Alton Brown Takes Your Questions

Alton Brown answered peoples' question today in a Reddit "Ask Me Anything". Some interesting things came out of it.

For one, Alton Brown will soon be launching a podcast (that I can't wait to listen to):

We're going to be launching the Alton Browncast on Nerdist.com as soon as we have about 10 of them finished up and ready to go. We want to make sure that when they start releasing that we don't have an interruption in delivery.

He's a fan of Dr. Who:

I am a Whovian, and proud of it... I don't have a favorite episode but Dr. 10 is my Dr.

He admitted to getting cooking pasta wrong way back in season one, and explained a better way:

I really messed up with cooking pasta in season 1. I said to bring a gallon of water to a boil before cooking dry pasta. Crap! Start in cold water and only use enough to cover the pasta.

But probably most exciting of all, was the following exchange:

Q: Have you considered bringing something like Good Eats to a webisode format?

A: Yes...in fact, we're doing that right now.

From other things he mentioned in the Q&A, whatever webisode thing he does will probably on YouTube. You can read through the entire AMA on Reddit. In short, it looks that, even though his show Good Eats ended, Mr. Brown is still going. And he's one of my favorite geeks ever, so I couldn't be more happy.

Quick Tip: Location Notes

Ever know that you have something but have no idea where it is, or where you last saw it? On the flip side, ever put something somewhere thinking that it's a great storage place, but feel something in the back of your mind telling you that there's no way you'll ever remember the location?

Well, both of those things have happened to me countless times, and assuming you get the feeling described in the latter situation, there is an easy solution I came up with: start keeping "location notes". Just little plain text files that you can stick in nvAlt or whatnot, documenting the location of an item; one note per item.

I, for instance, recently stashed a bunch of printed documents I only need to reference once a year somewhere on a shelf in a closet. Knowing I would forget that they are there, I jotted down their location quickly in Notesy. Now, when I'm rushing around the house in the future looking for the papers, I'll know exactly where they are.

That is, if I remember to check in my notes.

So far, however, these location notes have been quite helpful. Try keeping some.

Misquotes

There are some good ones in there. I've been saying that Darth Vader one for years. The Forrest Gump one I had no clue about, though. Either way, now you can be that person correcting everybody all the time.

Giphy

While everyone else is wasting their time arguing over how GIF should be pronounced (if only we cared that much about the things that matter, right?) Betaworks (the folks behind the recent Instapaper acquisition, the new Digg, etc.) released Giphy, a search engine for GIFs. Which, let's be honest, is just what the Internet needed. Find yourself in need of a good GIF? Giphy is now your solution.

It's not exactly complete yet, but it's close enough that they feel confident opening it up to the public. I've been messing around with it for a bit, not much of a GIF user myself, and I have to say that it's a ton of fun and works really well. I'd image that as time goes on, they'll catalogue and add more GIFs. For the time being, though, the depth of the database is actually pretty good. Also, be sure to hit the Browse button in the upper right corner to see GIFs by topic.

But about the pronunciation thing: How should we pronounce Giphy? It sort of works both ways.

Tips From A Pro On Designing For You

Matt Gemmell, a professional designer and developer, gives his thoughts and suggestions about designing your website with readers in mind::

I realized that I’d been focusing on my own obsession with what was possible, rather than what’s actually useful for the reader. [...]

I don’t think there’s any reasonable way, or any need, to separate vanity and ego from a personal blog. Writing is inherently about its author, and is a product of their personality and opinions – that’s not something to be shy about, and we shouldn’t try to change it either. So, write for yourself – and hold yourself to an appropriate standard, because you’d better believe that others are judging the person as well as the piece – but as soon as you publish your views, you’re inviting readers to take a look. I think that the needs of the reader and the author are more aligned than many blogging systems seem to believe.

He then goes into a great list of things he recommends to do, and things he recommend avoiding, when designing your site. Some I hadn't really considered much before (you might notice I have tweaked the fonts and line-heights today — and I would have loved to update the Archives page, but Squarespace doesn't have anything better), and others I have and totally agree with. I think that BitQuill is really designed to be clean and legible, and I am always cognizant of the reading experience. Fonts and sizing are always being tweaked, and there are other updates always being pushed out as well. I think and hope I am doing a good job. (What say you?)

There are a few things he mentioned, however, that I can't say I totally agree with:

• He suggests removing Twitter and RSS feed buttons from your site as unnecessary cruft. I disagree. I find them extremely helpful on sites that I read, and I am really grateful that they are included on the site rather than making me Google for the person, making sure I find the right account to follow.
• At some point in the article he assumes/suggests that you have excerpts of your posts on your main page. Personally, I hate that. I hate starting a post and then having to click on a link to be taken to a new page just to finish it. Just put the whole thing right there on the front page. I mean, why not? How is that not easier?

Other than that, though, I think this is a fantastic resource if you write and maintain a website. Give it a read and take note of things that you should, perhaps, change or tweak on your site — even if it isn't everything that he suggests.

(Via 512Pixles.)

The Column: Fixing Small Talk By Asking Better Questions

Small talk, not in the general sense but more when it comes to small talk questions specifically, has always bothered me.

I'm going to go on a bit of a rant here, so buckle up.

I don't have a problem with small talk. I have a problem with meaningless small talk. It doesn't have it be, but it almost always is. But the very definition of small talk does not have to be "meaningless conversation". Especially because many times people truly want their small talk questions to be meaningful. They just aren't.

Most small talk questions people ask are not good questions. As the extractor of information, you should be doing most of the work — not the person you want an answer from. Give the person you are asking a place to start to get a meaningful answer. Allow me to explain myself using some examples, because thus far we've only been talking in the abstract.

In The Wild

Let's take school, for instance. Almost always, when people ask me about my school, it's something along the lines of: "How are you liking school?". And my reply is almost always: "Oh. It's good.". What good did that whole interaction do? Does the person know anything more about me or my school? No. Not at all. Was that person even looking to actually learn something new about me? Perhaps, but the question was phrased in a way where it's impossible to answer. I didn't give such little information in my reply because that's all I have to say about my school — it's just that I wasn't really given a starting point. I mean, how am I liking school? — where to begin?!

Here's another one: The good ol' "How are you doing?". And what is your response? I practically guarantee that every single time you reply with simply "I'm good." (putting aside the various grammatical issues with that statement). Was that exchange helpful? Did the person asking the question gain anything from what just went down? Was the asker's life changed at all? In any way? No. No it was not.

You see, when someone asks a question like that, they aren't even expecting anything more than a superficial, menial response. It's quite hard, as a direct response to a question of the nature of the two spoken about above, to give anything more than a meaningless response — because the question is meaningless. And I'd wager that most people would be knocked off guard if you happened to launch into a dissertation about how your day was actually going.

People feel obligated to ask these meaningless questions, and you are, in turn, obligated to give meaningless responses.

The Problem

This all becomes a problem — or should I say a bigger problem than having dozens of totally worthless conversations every single day — when someone genuinely does care about the response you give, and wants something more than a superficial "good", but still asks the question in a typical, meaningless small talk fashion.

For example, say that you are, unfortunately, a little under the weather (that's sick, for all you anti-metaphor types). Most people would simply ask "How are you feeling?". But that doesn't really solicit great responses because it's really difficult for the answerer to decide where to start. How am I feeling? I don't know. Better than yesterday, but still not great, but better than this morning, but perhaps a little worse than last night, and something new might be bothering me, but something old no longer is, you get the point. And so instead, the person will simply say something like "A bit better, I guess", which, again, is rather meaningless.

This is a true pity, because the asker really cares to hear what the answerer has to say (I would hope), but is just asking the wrong question. And the answerer is so tired of hearing the exact same formulation of the annoying question "How are you feeling?" that he or she doesn't even want to answer it anymore.

The thing here is that the typical obligatory small talk questions have no meaning. While their intention is good, they are superficial and don't lend themselves to good answers. Personally, I find myself annoyed when people ask these sorts of questions, because I don't know what to answer. I don't like saying meaningless words like "good.", but I want to answer their question. The trouble is that if you answer these questions the way they were asked, the asker won't actually learn anything new.

Just as the questions were asked simply out of routine, so too are the answers given. And what good is that?

The Solution

Instead of just asking "How are you feeling?" when someone is sick, try "Are you in any pain still?" or "Do you need anything" or "What hurts?". You can even play along with the whole small talk thing, and then follow it up with an actual question: Try "How are you feeling? Do you feel better than you did yesterday?" — now the person to whom you are talking has something to go on.

Or if you know your friend just saw a movie, instead of simply asking "Hey, how was it?", try "What would you grade the movie if you had to?" or "Should I go see it?" or even just "Did you like it?" — all of which are easy to respond to with real information, and solicit clear and meaningful answers.

Try thinking a little bit as you ask typical small talk questions — not only so that you give the answerer something better to reply with — but so that you, yourself, might actually learn something from their answer.

The New Xbox

Microsoft took the wraps off the new Xbox One today, but we don't have many details other than how it looks. It's been completely redesigned, and the inside was gutted and reworked as well. There's some new Kinect sensor built right in as well.

Wired has a beautifully laid-out article with a bit of a closer look at the design.

Whatever we do know, it's sure more than what we know about the PS4. And it's no coincidence that they are both coming out at the same time. The long-time rivals both update their gaming console hardware every number of years with only minor updates in between. The cycle is about to begin again, but will the Xbox or PS4 take the edge?

Details about both devices are set to be released at E3 starting June 10th. Here is a wish list of features over on Hypable. In the meantime, you can pre-order it on Amazon, even though it has no set price yet, if you're that sure you'll want one.

(Via Tools and Toys.)

UPDATE: Some more details have come out on Slash Gear:

Some key questions that many people have about the new Xbox One weren’t answered in the keynote during today’s unveiling, but Microsoft confirmed afterward some answers to a few issues. First off, the Xbox One will not be backwards compatible with Xbox 360 games, but the new console will support used games and won’t require an always-on internet connection.

My First Geocaching Adventure

Geocaching according to Wikipedia:

Geocaching is an outdoor recreational activity, in which the participants use a GPS receiver or mobile device and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called "geocaches" or "caches", anywhere in the world.

I heard about it quite a long time ago and I always thought it sounded like a ton of fun. Yesterday, randomly remembering, I decided to actually try it with a friend of mine named Avi.

The Premise

I'm not expert by any stretch on Geocaching (obviously, considering I only started yesterday), but here is how Geocaching works in a nutshell:

Someone, somewhere, decides to hide a "cache", which is basically a container of some sort. He or she places some items inside if he or she would so desire, and also includes a logbook and a pen. They add the coordinates of the cache to the worldwide database, and then other people can find that cache.

With me so far?

Should you decide to join the great game, you download the app to get coordinates of the caches nearby, and go looking for them with your iPhone's GPS as your aid.

When you find one, you add your name and the date to the logbook, and can go back and see how many other people have discovered said cache. Often there is some sort of swag in the cache (toy cars, stuffed animals, etc.) and the general rule is you can take something as long as you replace it with something else of your own.

Oh, and yes, this all means that there is a constant, continuous treasure hunt of sorts going on all around the world, all the time. You probably had no idea, but I bet there are hundreds of caches near where you live, all within ten minutes of driving. You probably even pass by many of them everyday. Pretty cool, eh?

The Intro App

Should you, like me, decide one day you just want to give Geocaching a shot, there is a whole official website for it, but you really need the iPhone app that uses your GPS data to track you if you actually want to be able to find any of the caches. There are two official iPhone apps (and from what I've seen, I wouldn't go near any of the other ones): There is the introductory app, and then there is the full-on app. The former is free, the latter costs $10.

For our pilgrimage yesterday, I decided to start out with just the free introductory app. It lets you see the nearest three caches, and while it isn't updated for Retina screens, nor the iPhone 5, all other necessary features were there. We got the coordinates to the nearest cache and were on our way in no time.

Our First Cache

We drove around for a few minutes until the GPS said we were real close. We found the closest parking we could, and walked the rest of the way. The cache, from the looks of it, was hidden in a small little park a few minutes from my house. It's not a park that I frequent at all, but I certainly knew about it.

By the time we had set foot on the park grounds itself, the app had congratulated us on being really close to the cache. I switched the app to the compass mode, and we started our search.

We had a bit of trouble with using the app at first. We had no clue what we were doing, and the app, with astonishing accuracy, seemed as if it was playing a game of Hot and Cold with us. The number of feet we were away from the cache kept on rapidly switching from only about 20, to way up to 60 as we walked around.

Finally, we were able to pinpoint the little bit of foliage in which we were sure the cache was hidden. With the help of the cache's hint (also displayed in the app) we knew that it was next to a fallen tree. There were a lot of little fallen trees in the area, though. With a bit of rummaging around, mostly on Avi's part, we finally found the cache.

It was a rectangular metal box with a hinged closing mechanism. We pried it open and took a look at what was inside. Needless to say, we were both pretty excited. We were freakin' treasure hunters for a few seconds.

Inside was the expected logbook in which I accounted for out little visit — there were at least about 50 other people who had signed as well. I also marked the cache as found within the app. There were a few toy cars inside as well, along with some pens, stickers, and some Barbie thing. We took a toy car, and Avi replaced it with the blade of a hockey stick.

We immediately agreed that we wanted to find another one. We got the location for the next closest one, and headed over there. Just as with the first, we were able to get the approximate location via the app, but it still required rummaging to actually find. Again, mostly by Avi (I really didn't want to risk getting Poison Ivy — not fun — but Avi never seemed to be allergic like I am).

The second cache we found was considerable larger than the first with quite a few stuffed animals, and even more toy cars.

Both were considered by the app to be easy to find.

$10 For More Than That In Fun/Adventure

I called this post our first adventure because it definitely is only our first. I can't wait to go back out again. It was a ton of fun, even with the slight awkwardness of passersby having no clue what the hell we were doing.

If you've got some free time on a weekend, this is a great thing to do with friends. Highly recommended. Really. You know it sounds like fun — now get out there and actually do it!

Oh, and I bought the full $10 Geocaching app.

The Intriguing Clothing Company Called Uniqlo

Some handsome genius named Devir Kahan over at The Peak Lapel wrote a quick little article proposing a theory for how Uniqlo manages to deliver great quality goods at incredibly low prices:

Instead of having to produce dozens of different waist and length combinations, they simply produce only one length option and only alter their waist sizes. This must cut down a ton on production costs as well as in waste. It’s a genius business move, and the savings show in the final price of the chinos — usually right around $30-$40 before a sale. Buy the pants with a 34” length, and have them tailored for free. It possibly even makes the pants seem more prestigious because you’re having them tailored. Ooh.

There is also this article in New York Magazine that has some interesting information as well:

And what’s different about Uniqlo is that they have chosen fabric, rather than fashion, as the area where they want to excel. [...]

Uniqlo disguises the limited variety of products it makes by offering them in almost every color imaginable. There are, for instance, 80 colors of polo shirts currently available on the floor. Most of those colors don’t move very quickly—of the dozens of colors of cashmere sweaters available in the New York store last winter, the top sellers were black and white—but the wide spectrum serves as a helpful deception.

Uniqlo is an incredibly interesting company as a whole. The fact that a Japanese company can be so in tune with American culture and fashion is really intriguing to me. Recently they have been expanding their retail presence in the US (from being a Japanese-only company for quite some time) and they recently (finally) opened up a store near me. As someone who likes good clothing I can tell you that they have great stores and great products. They are not without their flaws, but as a whole, they are now one of my favorite clothing brands — and they were able to get me to say that with only one or two visits to their store. For the price, and even above, they simply cannot be beat.

And I think they've only just begun.

Yahoo!!

I would have put just one exclamation point in the title, but the name of the company already has one. Hence, to show my enthusiasm for recent events which I will soon get into, an additional point of the exclamatory variety was required.

Now, what is it that I am so enthused about? Well, first Yahoo! purchased Tumblr, announced officially by the two companies early this morning. As Marco Arment has since spoken about in a post on his blog, Tumblr should remain the same, and probably only improve with the additional resources that Yahoo! can provide for it. Yahoo! echoed the same notion in their own announcement post. So that's all good.

And before we go on, can we just drop the ridiculous "!" in Yahoo! for the rest of this post, at least? Yeah? We can? Great.

Anyway. As if that whole Tumblr thing wasn't enough for a company everybody thought to be dead, Yahoo just released a total redesign of Flickr (the other product they own without an "e") that is downright gorgeous. By breathing new life into Flickr, they are breathing new life into themselves, as a company.

The new design is really just pure pictures, and it makes them look fantastic. There are some cool little tricks in the new design, too. There is a new slideshow feature, and it sort of works with just a single image too: Find an image on its own page, then click it, then click it again. Pretty cool if you ask me.

Perhaps the biggest news of the redesign is that Yahoo is now providing one free terabyte of space for every user (much like Google gave one free gigabyte of space on Gmail when it first launched as an incentive). This is to encourage the upload of high resolution photos that look great:

At Flickr, we believe you should share all your images in full resolution, so life's moments can be relived in their original quality. No limited pixels, no cramped formats, no memories that fall flat. We're giving your photos room to breathe, and you the space to upload a dizzying number of photos and videos, for free. Just how big is a terabyte? Well, you could take a photo every hour for forty years without filling one.

And yep, you heard us. It's free.

What about Flickr Pro of old? Well, it still exists, albeit a little bit differently. You can now pay a yearly fee of $49.99 to go completely ad free, or pay $499.999 for the "Doublr" (that's without an "e", again) account to get two terabytes of storage.

Another interesting bit from the announcement? The redesigned Flickr app for iOS released last December grew uploads to the site by 25%. And now there is an Android app as well.

In summary? Kudos, Yahoo. Keep it up.

Star Wars Rebels and Other Related Updates

A new Star Wars TV show was announced today on the official Star Wars News blog:

Production has begun on Star Wars Rebels, an exciting, all-new animated television series based on one of the greatest entertainment franchises of all time. Scheduled to premiere in fall 2014 as a one-hour special telecast on Disney Channel, it will be followed by a series on Disney XD channels around the world.

Leading the development of the series is a creative team of exceptional talent. Screenwriter/producer Simon Kinberg (X-Men: First Class, Sherlock Holmes, Mr. & Mrs. Smith) is an executive producer on Star Wars Rebels and will write the premiere episode. He is joined by Dave Filoni as executive producer, who served as supervising director of the Emmy nominated Star Wars: The Clone Wars since 2008. [...]

The action-filled series is set between the events of Episode III and IV -- an era spanning almost two decades never-before explored on-screen. Star Wars Rebels takes place in a time where the Empire is securing its grip on the galaxy and hunting down the last of the Jedi Knights as a fledgling rebellion against the Empire is taking shape. Details about the show are a closely guarded secret at this point.

On that note, you probably already know about The Clone Wars being cancelled. I was pretty upset by that news. It really was a pretty good show. The series will no doubt be able to finish and air its last few, already-made episodes to wrap up the story line on another network, but details about that are not yet available.

With that news, though, also came the news that the other proposed Star Wars cartoon, the god-awful-looking Star Wars: Detours, is postponed indefinitely. So there's that.

So we have Abrams directing the next Star Wars movie, due out some time in 2015, and we have this new show called Star Wars Rebels coming some time in fall of 2014. And to be honest, if The Clone Wars is any measuring stick at all, Rebels could actually be pretty good. Here is the promo video:

Blurry PS4

The "teaser trailer" for the upcoming PlayStation 4:

Look, I'm not much of a gamer. In fact, I'm not a gamer at all. But I'm sure many people are really excited about this, and I think that Sony did a good job here to give people something to build up the hype. Even if that something is just a blurry image of the PS4 and some super-quick super-close-up shots.

The PS4, by the way, is due to be announced at E3 on June 10th.

BQ&A: Dave Caolo of 52Tiger and TUAW

Who are you, what do you do, etc.?

I’m Dave Caolo, news editor at The Unofficial Apple Weblog. When I’m not working at TUAW, I co-host two podcasts on the 70 Decibels Network (soon to be joining 5by5): 11 Minutes with Myke Hurley and Terry Lucy, as well as Home Work with Aaron Mahnke. I also run a website of my own, 52 Tiger.

What tools do you use to get your job done? Software, hardware, etc.

I don’t use too much stuff, I don’t think. We have our own CMS at TUAW. We also use IRC a lot. It’s our “office,” since only two of us are in the same state. If you’re working, you're in IRC. On the Mac I use Adium, and on iOS, Colloquy. I use Reeder for RSS.

As for 52 Tiger, that runs on WordPress and I use Mint for real-time stats. All of my long posts are written in Byword in Markdown, and then pasted into WordPress. I always write on the Mac and not the iPad or iPhone. For me, the iPad is too cramped and the iPhone is way too cramped. Plus, I often bounce back and forth between my post and my research. That’s a pain on the iPad.

When recording the podcasts, we use Skype to talk to each other. We all recored locally with QuickTime. I put the episodes together in GarageBand and then push the result through Levelator and finally, Sound Studio handles the last bits. I use a Rhode Podcaster mic on a boom stand.

As for organization, I use OmniFocus to keep everything tidy and in front of my face. That’s my “30,000 foot” tool. There’s always a Staples ARC notebook on my desk which includes, among other things, David Seah’s Emergent Task Planner. Finally, there’s always a notebook and a pen in my pocket for writing stuff down on the go.

Can you talk a little bit about your spot over at TUAW? Is that what pays the bills?

Yes that’s my full-time job. I’m lucky enough to be able to do it from home. The team I work with at TUAW and AOL really are fantastic, talented people. I love all of them.

How do you write about technology for TUAW as a job, and then write about technology for 52Tiger as a hobby? Do you not ever feel a bit burnt out? And do you not wish at times that, perhaps, you could be publishing your TUAW writings to your own site?

Oh gosh, yes. It’s funny to talk about this at this particular time. A few months ago, I finished writing a book on managing a vacation with your iPhone. To make a long story short, it’s not going to get published. It’s no one’s fault, it just worked out that way.

I found myself with this completed manuscript and no home for it. I considered shelving it forever. But then I thought, maybe I can re-purpose parts of it as a series on 52 Tiger. I’ve been doing that since May 1, 2013. And it’s been amazing. I love travel more than almost anything. Definitely more than technology. To see someplace new and absorb a new culture, new ways of doing things and thinking, to connect with people who are markedly different than those who are in your daily life, is the most life-affirming thing I know how to do. Writing about travel daily over the past two weeks has re-ignited a spark for 52 Tiger deep inside me that I haven’t felt in a long time. Yes, there were times when 52T felt like an echo chamber for me. Not just because of my work at TUAW, but because there are countless tech sites posting the same stories, even at the same time, day after day. Understand that I spend a huge amount of time staring at RSS, looking for stories. Every day I see the same eight or nine stories hundreds of times. It gets boring. Now, I’m writing about traveling with the iPhone. I haven’t seen anyone else exploring that topic exclusively day to day. I’m out of the echo chamber, doing something that’s — as far as I’ve found — uniquely mine. Plus I get to think about and write about this amazing world every day. It’s been awesome.

Are these monthly series going to be a thing? I think many people sure would like them to be.

As of right now, I’m not sure. I planned on doing just that – a “topic of the month” if you will. But I’m having so much fun with the current topic… we’ll see. :)

As you work from home, how do you balance your work life with your family life?

I’ve gotten good at it. Aaron and I talk about this on Home Work a lot. The first step is preparation. When you sit down at your desk, you must know what you’re going to do. Each night, I write down two or three major tasks for the following day.

Also, have a schedule and be willing to abandon it. I leave the kids at school around 7:30 AM and pick them up around 2:00 PM. Between 2:00 and, say, 8:00, I’m not getting any work done. It took me a while to be OK with that, but I don’t really have a choice. Otherwise, I feel resentful towards my family for taking me away from work or guilty about the to-do list that’s unattended on my desk.

Now, I get things done during the day and enjoy my family in the afternoon and evening. I don’t like to work the “PM shift” as I call it, but I do when something big is pressing.

If you could pick the single best thing, and the single worst thing about working from home, what would they be?

The worst thing is how infrequently I see other people. Sometimes I’ll look up and realize, other than driving to the bus stop, I haven’t left this house in five days. That’s not good. I have to make an effort in that area. I have a group of friends that meets twice a week to play board games, and I love that. Heck, I don’t even know what they do for a living, and I don’t care. We don’t meet to discuss work. We meet to play games, drink beer and make each other laugh. We’re great at all three.

The best thing is the freedom, of course. If I want to respond to email on the deck of my house, I do. Maybe I choose to wander around the yard for a bit in the late morning or drive to the library to work for the day. I also never miss a school event that my kids are involved in. It’s great.

You’ve got a cool little “diversions” section in your sidebar that is, to a degree, a substitute for the typical link-list — why do you choose to do things that way?

Ah, yes! That’s my little “pet.” As I stare at RSS every day, I see all sorts of whacky and interesting stuff. Those items aren’t appropriate for TUAW or even 52T, but I want to share them. I thought of doing a linked-list on the site itself, among the posts, but it gets unruly. On a day that I see lots of them, the end up pushing the main content out of sight. So the sidebar arrangement is perfect. I can post as much as I like and my articles stay on the front page.

It’s done with a WordPress plugin called “Sideblog.” Once you install it, designate a category for it (I use “aside”) and any post in that category goes to the sideblog.

Any future plans that you can divulge here?

Hm, not really. I’m mulling over a major change for 52T, but it’s still several months away.

If you could only install one third party app on your iPhone, what would it be? Mac?

Twitterrific on both.

If you could have one superpower, what would it be and why?

I’d be able to raise and lower my blood pressure at will, just like Dwight Schrute on The Office. Why? To freak out nurses and doctors, of course!

Well, It Is Missing An "E"

First with Flickr, and now with Tumblr, it looks like Yahoo is trying to purchase everything without an "e" in the name. All Things D reports:

The Yahoo board has approved a massive $1.1 billion all-cash deal to buy Tumblr. It’s not clear when the official vote was taken, but sources close to the board said the acquisition was a foregone conclusion and was unanimously approved by the directors of Silicon Valley Internet giant. The deal will likely be announced Monday morning, said numerous sources.

In terms of what will change for users of Tumblr, it doesn't look like much, which is a good thing:

As part of the Yahoo deal, Tumblr CEO David Karp — who will get a windfall of cash from the acquisition — will stay at Yahoo for four years at least and retain a lot of control over the service, much in the same way Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom does at Facebook. But, as there, Yahoo will undergird Tumblr’s nascent advertising business with its large and established infrastructure, said sources.

Some new ads so that Yahoo can make some money, and Tumblr is sure to bring tons of new traffic for Yahoo, so the acquisition makes sense.

My only remaining question: What does Marco Arment get out of this deal, if anything?

What Constitutes An American Tragedy

David Dennis, writing for The Guardian, analyzes the serious question of why the New Orleans Mother's Day shooting is not a national tragedy:

I've learned to redefine what constitutes an American tragedy. American tragedies occur where middle America frequents every day: airplanes, business offices, marathons. Where there persists a tangible fear that this could happen to any of us. And rightfully so. Deaths and mayhem anywhere are tragic. That should always be the case. The story here is where American tragedies don't occur.

As soon as I heard the news about what happened in New Orleans I was just waiting for the huge explosion of media. And then... nothing came. And for the life of me I couldn't understand why. The sad thing is that Dennis offers to tremendous new insight. It's just the upsetting way that American culture works with things like this.

Thoughts on 'Gatsby': Both Within and Without

The Great Gatsby. The great Great Gatsby. A film a anticipated seeing for months on end, only to have the release date pushed off a few months more. Then came the release of the absolutely stellar, tone-setting soundtrack. Finally, today, I was able to see the movie.

From the time the movie came out to the time I was able to see it, I noticed a clear divide in responses to the movie. Critics did not seem to be fans, while regular people loved it. The movie had an initial Rotten Tomatoes score of only 40%, later rising up to 51%, and finally settling at 49%. The Users score of the film, however, is an 84% — a score that makes a lot more sense to me.

Speaking of me, you're probably wondering what I thought about the movie. Well, I really liked it. I enjoyed the film from the very beginning until the very end.

Yes, I read the book — and like it very much — and I think that the movie stuck pretty true to the book. There were one or two smaller scenes that I don't think were in the book, and obviously stylistically the movie is quite different, but in terms of the overall plot, it was very true to the book. Fitzgerald's story is, of course, intricately rich and deeply complex, and I think the movie totally captures and conveys that well. It truly brings the book to life.

With a movie like Gatsby, re-watchability is important. And I think that the film succeeds at that level, too. Perhaps not like some of the greatest re-watchable movies of all time, but the movie is certainly re-watchable enough. I'd go see it again, and I could imagine myself really wanting to show this to people who haven't seen it yet years down the road. There are many scenes I could watch all day long. And the music, the clothing, the style Luhrmann's film only add to the re-watchability.

Speaking of the music and style of the film, that seems to really be the only critique of the critics — which would explain the massive discrepancy between regular movie-goers, even movie buffs, and the critics — most people don't care about stylization in a film. Everyone I spoke to, including my sister who saw the movie with me, loved the style of the movie. She couldn't stop talking about some of the cool transitions throughout the film. And you all already know how much I love the soundtrack, and I think the music worked perfectly in the movie — in fact, I only wish that there would have been more of the modern music.

(On that note, I should talk about the whole 3D thing. No, I did not see the movie in 3D. I can see how it could, maybe add to the immersive experience of the movie, but I think the movie's style alone is totally sufficient. Plus, I hate 3D movies in general and usually refuse to see anything in 3D.)

Faith Korpi, a movie critic in her own right, had this to say about the whole critics-vs.-people matter:

The thing that irks me the most about the buzz surrounding The Great Gatsby is the critics who have already decided to hate it. Look, if you don't like any of Baz Luhrmann's other films (Moulin Rouge!, Romeo + Juliet, Australia, Strictly Ballroom) chances are really really high you aren't going to like this one.

I make excuses for the general public, but when journalists and film critics are guilty of this, I cannot handle it. Yes, it's their job to write about these films, but how hard would it be to say, 'hey FYI I hated Moulin Rouge! so take everything I'm about to say with a grain of salt if you liked it.' Please do not write a piece as if your opinion is the correct opinion, and please do not presume I agree with you. Also, making it known how prepared to hate something you are (be it via Twitter or pre-release pieces) lessens your credibility enormously.

And I also particularly love this tweet of hers:

Criticizing a Baz Luhrmann film for being overly stylized is like criticizing a giraffe for being tall.

— Faith E. Korpi(@faitherina) May 8, 2013

There's also this great review of the movie by moviegoers on YouTube on Beyond the Trailer — a great YouTube channel if you like movies:

Guess what? They all love it.

All in all, if you're asking me, I totally, totally liked the film. The symbols were there, the great quotes were there, the music, the clothing, the style. Everything. I loved it. It was breathtaking to watch, the acting was phenomenal, and while it might not be the greatest movie of all time, I think it was excellent for what it was trying to do. I would not have preferred to see Gatsby made into a movie in any other way. I love everything about this one.

If I were giving the movie a grade, I'd give it a solid A- (and I did on FilmGrades).

The Seven Minute Workout Timer

Remember the seven minute workout from a week or so ago? Well, someone made an awesome timer for it, counting your through each of the various exercises complete with little images and text for what you should be doing in each a lotted time segment.

Our excuses are really running out. (Pun intended? Nah.)

Philosopher's Stone, Annotated

J.K. Rowling is auctioning off (for charity) a copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (or Sorcerer's Stone for all you non-British folk) full of new, original annotations, drawings, and notes. I can't imagine how much it'll end up selling for, but three of its pages were just posted online. Here's one:

This is what it says, in case you can't make out her handwriting (which could be a problem for the buyer, no?):

No shield here – crest. I mean all that came in the later editions. This one’s a bit wonky but you get the idea. Perhaps Hufflepuff house would have the respect it deserves from the fans if I’d stayed with my original idea of a bear to represent it?

Hypable has the rest of the pages complete with transcriptions. Does whoever ends up buying it know that we all expect him/her to scan each page of the book?

Man, I sure wish I could somehow go back, and read these books again for the first time.

The BitQuill Review: Killing Two Birds with One Wedge

It had to have been months ago that my father brought me home the darned thing from some sort of trade show he attended. It was the swag from one of the booths. A small little cleaning cloth for your electronic devices — specifically iPhones, iPads, and other iScreens. One one side a cool patterned design with a smooth finish, on the other a textured special micro-fiber cloth that magically, I kid you not, could make any screen look new again with a single wipe.

The instructions on the little package the Toddy cloth came in were simple: Wipe down once or twice with the textured side to clean, and then rub the screen down with the other, smoother side to polish. Once done, any screen will look new again.

The textured side is not the sort of micro-fiber that you're thinking of, though. It's like a mega-micro-fiber — oversized, in a way. It's super textured and I bet it's patented or something. But boy, does it work wonders.

A Thing

I never thought much else about the company, other than that I loved and cherished the single little cloth I had from them. It sat in my drawer and made every other cleaning cloth I owned obsolete. When I wasn't lazy, I would take it out and polish my iPhone with it, when it needed a good shining. It was not nearly as often as it should have been, though.

Then one day I saw the brand Toddy mentioned in first Macworld and then MacLife magazine (if I recall correctly). I didn't know that Toddy was a "thing" and that anyone could get one, but apparently it was more than just customized company swag. Excited, I visited their website and saw the coolest new product from them: The Toddy Wedge.

The Premise

The Wedge is basically a bean-bag like thing, shaped like a pyramid — or, well, a wedge, to be politically correct here — the front of which is surfaced with that oversized, special micro-fiber material, and the rest of which is completely made out of the polishing material. It's basically a bean-bag cleaning cloth. But it's more than that, because at the front of The Wedge is a little extra lip of material that functions as a stand for your iPhone.

That's right. It's a screen-cleaning iPhone stand. You rest your iPhone on The Wedge, and when a smudge presents itself, just grab The Wedge and rub.

Needless to say, I had to have one. They run just $15, but when I expressed interest, the folks at Toddy were kind enough to send one to me for review purposes free of charge. They also included another one of those regular cleaning cloths (which usually run $10). How awesome is that?

The Wedge comes in a variety of different colors, patterns, and designs. The one I got is just a simple brownish styling.

The Wedge

Every geek always has two problems (or at least to problems, anyway):

1. Screens are always smudged and dirty-looking. Especially the iPhone.
2. There's no ideal place to put your iPhone while you're at your desk that looks cooler than, you know, just laying it on the desk is you could be so crass.

The Wedge brilliantly and cleverly solves both of those problems in a way that nothing else ever has — for me, at least. Now when you get back to your desk, you can just stick your iPhone into the stand created by The Wedge — the surely comfortable stand, at that. And when you notice a smudge on your iPhone, iPad, or computer's screen The Wedge is just an arm's-length away. No more reaching through drawers and whatnot — or no more laziness of not doing that and letting your screens stay dirty. The Wedge is right there, and due to its shape and girth, might even function better than even the standard Toddy cloths.

It helps for cleansing the backs of your iDevices as well — although to a lesser degree. Oh, and you can also even fir an iPad Mini into the wedge if you's like to use it to prop it up for a movie, or if you'd want two Wedges, one for each your iPhone and iPad Mini.

It's seriously magical how well the thing works — and beyond the cleverness of The Wedge is particular, that should really be the highlight here. There's no spray, no nothing. Just a wipe and it's like new.

I love cleaning screens with it, because now it's actually realistic to keep all my screens clean at all times. It's right there always, and is super-convenient. It's fun, unique, and did I mention it's so clever.

Some Other Bits

• It'd make a great gift for someone (in addition to yourself).
• Audio plays fine while sitting in The Wedge. It was a slight concern of mine, but audio is not even noticeably muffled in my very unscientific testing.
• You can use it to prop your iPhone up in both landscape and portrait orientation.

Get One

Look, I love clever solutions to problems like this. It's so simple, and yet has so much personality. It's a cool and unique thing to have on your desk, and to solve the problem of screen cleaning alone is worth the $15, much less to also now have an awesome iPhone stand.

You can buy The Wedge as well as the plain Toddy cleaning cloths on Toddy's site.

'If I Were You' Show

Jake and Amir, the comic duo from such online comedy hits as Jake and Amir, have just released their first non-Jake and Amir-related venture. It's a podcast called If I Were You — a comedic advice show in which they take questions from real people (with fake cover names) and explain what they would do in said sticky situations.

There is only one episode out thus far, but I really enjoyed the show. It runs just about 30 minutes long, and so is easy to stick into your podcast listening routine. As they said multiple times on the show, neither of them are really equipped to be dispensing truly sound advice, and so despite the fact that at points there were some great suggestions, most of the show is just hysterical to listen to. It's a really fun half-hour. If you like podcasts, laughing, and Jake and Amir, check out the If I Were You show.

You can search for it in your favorite podcast client, or click here for a special Pocket Casts link.