Journal of Post-Ralphaelite Thought

So of course I had to be one of the first to install the iOS4 upgrade to my iPhone 3GS. Here are first impressions (your mileage may vary). First off, an iTunes upgrade is necessary (of course). That wasn't bad but did fail the first time. I'm wondering if there was a great crush of folks waiting to do this that caused the problem. There are a few differences in a couple of screens I noticed, but since I seldom use iTunes other than upgrading my phone and occasionally loading new music I'm hardly qualified to speak on the subject. iTunes cheerfully informed me there was a new version of the firmware available; did I want to upgrade. Then the ritual acceptance of new terms and conditions.  The upgrade itself was slow but not outrageous. Then came the phone backup. I stopped checking at 5 hours and just set my alarm for the middle of the night. A co-worker later told me that for whatever reason the app "Stanza" can cause glacially slow backups. If you have it, cons...

For Fathers Day today we caught Toy Story 3 . It was a heck of a show - the guys at Pixar have not lost their touch. We re-watched the Toy Story on blu ray  a couple of weeks ago to prepare ourselves. While the original was groundbreaking in its day, the years since have seen amazing strides in computer animation. Yet despite the technical tour-de-force (see it in 3D if possible), Pixar continues to show the world its real strength is in writing and directing. It's laugh out loud funny. Yet without giving away thing critical, let me say the theater was filled with the sound of choked-back sobs by the end of the show. Hell, I'm not ashamed to admit I was a weepy bastard. We see a couple of sides of Buzz Lightyear we haven't seen before. And new character Ken (Barbie's boyfriend)  puts on some moves I would have never thought possible. And if (like me) you have college students you'll find it especially bittersweet. So go see it - it's a great film. The...

I write to enquire in confidence, that we can jointly do some legal stock transfer trading  together based on a Joint Venture. The principal amount of the POF is $100M I have already worked out modalities to execute the  transfer, hence I seek for your consent if interested. khoza.

Tom Tomorrow (real name: Dan Perkins ), is the creator of the comic This Modern World . Read his recent strip, " What could possibly go wrong? " to understand why we now have millions of gallons of crude oil spewing into the Gulf of Mexico. And bitch-slap some sense into the next person who acts like this is no big deal.

Last Sunday was the LOST-o-thon: 2 hours of recap/interviews with cast and producers, followed by the 2 1/2 hour finale.  And if you wanted to hang around long enough, another hour entirely devoted to LOST on Jimmy Kimmel Live. It was exhausting. Reactions have been mixed. Much of Slashdot-dom hated it . They wanted ANSWERS, god-dammit. And while quite a few long time mysteries were addressed, not all were. So freaking what? A lot of how I processed the finale (as well as the show as whole) is based on things I learned and taught as a once and future painter. I've learned to appreciate and celebrate the power of ambiguity. Works of great art (if television can be art) engage the viewer/audience in the creative process. The viewer essentially finishes the work by layering on their personal interpretation or meaning, based on their life and experiences.  Giving people explicit answers shuts off that dialog. In the days that followed, there has been much discussion about ...

Dear God, Don't let stupid people piss me off. Rinse and repeat.

The whole Apple vs. Adobe soap opera continues. When will somebody cancel this show? The latest installment comes from Adobe, who's now running full pages ads in the Wall Street Journal and posting open letters. The latest is entitled, " Our thoughts on open markets ." As the founders of Adobe, we believe open markets are in the best interest of developers, content owners, and consumers. Freedom of choice on the web has unleashed an explosion of content and transformed how we work, learn, communicate, and, ultimately, express ourselves. Yeah right. This is because (sniff) Apple won't support Flash on the iPod/iPad/iPhone. Oh boo hoo. Guess what: when I use the Lynx browser on the console of my Linux box I get no Flash support either. More significantly, the Adobe EULA for Flash forbids anyone who has installed their Flash tools or plugin from working on Flash technologies. It is a closed, proprietary platform. Closed: not open. As far as open markets, A...