Thinkcage

I reshuffed a few things in the XML feeds for the site. So if you’re a subscriber (and really, why wouldn’t you be) you’ll see a little more than normal in the feeds. The biggest yet most transparent change is that I am using Feedburner to serve this blog’s XML feed. For most of you this will be transparent as the change was made via a server redirect. However you will notice that in addition to the none-too-frequent text posts you will also see pictures. After playing around for the past few months, I’ve decided to abandon my homebrew moblog for the ease of use of Flikr. Flikr is great, offers nice presentation and lots of community features. What’s more, Feedburner allows me to splice my Flickr images right into my regular RSS feed.

So, if you’re still subscribed to the Moblog feed – thank you! And you’ll see photos exlusively from Flikr for the time beging. However, those photos will now be automagically shown in the main feed so why not just use that one?

Later on I’ll integrate this all better with the site. I’d like to display the Flikr content in this template as well. I am also contemplating a move to Word Press or some other ready-made system.

So now you know…

I am 53% Hippie.

I am not a child of the 60’s but my heart is true to the cause, man. I realize that being a hippie is not just bell bottoms and tie-dye. It is also about the drugs and smelling bad, too!

Take the
Hippie Test
@ FualiDotCom

There was a funny exchange in an episode of South Park a few years ago in which Chef and Mr. Garrison discussed how white people have been appropriating black culture:

Mr. Garrison: Chef, what did you do when white people stole your culture?

Chef: Oh. Well, we black people just always tried to stay out in front of them.

Mr. Slave:[straightens up] How did you do that?

Chef: Well, like with our slang. Black people always used to say, “I’m in the house” instead of “I’m here.” But then white people all started to say “in the house” so we switched it to “in the hizzouse.” Hizzouse became hizzizzouse, and then white folk started saying that, and we had to change it to hizzie, then “in the hizzle” which we had to change to “hizzle fo shizzle,” and now, because white people say “hizzle fo shizzle,” we have to say “flippity floppity floop.”

Now I’m not going to claim this has anything to do with Black culture but I do feel a little like a soccer mom listening to 50-Cent on a Top-40 radio station as I write this. You see, even a year after DJ Danger Mouse’s, The Grey Album hit us over the head with the possibilities of the genre, I still didn’t get the whole mash-up scene until just recently. So believe me I know that I’m way off the bloggerati radar when I try to declare just how cool this is. On a blog in 2005 no less.

But I get it now. Mashuptown has shown me the way. There are a lot of types of mash-ups, but I think the ones that really appeal to me take two songs and make them better. A perfect example is today’s link: Callin it back by Banders and Mash, which is a mix of AC/DC’s Back in Black and Lyrics Born’s Callin it out. For me this one really shows the power of a mash-up to take a song like Back in Black, strip off the cheese, and use it to power a great rap lyric. Rap has been tough for me to listen to partly because I just dig guitar rock. But the sheer cheese factor and terrible vocals of AC/DC really make you forget how good that riff is. Problem solved.

Also worth noting is Spending one of these nights with Kelly’ by Aggro1. I’m not a real big fan of either original song but I have to say that this mash-up is so great because it just feels natural. Fantastic.

Catch ya later at the flippity floppity flop.

Michael Bierut’s post on Design Observer, The Obvious, Shunned by So Many, Is Successfully Avoided Once Again yielded this gem in reference to the grandiose aims of the young designer:

I labored over this 8.5 x 11 inch opus all day, never forgetting what I then held as the twin tenets of responsible design practice (one, create something absolutely without precedent; and two, demonstrate to onlookers how clever I am). Given my predilections at that point in my nascent career, this probably involved merging the home-grown rigorous modernism of Lester Beall and Will Burtin with the formal experimentation of Wolfgang Weingart and April Grieman.

It’s a great read, check it out.

I’ve been busy. Yeah, well who isn’t? After a truly trying stretch over the past few months I’m able to exhale and think about life again. Much of the pressure rests on the shoulders of a very demanding freelance work schedule — you know, in addition to the full day I put in at EF? While the extra income, unique projects, and opportunities to work with people I like and respect makes freelance a part of my life, the amount of my life that it has taken up over the past few months has been far too great.

That said, it is a tremendous relief to have finished up a couple of large projects (and many smaller ones) and start thinking about life again. It is fascinating to me how an inbox full of mail, a desk full of papers and magazines, a news aggregator full of unread posts, and a ever-expanding list of household projects can really add to the stress.

So now it’s time to come down, a get back to normal life. For me that means: Catching up on information (blogs, mail, messageboards, etc.). Finally getting to play World of Warcraft. Taking a little time off and spending it with the family. Working on my long-neglected personal project (like this blog). Restart the book on my nightstand.

It’s good to have the weight lifted.

According to this article, Wal*Mart has given up the fight against Netflix for their online DVD rental business. I have to give credit to Wal*Mart here for not taking the typical bully role *cough* Microsoft *cough* and simply squashing Netflix with their nearly limitless resources.

Clearly, Wal*Mart cares much more about profit and value than pride.

As a Blockbuster online subscriber I will be watching this battle closely.