All y'all Hoosier-folks know this cheer. It's for the underdog who finally overcomes the imposssible odds, the one for whom "sometimes a winner is a dreamer who just won't quit." And I'm not too proud to say, yes, I still watch that darn movie with Sean Astin in it every time I catch it on.

In the infrastructure realm, we're continuing to make upgrades that perhaps aren't very noticeable, but are, nonetheless, a big improvement. Our system administrator (yes, we have a dedicated system administrator now[~]let's here it for Rudy!) has been kicking some ass in making things more reliable and faster. Reliability and performance, of course, have never been our strong point. And Rudy didn't have an easy task coming in, but things have been getting better. And considering that we're handling an every increasing load (about 1,800 new user sign ups a day right), and he's had virtually no budget, that's pretty good.

Since a fair bit of my blog enjoyment has and still does come from folks who use Blogger and Blogger Pro, I am always glad whenever Ev and the folks make some more progress.

Mazel tov, Pyra-teers! Much continued success.

11:13:08 PM  [] blah blah blah'd on this    

Sorry, Bryce. I didn't realize I actually had some rss subscribers. From Bryce's ideas for improving news aggregation:

Better handling of updated items.

• I hate seeing the same item multiple times because of minor revisions.

Note to self: Use the friggin' Post button more often, and don't always just reach for the Post & Publish button by default.

7:06:44 PM  [] blah blah blah'd on this    

The ever-magical Megnut shares some ugly facts about being published by one of the Bigs...

This is another reason why I think boutique presses will become more viable. The buzz one can generate through blogs can catch the attention of the mainstream media, and with e-commerce, the distribution stanglehold isn't so strong anymore. Lotsa good editors are available as freelancers, particularly now that many of the Bigs have gone through some severe downsizing...

Someone remind me why again why we need them?

6:33:20 PM  [] blah blah blah'd on this    

Duncan also got wacked yesterday, too.

My first kernel panic. My iBook crashed with my first kerenel panic since usong Mac OS X. Still not sure why - seemed to be coincident with going to sleep and unplugging a USB cable but I doubt that was the root cause.

One hard crash in the many months I've been using OS X...

Thanks for the incantations to invoke, Alwin.

11:39:27 AM  [] blah blah blah'd on this    [ blinked via Duncan's Jotter ]

When I first saw this one appear in my news alligator (aggregator) page, so many thoughts flashed through my head.

Hollywood's Responsibility for Smoking Deaths. What Hollywood is doing by glamorizing smoking is unconscionable. By Joe Eszterhas.

I thought it rather ironic that the man who was in large parts responsible for the world having to sit through Nowhere to Run, Sliver, Flashdance, Basic Instinct, F.I.S.T., and of course, Showgirls would be uttering the word unconscionable. I thought a few other things, most of which were not too nice, some of which were just plain mean. Then I actually clicked on to read his opinion piece.

It turns out that Joe Eszterhas has had major surgery, due to his smoking habit (I was in the same room with him once -- he was the raspy, cantakerous nicotine smoke-belching chimney that other people were fluttering around, since they wanted to be near his money or fame.). I suspect the angel of death was whispering sweet nothings in his ward for more than a few nights (and he admits his bargaining with a superior being to try to prevent others from following him).

Worth a read, if you are trying to find the resolve to stay off the nico-habit, or know someone who is.

9:21:44 AM  [] blah blah blah'd on this    [ blinked via New York Times: Opinion ]