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Shareware Dead? A Bit Late, Slava

Slava Karpenko, admired h4x0r for various Unsanity plugins and MacAssed, errr, MacAST, is a bit late in proclaiming shareware dead. Clue to Slava: shareware died when the Internet became popular. As many MacAddict discs as are dumped on the world per month, the truth remains that the way "shareware" was "shared" - giving your friend a floppy disk with some demo product on it - simply isn't done anymore.

Survivor 6, Chapter 2

Like Nick, I decided to tune in to this week's Survivor to see how stupid the contestants could be. I'm writing this "live" as I watch it at 8:20 on a Friday morning.

The women have been sleeping outside for four days now. They basically have a few sticks a foot off the ground for a shelter on which, not under which, they sleep. It apparently takes "everyone's energy" to maintain water and fire. "I have no doubt that the guys are better off than we are." Uh, yes. Cut to scene of guys making flour/rice patties, hanging out in their luxury shelter.

Climbing: A 5.8- Day

So, being Thursday, Gabe and I went rock climbing. Gabe exceeded his previous abilities and did a 5.9 today - very impressive. It looked much tougher than he made it look after climbing it, that's for sure. I failed to get up some of the 5.8's I did previously - it was hot, and on one occasion I simply didn't trust my right shoulder to not freak out if I leaped for a grab.

I need to install some kind of bar to do pullups and things. Every sport I've played to this point has been a lower-body sport. Catherine two days ago told me I had "super sexy" legs and eyes, and while that may be true, those may be the only admirable things about me. 🙂 I need to start doing some pullups. My upper body strength - arms and fingers specifically - has always been quite weak. Even golf is a lower-body sport. Baseball, hockey, soccer - lower body sports, all of them.

Regardless of any "excuses" I might make up, I'm disappointed in myself.

MT 2.6.2 and Comments

MovableType 2.6.2 seems to be stripping the smileys from my blog's comments. Just the comments - they work fine in my regular posts:

O:-) >:-o 😐 😀 :-O 🙁 B-) 🙂 😛 😉 :-zzz

I'm not sure what's going on there: comments are set to "Convert Line Breaks" by default, HTML is turned off, auto-link URLs is on, and…

I'm using Brad Choate's MTMacros to transform a simple colon-dash-parenthese into this: :-).

Anyone have any ideas???

My PowerMate

powermate.jpgI got a $50 Apple Store gift card recently, and I bought a 5-pack of DVDs (still a few West Wings to go, and a new one every week) and a Griffin Technology PowerMate. I didn't see the use for it, but so many people said "it works great, try it" that I took the plunge (is getting something for free "taking the plunge"?).

I've already set it to scroll through my NNW list, and the click and long-click both press the "return" key - opening the article in Safari. I've set it to scroll through Web pages more slowly than my mouse's scroll wheel. I left the iTunes and system (volume control) behavior alone. I'm not interested in the Unsanity CeePeeYou thing.

So now, uhhh… what do I do with this thing? 😛

Trista Picks Ryan

I'm a romantic guy at heart, so I was glad to see the slickster Charlie, as good as he seemed, chucked to the curb. I can't imagine what his dating life will be like for the next few months - women will be throwing themselves at him, and that's not a good thing if you're looking for more than quick sex. I think Trista made the right decision, but then again, I also realize that reality shows are about as "un-reality" as reality can be. Or tries to be. On television.

If I were ever on a reality show, man, I'd make as much money in the aftermath as possible. I'd whore myself out to any talk show, I'd go everywhere, I'd sign book deals, whatever. Then when my 14.5 minutes of fame are over (the last 30 seconds comes when you're dead, I figure) I'd put the money in a bank and live off the interest.

Microsoft Buys Connectix?

Not quite, but just about: they bought VirtualPC from Connectix, or so sez CRN in this article (various other articles around the Web are linking to various articles). Sez Dan Crevier of the Mac BU:

The Mac VPC team will be joining MacBU. The development team will be
reporting to me. Don't worry, it's not going away. We've got lots of
exciting things planned.

The U.S.

I'm not terribly political, and so I tend not to blog on things political. Iraq, 9/11, whatever. I tend to have my own opinions based on very little information, and thus not ready to be shared. That having been said, my dad took a pretty nifty picture recently that I'd like to share.

flag_against_sky_s.jpg

And that's all I have to say about that.

Yow

I have named my new 12" PowerBook "Yow." It's a play on the Yao (Ming/Verne Troyer) commercial, and also indicative of my reaction when I saw the MWSF keynote address. My desktop remains "Gaia" (my world is on the thing - and the backup is "Monde" - French for the same thing, roughly). My external LaCie is still named Cyclops (it has a single, weird blue eye). Previous computers include Shania and Sandra, QuickSilver (my 15" PowerBook - before the Quicksilver towers were introduced), and likewise.

MovableJive

I am testing out Jive with the Swedish Chef (Valley Girl was disappointing) option. Let's see how this comes out, ok? As a test, here's what it generated from a previous post...

Inceedentelly, I ounly cell heem a sluot becuose-a he-a nefer seems cepeble-a ouff seying unyzeeng bed ibuout MEEcrusufft. He-a's celled me-a un OuS X sluot, buot hees cese-a duesn't huld muoch veter. I'fe-a fuound muony zeengs tu criticeeze-a letely, ifee-a iff zeey ire-a smell zeengs. I'll hefe-a a lunger "sluot" pust leter, prubebly. HEEs cumments iree-a't vurkeeng cuorrently.
Burk Burk Burk!

(Update: I've since removed it. It was a passing curiosity, and its time has passed.)

Outperforming Current Intel Stuff

Says the Microsoft Slut Robert Scoble:

Well, I've had some sneaks behind the scenes (not official ones, though). Apple has some cool stuff coming this year to be sure -- including some desktop machines that are outperforming current Intel stuff.

Incidentally, I only call him a slut because he never seems capable of saying anything bad about Microsoft. He's called me an OS X slut, but his case doesn't hold much water. I've found many things to criticize lately, even if they are small things. I'll have a longer "slut" post later, probably. His comments aren't working currently.

iPhoto for Windows

From the "Gee, this can't be legal" files comes:

iphoto_windows.jpg

Find out more here. I've sent an email to legal@apple.com (update: it bounced back).

In-Flight Broadband

I read an article about Boeing rolling out its 802.11b Internet access in airlines (in Britain for now, I guess), and I wondered if 9/11 would have happened - or if it would have been as bad - had everyone on that plane had access to the Internet - to friends on instant messaging clients, emails, police station Web sites, etc. I don't know. Anything good could be used for bad, too, and surely the terrorists could have disabled access at some point, but still, you never know.

Me, Google, and Blogging

They say Google lives on fresh links, and I guess you could say I've been linked to a few times lately. But here's a resulting curiosity: Google on "metal mac os x hig" and the first result (or two, depending on how you count) is this very site. Y'know, content that was published all of one week ago. It has been the top result for about four days now. Imagine that: a page that didn't exist became the top Google result for what I'd consider a fairly typical search within three or four days.

I should note that Vinay's blog is in the top 10 results.

Perhaps I should add a link to the actual Apple HIG on metal to the post that's getting linked. Apple.com isn't in the first two pages of Google results, and that's kinda sad.

Going Down?

flirt_sm.jpgHad to blog this one before I forgot about it (even though it took me long enough). Originally seen here on Vinay's blog, the image to the right is nothing more than a simple advertisement for vodka. The man is having a glass, enjoying himself, and looking at the stars.

Or at least that's what you think… until you look beneath the swing and between his legs. Ahhhhhhh. Does she come with the bottle?

Frankly, it's not something I particularly care for (vodka or, uhhh, what the hell, it's my blog dammit: getting head). I'd much rather cuddle up on the couch and play nibble-ear or something. Unfortunately, given my self-inflicted "ban of women until April 2003," the only candidate for that is my dog Flint, so you can bet your ass that ain't happenin'.