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Stuff + nonsense. Updated daily. So far. Pretty much. Overwrought by Scott Knaster.
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Friday, May 02, 2003
Steve Jobs in Time magazine
Here is an interview with Steve Jobs about Apple's new music stuff. He likes it! Some high-bandwidth RDF manages to seep through, even in the printed word.
Coke pulls swastika robots
In Hong Kong, Coca-Cola has stopped distributing toys with swastika-like symbols. Oops. It was likely an innocent, trans-cultural, non-Nazi-related mistake. No sign of them on eBay yet.
Thursday, May 01, 2003
Incredibly, the worms survived
See here.
They Might Be Giants
This week I got to see my favorite band, They Might Be Giants, perform twice. The were in fine form, the best I've ever seen them. Last night they had a great vibe going with the audience, and they really seemed to feed off it. They blew the doors off "Why Does The Sun Shine?", "Man, It's So Loud In Here", and "Birdhouse In Your Soul". They're awesome as a tightly rehearsed band, but their improvisations are amazing. For part of the show, John Flansburgh hooks up an FM radio to the speakers, twirls the dial, then the band goofs on what they hear. Last night that led to an improvised bit of The Beatles' "Tax Man", which led Them to play the next song, "Particle Man", with the "Tax Man" bass line behind it all. It worked beautifully. They are perhaps the most misunderstood, hard-to-describe band I've ever loved. They're nerds who rock, and they know they're nerds and also that they rock, so they don't take themselves too seriously, except that they know they are serious. I'm hoping the new documentary, Gigantic, will explain what they're all about to the rest of the world.
Wednesday, April 30, 2003
Video games in the potty
In the great tradition of "sink the cigarette", here is a game men can play while peeing.
Tuesday, April 29, 2003
No Timmy Thomas; otherwise, good start
Apple's music store is pretty much right on. No subscriptions, focus on downloading rather than streaming, and of course, it's nice to look at and darn easy to use. Reasonable restrictions: unlimited CD burns, songs can travel to up to 3 Macs. Free 30 second previews are addictively cool. Apparently, they helped keep the service practically inaccessible on the first day because they were so popular. Searching is a little broken: the main search function returns a maximum of 100 songs, so you might get the impression there's less music than you think. For example, if you search for Johnny Cash, you only see 4 CDs and 100 songs. But if you use the big eyeball Browse button and dive into Country, then Johnny Cash, you see 28 CDs and 236 songs for the man in black. That's confusing -- they gotta fix it. As for the catalog, it's a start, but it's far from the selection of the free services. It's hit or miss: no Led Zep, Beatles, Stones; plenty of Elton John, Paul Simon, Alan Parsons Project; a little Elvis Costello and They Might Be Giants. Limited new hits. Lots of artists have their b-stuff only. Lacks old obscure or wacky stuff I looked for (no Left Banke, Dave & Ansil Collins, Crazy World of Arthur Brown). I guess a lot of artists and companies are testing the waters, and if it works, they'll sign up later. That's crucial. But basically, Apple got it right!
Monday, April 28, 2003
Giants: ugh
Yesterday was the fourth time I've seen or heard the Giants get no hit: Mike "Scuffy" Scott in '86 (which clinched the division for Houston), Terry Mulholland (former Giant), Kevin Gross, and Kevin Brown (major nemesis and nearly a perfect game) were the others. Yuck. I hate when that happens. On the other hand, I've never seen the Giants no-hit anybody else, because their last no-hitter was in 1976, before I started following the team. No-hitters are scarce -- most years, there are only a couple. Yesterday's by Kevin Millwood was a 1-0 loss, which is the worst kind to lose. Hmm, it's the the third time the Giants have been no-hit by a Kevin in recent years. Coincidence? Why, yes!
