Dude, this is Slashdot. Of course he has time for surfing.
Re:Am I out of touch...?
on
Web Zeitgeist
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· Score: 1
I think you're a bit confused here, Gareth Gates is the pop idol without any personality. In fact, he's quite possibly a puppet, made out of wood and operated by a chimp named Simon. His singing voice is the only thing he has going for him on the musical front, he's completely devoid of any sort of passion or emotion and will fade away into the black. The only reason he'll last is because his stutter will leave him saying the same thing for years.
I'm not Will Young's biggest fan either, but Will does have a bit of personality, his own style and at least a marginal talent. But not much.
Taking up a musical instrument is very good for the brain and has proven effects on a child's mental ability because playing a musical instrument helps strengthen the corpus callossum (the thing that connects the brain's two hemispheres), improving communications between the two hemispheres of the brain. In turn, that can help a child communicate more effectively, perform logical tasks easier and generally be a better functioning human being.
The Jamband/Grassroots scene is one viable alternative. The scene, which has its roots in bands such as the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers Band, the jamband/grassroots scene is based on the principles of "tour lots, play well, allow tape trading".
Bands like Phish, Dave Matthews Band and John Mayer (three rather different artists) have become very popular primarily because of tape trading and putting on a good live show which varies night to night.
Some sites of particular interest are Homegrown Music Network and Jambase, the latter of which has a huge database of members interested in and willing to promote the bands it serves. Bands seeking to promote shows in certain cities pay Jambase to allow them access to all the members in certain zip codes, cities and states. These fans get promotional material to spread around their area, thus gaining more interest in the concert.
Another great site is archive.org's etree archive which has full concerts of lots of bands (from big names such as Dave Matthews to the unknowns like the Motet) in lossless SHN format.
Of course, the limitations of this scene is that it's basically all wrinkly old hippies noodling away on covers of Grateful Dead songs, but there are innovators such as the New Deal and Disco Biscuits, who play live, improvised trance/breakbeat house. Or Howie Day, a singer-songwriter playing Radiohead influenced songs using loops and samples to create a unique sound. OAR play (somewhat turgid) reggae-rock, and Illinois' Umphrey's McGee present us with an alternate universe of "What if Phish listened to Pink Floyd and Genesis rather than the Grateful Dead?". There's something for [mostly] everyone.
If you want the quality without going to the mainstream, you'd be best sticking to some of the leading lights of the indie scene. Bands such as Built to Spill, Modest Mouse, Belle and Sebastian, Bright Eyes, The Faint, Flaming Lips, Interpol.. the list goes on. These bands all produce quality, innovative music on an independant budget and belong to independant labels.
There are a few diamonds in the rough of obscurity, but around 75% of the time, those bands are obscure because they're rubbish. The indie scene is built on word of mouth - if a band is good, they get a buzz. If nobody's talking about a certain band, most of the time they're either too new or just plain unremarkable.
Re:I don't really get blogs...
on
Blogger Hacked
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· Score: 1
LiveJournal blogs are the worst, IMHO. People go on and on about events and parties with people that 99.99999% of their readers have never met. Once I realize I've stumbled across something like that, I leave it as soon as I can.
I'd really love to know where people get the idea that livejournals are blogs. Being the intelligent folk that you are, I'd have thought that you'd guess from the name that livejournals are... journals.
I've always thought of us as "Generation Y?", or "the why? generation", primarily because of trends in rock music. The tendency to ask "why me?", or "what does it all mean?" or "why do i hate myself and want to die?" But that's just my desire to add some glamour and intrigue to what is probably just a case of lazyitis on the part of the Bureau of Generation Names, Inc. Or something.
I am the people, and I would never support Lessig in the court. He is not a jurist. Jurists belong on the court, not amatuer's. He has some persuassive arguments, but thats not enough.
Amateur? Larry Lessig is quite possibly the most distinguished law professor of his generation - hardly an amateur.
Seeing as a great deal of posters seem to have trouble getting their heads round this concept...
JUST BECAUSE THIS GUY IS RUSSIAN DOES NOT MEAN HE IS DMITRY SKLYAROV!
Rarely is the question asked, is our slashdotters learning to read?
IANAE (employer, that is), but I have a feeling that in the UK, most decent employers operate on the principle of equal opportunities. There's a lot of fuss both in the tabloids and from unqualified British people because they often see better-qualified immigrants getting "their" jobs. It's all stupid.
Equal opportunities is the only way to go - employing someone because they're from a certain country is just as damaging as discriminating against that person for their nationality. Whatever happened to employing the best person for the job?
I know I'd rather be cared for by a fully-qualified doctor from India than a half trained medical student from Britain who was given the place because of their place of birth. Wouldn't you?
John Mayer doesn't mind copying of his albums (at least his first album, which was out of print for quite a while). In his words, "You can burn a CD, but you can't burn a t-shirt". He also allows audience taping of all his live shows.
Oh, and Strike Anywhere have pretty much their entire discography available in [128kb/s] Mp3 on their official website, so I'd say they're pro trading.
I think most of you are getting a little lost. See, you're making the mistake of labelling online journals as weblogs. While there is definitely some overlapping, journals and weblogs are not one and the same.
Like most of you have observed, online journals are mostly products of self absorbed teens whining about their lives (of course, not all of them are like that - LittleYellowDifferent is technically a blog but verges into journal territory lots, with a bunch of hilarious anecdotes from the author's life). Blogs, on the other hand, are the natural extention of links pages. They offer links to interesting or funny webpages and adding often hilarious commentary on the pages. Of course there are a ton of inane, cookie-cutter blogs, but there are a whole bunch of amazing and hilarious blogs out there too.
Oh, and here's my rule of thumb for finding great blogs: If, in your quest, you find yourself at Livejournal or Blogspot, run as far as you can in the opposite direction, because you're not going to find the next Davezilla on there.
Slashdot Mirror
Dude, this is Slashdot. Of course he has time for surfing.
I think you're a bit confused here, Gareth Gates is the pop idol without any personality. In fact, he's quite possibly a puppet, made out of wood and operated by a chimp named Simon. His singing voice is the only thing he has going for him on the musical front, he's completely devoid of any sort of passion or emotion and will fade away into the black. The only reason he'll last is because his stutter will leave him saying the same thing for years.
I'm not Will Young's biggest fan either, but Will does have a bit of personality, his own style and at least a marginal talent. But not much.
"I pronounce you geek and wife. Rob, you may now shove hot grits down the pants of the bride"
The only confusing thing is trying to tell which takes which.
Ah, but the real question with this is... when looking back on the disc of one of your relatives, will it use a blue screen to signify their death?
Linux? Nah, dude. Don't be stupid. That sounds like a job for NetBSD! I hear their pintsizedhuman port is really stable right now.
Taking up a musical instrument is very good for the brain and has proven effects on a child's mental ability because playing a musical instrument helps strengthen the corpus callossum (the thing that connects the brain's two hemispheres), improving communications between the two hemispheres of the brain. In turn, that can help a child communicate more effectively, perform logical tasks easier and generally be a better functioning human being.
Plus, the chicks dig piano. Trust me.
- taping the inhabitants of a girl's college changing room throwing hot grits at Natalie Portman.
Oh, the possibilities!The Jamband/Grassroots scene is one viable alternative. The scene, which has its roots in bands such as the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers Band, the jamband/grassroots scene is based on the principles of "tour lots, play well, allow tape trading".
Bands like Phish, Dave Matthews Band and John Mayer (three rather different artists) have become very popular primarily because of tape trading and putting on a good live show which varies night to night.
Some sites of particular interest are Homegrown Music Network and Jambase, the latter of which has a huge database of members interested in and willing to promote the bands it serves. Bands seeking to promote shows in certain cities pay Jambase to allow them access to all the members in certain zip codes, cities and states. These fans get promotional material to spread around their area, thus gaining more interest in the concert.
Another great site is archive.org's etree archive which has full concerts of lots of bands (from big names such as Dave Matthews to the unknowns like the Motet) in lossless SHN format.
Of course, the limitations of this scene is that it's basically all wrinkly old hippies noodling away on covers of Grateful Dead songs, but there are innovators such as the New Deal and Disco Biscuits, who play live, improvised trance/breakbeat house. Or Howie Day, a singer-songwriter playing Radiohead influenced songs using loops and samples to create a unique sound. OAR play (somewhat turgid) reggae-rock, and Illinois' Umphrey's McGee present us with an alternate universe of "What if Phish listened to Pink Floyd and Genesis rather than the Grateful Dead?". There's something for [mostly] everyone.
If you want the quality without going to the mainstream, you'd be best sticking to some of the leading lights of the indie scene. Bands such as Built to Spill, Modest Mouse, Belle and Sebastian, Bright Eyes, The Faint, Flaming Lips, Interpol.. the list goes on. These bands all produce quality, innovative music on an independant budget and belong to independant labels.
There are a few diamonds in the rough of obscurity, but around 75% of the time, those bands are obscure because they're rubbish. The indie scene is built on word of mouth - if a band is good, they get a buzz. If nobody's talking about a certain band, most of the time they're either too new or just plain unremarkable.
Most of the best blogs are hosted on the owners' domain (generally using MoveableType, or b2, and focus very little on the life of the blogger.
You don't know how to get emacs to generate electricity?
Back of the line!
I've always thought of us as "Generation Y?", or "the why? generation", primarily because of trends in rock music. The tendency to ask "why me?", or "what does it all mean?" or "why do i hate myself and want to die?" But that's just my desire to add some glamour and intrigue to what is probably just a case of lazyitis on the part of the Bureau of Generation Names, Inc. Or something.
Seeing as a great deal of posters seem to have trouble getting their heads round this concept... JUST BECAUSE THIS GUY IS RUSSIAN DOES NOT MEAN HE IS DMITRY SKLYAROV! Rarely is the question asked, is our slashdotters learning to read?
# dead.py
age = input("What... is your age? ")
print "Geek dead at", age
python dead.py Geek dead at 16
IANAE (employer, that is), but I have a feeling that in the UK, most decent employers operate on the principle of equal opportunities. There's a lot of fuss both in the tabloids and from unqualified British people because they often see better-qualified immigrants getting "their" jobs. It's all stupid. Equal opportunities is the only way to go - employing someone because they're from a certain country is just as damaging as discriminating against that person for their nationality. Whatever happened to employing the best person for the job? I know I'd rather be cared for by a fully-qualified doctor from India than a half trained medical student from Britain who was given the place because of their place of birth. Wouldn't you?
John Mayer doesn't mind copying of his albums (at least his first album, which was out of print for quite a while). In his words, "You can burn a CD, but you can't burn a t-shirt". He also allows audience taping of all his live shows. Oh, and Strike Anywhere have pretty much their entire discography available in [128kb/s] Mp3 on their official website, so I'd say they're pro trading.
I think most of you are getting a little lost. See, you're making the mistake of labelling online journals as weblogs. While there is definitely some overlapping, journals and weblogs are not one and the same.
Like most of you have observed, online journals are mostly products of self absorbed teens whining about their lives (of course, not all of them are like that - LittleYellowDifferent is technically a blog but verges into journal territory lots, with a bunch of hilarious anecdotes from the author's life). Blogs, on the other hand, are the natural extention of links pages. They offer links to interesting or funny webpages and adding often hilarious commentary on the pages. Of course there are a ton of inane, cookie-cutter blogs, but there are a whole bunch of amazing and hilarious blogs out there too.
Examples of some awesome blogs are Davezilla, the null device, and Kottke.org.
Oh, and here's my rule of thumb for finding great blogs: If, in your quest, you find yourself at Livejournal or Blogspot, run as far as you can in the opposite direction, because you're not going to find the next Davezilla on there.