Stop whatever it is you’re doing and go read/watch Ethan Schoonover’s series of posts on keeping your Mac’s desktop all tidy and distraction-free.
After that, do every single thing he said.
Ingmar Bergman
I bought Ingmar Bergman’s last film, Saraband, the day it was available on DVD. I never opened it, deciding instead to hold it until Bergman’s death. So now, it is both fortunate and terribly unfortunate that I can finally open the package and watch the final film of a truly great film-maker.
Am I a Blogger?
I’ve considered myself a blogger since I first set up jackbaty.com in 1999. At first, I did what everyone else did; linked to things I thought were interesting, occasionally throwing in a sentence or two about them as well. That was it. That was blogging. Then, for a while, I tried writing longer, original-content posts, but that didn’t last. Seems original thought isn’t my bag. What I’ve realized is that I’m still doing pretty much the same thing today as I was 8 years ago - and it’s boring.
So now what?
I don’t know. What I do know is that posting relevant, insightful and original content doesn’t seem to be happening here at all, so I may just stop trying - for now. I still enjoy linking to things I find interesting, but Tumbler works just fine for that.
I’m still figuring out what this site is about. I suspect it’s simply about me, but doesn’t Facebook do a better job of that already?
See you back here when Facebook stops being Facebook and Twitter stops being Twitter - ‘cause jackbaty.com will always be jackbaty.com - a network of one.
Jack-ness Defined?
My friend Dylan was picking the movies and music that he thought defined him. I suggested it was impossible to do that, but he shot back that it was simple, and quickly defined “Jack-ness” for me, like so…
Errol Morris
Woody Allen
Home Movies
Freeway
A Boy and His Dog
Iron Maiden
and of course Gone in 60 Seconds
I think he may be right.
Go Ahead and Top-post. I Don’t Mind.
Back when Usenet was relevant, top-posting was evil. In mailing lists it still is to some degree. However, when you and I are emailing each other, top-posting is perfectly fine. In fact, it’s preferred. This cute but misguided example is often used to demonstrate just how awful top-posting is…
A: No
Q: Should I include quotations after my reply?
If someone else wrote the “Q:” part I get it. Trouble is, 99.9% of the time I’m communicating directly with one other person, and in that case I just wrote the god damned question so I don’t need to read it again for context. People have been debating this for centuries (almost) and brilliant fellas such as John Gruber completely disagree with me. “Uncouth and illiterate?” Not really.
And a message to geeks everywhere… It’s perfectly okay to evolve.
Nielsen Who?
Jakob says that…
Blog postings will always be commodity content: there’s a limit to the value you can provide with a short comment on somebody else’s comments. Such postings are good for generating controversy and short-term traffic, and they’re definitely easy to write. But they don’t build sustainable value.
Maybe if Mr. Nielson had a blog he’d still be part of the conversation - and relevant.
The AIR Installer Scares the Crap Outta Me
Went to install the Pownce desktop client, which is an Adobe AIR app. Cool right? And like all AIR apps, I’m presented with the following…
Adobe’s working on this, right? For crying out loud, it’s going to be hard enough getting folks to install a runtime. What we don’t need is every app displaying a run-away-everyone’s-going-to-die!!! dialog like the one above to make matters worse.
Pownce vs. ???
The Flashier Foe
Scoble, in this Fast Company piece…
It’s too early to say who will win. But the loser is obvious: If your competitor builds a more interactive site than yours, customers will flee to the “flashier” foe.
Since when? Never, that’s when.