Geekery

Whatever I’m geeking out about at the time.

Neverland

by

Ooooh…I’m all sorts of excited about this: Neverland, a modern retelling of Peter Pan.

Neverland is [Damion Dietz] updated take exploring that thesis, with the Lost Boys a group of urban punks, Tinkerbell a single parent, Tiger Lilly a drag queen and Hook a sadomasochistic fury out to destroy all the beauty he envies.

…it works both as a fable and on straightforwardly realistic terms as well — and he’s not afraid to explore the darker implications of Peter’s refusal to accept adult responsibility and Captain Hook’s obsession with his own lost youth and beauty.

…Neverland seems like an appropriate way to celebrate the centenary of a book that never grows old. It opens up the book to newer dimensions, not to mention new audiences. Adults who remember the story only vaguely will be induced to pick up the book again, to check how the metaphors line up with the events in the book, to see whether they can see those pale colors when they close their eyes.

— from various reviews on the Neverland press page

(via Wil)

Wimoweh

by

This is great — Kookaburra pointed to a fascinating article about the origins and history of “Wimoweh” (more popularly known as “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”) called Where does the lion sleep tonight? that I’ve been browsing off and on for the past hour in breaks between jobs. Lots of neat tidbits in the article.

Like [the Weavers’] earlier recordings, it took place with Gordon Jenkins presiding and an orchestra in attendance. Prior to this, Jenkins had been very subdued in his instrumental approach, adding just the occasional sting and the odd swirl of strings to the Weavers’ cheery singalongs. Maybe he was growing bored, because his arrangement of “Wimoweh” was a great Vegas-y explosion of big-band raunch that almost equalled the barbaric splendour of the Zulu original. Trombones blared. Trumpets screamed. Strings swooped and soared through Solomon’s miracle melody. And then Pete [Seeger] cut loose with all that hollering and screaming. It was a startling departure from everything else the Weavers had ever done, but Billboard loved it, anointing it a Pick of the Week. Cash Box said, “May easily break”. Variety said, “Terrific!”

Custom MT skins?

by

Custom MT interface

So it appears that SocialDynamX, creators of FMRadio for Radio Userland (Disclaimer: I know nothing about either of these products) is working on creating a custom interface for MovableType.

First impression? Ugh, that’s horrid.

Now, I’m a little unclear from looking at their site as to whether that’s a replacment for the default MT interface that you see in your web browser (as is implied by the term “skin”), or whether it’s a seperate standalone program for posting to MT (such as Kung-Log, UserSpace or Zempt). If it’s a standalone program, then okay, it’s most likely Windows-based, and the horrid ugly interface makes sense. But if it’s a “skin” designed to replace the standard MT interface within the browser — why is it so verschluggene ugly?

I was going to go into more detail, but I’ve gotta head off to work, and I’m out of time. Judge for yourself, I guess. ;)

(via Scoble)

BuyTunes blows

by

Earlier this week BuyTunes popped up attempting to capitalize on the success of the iTunes Music Store by moving the same general idea to the Windows platform.

So far, the word is that they suck.

I already knew that they were blatantly ripping off Apple’s ads. I’d link to the BuyTunes versions, but that brings up the second major issue: they’ve restricted their website to Internet Explorer for Windows only. Any other browser, and you get redirected to this page. So far, things weren’t looking very good.

Then Jennifer at ScriptyGoddess actually tried to use BuyMusic’s services. Let’s just say that she’s not a satisfied customer.

First problem. After you buy an album, you need to download it. Sure, I knew that. What I didn’t know is that you have to download EACH SONG INDIVIDUALLY. One click per song. With Two large sized albums with many songs on it – it can be just a LITTLE annoying.

[…]

Second problem. Before each song plays – it has to download and verify your license. You can’t mulitple select a bunch and do this. You need to do this before EACH SONG will play.

[…]

Third and VERY big problem. […] Since I’m using Windows200, they force you to use a windows media plugin…[that] CRASHES consistently EVERY time I try to burn a CD. It is simply impossible to create a cd from my machine using that plugin.

[…]

And here comes problem number four. The “Main” license is the one I downloaded the first time to my machine (the windows 2000 box with the defective Roxio plugin). Subsequent downloads are “secondary licenses” from which you are not allowed to transfer to a mobile device, burn a cd, or do ANYTHING with except listen to them on that one machine.

[…]

In walks problem number five. Here’s their oh-so helpful (probably computer generated) form letter to me…

We apologize if you have experienced trouble downloading your music to a digital media player or copying your music to a CD. Unfortunately, We are unable to provide technical assistance after you have downloaded the music from BuyMusic.com to your primary computer. In addition, we are unable to credit you back for failed or damaged copies once you have successfully downloaded the music to your primary computer.

Sounds like BuyMusic is bound to be a bust, to me.

About 'Noises'

by

I wanted to take a moment to draw attention to the ‘Noises’ section of the sidebar to the left of this page. I’m tossing albums up there at more or less random intervals (often determined by what I’m listening to at any given point in the day). When I do, though, I’m highlighting three key tracks from the album and adding streaming audio ‘PLAY’ links to them, in addition to one for the full album.

The albums won’t stay up indefinitely, and the tracks aren’t downloadable (streaming only, sorry), but this should let anyone stopping by take a quick listen to whatever I’m recommending — and, of course, clicking through the picture lets you buy it from Amazon.

Enjoy!

Darwin Awards

by

Over at The After Hours Pub, halfast posted a list of Darwin Award winners. I hadn’t read this list before, but it prompted me to head over to the official Darwin Awards website and browse through some of the stories.

Man, some people scare me with their stupidity.

However, I did end up with two more books in my Amazon wishlist: The Darwin Awards: Evolution in Action and The Darwin Awards II: Unnatural Selection. You can even pre-order The Darwin Awards III: Survival of the Fittest!

KMFDM

by

Kein Mehrheit Für Die Mitlied
Keep Madonna From Doing Music
Kylie Minogue Fans Don’t Masturbate
Kill MotherFucking Depeche Mode
Klingons March Forth During Missions
Kill Me For Drug Money
Keine Macht Für Dich Mehr