I found this cover, luckily still available:
So I ordered it. What did I get?
In case you can’t read that, it says,
“NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE
STARRING WILL SMITH.”
I kind of feel like I need to justify my rage, here: unlike DVDs that are already becoming outdated and will one day be unusable, books are collectors items that maybe one day I’ll be able to pass on to my children, or if not my own children someone else who can get as much enjoyment out of them as I did. In 150 years, nobody’s going to know who Will Smith was. I want the book as it was originally meant to be seen.
Hulu Heroes
A few months ago, the brilliance at NBC/Universal officially ended their contract with iTunes after Apple refused to raise the price of a download to $4.99 per episode (NBC still claims, by the way, that there is no profit to give to the writers). They vowed to create their own video service that would compete, and they did. It’s called Hulu, and is in private beta testing right now. As far as I know, if you go to hulu.com you might still be able to get an invitation code to use the service before it’s “officially released.”
I signed up early and have been playing around with it… I wouldn’t call it anything like iTunes, but I see how it might steal away some customers. A lot of entire shows are available for free, right on the site, and not just ones from NBC. Fox, and a few other cable networks, are on there as well. And you can’t download them or otherwise take them with you (yet), but the quality is 10x better than anything you’d find on YouTube and it even (surprisingly) lets you embed the video files into your own site, like I’m about to do.
What’s even cooler, is that it lets you embed specific clips of the episodes.
Like so (don’t watch if you haven’t yet seen the last episode of Heroes):
That’s the last part of the finale of Heroes, which I finally watched yesterday. I think, based on the un-Heroes-like editing and Lifetime style montage, that that’s the part of the episode that was re-edited to serve as the finale because of the WGA strike.
I have to say, as bored as I was with the first half of the season (like I said here), the second half picked up. (Technically, I guess I should be using the term “volume” instead of “season,” since season two might still continue after the strike is over.) All of the reasons I was losing interest were eventually addressed by the series creator so things are turning around, I think.
The one remaining gripe I have with the show is that there seems to be little lasting consequences. With the exception of a few very minor characters, there have been no real deaths on the show. Don’t get me wrong — death just for death’s sake isn’t required — but people get shot, fall from buildings, even explode in a nuclear blast, and are able to just walk away from it twenty minutes later after some dramatic music.
I had tears in my eyes (shut up) when Claire’s dad, Noah, died. There is some good development! I thought. Noah was a great character… we thought he may be evil during season one, and, I guess he kind of was. But all he ever really wanted to do was protect Claire and his family, and seeing Claire’s reaction to him being shot point blank in the face was a very powerful scene. Claire vowing to avenge his death and bring down the company — whatever it takes — was a pretty good direction for her character to go. I was excited to see where things were going to go next after the death of such a pivotal character, and then… the last ten seconds of the episode was him hooked up to an IV being fed his daughter’s indestructo-blood, miraculously healing, and then sitting upright whispering profanities.
Sylar is another one! He should have been killed off at the end of season one! Except the camera pans down after all the action to see a trail of blood leading into a sewer. His character hasn’t really made me hate him like a good villain should, but he might be off too a good start after killing Maya. No, wait, he didn’t kill her. She was miraculously healed, too. There I was, thinking they might actually kill off one of the least liked characters in order to help Sylar’s development along. Heh.
Actually, this “no death” thing isn’t entirely accurate. DL died in a flashback showing what happened between season one and two, which actually was pretty heroic and for once made the title “Heroes” seem to fit the show.
So, although Nathan is shot by an unknown assassin, the drama and suspense of that scene just wasn’t there since there’s a pretty good chance he’ll be healed soon anyway.
Although, I was pumped that he was going to say, “I have the ability to fly,” which would have (hopefully) added a whole new layer to the show: the public calling him a lunatic until he actually flew away, at which point this whole “mutant phenomenon” would be made public, X-Men style.
Oh! And my prediction about Adam was right on! The speculation out there was that he could either travel through time or has lived 400 years. It’s very cool that he actually lived 400 years. Imagine being born in the year 1600 and realizing you’d never die, meeting someone who claimed to be from the future, and then, 340 years later, you actually meet them at the point of time they came from originally. Trippy!
Speaking of trippy: Later, I’ll get into my theory about how Hiro must be a space/time anchor since he apparently can’t travel through time and come back to his point of origin seconds later… in other words, when he spends 6 months in the past, he’s gone for 6 months in real-time. ::thinks:: Hmmm, yeah. Later.
Here’s another clip from Hulu, having nothing to do with Heroes:
Keep in mind that as of right now, the studio is the only one making money off of this thing. They sell ad time to companies who slap their logo all over the video and play commercials in the middle of episodes and, well, that’s the whole reason the WGA is on strike — to get some of that action. Right now, writers, actors, directors, editors, staff, etc., are paid nothing when you watch their work on Hulu.com. Since it’s in Beta and I’m able to give feedback on how to improve the service my main complaint is going to be that the writers aren’t getting a cut of the profits and if they don’t I’m not going to use the service after it’s officially released. Take that, evil studio heads! That’ll learn you!
Chappelle’s Show Classics #1
The day after Thanksgiving this year I went shopping with Katy and her mom and one of the stores we went to was Target, who had the entire series of The Chappelle Show for only $30. It’s one of the few shows of it’s kind that was actually appreciated while still on the air, and abruptly canceled (by Dave) before it’s time.
Anyway, I thought I’d post a sketch or two. I’m not sure if it’s illegal–see, the studios are saying they don’t make any money from online video anyway. That’s why, they say, there is simply no money to give to the striking writers. So if nobody is making money by posting things online, why would they come after me for posting the videos online, right? Nobody’s losing anything. In fact, all I’m doing is promoting the show and their channel, which is what they’re telling the writers internet video is for–promotional use.
So, if you like what you see, buy stuff for Comedy Central! Like pencils, so they can draft a fair contract for the writers.
It’s a sketch that never made it to air… hence no laugh track. Provide your own.
“Maximize Me”
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