Ringtone Downloads - what's all the fuss about?

Ringtones. Seems like everybody's searching for them and downloading them. Ringtone download sites are all over the 'net, and ringtone download advertising is pretty big business, if the number of ringtone download site ads visible on the average web site is any indication.

Ringtones For You, Ringtones For Me, Ringtones As Far As The Eye Can See...

I've never spent much time paying attention to ringtone download sites. I always figured that they were aimed at a younger audience, and, I have always been satisfied with the ringtones that were built in to my cell phones. Who's visiting the ringtone sites?read more »

Times Square Ball 2008

Today's announcement of the L.E.D.-lit 100th Anniversary Times Square Ball on Good Morning, America was interesting - from what I've seen, the new ball is a major technological leap forward and will be a real stunner, and more energy efficient too! It's over twice as bright as previous ones, and yet uses half as much power. It can even play videos and animated sequences. You can even buy a Waterford ornament modeled after the real thing.

It's built on an aluminum frame, and will be covered with Waterford crystals.read more »

I saw this in my inbox today:

From: dissembler@sevendegreesofbum.com
Subject: Ado6e Acro8at 8 79 $, 5ave 599.95
Body: Vlsi+ cheapxp4pc .com ln 1nternet Exp1orer.

This is so truly pathetic. Yes, it managed to get past gmail's spam filter. So what? It's so blatantly obvious that this is spam that one can just delete it without reading it. Out of the hundreds or thousands of spam messages that end up in my gmail spam box, this is the only kind of message that makes it through of late, and it's only rarely (one or two out of thousands!)read more »

I'm hearing a growing chorus of people calling for government intervention to halt the increase in gasoline prices. My response to such calls is this: If you want the price to drop, change your travel habits. Kick the habit. Get off the juice. The price is increasing due to two very real reasons, neither of which are under the control of 'greedy oil barons'.read more »

Blocking Firefox is a Bad Idea

A friend of mine forwarded me a link to WhyFireFoxIsBlocked.com (no, I won't link to them, because I won't feed this particular bit of link bait.) He asked: what are these people smoking?

My initial response probably makes him wonder what I've been smoking!

AdBlock Plus Is Not The Problem

In a nutshell, at least one webmaster has (and perhaps others have) decided to try to block site visitors who are using Firefox, because of the existence of a popular extension called AdBlock Plus, which has the ability to allow one to visit web sites and never see any ads.

I've been reading up on the issue, and it seems that Firefox-blocking webmasters' position is may be summarized as:

• Firefox users with AdBlock installed are engaging in "theft" (their words, not mine) because they are visiting sites that depend on commercial advertising revenues to support the site, and
• AdBlock developers have taken steps to circumvent webmaster attempts to detect and defeat AdBlock use by site visitors.

(There are other, non-essential and even more inflammatory arguments made about some Firefox users and promoters, but I won't bother with them here because they have nothing to do with the matter at hand.)read more »

If you dig lists and list-making, here are a couple of quick, fun finds I want to share with you all.

Simple Checklists

Want to keep a list of things for your private consumption, or to share with others? Need reminders?? Try ZingLists.

"My Dog is Better than Your Dog" lists

Want to make a list and share it with the world? Want to rank things by popularity? Want to see how others rank the items on your list? Try UnSpun by Amazon.read more »

A huge legal battle is forming around the HD-DVD crack posted on numerous websites, including Digg.com. Many sites have pulled the crack (which consists of nothing more than a series of hexadecimal digits making up a decryption key) under legal duress - It appears that Digg.com started to comply but has reversed its position, citing pressure from the Digg.com reader base.

So, it appears that a legal battle is brewing, and Digg.com may be the one to challenge the vastly hideous DMCA in court.read more »

Here's my shortlist of fave fonts for editing source code. Some of these are built in to MS Windows, others were supplied with Corel Draw 8 (my favorite illustration tool.)

I prefer monospaced, but some times I switch to a proportional font for variety - modern editors do a pretty decent job of dealing with them.read more »

What is Microsoft? What position does it occupy in the consumer's mind? When you think of Microsoft, what's the first image that pops into your head?

In my mind (as a software developer) Microsoft is a company that provides the Windows OS, and software development tools and APIs for it.

My mental image of Microsoft does not include:read more »

Herb Greenberg's blog at Marketwatch.com has some funny, albeit harsh observations about the recently-announced Mac OS and iPhone delays - doing a little 'spin translation'.