PFunked

Leaks, Humps, and Backups

There's an access way on the ceiling above my tub. It started leaking badly last night (the bathroom floor was drenched). I think the AC unit or the hot water heater is up there. Ugh. Cleaning up today (my floor mat is nasty, I might need to just toss it out) and hopefully they'll send someone to take a look soon.

Alanis Morisette cover of My Humps (and the original Black Eyed Peas version for comparison)

Finally:

Only wimps use tape backup: _real_ men just upload their important stuff on ftp, and let the rest of the world mirror it ;)

- Linus Torvalds

... which has an ounce of truth. After I'm gone, no one will care about the data I have backed up. If any of the data I have over at Digital Artisan is worth anything, people will save and distribute it.

iPod Shuffle

I got an iPod Shuffle this weekend (2nd gen, silver).

I haven't been using my 1st gen nano, mostly because it looks terrible. I bought it primarily because it was shiny, but now I'm embarrassed by it -- I feel like an abusive parent when I look at it. But I compare it to a similar device I own, my Motorola RAZR, which still looks gorgeous despite much more abuse.

I hope this tiny aluminum case holds up well. I'm digging the superb battery life, and the bass output is impressively rich. The only complaint I have is that I can't tell the difference between the green and orange indicator, so most of the time I have no idea what the thing is trying to tell me. It would have been nice to have one of those colors blue instead, or vary the intensity between the two colors so that grayscale-sighted people could still use it. But I guess the colors they chose look cool to normal people.

Right now I'm using it for podcasts mostly. I've been on a huge podcast kick - there are four weekly podcasts on my must-listen list:

- Diggnation
- This Week in Tech
- Legendary Thread
- Yours

Lately I also listen to audiobooks from Cory Doctorow. I've had mixed success from (but I like the concept of) Librivox.

Do you have podcast recommendations? I think I'd like a podcast about coding, but not sure how that should play out. Maybe I could start one.

I'm trialling three new (to me) podcasts. I'll come back and do a review once I've heard a few episodes:

- FLOSS Weekly
- Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing
- 43 Folders

[--Update--]

FLOSS weekly was interesting, it was mainly a 90 minute interview. I don't know if that's the format they always follow.

Grammar girl was too basic for me.

43 Folders, I'll have to check out a couple more. The one I sampled was short.

iTunes - EMI goes DRM free

EMI goes DRM free (in May)

EMI (one of the big RIAA record companies) announced that they are going to offer some of their library for $1.29/track, 256Kbps AAC, DRM-free (normally $.99/track, 128Kbps AAC, DRM-encumbered).

Interesting. I think full albums will still be at the $9.99 price point but will now be 256Kbps AAC, DRM-free. If so, this is definitely a step in a good direction.

I will probably turn to iTunes now if I want singles. And I haven't purchased anything through iTunes in years. If I want a full album I'll still buy the DRM-free CD and rip it to FLAC myself. But see, this makes me want to suck it up and recognize that I can't tell the difference between 128kbps mp3 and lossless wav. Touche', Jobs. Touche'.

I'd like to download albums instead (I don't really care about discs/art/liner) but I'm not exactly the target market. I'd pay $12 online for FLAC albums, and I consider that very generous -- distributing ~400MB is far cheaper than the cost of distributing and retailing a disc.

List of musicians signed to EMI (Wikipedia)

Surely this means that indie artists can now request their albums be sold DRM-free on iTunes...? Remains to be seen.

Some are saying that this means the death of the WMA format.

I'll wait to see if the other record companies jump on board. We'll see.

(Disclosure: I bought a gen2 iPod Shuffle this weekend)

Luke Smith

1up editor Luke Smith is my new favorite person. He is excellent on the 1up World of Warcraft podcast Legendary Thread. If you play (or ever played) WoW I highly recommend this show.

Alberto Gonzales