Posted 9:41 PM by Deemer

Talk Like A Pirate Day - 9/19 

Talk Like A Pirate Day - 9/19

Arrrr! Ahoy, you scarvy bilge rat! Yar be visitin' we site if'n ya knows what's good for ye. 'Av a sip of me grog and play me a tune on ye hornpipe. Aye, me thinks ye has had too much grog already.

Stop by again, matey, when your ship can stay in dock a bit longer.

Posted 8:03 PM by Scottman

Disgruntled listener 

I feel like complaining today. Instead of bellyaching about a marching band oriented topic, I thought I would discuss something else.





You probably recognize the photo above. If not, it is the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. It is one of the most recognizable paintings in the history of mankind. You'll probably also noticed that it has been compressed. I removed sections of it and made it smaller so it would fit better in this blog. Art lovers may argue that taking out sections of it ruins the image. No matter how insignificant the size of the deleted portion, all of it is required to make this painting great.

I agree. I altered the image to prove a point about music. People who know me will tell you that I listen to music A LOT. In fact, I am almost always near a radio or something that produces music. I even sleep with the radio on. Occasionally I'll hear a song on the radio that I really like. When that happens, I'll usually go out and buy a copy of the CD. More and more often I have discovered songs that are played on the radio are shortened versions of the original. This drives me nuts! Why can't the radio stations play complete versions of songs?! That probably doesn't bother most people, but it really gets on my nerves because it changes the songs. Just like the painting is changed above. Sure, we know it is the Mona Lisa, but it isn't the same as the original.

Quite frankly, I am surprised that more people are not up in arms about the butchering of music. People are quick to point out when a song is not the original version or that elements of a song are sampled or copied from something else, but for some reason they don't seem to mind if a song is cut up.

Maybe people don't notice stuff like that.

What a surprise.

Posted 8:01 PM by Deemer

SI Community: You decide... 

Well - we had quite a 'par-tay' on the message board last night (8/31-9/1 for those of you reading this sometime after). We were hoppin' back and forth between numerous threads until several of us (by "us" of course I mean "me") got dizzy and had to lie down for a while with a cold towel on their head.

After regaining consciousness and hoppin' back into the frey; the topic of a Chat Room was brought up by a few of the 'par-tay-ers' that it would have been easier than refreshing the message board to see 'new messages' every 10 seconds =)

Well - that's too bad. Okay, just kidding. I've been testing out one that's part of our hosting service. It's not IRC or anything, but it's better than a poke in the eye. I'll post the Test Chat Room URL here and you can let me know via email whether or not you like it or if it holds up...