Daily affirmations of a word mercenary
Geek Out Category
“Wah, GEEK OUT! Le geek, c’est chic!” This is the category that reveals my geekier side. You may not understand what I’m talking about, or you may think I’m revealing just how technologically un-savvy I really am, depending on who you are and what your own geeky proclivities may be.
Writely is cool
28
Dec
2006
In: Geek Out
Since my new Macbook* doesn’t have Office installed (and I don’t feel like buying the suite since all I ever use is Word), I decided to check out Writely, which is now Google Documents. Basically, Writely is to Word what Gmail is to Outlook — at least in concept. Writely isn’t quite as cool as Gmail in terms of features (there’s no word processing equivalent to Gmail’s message threading awesomeness) but it still packs quite a wallop.
Not only does it provide a completely browser-based word processing application with all the tools I need (word count, find & replace, track changes, revision comparison) but it also has some wiki features that make it awesome for collaborating. For instance, a friend just sent me her resume to edit, and I was able to make changes in Writely and then instead of emailing it back and forth with her, I could just invite her to work on it with me online.
I can already see where there’s room for improvement (my friend said it borked her resume formating), and the need to be online could be challenging at times, but for the most part, I think this will work just fine.
This now means that I use Google tools for: search, email, calendar, instant messaging, photo editing (although only on my pc), word processing, group management, and probably 10 other things I can’t think of now because they’re so seamlessly integrated into my daily routine. Damnit, Google. You own me.
*Yes, I’m bi-platform now, although honestly I don’t quite get all the Mac idolatry. Yes, this laptop is really pretty and nice in the ways that all new computers are. But, uh, my life hasn’t really changed now that I’m using it in addition to my PC.
Filtered posts & LiveJournal
27
Oct
2006
In: Geek Out
The closing panel at the conference today focused on looking ahead, and the thing that struck me the most was filtered posting, i.e. being able to control exactly who sees which posts. I sincerely hope this is a prediction that comes true because while I love having my public blog, I desperately wish that there could be a logged in version that my real life friends could see. I’ve poked around for MT plug-ins that do this, but none seem to exist. (Then again, development on MT is pretty stagnant these days, sadly.)
Of course, LiveJournal has offered this option for years, which is why I use my LJ account. But very few of my real life friends are on LiveJournal. It’s just not a service used by many late-20 and 30-somethings, but DEAR GOD I wish it were. The ability to create custom filters is such a hugely powerful tool — I have custom filters for all sorts of topics. I love knowing that the stupid meme I post will only be seen by friends who appreciate silly things like that, and posts about my reproductive health are seen only by my un-squeamish lady-friends, and grumbly posts about work are seen only by people who don’t work with me, etc. etc. Filters are incredibly powerful when it comes to feeling safe about what you’re writing — and only LiveJournal uses them. VOX has filters for friends and family, but that’s only two. The sheer versatility of Live Journal’s customizable filters is unparalleled.
Then again, there’s that shortcoming: very few of my real life friends use LiveJournal. If they did? Then it would be a real party. But at 31, I’m already way, way outside the demographic for the site, and I don’t have much faith that I’ll be able to lure anyone over. So I can only hope that filtered posts catch on outside LiveJournal.
@ Blog Business Summit
25
Oct
2006
In: Geek Out
I forgot to mention that I’m at the Blog Biz Summit here in Seattle this week. I’m not sure if any Elish readers are attending, but if so — say hi!
Ionolsen BE GONE!
18
Oct
2006
In: Geek Out
If you’ve been getting slammed by as much ionolsen comment spam as I have (as many as 600 spammy comments a day!), here’s the entry that you should add to your Movable Type SpamLookup Keyword Filter:
/ionolsen.*/i 4
You’ve probably noticed that all the spams start with ionolsen16, ionolsen19, etc. This keyword blocks ionolsenANYTHING and has been quite effective in blocking hundreds of spams from my site today alone.
The hating of Dooce.com
13
Oct
2006
In: Geek Out
Heather Armstrong made a big announcement yesterday. And people started bitching. Seems like when Heather does almost anything people start bitching. Dooce.com’s got a huge following (including me — I’ve read the site since 2001), but Heather’s also got extremely vocal detractors who love to talk about how much they hate her. Heck, I got an anti-Dooce comment within a few hours of linking to the Mediabistro article about Heather yesterday. People love to bitch about Heather.
It’s remarkable how much hate people can work up towards a woman who’s just writing a blog — and most of the time she doesn’t even write about hot topics like politics. She writes about her daughter, her dog, her husband. I get that her brand of humor may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but why the hate? Perhaps her website’s financial success brings out the resentment in people — “She’s successful writing THAT? I find myself much funnier and my blog doesn’t have that level of success. Therefore, I hate her.” Seems pretty petty to me, but the web can be a petty place.
I’m guessing that another factor in people’s hate-mongering is a response to the bite that Heather’s writing has. She’s deliciously opinionated and can be snarky as hell when she wants to be, and people may see this as their invitation to be twice as mean in their criticism of her. That said, it’s truly remarkable how cruel people get. They don’t just bag on Heather’s writing (which they have every right to do — writers get critiqued. It’s part of putting yourself out there), they insult every aspect of her personality, her family, her daughter, her parenting. Since she writes so intimately about her life, I suppose it could be argued that she invites this level of hate on the topics she covers. She’s in essence inviting internet strangers into her home, showing them around, and then dealing with the fall-out when some of these people wander into her living room and take a big fat steaming acidic shit that eats through the hardwood. Daily, from what I can tell. I have no idea how she’s able to deal with the constancy of internet spite people toss at her.
There are times when I worry about Heather. She’s written extensively about her battles with depression, and I get clucky and concerned that she’s chosen a difficult career for herself, given her personality. I mean, I’m not prone to depression and I have nowhere near the level of detractors and trolls that Heather does, and even I get seriously bummed and moody when I get hateful shit tossed at me on the web. Is the web-hate contributing to Heather’s depression? This leads me to wonder if the Internet is slowly killing Heather Armstrong, even as it pays her bills. Her website may be supporting her family, but the revenue flow seems to come with a steep emotional toll.
Beat the iPod
5
Oct
2006
In: Geek Out
Recently, my fourth-generation ipod (the photo ipod) started acting up. It’s only about a year old, and I’ve taken quite good care of it … but it was starting to get stuck and not reset, and then when I went so far as to try to restore it, it had a major malfunction and started making a strange little ping noise. I started to get angry — what the fuck is up with disposable electronics that cost $400+ and are designed to crap out in a year?! My old sidekick (now Dre’s sidekick) is starting to crap out, too … it’s just not right!
After doing a little research, I found a discussion amongst other people suffering similar problems with their 4g ipods, and what was the solution? Shake it. Or drop it. Or slap it. Basically, beat your ipod.
I was dubious, but I had nothing to lose. And so I did what you’re never supposed to do to hard drives: I shook it. And what the fuck!? It totally fixed the problem! It was also really satisfying.
This is getting ridiculous
27
Sep
2006
In: Geek Out
While I was sitting here checking my morning feeds, Electrolicious just got hammered with 100 comment spams (!!!) in less than 10 minutes. I quickly adjusted my spam filters so that they started getting blocked within a couple minutes, but seriously: wow. I never did get Akismet to work with Movable Type this week. The situation is getting so bad that this may almost be reason enough to switch to WordPress. Seriously!
Last I heard …
26
Sep
2006
In: Geek Out
Joe just came up with this fun li’l Google game. Enter your name and then “last I heard [she/he] was” into Google and see what happens. Here were mine:
The first would be Ariel. I don’t know how I messed that one up so badly. … Last I heard, she was in San Fransisco with the third guy.
Last I heard she was in your neck of the woods.
Last I heard she was dating a friend of mine, who’sa solid guy
Last I heard she was going to lock herself in her room and cry for an entire month to show just how hurt she is by this dreadful betrayal.
Ariel, did you find the Hobnobs in Bay downtown? Would you be able to guide Priestess … Last I heard, she was alive and well and working way too hard.
Ariel Avrech and I both learned to relate to God and religion and the clergy in the … Last I heard she was living in Connecticut as a stay-at-home mom.
Last I heard she was in Hippieville No. California, Willits!
Last I heard, she was sleeping in her car. And I ain’t sorry about that.
Called at various times Ariel, Sprite, and Shadowcat, last I heard she was going by Kitty.
Gummi boots
7
Sep
2006
In: Geek Out
Andreas’ quick translation of my new favorite website, the so-called “Das Boots.” (HA! BEN! HA!)
There’s a monthly group meeting of people interested in gummy boots. We try on different boots and test them out. It’s an open group! We’re always on the trail of trendy gummy boots!
From Trend Regenmode - V I S I T O R S. I am fascinated. Andreas promises to translate more tomorrow.
Writely is cool
28 Dec 2006 In: Geek OutSince my new Macbook* doesn’t have Office installed (and I don’t feel like buying the suite since all I ever use is Word), I decided to check out Writely, which is now Google Documents. Basically, Writely is to Word what Gmail is to Outlook — at least in concept. Writely isn’t quite as cool as Gmail in terms of features (there’s no word processing equivalent to Gmail’s message threading awesomeness) but it still packs quite a wallop.
Not only does it provide a completely browser-based word processing application with all the tools I need (word count, find & replace, track changes, revision comparison) but it also has some wiki features that make it awesome for collaborating. For instance, a friend just sent me her resume to edit, and I was able to make changes in Writely and then instead of emailing it back and forth with her, I could just invite her to work on it with me online.
I can already see where there’s room for improvement (my friend said it borked her resume formating), and the need to be online could be challenging at times, but for the most part, I think this will work just fine.
This now means that I use Google tools for: search, email, calendar, instant messaging, photo editing (although only on my pc), word processing, group management, and probably 10 other things I can’t think of now because they’re so seamlessly integrated into my daily routine. Damnit, Google. You own me.
*Yes, I’m bi-platform now, although honestly I don’t quite get all the Mac idolatry. Yes, this laptop is really pretty and nice in the ways that all new computers are. But, uh, my life hasn’t really changed now that I’m using it in addition to my PC.
Filtered posts & LiveJournal
27 Oct 2006 In: Geek OutThe closing panel at the conference today focused on looking ahead, and the thing that struck me the most was filtered posting, i.e. being able to control exactly who sees which posts. I sincerely hope this is a prediction that comes true because while I love having my public blog, I desperately wish that there could be a logged in version that my real life friends could see. I’ve poked around for MT plug-ins that do this, but none seem to exist. (Then again, development on MT is pretty stagnant these days, sadly.)
Of course, LiveJournal has offered this option for years, which is why I use my LJ account. But very few of my real life friends are on LiveJournal. It’s just not a service used by many late-20 and 30-somethings, but DEAR GOD I wish it were. The ability to create custom filters is such a hugely powerful tool — I have custom filters for all sorts of topics. I love knowing that the stupid meme I post will only be seen by friends who appreciate silly things like that, and posts about my reproductive health are seen only by my un-squeamish lady-friends, and grumbly posts about work are seen only by people who don’t work with me, etc. etc. Filters are incredibly powerful when it comes to feeling safe about what you’re writing — and only LiveJournal uses them. VOX has filters for friends and family, but that’s only two. The sheer versatility of Live Journal’s customizable filters is unparalleled.
Then again, there’s that shortcoming: very few of my real life friends use LiveJournal. If they did? Then it would be a real party. But at 31, I’m already way, way outside the demographic for the site, and I don’t have much faith that I’ll be able to lure anyone over. So I can only hope that filtered posts catch on outside LiveJournal.
@ Blog Business Summit
25 Oct 2006 In: Geek OutI forgot to mention that I’m at the Blog Biz Summit here in Seattle this week. I’m not sure if any Elish readers are attending, but if so — say hi!
Ionolsen BE GONE!
18 Oct 2006 In: Geek OutIf you’ve been getting slammed by as much ionolsen comment spam as I have (as many as 600 spammy comments a day!), here’s the entry that you should add to your Movable Type SpamLookup Keyword Filter:
/ionolsen.*/i 4
You’ve probably noticed that all the spams start with ionolsen16, ionolsen19, etc. This keyword blocks ionolsenANYTHING and has been quite effective in blocking hundreds of spams from my site today alone.
The hating of Dooce.com
13 Oct 2006 In: Geek OutHeather Armstrong made a big announcement yesterday. And people started bitching. Seems like when Heather does almost anything people start bitching. Dooce.com’s got a huge following (including me — I’ve read the site since 2001), but Heather’s also got extremely vocal detractors who love to talk about how much they hate her. Heck, I got an anti-Dooce comment within a few hours of linking to the Mediabistro article about Heather yesterday. People love to bitch about Heather.
It’s remarkable how much hate people can work up towards a woman who’s just writing a blog — and most of the time she doesn’t even write about hot topics like politics. She writes about her daughter, her dog, her husband. I get that her brand of humor may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but why the hate? Perhaps her website’s financial success brings out the resentment in people — “She’s successful writing THAT? I find myself much funnier and my blog doesn’t have that level of success. Therefore, I hate her.” Seems pretty petty to me, but the web can be a petty place.
I’m guessing that another factor in people’s hate-mongering is a response to the bite that Heather’s writing has. She’s deliciously opinionated and can be snarky as hell when she wants to be, and people may see this as their invitation to be twice as mean in their criticism of her. That said, it’s truly remarkable how cruel people get. They don’t just bag on Heather’s writing (which they have every right to do — writers get critiqued. It’s part of putting yourself out there), they insult every aspect of her personality, her family, her daughter, her parenting. Since she writes so intimately about her life, I suppose it could be argued that she invites this level of hate on the topics she covers. She’s in essence inviting internet strangers into her home, showing them around, and then dealing with the fall-out when some of these people wander into her living room and take a big fat steaming acidic shit that eats through the hardwood. Daily, from what I can tell. I have no idea how she’s able to deal with the constancy of internet spite people toss at her.
There are times when I worry about Heather. She’s written extensively about her battles with depression, and I get clucky and concerned that she’s chosen a difficult career for herself, given her personality. I mean, I’m not prone to depression and I have nowhere near the level of detractors and trolls that Heather does, and even I get seriously bummed and moody when I get hateful shit tossed at me on the web. Is the web-hate contributing to Heather’s depression? This leads me to wonder if the Internet is slowly killing Heather Armstrong, even as it pays her bills. Her website may be supporting her family, but the revenue flow seems to come with a steep emotional toll.
Beat the iPod
5 Oct 2006 In: Geek OutRecently, my fourth-generation ipod (the photo ipod) started acting up. It’s only about a year old, and I’ve taken quite good care of it … but it was starting to get stuck and not reset, and then when I went so far as to try to restore it, it had a major malfunction and started making a strange little ping noise. I started to get angry — what the fuck is up with disposable electronics that cost $400+ and are designed to crap out in a year?! My old sidekick (now Dre’s sidekick) is starting to crap out, too … it’s just not right!
After doing a little research, I found a discussion amongst other people suffering similar problems with their 4g ipods, and what was the solution? Shake it. Or drop it. Or slap it. Basically, beat your ipod.
I was dubious, but I had nothing to lose. And so I did what you’re never supposed to do to hard drives: I shook it. And what the fuck!? It totally fixed the problem! It was also really satisfying.
This is getting ridiculous
27 Sep 2006 In: Geek OutWhile I was sitting here checking my morning feeds, Electrolicious just got hammered with 100 comment spams (!!!) in less than 10 minutes. I quickly adjusted my spam filters so that they started getting blocked within a couple minutes, but seriously: wow. I never did get Akismet to work with Movable Type this week. The situation is getting so bad that this may almost be reason enough to switch to WordPress. Seriously!
Last I heard …
26 Sep 2006 In: Geek OutJoe just came up with this fun li’l Google game. Enter your name and then “last I heard [she/he] was” into Google and see what happens. Here were mine:
The first would be Ariel. I don’t know how I messed that one up so badly. … Last I heard, she was in San Fransisco with the third guy.
Last I heard she was in your neck of the woods.
Last I heard she was dating a friend of mine, who’sa solid guy
Last I heard she was going to lock herself in her room and cry for an entire month to show just how hurt she is by this dreadful betrayal.
Ariel, did you find the Hobnobs in Bay downtown? Would you be able to guide Priestess … Last I heard, she was alive and well and working way too hard.
Ariel Avrech and I both learned to relate to God and religion and the clergy in the … Last I heard she was living in Connecticut as a stay-at-home mom.
Last I heard she was in Hippieville No. California, Willits!
Last I heard, she was sleeping in her car. And I ain’t sorry about that.
Called at various times Ariel, Sprite, and Shadowcat, last I heard she was going by Kitty.
Gummi boots
7 Sep 2006 In: Geek OutAndreas’ quick translation of my new favorite website, the so-called “Das Boots.” (HA! BEN! HA!)
There’s a monthly group meeting of people interested in gummy boots. We try on different boots and test them out. It’s an open group! We’re always on the trail of trendy gummy boots!
From Trend Regenmode - V I S I T O R S. I am fascinated. Andreas promises to translate more tomorrow.
Hey there. I'm Ariel Meadow Stallings, a native Seattleite who's written my way up and down the Left Coast. Electrolicious is where I post daily randomata, but I also write for a living. My first book, Offbeat Bride, was published last year.
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