Balderdash

So I switched hosting providers and am now trying to get everything to work well again.

So I have a cold and in a fit of boredom and lack of concentration (maybe too much cranberry juice) I played some flash games from my bed. Here are my funtastic findings:

Portal http://portal.wecreatestuff.com/

It reminds me a bit of Dark Castle for the MAC (dating myself here), a bit puzzle a bit action with lots of fun.

Vector TD http://www.candystand.com/play.do?id=18047

This is a really great puzzle/action game where you choose different towers placed around a board to fry like monsters.

In fact most of http://www.candystand.com is worth a look.

Be forewarned that candystand is a large advertisement for Wrigley’s chewing gum. That said the games are fun and effort was paid to playability.

Have fun.

So I was finished with my class at the BU school of management, another fine evening of Bond evaluation over with. On my way to the T I was enjoying the snow fall thinking about all the stuff I needed to get through when I got hit by a Mini-van in a cross walk. After picking myself up and sitting on the curb rubbing my left leg the craziness got into full swing. First the cops came which was expected, then the firemen came which struck me as silly ( I was back on my feet by then) and then the ambulance. By the time everyone was there I was back together enough to send everyone away.

Everyone including the driver did everything they should have and I’m one lucky guy to be pretty much in one piece. I finished by limping to the T, going home, washing my boo boos and going to sleep

The disgusting piece came today. Not two days since I was hit and the personal injury law practice pamphlets have started. It’s gross that a simple accident would become some sort of windfall for someone. I’m fine, the other guy is sorry it happened and the whole silly business is over. Blah.

Since I meant the VP in charge of digital media in a class at BU about 4 months back I can’t stop talking about this website. This is a join venture of NBC and Fox to offer free content via the web. This is supposed to help cut down on Youtube abuses of copyright. The venture is split 35% NBC, 35% Fox and 10% Venture Capital. The VC firm paid $35 million for a 10% stake.

The site is in beta but you can sign up for a sneek peek at http://www.hulu.com. You are able to view full episodes from the networks and not just today’s shows but old stuff too. Here is a demo of there embedding tool:

Master and Commander.

Cool stuff ….

So about six months ago I discovered TED talks. Technology, Entertainment and Design (TED) is a conference that brings together some of the most interesting people from these three rather broad topic areas. Here are some of my favorite talks:

Malcolm Gladwell talks about uncovering the key to what consumers what:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/20 

Vilayanur Ramachandran talks about his brain research:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/184 

William McDonough discusses intelligent urban design, he co-authored "Cradle to Cradle" which is a stunningly intelligent book. 

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/104

James Howard Kunstler discusses themes from his books including "Home from Nowhere" about new urbanism:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/121

Enjoy the TED.

Things are moving so quickly that it makes your head spin. Our company is expanding very soon and there is an intense interest in new interactive technology. I’ve collected a couple of demos to show so I though I’d put them here as well:

Where we start seeing it:

TED:  http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/65

Now a couple of high end products:

http://www.microsoft.com/surface/

http://www.accenture.com/Global/Services/Accenture_Technology_Labs/Services/SeeingTheBigPicture.htm

Enjoy…

http://openarchitecturenetwork.org/

"One billion people live in abject poverty. Four billion live in fragile but growing economies. One in seven people live in slum settlements. By 2020 it will be one in three. We don’t need to choose between architecture or revolution. What we need is an architectural revolution."

I love seeing these sorts of collaborative solutions to very serious housing and energy issues. This reminds me of William McDonough and Michael Braungart’s brilliant book "Cradle to Cradle".

This is a series of really short, fun and very well thought out explanations of common web 2.0 applications and how they work.

Enjoy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x66lV7GOcNU&feature=user

Social Bookmarking in Plain English

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dnL00TdmLY

Wikis in Plain English

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6a_KF7TYKVc&feature=user

Social Networking in Plain English

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0klgLsSxGsU&feature=user

RSS in Plain English

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRqUE6IHTEA&feature=related

Online Documents in Plain English

Well my old Dell rep is gone and I have a new one. Let us hope that this one is as good as the last.