Before I settle in for my epic post about the great family time we had, I have to share the awesomest song I’ve heard in a long time. It’s NOT safe for work or children, but it isn’t dirty. Just find some time alone at home to listen and you’ll understand. After one listen you’ll be singing the chorus all around the house! And if you don’t think this is unironically one of the best songs you’ve heard all year, then… I only have bad things to think about you right now.\
The easiest place for you to listen to the song is on YouTube, but ignore the video the first time you watch, ok? Clicky for awesome!\
ETA- Kevin thinks “isn’t dirty” is inaccurate. I told him he was wrong, heh.
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Music Monday!
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The Ficly Server Support Project
Ficly is doing fine, and it’s a nice break from work stuff to go play in something uncomplicated without a bunch of dependencies. The community is great and they produce some fantastic stories.\
As I mentioned in my previous post, I’m enamored with Kickstarter and asked them if I could create a project for Ficly to see if we could get the community to help us out with the hosting costs for the coming year. I figured \$800 would cover the co-location facility and our Amazon bill (we store all the images people upload there and probably some other stuff in the future), and maybe some upgrades to Ficly’s box (I just realized I should add more RAM, for example).\
They said yes, and Wednesday night, I created the Ficly Server Support Project. In the first 48 hours, we’ve raised almost 75% of the total, and we still have 31 days to go!!\
If you can help out, I’d appreciate it. Ficly’s not going anywhere, but the help is definitely appreciated and makes things a little easier on Jason and me.\
Thanks! -
The Future of Product Development
I’ve been hearing about Kickstarter on various blogs this week. Well, I checked it out tonight, and I think it’s brilliant. It’s basically a way to run a pledge-based funding round for a specific purpose. A lot of the projects on the site are from artists who want to release an album, or filmmakers who want to make a movie. You have a certain amount of time to reach your funding goal. If you get enough pledges in the set amount of time, everyone’s credit cards are hit and you get your money. If not, no one’s out a dime. It could get bootstrapped startups off the ground, lead to truly independent art, and be a great way to crowdsource journalism. But, I think it could be the future of product development. If your users really want a feature, do they want it enough to pay for it?\
Here’s how it could work:- User requests a feature through Get Satisfaction
- Product Owner decides whether they want to build this feature and sets up a pledge for it on Kickstarter – setting a price based on complexity + time to implement * desire to build it (0 being “I was going to do it anyway and it will take five minutes, so why bother, 1,000 being I really don’t want to build it, but if you give me \$100,000, I’ll consider it).
- Product Owner posts the link to the pledge and the amount required to build that feature.
- If the pledge succeeds, the feature gets implemented. If not, it doesn’t (unless the Product Owner really wants it).\
For large companies, this doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. But, for small companies who have few resources and little time? This could make choosing what you work on next a really easy decision, and involve your users in the process.\
If anyone actually does this, I’d love to hear about it.\
And to prove I think it’s a great idea, I’ve pledged to support a zombie movie being shot right here in Savannah. Check it out… let’s help this guy make a movie!!\
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The Best Music of 2009 – So Far
Sound Opinions’ most recent podcast listed their favorite albums of the year so far. I did this last year, and there’s been so much good stuff so far this year, it’s time to do another one. So, here’s my list of the best albums of 2009 so far:
- Hazards of Love by The Decemberists: I love everything on this album. The fact that it’s basically a Rock Opera only helps. It’s great on a lot of different levels, but my favorite thing about it is that it’s great at many volumes. Turned up loud in the car or through headphones, the fantastic guitar work comes through. When quieter, the lovely vocals and lyrics are the stars. Really, you should get this before you do anything else.
- Hombre Lobo by Eels: Another rock opera from one of my all-time favorite bands, this one doesn’t disappoint at all. It’s got the sad ballads, and the ass kicking rockers that the band does so well. Fresh Blood is now my second favorite Eels song of all time (after Saturday Morning). The whole album is great, and it was hard to choose which album to be at one or two, but this album could have easily been number one.
- Eating Us by Black Moth Super Rainbow: Silly band name aside, this band is amazing. They’re somewhere between Zero 7, Massive Attack and Holy F*ck. Great analog techno, fantastic beats – this is an awesome headphone album.
- Lost Channels by Great Lake Swimmers: Ongiara is one of my all-time favorite albums, and this one picks up where it left off, adding some new sounds, but generally keeping the masterful folk ballad front and center. I love the addition of harmonies and some of the new instruments, but the heart of their sound is the lyrics.
- Dark Was the Night by a bunch of great people: I don’t normally get compilations, but this has a ton of my favorite artists on it, so I couldn’t resist. This album is worth the price just for Grizzly Bear‘s heart-breaking Deep Blue Sea and The New Pornographers‘ Hey, Snow White. The album is solid throughout, and the collection of bands they got to perform on it is staggering.
- Hospice by Antlers: This is firmly in Massive Attack territory, so I’m going to instantly perk up at anything that follows in one of my all-time favorite bands’ footsteps. It’s melancholy, atmospheric and so layered, it took me a dozen times through it with headphones on to pick them all out.
- Fantasies by Metric: This album is a little uneven, but the high points are worth the price of admission. If you like The Breeders or Luscious Jackson, you’ll love this album.\
There are a few albums that came close to making the list that are still good, but not quite good enough for the list. The latest from Vetiver, Malajube (I liked their previous album more), Sunparlour Players and Portland Cello Project are all worth checking out as well.\
What are your favorite albums of 2009 so far? Come on, share!
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Pools and Playgrounds, all day long.
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Slice of Life entry
I have a bunch of errands and shopping to do today, one of which is to go to the local library about a mile from my house. It doesn’t open until 2 though. 2! On a Saturday. Isn’t that lame? I want to go there first, since I don’t want groceries to melt or have to backtrack. So I am sitting at home waiting for the library to open, wasting hours, so I don’t waste 15 minutes backtracking. I also can’t get up the energy to start laundry or the dishes, since my plan was to do that after all of my errands were finished [in the morning]. This is why I can never be president. That and my period. I also can’t be a swim teacher either though.
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Staycationing in style
Instead of going on a real family vacation this year, we decided to check out Savannah’s fun spots. Besides the obvious benefit of saving money, we avoided the frustrating mornings and evenings in a hotel when everyone wouldn’t be awake at the same time. (I hate staying at hotels, can you tell?)\
We didn’t do everything on our fun list, be we did manage:- Ice Age in 3-D (yay air conditioning!)
- Beach (sorry, no pictures)
- Fireworks
- Playgrounds, playgrounds, and more playgrounds
- Star Wars marathon (gag me, but the boys really loved this)
- Baseball game
- Cook out, with root beer floats, yum\
Kevin’s posted some pictures already.\
We are going to both sets of grandparents’ before school starts, but those are “visits” not vacations. Just fyi.\
Q: What are you doing for vacation this summer, internet?
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Celebrating the 4th on the 3rd
I took the end of last week off to hang out with the kids and relax a little. We had a great time going to the beach, playing video games, grilling things, going to the playground(s) and taking the boys to their first minor league baseball game.\
The Savannah Sand Gnats put on a pretty darn good fireworks show. We let the boys stay up impossibly late, filled them up with cherry lime-ade, sprite, french fries and hot dogs and tried to explain the finer points of the national past time (they know the ins and outs of the Star Wars story, but not the art of the sacrifice fly. It’s all my fault).\
There are ~~two~~ three sets over on flickr – at the playground, us at the game, and the fireworks show.\
Enjoy! -
Rails in Athens
I was in Athens, GA yesterday speaking to the DWEEBS group at the University of Georgia about Rails. It was a lot of fun. Afterwards, I went out to lunch with Jinny Potter (the head DWEEB) and Kara, our former intern who’s now attending UGA, and then Jinny took me on a tour of the university and downtown Athens. It was a great time, and Jinny was a great host.\
Here are my slides from yesterday if you’re interested. I’ll be giving some form of this presentation at August’s Refresh Savannah.Welcome To Ruby On RailsView more presentations from Kevin Lawver. -
Pumpkin Muffin!
I’ve been trying for weeks to come up with a cute and witty intro to this post, and I just can’t. So here I go…\
Our good friends, Tom and Becky, are looking to adopt. You can check out their pertinent and personal info here: Tom and Becky.\
While reading about their effort to adopt, it just struck me that maybe someone reading this blog might know Pumpkin Muffin, (their pet name for their future child). Kevin’s half of this blog gets so many visitors, I wanted to take the opportunity to spread the word about Tom and Becky’s search. Maybe one of you reading this knows of a woman looking for adoptive parents. If so, click on the link above and see if there is a possible match. Thanks.\
A bit about Tom and Becky- They are well-educated, generous, intelligent, family-oriented, and fun-loving. Becky actually introduced me to Kevin, who turned out to be my Prince Charming. Wouldn’t it be nice if I were to facilitate Becky meeting her own little prince (or princess)?
