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I feel the need - For some NES Covers, if they could be... by: Jory Graham
Re: love it!!! metra? - @mrm: Thanks! I'm glad that the map has... by: ed knittel
love it!!! metra? - I'm moving to Chicago soon and your site... by: mrm
Re: I love it - Christian, unfortunately I don't think it would be... by: ed knittel
Re: THANK YOU!! - That's fantastic to hear. I'm so glad that... by: ed knittel

So now my 10 Most Recent Delicious links doesn't work. And it's not just because the link changed but because they changed how content can be retrieved. Needless to say I don't know yet what I have to do to make it work again so for now no more delicious links.

Bah!

Ummm, Microsoft, you're done.

Today Google, the world's biggest owner of everything, announced Google Docs templates. "So what? What's the big deal?" You might be thinking. But it is a big deal and here's why: people crave templates like children crave order. It helps them to accomplish goals and feel good about themselves. Templates, unlike "chores" for kids, also save a ton of time.

Have you ever needed an invoice? I know I have. What about a resume? Who hasn't? The thing is that these things and many more require you to find a place to start. From the horse's mouth:

When researching how people use templates, we saw that lots of you create documents for all aspects of your lives. You need resumes and cover letters to look for jobs and fax cover letters and invoices to run your businesses. And of course you want to use documents in fun ways with family and friends, such as unique designs and layouts for invitation cards and calendars. Finally, everyone wants to be able to have tools that "just work": print mailing labels, track portfolio values, and manage projects without having to painstakingly create documents from scratch.

Did you find yourself saying "yea, I need that" a couple of times? And that's where Microsoft has had you by the proverbial balls. If you've ever needed a place to start with a specific type of document chances are Microsoft Word had it for you. Even Avery has made label templates for Word. I've used them a bunch of times.

People, unlike myself, have been reluctant to embrace Google Docs. Google's Word clone, Documents, is lacking many of Microsoft's formatting abilities. Spreadsheets is behind Excel. And Presentations - whoo - where's the CrAzY animations from Powerpoint? Where do you start?

I like Google Docs because it's stupid easy to share documents and I can access them from just about anywhere (iPhone, I'm looking at you, sweetie). But now more people are going to fall in love with Google Docs because they can get started and "just work". There's no thinking about formatting and layout and jibbity-jab. Done.

Google changed blogging when they introduced templates for Blogger. Now every blogging system has out-of-the-box templates that A LOT of people use and stick with. Because they know they don't need anything fancy.

And these new templates are going to do the same thing. I guarantee it, just wait and see.

Over the night word began to spread. We'd lost another one; one of the greats had passed away. Revolutionary comedian, George Carlin died at the young age of 71 due to heart failure.

His voice and observations about humanity will be sorely missed. There was no other like him.

 
Photo: Vincent Laforet/The New York Times

• 2008 Design Trends
• Free Fonts Of The Month: Anivers, Gentium, Fresco | Fonts | Smashing Magazine

I really gotta get back into the blog of things *sigh*. In the meantime I have been using Twitter a bit more. Follow tastypopsicle if you're interested.

I knew as soon as I watched the video and listened to the song "Alice" done by Last.fm user Pogo that it was going to become an instant internet hit. I first saw it over at kottke.org and then today I see that Xeni Jardin posted it at Boing Boing.

Judge for yourself

You can download the song from here. eNjoy!

Albert Hofmann, the pioneering Swiss chemist and advocate of psychedelics who discovered the hallucinogenic properties of LSD, died Tuesday. He was 102.

If you don't know about the "Bicycle Trip" you've missed one of the most entertaining, non-fiction stories ever told. If you don't know about the story know this: it was 1943 when it happened. Probably 30 years earlier than most people could imagine.

R.I.P.

The CTA and Google announcement yesterday (and the large story in the Tribune this morning) has been driving traffic to my CTA Google Maps Mashup. I created and maintain a map that plots CTA stations on top of the Google maps API making it easy to find businesses near a particular location. It has served its purpose well since it first premiered in July of 2005 (I made the official announcement in October of that same year after it started to gain some internet publicity). Since then it has seen its fair share of peaks in traffic as other blogs and sites made mention of it. See here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

It looks like this is going to be another one of those days. Yesterday alone tastypopsicle.com saw a spike in traffic resulting in 465 visits (about 330 more than average). I expect to see as many as 500-600 hits today. However, this time all of the traffic is ironically enough from Google. Just do a search for "CTA Google Chicago" or "Google CTA" or any other sort of combination of those terms and you'll notice that my CTA Google Maps Mashup is the number one result.

Of course I realize that my map is not what these people are looking for. But even so I have noticed a large number of visitors are sticking around which means they at least find the map interesting.

And my map should get even more interesting. I plan to incorporate the transit trip planner into the map much the same way that I have incorporated the ability to find businesses near an address. I'll probably try a few ideas to see what works the best but I'd love to know what fellow Chicagoans and visitors to Chicago think. My map serves all of you who visit it and use it. And it's 100% ad-free (although I have had some thoughts about that - I won't lie. The spike in traffic today is reason enough to consider adding ads.) Contact me with your thoughts and comments.

In the end I do it because I like to do it and I find problem solving through programming challenging and rewarding. And if this partnership between the CTA and Google means the eventual death on my map then I welcome it. It means that these guys have finally caught on to what people really want.

Here's a few of the popular Chicago/CTA sites that are chimming in as well:

• Chicago Business
• CTA Tattler
• Chicagoist

 

Apple : Everything Macintosh because, well, they're the best computers.
Explodingdog : Good drawings with funny titles. Very creative.
Internet Movie Database : The best place to get all of the information about any movie - ever made. This is the only place you'll ever need to go.
SpyMac : A whole community built around, by, and for the faithful Mac enthusiasts.
The Morning News :: An interesting read on the days news - locally, nationally and internationally - but always with a fun or personal touch
NewScientist.com : Stumbled across this site recently. I've always been kinda fascinated with science and you'd be surprised with some of the stories they cover.
Things Magazine : a lot of talk about a lot of things. At the present time I am more interested in all of the various Web sites it links to.
What Do I Know : A collection of daily thoughts, news, and opinions concerning the new media & technology industry as perceived by Todd Dominey, sole-proprietor of Dominey Design.
Wired Magazine : I've always liked this periodical. I've had a few subscriptions to it over the years. Now you can read most of the stories online.