davextreme: January 2006

Oh what wonderful news. I’ve always thought that lesser-known straight to video sequels were part of Disney’s secret shame. Good to see Pixar has its integrity pants on.

The New Averaging Gradius

Movie made from 15 games of Gradius overlayed on top of one another.

What the Corinthians Wrote Back to the Apostle Paul

25 January 2006

GameSpy: World of Warcraft Level 60 Quest Guide

Excellent guide to quests and instances.

A Website about Corporate Identity

Lots of info about company logos and text treatments.

24 January 2006

Video Game Maps - Ian-Albert.com

Giant, extensive (if limited) maps of games.

UPN, WB to Shut Down; New Network Formed - Yahoo! News

Wow.

Fireworks Factory Explosion - Google Video

Ever wondered what would happen if a fireworks factory caught on fire?

23 January 2006

The Naked Truth - A Slate investigation into unrated DVDs. By Josh Levin

Top notch investigatory journalism here.

19 January 2006

Newsvine - Music Sales Are Booming on Internet

I think I really buy the idea that all some people needed to stop stealing music was an easier way to buy it legally.

18 January 2006

Newsvine - Vatican Paper Hits 'Intelligent Design'

Newsvine - Vatican Paper Hits ‘Intelligent Design’

NBC: iPod Boosts Prime Time

Rating of The Office are up, in part due to people getting a taste from iTunes.

13 January 2006

12 January 2006

Google Earth - System Requirements

Now has a Mac version.

Windows Media® Components for QuickTime

Play Windows Media files in QuickTime.

11 January 2006

The Prejudice Map

A map of the top Google results for a country when searching for “Germans are known for *”, etc.

Next Generation - Revolution Pressing the Right Buttons

Apple's share price an in-joke for Intelites

Apple’s share price an in-joke for Intelites

What’s even more strange is the very fact that the stock went up after a keynote. Usually Wall Street doesn’t know what to think of new Apple announcements and everyone sells.

10 January 2006

The Eagle_Fire Garfield Randomizer

WWDC 2006 Live Updates

This site will update automatically with text info as today’s Stevenote gets underway.

Daring Fireball: MWSF ’06 Predictions

09 January 2006

Magazine reveals Revolution details: Zelda, Super Smash Bros., Donkey Konga - Joystiq

Some of nation's best libraries have books bound in human skin - Boston.com

Some of nation’s best libraries have books bound in human skin - Boston.com

New Kodak Logo

Apparently the cool new thing in marketing is to take a really good, long-established logo and ruin it.

06 January 2006

Newsvine - Seeding the Vine. First Look!

Looks neat, and could be a good way to make money if you really want to do some reporting, or want to write a column.

HD TiVo Series 3 @ CES | PVRblog

Still no release date, but it looks like it’ll be a bunch of months and it’ll be on the pricey side.

Behind the magic curtain

First-hand tale of what goes into a Steve Jobs keynote.

05 January 2006

As expected, Microsoft announced today at CES a new music download service in partnership with MTV, called “Urge”. From the CNN coverage: The offering will include exclusive material from MTV, though it will not be compatible with iPods, which are currently the most popular MP3 player. Not that non-compatibility is a shock to anyone, anywhere, but I’ll ask the expected question anyway. Why? Why not make a service that peddles MP3s that will play on any player, including iPods? Why not set your goals on making the best download service there is that plays on every music player out there? (Of course, I’m no evil financial genius. I’m sure it makes perfect sense to Bill Gates’s people.)

Microsoft doesn’t ever want to win its customers by selling them the best, most reliable, most compatible product there is. They want to create the something and lock you into it. They want to be the HMO for the digital world, where if you want service you have to use theirs. (Of course, Apple’s guilty of this, too. You can’t play music you buy from iTunes on non-iPods, but at least they have the advantage of iPod compatibility.)

So why do I get so worked up about all this? I guess it’s because at the moment there’s still a chance that the bad guys won’t win. Given the choice between buying a song that only allows me to make x copies and one that has no restriction, I’ll take the one without the limits. No one wants DRM, but we’re paying for it anyway, and many people don’t even know it. It’s clearly to our advantage as consumers for Microsoft to release a music service that offers music that plays on all devices (as it would for Apple to release an iPod that plays all the music, for that matter), but Microsoft thinks it has the power to throw it in, anyway, and force us into it. It’s not like many other companies have the resources to strike up deals with record companies and produce competing products, so in the end we’ll be stuck with whatever we let them stick us with.

Also, “Urge” is a terrible name.

Salon.com Books | Secrets, lies -- and lawyers!

Salon.com Books | Secrets, lies — and lawyers!

Salan piece on the 4-year Bendis/Maleev run on Daredevil.

del.icio.us/popular/comics

TheFourthRail.com

Great reviews on this site, though its co-author just retired. No word yet on how they’ll proceed.

Bloglines | My Feeds

Again, won’t be useful unless you have my cookie, but I love Bloglines. At home I use NetNewsWire synced to my Bloglines account.

Ahn'Qiraj War Supplies Server Rankings: Whisperwind

Ahn’Qiraj War Supplies Server Rankings: Whisperwind

This is only a daily temporarily, but you can see my WoW server’s progress on the AQ war effort. It’ll be interesting to see how long it takes. Also I think the way the community came up with this is really cool.

Timothy McSweeney's Internet Tendency: Lists

Timothy McSweeney’s Internet Tendency: Lists

Always funny. I load it every day, but they don’t really publish that often.

Flickr: Explore interesting photos from the last 7 days in FlickrLand...

Flickr: Explore interesting photos from the last 7 days in FlickrLand…

A random set of interesting photos. Always good stuff in here.

The Hunger Site : Give Food for Free to Hungry People in the World

I keep a bookmark folder on my bar with all the sites I read daily so that I can open them all in tabs for quick browsing. Many of them don’t publish RSS feeds. This is the first one, and I try to click it and the Animal Rescue Site banner every day.

Data Mining 101: Finding Subversives with Amazon Wishlists | Applefritter

Homework (after reading this): now that you know what sorts of things the public can find out about you, think about how much Amazon itself knows about you. Or Google, or Microsoft, or Yahoo!

the Widget Foundry :: Amazon Album Art Widget

I’ll be giving this a try tonight.

Jon Stewart Slated to Host Academy Awards

03 January 2006

BBC NEWS | Magazine | 100 things we didn't know this time last year

BBC NEWS | Magazine | 100 things we didn’t know this time last year

Lots of good stuff here.

01 January 2006

macosxhints - Use the new standardized RSS icon in Safari

I somewhat doubt Apple will ever roll this into Safari, especially with the Snapback icon already being orange, but it’s a neat tip I guess.

Boing Boing: Coldplay's new CD has rules: No MP3s, no DVD players, no car stereos

Boing Boing: Coldplay’s new CD has rules: No MP3s, no DVD players, no car stereos

Not that I was going to buy this disc anyway, but damn, that’s ridiculous.

30 January 2006

27 January 2006

26 January 2006