The MIT’s $100 laptop is a wonder to me. It is a wonder that no one has invented a portable computer with a hand crank before now. This is the ultimate in low tech that makes sense with anything high tech. I absolutely hate to remember charging batteries. I want my cell phone, camera, Palm, and any other portable electronic device to grab power from the wind, sun, water, or rotation of the earth. Whatever works, just stop it with the batteries! Concept photos of the laptop show a coolness rarely seen outside a hobbyist convention. I want these guys to design my car…though it might not have a floor.

A note: This is an interesting media note from 1999 regarding hand cranked laptops. I wish I had one now. Sigh.

I found a white hair on my forearm today. Not one of those dinky hairs at your ankle that you only find when you’re idly picking out the lint of your toes, no…this one is a massive, gi-normous forearm hair that stares at you while saying, “What? You got a problem?” It is the Scarface of the hair populace on my body. I like to think that I have a little of that brash, brazen character in my DNA and now its true.

I also found another white hair in my nose, but I pulled that one out immediately. It won’t do to be that intimate with Scarface…and that scene with the pile of cocaine came to mind as well.

Just learning that .Mac 3.0 from Apple has upgraded its total capacity to 1GB out of the box, I am seriously thinking it might be good…for backups. After hearing about disasters and impending doom for all things electronic that cannot get wet, I have rethought my backup regimen. I have an external drive (80GB) that I can unplug and go at any time. I use ChronoSync to automatically keep all my files current from my HD (140GB) to the external. This is fine if I’m there to salvage the information, but what about automatic backup to remote locations? This is a fine idea, but not economical until recently with Gmail’s coup on disk space. When .Mac first came out, it was touted as a “secure” transfer and backup service along with all the other stuff like webspace and email. Well, when it was free, I used it and liked it. I could use the limited space for document upload and download through WebDAV and another email address was not remiss. When Apple started charging for the service, they lost me. It was 20MB of webspace or something ludicrous like it. No way was I paying $100 US DOLLARS for that. Now that .Mac has stewed in its own juices for a couple of years, it has matured into a web presence portal. It has email, web page development through templates, and backup software. They finally got it right this time around with Backup 3.0. It does incremental backups (new files only) rather than full (all files all the time). This will save you from the 10GB transfer limit per month that Apple has restricted for each .Mac account.

I have heard of Gmail hacks to use that webspace as a backup drive, but its only for Windows and I haven’t had the inclination to fool with it myself. I suppose that I could look into it before making any sort of rash decision. What am I talking about? Of course I won’t do anything. I never make a single technological move until I look at all the available options, then I gripe about the lack of scalability or feature and get the best device for the money involved.

It took me three months to decide whether or not I WANTED the Logitech Bluetooth Headset and once I got it, I found that I couldn’t live without it. BTW, it recently broke in my bag at work, so I’ll have to figure that one out soon…assuming there is a warranty for stupid people who inadvertently crush their headsets when Logitech supplies a hard cover for such an event. Yea, eBay is my friend in this instance I think.

Almost forgot to mention this little hack I heard on Security Now! about using your Gmail address to make unique website logins. Gmail is configured to allow a plus sign ( + ) after the moniker plus eight characters and still arrive in your mailbox. The idea is that you can create unique email addresses on the fly for particular sites you log into without compromising your security. I just think you can use it for unique spam signups and know who sold your info. I have utilized this hack for general spam (winterbc+spamATgmail.com) for example and have configured a filter at Gmail to place the email directly in the trash. Either way, the possibilities are quite numerous (8 * n)

Some of you may recognize the new-er layout, some of you may not. For anyone else who is not one of my two avid readers, I have added a search field on the right and moved the links from the bottom to the right. My saga to make this happen started with my unhappiness with the links at the bottom of my blog. Then, I went to Technorati and decided to list it. Technorati gave me a javascript to put on my blog and this was the impetus to change the layout. Little did I know that it would be so difficult to change such a simple thing. This blog is powered by the opensource software Greymatter which has a bug regarding this very issue. After perusing the help forums, I decided that this could be done and started by wiping the template I use back to its original state. I then experimented with various coding fixes detailed on the help forums, ulitmately getting me nowhere. I despaired and called upon a shower and 24 hours away from the problem to help me and it heard my call. During this frustrating time, I found a way to embed the links to the left of the top post, creating an inlet of clickability. While this was not what I wanted, it was pretty cool and I was willing to let it be. Also, I found unused code for a search field and wanted to implement that as well, as a sort of consolation prize when I failed at that which so many had already failed. Instead, I found my search field in the very place where the links were not, top right of the posts, where they reside now. Something (it might have been wiping the footer code) had done it and I didn’t care as long as I could paste the links there as well. As you can see, the result is apparent and I’m happy to say I am pleased with the turn of events. Happy weekend everyone.

This website has impressed me with its ability to decypher issues that I don’t normally hear about or hear very little about. Part of their mission statement says it better than I could: “We publish clarifying debates which help people make up their own minds.” This site reminds me of The Economist in its decisions of articles and the intellect portrayed in those articles. My favorite so far isn’t an article, but it is on the site. It is a book of the mug shots of all the heads of state at the UN. What intrigued me about this project is that they were looking for a pattern in the pictures, but found instead true randomness. This sounds like something I would do and probably is why I’m drawn to this site. The book is published and I’m thinking it would be a great coffee table gift.

What the hell is this? I’m downloading the WoW Mac update to 1.7 at like .3 bytes per sec. I go to the direct download page for WoW updaters and Macs can only update through the built-in updater. Then, the Blizzard Downloader has the audacity to tell me that I’m blocking ports its using to pull this 54MB file. First of all, the ports are fine. I’ve done this updating thing several times before and my configuration hasn’t changed. I was cruising along at top speed until today. Secondly, where is it written that only Windows computers get direct download privileges? I’m tired of feeling like a second-class citizen because I have discerning tastes when it comes to operating systems. I will not be penalized because I like the Mac!

Whew.

Yea, I’m sitting here waiting for this molassas download to finish.

It just put up the firewall warning again.

Just to make a point, I turned off the firewall.

Its still slow.

Just to make sure, I checked that I put this computer outside my NAT settings, ie. in the DMZ. Yep, its there.

The great thing about having a Mac is that while a firewall is a great thing, there are few script kiddies and worms out there concerned with the Mac OS, so shutting off the firewall doesn’t amount to a death sentence.

Still throwing up warnings of “could not connect to tracker.” Track this, Blizzard!

After reading Walt Mossberg’s article about the Nano, I will revise my earlier estimation of his limited brain capacity. He feels that the black Nano is the sleekest thing he’s seen and I agree with him. Stacking five credit cards together and cutting 20% off the side of those…I need to get to an Apple Store. Not that I can afford one of these, but who would possibly pay $200 for the 2 GB model when you can get twice the capacity for $50 more? Its an entry price thing and I get it. I’ll just dream for a while and read all the articles that speculate how the Nano will bring Apple’s stock up or down and their competition’s attitude up or down.

I like this new iPod. It looks cool and its just my size…nanosized. I want the black one.

Well, I didn’t think it would happen this year…I thought last year. Sparky and Krista are engaged! For those of you who don’t know Sparky, he’s a fantastic man from my college days. We weathered the British Isles Study Tour together with T.J. and according to the president of Whitworth College, he’s the only man without guile alive today. That alone should make you want to send him your congratulations. Do so: jacobspaun@gmail.com