D.B. Grady

Over at App Consumer, I throw rocks at the netbook. A snippet:

History, it would seem, is repeating itself. The netbook is obviously the frail child of the laptop. It is smaller. It is cheaper. It is slower. They keys are generally so miniscule that one would be justified in assuming they’d been pried from a TI-80 and arrayed in a traditional Qwerty layout. It plays, again, to the nostalgia factor of consumers. It plays to our comforts. We are used to Windows XP. We are used to Microsoft Office. We are used to arrows and a trackpoint or trackpad interface. (And as such, our microvascular surgeons are used to performing carpal tunnel procedures and purchasing expensive sports cars.) But again, to find a commercial for a netbook is to experience only pity when it is followed by an advertisement for the iPad. Apple’s creation is the harbinger of the destruction and the absolute obliteration of a portable industry which had tied its fortunes to the Fredo Corleone of computing devices.

Read the whole thing here.

(Photo credit: Newscom)

The long-awaited 2.5 update to the Kindle has been released by Amazon. New features include improved PDF rendering, enhanced font clarity, social network integration, and folder support for ebook organization.

Get a Kindle here.
Get the free software update here.

Here are a few reasons to keep the Internet, courtesy of my intrepid readers.

Frugal Teen Buys House with 4-H Winnings
> Lindsay Binegar was 14 the first time she spent any winnings from years of showing hogs. She bought a purse. The second time, at 18, she splurged. She bought a four-bedroom, two-bathroom house with a two-car garage. And she paid in cash.

Signing in the Waldenbooks by Parnell Hall
> This hilarious (and all too true) depiction of a typical midlist author’s experiences with signings features the funny and talented Parnell Hall, author of the Puzzle Lady mysteries, as well as the newly-revived Stanley Hastings private eye novels.

Meet the Fourteen Year Old Toilet Aficionado, ToiletDude7
> On March 24, 2009, Toiletdude7 recorded himself flushing a Universal Rundle Atlas toilet and uploaded it to YouTube. Since then, he’s uploaded more than 183 videos of toilets flushing. We spoke to ToiletDude7 about his unusual passion.

Recipe: Root Beer Float Cupcakes
> Root beer floats are one of those things that my brothers and I loved as kids. I don’t know about them, but for me, its still something that I love to have on occasion. That’s why I wanted to make a cupcake that tasted like a root beer float. I mean come on, nothing is more fun than a cupcake, or root beer floats… why not combine the two.

Hacking Netflix
> Netflix news and info

Study Suggests Hand Washing Cleanses The Mind
> Reporting in the journal Science, researchers write that hand washing seems to lower the amount of second-guessing and rationalization that occur after making a decision. Study author Spike W.S. Lee discusses the paper, and why the simple act of washing one’s hands could ease the mind.

Steve Jobs Offers World Freedom from Porn
> Rare is the CEO who will spar one-on-one with customers and bloggers like this. Jobs deserves big credit for breaking the mold of the typical American executive, and not just because his company makes such hugely superior products: Jobs not only built and then rebuilt his company around some very strong opinions about digital life, but he’s willing to defend them in public. Vigorously. Bluntly. At two in the morning on a weekend.

Happy SAHD
> What happens when a family decides that Dad will stay at home with the kids while Mom works? SAHDs (Stay-At-Home Dads) are a growing trend in our culture. This new documentary by award winning Baltimore filmmaker Michael Ivan Schwartz, Happy SAHD follows a dozen Baltimore-area fathers who have chosen for a variety of reasons to be the daily caregiver for their children. This illuminating and humorous movie reveals the every day life trials, tribulations and triumphs of these unique men living outside the norm.

Huge Book Sale at Amazon.com
> Enjoy incredible savings on the titles you love in Bargain Books. From former bestsellers to textbooks, there’s something for every reader, and daily markdowns make it a store to check often. Take advantage of our lowest prices on thousands of books today, as we can’t guarantee they’ll be in stock tomorrow.

The Best of Clarence Boddicker
> “BITCHES LEAVE – said with 0% emotion. Could only be Clarence Boddicker, haven’t seen many hardcore bad guys like this in films for years. Surely one of the best 80s films, absolutely classic.” – GlynOtto

A few wonderful things I found today:

The Lost Tribes of RadioShack (Wired)
> The story of RadioShack’s evolution over the past half century turns out to be the story of America’s changing relationship with technology. The RadioShacks of old catered to customers who could diagnose a busted TV on their basement workbench. They might be messing around with some project on a Saturday afternoon, find that they were missing a part, and hustle out to the nearest RadioShack for some of the very gear Cohen still stocks.

But his shop is a lone outpost; in a single generation, the American who built, repaired, and tinkered with technology has evolved into an entirely new species: the American who prefers to slip that technology out of his pocket and show off its killer apps. Once, we were makers. Now most of us are users.

Top Ten Motivation Boosters and Procrastination Killers (Lifehacker)
> The part of your brain that was forged in caveman times doesn’t want you to risk doing something great on your next project, to jump to a new career, to start writing on the side. It wants you to stay fed, remain quiet, and simply survive.

The Kentucky GOP Senate Debate (YouTube)
> [This is not the kind of thing I watch for fun. The most impressive debate I've seen in my lifetime was in 2000, between Dick Cheney and Joe Lieberman. But this was a perfect matching of the four styles of Republicanism, and, I suspect, a crystal ball into the future of the party. Just for the record, I think Rand Paul won fairly decisively. I covered the Southern Republican Leadership Conference for The Atlantic, and was struck not only by the passion of Ron Paul's supporters (Rand's father), but by the unlikely man on the stage inspiring that passion. He's not slick, he's not young, he's not tall, he's not handsome, and he's not a great speaker. But he's one of the few politicians on the national stage that knows not only what he believes, but why he believes it. And that sincerity -- that wisdom -- comes across. And that's what motivates his supporters, which are a growing minority in the GOP. (I'm not a Ron Paul voter, but I get it now, and I appreciate it.) All of this is to say that Rand Paul not only has his father's intellect, but has a spark that suggests President Paul isn't so farfetched a notion. - DBG]

8 Websites You Need to Stop Building (The Oatmeal)

Superheroes Suck! (Salon)
> Even at the peak of their creative powers, big-budget comic book films are usually more alike than different. And over time, they seem to blur into one endless, roiling mass of cackling villains, stalwart knights, tough/sexy dames, and pyrotechnic showdowns that invariably feature armored vehicles (or armor-encased men) bashing into each other. When such movies accumulate praise, it’s encrusted with implied asterisks: “The best superhero film ever made,” say, or “The best Batman film since Tim Burton’s original.” If the Hollywood studio assembly line is high school in a John Hughes movie, superhero films are the jocks — benighted beneficiaries of grade inflation and reflexive fan boosterism. (Critics who don’t like a particular superhero film — any superhero film — are apt to be simultaneously blasted in online comments threads as aesthetic turistas ill-equipped to judge the work’s true depth and snooty killjoys who expect too much and need to lighten the hell up. Neat trick.)

Microsoft Makes Free Version of Office (Seattle Times)
> As always, Microsoft has put much effort into building new features for the software.

Office Web Apps, for instance, allows users to create, edit and share Office docs with people who have Office and those who don’t. Two people could simultaneously edit the same spreadsheet, Word document or PowerPoint presentation from different locations through a PC, the Web or a Windows Mobile phone.

“It’s nice to be able to walk to any PC connected to the Internet and you can use Office Web Apps to create docs. You can round-trip the files from the PC to the phone to the browser,” Capossela said. “Nothing is gone. The pictures, footers, headers will all be there.”

Make Your Own Jabba (Microsoft Docs)
> [This is why the Internet was invented. - DBG]

Yes, there is a GlaDOS ringtone. (Download it here.) There are even instructions on how to make your own. If you’re an iPhone user (and I’m sure you are) you’ll need to do some trickery to convert the MP3 into a ringtone file.

While I’m at it, enjoy. And enjoy. And enjoy.

Great news for Kindle and Kindle DX users. Amazon is finalizing the 2.5 software update, which will add a slew of features we’ve been pining for. The release is expected to come in May, and will be pushed from Amazon’s servers. No thinking required. From the desk of Jeff Bezos:

• Collections: Organize your books and documents into one or more collections.
• PDF Pan and Zoom: Zoom into PDFs and pan around to easily view small print and detailed tables or graphics.
• Password Protection: Password protect your Kindle when you’re not using it.
• More Fonts & Improved Clarity: Enjoy two new larger font sizes and sharper fonts for an even more comfortable reading experience.
• Facebook & Twitter Posts: Share book passages with friends on Facebook and Twitter directly from your Kindle.
• Popular Highlights: See what the Kindle community thinks are the most interesting passages in the books you’re reading.

(Read the rest here.)

Collections are a nice idea, as anyone with ten pages of books can attest. PDF pan-and-zoom is long overdue and very welcome. Indeed, if properly implemented (and I have full faith in Amazon) it will be the reason Kindle remains the dominant ebook reader on the market. Fonts and clarity are a good thing, though I’m curious how they could possibly make gorgeous Kindle display even better.

Previously: Amazon Kindle 2 First Impressions
Previously: Kindle 2 Thoughts, and DecalGirl Skin Kit
Previously: M-Edge Prodigy Hinge Jacket for Kindle 2 Thoughts
Previously: Amazon Offers Another Reason to Give Thanks

Well, it’s official. I’m a Celebrity. Where do I pick up my bling? Many thanks to @shararee and the readers of Huffington Post. My first act as a famous person will be to ask the waiter why he thinks it’s okay to make eye-contact with me.

The first time I played a song on the Harman/Kardon SoundSticks II was like the first time I saw a movie in THX. Even the system beep sounded better.

To get the sense of the speakers and what they can do, I queued up a few genres on Blip.FM. Bob Dylan. No problem. Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings. So good. Nine Inch Nails. Better than we deserve. By the end of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, I sat stupefied. “My computer can do that?”

This is the sound we’ve been waiting for. This is why hearing was evolved/intelligently designed.

The speakers are plug-and-play. No drivers needed. No configuration necessary. Step 1: Plug them in. Step 2: Nirvana. (The band, and the state of mind.)

As an added bonus, they come with adapters for home theater systems. Think the Xbox is fun now? Plug these things in. When you score a head shot, you’ll hear the bullets tearing through brain tissue.

The speakers work with Macs. PCs. iPhones. iPods. iPads. Creative. Zune. Televisions. Sony Walkmans from the 80s.

And they’re [expletive deleted] gorgeous. Clear plastic surrounding the most beautiful wiring and circuitry this side of the G4 Cube. It’s like a jellyfish mated with an android. Turn out the lights and the subwoofer glows a vivid blue. (When was the last time you rearranged your desk to make room for a subwoofer? Get ready.) The volume controls are touch-sensitive. No clicks or dials. They feel as good as they look and sound. That’s three out of five senses right there. I haven’t licked them (yet) but I’m sure they taste like cupcakes.

What’s a Bose run these days? A kidney? The best part of the Harman/Kardon speakers are the price: a hundred bucks for a symphony orchestra in your office.

Technical things: a 20-watt powered subwoofer. Eight full range transducers on posable satellite speakers. A frequency range from 44Hz to 20KHz.

Computers have replaced the stereo as the musical center of our lives. As such, show a little respect. Ditch the ugly little fifteen dollar trinkets and check out the SoundSticks II. It’s time you experienced music.