Archives

Missing Blanks

Blank CD-RsI had one of those moments of consumer rage this morning, when I realized that it’s now virtually impossible to buy blank CD-Rs with nothing on the label side, meaning that if you want to buy some CD-Rs to back up your data or record some music, they will almost certainly feature branding from TDK, Memorex, Sony, Maxxel or some other company. You used to be able to find the kind of discs I’m looking for — you could call them generic CD-Rs — virtually anywhere, but after searching J & R, Circuit City, Best Buy, Staples, DataVision and even a few shady camera/electronics boutiques along Fifth Avenue, I came up with nothing. My guess is that the bigger CD-R manufacturers have shoved the smaller players from the store shelves, or there might be something going on with the RIAA here — maybe it’s easier to prevent the illegal copying of music CDs when the supply of generic CD-Rs is less plentiful? Who knows, but I’m tired of everything being branded when it simply isn’t necessary.

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Dead Letter Office

Missed MessagesIf, at anytime during the past year or so, you wrote an email to desk@subtraction.com or happened to make a typo while sending a message to my ‘real’ email account, or you just decided to make up an email address like, say, spam@subtraction.com and send me a note there, then you probably think I’m really kind of stuck up. See, I wouldn’t have replied to any of those emails, but the reason isn’t because I’m a self-centered bastard; rather it’s because, unbeknownst to me, those messages weren’t being forwarded to me as they should’ve been.

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Size Matters

Starship DimensionsStarship Dimensions is a phenomenal piece of work and a staggeringly detailed attempt to apply metrics to imagination. “This site is intended to allow science fiction fans to get an impression of the true scale of their favorite science fiction spacecraft by being able to compare ships accross genres, as well as being able to compare them with contemporary objects with which they are probably familiar.” It reminds me of a project I once had an idea to do: a unified timeline of science fiction histories, showing when the various post-20th century apocalypses happened and trying to show how the world of, say, “Logan’s Run” and “Star Trek” might all fit together. Don’t ask me why I would actually have an idea like that; I’m a geek.

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The Day the Music Died

FCC Chairman Michael Powell and his two Republican cohorts sent a powerful message today to companies that already control much of America’s television networks, newspapers, radio stations, and cable television systems: ‘No more will we coddle you in your duties in upholding the First Amendment. From now on, media companies had better grow up and learn how to promote the values of free speech and democracy all on your own.’ At first shocked by the sudden turn of events, the media companies are expected to rise to this great patriotic challenge by further consolidating the principle venues for broadcasting, publishing, communication and discourse. It’s a great day for this great country. Ugh.

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Think Outside of the Idiot Box

TiVoFor the better part of two years, I’ve been debating whether I should buy myself a TiVo, and as a kind of corollary to that, whether I should subscribe to digital cable television. The first question I always ask myself in trying to resolve this debate is: how much more time am I willing to devote to watching television? The closest I can come to answering that is, “I probably can’t devote much more time, but I’d probably find some way to devote lots more time.” Which begins to explain why I neither own a TiVo nor subscribe to digital cable.

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Learning to Type

As I’m typing this, my girlfriend is sitting here next to me on her computer, valiantly trying to install Movable Type on her server. She has a moderate level of experience with Perl and configuring CGI scripts, but she’s been struggling with it for hours.

It makes me glad that I spent US$35 (back before the cost went up five dollars) to have the Six Apart team install it for me, especially since I have so little expertise in the back-end details that a Movable Type installation requires. And it makes me think, too, that Six Apart’s upcoming TypePad, a kind of hosted version of Movable Type, is going to be a huge hit. The service will effectively help more people like me, who have only a passing knowledge of the ins and outs of Web servers, clear that hurdle and get on to creating interesting blogs.

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Weekend Worrier

The number one thing I will be doing this weekend is worrying about the impending vote at the FCC on relaxing the rules of media ownership. Most people who know me will readily agree that I am starting to harp on this subject, but it pains me greatly. The vote takes place on Monday, but the attendant media coverage is so wildly disproportionate to the vote’s significance to the health of American democracy for the next generation (which is to say there’s very little coverage ) that it’s all I can do to just complain aloud about it.

Actually, it brightened my day a little today to see Ted Turner come out publicly against relaxing these rules, even though he is a major shareholder in and board member of AOL Time Warner, a company that will clearly benefit greatly from these proposed changes. But I still dread Monday afternoon and the almost assured kick in the groin of free speech that the results of this vote will bring. Have a nice weekend!

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Take Note

The NoteUnexpectedly, one of the sharpest sources for political commentary on the Web is The Note, from the ABC News ‘Political Unit.’ Written with a tart, often gossipy insider’s tone, this daily journal is a heady fix for hardcore political junkies and those who, like myself, are merely enticed and not quite yet enraptured by politics. A friend turned me on to this several weeks ago, and I was at first overwhelmed by its loquacious onslaught of links, commentary, analysis and rumors, all of which revolve mostly around the 2004 Presidential campaign. Though its length is still daunting (I would say that the page for each day’s Note is as tall as ten or fifteen screens), I find myself eagerly reading as much as I can of it each morning. That’s also a sign that I’m starting to get worked up for next year’s Presidential race.

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Serially Folks

Serializer.netSerliazer.net, which I stumbled onto while poking around Ethan Persoff’s Web site, is a vibrant experiment in online comics. A subscription goes for the almost ridiculously affordable price of US$2.95 per month and gives you access to hundreds of pages from 25-30 regularly updated strips. I bought a subscription last night and so far one of my favorites is the beautifully drawn “Pup” by Drew Weing.

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