Death for Digg

I am constantly amazed by digg.com. Frankly, it is the coolest website I've ever seen. I would go so far as to say I'm addicted. I digg for stories with enthusiasm and read entire comment threads. This stuff (community driven and controlled networks) is changing the internet. But is digg doomed?

The growth of the digg community has been amazing. According to Kevin Rose and Jay Adelson (two of the Head Diggers) there were 30,000 users within 6 months. Today there are close to 5 million page visits per day. Psycho.

Can the future be this bright?

As digg gets more popular, the readership will change. The whole site is designed so that the content is user (audience) driven, and when the audience changes, so will the content. That's the problem.

Digg is so successful, partly, because it gives users control. As the population gets larger, that control diminishes. In the past it has been fun to watch a story I dugg percolate its way to the front page. However, as the community gets larger, my level of control - the effect of my diggs - goes down.

But that's basic democracy. The real problem for digg is that adding a critical mass of new users to the digg community will tangibly change the community. The early community was often very focused on technology, counter culture, the internet, etc. As this community changes, and the focus changes, early users may be turned off and stop using the site. However, the new people were only attracted to the site by the content provided by the old people, and so they leave. Pretty soon, the massive surge in popularity changes what was good and unique about the site, and a descent into oblivion occurs as users look elsewhere.

I think the future of digg-like websites is bright, but I believe a return to niche sites is inevitable. The critical mass of users, those who jump on the bandwagon rather than build it, will ultimately drag the site down. Perhaps the traditional media was right all along to appeal to the common denominator and achieve steady - if uninteresting, unchallenging and unimportant - results.

But that is just a sad thought. Until this day of bleakness and mourning I will be diligently digging away.

April Fool's

Is anything tougher than being an internet user on April 1st? Every year we hear reports of things wild and wacky - which we quickly pass on - only to remember too late that it is April Fool's Day. I usually do a pretty good job of saving face, but only because I'm slow to post. If I were more ambitious there would definitely be blog evidence of my gullibility.

All I have so far:
BoingBoing Spoof
April Power Hacks!

And a collection of online April Fool's pranks.

THE MEATRIX

This is an advocacy film about the practices involved in modern factory farming. Even more fun, it's a spoof of The Matrix. The video clip is a few minutes long, but nicely scripted and subtly funny.
Check out: THE MEATRIX

G. B. Shaw

"Some men see things as they are and ask why. Others dream things that never were and ask why not. G.B Shaw"
Link.:

I am a Total Geek

It's official. I even have the proof. My score of 33% placed me squarely within the range of "Total Geek".
Take the test, let me know your score.
INNERGEEK: home of the Geek Test

I'm a Genius (Sometimes)

Every so often I stumble onto brilliance. This is one of those times. Sadly, I lack the motivation and the know-how to pull this off...so feel free to pawn this idea as your own and reap the glorious rewards.
Hold a photo contest in the Subway system of any major city. All of you meet at a specific station at 11:00am, pay your few bucks to ride around for a few hours and meet at a totally separate station somehwere across the city whenever you are done. As a group go for a few drinks and then (depending on your access to technology) have a gallery of what you shot.
I think it would be pretty cool.
(Inspiration from here and here.)

London

Over the hurried feet bridge and into the rushing across the wet city -
taxi cabs and big, red, slippery bus streets.
So many stories.
Bad coffee through a window sipped at St. Paul's slowly gazing.
Busy back-and-forth wet hair of dripping traffic on the street -
a river runs through it.
Fleet Street heads down, dailies hawked splashing in the rain.
Construction briefcases everywhere, in every hand.
Where is the Strand?
(2005)

Jason Bradbury: World's First Phone Glove!

Look what I found.

Makes you wonder where technology will leave spy films.
Jason Bradbury: World's First Phone Glove!
This site will walk you through the construction of your very own glove phone. It has a switch in the knuckle that allows the phone to be answered with a flick of the wrist. Connects to any phone with Bluetooth. A whole new meaning to the term "talk to the hand".

Microwave a Lightbulb

via Digg.
What happens when you microwave a lightbulb?

Free Street Fighter

via Kevin Rose and Digg.
Free Online Flash Street Fighter. Easy to play, quite addictive and you can beat up on your friends.
Here's the link.

That was a good pizza.

Wireless USB

Found on Digg.
According to a report found here, wireless USB should be ready by the end of this year. Bluetooth (the current short-range wireless networking solution) is hard to set-up and has a few compatibility problems. Those difficulties are exactly what USB exists to overcome. There is also a USB dongle that fits into a standard USB 2 port and would make any machine with a USB port capable of using USB Wireless. I just moved a few computers and I can't wait for the wireless revolution to continue.
Does this mean that USB powered devices will be able to be powered wirelessly? No? THAT would be good pizza.

Final Fantasy...The Symphony

This story makes me smile. I'm at once happy, sad, shocked, unsurprised and encouraged. Strange.
The Chicagoland Pops Orchestra recently performed a show entitled "Dear Friends, The Music of Final Fantasy". Even better, the show sold out to mostly young people dressed in everything from tuxes and gowns to jeans and t-shirts. Images from the video game were played above the stage and the show was received with several standing ovations.
Here's the link to the MSNBC story.

Turn your old PC into a music server

I saw this on "Call for Help" the other day. I've seen it before (even used it), but these are nice step-by-step instructions on how to make use of an old computer tower as a network-wide Music Server. Pretty slick, and perfect for university houses. Don't we all have an old computer kicking around downstairs?
This system will allow you to store all the music on one computer that becomes accessible to every user on the network. You can all combine your music libraries and brag about the resulting massive music collection.
Turn your old PC into a music server

How to Destroy the Earth

via The Gravity Lens Weblog.
This site is aimed at those for whom merely taking over the world has become somewhat passe. Now, with the help of Sam's Archive, we are able to flat out destroy the world. Carefully thought out strategies include:
-Waiting for the all the atoms that compose Earth to suddenly, simultaneously and spontaneously cease to exist. Odds of this happening are somewhere north of a googoplex (see site for details), but it requires no real effort on your part. Bonus.
-Existence negated via time travel. Simply go back in time with explosives to blow up any patch of material that might someday form a planet the size and composition of Earth. Simple, yet effective.
Lots more at Sam's Archive.

Voodoo Blogging

I came across this site the other day and immediately read through the entire thing...including the archives. It's a blog that lists reasons why the author hates his/her flatmate. Fairly anonymous, totally hilarious, fun for the whole family. Well, not the whole family. This one has some pretty colourful language. Otherwise all good clean fun. No voodoo. Sorry.
Things I hate about my Flatmate

My Favourite Firefox Extension

From the "Yet another reason to switch to Firefox" category...

The BlogThis Extension. This is my new favourite add-on to Firefox. I can now right-click from any page on the web and a pop-up window appears which allows me to update my blog. It is seamless, clever and very useful. I don't have to worry about loading my blog editing screen or opening multiple tabs...it's all right here. Plus, it already has the hyperlink recorded for the page I'm blogging. That's good pizza.

Blog Hopping

A new game I like to play when I have free moments on the internet is one I call Blog Hopping. As a Blogger member I put a wee bar at the top of my blog. On this bar (as you can see at the top of my site) there is a button called "Next Blog". Usually, after a few doses of languages not my own, I find something interesting.

For example...
PowerBlog!
This blog has something to do with a radio show. Scroll down far enough and there is an interesting read about the concept of purgatory.
Here's the link to that article.

Happy hopping!

Star Wars Arcade Game

I was sitting in Gatwick Airport in London, minding my own business, waiting for my delayed flight to board, not expecting to see anything cool. Then it happened. I looked over my shoulder and saw the Star Wars Trilogy Arcade. I decided that 50p was a good investment, grabbed the single control stick and attempted to use my X-Wing to take down the Death Star. Life was good.

Here's the site I found with more information.

Inspiration

I was recently reading Scott Moschella's Plastic Bugs and it inspired me. Moschella has already created a word (WarTuning...check wikipedia, Oxford English hasn't caught-up yet) and now he is attempting to create a phrase. "Skipping the Monkeys" is, basically, skipping the bad parts to get to the good. Here's the link to this.

In response, I have decided to share the phrase I first heard in Norway. My Girl and I came up with the phrase "that's good pizza" to describe anything good. The beauty of this phrase is its ambiguity. Good Pizza can be used both sincerely or sarcastically. It's all in the delivery. So I release my new phrase into the untamed wild. Creating new metaphors is definitely good pizza.