Some people on their blogs are whining about the lack of good Flash content. Well, here's an interesting example done by MSNBC. Personally, it feels too much like TV. I'm not sure I want a TV experience in my Web browser. But it is interesting to see how Flash is being used in a commercial setting. Watch out if you leave too quickly, though. I got a nice survey that asked me why I was leaving so fast.

Well, the wedding festivities have officially started and boy am I stuffed!

Iranians know how to party. First, my fiance told me to come home for lunch. When I got home there were a bunch of relatives and a feast for a king. Maryam's mom had worked on it for two days, I learned. After food came Iranian music and dancing and partying.

Then, when I get home from work today, I get treated to a second meal and even more relatives and more dancing. The food is most excellent and the dancing is really great.

Why am I writing about this mushy wedding stuff here (other than trying to keep up with RageBoy in a futile bid to show off that I too have a life)? Well, such partying is illegal in Iran. All these people in my house felt led to leave their homes and come to a strange foreign country to be able to dance and party the way they want to.

Think about that for a minute. What would cause you to move 3000 miles from your home and family?

What really pisses me off about video blogging? Well, listening to some shmuck at a Macromedia conference say "I just saw some really cool shit and I can't tell you about it now." What the hell is that about? Can't you just type that up and save me the two minutes of looking at your ugly face? Shit. I just did the same thing here. I got a cool toy that I can't tell you about either. Hey, why don't we meet somewhere. I'll show you my cool toy if you show me your cool toy. Heh.

Yeah, my weblog home page is now 11KB. Anyone notice that it loads fast? Can anyone say "I love plain text?" I've optimized my templates so they are small, small, small. What's the advantage? Pure speed. Even on a slow modem link.

I see that Jeremy Allaire and club over at Macromedia are playing with video weblogs. So is Marc Canter, who today tells us all to "keep your Flash plugin."

I haven't unloaded my Flash yet, although I sure am getting close to. I hate those damn ads that take over your browser for a second before letting me close them.

And, I'm not all that excited about Flash or video. Yes, I've been playing with them and keeping up with the debate. It's just that I'm a plain text guy. I love text. I haven't even begun to discover what's possible with plain old text. I'm way behind folks like Mark Twain, or Shakespeare, and they all are dead.

What's so glorious about plain text? Easy: Google can index it.

Photos, videos, and such are nice, but wake me up when Google can look inside, OK?

What else? Easy. Bandwidth. I'm often on bad bandwidth. Video and audio just plain suck when you're in some hotel room somewhere trying to partake of all the Web goodness.

Oh, so you have a high-speed broadband connection, do you? Well, I have a T-something at work too. Guess what, it's always nice and fast on plain text, but with video it often doesn't deliver a good experience. Why? Cause the publisher of content often doesn't have enough bandwidth. I ain't gonna explain that again. But, if everyone in Radio UserLand were to use video or audio the system would fall apart. $40 a year don't buy everyone video-capable bandwidth, sorry. Just wait until someone gets Slashdotted with a video on their page. Urgh.

But, I'm just throwing rocks, huh? And that's no fun. After the wedding I'll take a different stance. I'll start showing some of my digital pictures and maybe even try some video/audio blogging.

One problem: you'll all need to look at my ugly face if I do that.

Wow, my page loads tons faster now. So, now I'm not penalizing the majority of my 15 readers anymore. One disadvantage I see. My DIVs are falling apart. Help me, my DIVs are broken and I can't get up. Heh. I'll just write more so that the DIVs start working again. It's a hack, but then it's one I can live with.

Whoa, just looked at my referer logs and I see that Gretchen has brought 100+ people here. Damn, that girl is popular! Now I remember why I wanted her at my wedding. Heh. At least it'll be blogged.

I'm looking at the design of my weblog and saying "this place sure needs something more." I am watching Jeffrey Zeldman redesign his weblog and I like it. I usually don't like sites that go with some funky background color. It usually hurts readability. But, I like Zeldman's site, for some reason. It's giving me ideas. I like that. Break the rules. Why not?

Oh, in my youth I'd probably have blogged about what I held in my hands today at work. But, I'm older. Wiser. Well, and have a bunch of scars on my back. So, we gotta wait until after Comdex to talk.

OK, while I'm getting ready for our wedding on Saturday, why don't I start a little debate here. What is the right number of days to keep on the home page? My thesis? One.

Why?

Because I assume that 90% of you are coming here for my latest thoughts and news. After all, if you wanted to read last week's swill, you'd just click on the calendar and go see what I posted last week, wouldn't you? So, I've switched my site to only show today's thoughts and no other. Why do I think that's better?

Because I'm not penalizing 90% of my audience to please the 10% who came here to read yesterday's crap. I look at this like a newspaper. I print today's news and nothing more. If you wanna see yesterday's news, go to Google and do some searches.

Now it's your turn. Tell me why I'm wrong.