It would be nice if Google Finance allowed you to use easy-to-type URLs, i.e.
http://finance.google.com/goog
Which could redirect you here:
http://finance.google.com/finance?q=goog
Perhaps something like:
RedirectMatch /([a-z]{4}) http://finance.google.com/finance?q=$1
fun flickr toys that let you make calendars, billboards, fortune cookies and more out of your photos.
fantastically beautiful high speed photos of water, sparks and motion. and lightning.
Remix: this movie + WordPress’ PressIt bookmarklet = Apple Store bookmarklet
javascript:if(navigator.userAgent.indexOf('Safari') >=0){
Q=getSelection();
}else{
Q=document.selection?document.selection.createRange().text:document.getSelection();}
void(window.open('http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore' +
'?productLearnMore='+encodeURIComponent(Q)));
(I’d make it draggable, but WordPress auto-curly-quoting is being too clever.)
Update: the movie is from Jon Rentzsch.
TED, the uber-cook, uber-exclusive Technology/Entertainment/Design conference, now has a blog.
For the past two years, I’ve been playing hockey at Ice Oasis. It’s a nice enough rink, but their web site is terrible. While they’ve since ditched the neon colours, the schedule page is pretty awful:
My ice oasis schedule fixes all of those problems, and gives you even more. Features include:
The site caches data from their site and converts it, much like Google makes PDFs and Word files available in HTML. It’s pretty gentle, not hitting the real site more than once a day.
At danah’s suggestion, I took the bait and sent a reply to the YASNS spammers. I picked “Carrie,” and sent her a note full of spelling mistakes and a run-on sentence:
i got your email on myspacester isn’t it nice you are in san jose too now. its pretty nice but no san frnsacisco.
do sned me some more pictures of you.
“Carrie” replied, pushing an adult personals site:
X-Apparently-To: XXXXXX@yahoo.com via 66.218.94.73; Mon, 26 Sep 2005 13:47:00 -0700
X-YahooFilteredBulk: 69.42.68.182
X-Originating-IP: [69.42.68.182]
Return-Path: <carrie00 @meethemnow.com>
Authentication-Results: mta109.mail.mud.yahoo.com from=meethemnow.com; domainkeys=neutral (no sig)
Received: from 69.42.68.182 (EHLO meethemnow.com) (69.42.68.182) by mta109.mail.mud.yahoo.com with SMTP; Mon, 26 Sep 2005 13:47:00 -0700
Received: by meethemnow.com (8.13.1/8.12.11) id j8QK1OOF024349; Mon, 26 Sep 2005 16:01:24 -0400 (envelope-from carrie00@meethemnow.com)
Date: Mon, 26 Sep 2005 16:01:24 -0400
From: “Carrie”
Message-Id: <200509262001.j8QK1OOF024349@meethemnow.com>
To: XXXXX@yahoo.com
Reply-to: carrie00@meethemnow.com
Subject: Hey you - Here are my pics!!
X-Mailer: PHP v4
Content-type: text/plain
Content-Length: 604Hey, thanks for getting in touch with me again! I am definitely ready
to hook this up with you. According to Myspace, we live really close so
we could meet up whenever you want. Come check out my newest personal
at http://www.centralpassion.com/carrie00 My profile is listed inside
the site under “BackSideBabe”. I decided to post my personal info (i.e.
phone # and my personal email address) on this site for 3 simple
reasons. 1) It’s DISCREET 2)I never have to worry about being contacted by
children since only adults are allowed in the site and 3)I know all the
replies I receive are genuine. Well that’s about it for now, I really do
hope to meet up with you…and let’s make it soon!Talk later,
Carrie***The following is a requirement of this website: “If you are offended
by adult material or are not of legal age to view such material, or if
you simply would not like to hear from any members from this website,
follow this link to be removed:”
http://www.centralpassion.com/subscription.php
The host 69.42.68.182 doesn’t reverse, but if you check the two domains mentioned in the email, you see that meethemnow.com is 69.42.81.182 and centralpassion.com is 69.42.81.180.
The IP block is owned by Webair Internet Development Inc. at
Their AUP states:
Spamming (sending unsolicited bulk and/or commercial messages over the Internet). This includes, but is not limited to, bulk mailing of commercial advertising, informational announcements, charity requests, petitions for signatures, and political or religious tracts. Such messages may only be sent to those who have explicitly requested them from your domain. Using spam to promote a Web site hosted on the Webair Network ("spamvertising") is also prohibited, even if the spam is not sent through the Webair Network
I’ll be dropping them a note shortly.
Over at FastCupid, Brent notes some spam in his Friendster and MySpace inboxes. I’ve started getting the same thing.
First, on July 5, I got this message from Friendster user Jen, whose account was deleted:
Hi there, I’m Jen. I couldn’t sleep so I decided to do some browsing and happened on your ad and I thought I’d drop you a line. I recently moved to San Jose and I thought this would be a great way to meet new people. Outside of my work and my neighbor I don’t know anyone around here. So tell me more about yourself? What brings you to world of online personals? To be honest I liked your ad and thought your pic was cute and according to the site we live pretty close by each other. We should meet up for coffee or someting, it’d give us a chance to really get to know each other. LOL, sorry I have a tendency to ramble on sometimes, tell you what if you’re interested just drop me a line and we can get the ball rolling. I rarely have time to check this mail but you can always get a message to me at jen_usher26068@hotmail.com. Well its getting late, I should probably get to bed soon.. I hope to hear from you soon.
Jen
Next, on September 22, I got a message from another Jen:
Hi there, I’m Jen. I was browsing and saw your ad and I thought I’d drop you a line. I recently moved to Sunnyvale and I thought this would be a great way to meet new people. Outside of my work and my neighbor I don’t know anyone around here. So tell me more about yourself? What brings you to world of online personals? To be honest I liked your ad and thought your pic was cute and according to the site we live pretty close by each other. We should meet up for coffee or someting, it’d give us a chance to really get to know each other. LOL, sorry I have a tendency to ramble on sometimes, tell you what if you’re interested just drop me a line and we can get the ball rolling. I rarely have time to check this mail but you can always get a message to me at jensiir1151@hotmail.com. Well, I should probably get back to work.. I hope to hear from you soon.
Jen
And lastly, from Carrie on MySpace:
Hey there, how’s it going? I was just browsing around trying to meet some new, exciting people from around here. I recently moved to San Jose so I don’t know too many people. So how’s your weekend treating you? Any plans for this night?? Well I’ll keep this short until I know you’re interested. I’m just looking for someone to hang out and have a good time with….not looking for anything serious. I RARELY get a chance to check my myspace mail, so if you want to chat hit me up at
carrie8543goats@hotmail.com and I’ll send you some more pics. I hope to talk to you soon, hopefully:)Carrie
So. Always in the Bay Area. Always with the subject “Hi Paul.” Always “rarely have time to check this mail.” Always with a Hotmail account.
Who’s doing this, and why? And stop bothering me.
Paul Scrivens (rightly) notes that MySpace sucks in terms of design:
It’s also a designer’s and lover of design’s worst nightmare because the UI of the site is atrocious yet it boasts 17 million visitors a month (and rising) and was recently purchased for over $580 million by News Corp.
…
Trying to navigate the MySpace UI is frustrating at best. So why does it work? Besides the community I think it’s the fact that you can customize your pages and if you explore the community you will see some crazy designs going on. 90% of them you can’t even read the content, but people love it.
Unfortunately, he doesn’t seem to offer a solution. Nor, in my opinion is he scathing enough. Memo: neon pink text is always a bad idea.
YA Google Maps hack: google maps pedometer.