Applications Places System

Comic the first

kenwilson — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 15:38:35 +0000

Click to see full sized image ^

the poor kettle has clearly been through this before.

Sketched Universe

kenwilson — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 04:07:18 +0000

Check out my new side project over at http://sketcheduniverse.wordpress.com

Cowbell Hero

kenwilson — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 02:15:47 +0000

You’ve seen the t-shirt, check out the video

Embedded Video

Is the "Name Your Price” model catching on?

kenwilson — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 20:17:52 +0000

I sure hope so. Following the reported success of Radiohead’s In Rainbows release and Cliff Richards adopting a similair strategy, news is making it’s way around the blogosphere of music, film, and culture publication PASTE MAGAZINE being next in line to have a go at the “Name Your Price” pricing model. I’ll bite if only to help prove that this pricing model can work out well for both buyer and seller while cutting out the middle man.

Tags: music, news

Flock’s integration with WordPress is impressive!

kenwilson — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 14:05:50 +0000

and here’s a funny comic with which to test

Tags: test, comics, flock, browser

Ken’s guide to rainy day listening

kenwilson — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 03:29:00 +0000

It’s been raining all day. There is rain in the forecast for the next three days straight (here in Philadelphia that is). The World Series is on and it’s raining (in Boston). So, here’s some great music well suited to wet days like these:

Mary J. Blige – My Life
“This certainly isn’t your parents’ (or grandparents’) soul. But it is some of the finest modern soul of the ’90s, backing away to a certain extent from the hip-hop/soul consolidation that Blige introduced on her debut album. The hip-hop part of the combination takes a few steps into the background, allowing Blige’s tortured soul to carry the album completely, and it does so with heartwrenching authority. My Life is, from beginning to end, a brilliant, wistful individual plea of desire.”

GZA – Liquid Swords
“…the Wu actually never did top this album’s mix of pirated Asian cultural references, been-there-done-that noir, rugged, terse, no-bullshit lyricism, and wild-card catchphrase loopiness: like one who tries to catch lightning in a bottle again, they never yet managed to make anything this memorable, otherworldly, and strangely beautiful again. “

Zero 7 – Simple Things
“Characterised by Rhodes piano, sweeping strings and gentle, parping brass their music is way beyond the monikers of ‘chill out’ or ‘ambient’, it is soul food from the lounge room at the end of the universe.”

Slum Village – Fantastic Volume 2
” Hands folded across the chest. Relaxed but ready for action. Fantastic Volume 2 captures Slum Village’s swellegant b-boy stance on record.”

Amel Larrieux – Infinite Possibilities
“…she calls to mind female jazz greats and contemporary soul eclectics from Billy Holiday to Les Nubians More concerned with love and spirituality, Amel segues effortlessly from the love themes of “Make Me Whole” and “Even If,” to the introspective “I N I” and “Searchin for My Soul,” with the jazzy lead single “Get Up” setting the course.”

Res – How I Do
“Res’ voice is more unique and emotionally direct than big and operatic, a perfect fit for the rock-soul sounds behind her. The lyrics, written largely by singer-songwriter Santi White, are diarylike poetry about being yourself, being strong and being in love – “What’s your soul taste like, baby?” she coos on the dreamy, reggae-ish “700 Mile Situation.”

Grab these, sit back and wait for sunshine. And use the word “swellegant” in conversation at some point during the day. I promise, it will brighten someones day =)

The OiNK story – half truths defined

kenwilson — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 01:57:00 +0000

As reported by the BBC.

“…Users were only invited to join the site if they could prove that they had music to offer, according to an IFPI spokesman.”

Half truth. Users were invited to join the site if they were given an invitation by a current member. Invitations could come from friends and family, message boards, various websites – invitations could even be purchased.

“…They were encouraged to distribute recordings in the torrent file format with other OiNK members, and have to keep posting such music to the site to maintain their membership.”

Again, half truth. Many (most?) users never posted a single recording to the site. The requirement for maintaining an OiNK account had nothing to do with your ability to “post” music to the site and everything with share ratios.

I’m picking at words here a bit, but clearly what people will take from the spin of these statements is that the OiNK staff were ruthless criminals, robbing both the record industry and their membership blind. I won’t speak to the legality / morality of file sharing here, but these witch hunts will not win the RIAA-type organizations (RIAA, IFPI, FACT, ARIA) any supporters.

My ultra-hi-tech web 2.0 enabled blogging system!

kenwilson — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 01:01:00 +0000

Blogging is an enterprise initiated by many but followed through on by few. I intend to be one of the few. I’d be very interested to know how many Blogger.com and WordPress.com blogs were registered and have 5 or fewer posts with months (years) of inactivity. I’d guess at least half and likely far more than half. So I mentioned to Andrew today that I really need to get on top of this blogging thing (he admitted he needs to do the same). I figured I needed a kickstart – a way to blog on the move. I’m rarely in front of a computer with nothing to do, but I spend plenty of time riding mass transit around the city, perfect blogging time I figured. So, on the way home today, I picked up the titular “ultra-hi-tech web 2.0 enabled blogging system, pictured here

If this can’t get me – and keep me – blogging, nothing will. I figure there are two major advantages of using a pen-and-paper system like this. First – no matter where I am, no matter what time of day, I am a flip of a page away from capturing the fleeting ideas. Second (and most importantly), using this blogging journal will help keep posts focused and on point. My rule – one post, one page. No more. Will I stick to this? We’ll see. At worst it’s an interesting experiment.

“Hello World“, post 0 is out of the way. Post 1 is now also out of the way, let’s see what comes of this.

An introduction

kenwilson — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 14:20:00 +0000

So who are you?
My name is Ken Wilson. I was born in Southern New Jersey and now live in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. My introduction to the world of computing was by way of my mothers Hewlett Packard 486 so many years ago. I read the DOS manual cover to cover, teaching myself all of the commands. I studied BASIC and Pascal in high school; Java, C++, ML and a bit of assembly in college. My introduction to the *nix world was as a lab consultant in the Computer Science department SPARC lab. Here is where I learned my way around a UNIX filesystem, here also was my first exposure to GNOME. I began almost immediately running Red Hat Linux on my personal computer, moved on from Red Hat to SuSE, and eventually onto Ubuntu (from whence there are no foreseeable reasons to move on again).

What’s up with this blog?
I intend to use this blog as a place to keep track of some of the things I’m working on (primarily ubuntero.org, though I expect a lot of other general Ubuntu things and personal projects to appear here). I’ll also use it to gather my thoughts and opinions on things that interest me. Hopefully you, the reader, will find what I have to say interesting or useful in some way.

Applications Places System?
My Desktop Environment of choice, GNOME, features by default a menu containing three options, Applications, Places, and System. I felt the name appropriate because it vaguely describes the planned content of this blog – the projects I’m working on (Applications), my various travels and experiences professionally and personally (Places), and the other random things that matter to me (System). It’s a bit of a stretch, I know, but I also just like the name, and thats reason enough, is it not .