53R1A75

here’s a couple neat things and info I’ve collected this week.

First is hobnox. Most of you who know me, know I’m always rattling on about music I make with ableton live and reason. Here is a audio generation tool that is based off of a similar usability theory as reason: graphically recreate the instruments and their interaction (i.e. cables etc.). The plus side for all of you and myself is that you don’t have to install anything (until they come out with an adobe air version). Which means that you don’t have to know a whole ton about music software, just music hardware in general. If you can hook up some guitar pedals and fiddle with a beat machine, you’re there. It’s a lot of fun. My cube-mate wasted a couple hours because I introduced him to the site (sorry). So have fun. If you figure out a way to record what you’ve done (you can’t save yet) put it on muxtape and let me know about it.

Second, is just a little article for all my friends looking to get their money into the money making business. High yield savings is the first step, and this article shows you how you can figure out just how much interest your savings account is bringing in. Very helpful. Also, you’ll want a calculator. I recommend and use instacalc on a daily basis.

Since I’m on such a crazy political rampage, I thought I might just include this little note I found lying around reddit. Its by Dr. Ron Paul. Look, it should be obvious at this point that the Government had a little more than something to do with the current market scares and down-trends. Albeit most of the blame still has to be put on really really bad risk management on the part of the banks (something I like to call greed). But I like to look at more from a perspective of: “and you still want the government to control — insert target of gov’t program here –!?”

Also I would like to point out that the other aspect of the government involvement may have been more directed to PROTECTING it’s citizens from bad lending practices and not PROVIDING HOMES FOR THEM.

i’ve had netvibes for some time. i just now took the time to add a good number of news feeds to it. i’m thinking this will be an improvement in my blogging process since i can see at a glance what’s being talked about on the news line and i don’t have to deal with the ranking crap of reddit and digg (but i do have digg in my netvibes, never know what you’ll find)

First up today, girls gone wild? well, yes, but on facebook. probably NSFW, I braved it, though somewhat suspiciously. Now I haven’t been able to check the credibility of this, but I at least can say that I haven’t noticed anyone in my network of friends posting that stuff. I myself am not exempt either. I just post it elsewhere for everyone to find it.

Science blog article from wired about dumping urea into the sea to offset CO2 by stimulating the growth of O2 producing algae. To me it seems like environmentalist infighting. Here are some people who have an idea of how to fix a problem, and the people who want the fix are saying “not really gonna let you do that.” It’s oversimplification, I know. But the topic warrants looking into the source article referenced and the related topics as well.

Is the human race mutating? No not really, actually it was probably pretty insensitive of me to say that, but I digress. This is a pretty popular story among the news outlets. This girl was born with 8 extra limbs. I can’t really tell from the picture which ones they are. If I had a say I wouldn’t take them off unless it really adversely affected her health (it does, I’m just saying..), because hey, who hasn’t wanted to be a human spider? I kid, I kid.

This is just one of many many articles analyzing Google’s announcement of Android - an open mobile technology platform. I just happened to find this one. I’m psyched about this if it pans out. I’ve always been sick of ATT et. all locking phones up and limiting my choices as a consumer through contracts. I recently shelled out a good wad of cash just to say FU and bought a phone not sold as a contract package by ATT. Yay me, right?

I’m really not a financial expert, but if the dollar keeps falling I’m gonna be pinching for my vaca this winter. It seems this is largely based on irresponsible borrowing and lending. With our GDP so high, what gives?

My major news outlets are some feeds on my rss, reddit, digg, and am radio. The only place I’m hearing anything worthwhile about this is from the autoblog feed I subscribe to. From their articles, I’ve clicked through to some Detroit news outlets and I infer that CNN and other television news networks are covering it. Maybe it’s being looked over by the mortgage “crisis” or Ahmadinejad speaking these past two days. Or maybe the economy isn’t really determined by the US car makers anymore and I’m just getting old. At anyrate, I’m keeping tabs and things aren’t looking good for GM. CAW is joining UAW, and in the midst of everything, GM is simply playing temptress with an export deal to China (which pretty moot considering how many parts they have have to import from China just to build the product they will export). But the GM stock seems to be holding steady today, so who knows?

Just a simple, interesting article about how a guy won an award (or awards) for a piece of software that was actually a text file that simply read something like, “this is not a program.” How? Because the software download sites just want you to post a badge on your website saying that you won the award so people check out their site (really basic version).

If you’re not following it, you should be. We very well could be at war with this man’s country because of things that he says and things that our government says. The transcript of Ahmadinejad at Columbia University is much easy to understand than trying to listen to his translator’s voice superimposed over his voice.

Phewf, what a day.

GM is officially on it’s way to bankruptcy. I remember hearing stories about exactly how long it could survive a strike before it went kaput, but that was all hearsay. At any rate, UAW went on strike at 11am after GM and the UAW failed to reach an agreement. GM has about a one month supply of cars in stock, so we’ll wait and see what happens. If the car industry is an indication of the national economy, I hope this doesn’t go as poorly as it could.

Remember that Sci-fi Sliders? Yeah they’ve proved that there could be an infinite number of parallel universes mathematically. Duh duh duhhhhnnnn. Maybe I’ll wake up and women are ruling a world where we’ve taught apes to talk and they tell us that they want to eat dolphins.

No cheap, urban wifi? Say it ain’t so. But not like you didn’t see this coming.

I will be using this tool to setup my upcoming new desk space in my new apartment. I also recommend anyone to use this who really hates sitting at their desk because it’s so damn uncomfortable.

I first learned about Jobs and Wozniak when I did a research paper called something like, “The history of hacking: an introduction to monopolies, politics, and phreaking.” (or something like that… it was awhile ago). I found this historical article through Fake Steve Jobs (I’m too lazy to link, just google it). They were hackers before Jobs, Woz and Gates turned evil. (Gates went first, and probably the farthest into user-rights-hell, Woz just got completely lost, and Jobs probably just figured everything was too ugly for him and then realized he could make everything pretty once again and came back… evil).

What I hope will be the ugly-evite-killer. Complete with party to-do lists.

i just found this blog/zine/whatever site that keeps track of web-based apps. it is now both in my reader and in my del.icio.us and i plan on reading it frequently to learn of new and awesome apps to use on the web.

another site worthy of a del.icio.us tag, bust-a-name helps you find the domain name that you want and that is available.

i don’t usually link to lew because i typically find the articles interesting enough for myself, but rarely enamoring (or MOtR) enough to post here. this particular article addresses the quagmire that is US involvement with nuclear weapons.

Snow in Buenos Aires. I’m not too good with international weather patterns, but apparently this only happens every hundred years or so. For those who are geographically challenged: google maps.

Apparently not an uncommon thing to do, but the guy who is Harry Potter wears the same clothes everyday to fool the Paparazzi. I’m not sure how effective it is, but it at least sounds pretty clever.

GOP conspiracy theories are in the thick these days. My ole buddy santorum has been hinting about attacks on the us. now if i hinted that there would be attacks on the US in the upcoming months you can be sure as hell i’d be sent to Gitmo. I’m just sayin’s all.

and to continue my hegemony against the us, this Irish economist points out that the international community is pretty fed up with our economically retarded policies of borrowing more, spending more, and saving nothing. somebody needs to be saying it. bread and circus??? and in case you’re wondering, here’s what he means by two fingers.

I del.icio.us‘d this one: SignalMap. It allows you to add what signal you are getting, where you are getting it to a googlemap api. You can see all the signal points in your area with comments. I added one for work so far.

the hypochondriac’s favorite (or most feared) site has a decent article with pointers for getting more energy. don’t read the last page, it’s advertisements basically (and totally lame). top on my todo list is exercise (in the morning!?!?) and breakfast.

great list of credit pointers (10 commandments style) from the consumerist.

what apple product have you owned? my first mac (besides the ][’s at school) was a Mac Classic. with a black and white screen, i was able to surf the web through prodigy (which is still around somehow). which basically meant i was surfing a fake web.

i don’t usually link straight to Fake Steve Jobs, but he includes some parody thoughts that i particularly like regarding the sloth known as the recording industry.

more screw-the-recording-man goodness: ars has a little article about a grandma who is fighting back, as well as some related stories down at the end which are worth a look.

Here’s a great list of web2.0 web applications that let you do day to day computing from anywhere. so far, i stick with google docs and keep it simple. other webapps that i enjoy regularly are moneytrackin’ and instacalc.

Great page of information on all the thought that should go into acquiring a credit card from the federal reserve. a must read for financial hopeful’s like me.

in hong kong a gym is beginning to add electric generators to the treadmill equipment to create the electricity for the building. this isn’t a new idea i’m sure, but this is the first i’ve read of anyone actually doing it.

a man in georgia kills a bear by throwing a log at it while protecting his son. he gets a ticket for not securing his campsite. sweet irony.

is apple really going to be able to deliver on the battery life of the upcoming (THIS WEEK) iphone? slate delves into how they may have made this happen.

youtube is seemingly becoming a more legitimate media outlet, signing on a reality tv show for ad revenue sharing.

pretty interesting article (from the sound of it. i haven’t read it entirely yet, but i’m about to) on class differences becoming a factor in which social engine you use (facebook vs. myspace). i use virb for my band, and myspace for exposure, facebook for friends, and linkedin for business. i’m connected baby.

this mirror-based painting is quite possibly my favorite post of the day. this is a painting that can only be viewed correctly with a round kind of mirror. and they did this by hand! in the 1700’s! very awesome.

is america’s technology sector going overseas? this editor at cnet thinks so. and based on what he presents, i’d have to agree. i’ll have to brush up on my russian or japanese. d’oh! those aren’t on his list.

keeping it really real on flickr, this person points out a nice fat finger argument against the iPhone. but looking at the picture of how it will be normally i have to ask, why not both ways?

DON’T FLUSH YOUR UNDERWEAR DOWN THE TOILET. EVEN IF YOU POOP IN THEM.

i haven’t see this guy in so long. i heard they were canceling the production of this or something or other to that effect. i hope this becomes a big screen reality. come to think of it, i may watch some indiana jones this weekend. too bad i can’t download it on my xbox.

Manhunt and GTA are both works of entertainment and arguably, works of art. Therefore, I must have manhunt 2. And you can’t argue that this isn’t just a big PR ploy. They’ve got the M rated version ready and waiting. They just love all this free press. DON’T MESS WITH FREE MARKET, ESRB.

I must not really have a good grasp of business and entrepreneurship because what this guy is doing, while totally understandable and feasible, just blows my mind. On my list of things to check out: Entropia.

Don’t go to work!

This is an insanely long article on global cooling. You know what I think? (not like you really care what I think, but I’m telling you anyways) I think that global warming and global cooling is just about as honest and truthful as healthy eating and dieting tips from food vendors. The more confused about the subject, the more money you will spend/waste in order to “fix” the problem. Also one of the over-arching issues at work that has always bugged me, is the insane amount of pride involved in the science community. My favorite quote from the article:

Climate stability has never been a feature of planet Earth. The only constant about climate is change; it changes continually and, at times, quite rapidly.

Now don’t get me wrong. I like the earth and I think we should keep it in good condition. But seriously, there are agendas at work here on both sides so there’s no point in being totally insane about the topic. Simply keep in mind the well being of what is around you and the well being of future generations.

For my brother, I hope this cheers you up. It’s old school cartoon styles of those funny cat pictures you love.

I’m gonna make one of these like the millennium falcon.

And then sneak around and scare people in one of these.