John Gushue . . . Dot Dot Dot

A hangman tailored to your tastes

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, May 27, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

When I was a kid, Hangman games were one of the ways we got through road trips. It’s simple enough for anyone to play. You guess some letters, knowing that a correct choice gets you closer to an answer, while an incorrect one … well, that gets you closer to something worse than a dangling participle.

This week’s web tour includes an updated version of Hangman, one that even plays to your particular interests and hobbies. We’ll also tap a well-known magazine’s audience for expert advice, get some Kiwi gardening advice, and learn about the value of those CFL lightbulbs.

Hangman
This Norwegian twist on Hangman has a key appeal: you get to select a category before you start playing. Just a few of the categories include countries, Al Pacino movies and frequently misspelled words … many of which, in the last category, didn’t strike me as being commonly misspelled. Then again, this game comes to us from Norway! The categories add a little sparkle, but they also do help make it easier to guess correctly.

Wired How-To Wiki
Wired magazine is a must-read for technofiles of varying degrees of skill and geekitude. It’s not surprising, though, that its audience would have the chops to make a go of expert-guidance articles on all manner of topics, from converting a DVD so it can play on an iPad to making your own yogurt. Registration is required, if you want to write or edit. If you just want to read or browse, you can click your way straight through.

Moosey’s Country Garden
From New Zealand comes this gardening site, which one of my friends heartily recommends. That may because she enjoys reading about someone’s bounty during the cold winter months here – which is perfect, because when we’re snowbound here they’re right in the height of summer. That also means the latest posts are about their less-lush season, but gardening buffs will relish seeing tracking back through the last few months.

Executed Today
Perhaps it’s a little on the grim side, but Executed Today looks at history in an unorthodox way. It’s a blog that each day documents an execution. The range of subject matter is surprisingly wide. The tone aims to be fair and neutral, which is impressive, given how loaded some of the specific subjects can be.

Pictorial History of Dentristry
Humans have been figuring out how to fix dental problems for a long time – much longer than I ever imagined. I have no problem with reading up about dentistry, tooth decay, surgery and such, but I found myself strangely fascinated by the materials here. If you’re nervous about the modern dentist’s chair, you may want to stay away.

CFL bulb savings calculator
I started using compact fluorescent lights a few years ago, gradually replacing my incandescent bulbs. (Well, most of them.) The bulbs have certainly taken off in public acceptance, with the Canadian Football League now competing for top-of-mind awareness for the CFL acronym. While I’m wary of the mercury in these bulbs, and wonder how well we’re disposing of them, I’ve gotten used to the light they provide. Here’s a handy resource on the financial reasons to switch.

Arcade Fire single
Next week, Montreal-based Arcade Fire will release a 12-inch vinyl single called The Suburbs, in advance of their first album in three years. Last week, we got an online teaser in the guise of a mini-stunt: you see an image of a vinyl record, and when you click on it, it spins and a sound comes out. Sort of. It speeds up and slows down, and you won’t hear very much, but it’s an amusing way to spark some interest in new music.

John Gushue is an online editor with CBC News in St. John’s. Twitter: @johngushue.

Lost on the web … but for how long?

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, May 20, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

This coming Sunday, I and millions of other people will be planted on our couches and chairs, our eyes fixed on our television screens as we watch the final minutes of a television that has captivated us for almost six years.

Lost was something special in television storytelling: a show that grew many times more complex as it wore on, that widened its scope in successive seasons, drawing in influences from arcane corners of knowledge but (as we’ve been finding) boiling down its references to key legends and myths that have been part of human storytelling for millennia.

It’s how Lost told those stories, though, that made it remarkable … and part of that has been its up-to-the-minute use of the web to entertain, illuminate and tease its audiences.

It’s a pity, though, that many of the web components created for the show have already vanished, like a puff of smoke, to use a Lost phrase. Indeed, I’m wondering what will be left online as the months pass.

 
Lostpedia
Lostpedia, a site created and maintained by fans, has emerged as not only the best repository of countless number of facts about the show and its Dickensian list of characters and situations, but also a guide to how the show has used the web.

Lost’s producers did more than just baffle their viewers from the start with one mystery after another, peeling the plots back like onion layers. They also used the self-directed aspects of the web to make the experience of following the show that much richer, if not addictive.

One of the most engaging of the official sites was called oceanic-air.com, named of course for the fictional airline that crashed into The Island. As with others, it looked like something else, leaving the user to figure out what was happening. For instance, there was a seating plan, not to mention a seemingly endless number of clues you were meant to stumble across.

Unfortunately, the site is currently down. You can read about it on Lostpedia, but clicking on the link leads to ABC’s official site. Speaking of which …

Lost
As official show sites go, Lost’s is pretty darn good. There’s lots to read (less to watch, unless you can jerry-rig your IP number so you can see the U.S-restricted episodes), and you have the benefit of knowing that the recaps are official descriptions of what actually just happened. (In the Lost universe, that can be mighty important.)

The sad thing is that a number of Lost-related web enterprises have been transported, like a polar bear in the middle of a tropical island. Sites for the Hanso Foundation and game-within-a-game sites like Let Your Compass Guide You are no longer active. Granted, a good few of them were created as diversions between the long months between seasons, while the show was on hiatus. Nonetheless, it’s a shame there isn’t a more apt legacy still online about Lost, which was so brilliant in its approach to interactive media.

Elsewhere this week

Times Skimmer
I’ve been talking this site up lately with my media colleagues: a concise, visually attractive way to scan what’s on the New York Times site. In fact, this is how I prefer to start with the NYT each day. It’s also customizable, and breaking-news junkies will appreciate the “most recent” tab on the bottom right.

75 Things You Can Compost
The full title of this feature, on the Planet Green site, includes the words “but thought you couldn’t.” It includes one of the items that was a revelation to me when I started composting: dryer lint. You’ll find 74 other things here that you can pick up around the entire house and not have to put in a garbage bag.

Sad Trombone
Having one of those deflated, depressing days, when nothing seems to be going your way? Celebrate it, friend, with this sound effect … ready to be hit at a moment’s notice. (On the plus side, it’ll cheer you up. I guarantee it.)

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

Entered an online contest? Here’s what you really won

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, May 13, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

Once or twice a week, sometimes a few times a day, I come across one contest or another … an appeal to win a CD, perhaps, or to put my name in for a draw for a vacation, like an ocean cruise. I ignore almost all of them.

Sometimes, what I come across is not a contest at all, but a registration form, just for the privilege of continuing on unfettered to particular content on a site.

But the real sizzle is with contests. The prizes may be small, they may be dramatic. I suspect that for some people, that may not even matter, because the thrill comes from a chance to win something, or even just to score a freebie. To modify some lottery wisdom, you can’t win if you don’t enter.

Even so, I don’t bother entering online contests. It’s not just because I think my chances are too small, but rather because I know what the real point of the contest is. That is, the point is not to give something away, but to haul something in. In this case, it’s information about you. 

Imagine how difficult it would be to go and collect, say, a few thousand email addresses. Now imagine you need to get addresses from people who are interested in something specific, like, as examples, sports, fashion or nature photography. Now, imagine narrowing that list to people who are between 25 and 40, who are women, who live in cities, and who happen to be driving distance of, say, a particular retailer.

A long time ago, marketers figured out the value of contests. With a modest investment, they can collect a considerable bit of data. Not just random data, but what old-fashioned sales guys used to call leads. That is, real names, real contact information.  

That is, after all, why so many contests want to know things like your postal code, your age range and any number of other bits that will get dumped into a database. From that database, they can pull out some impressive demographic profiles.  

Maybe you’ll win something in that contest you’ve entered. More than likely, what you’ve won is the probability of being pitched something in the future.

And, to boil it down, you’ve given up something of your privacy.

 If I absolutely have to fill out a “free” online registration form, just to read something, I am more than likely not going to be quite honest. If I have to need to click on a confirmation link, I’ll use a real email address. Otherwise, I’ll confess this: I’m going to fudge some things. My postal code, for instance, turns into A1A 1A1, my age changes and I’ll probably pick random answers to other questions. 

Before the winter Olympics in Vancouver, my son filled out an entry on the cardboard of a box of Cheerios, in order to “win” a T-shirt. I’ve never been surprised, then, to see our son receive messages about food. That is, I knew what the real cost would be. (The messages come to my email box.)

The ever-thinning edge between online engagement and privacy has been increasingly controversial lately for Facebook, which has come under fire for continually reinventing its policies. Why? Have a look at this.

Facebook's Eroding Privacy Policy: A Timeline
The Electronic Frontier Foundation published this feature, illustrating just how much and how quickly Facebook has transformed from an online gathering place to a marketing tool. Consistently, and increasingly, Facebook has been farming out its members’ data. Sure, it’s the price of a free membership, but it’s small wonder that many people are fighting back against Facebook’s quiet but dramatic policy changes.

What bothers me most is that Facebook is retroactively changing its terms of membership, and dumping all of your previous movements into a database that may or may (but almost certainly will, at some point) be useful to someone somewhere. [Note: You can hear more of my opinions about this by clicking on this link to the May 31 Crosstalk on Radio Noon from St. John's; I and fellow guest Ed Ring spoke about privacy with host Maggie Gillis.]

It gives a different meaning to what Facebook calls your “profile.” You may think of it as a summary of who you are, for your family and friends.

The people who are profiling use look at it as the building blocks of a marketing campaign.

In other words, be careful about who’s profiling you, while you’re not even aware of it.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

Moving along at a steady clip

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, May 6, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

I’ve been reading plenty about the iPad and the expected slate (no pun intended) of tablets expected to launch in the months and years ahead, and how life as we know it is about to … blah blah blah. You can fill in the hyperbole by yourself.

 That said, a lot of it is ringing true. And some of it has been coming from some unexpected types.

 Like Martha Stewart, for instance.

Now, I know I should not be so tough on Martha; sure, she may be a domestic diva of the first order, but she’s also been a technological innovator. (Don’t forget, for instance, that she came to St. John’s once as part of a collaboration with the ill-fated Microsoft online magazine Mungo Park.) Stewart was one of the first publishers to “get” the web, that it required a different approach to content beyond what was in her printed products.

So, I suppose, it wasn’t that surprising that Wired, for its comprehensive takeout on iPads and tablets (on why they will … you know, blah blah blah) asked Stewart for her take.

Apart from her expectation that tablets will make magazines much easier to enjoy (she practically drools over what could happen with National Geographic), she made a point that should resonate with packrats everywhere.

“We all have so much to read these days, and having the ability to pick and choose and save and file and send digitally is really exciting,” she said. “I have a bag full of torn-out magazine pages that I distribute to various people for creative ideas. I’ll be able to do that much more effectively if I have access to a digital version of those magazines rather than having to destroy them.”

Well, that kind of hit home with me. Let me explain.

In my home office, I have scores of magazines – hundreds of them, actually. I’ve clipped pages out of some of them, but what will likely happen (as it has in the past) is that I will sooner or later get tired and send a large of them out for recycling. One of my wife’s long-running to-do projects is to clip preferred features and layouts from her own collection of magazines.

So, the idea of digital clipping sounds quite appealing.

It’s not entirely new, of course. In the grand old days, when online databases like InfoGlobe were strictly text-based and you paid by the minute, and even before the web as we knew it didn’t exist, I kept directories of “clippings,” or news stories I wanted for reference. That migrated with the web, and I found that copying-and-pasting text was useful.  In these pages, I extolled products like AskSam, which made warehousing text possible, and searchable.

But what’s been missing is the ability to extract full-resolution “clippings,” distribute them, share them, store them and retrieve them – pretty much as Martha Stewart described above.

Managing a personal library with a few taps of the finger. Trust me … there’ll be an app for that.

Elsewhere this week

 
Monty Python Video Wall
When I was much younger, I developed a thing for Monty Python, from sneaking into a screening of the Holy Grail to staying up late for Flying Circus repeats. The “wall” presented here is a vast array of screens, each one taking you to a howling moment from the Python canon.

forLater
Do you know something that you’ll need to do in the future? Keep forLater on hand, for sending an email that will arrive with a reminder, just when you need it.

Laundry symbols
Trust me: I can be trusted with the laundry. That doesn’t mean, though, that I can identify on sight what each and every one of those washing symbols means. Here’s precisely the tool for the most obscure icons you’ll find on laundry day.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

Out for dinner? Put your flipping phone away

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, April 29, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

Case No. 1. It happened in one of the splashier restaurants in St. John’s, and we were out for dinner with one of our favourite couples. Several tables over, a cellphone started ringing. And ringing. And, minutes later, ringing yet again.

We suspect the well-heeled folks at that centrally located table were pretty significant, because the wait staff and managers at the restaurant did not ask them to turn off or even mute the phone – which, incidentally, was never answered – despite several requests (including from our table) to do just that.

Case No. 2. Recently I watched a table of four thirtysomethings wait for their dinner, all while they individually checked their phones, sent messages, browsed, Tweeted or whatever it was they were doing. It made for quite a sight – a quartet of bobbing heads and fixed gazes.

Obviously, the first case was more annoying, both because of the noise and the restaurant’s refusal to address the loud elephant in the room. 

But, more and more, Case No. 2 is becoming more of a nuisance, even as the phenomenon – a full table of adults all consumed with their smartphones – becomes more prevalent, and even though they don’t actually make any noise.

Maybe it’s because it’s so distracting; I can’t help but notice all those turned-down heads and the flicking and clicking of fingers and thumbs.

Or maybe because it’s so sad. Yes, a tricked-out, app-heavy phone can be amazing, but the time and place for it surely is not a night out in a restaurant with friends or loved ones.

After all, if the mobile web, like the desktop web before it, is all about connection, why turn your back – or your forehead – on one of the most wonderful ways to connect? What, really, is a meal but a chance to share and to delve deeply into the lives and thoughts of people who matter to us?

I haven’t been tempted, of course, to complain about a table of phone-addled customers. For their sake, maybe some day I will.

Elsewhere this week

TimWit
If you were at MUN in the early 1980s, the name Captain Leisure may mean something to you. It was a comic strip that appeared in the Muse, the student paper, and it was the creation of  my friend Tim Peckham. Tim has gone to be a graphic artist and cartoonist in Toronto, and is now the creator of an app at the iTunes store. Loading TimWit will give you 200 editions of a single-panel strip Tim created. It’s a great chuckle, and it’s free.

Republic of Avalon Radio
ROAR, as it’s also known, bills itself as Newfoundland’s first podcast … which sounds about right to me. It’s a product from singer and musician Jim Fidler, and it’s back on track after being a little dormant for a while. Click here to subscribe and have new editions delivered straight to your drive.

Sistine Chapel 360
Years ago, I had the opportunity to see the Sistine Chapel for myself, and although one of the highlights – Michelangelo’s full-wall fresco, The Final Judgment – was not then visible because of restoration, I found the experience almost overwhelming. This panoramic view of the Sistine Chapel is provided through the Vatican’s website; it’s not as engaging as the real thing, but it’s still pretty absorbing. Need proof? Just try the zoom function, and see the stunning detail of Michelangelo’s work.

A message from your conscience
Finally, I leave for you a bit of wisdom and common sense. What is it, you ask? Well, you’ll have to find out for yourself. 

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

Tourism tips in your pocket

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, April 22, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

A tourism app for your smartphone is the first step on this week’s hop around the web. The next stops include a tribute to a beloved scientist and friend; a tool that shows how multiple translations can veer far, far away from the original message; and a collection of photographs that imagine what celebrities would look like if they lived in a low-key suburb near Toronto. 

Let’s get started. 

St. John’s app
Through Destination St. John’s, here’s a way to get more out of the city on your iPhone or BlackBerry. You’ll find restaurant listings, points of interest, where to go for a hike, where to grab a beer … it goes on. If you know someone coming for a visit, this would be a great tip to send along. If your phone is GPS-enabled, the mapping functions will become a whole lot more useful. 

Thanks Jon
When Jon Lien died last week, Newfoundland and Labrador lost not only one of its best-known scientists, but one of its key voices in conservation, not to mention a farmer, a wildlife advocate and a good friend to many. This page was created days later, to collect tributes to Lien. [Update: check out this video feature compiled by cbc.ca/nl.]

Bad Translator
The phrase “lost in translation” is often apt when we move from one just language to another. When you zig and zag between multiple languages, well, hilarity can ensue. Bad Translator takes some wording of your choice, runs it between a mini-Babel of options (at least 10, but you can select more) , and presents you with a finished product that will no doubt be far away from your starting point. To try it out, I typed in Brian Peckford’s oft-used aphorism – “Some day the sun will shine, and have-not will be no more” – and wound up with this: “One day, sunny, most will not." 

 
Celebrities of Barrie, Ont.
This hilarious collection of Photoshopped faces has been making the rounds on Facebook, which means you’ll have to be a member to see it. Let me put it this way: it’s so funny, it’s worth joining Facebook, if you haven’t already signed up. Someone took pictures of John Travolta, Tom Cruise, Gwen Stefani and many others, and morphed their facial features into the bodies of some particularly average people. 

Record Club
Beck, a mainstay of alternative rock for more than 15 years, evidently has lots of friends – or at least acquaintances willing to show up at his studio, jam on a tune, and allow the results to be posted here. Record Club includes collaborations with Feist, Devandra Bernhardt, Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy and others, taking on various covers, including hits by INXS. As the stakes are pretty low, the willingness to take chances (already pretty high with Beck, anyway) is pretty high. 

Browser market share
If you’re like, well, almost everybody, the browser you’re currently using to surf the Web has changed in the last eight years. This interactive graphic cleanly and clearly shows the shifts in browser choices, from January 2002 up until last summer. Once upon not that long ago, we were in the AOL and Netscape universe; looking at this graphic, you’ll see how much things have changed.
 
Create Your Own Motivational Poster
One of the most popular memes on the internet for years has been the motivational poster – not the earnest, up-with-people posters that you’ll find on actual office walls, but the ironic or sarcastic or just plain old hilarious sendups you’ll want to share with friends. Here’s a tool that will help you make your own. You need to add your own picture … and something clever to say. 

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

It’s not viral just because you say it is

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, April 15, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

A few weeks ago, while I was clearing out some of the bumpf and filler that pass for real messages in my Inbox, I noticed a pitch I had received from a PR agency working for a nationally known company.

 “Please help promote our latest viral video,” said the notice, pointing to a link where I could watch said video.

I clicked on the link. I watched it. I yawned. I stopped watching it … after, I would guess, about 15 seconds.

If that video went viral, it didn’t happen on my account.

Nor, I’m willing to bet, anyone else’s. I never heard of the project again, and I certainly didn’t come across it in any of the social networks that overlap with my own.

It’s certainly not the first time a company paid some bucks to get “buzz” or “juice” through an online campaign, and had little to show for it later.

It also wasn’t the first time I’ve been told to go look at a “viral video” that someone (usually a company or institution) has made. Sometimes, I’ve been impressed with what I’ve seen. More often, I’ve kind of shrugged and moved on to something else.

What’s really struck me during those “meh” moments is this: simply calling a video “viral” does not make it so. To get a video, photo, drawing or any online item to take off and become truly viral involves a number of ingredients, and the first one is luck. There’s also a clever title (for that clickability effect), content that can be quickly if not instantaneously grasped, something imaginative, a clean design, a cluster of early adopters …  to name just a few possible factors.

You also need to have a platform that makes viral-ness happen. For instance, all the social media tools need to be in place, embeddable code should be in place, and the item should be practically dying to replicate itself. They don’t call it viral for nothing.

You’re also going to need some good old-fashioned elbow grease. When a truly viral meme (the word applies to something that’s passed around, and sometimes changed along the way) is happening, growth is measured exponentially. By that point, it’s beyond anyone’s control. First, though, you need to stoke your own fire: send the link around, invite others to repeat it to their networks, mention it during idle conversation.

Just don’t tell your friends it’s viral, at least before that’s actually happened.

Why? Because it’s poison.

And it’s presumptuous.

When something turns really and truly viral, it’s because people make an emotional connection with it. They love that sense of discovery, the private joy that comes when you find something cool. Next is another very human impulse: the need to share.

It’s word of mouth, the key fuel source on the web. Remarkably, it’s most powerful when it’s free… and unforced.

It can also be breathtaking. Consider the case of Colby Chipman, the little boy in Paradise who – appalled when he saw his older sister kick a toy penguin across the room –  took immediate action. He made a sketch, called it No Kicking Penguins … and a viral phenomenon that would sweep the world was born. Some were drawn to the environmental message, perhaps, and others liked the off-the-wall humour. I think a lot of people just found it charming.

The innocence of the drawing was its greatest asset, and the campaign captured people’s imagination. Getting posted (via an uncle) on Reddit helped, which helped spread the word – attracting media attention, which in turn got people talking. Months later, I’m sure the site (www.nokickingpenguins.org) is still drawing traffic, and is raising money through T-shirt sales for the Autism Society.

You couldn’t have designed it. That’s something for marketing types to think about before they pre-emptively boast about their viral videos.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

Radio running on full Battery power

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, April 8, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

This week’s web tour starts in a community within a community, incorporates an old Newfoundland fable, implores citizen action to preserve a slice of St. John’s history, and underlines the importance of storytelling.

And that’s just the first few sites we’ll site. We’ll also get old-fashioned with St. John’s performer Joe Belly, see how Lexus has been sponsoring finely crafted web series (including a funny bunch with a former Friends star) and tempt the jazz gods with a low-fi digital tribute to Miles Davis.

The Annotated Jack
A few weeks ago, this documentary by Chris Brookes aired on the local airwaves, in installments on CBC Radio’s On The Go as well as on the weekly Performance Hour. It’s not the story of not just one but two Jacks: the Jack of folklore, who learns the wisdom that lies in listening to a crazy-talking cat, and one Jack Wells, a retired fisherman who lives near Brookes in the Battery section of St. John’s. This link takes you to the Irish public broadcast RTE, which aired the documentary in December. It’s well worth the time.

Save Jack’s Twine Store
Coincidental to the production of the radio piece, the fishing premises that the Wells family used for years were battered by a recent storm surge. This page was set up by his friends and supporters, to raise enough money to repair the twine store and a nearby wharf. This page lists several ways anyone can get involved to restore an iconic corner of St. John’s.

Battery Radio
Chris Brookes has worked on many other terrific documentaries over the years, and you can find out plenty about his work –  and stream or buy a lot of it – right here. I’ve had the pleasure of working with Chris in the past, and can vouch for the fact he approaches his subjects in unusual ways, with spectacular results.

Elsewhere this week

Joe Belly’s Nickles and Dimes
St. John’s singer Phil Goodland’s Joe Belly persona recently released this video, for the title track of his album Nickles and Dimes. It’s shot on Super-8, which gives it a retro feel that can’t be matched with editing effects.

L Studio
The L stands for Lexus, and before Toyota had other things to worry about – gas pedals, recalls, and such – it was able to do things like launch a website featuring high-quality films featuring musicians (Jon Anderson of Yes, Ray Manzarek of the Doors) and quite a bit of original work. My favourite? Lisa Kudrow’s appearances in a series of short films called Web Therapy, in which her character counsels one sad sack after another. All told, L Studio is an unusual way to take the Lexus branding to its choice demographic – well-heeled boomers, I imagine.

 
SolarBeat
We all know that the planets make laps around the sun at different intervals … but how different? This page will show you how, and make you think about the enormity of things for a moment.

Kind of Bloop
Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue has a revered status in jazz, more than 50 years after its release. Kind of Bloop is subtitled “an 8-bit tribute” to Kind of Blue, and it made me laugh. You’ll hear old-school synthesized sounds, mimicking the album’s tracks. (You’ll have to buy it for $5 to hear the whole thing.) It’s kind of like Nintendo meets bebop.

United States quiz
Would you be able to identify Kentucky or South Dakota, simply by looking at a drawing of their borders? That’s the gambit of this quiz, which rewards those who paid very close attention in geography class.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

Thanks, Flash, and take care

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, April 1, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

Every now and again, my handy dandy Macbook has a fit. It rarely crashes, but instead goes into that dazed-and-confused state featuring the symbol that Mac lovers know as the beachball (sometimes known as the beachball of death).

The beachball is a spinning circle of multiple hues, and for me, it’s Apple’s way of getting around its famous claim that its computers don’t crash. Instead, the beachball just spins … and spins … and spins…

Turns out Apple boss Steve Jobs knows where to point the finger: right at one of the most popular things on the web, Adobe’s ubiquitous Flash. 

“Whenever a Mac crashes more often than not it’s because of Flash,” the popular tech blog Daring Fireball reported on comments Jobs is said to have made to staff in February.

The blog is quite upfront in noting its information is second-hand, but it jibes with other accounts, which all have Jobs making one knock after another against Flash. One of the more generous comments? Jobs called Flash “buggy.”

 The comments did not seem at all surprising, though, because anyone with an iPhone or a related product knows one thing for sure: it won’t support Flash.

Many of you might be wondering at this point, well, so what? Why should I care?

The thing is, Flash really is a remarkable thing. YouTube wouldn’t be able to work without it. A bazillion online games depend on its simple way of handling online animation. I doubt it’s possible to count the websites that have, in one way or another, incorporated Flash somehow in what you see.

The other thing is, Flash is really showing its teeth. It dates back the better part of 15 years, and even its ardent admirers would have to admit that Flash was not designed to do what is now being asked of it.

Yes, Flash has been an earnest, tough, hard-working soldier, but in the beginning, no one expected that a Flash product would (for instance) be used to handle full-motion, high-quality video.

Flash’s shortcomings are most noticeable right now in the mobile world, and not just because iPhones have built a moat around it. Simply put, Flash products don’t work on the fly.

That’s expected to change, though, and you have to give some credit to owner Adobe for not giving in without a fight. Later this year, some smartphones (notably Androids and Palm’s Pre) will have a Flash player called 10.1, which will allow users to enjoy Flash products as if they were at a PC. Adobe says 19 out of the top 20 smartphone manufacturers have stepped up to support the product. (If you spotted Apple as the holdout, you’re right.)

But a new version doesn’t guarantee Flash is good for the future. Many of the web cognoscenti are more enthusiastic about HTML5, which its creators hope will open the gates for all kinds of products, and free users from proprietary systems  … like Adobe’s Flash (and, for that matter, Microsoft’s competing Silverlight).

Sure, Apple has given it its blessings, but for me the more interesting early adopter is none other than YouTube, which has been trying HTML5 out for some time … and probably for loads of reasons other than the fact competing video purveyors have already been flocking to the language, which is far from even being completed.

If you have a smartphone, you may be used to the little blocks or spaces that pop up when you ought to be seeing, say, an animation or a video. Soon, those hiccups will be history.

The question, as the world shifts toward a web that flows through mobile devices, is whether Flash will still be in the pan.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

A sign of character

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, March 25, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

We have a mixed bag this week, starting with a local photo blog that is not updated often, but which is deserving of your attention. Later on, we’ll revisit some childhood memories, turn YouTube videos into MP3s, and eavesdrop on some healthy venting from designers and journalists.

 

St. John’s Character Collection
Sporadically updated as it is, this set of photographs is really something. Robert Young, every now and again, adds a picture and some comments to a set of images of folks who make St. John’s what it is. In February, he marked the passing of Bill (“Moon Man”) Sweeney; at other times, he’s added images of folks you see around the city. I wish Robert would add more … and maybe pursue a more ambitious project. The idea is that good.

Young Me Now Me
Surely you have a picture of yourself as a child that captures all the exuberance or awkwardness or poignancy or innocence (or, just maybe, all of these things at once) of your younger self. Ze Frank, who has had some great online success with off-the-wall ideas, has a wonderful feature called Young Me Now Me, in which participants take a photo of themselves, more or less matching the pose of a childhood snap. Some are spot on, some don’t seem at all similar, and a few might take your breath away.

Dirpy


Ever seen, say, a concert performance on YouTube that you liked so much, you wanted to listen to it later on your iPod? Dirpy is the tool for you. It converts a YouTube video to an MP3, suitable for loading up on the player of your choice. A caveat: you may well be cheating a copyright law or two here. Another caveat: remember that the audio quality in many YouTube videos is, well, hideous.

Clients From Hell
This site has been making the rounds lately among some self-employed folks and creative types I know, and they’ve been laughing – often out loud – with recognition. The idea is that professionals (designers, web developers, writers) send in horror stories of working with clients who just don’t get it. Take the designer who informed the client that the small, out-of-focus pic supplied simply would not work for a professional campaign, and was told the client was disappointed in their skills. Even outsiders will find this funny … and perhaps a few clients would benefit from reading the tales, too.

Overheard in the Newsroom
In a similar vein, but closer to my profession, Overheard in the Newsroom publishes anonymously submitted tidbits, almost always verbatim exchanges that make you laugh or cringe, or both. An example: “Editor: ‘Kiddo, you can’t pitch stories like you’re already in love with them.’ Intern: 'Sorry. I forgot that enthusiasm is a no-go in this place.' "

Dilbert Mashups
Yes, Scott Adams had hit the nail on the head a thousand times or more, as chronicles the petty insults and idiocies of contemporary office life … but couldn’t you (yes, you, with all of your wit and pain and woe) do a better job? That is, sort of, the point behind Dilbert Mashups, in which the official site asks readers to take an existing strip, and put their own personal spin on it.

10 Words You Need to Stop Misspelling
From The Oatmeal, a tipsheet on good grammar (e.g., how to know the difference between They’re, Their and There) that is also great to look at. Feel free to share with your friend and colleagues; after all, they may better accept spelling advice when it comes with a smile attached.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

We all live in Jake Doyle’s universe

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, March 18, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

 

Several weeks ago, when the sheen on Republic of Doyle was still fresh, a Toronto-based friend of mine and I were exchanging emails, and she wondered whether St. John’s was genuinely like what the show depicted. She’s never been here before, poor duck, and was intrigued with what she saw.

I told her there are wonderfully colourful houses (but not quite the intensely saturated hues in the opening and in some scenes), that the sun does indeed shine in the sky (although not with the apparent frequency that it does in the program) and that, happiest of all, there really is a Duke of Duckworth (although it’s much more comfy and lived-in than the replica built for a set).

Republic of Doyle
The official program area on the CBC site is the place to go to see episodes you might have missed, or revel in the dialogue that seems to spin off catchphrases each week. A head’s up: the site is geocached, which is a fancy way of saying that users outside Canada probably won’t be able to watch.

 Take a look around the site for special ‘webisodes,’ including a recent one called Graffiti Moron, which features Mark O’Brien’s scampish character, Des. If you’re trying to place some of the songs heard in the show, click on the Music tab; it has credits to a mix of artists, including local favourites like Bill Brennan, Joe Belly and, of course, Sean Panting (who does double duty, playing Jake’s randy lawyer). Meanwhile, if you’d like to download full Doyle episodes to keep, look for the iTunes link on the landing page. I signed up for the season pass.

DoyleMaps
It didn’t take long for fans to respond to the show. I like the premise of this site, set up by Jon D. Rowe, which mashes up plot points from episodes with Google Maps. In other words, you can see where specific scenes were set (and, when outdoors, actually shot).

#doyletweets
The above is the hashtag for a lively conversation that pops up online during each broadcast, via Twitter. A hashtag, for the unitiated, is a type of keyword helps Twitter users track what’s being said. In this case, they’re reactions and comments on each episode, in real time. Plugging it into search.twitter.com will get you there fast on Wednesday nights.

Doyle on Facebook
With 40,000 fans and counting, the official Facebook page is the pre-eminent gathering place online. I might have expected a bit more dialogue among the fans, but that hasn’t necessarily been the case … at least so far. In any event, it’s a great way to connect, and to keep up with the latest.

Doyle on Twitter
The show’s Twitter feed, though, has been much more informal – and informative, to boot. And, given the conversations that have sprung up, it’s also been pretty interactive with the fan base, showcasing a tone that’s funny and a little cheeky. Wonder where they got that …

Elsewhere this week

Sushi Cat
It’s not Pac-Man, but it does feature an omnivorous creature that moves around the screen, gobbling up what it can. The catch is that you position your kitty over a pile of food, and let physics, or at least the physics in the game, run its course.

Home Sheep Home
We’re big fans, in our house, of Shaun the Sheep, the animated little animal and his barnyard fans, as produced by the stop-motion geniuses behind Wallace and Gromit. This is a game that rewards problem-solving, as your job is to get the sheep (usually three of them) from one place to the next, including across the odd chasm. It’s very clever.

Television Tunes
Decades after I saw them, I can still recognize the themes of plenty of old TV shows, including plenty I’d be happy to forget. (Thank you, Love Boat.) This site celebrates theme songs, and collects them as well.  If you like what you hear, get it emailed to your phone as a ringtone.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

Hey! Let’s watch some cartoons

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, March 11, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

When I was a kid, cartoons were best watched on Saturday mornings. That is, that’s when you could most easily find them in abundance. Nowadays, there are whole networks devoted to ‘toons, and the web is rife with animation. In other words, you could easily spend every waking minute watching one kind of animation or another.

 The range of quality for online animation is startling. This week’s column is devoted to some of the best … and to some other stuff, too.

Logorama
Logorama won the Oscar on Sunday night for best animated short. It runs just 16 minutes long, and many of its stars – hundreds of them, actually – are world-famous. They’re not people, though; they’re logos. Nonetheless, they’re characters in this remarkable film, with attributes that are, well, like people. I wonder how many media literacy courses will take advantage of this clever film.

Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty
While Logorama got the big prize in L.A., I actually liked this Irish short even more. Granny O’Grimm looks just like your stereotypical sweet-hearted granny … until she starts talking, that is, and you realize her bedtime story is infected with a lifetime of repressed anger. Don’t get the wrong idea: this is hilarious, and (to use a local frame of reference) like something Codco might have cooked up. It looks great, too. The best news on the site: the makers are planning a series.

How They Donut
One of the other nominees in the best animated short category featured a cheese-loving Englishman and his silent, remarkably efficient dog. Wallace & Gromit have had Oscar love before – three times, in fact – so perhaps it was someone else’s turn. I haven’t seen the new short, A Matter of Loaf and Death, yet, but I had a good laugh watching this, a making-of special … with a joke of a title to match. [Note: Since this column was published, the video for this item has been removed.]

Runaway
More and more, I love the NFB site, which offers crisp, high-quality uploads of shorts and full-length films. Runaway is the third film by animator Cordell Barker, and it’s a hoot, what with a cast of characters about a train gone wild, accompanied by a pulsing, rhythmic score … but oblivious to the dangers that are literally around the bend. Barker made The Cat Came Back, a Canadian favourite, in 1988; you can watch that online, too, if you poke around for it. 

Hungry!!
Don’t have the time today to commit to most animated shorts, even those running just seven or eight minutes? Hungry!! will do the trick, since you can see the whole thing (girl meets muffin, muffin gets revenge) while you’re dialing a number and waiting for someone to pick up.

RenderMan
RenderMan is a propriety system that Pixar uses to make movies like Up, Wall*E and more; you can actually buy a copy for yourself, if you’ve got the cash. Movie fans, though, will dive right into the rich material on this site, which explains fully how those amazing details in Pixar movies come to be. Remember the realistic food in Ratatouille’s kitchen sequences, for instance? You’ll learn how the artists made the grapes and steaks look good enough to eat, and then some.

Elsewhere this week
 
Whiteout
George Murray is a St. John’s writer, and the author of Bookninja, a book-focused blog that has a worldwide following. He’s also a renowned poet. You can read one of his poems, Whiteout, here in the prestigious literary journal Granta, and listen to Murray read it, too.

BoardTracker
Google may be the default choice for looking stuff up on the internet, but always remember that even Google has its limits, and that other tools can be very useful for finding particular things. BoardTracker specializes in following that old-fashioned corner of the web, the message boards. They may have flourished even before the boy-band era, but they’re still vital.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News. John is on Twitter right here.

Frontline medicine and unhappy hipsters

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, March 4, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

Our lives are made of serious moments and foolish thoughts, of solemn reading and outright silliness. This point really came to home when I took note of some of my recent surfing habits.

A few recent stops are included in this week’s column, which runs the full spectrum, from the noble to the hilarious and definitely to the profane. (You’ve all been warned!)

Voices From the Field
The world hears much about Doctors Without Borders (aka, Medecins sans frontieres) when there are natural disasters, such as last month’s earthquake in Haiti, although the organization is active year-round, around the world. Voices From the Field is a collection of reports that add important perspectives to stories that have been reported, but not necessarily understood.

 
Unhappy Hipsters
I like Dwell magazine, which I learned about years ago from the architect in our family. I’ve bought many copies since then, even though we’re not planning to build one of those ultra-cool houses from scratch with reclaimed or industrial materials … the sort that magazine art directors plan photo shoots over. What I had not noticed, though, until I saw the Unhappy Hipsters site is how often the subjects have grim (or at least bored) expressions on their faces.

Lifelong Learning
It’s been years since Memorial University ran the renowned Extension Service, but it still reaches into the community with non-credit courses on a wide range of topics, from art to business skills to all sorts of recreational pursuits. 



Grape Radio
Talk shows cover the gamut of issues, from the day’s news to celebrity foibles. Here’s one with a twist: a talk show dedicated to wine, and nothing else. A new audio podcast goes out about every week, sometimes replaced by a video feature. It’s about far more than wine tastings: you’ll hear about urban wineries, how restaurants go about putting together great wine lists, and the science of winemaking. It’s fascinating, and terrific listening for, say, making a Saturday supper while sipping on a nice glass.
 
Less
Amid the countless sites pitching ways you can spend money and buy more, the site mnmlist (that’s a minimal way of saying “minimalist”) takes things in exactly the opposite direction. In other words, that means decluttering and simplifying your life, and especially doing away with many of your possessions. Sure, reducing your carbon footprint, etc. etc., is noble, and many people will find inspiration in the posts here, but I found that even a few minutes here was about as much piety, earnestness and self-admiration as I could digest.

Star Wars Weather Forecast
If it’s freezing cold out there – really freezing, so cold you’d need to find warmth in the carcass of a peculiar creature – you could say it’s just like Hoth. Hot and cloudy? Yavin 4 comes to mind. This is a fun site that will appeal to Star Wars fans, even though it’s a one-note joke. Theoretically, you can enter any city’s name and get a matching forecast, though I couldn’t get far with anything for St. John’s.

The Filthy Critic
Often foul-mouthed reviews, and presented in just a few words. Here’s an example of the kids’ animated movie, Barnyard:  “Hate your kids? Show them this.” Ouch. As you might guess, be prepared for swear words and strong language.
 
Let Me Google That For You
Here’s a chuckle, and a novelty to pass to your friends – especially those who like to get you to look stuff up on their behalf. Whether or not you satisfy yourself by sending a link to them (on the hopes that they well and truly get the message), you’ll get a kick out of watching what happens when you type in a question.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here.

Hunted tunes and Boss bootlegs

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Feb. 25, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.] 

"Without music, life would be a mistake," said the most light-hearted man in history, a.k.a. Friedrich Nietzsche.

Good ol’ Nietzsche, though, had a point. Where would we be if we couldn’t have a little music in our lives? Whether your tastes run from choral performances to ukulele covers of punk tunes, or from classic rock to polka dances, the web is full of things to find and possibly love.]

This week, we have some help in finding some new fodder for the iPod.


We Are Hunted
If you’re into cutting-edge music, or like to know what’s happening before everyone else does, We Are Hunted is a great resource. It’s a chart of 99 songs that are happening right now, but it won’t look like any sales chart. That’s because instead of counting sales or airplay, We Are Hunted gathers data from around the web of what people are talking about (e.g., chatrooms) or looking for (via torrents, etc.). Or, as they put it, they “detect sentiment, expression and advocacy to understand what people like and dislike.”

Bruce Springsteen MP3 Bootleg Index
How devoted are Bruce Springsteen’s fans? Not just the ones who yell “Broooooce” at his concerts … anyone can do that. The fans who maintain this index, which consists of lovingly if not quite legally recorded concerts and such, are hard-core. You’ll find material dating back to the Seventies, when The Boss was just one of the New Dylans, and before people starting describing soulful rockers with something to say as New Springsteens.

Slice The Pie
Have you ever championed an up-and-coming group so much that you’d bet on their success? Welcome to Slice the Pie, which actually lets you put your money where your mouth is. The prospects are generally unknowns, and the stakes are fairly small (the idea is that many hands can work together to help a band make it to the next level), but as games go, this one is far more rooted in reality than many virtual alternatives.

Minnesota Public Radio tunes
I love finding music, and I like a good bargain, which makes free song-of-the-day features an attractive find. I recommend the long-running offers from the U.S. radio stations KEXP and KCRW; here’s another one, hosted by a Minnesota Pubic Radio program called The Current, specializing in the broad label that is alternative rock. Recent entries have included better-known bands like Spoon to up-and-comers, like the UK folk act Mumford & Sons. 

Great Canadian Song Quest concert
Last year, CBC Radio 2 painted itself red and white and asked its audience to pick the places in the country deserving to be commemorated in song, and the artists to do the tunes. The local winners were Gros Morne National Park and Hey Rosetta! (above) Here’s a link to a video of the resulting concert. Kick your feet up and enjoy.

Songfight
For almost a decade, Songfight has been a champion of grassroots, handmade, no-frills indie music. And, yes, getting fans to fight about it. The premise is simple: for each weekly voting period, bands or singers upload their own songs, and then the public votes on what they like. You can vote once each week, but you may actually vote for more than just one song. Indeed, you’re asked to vote for all the “good” stuff and ignore the bad. Even better, you can download what you like for free.

Fuller Up: The Dead Musician Directory
It may be in poor taste, but I bet this site attracts plenty of visitors, curious to learn how various musicians met their fate. There’s not a lot of scholarship here (some entries appear to have just been copied and pasted from other sites), but some fascinating, if grim, reading.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here.

Shaving heads, tapping toes and petting cats

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Feb. 18, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.] 

A site that is helping a local cancer fundraiser evolve into a bit of a movement is the starting point for this week’s tour around the web. We’ll also check in some musical celebrations, keep up to date with heritage properties and learn about what makes cats ticks. Or purr, as the case may be.

Shave For the Brave
The first Shave for the Brave happened in 2006. In a few short years, it’s gone from a relatively small fundraiser for St. John’s-based Young Adult Cancer Canada, pulling in about $40,000 that first year to five times as much last year. Shave for the Brave now seems to have household name recognition in our area, with hundreds of kids and adults alike signing up to have their hair shaved off, with proceeds going towards programs aimed at young adults dealing with a cancer diagnosis.

Shaving season is coming soon (with a major mass-shave at the Avalon Mall on March 6, for instance), so now is the time to register and collect pledges. How much would your friends and colleagues pay to see you lose your locks? Now’s a good time to find out. The site has plenty of information about what it calls “the coolest cancer fund-raiser in Canada.”

Elsewhere this week

ECMAs 2010
Ruckus on the Edge: Juno Week
A couple of musical events are on the calendar for the coming weeks. The East Coast Music Awards are coming up in March in North Sydney; you can check out the nominees and such now, but keep an eye on the site for the weekend, as the ECMAs do boost their online presence.

 Meanwhile, there are just over seven weeks now do the Junos in St. John’s. The so-called Ruckus on the Edge celebration is still a little scanty on the details (i.e., who’s playing and when) but you can get a sense of how the full week will shape up. You can even enter a tune in a contest for the theme song. Hurry: the deadline for that is next week.

17 Things Worth Knowing About Your Cat
I love The Oatmeal, which makes web-based infographics that are spot-on with the facts and fun to look at besides. This one is a list of remarkable facts about the common housecat, from their well-known visual acuity to the famous scientist who invented the cat door.

Historic Trust
The Newfoundland Historic Trust has been a force in the province since the 1960s, and has played a strong role in preserving – and cherishing – important houses, churches and other buildings. Its website has been freshly re-launched. Look for a Flickr-powered slideshow that will take you right around the province.

The Archers
The longest-running soap opera in the world is a British radio serial that airs six days a week, just as they’ve been doing since 1950. The story of the goings-on of a fictional farming village is also pretty addictive, even though there are more characters than anything in Dickens or Trollope. You can listen to BBC Radio 4 live if you like for your daily 13-minute serving, but you may find it easier to subscribe to the podcast. (It’s worth noting that The Archers is the most popular online program offered by the BBC.) The companion site is filled with detail, including synopses, character biographies and interactive features.

Doodle
Have you ever tried to get a group of different people – like volunteers on a committee, for instance – in the same place at a same time? It can be a bit of a challenge, particularly if people work in different places and have different schedules. Here’s a tool that can really help you. Doodle is a web-based tool that allows everyone to select scheduling options, or even make a group decision, without so much as a phone call.

Follow you, follow me: Getting the most out of Twitter

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Feb. 11, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.] 

A year or so ago, when the Twitter bandwagon was ramping up to warp speed, I read no end of things advising on how to get massive influence on the social network. The bottom line: follow few, get followed by many.

The thinking was that your influence boiled down to a ratio. If many, many more people followed you than you followed – that is, if thousands of people subscribed to your feed, while you only viewed the feeds of a comparatively small percentage of that number – then you were considered to have a great deal of influence.

My view of that theory: it’s garbage. As a journalist, I’m naturally and indeed professionally curious. I want to have access to information, and lots of it; why would I only want to be limited to a small few?

I understand why people keep limits on the number of feeds they follow. After all, your home feed can quickly become swamped with tweets, many of which will be anything but important.

However, there are methods to sift through your feeds. Last fall, Twitter itself made things a whole lot easier by establishing a lists feature. I use several lists, so I can keep track of things by categories (journalism, news, magazines, local Twitter users, and so on).

I had already been doing this through HootSuite, a program which has made managing Twitter a breeze. The lists function is now fully integrated. I used to use TweetDeck, which worked fine, although I find HootSuite much faster and less likely to get gummed up.

In other words, the argument that a high number of follows is a negative makes absolutely no sense. I’ve noticed that some of the Twitter apps that measure influence are now more concerned about things like reach (how your network can in turn reach more users), generosity (how often you retweet the messages of others) and engagement (how often you discuss things with others, and vice versa).

The buzz and novelty of Twitter are fading away, but it’s becoming a part of daily life and communication for millions (about 20 million different users last month). Maybe you want to have an Oprah-like level of influence; more than likely, you just want to have a network of friends and others with similar interests.

As I’ve been developing my own network, I’ve taken time to spread my wings out, with follows of people I don’t know at all, but who I hope will help serve one of my ultimate goals on Twitter: learning something I didn’t know before.

That, for me, far outweighs any idea of “influence” that downplays the significance of follows. Indeed, that very thinking runs counter-clockwise to key principles of social networks: sharing, exchange, collaboration and conversation. 

Elsewhere this week

Cork’d
Not sure about that bottle of wine at the liquor store? Do some consumer research of your own, and run it past the user-submitted wine reviews here. You’re especially welcome to chip in your own later on. 

Behind The Name
If a baby is in your future, you may be getting some advice on naming from friends, families and colleagues. This is a site that explains where hundreds of names from around the planet come from, and what they mean.

5min
The idea behind the tutorial-minded video site 5min is that you’ll only need five minutes to learn, say, how to make ice cream at home, or add some bass effects next time you and the crew are doing some beatboxing. In other words, something for everyone.

Make Wee
It sounds like what two-year-olds say when it’s bathroom time, but Make Wee is actually just a way to make avatars (that is, cartoon-like representations of yourself) suitable for the Wii, or otherwise.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and works with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here.

Take one tablet, but wait a year for full effect

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Feb. 4, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.] 

This week’s column is about the iPad, but first, a few words from an unexpected source: Conrad Black.

Remember Conrad Black? The disgraced publisher who went to jail for defrauding shareholders, while funneling his newspapers’ money to himself?

A larger-than-life figure long before that, Black was the keynote speaker at a Canadian Association of Journalists conference I attended in Ottawa in April 1994. Black’s speech was full of the invective and needlessly complex words we expected – he also made sure that the hundreds of journalists knew that he thought little of many of them – but also had a few surprises.

One of them came when Black was asked to speculate on the future of the newspaper. Remember, this was an era when the Mosaic browser was the standard, and the phrase “world wide web” didn’t yet sound that ridiculous.

As I recall, Black said while he felt there would always be a market for printed newspapers, he also expected the news to be delivered to some kind of tablet. What it would like, and how it would work, no one knew. It was the first time I heard anyone of Black’s media stature roll out that kind of expectation. 

Almost 16 years later, I think we got a pretty good sense of where things are going with Apple’s unveiling of the iPad.    

To be fair to Black, talk of a tablet was in the air – sort of – back then. Apple had released its ill-fated Newton, a handheld device that was a commercial flop, but which prefigured many of the consumer electronics that have dominated our lives in the last decade, from the Palm Pilot to the BlackBerry to, yes, the iPhone. 

And, now, the iPad, which came out to a good round of applause but also a loud chorus of snickers about its name and a collective yawn from many spectators, including some Apple fans. Seth Meyers made a crack on Saturday Night Live about Apple releasing “a thing that does stuff its other stuff already does.”

It seems like a fair comment, since the iPad shown to us looks like a wider, longer iPhone, with the fun of an iPod and the broader functionality of a Macbook.

But I think that’s missing the point. I expect developers and content producers (including newspapers, but also magazines, television networks and all kinds of ordinary users) to rise to the challenge that the iPad presents.

Many people are expecting the new device to be a savior for hard-hit newspapers and magazines. I’d like to see that, too, but I also want the technology to evolve – and the storytelling, too.

Let’s say you download a new edition of your favourite magazine. Maybe you’d be content to flick through the pages, ebook-style, but I bet readers will want a richer experience that draws on the strengths of new media.

So, for instance, the photograph you see will offer video; the chart or infographic will be animated, and the text itself will have way more than mere web links to enrich your experience and understanding.

On the opposite page, where you normally see an ad, expect the marketing folks to make a technological leap. Why put a static ad into an evolving medium that offers so much more?

I don’t think the next generation of content will be mere replays of what we already see on the web; rather, it will (or should) be a great, thrilling, imaginative leap forward.

I’m not sure if I will order an iPad when it’s released this spring. I want to see if the next generation solves some design issues.

However, I’m dying to see to where the app and content developers are going to go with this new platform. I think we’re off to somewhere quite exciting.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here.

Should St. John’s get the Park Place treatment?

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Jan. 28, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.] 

If there’s on thing that Newfoundlanders love to do, it’s to root for their own. Consider Canadian Idol (when in season), various Facebook groups that have the arbitrary purpose of just gathering a bunch of Newfoundlanders, and – most recently – a campaign to put St. John’s on the next Canadian edition of Monopoly.

Monopoly Canada
You can buy Monopoly editions devoted to everything from the Simpsons to golf to even I Love Lucy. National editions abound, and for the next Canadian edition, the public has been invited to make the choices. Through the last couple of weeks, St. John’s has done well, but as I write this, has slipped from 6th to 10th place in a matter of a couple of days.

It’s not just getting a square on the board, of course, but which square. That is, the highest votes get the royal-blue colours that usually go to Boardwalk and Park Place, the next three get the deep green colours, and so on. In other words, a motivation for residents and/or supporters of various cities to keep voting (you can do it once a day), to get or hold on to a prestigious colour.
 
There are still more than three weeks to vote. Let’s see where the dice land. 
 
Elsewhere this week


 
A History of the World in 100 Objects
Earlier this month, BBC Radio 4 launched what’s already turned out to be a fascinating series: an attempt to tell the history of civilization, through a set of objects. I’ve been hearing some of the segments live through streaming radio; here, on the companion site, you can not only learn more, but contribute to the project – or, as they put it, “make history” yourself.
 
You can follow each day’s contribution through a podcast, the blog, supplementary information, and more, all in collaboration with staff at the British Museum. As host Neil MacGregor put it, the creators are passionate about physical objects, namely “things made by somebody with hands just like ours, for a purpose we can still hope to understand.”


My Parents Were Awesome
There comes a point when people – the teenage years, as young adults, maybe later – when people realize their parents are not space aliens but interesting, worthy human beings. My Parents Were Awesome is a collection of photographs that readers submit from years past (many, many years, on occasion) showing their parents. Some of the photos are hilarious, some are depictions of the time that taste forgot, and some are quite touching.
 
Bettween
It’s Bettween, not between, but that’s the point: this is a tool in which you can track conversations (i.e., replies) between two particular Twitter users.


Age of Persuasion episodes
Friends of mine, who have an evidently more pure ideal of what CBC Radio should be, were shocked the network started a half-hour program on advertising. For me, The Age of Persuasion with host and marketing guru Terry O’Reilly is one of the smartest, best produced programs on the network, with weekly insights that go well beyond how commercials work. If you miss the show, you can stream it here, plus past episodes; downloads or podcasts, unfortunately, are still off limits because of copyright issues.

Epic Win FTW
If the title of this site doesn’t make immediate sense, we’ll catch you up. “Epic win” is one way of saying “astonishingly cool,” and FTW stands for “for the win.” Which, um, kind of makes the title redundant. But don’t worry about that; instead, check in regularly for loads of cool things, especially hilarious pictures, often with a fanboy edge. 

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here.

Tomatoes, timepieces and keeping track of things

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Jan. 21, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.] 

Could a simple tomato help you regain focus in your work, spur productivity and help you clear outstanding tasks from your to-do list? According to people who believe in what’s called the Pomodoro Technique, the answer is an unqualified yes.

The first thing to realize, though, is that this is not your garden-variety tomato.

 

Pomodoro Technique
In a nutshell, the Pomodoro Technique is about time management. Creator Francesco Cirillo developed it years ago, although it seems to be gaining ground more recently online, with discussion groups and fan pages sprouting all over. And, yes, plenty of software choices are already available.

Here’s how it works: you take a kitchen clock – the technique is called Pomodoro, because of the tomato-shaped timer that Cirillo used – and set it for 25 minutes. During that time, you work with purpose on a set task. When the alarm sounds, you can do what you want for five minutes. Then, you do it all over again. When you’ve done a few “pomodoros,” you’ve earned a longer break.

Adherents swear by it, particularly as the web and our gadgets supply us with an ever-increasing list of possible distractions. At the official site, you’ll find the technique is as much a product as a way of living, or at least working.

Google Timer Group
Curiously, many people who work online have become infatuated with the Pomodoro idea. This is a popular Google Groups forum devoted to developing and promoting software connected to the Pomodoro universe. I would have thought things would be straightforward – an online timer, and that’s about it, right? – but plenty of people are working on some pretty sophisticated applications, such as the involvement of real-time networking for large groups of people. 

Online Clock
You don’t have to have huge, complicated ideas to benefit from the technique. This application is really simple: you set an alarm (like, for 25, or 45, or however many minutes from now), and an annoying buzzer goes off. It’s great for micronaps, by the way. 

Elsewhere this week

At Cupids Cove
Here’s a link where time is definitely an issue. Last Sunday, BBC Radio 3 broadcast a documentary on John Guy and the settling of Cupids, tied to this year’s 400th anniversary celebrations. It’s a good piece, and you can listen to it here, but (because of the BBC’s limitations on playback) for just another three days. [Note: The window to hear this piece has now, unfortunately, closed.]

 
Amelia Curran Live
Last month, CBC Radio 2 broadcast a full concert of singer-songwriter Curran playing in St. John’s. It was a lovely show, and you can hear it whenever you want, courtesy of the Concerts On Demand feature. You can also sign up for the podcast, and keep the downloaded show (plus many others) for as long as you like. I’d recommend the podcast option, as it’s a terrific way to get live, high-quality music from top-shelf artists.

Amelia Curran
Curran’s own site offers some background information, although fans and prospective fans will find more to sample at her MySpace page; look for the link among the resources here.



Designboom: Parking
When the blog designboom (no capital letters, please; they’re too cool for appropriate punctuation!) launches a competition, hundreds if not thousands get in on the action. This one asked participants to imagine “solutions” to parking crunches in urban areas; some of the results are out there, and a few are hilarious.
 
Bureau of Made Up Statistics
Need a fact that need not be true? Here’s your place for one-stop citations, true or false (but almost always false). It’s a hoot.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here.

Mapping St. John’s, down to the ground

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Jan. 14, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]  

The first featured site this week takes a map of St. John’s, and invites the public to make sense of it. We’ll also hit the drama button, find out why your chimney may be smoking, and getta feeling – a funny one at that, but not with the Black Eyed Peas – about last night.

Wikimapia: St. John’s
When Google released its Street View presentation of St. John’s late last fall, I’m sure I wasn’t the only one to dive in a take a close look at houses, offices and other familiar places in our daily lives. (And what a relief that the Google team went around on a sunny day last summer!)

While Street View brought a dimension to how we view St. John’s, here’s another tool you may enjoy, and which is great to bookmark. Wikimapia takes Google Maps data from around the world, and mashes it with wiki-style tagging and descriptions.

Already, whole neighbourhoods have been marked, key buildings have been identified, important destinations marked out. And there’s plenty yet to do: register (it’s free), and you can contribute to the project. 

Elsewhere this week

Waiting For Fidel
I still find the 1974 NFB film Waiting For Fidel absorbing, even though (like its Godot-like title) it’s about what doesn’t happen. You can watch the full documentary, about how former premier Joe Smallwood and media magnate Geoff Stirling tried to get an audience with Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, online through the NFB site. Check around to see the wide range of docs, shorts and more that the Film Board offers for on-demand streaming. 

Successful Fireplace
We’ve had a few unfortunate experiences with our fireplace – a normal, crackling fire somehow leads to smoke in the living room. It’s unpleasant, and unhealthy, too. This page provided terrific information about some common problems. (A stumbling block for us is that our house, built about 40 years ago, is one of many houses to have a fireplace along an exterior wall, which means that outdoor temperature can seriously affect a chimney’s performance.)

The Drama Button
I have played this melodramatic sound effect for a lot of people over the last few weeks, and have yet to encounter someone who didn’t smile … and often would want to hear it again. (It lasts just a few seconds.) Save it for those moments when you have a big announcement to make around the home or office!

Spacing
Urban blight, anyone? Not for the folks at Spacing, a small-p political magazine that launched in 2003 to spur debate in Toronto about how the city can function better. Since then, it has broadened to include coverage elsewhere, and now boasts a regular podcast.
 
I Gotta Feeling parody
Whether or not the Black Eyed Peas’ hit from last year is still a brainworm you can’t shake, you might enjoy this parody from College Humor, which speculates on what happens the morning after the night before. The party-hard shenanigans described in the tune may sound like fun, but the consequences can be dreadful. A warning: not appropriate for work, or the kids!



iDragPaper
It’s fun to pull on a roll of toilet paper … but it’s messy, and let’s face it not very good for the environment. So, here’s a free app from the iTunes store that not only let’s you indulge that whim, but times you as well, making you want to beat your last score. No wonder it’s been the top download among free apps. I laughed watching a nine-year-old girl show me her tricks the other night.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here.

Goodbye watch, goodbye briefcase

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2010. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

Over the holidays, I caught up some reading, including a stack of magazines that has been piling up for a while. In one of them, I read a piece about how e-readers – Kindles and the like, including Apple’s much-anticipated tablet – may be the salvation of the very medium I was holding in my hand. 

(Incidentally, I’ve read far, far more about this expectation online, but that’s another story.) 

In another magazine, I read about what apparently is becoming an anachronism. Monocle magazine profiles the details of how mayors and regional political leaders around the world get on with governing. On one page, the mayor of Espoo, Finland – home to a little company called Nokia – talked about how she uses the giant’s devices to manage her affairs, and her ambition to move more governmental forms online. 

But on the opposite page, we met the lord mayor of Munich, who is a comparative traditionalist, reading a set of newspapers in the morning. The telling detail, though? “He relies on his briefcase,” read one caption, of a photograph showing a sturdy, but definitely conspicuous, briefcase. He wasn’t being criticized or ridiculed; his old-school style just seems to stand out.  

Old-school indeed. Now, many people still tote things about, but when you look closely, it’s more likely to be an item designed to carry a laptop and perhaps a few other goods, rather than a traditional, battle-weary briefcase. I have several items myself, my favourite being a satchel I can strap around my shoulder or over my back, which is helpful if I happen to be on my bike. 

I used a briefcase earlier in my career, but I felt like a bit of a fogey at the time. Now, even though I have a fair bit of grey hair, I think I would look even more ridiculous. First, I no longer need to carry a ton of paper around with me. The web, and digital networking, long ago made all that unnecessary. 

Briefcases are one thing; let’s look at the hands that carry them, and more particularly what’s just above those hands. 

 This is a story my wife told me a while back, after she returned to St. John’s from a conference in San Francisco. The keynote speaker was Sir Ken Robinson, the British author who’s become a popular talker on innovation and creativity. 

Robinson was addressing a large hotel ballroom filled with several hundred delegates. Robinson (who, it’s worth noting, is in his late 50s) told the crowd how technological change has changed many of the commonplace things of daily life, particularly with younger generations. 

To make a point, he talked about the wristwatch. He asked all the people in the room (around 800 or so) to raise their hands if they were wearing a wristwatch. Quite a lot of hands went up. Then he asked how many of those people happened to be under 30. 

Very few hands remained in the air, reported my wife, adding that a healthy proportion of the delegates were indeed young adults. They certainly didn’t seem to be as surprised as their older peers, who gazed in awe around the room. 

Which was Robinson’s point: with so many ways to keep track of time these days (the cellphone is a key way, but far from the only one), why spend money and, well, time on a device that has such a limited purpose? (I still argue that watches are about status and style, but let’s set that aside for now.) 

In other words, we expect our devices now to multitask, and increasingly, we’re putting those expectations into the things we hold in our hands, not around our wrists. It doesn’t have to be a phone. Look at the success of Apple’s iPod Touch, which anecdotally seems to have been a hot gift this Christmas. Its success shows that for many customers, all the stuff that gets packed into a smartphone can function perfectly well with one ingredient missing: the phone itself. 

That said, the common cellphone these days often has technology in it that would have been startling a decade or so ago. As Robinson’s example shows, a whole generation is relying on their phone to keep them on track during the course of the day. 

The briefcase, meanwhile, is sure to continue its path to becoming a niche product, if not a museum piece. Later this year, Apple is expected to follow through on months of often-overheated speculation and anticipation, and release a tablet – or whatever we’ll wind up calling it – that will at the very least compete with Amazon’s Kindle. (Microsoft and HP are apparently racing to produce their own model.] 

With wireless access growing rapidly, we are becoming getting used to a working culture that lets us put everything – not only a watch, but anything you’d care to stuff into a briefcase – into the palms of our hands. 

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here. 

Real-time buzz and other 2009 goodies

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Dec. 31, 2009. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

The year is down to its final hours, the champagne is chilled, and my calendar for 2010 is suspiciously filling up already. Before I get into the swing for what the coming year has in store, here are some markers of the year we’re putting behind us, with nods to the big trends and favourite moments of 2009.

Real time goes prime time

What we call the real-time web hit its stride in 2009, and is likely to evolve even further, and more powerfully, in 2010. The web has always operated in real time, of course; it’s just been difficult to know what’s happening, and being published and said, as it happens.

Google has led the way with search results that emphasize the instantaneous. Twitter and its myriad spinoff applications have made the real-time web a hot item. And even on Facebook, millions of users have become accustomed to real-time connections; thanks to instantaneous notifications, two or 20 friends can have a rapid-fire running commentary on a photo, note or status update.

Best download deal
The link above will take you to an iTunes page for a massive collection of classical music called 111 Years of Deutsche Grammophon, and I apologize if you think you’re about to get a deal. Unfortunately, this deal was a boo-boo, and it lasted for just a few days in October, when the package – 730 tracks of masterworks, or 55 CDs of music – was selling for just $9.99. Turns out the right price was $119.99; what a difference two digits make. We noticed some chatter on Facebook, and logged on straightaway. It took hours to download the lot, and not long after, iTunes corrected the price.

Favourite online shop
That would be Tee Fury, which sells one-of-a-kind T-shirt designs for just US $9 … with the catch that each design is available for only 24 hours. I bought a Star Wars Christmas parody (an AT-AT walker done up as a reindeer, in a scene called Merry Hothmas) for everyone in the family.

Augment this
Augmented reality got a fair bit of attention in 2009, although AR is far, far from mainstream use. (Or real reality, as it were.) The idea is that we’ll be able to mash up devices and software with interactive applications, often with a GPS tossed in there somewhere. For instance, you one day will be able to point your phone at a restaurant and have its menu downloaded to you; tourists can have real-time information served up as they navigate their way through attractions and to destinations. Expect some deliverables in 2010.

Favourite podcast
I subscribe to several dozen podcasts, which is, probably, a few dozen more than I need. I will probably spend some time this week doing mass-deletes of the 35 gigs I’ve accumulated. In the meantime, I never miss the Friday Night comedy podcast from the BBC, which makes the weekends a little funnier.

Biggest delayed-enthusiasm app
Google Wave is very cool: I’ve read and been told that dozens of times. That said, I don’t use it. I can’t quite see how it would apply to my life yet. I’m not saying Google Wave, which allows teams to work together simultaneously on projects, sharing their documents and communications, is useless; far from it. I’m simply one of the people that can’t apply it. I’m curious to see how it and its sure-to-emerge competitors will evolve.

 

Those “awwww” moments
A piece in the new issue of Vanity Fair argues that America has become addicted to cuteness, with endless websites devoted to panda bears, kittens and babies. Fair enough, but there’s a good reason why certain, exceptionally short videos (think of that baby kicking his legs in step while watching Beyoncé’s Single Ladies video, or the kitten that popped its paws out after being tickled) spread around like a tornado. Amid a chaotic day, everybody needs a smile. That’s all.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here. 

Elephants in the room, beats on the box

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Dec. 24, 2009. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

I have a few, final tips for Christmas surfing, but feel free to clip this column for the moments when you’re about to enjoy some lazy, well-earned downtime in the days ahead. They’ll definitely work well past Christmas Day. (And have a good one, by the way.)

First, though, some advice on how to deal with those who’ve indulged too much during the season of high spirits.

Deflate The Elephant
Have you noticed the ads from the LCBO – the Liquor Control Board of Ontario – on TV this month? The board has been buying lots of national airtime with spots based around the premise of the “elephant in the room” at this time of year, when a drunk friend or loved one decides to reach for the keys and head home. This is the companion site, which is worth reading before you have anyone over and the drinks start getting poured; you’ll find strategies for preventing drinking and driving, and possibly saving some lives. 

Curtis Andrews
The hirsute percussionist and all-round groovy guy has been on a roll lately, and not just because he seems to play with every cool outfit in St. John’s. Last week, he won the Atlantis Music Prize, sponsored by the St. John’s alternative paper the Scope, for album of the year, for his jazzy, worldbeat-inflected record The Offering of Curtis Andrews. Last month, he also picked up two major awards from MusicNL. You can learn about his music here (and sample the entire album, or, even better, buy it), and learn about his passions, including a plan to build a school in 2010 in Ghana. 

Holiday Photo Maker
From JibJab, the makers of funny videos and the perennial Elf Yourself app, comes this feature that allows you to plop headshots of you and yours into all kinds of seasonal settings. A head’s up: some of these are definitely not kid-appropriate, so look through the many options first if you’re looking for an activity with small kids! If there’s a new camera under the tree, knock yourself out here afterwards. 

Mashup Arts
In a similar vein, here’s an entire site that allows you to craft cards, messages, etc., for holidays, birthdays or practically any occasion. Upload some pics (it connects with Facebook and Flickr), drag and drop some materials, including comic-style balloons, and zap, you’re done. A nice way to add some pizzazz to your next message. 

Canadian emergency code alerts
I’m sure you’ll recall the colour-coded terror alert system the U.S. government unveiled in 2002 (you know, red means “severe”, green means “low”). This tongue-in-cheek feature adapts the system to the Canadian environment. Hence, green – the lowest threat level – means “Stanley Cup playoffs on, majority government, roll-up-the-rim contest in progress.” You can imagine what happens as things get worse.

Random paragraph generator
Trying to write something, and finding yourself staring at a blinking cursor or a maddeningly white piece of paper? I’ve been working on a pretty large writing project lately (a book, or at least what I hope will turn into one), and have had a few awful moments along the way. This tool can trigger a new train of thought, or inspire a way out of writer’s block. Or, it may just amuse you by presenting weirdly random collections of words.

Christmas in the Sixties
My buddies at the CBC’s digital archives put this collection of TV and clips together. If you’re about my vintage, you may find it fascinating or striking to see and hear how Christmas was celebrated, and described, during the era of aluminum trees (the Charlie Brown Christmas special didn’t make that up). 

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here. 

A few bright ideas during the darkest days

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Dec. 17, 2009. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

The days are getting progressively shorter, or at least the amount of sunlight we see during the course of the day. This week, a few sites for celebrating the bleak midwinter, a few amusements for any day of the year, and first a cool way of looking at where the sun is shining.

World Sunlight Map
With the solstice almost upon us, we’re more conscious than ever of just how much (or how little) daylight we have. Telling whether it’s light or dark at the moment is as simple as looking out the window, but what about a faraway place, like Berlin or Sydney or Qatar? Here, in one place, is a picture showing you what parts of the world currently have sunlight. A bright idea, no?

Auto Tune The News
Everyone from Barack Obama to Hugo Chavez to Katie Couric and many other TV talking heads have been auto-tuned, in one of the most popular video series produced this year. Auto Tune The News is a team of comedians who take existing TV clips, insert themselves into the mix, and run some of the vocals through an Auto-Tuner, the ubiquitous electronic processor that brings a distorted flair to countless hip-hop and pop songs. With the news, it becomes surreal and often laugh-out-loud funny. All of the videos of the year are collected here, on their YouTube channel. Here's a sample from November:

 

Great Big Séan
Séan McCann, one third of Great Big Sea, is launching a solo record, Lullabies for Bloodshot Eyes, in February; he’s just launched a website to help promote it. You can stream song songs and, if you subscribe to a newsletter, get a free download. You can keep up with McCann’s irreverent Twitter feed, and find a link to a new Facebook fan page.

Elf Yourself
From JibJab, the makers of those satirical videos, comes a seasonal application everyone should try, at least once or twice. Or, as the case may be, five times. You can make five “elves” here, by uploading pics of yourself and your family and friends. The app is now synched up with Facebook, so you can browse your photo library from your account there. A little zooming and rotating, and whoosh: you’re ready for North Pole duty. 

Victorian Christmas
Much of what we do, sing, eat and decorate during the Christmas season got nailed down during the Victorian era. This site is a feast of material about the Christmas season, including details on the complex ornaments crafted in the era, the meals that were served (think about all the things Charles Dickens describes in A Christmas Carol), and the games people played.

Daryl Cagle’s Political Cartoonists Index
What does it say when you can learn a lot about current events from cartoonists? Relax: good political cartoonists have always had an edge; they are, after all, among the most avid consumers of political news and such. Daryl Cagle, who now draws for msnbc.com, aggregates the work of many cartoonists here, with blog items to boot.

Newspaper Blackout Poems
Austin Kleon is a writer (and cartoonist) in Texas who creates poems through interesting means: his canvas is a newspaper, and his key tool is a marker. By eliminating most of the words, and carefully leaving behind a selected few, he creates some really original stuff.

The Movie Network streaming
If you subscribe to the Movie Network’s channels on cable or satellite, you may want to take advantage of this online bonus: the ability to stream movies online, at your convenience. The menu includes films like Doubt, Frost/Nixon and Get Smart, among others; a pay-per-view option is also available, for newer releases.

John Gushue is a writer currently on leave from his job at CBC News in St. John’s. Twitter: @johngushue. Blog: johngushue.typepad.com

Christa’s Christmas

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Dec. 10, 2009. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

I have no empirical evidence to back this up, but my guess is that Christmas Day tops the other days of the year, in terms of number of photographs snapped.  Pictures are hard to resist: the surprises of Christmas morning, the glee on children’s faces, the joy of families brought together.

Our first stop in this week’s web tour is a video that makes great use of family pictures, in a musical kind of way.

Christa Borden: O Holy Night
Borden’s newly released version of the hymn is splendid, and she has the voice to pull it off: only the brave and/or talented, for instance, will want to try those famous notes at the end. For the accompanying video, Borden reached out to the community, and asked friends and fans to send her some of their Christmas pictures. Here’s the resulting video, which was posted a week ago to YouTube. It’s sentimental and sweet … and a bit of a pleasure amid the seasonal bombardment.

Elsewhere this week

Mailing dates
Still have some cards and things to put into the mail? It may not be too late, depending on what it is and where it’s going. Here’s a link to Canada Post’s guide to deadlines for delivery.

 

Christmas Mah Jong
Mah Jong games, in which you click on matching tiles to eliminate them, have been an online staple for years. Here’s a variation with a Christmas theme, featuring images of Santa, gingerbread, and so on. It was the first game of its kind my son played, so it took a while to get the hang of it; if you’ll recall, only tiles with one border free can be clicked and released. A fine diversion for with the holidays coming.

Tee Fury 
I had never heard of Tee Fury until a couple of weeks ago, when I randomly came across a hilarious T-shirt design, featuring a scene from the Hoth battle sequence of The Empire Strikes Back, redone with a Christmas touch. (Maybe you need to see it to believe me.) I’m glad I read the small print, as the shirt was available for that day only. That’s how it works on Tee Fury: cool designs, cheap prices (US $9), and a big catch. The limited edition shirts are on sale for just 24 hours, so it pays to check regularly. 

Give It A Ponder
Hats off, or beards off, rather, to James Lipton of Inside The Actors Studio for mocking his own image in a clever and really funny series of commercials for communications giant LG, all about the hazards of texting. The message: think before you blurt. Lipton deflates his stuffy image with ads that any tween, teen or older should see. 

Where’s Waldo? 
Whether or not you’ve bought any of the Waldo books, chances are good you would recognize the lanky dude in the striped shirt.  (If you’re British, you may know him better by his original name, Wally.) This online game follows the books: your mission is to find not only Waldo, but his friends, marking them as you go. Look for the “game widget” when you load this page. You can also create your own avatar, and shutterbugs can have fun with a Flickr-powered photo challenge. 

Riddle Fence  
The sprightly St. John’s literary journal has just finished its fourth issue; you can’t read them online, but you can get a taste of what it’s about, plus directions on how you can contribute to upcoming editions. 

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Twitter right here.