2007/08/22

Amazing Finnish Version of YMCA

I saw this listed on Boingboing.net.

Amazing video from the 70s (I hope!) of a Finnish version of YMCA, called NMKY.

There are 5 things I love about this video

1) The keyboard player, his crappy synth sound, his 70s clothing and beaming smile.
2) The lead singer and his wardrobe
3) The back-up singers and their choreography
4) The bass player. He has some sick chops! Apparently he is famous, Pekka Pohjola (in Finland). There are a few quotes (early on) in the comments on YouTube like "Did he need the money?", "Why Pekka, why?", etc.
5) The band's total lack of emotion.

It's only 2 minutes so you really can't loose.

2007/07/09

Open DNS

If you want to speed up (slightly) the web, you might want to try OpenDNS service. DNS is Domain Name Server and is what your computer uses to translate the text of an http address (like google.com) into the numbers the internet really uses -- IP address (192.168.1.1 for example [not google's]).

This company has their own, more effecient DNS server which speeds up the request for IP addresses and also blocks phishing sites. Seems like a good idea. Not sure how they make any money on it though. Privacy policy seems pretty good.

If you are using DSL, click on configuring your router instead of each computer and then all computers will use it.

http://www.opendns.com/

2007/07/06

Live Earth has started...

Well, I was looking forward to the Live Earth web broadcast. But what I'm seeing right now...well, it sucks. I was expecting a lot from the same people who did Live Eight. That was a great web broadcast. Great sound, full screen video, easy to change to different stages. No commercials, no interruptions.

What do we see so far with Live Earth? Well, if you don't use Internet Explorer, you get a tiny Quick Time window. Boo! :( If you use Internet Explorer, you figured it would be awesome right? No! It's also not full screen. There is an option to make it full screen, but the resolution is not good enough... it's blocky. So the regular resolution is bigger than the Quicktime/non-IE version, but still not full screen. Gee, thanks Microsoft.

Oh, and get this. Australia concert has started but you can't even access it on IE. You click on the concert link and nothing happens!! Firefox/Quick time is running though. Hope they fix that problem before some real network traffic comes through.

Anyhoo, I'm really only interested in the concert on the Kyoto Stage. Haven't been able to find if it is being broadcast anywhere (HD TV or XM radio). Looks like the Tokyo one is partially on Sundance channel. Here's Kyoto Stage lineup:

LIVE EARTH KYOTO (Special Broadcast Event)
(not representative of running order; TBA)

BONNIE PINK
MICHAEL NYMAN
RIP SLYME
UA
YELLOW MAGIC ORCHESTRA

SPECIAL BROADCAST EVENTS
To-ji Temple in Kyoto, Japan

LOCAL START
11:00 p.m. 7/7

USA START (EDT)
10:00 a.m. 7/7



Yeah, I don't know why Nyman is playing there...but that's okay. The big news is Yellow Magic Orchestra!! First reunion under that name in over 10 years. They have been playing a little under the name Human Audio Sponge over the last 2-3 years.


Well, the rest of the lineup is here:
http://liveearth.msn.com/about/factsheet

Only other artists I'm kind of interested in are: The Police and Spinal Tap (not together, unfortunately)

If anyone finds out info about the Kyoto broadcast (other than the web, please post!)

Enjoy??

2007/06/03

Odd things from my trip to Singapore/Bali

Here's a link to some photos I took on a recent trip to Bali. They are photos of commercial products or things I found amusing.

BaliTripCommercialThings


Make sure to pick "slide show" so you can see all my clever captions.

Dedicated to Charles Nelson Riley who passed away last week.

2007/03/06

Taigan No Kaji

is a Japanese saying that translates roughly into "the fire across the river". It's a nice phrase basically meaning that there is a problem out there but it is far away enough from you that you don't worry about it. I don't think there is an similar phrase in English.

In a work context, I was thinking that there are a lot of people who do their job with this feeling.