I Am A Grammar Girl Fanboy

And so I share this link to Mignon Fogarty spotlighted on an evening news program.

Worst Buy

I don't expect Best Buy employees to care about their jobs.

I don't expect Best Buy employees to care about me.

But don't you think the video game guy should know the big-title video games coming out THIS VERY WEEK?

I sat on a phone for a couple minutes, patiently trying to spell "SSX Blur" to the apathetic clerk helping me. My co-workers were busting up around me: "SSX Blur" "What was that sir?" "SSX Blur" "What's the second word again?" "Blur" "Can you spell that" "B-L-U-R" "Can you spell the game name?" "S-S-X-SPACE-B-L-U-R" "What's the second word again?" "Blur. You know, like blurry, you can't see very well?" "Oh, blurry" "No, just blur" "Oh. That's not in our system."

Shouldn't his much-vaunted system know that the game will arrive TOMORROW? That's what I wanted to know: Is it in today? Or do you get it tomorrow?

On the other hand, maybe his system does know. Maybe he just didn't spell it right.

Genius Advertising

One can say so much with so little, given enough creativity. That's what happened in a billboard tiff between Argentinian football fans and Brazilian football players. Mad props to both sides for a clever ad campaign.

via meriko, amusing herself while snowed in at Dulles

i love sweaty basketball players

Well, actually, I don't. But George Takei says he does, in this awesome reaction to Tim Hardaway's open gay-bashing.

Triangler Wins Mobile Gaming Award

Congratulations to my friend Oskar, who won an International Mobile Gaming award for his game Triangler. Players use mobile phones and GPS tracking facilities to capture their opponents inside large equilateral triangles. Oskar's way way out there on the smart chart; I just wish my mobile device could play the game.

Violet Blue's SFGate Column Attacks SFGate

I've said before that I don't read Violet Blue's SFGate sex column—I don't actually read SFGate—but maybe I should start: This is the second time in a few weeks that she's generated a blogosphere buzz.

In this week's installment, she uses her SFGate column to attack SFGate. Talk about guts. (By the way, I love this line: "so that I feel like I have a life outside of the daily bump-and-grind".)

She feels that the Chronicle did a poor job reporting Kink.com's purchase of the Mission's Armory building for the company's porn production. The article quoted all the anti-porn protesters, but none of the workers. And the site put that article up high, while Blue's original article, favorable to the move, appeared "below the fold," which on a web site translates to below the normal browser window's edge.

Of course everyone has an opinion about porn, but her article seems surprised that the reporter would be biased. Every reporter is biased, because every human is biased. Even reporters who cover a subject "objectively" are choosing quotes and mannerisms that they think reflect a person's stance. But it really reflects the reporter's view of that stance, which is going to be colored by the reporter's own views. When I cover a controversial topic, I try to represent both sides fairly, but I'm just as guilty of adding my opinion in subtle ways. For my foie gras article, I chose nonviolent verbs for the force feeding. Other reporters use "stuffed" or "crammed" to illustrate the act, and I chose "inserted" (I think). That word choice reflected my view of the matter, but I was pre-disposed to favor foie gras.

And of course, would she have been so upset about the bias if the article had been all positive?

Book Tech Support

How early help desks trained users on newfangled "books".

Pompous Ass Words

via the NPL mailing list, a web page devoted to Pompous Ass Words, "an uncommonly understood word that is synonymous with a commonly understood one." PAWs are a good way to make your text less clear.

The Passion of the Drone

Wow.

The Chronicle takes calls into its comment line, and some of them get replayed on a podcast. I guess the paper used the phrase "pilotless drone" and that hit some wacko's berserk button. I get pretty worked up about grammar stuff, but mostly in the privacy of my own home. And I never get as worked up as this guy.

Here's their blog entry on the subject, complete with links to YouTube dance music remixes of the phone call.

Bulwer-Lytton Results

The results of the 2006 Bulwer-Lytton contest, to come up with the worst opening line for a piece of fiction, have been posted. The contest is named for Edward George Earl Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, who wrote the opening line that any Peanuts fan will know: "It was a dark and stormy night." Wikipedia also gives him credit for "The pen is mightier than the sword" and "the great unwashed," among other florid phrases.

Sarah Silverman On Love And Sex

The Onion got comedian Sarah Silverman to answer some questions about love and sex. Her answers are lovely. I suppose it's offensive to the over-conservative.

Like most women, my girlfriend is very self-conscious about her body. When we "do it," she insists on turning the lights out. I love her body and want to actually see it, but no amount of reassurance or pleading will change her mind. How do I convince her to leave the lights on?


Anonymous




SS: Just wondering if maybe it's occurred to you that it's you she doesn't want to see naked? I say keep the lights off. If you need to see her body, get night-vision goggles. Also, that way less of your face will show. It's a win-win!

Pipes

I don't have an immediate use for Yahoo!'s new Pipes service, but Tim O'Reilly explores its potential a bit more. Pipes is trying to be a generalized, user-friendly tool for mixing and matching RSS feeds into new data-rich pages. Neat.

Perplex City Is Over

Someone's found the Receda Cube, the prize in Perplex City worth $200,000. The company has plans for new contests, so keep an ear out.

Google SketchUp

When I downloaded Google Earth, I also grabbed its spiritual cousin, Google SketchUp, a 3D modeling tool that Google bought a couple years ago. The two programs connect in an unusual way: You can plant models of buildings onto Google Earth that other GE tourists can see. For instance, when you visit the Palace of the Fine Arts in Google Earth, you can see a 3D Model of the building instead of the top-down aerial photo. You can also see the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance, superimposed over the flat picture of our famous landmark.

But the program works independently of Google Earth. I've played with a few 3D modeling programs in the past, but they've always featured a steep learning curve. That's why I was so impressed with SketchUp. The designers managed to make a straightforward program that makes most things easy and hard things possible. To make a polyhedron, you just click the pencil from point to point. SketchUp connects the dots whenever you close a polygon. You can pull surfaces away from others, and move surfaces while SketchUp adjusts all the other faces to keep them attached. Want a roof shape on the box you just drew? Draw a line down the middle of the face, creating two new ones. Move that edge up the z-axis, and watch the two faces slant upwards in response. Within a few minutes of doodling alongside the user's guide introductory chapter, I had created a complex shape with weird slopes and faces. And I knew exactly what I had done, which is unusual with 3D programs.

So check it out, if you haven't already.

Fresh Air Now In Podcast Form

I know not everyone likes Terry Gross' Fresh Air, but I'm a big fan. So I'm thrilled to see it available as a podcast.

If only the Metropolitan Opera would be smart enough to put Saturday's live broadcast into a podcast form, my ultimate podcast collection would be complete.

The Violet Blue Frenzy

I don't normally read Violet Blue's weekly sex (not sex advice) column in the Chronicle, but this post on the SFGate Culture Blog, by my former SFist editor Eve Batey, prompted me to read the latest piece.

Here's the chronology. Forbes posted their Top 25 Web Celebs list, and it included John Dvorak, Leo LaPorte, and Violet Blue, among others. Dvorak and LaPorte are two of the co-hosts of This Week in Technology, a podcast that I know many people love but that I simply find tedious, and they lampooned the list in general, and Violet Blue's place on it in particular. "Why is she there?" seems to be the gist of their comments.

Blue, who's a popular podcaster, blogger and videoblogger, used her weekly column to respond. She took exception to "the Moose Lodge" feel of the TWiT conversation.

Eve sent the TWiT guys the link to Blue's column, and LaPorte responded to Eve's email, but she's not allowed to print his response. Oooh, I'll bet it's juicy, though. Peter Norton, another host, did respond, and you can read his comments, which among other things apologize for LaPorte's unseen response, at Eve's Culture Blog post. Dvorak publicly apologized, but you simply must read the ferocious comments of the Dvorak Army. No one is so venomous as the commenter lending words of support to one blogger about the words of another.

Update: Leo Laporte apologized, saying that he had confused Violet Blue the podcaster with Violet Blue the porn star.