Archive for August, 2009

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Why Shopping Feels Good

[ Add A Comment ]Posted on August 21, 2009 by admin in Lifestyle & Culture

Friday, August 21st, 2009

Unless of course you’re some kind of shopping addicted, Oniomaniacal mess.


You Have A Problem, And
This Little Box Is The Solution

The Pew Internet & American life project says that about 30% of you are here for no real reason, so I’m here to give your Internet time some purpose. You know that nice feeling you get when you’ve decided you can afford something for yourself, you take a little time comparison shopping, and finally make the purchase? Isn’t it fun to take the item home, and if it’s clothing – try it on again – without the tags, or if it’s a new gizmo, mutter profanities about the bubble pack and maybe draw blood opening it, but then get down to playing with your new toy? It’s really a good feeling isn’t it? It can actually be very calming and gratifying. Well, it may just be the dopamine talking, but who cares? It feels good. And thanks to the wonders of the Internet, you don’t even need to move from exactly where you are right now to get this wonderful set of feelings. That little search tool below? It lets you explore all sorts of products, without leaving this page, and when you see something you like, just click on it, give the invisible Amazon Elves some magic numbers, and within a few days, voila! It’s delivered right to your door. Of course, before you engage in this kind of behavior Read the rest of this entry »

How Green Are You?

[ 2 Comments ]Posted on August 20, 2009 by admin in Clean & Green, Lifestyle & Culture

Thursday, August 20th, 2009

Take Some Simple Quizzes To Find Out


This Guy Still Wins My Green Living Award

I have a confession to make. This week I threw away two tuna cans, an egg carton, and a fruit juice bottle. In the trash. Not the recycle bin. The trash. I wouldn’t be confessing my sins like this, except I live in a small, allegedly progressive college town full of liberal elitist tree huggers and hippy co-op types. When I walked down the street this week, I carried a silent shame, convinced that they all somehow knew what I had done. Then I suddenly remembered that the liberal elitist treehuggers all drove BMW’s when they went to dinner at restaurants where they wasted half the meals, and if they did ask for a take out box, it was styrofoam, and they forgot and left it on the table ’cause they didn’t drink enough unfairly-traded coffee or evil Fiji water after getting drunk on wine that’s destroying the planet. So I felt better, but remained curious. Just how green am I really? Well, because of my poverty-inspired market-to-table and mass-transit oriented lifestyle, pretty darn green; just check out that crazy score below. So how green are you? Take some quizzes and find out. After reviewing about a dozen annoying Flash-based quizzes like this British Council How Green Are You quiz that seemed geared more toward making the publishers feel green about themselves, I found two that seemed to actually help you assess how green you are. The Low Impact Living Index (my results are below, a 23, thank you very much) asks some smart questions, and gives some fairly useful answers at the end. The Airhead Calculator was a little less detailed, but I discovered that I emitted 849 pounds of air pollution last month. Hmm. I had no idea I was so, um, emissive. So how green are you? Read the rest of this entry »

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

[ Add A Comment ]Posted on August 19, 2009 by admin in Popular Media

Wednesday, August 19th, 2009

Nothing is permanent, not even death?


Nothing is permanent, not even death?

I don’t know why I still list Terry Gilliam as one of my favorite directors; I didn’t see his last two films (The Brothers Grimm and Tideland), and although I definitely enjoyed Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (I am in fact Hunter Thompson’s well-mannered bastard child) I’d hardly describe it as a cinema masterpiece. Perhaps Gilliam remains a favorite because Brazil, The Fisher King, and 12 Monkeys are three of the most absolutely brilliant films ever made. Which is why I’m giving it another shot and getting a little excited about The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, due for release October 16, 2009. Will the magic of Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell fleshing out Heath Ledger’s last and uncompleted role bring something special to the film? Let’s hope so. And lets hope they use a line other than “Nothing is permanent, not even death” in the continued promotion of the film. Read the rest of this entry »

RockMelt: A New Browser? A Planet Vaporizing Death Ray?

[ 3 Comments ]Posted on August 18, 2009 by admin in Technology

Tuesday, August 18th, 2009

I know the answer, but if I told you, I’d have to kill you.

The mysterious new startup RockMelt is creating more of a subdued hum than an actual buzz with their mysterious press leakage. Is it a browser? A social networking tool? A planet-vaporizing death ray? The most informed guess so far is that it’s an all new browser built from the ground up to more effectively take advantage of social networking and the social web. The fact that Marc Andreessen (creator of Netscape Navigator) has invested in the company has fueled speculation that it’s some kind of all-around Firefox/Google Chrome/IE Killer. But why would Andreessen back a new browser, especially in light of remarks like those of Xoogler-turned-venture capitalist Salman Ullah (say that name out loud for a good laugh) in this Esquire piece a while back in which, when told that the next pitch he was going to hear was for a browser, he said “Tell them to go fuck themselves…what value do I get as an end user? Why would I install a new browser?” Well, there’s a lot of quiet speculation that it’s just an irrational expression of Andreessen’s frustration with ultimately losing the Browser Wars to the Evil Forces In Redmond. But if the anger is directed at Microsoft, Google, or Mozilla, why does the RockMelt logo so closely resemble an exploding-Earth version of the .Mac logo? Read the rest of this entry »

New Release From Swiss Band Yello Due October 2, 2009

[ Add A Comment ]Posted on August 17, 2009 by admin in Music

Monday, August 17th, 2009

You may know of them because of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off or Twix commercials, but Yello has been around since the late 70′s.

Some of you may only know of the band Yello from the use of their song Oh Yeah (original video below) in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Twix commercials, but the duo has been churning out innovative music since the late 70′s, and have gleefully prostituted themselves more than Moby during that time (see a long list of placements here) You might think you’ll know what to expect when you throw on a recording by a Swiss band comprised of two guys named Dieter and Boris, but the band Yello has always managed to skirt expectation just enough to keep their sample-based sound fresh over nearly three decades. Part of the reason their music holds up is that although they use sampling extensively, they don’t sample other people’s music, they sample their own and edit it into elaborate compositions. They also maintain production values on par with say, Trevor Horn or Quincy Jones, and program with the sophistication of Kraftwerk. I personally can’t wait to hear their new collection “Touch”, slated for release October 2, but I guess I’ll have to; although the track “You Better Hide” will premiere in the Swiss science fiction movie Cargo (see an early look at the movie here if you speak Swiss) on September 24th, there are otherwise no pre-releases or leaks available as of this writing. For more interesting background on Yello, visit their refreshingly functional Flash-driven site or Planet Origo.  A new Yello release? O-o-o-o-h Yeah…. Read the rest of this entry »

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