The Morning News
Question: do you have hipsters? 
CSS Vertical Align
Aligning things vertically in CSS seems to befuddle most. I still need a refresher course from time to time to remember what actually works. Vertical-Align Misue over at iBloom Studios clears it up.
Find All Instances
This may be common knowledge to some of you, but up until today I didn't know how to find all instances within a movie clip with Actionscript. After emailing Mason, he sent back exactly what I needed to know. Of course, once I learned that it's called a "for-in" loop, I found references to it all over the place. The example in the movie clip chapter over on the O'Reilly site is essentially that same idea. Thanks again, Mr. Poe!
In This World
I pulled a Scott this weekend and watched five movies: The Squid and the Whale, Bubble, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Island and Everything Is Illuminated. Of them all, Everything Is Illuminated was my favorite. I will also say that Michael Bay sure knows how to do a car chase.
Bubble had a similar feel to Gus Van Sant' Elephant, but wasn't satisfying. However, the commentary track from Steven Soderberg and Mark Romanek was. Romanek was a pleasant surprise. Definitely more of a technical conversation about the film making process, but cool to sit in and listen to those two talk about film for an hour or so.
During the commentary, Soderberg mentioned In This World by Michael Winterbottom. That recommendation and the 90% rating at Rotten Tomatoes definitely piqued my interest.
Google Calendar
Looks like Google launched their calendar on us and it's awesome: calendar sharing, iCal publishing, integration with Gmail, cell phone reminders. Here's the official word from Google on the calendar launch.
Flash Object
In my search for a cleaner solution to the upcoming IE ActiveX update, I stumbled onto Flash Object over at deconcept.com. I need to test it out with our sites at work, but looks as if that's what I'm switching to for Flash detection and embedding.
CNN Redesign
Looks like CNN rolled out a new home page over the weekend.
White Powder
In addition to a pretty eventful weekend hanging out with Amy, Jeremy and my brother, I managed to squeeze in four movies: V For Vendetta, The Aristocrats, Serenity and Jarhead. In that order, here are my one-word reviews: Excellent, tedious, superb, satisfactory.
Nintendo DS Lite
Great video review of the Nintendo DS Lite by Cabel Sasser.
Joshua Davis
There's an interview with Joshua Davis over at Wired.
Reggie Fils-Aime
Here's the integral question from a recent Engadget interview with Reggie Fils-Aime of Nintendo and why I will always love that company.
I know we don't have a ton of time left, so one of the last things I wanted to ask you about was about how Sony and Microsoft are positioning their new consoles as multimedia digital entertainment devices in addition to gaming devices, something which Nintendo has not emphasized. Sony talks about the PSP and how it can play music and video, and while the DS can have those capabilities, it's not something Nintendo talks about very much. What is Nintendo's philosophy about all this stuff going forward? Do you see multimedia as a distraction from gaming?
Our philosophy is that consumers want great gaming experiences and our passion is delivering great gaming experiences. In the home console space, we believe that the best way to do that is with a dedicated machine. In the handheld space, as you've said, the DS does have other capabilities in the multimedia area, but we believe it's important to first establish its credentials as a superb game playing device.
To be perfectly clear, the Microsoft and Sony strategies are based on overall corporate objectives versus what's right for the consumer. That's a reality. Microsoft is essentially trying to get you to put a PC in your living room because they are fundamentally a PC software company. Sony is trying to get you to put an entertainment hub that has Blu-ray technology because that's important to their movie business and the rest of their entire electronics business.
We are a gaming company. We are gamers at heart. We love creating great, innovative content and superbly designed hardware, that's what we do. And with that passion comes a laser like focus to do things that are right for the consumer and right for the business. That's the fundamental difference in our strategy versus our competition.
Nacho Libre
Jared Hess + Jack Black = Nacho Libre.
Western State
The Western State series over at Coudal is pretty nice. They've been up there for a while it seems, but they are great shorts.
Gameboy Micro
The Gameboy Micro mini-site from 2Advanced is probably the first tasteful thing I've seen from those guys in a long time.
Romanek
There's an Artist Series Documentary featuring Mark Romanek up over at Hillman Curtis. Watch the one on Pentagram while you're there, too.
XHTML2
I've seen hints of what's coming as far as markup on the web, but the IBM series The Future of HTML definitely spells it out for me. Part one of the series deals with the WHATWG, HTML 5 and Web Forms 2. Whereas, Part two takes on the future of XHTML 2.
HTML more confined to standards mixed with Web Forms 2 sounds like a great start to me. A total adoption of either seems impossible. Obviously, any of these changes will be phased in over several years.
BigDaddy
Apparently, these are the IPs for the upcoming "BigDaddy" algorithm switch at Google: 66.249.93.104 and 64.233.179.104. I was still at the top of the list for "Robbie Player", but apparently it's supposed to shake things up a bit.
Abercrombie
The owner of Abercrombie & Fitch looks weird.
Web Authoring
Awesome breakdown of Web Authoring Statistics from Google. I'll have to dig through this more at home.
Jump Justin
I haven't ever had a reason to use the Favorites options on Flickr until I saw this picture of Ben's friend Justin. So good.
Paper CD Case
I'll have to try out the Paper CD Case. If anything, just another clever way to package mixes.
Meetings
I agree with the University of Minnesota and 37 Signals: meetings are usually more detrimental than helpful. Length, lack of focus and poor preparation are usually to blame.
Command Line
I like dabbling with the XP command line occasionally. This XP/2000 command list is the best reference I've seen.
Invisibles
I completely cleaned out IE 6 yesterday and moved everything over to Firefox for good. In the process, I remembered I used to be addicted to Invisibles. I immediately added it back to my bookmarks. Glad to see it's still updated weekly.
X v XP
I understand why Windows XP/Vista eventually running on the new Intel-Macs is positive for Apple, but the real question is will the Intel build of OS X run on my PC?
Predictions
All the 2006 predictions have started rolling out. Two lists I've seen that seem reasonably plausible are I, Cringely and Popular Mechanics.
Things that will affect my life in '06: metadata, the proliferation of AJAX, new stuff from Google, NAND Flash memory, and Adobe's acquisition of Macromedia.
Aperitif and Digestif
I may at some point or another, if you've had a meal with me, have mentioned aperitifs and digestifs. I almost always get a puzzled look in return. Nevertheless, for all of you in the dark, an aperitif is drink that is served before a meal to stimulate the appetite (e.g., sherry is a popular one, as well Greek ouzo — like an appetizer). As you may have guessed, a digestif is served after a meal and should aid in digestion (e.g., brandy and cognac are popular). Basically, a lighter, sweeter drink beforehand, a heavy, strong drink afterwards.
There is no point to this post, other than to educate those who may not have known what I was talking about at the time. I don't know why this idea has always attracted me (although I believe it may have been in the movie Made), but I'd like to get back to the usage of aperitifs and digestifs. If only to see if they actually do aid in creating an appetite and/or digestion.
Yeah, I know this is weird way to start 2006.
Merry Christmas
To the handful of people who come here regularly, I'll be attempting to take a break from the interweb over the Christmas and New Year holidays. I should be back to posting again on January 2nd. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, everyone!
ExtraTasty
ExtraTasty is live. Get your booze on.
Mac IE
I'm going to consider this the final push I needed to finally remove Mac IE 5 from my machine at work.
Checklist
C82 posted a great alternative to a multiple select element. Displaying the information as a scrollable checklist is a much more intuitive solution.
Spreadshirt
Apparently, you can design a single shirt and have it printed over at Spreadshirt. Quality is the big variable, of course.
Typography
I was told about The Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst several years back. Richard Rutter is applying the same ideas covered in the book to the web through CSS. Should prove to be a useful resource, if only to motivate me to buy a copy of the original book.
RSS
IE 7 to use Mozilla's RSS icon. Now if only Republicans and Democrats could play nice.
Echizen Kurage
Giant jellyfish terrorize the people of Japan!
Euphemisms
Here's a great thread that has crept its way back into the limelight over at YH: Sexual Euphemisms That Won't Catch On
Ray Kurzweil
Ray Kurzweil was on The Diane Rehm Show this morning talking about Singularity, human vs. computer intelligence and advances in technology. Stream the show if any of that sounds interesting.
Root Servers
Honestly, I'm glad the US managed to maintain control of the internet's root servers. Getting the UN involved would just screw it up for everyone. We made it, it's ours.
AOHELL
Do not install that new version of AIM. Sure, it is an improvement over what's out there now, but it's a RAM hog and it basically infects your computer with its madness. The Notification Manager remained installed and continued to weasel its way into my start-up process.
The Fountain
Oh, man. I can't wait.
Beijing 2008
China released the set of illustrated mascots that will be used for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. Definitely puts past US mascots to shame.
Oil Hearings
Glad to see the guys/gals on The Hill decided to do something about the ridiculous profits the Big Oil companies reported last quarter. Like I said before, there's nothing wrong with capitalism and making a profit, but it's how much profit certain oil companies made during the past several months. And how much they could make if nothing is done about crude oil before Winter sets in.
Unfortunately, the wonderful Republican solution looks like they are going to drill in the Alaskan wildlife refuge. Mother Earth is going to wipe us out and not think twice about it, one of these days.
Control
I was familiar with about 90% of these alternate PHP control structures. It's still a nice reference.
Whiskerino 2005
Two years ago, I was part of The Beard Contest 2003 over at yewknee.com. Well, it's back and this time it's been dubbed Whiskerino 2005. If you'd like to keep up with my progress, here's my personal detail page over at Whiskerino. There's a larger NC contingent this year.
San Francisco
Back from vacation with Amy to California for her 30th birthday. It was an eventful trip and we actually ended up in Los Angeles for a day or so.
Google Print
And then there was Google Print.
Boston
Definitely seems like I haven't stayed put much lately. I just got back from Boston this past weekend and am heading to NYC for the CMJ Music Marathon tomorrow.
fvlogger
A contributor to A List Apart has created fvlogger, a Javascript logging utility. I would've liked something like this many, many times in the past. I'll have to keep in it mind for future projects.
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