Bookmarks for August 5 to 11

1. wzdd: On computer programming
   Is this really what we do? funny programming

2. YouTube - PostSecret Video made by the owner of postsecret.com Post Secret is the bleeding of an entire species. art video blog

3. armstrong_thesis_2003.pdf (application/pdf Object) erlang programming concurrency distributed thesis
   

4. Wikidbase: the ultimate groupware application, possibly Very interesting project here. Wiki with formatting that controls a database.

5. Teach a Kid to Program / Wired How To's programming education parenting

6. Cleversafe Open Source Community storage distributed grid
   

7. eBay My World - crystal-forest

8. WinSplit Revolution Still trying to find better ways to utilize my screens. This looks promising. display productivity monitor software windows free

9. diagrammes modernes: Friendly Readable ID Stringspython algorithm generation debugging
   

10. The Independent Gaming Source's (Opinionated) Guide to Indie Gaming Really good list of great indie games. games indie list free fun

11. The Wii Remote API - Opera Developer Community web wii interface javascript

12. Multiverse mmorpg games development

13. Paul Buchheit: The first thing that you need to understand about humans brain people interesting psychology
    

14. Not Worried About the Future future religion children intelligence
    

Extra, Extra, Google Storage Service, Who Cares?

Google is rolling out storage services for their products, and I just wish they'd take my Amazon S3 keys, instead. Go figure.

Less for More in Media

I think this is appropriate, because my favorite software is a transport for media. YouTube, music downloads, blogs, and web comics are all old media turned new. TV and movies are old and web videos are new. CDs are old and downloads are new. Books and magazines are old and blogging is new. Newspaper comics are old and web comics are new. Why did I single out comics? Because, Scott Adams, of Dilbert fame (who has an excellent, non-comic-centric blog) took fledgely comic cartoonist, Scott Meyer, under his wing. This is old teaching new, and is interesting to watch.

On the first post from Adams, I commented about how many cartoonists might not even want the traditional route of syndication, and will choose to stay with web formats. On part 2, I commented as follows:

It is becoming one of the defining characteristics of the New Media that more people can make less money. To the eyes of the Old Media, this is obviously a Bad Thing. No one gets quite as much attention or makes quite as much money, but if you look at how many more people can make it at least to a good level, and you sum it all up, I'd be sure the overall industry makes more. To add to that, huge chunks of the money aren't going to syndication agencies and other central entities. More of the less money stays with the artists. The same is happening in moves from newspaper comics to web comics, music from CD to download, and sixty dollar video games being pushed aside for dozens of ten to twenty dollar smaller titles, each. The end is more variety, and a better chance of finding something that you like, more people make a living on what they love, and more of the profits staying with the people who are actually doing the creating. The old media will not go away for a long time, and we still need it, but the model simply changes. Cartoonists aren't supposed to make a million dollars a year any more, and that's OK if, instead, twenty or more cartoonists can make a very decent living with their craft, don't you agree?

Why An Empty Inbox Is Terrible For Productivity

Mark Hurst of Good Experience has had a deceptive experience. I feel for his sense of accomplishment, but I'm here to let him and everyone know that an empty inbox is a terrible recipe for lost productivity.

It was incredible. It was so stunning to me. I had written off the idea of ever having a totally empty inbox.

- Mark Hurst

The problem here is a subtle lie that none of realize we tell ourselves or others when we talk about the virtues of keeping a clean inbox. The word "inbox". I did all of this some time back, and I was really excited, just like Mark. It wasn't long before I realized I had only made things worse.

Some people may know that I slowly slipped away from Python-Dev lists, and what you wouldn't know is one of the key causes to my lack of participation in mailing lists for some time now. The problem started when I added filters for all my mailing lists and started regiments to empty out my inbox to 0. I sat, looked at my wonderous empty inbox, and spent the next few months continually ignoring the non-empty labels hidden off in the label listing.

Sure, my inbox can stay empty these days, but all we're doing is hiding the problem. Hiding a problem is not a solution.