Green Scissors

 RIP Don Knotts.

Don Knotts, 1294-2006 - Call him Mr. Limpet, Mr. Furley, Wormie, Les Calhoun, or Barney Fife. Actor Don Knotts has passed away at 81.

(Via Metafilter)

 Seriously, when will the iPod stuff stop.  Although this one looks fairly neat, it is still a bit over the top for my taste.  But then, I never wear a tie.

Pink Commuter iPod Tie -

If you’re looking for a convenient place to carry that iPod nano, the Pink Commuter tie is for you, that is, if you don’t mind looking slightly fey wearing pink. Actually, this 100% silk tie is available in red and navy for metrosexuals, in addition to pink for all you others. The tie has a special loop that keeps all those wires in check, and it looks like you could run the wires up behind your tie and underneath the collar of your shirt, discreetly poking out the back on their way to your earbuds. So if you’re forced to wear that coat-and-tie monkey suit all day, might as well take advantage of it with a great place to hide your tunes. From Thomas Pink for $85.

The iPod tie [TechDigest]

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(Via Gizmodo)

 If you have read System of the World by Neal Stephenson you will find this Flickr set interesting.  Lots of good pictures with page number references to the books.  Merry ole England never looked so good.

Flickr set documents locations in Neal Stephenson trilogy - Cory Doctorow: Neil sez, "Great chunks of Neal Stephenson’s ‘The System of the World’ trilogy (review) use the Tower of London as a pivotal location, but I never got a clear enough mental picture of the place. So I photo-documented the Tower, with Flickr notes text extracts to provide a visual guide for the interested reader. The Baroque Cycle takes in a lot of the specific geography of London, and I’d love to see a collective gazetteer emerge, perhaps using ‘baroquecyclelondon’ as a tag?" Link (Thanks, Neil!)

(Via Boing Boing)

Sooner or later it was bound to happen.  Comment Spam.  On the one hand I see it as a backhanded compliment that someone deems my site worthy of spamming.  On the other (much larger) hand I find it a sad commentary on the state of things.

 For the moment I have disabled Anonymous commenting and all registered users will have their comments approved before they are posted.  Not like you were all beating down the door in the first place

 So if you are  looking for comments about big beautiful donkey raping European teen orgy cams, you will be out of luck at Green Scissors.

 Yet another reason why I am trying to get away from using Microsoft products.  Sure, they have every right todecide how their product is liscensed.  But what they have done now is made an upgrade that should cost between $50-$150 into at least a $200 proposition.  And this will not prevent those who will simply reinstall anyway.  Just punish those dwindling number of customers who actually try to follow the rules.

Microsoft: Upgraded Motherboard = New Windows License - Microsoft recently made a change to the license agreement saying that a new motherboard is equal to a new computer, hence you need to purchase a new Windows license. Here is what Microsoft has to say:

 

?An upgrade of the motherboard is considered to result in a ?new personal computer? to which Microsoft® OEM operating system software cannot be transferred from another computer. If the motherboard is upgraded or replaced for reasons other than a defect, then a new computer has been created and the license of new operating system software is required.?

 

The reason Microsoft gave for this term is that ?Microsoft needed to have one base component ?left standing? that would still define that original PC. Since the motherboard contains the CPU and is the ?heart and soul? of the PC, when the motherboard is replaced (for reasons other than defect) a new PC is essentially created.?

 

Microsoft sent a memo to its OEM partners asking them to enforce this new policy, every time they upgrade a computer for a client.

 

(Via Metafilter)

 Yet another great little kit of tools for developing web apps.  At this rate I won’t be able to keep up with everything.  These tools are downloadable and installed on your own web server.  And they are free!  Watch out folks.  Soon AJAX based web apps will be as common as RSS feeds.

Yahoo releases free/open source UI library - Cory Doctorow: Premshree sez, "Yahoo! just released the Yahoo! User Interface Library, under a BSD license. From the website:"

The Yahoo! User Interface Library is a set of utilities and controls, written in JavaScript, for building richly interactive web applications using techniques such as DOM scripting, HTML and AJAX. The UI Library Utilities facilitate the implementation of rich client-side features by enhancing and normalizing the developer’s interface to important elements of the browser infrastructure (such as events, in-page HTTP requests and the DOM). The Yahoo UI Library Controls produce visual, interactive user interface elements on the page with just a few lines of code and an included CSS file. All the components in the Yahoo! User Interface Library have been released as open source under a BSD license and are free for all uses.

Link (Thanks, Premshree!)

(Via Boing Boing)

 More mashups for me to listen to tonight.  Why do the Beatles seem to get the remix treatment more than most?  Who knows.

New album of Beatles/Beasties mashups - drop-dead awesome! - Cory Doctorow: dj BC has released a second album of "Beastles" (Beatles/Beastie Boys) mashups called Let It Beast. dj BC is one of my all time favorite mashup artists, not least because I love both the Beatles and the Beasties and the way that he mixes them together brings new life to both. He clearly loves his source material dearly, and his treatment of them is playful, artistic, and totally danceable. I’m halfway through the new album, and I’m already in love, especially with Electrified Kite, a remix of "Being for the Benefit of Mr Kite" and "Electrify."

1. Ladies Do Love Me
2. Belly Movin
3. Buildin My Life
4. Electrified Kite
5. Let it Beast
6. Lovely NYC
7. Anna’s MCs
8. Love You To Check It Out
9. Looking Down The Barrel of a Warm Gun
10. A Day in The Life of A Beastie Boy

This is dj BC’s second Beastles album; the first one was just called "The Beastles" and it’s up for download on the dj BC site as well. Link (Thanks, dj BC!)

(Via Boing Boing)

 Dammit now I have to explore all these new AJAX tools.  At this point Protopage looks absolutely killer once there are some more widgets (and an API) to mess with.  Good times!

Online Ajax Pages The New Web Desktop? - SphereOfInfluence writes "With our existing models for operating environments aging badly, how do we manage our information and software as we get increasingly mobile and short on attention? In a ZDNet piece, Dion Hinchcliffe discusses the rise of the new dynamic, online, roaming Ajax desktops like Netvibes, Live.com, Protopage, and Pageflakes. Will concerns about privacy and reliability kill these or is this the wave of the future?"

(Via Slashdot)

 The best news I’ve heard about sports broadcasting in a long time.  The ESPN Sunday Night NFL team has rightly been regarded with some contempt and a lot of that has been directed at McGuire (watch this right here.  you wanna see a guy getting ripped.  BAM!! right there!).  Replacing McGuire with Kornheiser, one of the smartest people in any media, can only help.  Imagine Dennis Miller but with a vastly improved knowledge of the game and a sharper sense of humor.

Tirico, Theismann, Kornheiser to call ESPN’s MNF games - Mike Tirico, Joe Theismann and Tony Kornheiser will be part of a three-man booth calling the games on Monday nights next season and Suzy Kolber and Michelle Tafoya will be sideline reporters.

(Via ESPN NFL News)

Concurring Opinions has a fantastic humorous translation of Attorney General Gonzales’ testimony at the NSA surveillance hearings. A couple of highlights for your reading pleasure:

GONZALES: Presidents throughout our history has authorized the warrantless surveillance of the enemy during wartime, and they have done so in ways far more sweeping than the narrowly targeted terrorist surveillance program authorized by President Bush.

TRANSLATION: They did it too! It ain’t fair to single us out. Yes, they did it before the FISA was passed, but still! 

 

GONZALES: In terms of, "Why not go to the FISA Court?" once the determination was made that neither the Constitution nor FISA prohibited the use of this tool, then the question becomes, for the commander in chief, which of the tools is appropriate given a particular circumstance. . . . What I can say, Senator, is that we are continually looking at ways that we can work with the FISA Court in being more efficient and more effective in fighting the war on terror.

TRANSLATION: Basically, going to the FISA court is a total pain in the ass.