Written by Michael Lankton Saturday, 30 January 2010 07:05
I've had a hard-on for a new phone ever since the Droid came out in November. The Droid wasn't the "it" phone for me, but it got me to start paying really close attention. I figured I would wait until some Android phone with a killer form factor and a fast CPU came along, and I would be in. I was kind of thinking that a Nexus One on Verizon would fit that bill.
So it just barely got my attention that the Palm phones were debuting on Verizon on Monday this week. I kind of noticed at the last minute, but I did the same thing I did with Android. I downloaded the SDK and started playing with it on my Mac. Holy crap! Not only was Palm not even on my radar, this operating system destroyed Android! Totally shook up my whole frame of mind on phones.
So I spent the whole weekend obsessively reading and watching everything I can find on the Palm Pre. That obsession continues into the week. Lucky for the world, because I quit smoking on Monday. The Palm Pre is not only a kick ass smartphone, it saves lives. Saves lives because I am pretty sure I would have killed somebody for a cigarette this week, but didn't because I went out and got a Palm Pre Plus instead.
Written by Michael Lankton Monday, 11 January 2010 10:35
I worked a double shift last night, and on the back half of my day I got a copy of Rolling Stone's Top Music of 00 or some such issue in my hands to help kill an hour. When I was a kid Rolling Stone was my parents generation's music rag, but I respected Rolling Stone because even though those geezers were in their 30s they still knew a good thing when they heard it. So, while the cover still had people like Frampton and Springsteen on it, if you turned to the back you would regularly read about bands like The Dead Boys and Sex Pistols, and Rolling Stone loved them. I forget what Rolling Stone said about 1981's Damaged by Black Flag, but it boiled down to they thought that Black Flag was the real deal and it kind of made all the posturing arena rock bands of the time look and sound like some kind of joke. I agreed.
I'm in my 40s now. I have a mortgage and a couple of car payments and you are likely to find me wearing sleep pants and a "World's Greatest Dad" t-shirt on any given day, but I'm not dead yet. I still like good music. So, while I can tell you a lot more about the music of 1985 than I can the music of 2009, I still find and latch on to the stuff that I think is really good.
I was curious to see how Rolling Stone's assessment of the music of the last decade matched up to my own.
Written by Michael Lankton Saturday, 19 December 2009 09:32
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In the spirit of listening to my audience, I spent quite a bit of time thinking about alternative economic models for generating web revenue. Given my vastly unpopular stand on internet advertising, I gave my detractors an open ear and an open mind, and those that had something more useful to say than "ur a douch bag" had their own opinions on ads and web monetization.
As a brief experiment I switched this site to an ad-free, voluntary donation site. Now one, I know that at three months old no one is reading my personal blog except my friends and a few strays sent by Google. Two, the type of content necessary for a voluntary donation site is rather unique. Think about it, how many web sites have you encountered whose content you enjoyed so much that showing your appreciation for the content with your wallet felt like a good idea? Precious, precious few.
In fact, it isn't a valid means of making income, period. If you look at the sites that encourage voluntary donation they fall into two categories: blogs that are already monetized with advertising, and sites with specific content that is so good they offer physical product based on their content, ala theoatmeal.com and 27/6. Hell, I even bought something off 27/6 the second time I went there. theoatmeal.com has a donation banner, but I guarantee you that posters and comics are what make the site owner money.
