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Blogging bragging rights

Isn’t this always the case? I remember those early days of the Interweb when it was a rush to be the first, and I’m not talking about making geeky websites and whatnot. No, it’s way more stupid than that, and you know exactly what I’m talking about.

Those various sites with message boards where someone has to be the first person to post a reply for the soul purpose of being the first one to do it. It said very little and pertained just as much to the initial topic of the post. It would just say, “First!” That’s it. One word, and it’s a mind numbing mentality that still goes on today.

This is what I think about when I read this:

Someone, somewhere created the very first Web log. It’s just not quite clear who.

It may not be one of the Internet’s grandest accomplishments, but with the number of active bloggers hovering somewhere around 100 million, according to one estimate, there are some serious bragging rights to be claimed by the first person who provably laid fingers to keyboard in the traditional bloggy way.

Was the first blogger the irascible Dave Winer? The iconoclastic Jorn Barger? Or was the first blogger really Justin Hall, a Web diarist and online gaming expert whom The New York Times Magazine once called the “founding father of personal blogging”? [cnet]

Bragging rights, to me, means who really cares? Even if you were the first, then good for you. That doesn’t change a whole lot for me.

Benefits of being able to declare bragging rights? Wikipedia will smote those who attempt to pull your name off their pages, your name will go into traditional history books, and I’ll give you a cookie.

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Documentary: The Great Global Warming Swindle

I heard about this about a week or so ago. Apparently “The Great Global Warming Swindle” is creating quite a stir, and I am not surprised. Rebecca and I watched it over the weekend, and it really makes you think about things. Personally, I think there is some validity to all the arguments regarding global warming, for or against it actually happening or not.

You can watch this for yourself on Google Video. It’s almost an hour and a half long, but worth the time.

Bottom line, I don’t want to breathe in this stuff anymore. I am all for reducing CO2 emissions and making the skies less hazy with smog. The fact that my great uncle in California always sleeps better, feels better, and has less pain in his joints whenever he is visiting family, outside of the greater L.A. area in which he lives, tells me a lot. It’s bad juju.

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Making my way up to Prospect Point

I figure that it’s about time that I do another Stanley Park update. As a quick recap, you can read this post, but the basic jest of the story is that a horrible storm damaged a large portion of the park back in December 2006. I’m doing my best to post updates of what I’m seeing as the park cleans up and opens more portions back up to the public. After all, it’s one of my favorite places to go running.

Last week, I tried going into areas of the park that I’ve mentioned previously, but they were still closed to the public the last time I did this, at least officially. It was very easy to go around these orange and white barricades that had caution tape tied from it, spanning to nearby trees in almost spiderweb like fashion. This time around, the trails were not blocked off, seemingly open for business.

The trails were cleaned up more than the last time I was in the area around Beaver Lake, so I decided to try my chances and head over the foot bridge to the other side of the causeway. Everything on that side looks really good, but heading down the Tatlow Trail ran me into a huge, fallen down tree that is about 50% from being fully removed. There is no easy way around it other than climbing, not hopping or straddling, over the trunk that is about half my height.
Continue reading “Making my way up to Prospect Point”

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Bowing down to Flickr Uploader

It might sound crazy, but I have not been using Flickr Uploader for the Mac since I first joined into the Flickr fun. Being a long time supporter of the widget way of doing things, I liked the one I was able to find for Yahoo! Widget Engine, formally known as Konfabulator. It worked well, and was, overall, fairly effective in its use.

Flickr UploaderThe other day, I downloaded Flickr Uploader again to find how much better of an application it has become. My first time around with it was shortly after its inception, and I read a lot about it, hearing mostly that it was lacking in functionality and stability. Basically, I was picky and wanted something “better”, not to mention at my fingertips.

That’s hardly the issue anymore, and if you ain’t using it, then you’re missing out. I have to say that I loved having the little widget directly on my desktop, but that frame of mind is easy to change once you try this sucker out. It’s like one stop shopping, no needing to visit the actual website after you’ve uploaded everything. Stupidly, that’s what I had to do before, and now I hang my head down in shame.

So long I have resisted, but now I see the light.

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Happy St. Patty’s Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day Hope you enjoy your St. Patrick’s Day today. 300 today, Canucks game tonight, so I can’t complain at all.

However, the true party is that fifth day in May. Mark it down and get the blender ready for some mad margaritas.

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RadioZoom#129 – Six Song Donut Spectacular: March 2007

Recorded and posted yesterday.

All IODA, all SXSW. This is a direct sampling of six artists from the IODA SXSW Opening Day Bash. I caught wind of this the other day and thought it would make for a great episode for this month’s six song. You might call it lazy, but I explain more as we go along. By the end of this one, I hope you find new music and new reasons why you should check out SXSW

50:54 minutes
radiozoom.net

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Worldwide promotion through podcasting

This little post from GZExpat about some of the craziness in his life kinda made my day. A bit of back story, he’s our pal in China, living and working there along with his family. He’s a great supporter of our podcasts, big Canucks fan, and a damn cool guy.

He made a jaunt into Hong Kong the other day and details the events, but it was this snippet that made me a tad happy.

We spent the entire day on the run…taxi’s, walking, subway, more walking. By the time it was finished, we had walked 4 districts of the city and put on countless km’s on the sidewalks and escalators. We finished up shortly after 5:30pm. Just in time to allow me 45 minutes in HMV. Here is what I got:

* Secret Machines: Ten Silver Drops (thanks to John for the introduction!)
* Goo Goo Dolls: Superstar Car Wash (an old one I didn’t have)
* Five For Fighting: Two Lights
* The Shins: Wincing the Night Away
* Bloc Party: A Weekend in the City (new album is WAY better than the first…)

[gzexpat]

Aside from a pretty good taste in music, that Secret Machines that he picked up was a result of RadioZoom having permission to play their music on the podcast. I played it, GZExpat heard it, and has since gone out to buy their latest album.

Proof positive of the effect that podcasting can have? Yes.

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The Crazy Canucks #25 – Kukla’s on our Korner

Recorded last night, and posted this morning.

This is an episode that is chalk full of good stuff. Everyone is here this time around, and we even have a special guest, legendary internet hockey guru Paul Kukla from none other than KuklasKorner.com. We get to know him and look ahead to the game the Canucks will have this weekend against his favorite team, the Detroit Red Wings. Yes, it’s difficult to not talk about Bertuzzi being there now.

Record as of this episode: 41-23-6
Northwest Division: 1st
Western Conference: 3rd

No need to fear, we talk about the Canucks a lot as well. We take a look at the games against Phoenix(W), San Jose(W), Anaheim(L), and Minnesota(OTL). A new thing we’re trying is calling in after a game at GM Place, John and Rebecca being the suckers to try it out after an overtime loss to the Wild. We also are starting look towards the road ahead since the playoffs are coming into sight, and Paul chimes in with his perspective on how everything is going this season.

61:30 minutes
The Crazy Canucks

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Bringing on the Bra Power

20070313(001) I appreciate the trend, but men wearing bras (without a shirt) in the seats of GM Place during the Canucks game last night, in which they lost because of Christina Aguilera, is slightly disturbing. I’m all for it replacing tower power[wiki], but for crying out loud, they should be spun in the air, not worn.

By the way, this dude was selling them for ten bucks as people ventured to the game last night. I don’t think he was the only one, but they made me hesitate a little. Not that I would buy one, but you might find something similar in a dumpster somewhere. At least their dinginess made me think that.

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Jealous of you SXSW’ers

The last and only time I went to SXSW was in 2002. It was a free ticket to go, thanks to KRUI. We crammed nine people into a University of Iowa SUV and drove the whole way down. That sounds like fun, but when you only have certain days that coordinate with classes and exams, things get tight for time, money, and space. 17 hours of driving, without stopping, we put all of us into two rooms, not far off 6th Street[wiki] in Austin.

Oh, Austin. The one place in Texas that I would seriously consider moving to. Incredible music scene? Check. Good food? Check. Warm weather? Double check. Large Hispanic population? Ubercheck. I even applied for an engineering position at KUT, and there was hints of interest. Sadly, the call back never came.

I loved my time at SXSW, but my reason for going there were way more music related than the film and interactive part, and I kick myself now for not understanding what that “interactive” thing in the title meant. That should say “internet” in big, bold letters.

In hindsight, if I had more of a mindset to pay attention, I would have used some of the knowledge being spread there to apply it to the realm of radio that I was slaving away in. How? Let’s just say that when I checked out the KRUI website the other day, I was so happy that someone took the initiative of setting up a WordPress blog to run the site. It’s a really great step in the evolutionary petri dish for that particular student run radio station.

If I went again, and you know that I’m thinking about it heavily, I would completely pay attention to this interactive, internet, blogging, podcasting, geeks-on-steroids conference with much more anticipation and enthusiasm. At the same time, I would have to check out the music portion.

I can’t tell you how often I think about that opportunity. I saw so many great acts. They Might Be Giants, Lo-Fidelity All Stars, Shiner (twice), Jurassic 5, The Promise Ring, Boys Against Girls… and that’s just what I can remember without spending too much time recalling all of them.

Combine all of this internet and music stuff, it makes me sad every year SXSW rolls around. I want to do it again soon. There is good news though. You can download podcasts from some of the panels now. It’s the next best thing I’ve got to being there.