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I went on a bit of a tear today - though not as big as I had originally intended - and removed a few applications from my /Applications folder today. Actually, I put them onto .dmgs in case I should ever need them, but at least now they won't show up in LaunchBar.

in other words, here are the games or applications I haven't played or really used for at least about a year, even though I may have kept them up-to-date:

4x4 Evolution 2, Airburst, Audion 3.0.2 X, Charla 2, Bubble Trouble X 1.0.0, Interarchy 6.2, Jedi Knight II, Kung-Log, Kung-Tunes, Mozilla Firebird, Mozilla, MP3 Rage 5.7, Neo, Package Tracker, Quake3, QuickBooks NUE 5.0, StickyBrain, Switch, Wolfenstein

From Brent Simmons' list of "I'd Buy it If" tactics comes this:

I just played the demo of your game "Rock Star" and I enjoy it immensely! 🙂

However, there is one feature that kind of ruins it for me… I think you should allow people to to turn off the "disappearing answer options." I would enjoy the game much more if there were just 5 fixed answer options all the time.If you could see fit to add that as a preference feature I will probably feel compelled to register the product 🙂

Other than that the game seems perfect...kudos!

That's probably not gonna happen. We've got several reasons why - among them the fact that it'd change the game for some people and that Rock Star has no "Preferences" on purpose. It's a $9 game (right now), so c'mon dude! Giving anyone an ultimatum is rarely the best approach.

We can't be goaded that easily. Your $9 is not really enough to warrant $1000 of our time. Would 112 other people really buy if only we had this "feature?" I doubt it.

I own a small (but growing!) Mac software company. So do about fifteen of my friends, and about 35 of my acquaintances. I excel at writing software. Debugging. Customer support. Drafting and choosing icons. You know: all of the geeky things.

However, I suck at marketing and PR.

It struck me today that that someone who knows a lot about the Mac (and thus why, for example, FTPeel or Rock Star might be cool) and has an interest in public relations could make a killing doing PR work on a freelance basis for about 25-50 small to medium Mac software companies.

Such a person would have contacts at Mac print and web magazines. They would write up press releases and distribute them (no doubt using a pretty standard template or three). They'd monitor VersionTracker/MacUpdate. They'd look for pairings between their clients for cross-promotional deals and otherwise set up things that would increase the business of their clients.

Yet I don't think anyone's filled this position. I'd gladly hire someone at $50/week to do the minimal PR that Freshly Squeezed Software needs. We'd need to sell all of five more copies of Rock Star per week to justify hiring such a person. Three copies of FTPeel. One copy of MailDrop. In other words: it's money we'd gladly spend.

For the guy or gal doing the work, the math is pretty simple: $50/week = $200/month. Work with only 25 clients and you're making a pretty damn good living!

Is anyone up for it? Seriously. Anyone?

Question: How many items have you got in /Applications?

My Answer: 165. I'm going to be deleting some today, though.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

AT&T is now owned by Cingular. I wonder if that means I can get my Motorola v600 (or v80) sooner? Doubt it. Better coverage? Hope so (not that I'm dissatisfied as is).

Question: Have you ever been promoted (and I don't mean from counter clerk to fry master)? What was your increase in pay?

My Answer: I was promoted last May, and I'm looking to be promoted again. Of course, within my own company, there's really no way to go in any direction. 🙂

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

Akimbo is a new video-on-demand service. In the signup form they asked for my "content wishlist" and I supplied the answer "Fishing shows and porn. What more could any man ask for? :-)" We'll see how much fishing they actually get on there, eh? Heh.

Question: Have you ever worked in a fast food restaurant (including Denny's, IHOP, etc.)?

My Answer: The programmer in me wants to say "yes." So "yes." I used to work in a Boston Market back in, uhhh, 1996. I was hired in January at $4.25 or whatever minimum wage was back then, was promoted a few months later, took a month off to go to France, and left for college in August at $7.50/hour. I was good, and I've still got - and still use - my employee discount card. 🙂

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

Question: Are you judgmental?

My Answer: Nah. I know what I would do, I know what I'm comfortable with, but I don't force or impose my values on others. You wanna be gay? Go ahead. Wanna smoke? Go ahead. If you're blowing smoke on me or trying to hump me, then that offends me and I'll speak up, but that's not being judgmental. There's a difference, too, between having and sharing opinions and being judgmental.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

Clearly I've left the sidebar on the right-hand side. That change stuck. As I check out Vinay's new blog I get a hampering to redesign mine a bit. I've long wanted to do just about what he's done - a subtle, muted color. Most of my images, though, have white backgrounds, so I've gotta stick with white for the main area.

I still like how my blog looks. I think the colors are bold and distinctive. The biggest knock I guess I've got at this point is that the blue and green look a bit too much like Windows XP. 🙂

My friend Rob has told me a few times about a fishing show on the BBC, and I'm hoping that readers of my blog can help me figure out the name. The show airs on BBC here in the U.S. and is a competitive one that pits one man against another. They each fish a series of the same holes on alternative days. The men (or women) camp out, moving from one fishing location to the next. As each fish is caught it's weighed and "live" results show as the competition goes along.

So, anyone have any idea what the show is, or where I might find information? I've looked on the BBC site but didn't find anything.

Question: What's your least favorite holiday?

My Answer: I think that Labor Day is my least favorite holiday simply because it's so bland. Presidents, Columbus, mothers, fathers, independence, lovers, turkeys, and Jesus all have their own days. Labor day? What's that? Blah, that's what it is! I don't dislike it, but it's my least favorite.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

As PulpFiction's deadline nears (we're shooting for March 1, which of course means sometime in August), we're weighing the two primary forms of documentation: a PDF document^* or a series of HTML documents.

PDFs are great in 10.3. Preview allows people to load PDFs quickly and perform live searches. PDF documnts can be copied or printed without incident. PDFs can also be deleted easily and are often a bit bloated.

HTML documentation ties in easily with Apple's help system, but fails where when the "P" in PDF is important. It is searchable as well, but only through Help Viewer. Recent advances in Help Viewer's renderer have made styling HTML-based help possible.

As PulpFiction is a 10.3-or-later application, we can rely on Help Viewer not - how should I put this - sucking ass as it did in 10.0-10.2. I think that we'll go with HTML documentation, but I'll listen to any feedback before we decide for sure.

What's your opinion of documentation styles? What application has the best?

^* Previous PDF documents for FSS products were created in AppleWorks and printed to PDF. We realize that this is hardly optimal.

About 500 MB of downloads later, I must say that I'm quite impressed with the ATI Demos available for download. In two varieties - stand-alone and screensaver - these demos show off, well, here:

The included applications highlight features of ATI's SMARTSHADER technology. ATI demonstrates its latest vertex and pixel shader generation (called Shader 2.0 in DirectX terminology).

All I have to say is they look great and are well worth the download if you've got the gear.

Question: What's your favorite Disney movie? What's your favorite non-Pixar Disney movie?

My Answer: Toy Story. And then, uhhh… Mulan, perhaps?

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.