Kirby T @thecave.com
A collection of various ramblings on technology, life in Salem, and other useless topics.
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- Jet Lagged Alex
My buddy Alex was on NBC's Today Show this morning in a bit about jet lag.
Wed, 05 Mar 2008 16:21:00 GMT - A Better Way To Buy Music
Nine Inch Nails quietly released their latest album, Ghost I-IV, online Sunday night but it was anything but quiet. Fans flooded the server to get the new album. This caused an overload on the server, which finally was brought down on Monday for a few hours to correct the problems. Despite the temporary server problems in the first 24 hours, this experiment in how to buy and sale music online is a complete success in my opinion and I hope more artists follow NIN's lead.
NIN is offering a free sampling of the new album, Ghost I, which includes the first 9 songs. You can buy the complete 36-song album, Ghost I-IV, for only $5, which I did right away. A great bargain in my opinion. Other purchase options include a 2-CD set for $10, deluxe packaging for $75, and a limited signed edition, which sold out in less than 24 hours, for $300 (2500 limited edition units x $300 = $750,000 gross revenue in 24 hours...awesome!).
Years ago I collected music, first on vinyl than on CD. My total music collection was around 3,000 pieces but a third of those pieces were stolen when I moved to NYC. This depressed me and I was no longer motivated to buy new music. I went from buying hundreds of CDs a year to buying less than 5. And this lack of motivation has nothing to do with pirated music available on the Internet. My MP3 library is a copy of my favorite music from my CD collection, not pirated music. So over the past 8 years I have not listened to or bought much in the way of new music. But this is slowly changing.
Recently I bought a couple of albums from Amazon MP3 Download store. Why now? Because Amazon offers DRM-free music. Buying music online is nothing new but I have a real problem with DRM enabled music that limited my personal use. So the introduction of DRM-free music was the first step in getting me to buy new music, but I'm still not buying as much music as I use to. Why?
I prefer buying complete albums. Sure, I have a favorite song here and there, but to me the entire album represents the complete vision the artist had at that time. I can't image buying and listening to only 1 track from Lou Reed's New York. You really must listen to the entire album, and in song order not shuffled. Again, in my opinion. But buying complete albums even on Amazon MP3 Download store can be expensive especially for some of the music I like. For example, The Eye by Yello is $19.80 on Amazon MP3 and that's only $2 less than what I paid for the CD when it first came out.
So the high cost of digital music downloads keeps me from buying as much music as I once did. Why pay CD price for something that is digital only? The lack of packaging and materials alone should sufficiently lower the price for a complete album.
So while I'm still slow to buy music like I once did, but that will likely change if more artist follow the lead of Trent Reznor and NIN. $5 is a great price for a digitally downloaded album, a price I'm willing to pay over and over again. And it is probably a good price for the artist too who, like NIN did with Ghost I-IV, publishes and sells the album directly to the consumer bypassing the record industry. I don't know the actual figures but I got to believe a $5 album sold as digital download directly by the artist will put more money in the artist's pocket than selling same album for $14 on CD though a record company.
Wed, 05 Mar 2008 14:29:00 GMT - When is the Next Release of Killink CSV Coming?
I have received a number of requests for new features in Killink CSV to be included in the next release of Killink CSV. I have been telling people I hope to have the next release available download no later than the end of February. Well, today is the end of February and the new release isn't quite ready. More testing is needed before this next release is made available to the public. Assuming all goes well, the new release should be available within the week.
The 3 most requested features coming in the next release are:- Sorting
- Unicode support
- Bulk paste
So if you are one of the people waiting on the next release of Killink CSV then keep an eye on this blog and or the announcement area of the White Peak Software support forums.
Fri, 29 Feb 2008 13:21:00 GMT - My 2008 Trips
Last year I kept a travel log to see how much I really travel in 1 year. It was interesting to see that I do too much travel and explains why it seems like I'm always on the go. While I do not plan to travel nearly as much this year - actually my wife and I recently realized nearly 6 months will past between airplane travel for us, something that has not happened for me since 1997. I'm usually on an airplane at least once a month.
So 2008 will not be as travel heavy as previous years but I still want to track my trips for the year. So here is where I have been so far in 2008:- January 16: New York City (business)
- January 29 - January 30: Killington VT
- February 14 - February 17: Killington VT
- February 24 - February 25: Portland ME
Tue, 26 Feb 2008 22:04:00 GMT - Update on New House #3
We're finally in the new house. Woohoo!! Work on all the rooms is basically complete with one exception, the upstairs half bathroom, which can wait a couple of weeks. We're slowly settling in with a little more than half the boxes already unpacked. And we're planning a shopping trip for later this week to purchase new furniture for the baby's room.
I'm so glad to be done with the majority of the renovation work. Overall I'm happy with the end results, but there are areas on some walls I would like to redo someday. But I can't complain. After all, this was my first time doing home renovating work like this. I definitely learned a lot and will do much better work faster in the future.
I would like to send out a special thank you to my mom and brother for helping prepare the house. Without their help on the final days leading up to the move, we might have had to postpone the move in date a second time. Thanks for the help mom and Andy.
Mon, 18 Feb 2008 20:01:00 GMT - Home Improvement Before and After
I have posting some before and after pictures from the home improvement project. The pictures shown here are of Baby T's room. The first picture is from the previous owner. The second is the mess I dealt with during the renovation. And the third picture is the completed room, which I finally finished last night. Click here to see the full gallery of before and after pictures.
Mon, 18 Feb 2008 19:49:00 GMT - Update on New House #2
Work on the house is nearing completion. 4 rooms are now ready to go and I hope to have 2 more rooms completed by Saturday night. This leaves 1 room left to complete before we move in, which is now scheduled for Thursday, January 24. If I stay on track, I'll have the final room completed on Monday. New carpet on the stairs will be installed on Tuesday. And we clean, clean, clean on Wednesday to get up all the dust and dirt from the floors.
Thanks to all who have helped over the last few weeks, Brooke, Josh, Darren (major thanks to Darren), Dana, and especially Zack, the little helper in the picture.
Sat, 19 Jan 2008 00:19:00 GMT - To The Customers of White Peak Software
I would like to express my sincere apologies to the customers of White Peak Software, especially those who are waiting for features to be added to Killink CSV. My life has been turned upside down, in a good way, over the last 3 months. My wife and I are expecting a new baby at the end of March and we recently bought a house, our first house, which unfortunately needed work before we could move in.
The good news is we will be in the new house by next Thursday and life will return to normal, or as normal as one can expect with a new baby coming soon. The other good news is that I'm planning to release the next version of Killink CSV soon. This next version release should have many of the recently requested features including sorting and Unicode support. An update to SMTP Diagnostics is coming soon too.
So again I apologize to the customers of White Peak Software and I appreciate your patience over the last few months.
Fri, 18 Jan 2008 19:31:00 GMT - The Cavalry is Here
My very good buddy Darren has come up fromTampaSt. Pete to help with work on the new house for 3 days. I can't begin to say how grateful I am having Darren here to help. Work on the house is progressing nicely now and we're hoping to have most of the rooms completed by the end of the weekend.
Thanks for the help Darren. I owe you big time!
Sat, 12 Jan 2008 13:14:00 GMT - They iScrewed Me Again
This spoof from MadTv is too funny especially if you are one of those individuals who keeps buying a new iPod each year. Me? I'm happy with my oversized, first-generation iPod Classic which is incompatible with almost things iPod these days.
Tue, 08 Jan 2008 22:26:00 GMT
