Geekery

Dave Winer has created something pretty damn sweet. A readable, portable version of The New York Times that I can read on my Treo. Normally I just stick to mobile.bbc.co.uk and mobile.latimes.com, because they’re the only news sites that I read regularly that have good mobile support. Point your mobile browser here: nytimesriver.com. Thanks, Dave!

My home media/backup server officially has an obscene amount of storage. I have three internal drives and one external: Utnapishtim – 400 GB (I scored this last week for $120 shipped, via DealMac.com) Shamhat – 200 GB Enkidu – 25 GB Humbaba – 250 GB Now that I think about it, perhaps I should rename the 400 GB drive Humbaba.

So last week I blogged about cyber security, and Stephen Colbert joked last week about entering random search queries to throw off an online profile. Today, life imitates art: Enter the TrackMeNot Firefox extension.

With all this talk about search data being leaked, I’ve given a little bit more thought to cyber-security. First, I use my ISP‘s VPN almost all the time now. Second, I’ve switched from Fire to Adium, if for no other reason than it’s more customizable and has really super easy built-in encryption. Then today I came across these tips from the EFF on how to keep your search history private, including a suggestion to get the CustomizeGoogle Firefox extension. All…

This evening, I installed Parallels Desktop to my Mac, enabling me to run Windows XP on my Mac. It’s a weird feeling.

Seems to be working now.

Apparently, I’ve cracked the top 10 of “Cyrus” on Google. I’m after the Cyrus Restaurant but before Cyrus’ Blather. When I last blogged about it, I came in at number 11. That is all for tonight.

Mark Pilgrim‘s blog has taught me two things today: 1) HOWTO make the perfect fruit salad and get laid 2) On storage, from the comments: My uncle works for NASA. Years ago, he was called in to consult for the government on how to store some important data. Tape drives? CDs? (This was before DVDs.) His response was this: “If you write it on papyrus and lock it in a pyramid, we know it will last a few thousand years.…

I spent my lunch, accompanied by Paul Boutin, writing this: Xenii Xeni Coordinates: Ask Sergey Ask JBat Altitude: 100 feet above sea level 5’9″ in heels Posse: Kweli, Foxx, Coolio Cory, Pesco, Frau Hardware: (5) 2 x Technix SL-1200 MK6 prototype turntables (5) Rane 24-channel mixers 400,000 watts total Gold-plated MacBook Pro Telefunken 768B Uniblogger Wireless Studio Diamond earring that doubles as bluetooth headset Maximum Volume: 146 dB with sub-subwoofers engaged The time Wired killed her cover story Security System:…

No, I wasn’t imagining things. After 13 months of use, my iBook battery has cycled 279 times, thus reducing its capacity. It now can run on the battery for about one hour. A new battery is about $100 – $120. Damn. So that reduces the resale value of this iBook when I sell it, whenever the new MacBooks come out.