Nearly A Nerd.com

Readability’s Future Functionality

Readability is a simple tool/service for internet readers that instantly removes clutter with the click of a bookmark(let) button so you can eliminate distractions and just read — as you (will) see below.

Before Readability

After Readability

Making Readability work is cake. After arriving on the Readability project page first select one of five presentation/font styles; then choose one of the five font sizes; finally, set your margin spacing — also from five choices.  Step two: drag the Readability badge/button to your browser’s bookmark toolbar. Now you’re set.

When visiting a webpage worth reading, click what you’ve just added to your bookmark bar and you are now reading better.

Readability Bookmarklet Button

. . . “Wait! I want the regular, ‘real’ webpage back!”  Alright, done. Click the gray refresh/return button in the upper left.

Readability's Refresh/Return Button

Make the jump to learn some potentially exclusive news about the future of Readability.

Oh, and if you want the MC Frontalot track mentioned above, it’s at SPIN.

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Brian Alfred

Pleasant, thoughtful mix of stop-motion like type stuff, “live action” and animation from visual artist Brian Alfred with a soundtrack heavy on sound design including Columbia, Missouri’s own Jon Sheffield.

So why no HD version?

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Ask me about my Zombie plan

Crap. Really do need a Tumblr blog for this sort of stuff — like all posts here today so far. Especially for the error fetish.

But pictured is a $16.95 Ask Me About My Zombie Plan Shirt from Rooster Teeth.com.  Buy it from them here.

Posted in Art, Design, Ephemera, Error of the Day | No Comments »

How to Report the News

With a few more dollars and know-how, I’d be cranking out iReports left and right with the formula professed above.

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2009 Penny: Ban this scrip?

Found this scrip in the car.

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Website reliability checker itself found to be unreliable when checked

I twitted:

How is one to check if a site is down for everyone, or just me if http://downforeveryoneorjustme.com is itself down?

Everything could be completely kosher, however, and the error above due to my errant behavior.

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Glimmer of hope from Epitaph Records

Last April I bought “The Spirit of Apollo” by hip-hop project N.A.S.A. on vinyl; purchased only because of the free digital copy provided since I still don’t have my turntable hooked back up.  But naturally, Epitaph, the record’s label, only gave three chances at downloading it on their sub-site — with a unique code and password — and it resulted in error each time while also counting toward my three downloads; so even if it was fixed, my download quota would need to be reset.

I immediately fired off an email to Epitaph.  Yesterday — some nine months later — an Epitaph intern replied with a MediaFile download link of the the album with a live Tom Waits cut tossed in for good measure.  Even if the audio quality of the .mp4 files finally provided should be better, any act like this is a step in the right direction.

“Make the money, make sure the money doesn’t make you. . . Be about something.”

Make the jump if you’d like to be bored with the actual brief email exchange.

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Turn black metal guitarist into toy

Never has this webspace solicited votes for anything.  That changes immediately.

Above the text, black metal guitar god Olaf Thundarsson beckons you to immortalize him in an action figure toy.  Olaf — the brainchild of my pal Phil Balsman, aka Ballsy Balsman – needs more votes before embarking on the path to toyhood.

See, designers submit (toy) concepts to PatchTogether.com.  With enough votes and attention the design garners ON DEMAND status.  Willing consumers then place pre-orders.  After sufficient pre-orders, Patch Together prototypes and produces Olaf.

But now, Mr. Thundarsson demands only mouse clicking, roughly two minutes, a 1-5 rating and very few words of your choosing.

Olaf will become a real toy when you use your power to vote for him now.

Posted in Art, Design, Music | 1 Comment »

BumpTop: 3D Mac Desktop

BumpTop — a Mac program that converts your drab desktop from 2D into 3D —  looks interesting enough to try.

Tech Startups brings a “hands-on” review and opines.

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Man-Gifts at ‘What to get Guys.com’

A shout to Rob Stretch and his man gift site What to Get Guys.  Rob cherry-picks products for you, so when buying for males, go there first — it saves time and prevents frustration while delighting all involved in the resulting consumption.

He pointed me there to check the Digital Harinezumi Video Camera — a tiny, future-retro type camcorder that instantly applies a 60’s-ish Super 8 effect to everything it records.

The actual camera

Freeze frame from footage shot with the Digital Harinezumi

It’s a fun novelty concept, great for quickly achieving an aged analog feel, but for film heads, a very similar effect could be hand-created with your editing program once, saved as a template, then applied ad infinitum to any footage.

The Absinthe Gift Set slays.  Buy it, but don’t wait for the experience.  Lucid Absinthe is now available in all 50 states.  I quaffed some around the corner at the Heidelberg a while back so check your bar.

I still want to check Thomas Fink’s “The Man’s Book: The Essential Guide for the Modern Man” which allegedly answers many questions including:

Do you know how to tie a bow-tie, mix a martini, or make a potato gun?

Do you know when to get married and how to break up, or the difference between a bock beer and a bitter?

Do you know which urinal to choose or how to start a fire with a Coke can?

It would reside perfectly next to “The Alphabet of Manliness” on your bookshelf.

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