Interesting links and notes on updates to my main website.



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I watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

It's very good.

It's by Charlie Kaufman, who also did Being John Malkovich.

Fortunately I don't have to worry about erasing my life, because there's not actually anything to erase. posted by Richard at 23:15 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

You can get Microsoft Photo Story 3 free.
You have to let Microsoft check that your version of XP is legal.

Windows Genuine Advantage Offers

Slashdot Microsoft Just Wants a Little Look /. posted by Richard at 13:12 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

asked and answered - digiphoto organization

What do I do to organize my photos?

Mostly, they are in folders by location and date in the Canon photo download program.
That's it.

The ones online are in Pbase because that was the best choice at the time.

Flickr seem to be very clever in their whole tag architecture and its integration with web standards.

photos.akerman.ca

www.pbase.com/rakerman

www.flickr.com/photos/rakerman/

I don't like iPhoto that much. I hate apps that reorganize and rename files according to their own internal whims.

I got iView MediaPro for organizing stuff on the Mac.

Adobe PhotoShop Album 2.0 Starter Edition and Picasa are worth trying on Windows (they are free).

www.akerman.ca/digiphoto.html#Capture-Software posted by Richard at 20:10 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

The Democrats have a problem: John Kerry is a sucky candidate.

Perhaps the only thing that may save them is that he is Not Bush™

The Economist says

With a heavy heart, we think American readers should vote for John Kerry on November 2nd

The incompetent or the incoherent?
The issue of Guantanamo doesn't seem to even register with the US press, but I think it is an evil of Bush's doing.

The biggest mistake, though, was one that will haunt America for years to come. It lay in dealing with prisoners-of-war by sending hundreds of them to the American base at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, putting them in a legal limbo, outside the Geneva conventions and outside America's own legal system. That act reflected a genuinely difficult problem: that of having captured people of unknown status but many of whom probably did want to kill Americans, at a time when to set them free would have been politically controversial, to say the least. That difficulty cannot neutralise the damage caused by this decision, however. Today, Guantánamo Bay offers constant evidence of America's hypocrisy, evidence that is disturbing for those who sympathise with it, cause-affirming for those who hate it. This administration, which claims to be fighting for justice, the rule of law and liberty, is incarcerating hundreds of people, whether innocent or guilty, without trial or access to legal representation. The White House's proposed remedy, namely military tribunals, merely compounds the problem.

As seen on Slashdot /.

You can read the letter I wrote to the Economist (they didn't publish it). posted by Richard at 19:56 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

Hello virus-friend.

Symantec has a new threat level 3 virus

W32.Beagle.AV@mm

I got a bunch of these (with virus already stripped out) this morning.

Opens a backdoor on TCP port 81. posted by Richard at 13:48 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

A Wired article about creating digital photo metadata to aid in searching and retrieval.

Well, they put it this way: Point. Shoot. Kiss It Good-Bye. posted by Richard at 22:37 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

Let's play the iTunes Canada Music Store speculation game.

What price do you think each song will sell for?

See, I have been wondering for a while if the reason that we haven't see iMS-Canada is the pricing problem. Apple likes to price at 0.99

But if the price at C$0.99 all the US people are going to be annoyed since that makes songs cheaper for us.

So they could just pick some conversion point, and make it say C$1.25
But the competitors like PureTracks have chosen the C$0.99 model.

So I wonder if they're launching next month just because the exchange rate has gone up. posted by Richard at 07:02 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

When Lorelai wears glasses, it causes me to have thoughts so impure it's a wonder the Vatican didn't burst into flames.

I don't know about the whole Dean situation.
Particularly since Rory is at Yale. She should be meeting new people.
But it's partly the constraint of the show.

Shows aren't really set up to deal with people's lives changing.
If the show is all about the L-R dynamic, and R is away having a new life at Yale, it doesn't really work.

So they have to cook up some reason/excuse for Rory to end up in Stars Hollow every week. posted by Richard at 06:56 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

crossover

There will be a report on e-voting on CBS 60 Minutes Wednesday,
tonight Wednesday , Oct. 27, at 8 p.m. ET/PT.

See Paper Vote Canada for more information.
posted by Richard at 17:43 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

Cool, the Montreal Botanical Gardens are all Tubby and the Lantern. posted by Richard at 17:06 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

To use the Firefox Profile Manager in MacOS X

/Applications/Firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox -ProfileManager posted by Richard at 17:00 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

If you have Internet though Rogers, you can test your connection speed with

speedtest.hispeed.rogers.com/speedtest/

It uses Java. posted by Richard at 13:20 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

Blogger and BlogSpot have been down all morning, as far as I can tell.

status.blogger.com won't even come up, which seems to defeat the purpose of having a status page.

I haven't seen any reason for this posted anywhere.

UPDATE: There is now a notice posted on status.blogger

UPDATE UPDATE: Blogger is now working. posted by Richard at 13:09 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

posted by Richard at 22:10 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

iPod Photo and iTunes Music Store Canada

A comment buried in Slashdot New Apple iPod with Photo Capabilities says

iTunes Music Store is coming to Canada in November

The exact quote from Apple is in their press release Apple Launches EU iTunes Music Store

Apple today also announced it will launch the iTunes Music Store in Canada in November.

posted by Richard at 16:30 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

Yahoo - AP - CP Internet users not as safe online as they believe, researchers report

Yahoo - PC World Threat Assessment: 9 threats to your PC

Yahoo - PC World What You Should Know About Firewalls posted by Richard at 10:30 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

The Atlantic November 2004 Welcome to the Green Zone.

Worth reading. Not free online.

Here's the basic thing.
For all the anti-war rhetoric, ok fine,

America sweeps into Iraq, bang bang, Saddam gone.
This is fine. Stupid, somewhat mad, but fine. Well done America.

What is supposed to replace Saddam is some kind of stable society progressing towards democracy.

Here is the actual problem.
What actually replaced Saddam was chaos.

That's the part they f-cked up.
The reasons they messed up the post-Saddam situation are numerous, but basically it's a combination of ideology and cluelessness.

They're Americans.
Most of them have never been outside America.
They have no f-cking clue about anything concerning Iraq.
They don't speak Arabic. They know nothing of the history or customs, or the reality of daily Iraqi life.

And there they are, trying to run the country.

Yeah, that's going well.

Now, to be fair, there were some thoughtful, detailed post-war plans.
All of which the neocons ignored.

See The Atlantic Jan/Feb 2004 Blind Into Baghdad. (Also not free online.) posted by Richard at 21:14 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

movie summary

Team America: not recommended
Mean Girls: Recommended
THX 1138: recommended only if you are a sci fi freak
The Day After Tomorrow: not recommended

Team America is funny up until the celebration at the end of the first mission.
After that there are only occasional flashes of humour.
Mostly they go on a big anti-actor, anti-leftwing rant. posted by Richard at 21:10 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

The "rolex" spam count now stands at 41.

Update 2004-10-25: Count is now 50.

Update 2004-10-31: Count is now 73.

Update 2004-11-03: Count is now 90.

Update 2004-11-20: Count is now 183. posted by Richard at 06:34 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)

Watched Mean Girls.
It was good. I was surprised. posted by Richard at 01:12 / permalink (post) | permalink (numeric)