Thursday, January 17, 2002

Add this to my wish list! "For starters, the BA800 packs a mind-blowing 256MB of internal memory in a snazzy, rounded design reminiscent of the iMac. That's all well and good, but what's truly revolutionary about the BA800 is its chameleonlike casing: a layer of plasma under the device's "skin" can be set to 256 different colors! You'd think that this active color-changing technology would be a power drain, but the rechargeable battery has a life of more than 20 hours. True, this cosmetic innovation isn't as vital as some of the internal technical improvements, but we were so taken aback by this electronic chameleon that the BA800 is one of our favorite products from CES. It ships in March for $300...." [CNET]   8:38:15 PM  Permanent link here

Note to my ILA RTSF colleagues: I'll be writing up my Radio experience soon, elaborating on the thoughts I posted to the mailing list earlier today.  At work, we want to move our Web site to an intranet-extranet environment.  We started with Oracle Portal, but the learning curve so far is a straight line running upwards at a 45 degree angle.  Actually, we have databases and authentication working pretty well, plus some basic intranet services, but I don't think Portal is going to do what I want it to do.  At least, not easily, and certainly not if the length of the day remains steady at 24 hours. I need a CMS for knowledge management with blogging and - ideally - easy templates with WYSIWYG editing.  So now I'm playing with Frontier/Manila and also Movable Type.  I've just started with both, so I can't say much yet, but I wonder if Radio is spoiling me for Manila. If you've gone through this process and come out the other end with a solid product that is easy-to-use and cheap, please-please-please contact me!   8:31:01 PM  Permanent link here

Kazaa Suspends Downloads [in NewsBytes] "Dutch portal Kazaa has announced it is voluntarily suspending downloads of its file sharing software until further notice.... Unconfirmed reports suggest that more than 27 million copies of Kazaa's file sharing software have been downloaded." Tell me again how this is going to stop downloading on Kazaa? 7:13:15 PM  Permanent link here

You're a very open and adventurous person, you've been around the block and back several times. Yet, as all people do, you realize that this life style cannot go on forever and need to settle down. Hopefully as more time progresses you'll stick to one gender and not be so greedy! Take The "Which Kevin Smith Female Are You?" Quiz!! Take The Scooby-Doo Test! Well, duh. 7:03:25 PM  Permanent link here

How Others See U.S. [in WSJ OpinionJournal] "This is exactly the sort of accident that befalls Homer Simpson, night after night, in The Simpsons cartoon series." Sorry, I couldn't resist.  :-) 7:01:32 PM  Permanent link here

Black Hawk Download: Pirated Videos Thrive Online [in The New York Times] "'There's a huge difference in what people think copyright is and what the corporations think copyright is,' said David Rocci, the founder of Isonews, a Web site that tracks the availability of movies and television shows on the Internet. 'I'm not so sure it's morally wrong for someone to go to 'Lord of the Rings' in the theater two or three times and then download it because they like it.' But for Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Association of America, there is no doubt. "We're fighting our own terrorist war," said Mr. Valenti...." Does that mean that if librarians fight this legislation because it doesn't have provisions for libraries that we are "terrorists?"  That's just a bit much, Mr. Valenti.  Sheesh. 6:03:20 PM  Permanent link here

What SGML Can Teach Us About XML & the Web. CMSWatch:  If you had 30 seconds to explain the rationale for XML to a non-technical business manager, what do you say? Harvey:  Repurposing of information is typically the biggest advantage of going to XML.  You can take it to traditional paper, you can take it to Web, you can take it to wireless applications, and you can take it eBooks. CMSWatch: Can’t you go from Microsoft Word to all those formats? Harvey:  No.  There’s no inherent structure in Word.  If you export a Word file, you’re going to get RTF or HTML.  And if you’re trying to get some sort of complex information from the data, Word just isn’t going to do it for you.  [via More Like This WebLog] 5:34:56 PM  Permanent link here

"New Wallace & Gromit!" [in BBC News, via Daypop Top 40] Oscar-winning animated duo Wallace and Gromit will return for the first time in six years in a series of short films available on the internet. Whoo-hoo!  You can't see me, but I'm doing the dance of joy!  They're the wrong trousers! 5:16:12 PM  Permanent link here