OK…after the recent upgrade and subsequent tweaks to Google’s RSS reader, I’m taking it out for a spin as my primary feed reader (replacing the Firefox plugin sage, FYI). So far, so good.

The big bang for my buck is no duplication…I have feeds duplicated in readers at home, at work, and on my laptop with sage (and also on my Nokia 770 with it’s integrated reader), and it’s a royal pain in my ass to have to re-read feeds in 3 places to make sure I don’t miss anything. Online readers fix that…but I hadn’t been able to find a web-based reader I could stand. I tried bloglines several different times, and I hate the interface…and in fact, I hated the original Google Reader interface. It’s why I stopped using both of them.

But with the new updates, Google Reader isn’t too bad at all, and even supports keyboard shortcuts; sweet! I had a bit of a struggle getting one of my own feeds (for my blog comments) subscribed…finally worked it out. There does appear to be a tiny bit of wigginess with feed subscriptions, though. I hope it never bites me severely! But for now, I’m happy to spend some time kicking these tires.

What a week! More info later, but for now, check out Flash 9 for Linux (beta finally released!), Democracy Player (update; lots of new features), Beep Media Player BMPx (new release a couple of weeks ago, I just found it), and Songbird (new release). Also, I finally started playing with last.fm, since BMPx and Songbird integrate with it.

Busy!!

Penguin.SWF: Beta Is Live

Will update soon with my experiences…

UPDATE: Snap…this shit works. So far, so good.

Here is the blip.tv page, and direct MP3 download link for the October 13th episode.

I paused a podcast by Jon Udell to rant about his topic, unified messaging. (Note: I couldn’t remember specifics while I was talking; Jon Udell was talking to Mark Ericson, and the app is SessionSuite. The company is BlueNote Networks.) Links:

• Jon Udell’s podcast with Mark Ericson
• BlueNote Networks
• GrandCentral
• FreeSWITCH
• LibJingle
• Jabber Software Foundation
• Speex (free speech codec)

PS: No, I’m definitely not happy with the audio. I’m trying two new different solutions for in-car this week.

It took me a month, but I finally got around to reading What’s New in Python 2.5. I had forgotten about some of the good stuff (try…finally…except support, ElementTree added to std library), and didn’t know about some stuff (__missing__ dict attribute, sqlite3 added to std library, datetime.strptime). Outstanding!

If you’re interested in politics, and don’t get factcheck.org’s emails regarding advertising, I heartily suggest you visit their site.

FactCheck.org was originally started to fact check info in the 2004 election, but they’ve stayed around, and they’re doing a great job dissecting misleading and downright deceitful advertising by both sides in this election cycle. As near as I can tell, they do a great job of being objective…they aren’t shy to take on either side.

I have little tolerance for politicians of any stripe (or anyone, really) that twist and distort the facts to make a false statement seem true, or misrepresent a situtation. Especially in as important a circumstance as an election. I commend the FactCheck folks for their hard work in trying to help let some sunshine in!

A couple of recent examples (I’m deliberately choosing one from each side here):

• Tugging At Heartstrings With Loose Facts: A mother makes an emotional but misleading accusation against GOP Rep. Nancy Johnson.
• Taxing Times in Ohio Battleground: GOP wrongly accuses Democrat of reversing her tax stand.

Plenty more good stuff where those came from.

I’m a sucker for Python toolkits. Kamaelia is a new one to me…I think I heard a bit about it earlier, as it got some airtime when it was announced (it’s initial development was by the BBC for some of their Archive initiatives). But I wasn’t aware all these toys were available to play with! Joy.

I’m so easy.

I’m playing with Google Code Search….looks like it could have uses at times. Another wrench for the toolbox!

WRT the YouTube purchase…so far, I like Andrew Leonard’s comments in Salon. Not the dot-boom part; the fact that [it] is the necessary next step in the democratization and enrichment of global cultural intercourse. I think that’s well put. There are definitely growing pains coming for the entrenched rich media companies, but this is only a good thing for everyone, IMO.

Here is the blip.tv page, and direct MP3 download link for the October 6th episode.

I renege on my solumn vow to never use the iPAQ again for podcasting, and then navel-gaze regarding my options for replacing it; I rant on the bizarre AM radio commercials I listened to this week, discuss games as learning experiences, thank Cthulhu for this thing we call podcasting, make a pledge to catch up to BG 3.0 episode 1 by sometime next week, and then trip off to work.

PS: I’m trying to figure out best encoding parameters…this is encoded at 32 kbit, vs. 64 that I’d been using before (half the size). If it sucks, let me know. 

Here is the blip.tv page, and direct MP3 download link for the October 1st episode.

I finish the podcast list, and do it sitting at the PC to boot, so it probably sounds a bit better. I review my technical podcast list, and round things out with the miscellaneous skeptic stuff. On to the jazzy new material…huzzah!

Links mentioned:

• Distributing The Future
• Digital Village
• Jon Udell
• 2600: Off the Hook and Off the Wall
• Neofiles
• IT Conversations
• Skepticality
• FreeThought Radio

(Note: Jon Udell DOES have an RSS for his podcast, turns out: http://weblog.infoworld.com/udell/gems/fridaypodcast.xml)