DefinitiveInk

What I love about blog/media sites is that in the midst of hard news coverage there are occasional posts of babies and sometimes even cats.  Josh Marshall's photos of his kid Sam are sandwiched between  a post about a CNN poll on Iraq and Cheney's lawyer backing down on the claim of a "fourth branch" theory of government. 

So an odd several minutes in mid-town; one of my employees gives me notice; I ride down in the elevator with three other people and as the door opens on one a man gets on before any of us can get off and a whole bunch of angry "excuse me's" are offered; then at the Tasti Delite the clerk yells at a customer to make up her mind faster; then I go to pick up some tailoring only to find that the ticket says Friday at 5. Luckily I've made it back to my office safely. 

Drop a little sugar in my bowl
I ain't foolin'
Drop some sugar- yeah- in my bowl.

Amazing article about China and our pesent and future economies

China Makes, The World Takes in The Atlantic is a must read article. The title is a play on "Trenton Makes, The World Takes" a slogan that you can see on the bridge from the the NJ Turnpike

Top Ten: Laptop Bling from Apartment Therapy

Apartment Therapy rounds up some great looking things to make your laptop a thing of beautyTop Ten: Laptop Bling. I'm going to take a closer look at LapSchticks which is somewhat badly named. I get it, they make vinyl stickers for your laptops, but I'm not a fan of fake or incorrect Yiddishisms

KittenWar  battle of the cutest cats. Little gladiators.

Gawker getting right to the heart of the circumcision decision. They talk to a some self proclaimed sluts and a tattooed Jew to get the lowdown.

Marc Andreessen on facebook's paradigm shift
and Ning introduces Facebook app builder.

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Hearing voices on the Colbert Report

My new friend from childbirth class, and the source of many amusing comments, was on the Colbert Report last night talking about his new book Muses, Madmen, and Prophets. He also had a long excerpt in the NYT Sunday Magazine. He did well but I'm surprised they didn't discuss some current politicians who claim they hear the voce of God. Watch the video.

David Denby's namesake

One day last  week I went to look at cars as my 1989 Saab has been deemed not baby worthy by several people with whom I'm very close. I found myself at the desk of a car dealer who was helping me track down a wagon they didn't have in stock. I noticed his name was David Denby and said something to the effect of , "like the critic". Not only do they share a name but then the salesman launched into a story of how when he goes out to eat he sometimes says he is David Denby, and gets seated. Apparently this has worked at The Waverly Inn, Union Square Cafe and many others.

Help me choose my daemon from the Golden Compass

I really loved the books, and am excited to see the movie. Not crazy about the fact the my deamon is a monkey kind of wanted it to be a cat.

covering the action in sports blogging.

Blogger evicted from NCAA game for covering the game. The coverage of play-by-play action is the next battleground for sports journalism.

Imagining live blogging from the US Open if bloggers can't cover the action of the match.

1:31 - The crowd roars. Most have their heads turned to the left.
1:33 - Heads turned right, heads left, heads right, heads left, roar.The sun is out.
1:34 - polite clapping lost in the din of a jet.
1:35 - many are drinking soda, is it just me or does that cloud look like a rabbit?
1:35 - Heads turned left, turned right, turned center, turned right, clapping.

Interesting to learn from the article that the NCAA can revoke press credentials of organizations that blog from public areas and from watching a game on television. For me the NYT blogging of the World Cup was a fantastic way for me to experience it.

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"Ugh. Fine, join facebook, but for the love of god, don’t friend your kids. It’s the online equivalent of trying to hang out with your kid and their friends." A reader comment on a the NYT article "omg my mom joined facebook!! 

“wayyy creepy,” it said. “why did you make one!”

Ah, there she was.

“What are you talking about?” I typed innocently.

“im only telling you for your own good,” my daughter typed.

“Be my friend,” I typed.

“You won’t get away with this,” she typed. “everyone in the whole world thinks its super creepy when adults have facebooks.”

“Have facebooks? Is that what you think a Profile page is called?” I typed.

She disconnected.

And below a favorite Simpson's clip.

hacked sites

Today I received an e-mail from Dreamhost that they had suffered an incident in which over 3,500 FTP passwords were accessed by a third party. And of those only 20% of the sites run off of these accounts had been compromised. And that even then all the hacker had done was replace the index pages with other pages. It turns out that all of my sites were affected. Incredibly annoying!!! Makes me feel vulnerable. I've been able to restore 95% of them. Since these sites are primarily for some author friends and one not-for-profit and they don't pay for hosting, at least real hosting, I guess we were lucky.

Sounds of the wild come to Google

Sounds of the wild meet Google Maps and Google Earth. An audio company called Wild Sanctuary has released a Google Earth layer that enables users to hear the sound of places like Antartica. They also have a GMap version.  The wolves of Algonquin Park are something to be heard.

Aardman's Creature Comforts comes to the states

When we were in Bristol last Fall I watched a bunch of the Creature Comfort episodes that Aardman studios created. Now they are a show on CBS. Very funny. Here is a short clip.

London unveils jagged new media inspired Olympics logo

Happy Torino Olympic  ice-cube logo beings say hello to your new friend jagged London Olympic logo shape who is imbued with a lot of meaning.

Apparently the logo "... is meant to embody four key "brand pillars" of access, participation, stimulation and inspiration..."This is not just a marketing logo," said the culture minister, Tessa Jowell, "but a symbol that will become familiar, instantly recognisable and associated with our games in so many ways during the next five years." Hmm, perhaps over the next five years this will make more sense.

Midtown Lunch blog -

Midtown Lunch is a blog that covers where to eat in Midtown. I expect that I'll be looking at it for inspiration several times a week.

(Via outside.in.)

Knocked Up is a very good date movie to take a pregnant woman to. It may become a Caddyshack kind of classic. "It's a style, it's just a style."