Pogue (over at NYT) hoists the “Take Back the Beep” banner

Lifehacker has some ideas (and some comments that are just weird) on handling annoying cell phone settings

As I/we don’t use one of the four major carriers, more investigation is warranted.

Posterous vs. Tumblr: A Head to Head (mashable.com) the most complete post of the lot; if you just read one, read this one

Posterous Beats Tumblr In Simplicity (techcrunch.com)

Tumblr vs. Posterous: microblogging throwdown (raddevon.com)

Posterous vs Tumblr, and why they’re awesome for bloggers. (cuppycake.com)

Update

Appending Andy Ihnatko’s review of Posterous after @communicatrix tweeted it

And in another allied arena, here’s UC Irvine developing a treatment for tinnitus (from which I suffer chronically). I don’t look for aid in the near future, but I’m glad work’s being done.

How do you like the tons of money (that’s $100 billion a year) hunkered down like a skunk in off-shore tax havens?

Because you never know. The Unofficial MacGyver How-To Handbook (at scribd).

Failed drug laws. The elephant in the room. Wasted money. I say again: start with legalizing marijuana. Tax the hell out of it. Use the funds to set up and maintain free drug treatment facilities. (But those who have a horse in the race as far as maintaining the status quo — think of all those jobs — will quash the idea in its crib.)

Addendum 4/25: the Wall Street Journal (Steven B. Duke) agrees with me on marijuana, cocaine, and other drugs.

A most impressive experiment has been underway in Portugal since 2001, when that country decriminalized the possession and personal use of all psychotropic drugs. According to a study just published by the Cato Institute, “judged by virtually every metric,” the Portuguese decriminalization “has been a resounding success.” Contrary to the prognostications of prohibitionists, the numbers of Portuguese drug users has not increased since decriminalization. Indeed, the percentage of the population who has ever used these drugs is lower in Portugal than virtually anywhere else in the European Union and is far below the percentage of users in the U.S.. One explanation for this startling fact is that decriminalization has both freed up funds for drug treatment and, by lifting the threat of criminal charges, encouraged drug abusers to seek that treatment.

We can try to deal with the Mexican murderers as we first dealt with Al Capone and his minions, or we can apply the lessons we learned from alcohol prohibition and finish dismantling the destructive prohibition experiment. We should begin by decriminalizing marijuana now.

I’ll still keep Skype etc. Very very interesting.

30 unforgettable opening movie title sequences (videos)
A reference to Fairytale Of New York in Andy Ihnatko’s blog. That’s a fave song. Especially poignant as Kirsty died a few years later (while Shane is still trooping along; go figure)
A site about the art of foley. Y’know, making noise in movies.
Bartleby.com looks to be a huge reference for book lovers, readers. I can actually search for a section of text in a lot of classic books.
A video bicycle tutorial site. Bike repair. Cool.
Learn a lot of obscure stuff about your birthday. What happened on date, various esoteric bits of info.
The ever popular BMI site has a BMR calculator (basal metabolic rate).
Four links about braceros.
The bubble calendar. You love to pop them. Do it every day.
Louis Wain was an 19C. artist who drew/painted cats. He developed schizophrenia and his art changed. (video)
If you want to buy your cat entertaining DVDs, here’s the place.
Change.org – ideas for change in America
If you always forget what Chinese New Year it’s going to be, check here.
One of the best cartoons I’ve seen in a while on my profession. (How to kill a web designer in 6 steps)
This post on shower power was tweeted and I replied that I’d long (2004, 2006) had an idea for a whiteboard in the shower. Someone already patented it.
The scientific angle on exercise and health. Note to self: remember this.
A lot of cool hemp products. Hemp is a terrifically sturdy fabric/thread and it’s ignorance and bias that keeps American farmers from a useful crop.
Why Google is the best way to download MP3s. (video)
Self-chosen top “most Canadian” songs.
Because I can’t put this on my business site: 20 signs you don’t want that web design project (real examples) from Zeldman
A recent sideways turn in an iChat brought me a-cappella.com and the Kings Singers with lots of madrigals I used to sing.
WSJ (!) editorial by Ethan A Nadelmann: Let’s end drug prohibition. Too commonsensical for the ideologues.
A fantastic compendium of millions of historic photos from 1860s forward through the decades, from Life magazine, hosted by Google
A list of unusual words beginning with B. I’d been looking for a good alliterative mate.
A most unusual artist, Ashleigh Talbot: Madame Talbot’s Gothic Lowbrow
Movie-O examines the historic truth of “based upon” movies
Mukhtar Mai is a brave and admirable Pakistani woman. Read this to get some perspective. I wish I had the dough to send her school tons of my books.
Don’t look now. Non responsive tuberculosis could be sitting nearby.
A few very interesting thoughts on what’s “fair”.(context: the bailouts) Note to Detroit: You’re history.
Paul Krugman’s depression economics – how it works (Salon)
Because I always want to know where to find that photo of soldiers returning from World War I to Prohibition, bearing the sign “We want beer”
Retro-food.com could be the source of a lot of great recipes
The Right to Quiet Society.
The way to save (native) squirrels in England may be to consume the invaders.

The way to mulitply numbers in your head. Pretty cool. (video)
Spirals. More spirals. If it’s spiral and it’s not here, it’s not really spiral. Gallery of photos.
Learn Lord of the Rings elven languages.
An interesting idea that didn’t work out. Sort of a lottery. The Eleven Dollar House.
Change is come today. The country’s new robots.txt file
Steampunk Workshop. I just find this stuff fascinating.
Love it. Hate it. Pick it apart. Feel renewed by it. Barack Obama’s inauguration speech.
WSJ on Walmart and the shopping death. I have my opinion.
The Beguiling is Canada’s finest purveyor of comics, graphic novels, etc.
What do women want (sexually). It’s not simple.

(*They’re actually in alpha order by web page title, but that’s pretty meaningless in this context.)

See if you can spot it. (Telegraph UK, 50 facts you may not know about Barack Obama)

Someone’s take on 33 of the best programming fonts. Recently I switched from ProFont to Monaco.

Ah, those crazy internet memes: a mouse down memory lane.

A “Lethal Weapon” espresso machine? It gets odder from there.

24: the unaired 1994 pilot episode

This is to precious to miss. Please watch.

Learning from (Stephen) King and (Joss) Whedon : can you hear the creaking of a shift?

Joss Whedon is now in the new media entertainment space. Stephen King is, too. If we snag Steven Spielberg, I reckon a great many eyes will open, a great many hands will slap against foreheads, and we’ll see some much-needed mainstream movement towards using the ‘Net as a viable platform to deliver original content to audiences.

Pandora on the verge of collapse

Why is this happening? Last year, web radio giants were hit with outrageously ridiculous fees by a federal panel for every song that would be played on their stations. This caused a lot of services to either shutdown, or go through what Pandora has been experiencing for the past year.

Random.org

RANDOM.ORG offers true random numbers to anyone on the Internet. The randomness comes from atmospheric noise, which for many purposes is better than the pseudo-random number algorithms typically used in computer programs.

10 Likely events in 2008

Posted in January, would be interesting to read in December. (Business Week)

The Web Time Forgot

And you thought you knew the history of the internet. (NY Times)

But within the past week or two I’ve invested about $90 in a new battery, about $60 for an 11g card — the highest it will take (less the $50 rebate I’ll get for turning in the old 11a card), and about $99 for an Airport Express (11n out) wireless device.

On the “out and about” end of things, I’ve recently had one and will have another client meeting using the laptop.

But to the genesis of this post. I am lying back in M’s hammock in the shade of the pergola in the back garden, browsing inspiration sites to generate some trains of thought for a new (self) project, listening to birds twitter and coo whilst watching the leaves tremble in the gentle breezes.

I think I’ve “got” this laptop thing you’ve spoken about, D.