Now that Conan O’Brien is locked in for taking over the Tonight Show from Jay Leno (it’s old news, I know), I have a prediction the other late night show.
In a few years, I predict David Letterman will hand over his show to Jon Stewart.
Beautiful photo by a friend at another friends’ house in Massachusetts.
Hunting for GeoCachers
During a long drive, a few of us invented a new sport: Hunting for geocachers. Here’s how it works:
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Go to a geocaching website and enter a location for geocachers to find.
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Place a trap at this location. Possible traps include a hole covered over with light foliage, a rope-that-grabs-you-and-hangs-you-by-the-foot trap, a web-cam, or the classic tibia-snapping bear trap.
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Wait.
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Return to see what nerdly game you have caught.
How To Be a Rock Band on the Internet: Sloan
One of Canada’s finest rock bands, Sloan, also happens to have a great taste in web development firms (and a smart lawyer who worked with us on another project). This fortunate situation led to the creation of SloanMusic.com, a website that provides ample opportunity for fans to comment on the news, post their reviews and photos from shows.
This month, Sloan released their latest album, Never Hear the End of It. I think it’s their best album since Navy Blues from 1998. Along with the release of this record, Sloan’s manager, Mike Nelsen, has been posting short videos taken behind the scenes in the studio and in rehearsals as the band prepares for the release.
These short videos are a perfect of example of how a band can engage their fans through their website. The technology involved is not fancy. The website uses a standard weblog format. The videos are posted on YouTube, off-loading the hosting and flash-player nonsense (this has also led to many sarcastic declarations at our office that this is some kind of web-twenny mash-up).
The videos are short (most are well under one minute long) and most involve quick chats with the band members in the studio. A video was posted every day for 30 days (which also happens to be the number of songs on their remarkable new album).
The end result was surprisingly engaging. I found myself laughing with the band and anticipating the new album even more than I had been already.
It also helps that the guys in Sloan happen to be funny.
Sloan’s new album, Never Hear the End of It, is out and is good – Merlin Mann likes it
Great talk at the TED conference by Malcolm Gladwell
On Bullets
- Me: “bullet lists are awesome”
- Me: “they are the new paragraph”
- Friend: “they take up so much space with so few words”
Gaim Needs You
The fabulous instant messaging client, Gaim, could use your help. That is, you’re a talented and generous web designer.
With the impending release of Gaim 2.0.0, the Gaim website is in need of an update to be as slick as the application it represents. If you are a web designer that is interested in helping create a new, better Gaim website, please let me know.
There may be some budget available, but we’re really looking for people to contribute sans-monetary-compensation. That said, if you’re worth it and can’t afford to volunteer, but are still interested, let me know.
I’d love to do it myself, but I’m too fabulous busy doing other stuff.
MySpace is Rock and Roll
I’ve never understood MySpace. Apparently the kids love it, but it has always seemed like noise to me.
Then it dawned on me.
MySpace is rock-and-roll and I’m a middle-aged parent in the 50s.