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2005

Xeni Profile from LA Times

Courtesy of Boing Boing.net, the LA Times has written a profile of Xeni Jardin. Xeni is famous as a co-author of the Boing Boing blog, tech writer for Playboy, Wired, and Popular Science, and radio correspondent for NPR’s Day to Day.

Xeni is pretty interesting. I’ve TiVo’d a few shows she’s been on as a guest, and listened to her on NPR, and her voice always strikes me as something I didn’t expect after seeing her picture. She’s one of the new breed of journalists who “gets it” – the convergence of media, pop culture and the internet are creating a new form of journalism.

Ubuntu Linux 5.04 is out!

Ubuntu Linux 5.04 (Hoary Hedgehog release) is out!

Go download it!

Ubuntu has, by far, become my favorite linux distribution. Releasing stable version of Debian every 6 months, with the latest version of the Gnome desktop, an awesome user community, and a great selection of software.

The Hoary Hedgehog release adds X.org for the xserver, faster boot process, much better laptop support, and what I think may be a first for a Linux distribution, automated package manager download and installer to upgrade the OS. Check it:

Ubuntu 5.04 includes two new packages to help you keep your computer up to date: update-manager and upgrade-notifier. The Synaptic package manager also now includes support to upgrade your Ubuntu Distribution.

update-manager is a package that allows you to quickly and efficiently upgrade your software in the background. The process is simple but without the fine-grained choices offered with the Synaptic package manager. The package is good for people who like the simplicity of a one-click upgrade, similar to that available in other operating systems.

Read the Release notes here.

I know what I’ll be doing this weekend: Upgrading 5 machines to Hoary, including my server. (My original plan was to get the server back up on the DMZ and get Jinzora working. Ack).

Playing with a new theme

The WordPress Themes Competition winners have been announced. I’m torn to what theme I want to use.

I’m testing the equix theme, which I like as a light colored theme, though I’m still debating about going back to a dark theme. I don’t like the mouse cursor, and I don’t know why it doesn’t render correct in IE (damn work forcing my browser choice). It works fine in Firefox. I like it’s clean look though.

…Must learn more HTML, PHP and CSS.

Update 6:00 p.m.: Cursor fixed, thank god

Interview with Jon Lech Johansen

Slyck.com Interviews Jon Lech Johansen, famous (or infamous if you work for Big Media) of DeCSS fame, and *Musique fame. Interesting follow-up to last week’s post about Digital Music on Linux.

Miguel de Icaza, of Gnome & Mono fame, recently reached out to Jon to create a pyMusique port to GTK# resulting in SharpeMusique.

It’s on my t0do list to download and try out. I’d give Apple’s iTMS a shot if it works. I’m hoping it shows up soon in the Ubuntu universe (I haven’t checked yet). I have Mono running, with a few apps (I love Muine) and I miss Tomboy (Tomboy isn’t working in Hoary for me, no idea why, it was fine in Warty).

24 – Day 4 – 10:00 – 11:00 PM

This week’s episode, in Season 4 (Day 4, 10:00 – 11:00 p.m.) might just be the best episode of 24 ever.

It’s definitely tied in my mind right now with the season finale from Day 1. I’m not going to spoil anything, but it’s an interesting twist to what has come before.

Well done.

Game over for WoW?

Slashdot linked to a story on Grimwell.com discussing WoW & MMO subscriber rates during launch and post-launch. It takes a look at where WoW falls post-launch within the MMO genre, and speculates about WoW’s longevity.

It’s a good article, but could have been harder hitting. I agree with the premise: WoW’s future is in question. When you consider WoW’s issues with new content, fast levelling to 60, catered to “casual” play, and lack of social interaction, how long will players stick with it?

Here’s a snippet:

Based on past trends of similar styled games, World of Warcraft will not retain players the same way that Everquest and Final Fantasy XI have. I expect it will fall to somewhere between a half to a quarter of its current subscribers. This is ratio greater than that lost in Planetside and City of Heroes because I believe the “core following” is far less than the runaway success World of Warcraft has been would indicate.