So this chain letter thing is floating around the blogosphere, except you get to find things out about people, and there are no threats of buildings falling on your head, or elephants trampling over your loved ones if you don’t participate. And hey, aren’t they the best kind of chain letters anyway? So here it goes, courtesy of Thord.
1. I have been online in some form or another since 1994, when I worked for a local computer camp teaching 8 year olds html markup. Yes, sir, that’s when AOL had yet to contribute to landfills the world over with their “free” offers, Netscape was still “cool”, Microsoft hadn’t “gotten” the Internet, and Google was still just a number that only number geeks knew.
2. I am a big comic book geek. And with the proliferation of comic book movies and the growth of Manga in normal book sellers its changing from what I knew as a child. But at least its growing! (Oh, Comic Book Guy — I think you’ll be an anachronism soon). Also cool? How Marvel and DC are collecting their stuff in trades. I can catch up on 2 years worth of issues in a single hour!
3. I am a direct marketing geek as well. Does anyone still remember $20 Marketing Bootcamps, the “magic” of ezine “marketing, and Corey Rudl? RIP, man.
4. I love my Xbox Media Center. Modifying your Xbox with the Xbox Media Center is truly the best thing since sliced bread; I have it hooked into my LAN at home, so I can stream videos and movies right to my TV. The best part? The interface is absolutely delicious (man, it is so good), and it is a virtual swiss army knife when it comes to formats. Xvid, quicktime, it does it all. The only problem is that it can’t stream true high definition stuff, but its a forgivable small strike against it, as that’s what the Xbox360 is for.
5. I actually like Digg. In spite of all of the critical posts on Digg, I have been watching Digg for two years (Dec 04). Back then, it wasn’t all that unusual to see front page posts with 20 Diggs. I am critical of Digg only because of the some of the inherent hypocrisies, the way it treats its best users, and how corrupt its gotten, in spite of its geeky roots.
At this point I’m obligated to pass it along, and I nominate Yaro (who I am separated by 3 degrees of separation — man, its a small world), Amit , Muhammad , Jessica , and Abe .
December 19th, 2006 at 1:21 pm | Permalink
Do these count for the meme? I could have guessed all but #3! :)
Be interesting to see you write about that subject too… there’s still a lot of mileage in DM, so my cleverer colleagues tell me.
December 19th, 2006 at 1:54 pm | Permalink
Yikes.
I guess I am as transparent as my wife thinks! :D
December 19th, 2006 at 2:48 pm | Permalink
Hey. Transparency is a good thing for bloggers, right?
December 21st, 2006 at 2:23 am | Permalink
I still read comic books too. I recently wrote a post about some of my current favorites:
http://engtech.wordpress.com/2006/12/03/gift-guide-for-geeks-part-4-comic-books-alan-moore-garth-ennis-jms-frank-miller/
Also, check out CDisplay and grabbing torrents of CBR/CBZ comic book scans. It’s a pain in the ass to try to read comic scans for any length of time, but it can be a great way to see what you think of a series before buying into it.
Local libraries have a fairly large selection of TPBs and graphic novels. You’d be surprised at what you can find. Knowing who the good writers are can lead to some great explorations.
December 23rd, 2006 at 8:58 am | Permalink
Hey Engtech,
I have, in some form or another, read some or all of the ones you suggested. They are all great. ;) TPB’s make it all them more easy and affordable to read all of the issues. I noticed that Marvel is pushing the TPB’s as a way to actually *read* stuff, as much of their original comics are out in quite a limited release. It creates a secondary market for the originals, which in turn creates interest and buzz; it creates a market for TPB’s which can be expanded into TPB’s of varying price points; and it creates accessibility for stories as TPB’s are being picked up by mainstream book sellers.
Win-win as far as I’m concerned. ;)
December 26th, 2006 at 1:07 am | Permalink
[...] It’s possibly the most contagious “flu” going around this holiday season - the “five things” blog-tag game. I’ve been tagged numerous times now (thanks Tony, Igor, Luc and Sreejith) and it’s about time I acted on these requests to join the epidemic. [...]