Eclecticism

Sometime between February 23rd and February 24th, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too!

• Safari 4 Hidden Preferences: $ defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4TabBarIsOnTop -bool NO to kill the tabs-on-top 'feature'. Admittedly, I haven't installed the Safari 4 beta yet (that's on the dock for this evening), but just from the screenshots and Erik's notes, it doesn't seem like such a good idea.
• And the Circle Is Complete: Star Trek novels with new titles photoshopped in based on the cover art. Some really funny stuff in here.
• UserFriendly comic plagiarized multiple punchlines from Metafilter comments: The author's a long-time Metafilter user and apologizes here, while people keep finding more. (Ironic disclaimer: all of the preceding text was <del>borrowed</del> <del>copied</del> <ins>plagarized</ins> from Waxy.org links!)
• Last.fm – the Blog · "Techcrunch Are Full of Shit": "On Friday night a technology blog called Techcrunch posted a vicious and completely false rumour about us: that Last.fm handed data to the RIAA so they could track who's been listening to the 'leaked' U2 album. ¶ I denied it vehemently on the Techcrunch article, as did several other Last.fm staffers. We denied it in the Last.fm forums, on twitter, via email — basically we denied it to anyone that would listen, and now we're denying it on our blog."
• Roger Ebert: The Oscars are Outsourced: In his post-show wrapup, Ebert mentions one of my favorite bits of last night's Oscar ceremonies: the set. "By moving the orchestra onstage and replacing a traditional orchestra pit with the semi-circled seats of nominees, they made the Oscarcast feel a little less like a show, a little more like a party. ¶ The new design also made possible a crucial new camera shot, looking directly at the nominees from behind the presenters on stage. The looks in the eyes of Viola Davis, Marisa Tomei and Amy Adams as they were praised by Oscar legends was dramatic–infinitely better and less sadistic than the the traditional practice of framing the nominees in little boxes so we could see the instant reactions of the losers."

Sometime between February 18th and February 23rd, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too!

• Reality TV Helps Break Down Racial Barriers: "Despite decades of public pressure on the major networks to diversify, the lead characters in all but a handful of prime-time scripted shows this season are still white — and usually young and affluent. In contrast, reality programs consistently feature a broader range of people when it comes to race, age, class and sexual orientation."
• Can You Really Just Waltz Into SAM, Say You Have No Money to Pay the Suggested Donation, and Be Let In?: Apparently, yes you can: "Before I could finish, she said, 'Oh–absolutely, here you go,' and handed me a ticket printed with '1.00' in the corner. She was the epitome of friendliness. As we passed a museum guard, who'd heard the interaction, she smiled and gave us directions to Hopper. We looked at Hopper's women, and looked at women looking at Hopper's women." This is really neat — good for you, SAM!
• Re: The P-I’s Online Plan: "It's hard to overstate how big a change this represents. For a daily newspaper to abandon its belief that important local news should be conveyed first through its own trusted reporters, and its own trusted reporters only, is a tremendous shift. It fits with something else that's been becoming more clear lately: Hearst wants to hold on to the P-I brand, and the online traffic that comes with it, but it is ready to jettison a lot of old notions about what makes a journalistic enterprise."
• The Mystery of Ireland’s Worst Driver: "It was discovered that the man every member of the Irish police's rank and file had been looking for – a Mr Prawo Jazdy – wasn't exactly the sort of prized villain whose apprehension leads to an officer winning an award. ¶ In fact he wasn't even human. ¶ 'Prawo Jazdy is actually the Polish for driving licence and not the first and surname on the licence,' read a letter from June 2007 from an officer working within the Garda's traffic division."
• Wil Wheaton: Spoiler Alert: WATCHMEN is fucking awesome.: Wil says good things about the Watchmen movie in his (actually spoiler-free) review, which I was going to link to anyway after reading it in Google Reader, but when I tried to click through to Wil's site to link the page, I got this, which I thought was funny: "Your request to URL 'http://wilwheaton.typepad.com/wwdnbackup/2009/02/spoiler-alert-watchmen-is-fucking-awesome.html' has been blocked by the Webwasher Real-Time Classifier. The page was classified as sexual, erotic or adult content (90% probability in meta information) which is not allowed by your administrator at this time. "
• Writing Star Trek Novels, Or, Why Don’t You Get a Morally Acceptable Job?: Vonda N. McIntyre: "Years later, the opportunity to write a Star Trek novel came along. The folks who invited me to write it knew I'd been fond of the series and they trusted me to treat the characters with some respect.¶ My editor happened to be coming to a convention in Seattle just before the book was due, and asked me to give him the manuscript there, so I did. ¶ To my surprise (and not a little discomfort), my editor sat himself down in the middle of a small party and started reading. After he'd read fifty pages or so, he said, 'Paramount will either love this, or they'll really, really hate it.' ¶ Fortunately, the former."

Sometime between 07:00 and 13:31, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too!

• Non-Hierarchical Management: "A better way to think of a manager is as a servant, like an editor or a personal assistant. Everyone wants to be effective; a manager's job is to do everything they can to make that happen. The ideal manager is someone everyone would want to have. ¶ Instead of the standard 'org chart' with a CEO at the top and employees growing down like roots, turn the whole thing upside down. Employees are at the top — they're the ones who actually get stuff done — and managers are underneath them, helping them to be more effective. (The CEO, who really does nothing, is of course at the bottom.)"
• Irony for Me: The Trilogy Tomatometer: "Do you know how many hours are wasted amongst men and women determining the best movie in a trilogy? Trillions, that's how many." The Trilogy Tomatometer uses SCIENCE — and the Rotten Tomatoes movie review site — to determine the relative awsomeness of movie trilogies.
• No Photo Ban in Subways, Yet an Arrest: "Twice in the last five years, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority proposed a ban on photography in the subways as an antiterrorism measure. And in 2007, the city proposed severe restrictions on filming in the city streets, but retreated when visual artists and activists gathered 26,000 signatures on petitions of opposition within a few weeks. ¶ Both times that the transportation authority tried to ban photography, it, too, dropped the idea because of opposition. Even so, people taking pictures in the subways are regularly stopped by the police and asked to let the officers see their images or to delete them. ¶ 'They don't have to do that, and it's completely unlawful to ask them to delete them,' said Chris Dunn, a lawyer with the New York Civil Liberties Union. 'But it comes with the explicit or implicit threat of arrest. It's a constant problem.'"
• Facebook Backs Down on Privacy Terms: "Facing a federal complaint from a leading privacy advocacy organization and a revolt of tens of thousands of its users, Facebook on Tuesday night backed down from what many have seen as an onerous privacy policy. ¶ The policy had seemed to grant Facebook perpetual rights to users' uploaded content, and the threatened complaint from the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) had demanded, essentially, that the social-networking service return to its previous terms. ¶ Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a blog post late Tuesday that the company had decided to do just that."
• YouTube – the Simpsons – NEW Main Title: The Simpsons gets a new intro sequence — the first since it began, I believe — for its transition to HD.

Sometime between 14:54 and 17:12, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too!

• Magenta Ain’t a Colour: "So what does the brain do when our eyes detect wavelengths from both ends of the light spectrum at once (i.e. red and violet light)? Generally speaking, it has two options for interpreting the input data: ¶ a) Sum the input responses to produce a colour halfway between red and violet in the spectrum (which would in this case produce green — not a very representative colour of a red and violet mix) ¶ b) Invent a new colour halfway between red and violet ¶ Magenta is the evidence that the brain takes option b — it has apparently constructed a colour to bridge the gap between red and violet, because such a colour does not exist in the light spectrum. Magenta has no wavelength attributed to it, unlike all the other spectrum colours." So apparently, T-Moble has trademarked a color that doesn't actually exist. Boy, I bet that makes the lawyers happy!
• A Young Mad Scientist’s First Alphabet Blocks: "We are pleased to announce the release of our Young Mad Scientist's First Alphabet Blocks. These lovely blocks contain many carefully engraved illustrations of the equipment, training, and activities that a budding mad scientist will require, combined with a clever alphabetic introduction to the concept depicted."
• CBS & Paramount Announce First Star Trek Blu-Ray Sets: "Today CBS and Paramount made official what we have been reporting for months, for the first time ever, Star Trek is coming to Blu-ray in 2009. CBS announced a Blu-ray set for the first season of TOS and Paramount announced all the TOS era movies are coming to Blu-ray, all to be released this Spring. TrekMovie and DigitalBits.com have worked together to bring you all the info on the new sets."
• Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Specify Your Canonical: "Carpe diem on any duplicate content worries: we now support a format that allows you to publicly specify your preferred version of a URL. If your site has identical or vastly similar content that's accessible through multiple URLs, this format provides you with more control over the URL returned in search results. It also helps to make sure that properties such as link popularity are consolidated to your preferred version."
• Joss Whedon Goes Where No TV Man Has Gone Before: "Joss Whedon, the George Lucas of television, reveals why working on his triumphant return to the small screen, Dollhouse, has convinced him to abandon TV for good. His alternative medium: Web serials." (via Seattle Geekly)

Sometime between February 12th and February 16th, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too!

• Mindfuck Movies: "Some movies inform. Some movies entertain. And some pry open your skull and punch you in the brain. MATTHEW BALDWIN gathers up the films that have caused him to clutch his head and moan." Not a bad list — of the ones I've seen, I've liked all of them except Mulholland Drive (that was two hours of my life that I'll never get back).
• Firefighters Get Eyeful When Called to Hotel: "A ruckus at the Black Angus Inn on Gambell Street ended with the hotel flooded, a man under arrest for assault and firefighters who were trying to control the sprinkler system mooned by an unruly guest. ¶ The bare-bottomed woman also ended up in jail after refusing to leave the crew alone, according to police. ¶ 'She was drunk and obnoxious, getting in the way of the firefighters,' police spokeswoman Anita Shell said. 'She was mooning the firefighters, asking to see their penises.'" Yeah, well, you spend the majority of six months without sunlight and see how desperate you are for entertainment! ;) Heh…Alaskans are wonky.
• Legal Guide for Bloggers: "The difference between you and the reporter at your local newspaper is that in many cases, you may not have the benefit of training or resources to help you determine whether what you're doing is legal. And on top of that, sometimes knowing the law doesn't help – in many cases it was written for traditional journalists, and the courts haven't yet decided how it applies to bloggers. ¶ But here's the important part: None of this should stop you from blogging. Freedom of speech is the foundation of a functioning democracy, and Internet bullies shouldn't use the law to stifle legitimate free expression. That's why EFF created this guide, compiling a number of FAQs designed to help you understand your rights and, if necessary, defend your freedom."
• 13 Facts About Friday the 13th: "If you fear Friday the 13th, then batten down the hatches. This week's unlucky day is the first of three this year. ¶ The next Friday the 13th comes in March, followed by Nov. 13. Such a triple whammy comes around only every 11 years, said Thomas Fernsler, a math specialist at the University of Delaware who has studied the number 13 for more than 20 years."
• Star Trek Inspired Corset: If I was a girl, I'd be snapping one of these up in a heartbeat: "This corset is designed after the Star Trek: Next Generation jumpsuits." (via Boing Boing)