Time in a Vacuum

Mark Cubin has a wonderful post explaining his decision to vote for Barack Obama, the President-elect - Proud To Be An American.

What Obama brings:

“Its simple. Having an elected black President will do more to energize this country than any economic or social policy ever could. In a single day of voting, our amazing country once again reinvigorated the dream that any child in this country, no matter what circumstances they are born into, can grow up to be anything they want, including President of the United States.

That dream, staying viable, being reinvigorated, will do more for this country than any economic policy or any legislation that could ever be passed.

I have said it before, the power of the American Spirit is what separates our country from every other. We have been able to overcome the stupidity that politicians do every year, and will do for ever more. The election of Barack Obama is a shot of adrenaline for those who felt they could never participate in the American Dream.

This is the very reason why so many young voters made it out to the polls, to cast their voice. They felt a part of this system of ours, something they have a say in, a direction they could choose.

While Cubin does not agree, or like, the Economic plan Obama has laid out, he argues that it is not nearly as important as what he truly brings to the table:

“As any successful CEO will tell you, leadership, vision and motivation has far more impact on results than any tax cut or increase. While I prefer lower taxes, I can tell you that no entrepreneur or CEO worth a damn in this country gives up or works less because of a change in tax policy. In this country you work harder to achieve your dreams and goals.

One should not run their life or business based on taxes. Would someone passionate about their business close down their doors simply because of tax increases? No. Would they re-evaluate things? Sure. But that is business as usual. You have to be nimble and agile.

It is time to ignore the lies and realize that we control our fate. No system or individual can stop us from doing as we please or dictating the direction we wish to proceed in.

I too agree that Obama’s Economic plan may be unsettling, but what Cubin notes is true - Obama is awe inspiring.

I took a photo of this picture which was in the window of a Nepalese restaurant in Madison, WI. I have absolutely no idea what to make of it, or its context…

*Captions Welcome*

I don’t know about you, but I do not understand “no-reply@_____.com” email addresses.

Common uses of this you see are with account validation and report summaries. So, for example, when RescueTime emails my weekly efficiency report to me, I cannot reply to the email. Should I have a question or even a suggestion for them, my reply, presumably, will go into oblivion.

How high could the cost be to “deal” with people replying to such an email? Why would you want to miss out an opportunity to interact with your customer?

Why bother convincing your friends to join your criminal enterprise when you can just outsource the work to Craigslist.org.

“I came across the ad that was for a prevailing wage job for $28.50 an hour,” said Mike, who saw a Craigslist ad last week looking for workers for a road maintenance project in Monroe.

He said he inquired and was e-mailed back with instructions to meet near the Bank of America in Monroe at 11 a.m. Tuesday. He also was told to wear certain work clothing.

“Yellow vest, safety goggles, a respirator mask… and, if possible, a blue shirt,” he said.

Mike showed up along with about a dozen other men dressed like him, but there was no contractor and no road work to be done. He thought they had been stood up until he heard about the bank robbery and the suspect who wore the same attire. - King5.com

Brilliant.

It is pretty rare that I come across a band that is new to me that actually moves me… Pomplamoose is one such duo.

Why do I like them so much? The simplicity of their music and willingness to play with sounds.

Or, how to migrate your Outlook 2003 mailbox, contacts and calendar items to Mac OS X.

1. Do yourself a favor, spent $10, save your self hours and hours of extra work, and buy Little Machine’s Outlook-to-Mac (O2M). It will convert your outlook profile/.PST to Mac friendly standards perfectly. Download and install.

2. From you PC with your Outlook 2003 profile open, run O2M and follow the prompts, asking you nicely to place a check mark next which folders you want to convert. YES. This does include sub-folders, sent items, drafts, etc. You can also select your contacts and you calendar for conversion as well.

3. Copy the folders created by O2M to a thumb drive or maybe a CD and then copy them on to your Mac OS X machine.

4. From your Mac you can now go through each app, mail, address book and ical, and import your stuff. File > Import > Mailboxes, vCards or iCal file.

Done.

Here is a great little Mac OS X app for editing PDFs: PDFPen from Smile On My Mac.

Some of its features:

1. Replace text in original PDF with editable text blocks
2. Fill out and save PDF forms
3. Move, resize, copy and delete images in original PDF
4. Copy and paste rich text; retain fonts and formatting when copying
   from PDFs
5. Select and copy text across multiple columns
6. Overlay text and images onto PDF (for example, sign purchase orders
   by applying signature image)
7. Show PDFs in single, facing-page, multi-page, and multiple facing-page views
8. Insert and remove pages; re-order pages in a PDF by drag & drop

Twistori > Summerize > Twitter

Twistori presents a flow of common emotions that people twit about on Twitter, pulled via Summerize. What is funny is how removed the viewer is from an emotion that started so intimately.

Created by Amy Hoy and Thomas Fuchs.

From a usability standpoint, well any standpoint for that matter, treating links as if they were footnotes makes absolutely no sense. It defeats the whole point.

The website for the Chicago Recycling Coalition uses this approach in full force:

Dates and locations for collections in the Chicago area can be found on the IEPA website link, under “web resources,” below. - ChicagoRecycling.org

It was hard enough finding that tiny bit of info on their website, let alone then having to sort through a list of links at the bottom of the page to find the collection dates. What could reasoning for not placing the link right there baffles me.

Making your website visitors work harder than they have to is moronic.

I am pretty good at remembering to quiet my mobile whenever I go to a movie or any where else I need my phone silenced. What I am not good at is remembering to turn the ringer back on.

I’d love the profiles on my Blackberry to be more dynamic, so when I am switching between them, the BB could ask me how long I would like to stay on that profile for. Say, 2 hours for a movie. Then after those 2 hours are up, it switches back to the ‘Normal’ profile.