Whaddayaknow

If I'm not blogging regularly, it could only mean one of two things: either I'm busy or I have nothing to say. Well, it could be both, but I'm simplifying things. In this case, I am havin' a blast. I got home on Thursday night. I spent Friday night with my friends and most of Saturday with them as well. Today was a family day; my sister and I went with our parents to get a Christmas tree.

So, whaddayaknow, it's almost Christmas. As usual, I don't really want much stuff. I asked my parents for (i.e., bought with their credit card) a Creative Commons t-shirt. The money goes toward a good cause, and I can use my chest to advertise it. Sounds like a winning plan all around.

From the Stuff-Nobody-Cares-About Dept.: I used to use my own Update Notifier for my Greasemonkey user scripts. Almost everybody writes their own, but I've gotten tired of having to maintain it and figured that someone else would probably do a better job, so I'm switching to usoCheckup for my scripts. It has some interesting features that are too boring to describe here.

And hey, whaddayaknow, it's the end of the post already.

I've sleepwalked before, and I'm afraid of doing it again because it's really creepy. Case in point: sleep-emailing and other strange occurrences. (Via The Presurfer)

Watch as a woman attempts 21 accents in three videos: 1, 2, 3. She's pretty good.

Here's an interesting column that appeared in a UF student newspaper this semester: Social Media Emphasize Individuality. The author argues that when people we don't know very well pour their souls out in blogs and the like, it helps us understand that they're more than meets the eye.

Some weather

The winners never say "It's only a game..."

Remember how college football equals epic drama?

In September of last year, the Florida Gators suffered an embarrassing loss to Ole Miss at home. After the game, Tim Tebow, the Gators' star quarterback, promised that no one would work harder than he would for the rest of the season. The Gators went on to win every game, including their conference championship and the national championship. The words of "The Promise" were etched onto a plaque outside the stadium. Tebow led the Gators through this season undefeated as well, for a total of 22 victories in a row.

The fun came to an end tonight as Alabama crushed Florida to win the conference championship.

I was watching at my friend Andrea's apartment. All of us—she, her boyfriend, her other friends, and I—were on edge the whole time. The Gators never led in the game. A comeback looked less and less likely. Finally, the score was 32-13 in the fourth quarter, and the announcers were declaring it over. Alabama had possession and took a knee. Tim Tebow cried. He had already played the last home game of his career. The team's hopes for a repeat national title were ruined.

A lot of thoughts were going around in my mind. I was tense. I could feel my heart beating in my stomach. I hadn't felt like this in a long time, and I have had some pretty bad times. I thought about how I could cheer myself up. If I had a bottle, I would drink. If I had a girl, I would kiss her. But there was nothing I could do. I wondered if I was the only person in the room who felt this way. Everyone else seemed to be laughing it off. Maybe they were just coping better.

Rather than sticking around to watch more TV, we went out. I kept my sweater on over my Gators shirt. We went to the mall, where I couldn't help but see tons of Gators merchandise for sale. We walked around for a little bit, I guess to get some milkshakes. I got one. Then we went to Target, where there was also tons of Gators merchandise in view. Andrea and some of the others bought cases of Dr Pepper, which happened to be the main sponsor of tonight's game.

I felt like it was letting it get to me too much, but I didn't want to say that because then everyone else would know it was getting to me too much. I think they all could tell, anyway. (If not, I've just blown my cover.) They took me back to my apartment, and to my dismay, I realized it was only nine o'clock. I had been counting on plopping right into bed, but it was too early. Oh, the world can be cruel sometimes.

I know, I know. This is a ridiculous thing to get worked up about. It is only a game. It's an hour of bulky sociology majors trying to move an oddly-shaped ball from one end of a field to the other in short bursts. It's not politics. It's not love. It's not like anyone died.

This is where I would rebut those potential criticisms and point out why it is in fact important, but I'm coming up short. All I know is that a lot of people had their hopes riding on this season, and that everyone who hates the Gators will have a field day. Actually, thanks to the magic of Facebook, I can tell that they already are. I guess that's the worst part for me since I have thin skin. Being a loser isn't fun.

Yes, this post is going to look stupid in the distant or not-so-distant future. But I don't know which is worse: feeling sad about this or knowing that it doesn't matter. When I'm feeling down about something, I want it to believe it's important, so I'd rather not hear optimistic words of wisdom, even though they often are true.

Meanwhile, the struggle between emotion and reason goes on. So, in spite of myself, I'd like to offer the following. Feel free to hold hands with the people next to you and sing along.

We are the boys from old Florida,
F-L-O-R-I-D-A,
Where the girls are the fairest,
The boys are the squarest
Of any old state down our way.

We are all strong for old Florida,
Down where the old Gators play.
In all kinds of weather,
We'll all stick together
For F-L-O-R-I-D-A.

Here's something few people will be interested in: A Literary Appreciation of the Olson/zoneinfo/tz Database. (Via waxy.org)

Watch old movies you've never heard of at Classic Cinema Online. (Via Lifehacker)

I've got time for trivialities

I went home this weekend. As with many things, it got me thinking.

At the risk of being really cheesy, let me mention that Wiktionary defines "home" as:

One's own dwelling place; the house or structure in which one lives; especially the house in which one lives with his family; the habitual abode of one’s family; also, one's birthplace.

That's the first definition of ten just for the noun. It's not helpful.

I believe it was Maniac Magee who said, "Home is where you sleep." Now that's more like it.

Why all this philosophizing, you may ask? I've noticed that some of my friends consider their homes to be their apartments here in College Town, USA, rather than the houses where they grew up, where their parents live, and where they go for holidays. I also caught an article in Unofficial College Newspaper last week that warned of the "Garden State moment" when you realize that "the house you grew up in isn't really your home anymore."

Oh, Jordan, you say, isn't Garden State a great movie? I loveeeeeeeeeee it, just like I love drawing out silent letters! Less than three hundred thirty-three thousand three hundred thirty-three. Yeah, well, I haven't seen more than, like, five minutes of it. I know, what a horrible person I am for never going out to the video store and renting your favorite movie, or for never consciously trying to find it on TV and taking a break from everything else in my life for two hours to watch it. Sue me.

Um, anyway, I hadn't been home for three months (my trip to Europe wasn't even that long), and I found myself stumbling around a bit, trying to remember how each door opened, where some things were, and the like. I'd still call the house my home—I did feel at home there, and I highly doubt I'll be living in this apartment after I graduate—but I couldn't help but wonder when the Garden State moment would come. Hopefully, it won't be until after I graduate. By that time, I hope to have a full-time job, a non-student apartment, a live-in girlfriend, and other things that can be described by hyphenated adjectives.

Need some dummy text for some sort of design? Check out the Dummy Text Generator. I've featured a similar site previously (December 23, 2003), but this one has more texts to choose from (including the opening of The Metamorphosis) and uses JavaScript magic so there's no waiting for new pages to load.

How to Bind a Paper Without Staples. I've already used this technique successfully, but only with scissors (instead of ripping the paper).

Appreciation

All is quiet on the World of Stuff front. Okay, I guess you guys don't think polished writing about potentially lethal fast-food menu items is very much worth commenting on. Noted. I never know which posts are going to be snoozers and which aren't.

This past week at work, there was a sort of appreciation week going on. People were getting appreciated left and right. Even we, the humble IT workers way back in the corner of the building got some love. On Thursday, I got a half-dozen homemade blueberry muffins from a student group whose web site I run. And on Friday, we had a Thanksgiving feast for lunch. During the meal, we were asked to select a needy child to buy Christmas gifts for, and my IT co-workers and I decided to provide for a two-year-old boy who wanted some toy trucks.

Yes, 'tis the season to ask your professors if they're holding class the day before Thanksgiving (and of course, they all are). The student body voted last year to make the day before Thanksgiving a university holiday, but it won't go into effect for a few years because they draw up each year's calendar far in advance.

How Races and Religions Match in Online Dating. (Via waxy.org)

A Google employee realized that many people don't know what a browser is even though they spend a lot of time using one. To that end, he created a short video with an explanation. (Via Lifehacker)

Stream of consciousness VIII

Here's something I haven't done in a while. Streamed my consciousness out for all to see. Okay, it's not true stream of consciousness because I'm not adding in stuff like gee I have to go to the bathroom every five seconds. I don't have to go to the bathroom right now, but it's an example.

On Sunday nights I tend to get philosophical. Earlier I was reminiscing a bit about the days when I used to jam with my friends. I don't feel very comfortable as a musician, but with them, it was all right. I don't know if I could ever meet people like that again. That's why I'd like to get together with them and play some music once in a while.

I haven't been playing much because my guitar is kind of shot. The frets are worn down. I do have others, but they're... well, I'll describe them. I have my first guitar, a Hohner (as in, the harmonica company) acoustic that I believe is 3/4 size and whose case cost more than the instrument itself. I have my DeArmond electric, a sort of a Les Paul copy that's held up pretty well. I have my Epiphone Dot, which I've considered my primary guitar since I got it in March 2003. It's the one that's sounding pretty sad. Finally, I have a Carlo Robelli 12-string acoustic guitar, which sounds heavenly but is nearly impossible to play because it's a 12-string acoustic guitar.

The suggestion I've gotten in the past is to sell some or all of those babies and buy a new one. But I'm not sure how much money I'd get for them, and they have a lot of sentimental (and practical, sometimes) value. Maybe I could buy one good acoustic or one good electric, but I don't know. I also don't know how much money I could sink into a new guitar considering I am a college student and all. Also, I don't play nearly as often as I used to. Is it because I'm no longer interested or because I have a guitar that sounds like crap and is musically unviable? I'd like to think it's the latter. (The poor Dot, by the way, is the only one I have at my apartment, a five-hour drive from my house.)

I don't want to buy a new one, so I'll probably do what I can to fix the Dot. All I can think of doing is changing the action because I don't think that having the frets redone would be worth the money that's been spent on it. It's already had a costly repair a few years ago.

Speaking of things not working, I've mentioned that the memory card I bought for my camera in anticipation of my big European trip (you know, the one that broke during the trip)... umm... broke. It turned out that it worked in my dad's camera, so I figured the issue was with the adapter that I used to fit it into my camera. Apparently that's not the issue, I've found out after my dad bought two new adapters for me. The memory card and the camera just don't get along. I'll have to have the thing reformatted, I guess. Or buy a new one. Actually, I don't want a new one because I've been locked into Sony (we're talking Sony cameras and Memory Sticks here). I think I'll just wait for my current camera to bite the dust, be it in one week or ten years, and then buy all new stuff. And no vendor lock-in this time.

From my dad's camera, I did manage to get 10 photos that I thought were lost when the memory card crapped out. That brings my total number of photos taken during the trip to 4,012.

Creepy video of the day: Barack Obama's Amazingly Consistent Smile. (Via The Presurfer)

Here's an epic song directed at Lily Allen, who apparently has been concerned that file sharing will rob her of her income in the future. (Via waxy.org).

Sharing is caring, it can be fun

The World of Stuff's first original video in almost three years is hardly original at all... but that's okay!

Here's the skinny: Copyright law gives you the exclusive rights to the works you create, as evidenced in the familiar phrase, "All rights reserved." Creative Commons is an organization that provides various licenses that you can apply to your works if you only want "some rights reserved." Some licenses allow commercial uses of the work, others allow creating derivative works, etc. The Attribution and Attribution-Share Alike licenses are the most permissive.

Jamendo, one of my favorite web sites, allows musicians to post their Creative Commons-licensed songs for people to download at no cost. And a lot of it is is good stuff. I've rolled a custom RSS feed that lists the latest albums uploaded to Jamendo under either the Creative Commons Attribution or Attribution-Share Alike license. It lets me stay on top of things.

Recently, an artist named Josh Woodward released an album called Breadcrumbs on Jamendo. He followed up by releasing an instrumental version with the vocal tracks removed. Both versions were released under the Creative Commons Attribution license. It wasn't long before another artist named Sean Wright added his own vocals to one of Woodward's songs, and released it on Jamendo under the Attribution-Share Alike license. This is the kind of stuff that gets me going!*

Both songs are really great,** so I wondered what it would sound like if I synchronized them. I spent much of Sunday working to share the result. Hence The World of Stuff's latest video, Creative Commons in Action: Josh Woodward and Sean Wright. Have a listen! They sound even better together. The best part is that I didn't need to seek anyone's permission to make the video; the Creative Commons licenses already granted it.

Here's a bit of a technical background for the curious. I haven't really worked with editing video since I was just starting out with Linux almost three years ago. The truth is that video editing software is the last frontier that Linux has yet to conquer. For this video, I used Pitivi, which is finally pretty stable and lacking only video effects (in my opinion). In the past, I might have used Kdenlive, the only other working video editing program for Linux that I've encountered, but it's a KDE application, and I use GNOME. Other Linux users will hopefully understand this.

Also, it's interesting to note that the video was produced entirely with free software and free formats. I started with Ogg Vorbis versions of the two songs (licensed as CC-BY and CC-BY-SA), combined them in Audacity, and saved the result as FLAC audio. The visuals were created using the similarly-licensed album artwork and Bitstream Vera Sans in the GIMP before being saved in PNG format. The video itself was produced in Pitivi and saved as Ogg Theora/Vorbis. I've licensed it as CC-BY-SA, and it's available on YouTube as... Flash. Yeah, I know. But I have the original file if you want.

Just today, Sean Wright released more songs based on Josh Woodward's instrumental tracks. If you enjoyed "From Your Lips," do check them out!

This post is already running long, but here are a few links:

An instructional video: How to Make Your Own Soda. (Via Lifehacker)

Here's a map showing the distance to the nearest McDonald's for every point in the contiguous United States. The "McFurthest Spot" is somewhere in South Dakota. It's a 233-kilometer drive from there to the nearest Golden Arches. (Via J-Walk Blog)

* Not the only stuff that gets me going
** I like the original better

Get databased

As you may know, I volunteer for Get Carded, a student group that raises awareness about organ donation on Florida college campuses. It's my third year with them, and this time, some things are different. One of the two co-directors of the group has graduated, and his would-be replacement is no longer around due to some drama that apparently occurred over the summer. It's unfortunate because we'd all been a friendly bunch for as long as I'd been a member.

But that wasn't the only big change to happen the summer. Get Carded's parent organization has been put in charge of Florida's organ donor database, and it's now taking registrations online. In the past, we distributed organ donor cards, but now we just tell people to go to the web site (or to mail in a form). Our first tabling event was last week, and I had to update my spiel.

The tabling was part of a week-long PR blitz for homecoming week. It started on Monday night when we painted the 34th Street Wall, the only place in town where graffiti is tolerated. Our tabling was Wednesday, and the group also made itself present at the homecoming parade on Friday, although I pulled out of my commitment to that one due to unforeseen circumstances. (I'd been at probably every event for the past two years, so I felt I had the privilege. Also, the co-directors didn't care.)

Incidentally, the new database makes the name "Get Carded" go from confusing to completely inaccurate. We were told that there was a strong push to change the name, but one of the better-established chapters wouldn't have it. Branding, y'know.

Are you a Florida resident? Are you an organ donor? (Check your driver's license if you're not sure; it would say "Organ Donor" under your signature.) If you're not, go to donatelifeflorida.org to sign up right now. It just takes a minute, and you'll be able to edit your personal details whenever they change. (For the question "How did you learn about Florida’s donor registry?" we ask people to select "College campaign" and then specify "UF." It make it sounds like a cheesy competition, but that's really how the state organization judges our success.)

And if you have any questions about becoming an organ donor, just ask me.

Remember when people used more than one search engine? A lot of those old ones are still around. See Popular Search Engines in the '90s: Then and Now. (Via The Presurfer)

For the people who are older than I am: Old Operating Systems Don't Die.

Review des extensiones

Two months ago, I wrote about some Firefox extensions I had installed. Now it's time to check back in and see if I'm still using them!

• BetterPrivacy: I'm still using this one. It's one of those set-it-and-forget-it extensions, and it's doing its job well.
• Ghostery: I uninstalled this extension and subscribed to the EasyPrivacy filterset for Adblock Plus instead. The filterset is updated regularly, and I was already using ABP anyway.
• Perspectives: This one hasn't come in handy yet, but I like to think it will be useful sometime.
• Targeted Advertising Cookie Opt-Out (TACO): I uninstalled this extension for reasons I will explain below.

Since then, I've installed the following security-related extensions:

• CS Lite: A simple extension that lets you manage your cookie settings from the status bar and offers more options than Firefox does by default. I have it set to block all cookies except from sites I've specified. For some of those sites (e.g., Wikipedia, The World of Stuff), I've allowed cookies to remain till they expire. For others (e.g. Facebook, my bank), I allow their cookies to stay until my browser session ends. CS Lite also lets you allow cookies from a site for the current session only, which can be useful for sites like nytimes.com (which still makes you register to read certain articles) or my high school's web site (which ingeniously redirects to itself if cookies are disabled). Since I now use CS Lite and EasyPrivacy, I don't feel TACO is necessary.
• NoScript: One of the most popular Firefox extensions, it blocks JavaScript on all sites and allows you to set exceptions for sites you trust. It takes a little while to set it up if you visit a lot of script-heavy sites regularly, but after that, it's not too much trouble. In fact, it makes many sites zippier, particularly blogs that are weighed down by tons of crap scripts. NoScript contains a lot of other security features like protection from cross-site scripting attacks. It also lets you block plugins like Flash and Java on untrusted sites, which makes sites like my high school's web site a whole lot more bearable. I never installed this extension before because I thought it was incompatible with Greasemonkey, but NoScript now allows most Greasemonkey scripts to run.

I could probably get used to using CS Lite and NoScript, but some web sites that rely on JavaScript or cookies don't tell you to allow them, and that can be annoying at times. Web designers shouldn't just assume that visitors will have JavaScript and cookies enabled.

I haven't actually tried this, but it sounds interesting: Omegle lets you chat with a random stranger. Exciting?

This is pretty epic: a non-traditional visualization of Beethoven's Fifth, showing each note and instrument. Of course, there's audio too. (Via The Presurfer)

Dinner at Andrea's

Now that I attend a university with a top-ranked football team, I watch a lot of football games. Usually, I watch them alone because everyone else is going to the game or going out drinking or just doing something else entirely. That's all fine and good, but it's nice to actually socialize once in a while.

So I was pretty pleased when my friend Andrea invited me over to watch the game. A few of her other friends came too, and we watched (in HD) while having some pizza and snacks. I actually got there way early and stayed way late (through Saturday Night Live), so there were a lot of good times to be had. Well, I thought so, anyway.

The game itself was good too. The #1 Florida Gators' star quarterback had suffered a concussion in the previous game, and no one knew if he would be able to play in this, the biggest game of the season (at #4 LSU). He was finally cleared to play, and he lead the team to its fifteenth straight win by a score of 13-3. College football = epic drama.

During the game, the announcers offered a trivia question (brought to you by Aflac): when was the last time LSU hosted a game between Top 5 teams? I impressed or creeped out everyone present by knowing not only the year but also the teams, rankings, and score. (1959, #1 LSU def. #3 Ole Miss 7-3.)

I had read it in the newspaper the day before. I swear, they must get all their trivia questions from the college paper because that's not the first time that's happened. Anyway, I happened to come across that fact in an article, and I thought, That's interesting; I'll absorb it with my mind. Maybe it'll come in handy someday!

Anyway, it looks like the fun times will continue because I'm going to Howl-O-Scream at Busch Gardens with Andrea and friends on Thursday night. I haven't been there since I was too short or wimpy to ride the brand-new Montu, and I've never been to a Halloween-type event at a theme park (omg omg omg so awesome how could you not ahve ever been). Friday is Homecoming, a school holiday. Nice.

From Rocketboom: Know Your Meme: FAIL. (Via The Presurfer)

Birds on wires = music notes on a staff? See what some birds sound like when they're turned into notes. It's actually quite nice. (Via waxy.org)

Mind mashup

One of the organizations I'm involved with is Florida Free Culture, UF's chapter of Students for Free Culture. On Tuesday, we had an event called Mind Mashup. It took place in the main library on campus and was organized with the help of the librarians. Thanks, librarians!

At the event, we explained the concepts of the public domain and Creative Commons, demonstrated some free software for editing photos, audio, and video. We also presented a list of public domain and CC-licensed resources for people to mash up. In our advertising for the event, we had suggested that people bring their laptops so they could follow along and start right away. Some people did.

The event was actually pretty well attended, particularly by student journalists. I got pulled aside to talk to an Alligator reporter's microphone, and an Alligator photographer got some shots of me.

The brief article appeared the next day. Of course, the only photo they published was of our only demonstration of a non-free program, viz. Adobe Premiere. I wasn't quoted, but they did post some of my sound bites with the online version of the article, so you can hear my all of my hemming and hawing.

When the Mind Mashup was over, I hurried to the building next door to get to the Esperanto Club meeting, where Andy was giving a lesson in my absence.

In other news, I met my new roommate on Monday night. I haven't seen too much of him around, but he seems like a good guy. I think we'll get along well. But here's a funny thing: remember how I said, like, last week that people shouldn't assume that everyone is straight until proven gay? Well, I assumed my roommate would be white, but he's black. All I can say is: daaaang.

Pretty interesting: some irate messages hidden in old video games by their developers. (Via waxy.org)

What the Internet Knows About You can tell you what popular web sites you've recently visited. Find out how it works for the details of this clever exploit. (Via waxy.org)