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2005

KCMP – Better than I expected

My corporate firewall / proxy server defeated me at work today. I was unable to stream the Windows Media stream for 89.3, KCMP The Current. So tomorrow, I shall go old school, and bring an old radio / small boombox. Take that corporate IT managers!

The Current publishes their playlist for the last 6 hours, here’s a sample (in reverse order) of what I heard on the way home from work today:

The Jayhawks – I’d Run Away

Shivaree – I Close My Eyes

Iron & Wine – Teeth In The Grass

Pinetop Perkins – Meanest Woman

The Black Keys – Girl Is On My Mind

A.C. Newman – Miracle Drug

R.E.M. – Driver 8

T Rex – Mambo Sun

Fountains of Wayne – Radiation Vibe

They had a Beach Boys song in there too, that there website doesn’t list for whatever reason.

Looking through today’s playlist is absolutely amazing – Ani DiFranco (32 Flavors!), Dylan, Soul Coughing, a bunch of REM, Luna, deep cuts from Liz Phair, Luna, Muddy Waters and Sonic Youth. I could go on. This is everything I expected and more. I can’t communicate how happy and excited I am.

This is music. This is radio. This is freedom.

KCMP Launches Today!

I’ve been meaning to blog this all weekend, but I got distracted.

MPR has re-launched their website, replacing just the blog, including bios of the on-air talent, a feedback form, a FAQ, and donation information.

Speaking of donating, in the age of XM, Sirius, and Napster, when you can pay $10-$15 month for hundreds of stations, why donate? Because 89.3 is public radio, a community service, and is unlike and other radio station out there. Where DJ’s control the playlists, not big media (yes, even XM has a significant Clear Channel stake), and 89.3 will also have a heavy local focus for Minnesota artists. I did my part, and put my money where my mouth is.

They will be streaming live, including Windows Media Player (more ick), and aacPlus, a fairly new MPEG-4 audio stream that supposedly has excellent quality at low bandwidth. The open source VLC project has a player available for Windows, Mac, and Linux that will stream aacPlus. I’ll be installing that this morning!.

Give it a try, and listen in.

24 vs. Alias

I recently blogged about Alias’ current reboot, and as I try and get caught up on my TiVo, I finally watched the two hour premier of 24.

Talk about how to reboot a show in two totally different ways. I’ve already complained about Alias and my inability to suspend my imagination about the reboot. 24 handled it the opposite – in less than 5 minutes they explained the changes in Jack’s life, made it believable, and then the action just grabbed you and didn’t let go for two hours. Sure, Jack becoming a temporary field agent stretches the imagination a bit, but no where near how Sydney’s working for Sloan again does.

I was very impressed with 24’s season premiere, and couldn’t stop watching. Where with Alias, I watched it, but I was just waiting for the next thing to happen.

The 3rd season of 24 might have been the weakest in some regards, but it was also better with how they kept the plot moving, 3 major plot shifts instead of 2 at the twelve hour mark, (which helps people watching for continuity’s sake). The 4th kicked off with a bang, and hasn’t let go yet.

I’ll continue to watch both shows, but for very different reasons.

What was TiVo thinking?

As seen on Slashdot, TiVo is in the news today, starting with a New York Times article (Registration required or visit Bugmenot that paints a bleak future for the company. With TiVo’s CEO promoted out of his job due to failing to close the Comcast deal, many talking heads on the ‘netare pointing to failed negotiation as sealing TiVo’s doom. According to these news reports, TiVo was offered less than one dollar a month from Comcast to license the TiVo technology in Comacst set top boxes. This offer was less than what DirecTV was currently paying, but Comcast has twice as many subscribers – almost 40 million. And it was no secret that with Rupert Murdoch’s acquisition of DirecTV that DirecTV was looking at other PVR ideas than TiVO, which has since been announced.

My thoughts? I believe TiVo is the greatest device invented in the last 20 years, eclipsing DVD, CD, and MP3 players (sorry folks, the internet has been around a lot longer than 20 years). TiVo has changed the way I live my life and watch TV. The functionality and features are second to none, including the old Replay I own or any other PVR or Media Center PC I’ve seen. TiVo’s Season Pass functionality to record a show on any channel, by new, repeat or any and all, ranking of what shows to record when, quality, I could go on forever. I would hate to see this company go under, but they just haven’t struck the deals necessary to keep going. By building their own box, and getting away from relationships with Sony and Philips, limited functionality with the TiVo basic service in DVD recorders, and the DirecTV deal slipping away from them, the writing looks to be on the wall.

And this doesn’t even touch on what the Broadcast Flag going live on July 1st could do to their functionality moving forward. Sure, existing devices will be grandfathered in, but will Big Media try and hamstring them after July 1st? Things like the Strangeberry acquisition and TiVo2Go (burning your shows from your TiVo to your PC and sharing them) are steps in the right direction, but is it too little to late?

I know in the future as I move to finish my basement, I have a goal of building a Home Theater PC that will run MythTV, a Linux PVR solution that layers on top of an existing Linux installation. MythTV is in active developement, and with the inclusion of a Linux HDTV card on the market, I will have similar functionality to record DirecTV programming (except their HD signals) and off air HD. MythTV will allow me to save my television shows on one box, and stream to any other Linux PC in my home, say, my den, as I’m gaming. From there, I can easily edit and burn to DVD to archive shows or save on DVD if my HD starts to get full. It also has a series of modules so I can check the weather on my TV, stream my music from the HTPC or my server, rip and back up DVDs or CDs, the list goes on.

I love my TiVo, but I may have to plan for a day they are no longer around.

Mmmm, football

Good football weekend. After the disappointing Wild Card weekend, the top 4 seeds in both conferences advanced this weekend to the Conference Championships.

How must Doug Brien of the Jets be feeling this weekend? To win in overtime in the Wild Card, to missing two in the Divisional game versus the best team in football? The Jets kept pace all game, with Big Ben having one of his worst performances of the year. To doink the crossbar, and then wide left, Brien must be kicking himself (pun intended).

I didn’t expect the Falcons to manhandle the Rams as much as they did. I’m not a big Vick believer, but his escapability in the pocket was amazing. To think Donatell got canned in Green Bay and had such success in Atlanta. Sure, the head coach is a former defensive coordinator as well, but based on Green Bay’s performance this year defensively, I have a hard time blaming the defensive coordinator.

The Eagles game wasn’t a surprise at all, that game went as expected. The Pats – Colts game on the other hand was. I was hoping the Pats would win, and with the field conditions I held out hope. But to utterly dominate the Colts high powered offense with the injuries the Pats have on defense, was quite a surprise. Dillon ran hard, and three of the Pats scoring drives (FG, TD, TD) each averaged 8 minute drives. When you can keep Manning off the field like that, you’ll win.

Two more weekends of football, and then the long dark time until late summer.

Bluefish & Screem

I want to dedicate two nights a week to programming / web development. Unfortunately, with the 3 machines I have here at my desk, my Windows box is the only one really set up for any type of long term typing.

The problem is I’m used to Bluefish on linux, and recently I also tried Screem, which was equally impressive. Jedit on Windows is just plain ugly, and feature lacking, and there really aren’t any other good open source alternatives I’ve found. I need to get off my butt, get my server sorted out so I know how many hard drives I really have (and work), and pop one in my gaming box so I can dual boot.

So much work to do, so little time.

In other news, Matt came over this weekend, and we’re 90% done with the electrical wiring. Get the ceiling boxed out, fnish the wiring, get the insulation in and we’re ready for the drywall! I need to keep the momentum going with the basement, so I don’t stall anymore.

More Christmas Presents: Books

One of my favorite Christmas presents to receive is a Barnes & Noble gift card. And this year my sister hooked the family up with a dandy. Alex was able to purchase two nice hardcovers by Garth Nix, and I picked up a few.

On my list for quite a while is a few books by Lawrence Lessig, founder of Creative Commons, EFF board member, and a Stanford law professor. I bought The Future of Ideas and Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity.

In addition, I picked up We The Media, Grassroots Journalism By the People, For the People by Dan Gillmor, who recently put his money where his mouth is, and left his job at the San Jose Mercury News to found a grassroots journalism project.

And last, but not least, Geoffrey Stone’s Perilous Times: Free Speech in Wartime from the Sedition Act of 1798 to the War on Terrorism. Mr. Stone had the opportunity to guest on, but who else’s, Lawrence Lessig’s blog in December. Fascinating thoughts, facts, and history behind the governments role in free speech regulation during wartime. I’m really looking forward to reading this book.

It feels good to be buying non-fiction, and topics I believe in: Free Speech, copyright reform, and journalism. Now to finish off the two novels I’m reading and tackle some real reading material.

Alias 4.0

Over a year ago when the 2003 TV season started, I blogged about Alias rebooting for the third time.

After sitting on my TiVo for over a week, I sat down and watched this season’s premiere and the current episode. We’re now on to Alias 4.0, another reboot to start the 4th season. I enjoy the show, but it’s getting harder to suspend my disbelief after all of the plot holes that open up every time they decide to start over.

This time, we find Sydney, Jack, Vaughn and Dixon have been transferred to a black ops division of the CIA. (The show can now just ignore the whole workings of the CIA). And guess who they’re working for – Sloan! We have now recreated SD-6, but sanctioned by the CIA now. By the end of the 2nd episode, Weiss & Marshall are working for them now.

I’ll give them some credit – continuing plot points are still there, with the tension between Sydney and Jack regarding her mother, Rombaldi, and Vaugh and Sydney’s romance. I’ll give it a try, but I’m at the end of the line. I’m all for watching a well done espionage with a beautiful heroine, but at least try and keep a plot for more than one season. I understand that people didn’t watch the show because they couldn’t follow the plot if they missed an episode or two, but dammit people, buy a TiVo. That’s my favorite part of shows like Alias & 24.

Gates just doesn't get it.

Gizmodo has their interview with Bill

Gates Part Four: Communists and DRM up.

Bill Gates, Microsoft’s chariman has been getting flak for some comments at CES where he equates those who don’t favor copyright and DRM as communists. He more than proves that it’s Gates himself that doesn’t get it in the above interview.

Look Bill: No one questions that artists should be compensated for their work. Period. The fact that some of us may choose to create content, say, a blog, and not want to be compensated, and want to share it, is our choice. And when we do choose that, we can choose to use the Creative Commons licenses to share our work.

God forbid a music artist, or the spoken word, or the written word want to be given away at the artists’ discretion. It’s worked in the programming world, and more and more examples in the media world have started.

Viva la revolution.

Is the Sherman era over?

Will tomorrow be the day Mike Sherman loses his GM responsibilities?

Will he be able to transition to “just” being a coach?

Will he be happy if he doesn’t get a contract extension as he enters the final year of his contract next year?

Will he even be our coach after next season?

I guess we’ll find out some of these answers tomorrow! Change is good. We don’t need more disappointment from the Packers. Sherman’s record is amazing, but his lack of success in the postseason is very disturbing. I don’t question his drive, his motivation and his will to win. But when is it too much for one person? It will take change to get to the next level, so change is good.