SlackthePlanet

Alright, so not many people know this about me but other than being a slacker and computer geek I am also an aquarium nerd. If it lives in water I love it, its just that simple. I’ve kept fresh and saltwater aquariums now for almost 12 years. It doesn’t seem like I’ll be kicking the habit anytime soon. Over the last few years I probably haven’t gone more than a day or two without checking in on Nano-Reef.com. Its a great place for information about anything saltwater related.

Lately I’ve also been playing with Animoto.com. Its a video production website that allows users to upload their pics, choose or upload a song, and then *poof* a video is born. At first I simply scoffed. There was just no way a web interface could produce something as good as a video slide-show from a home computer. I was SOOO wrong. Not only did it produce video with much high production values than “most” people can do at home, it was also dead simple to do. I don’t think I would be to far off in saying someones grandma could probably figure it out in five minutes. Well…once you got past showing good old grandma how to use a mouse for an hour anyway.

So to my point, what do these two things have in common? Nothing really, I was just setting up the fact that I just made a simple video using pictures from nano-reef.com using animoto.com and it took all of 10 minutes. Oh, did I mention that they can also transfer your shiny new video straight to your Youtube account? Try it out, its fun and free…FREE PEOPLE!!!

• Just downloaded safari for windows. It just reinforces that I must get a mac one day. #
• Ugh!…transfering 115gb over regular 10/100 This is gonna take close to three hours. Time for bed. #
• Going to try to install compwiz tonight. Wish me luck #

• Just got a bill for $4k. Looks like its back to man-whorin for me. #
• Busy day #
• Playing with animoto…its so fun and easy my mom could use it #

• Ok, Netfirms finally got around to fixing their SQL server….only took them 10 hours #
• I know I should sleep but it just feels like a waste of prime internet time. #
• Anyone know of a really great Flickr gallery for wordpress??? #
• The sun is coming up soon. I guess I should go to bed before I get a tan #
• Wow, a whole 5 hours of sleep, boy do I feel refreshed<90s>NOT!</90s> #
• Looking for a way to combine picasa and flickr #

This comic pretty much sums up my wife. I hope she doesn’t kill me

A little history. I’ve been stuck in the dark ages for a long, long, long, time. When I first started using computers way back then 14.4 modems were considered fast(Don’t laugh). Over time I did what any reasonable geek would do I upgraded every chance I got throwing money away on what now would be considered “relics”. I made the progression up to 28.8 to 33.6 and then 56k…sadly however that is where it all stopped for me.

I had the misfortune of living in the country. Yes, this does mean I am blessedly free of neighbors complaining every time I do something like walk naked in front of an open window. However it means I am also on my local phone providers shit list. I had been begging their customer service for years to run DSL to my location. Their response over the last six years has always been the same “Very soon, we are expanding all the time”. It turns out that the customer service line about expansion could not have been further from the truth. One day I happened to talk with a DSL technician for said phone company. I asked the gentleman is there was anything he could do to speed up the deployment or possible give me an ETA. The response was the one I had been expecting all these years, he begins with a laugh and then says:

“Out there? You’ll never get DSL way out there. We need at least fifty houses to agree to sign up before it becomes financially viable to put a switch out there.”

In itself this wouldn’t be so bad for most people. Then again most people have more than one option for internet access. Not here though. In my area my local phone provider is also the only dial-up internet provider. No AOL, Earthlink, NetZero, nothing at all…and to make matters worse my phone provider didn’t just charge $9.95 for their dial-up. Oh no, I was paying $21.95 a month for FREAKIN DIAL-UP PEOPLE!

Now its not that I’m a cheapskate, I told them I would gladly pay much more for a faster connection. At this point most people usually point out HughesNet or Wildblue or some other satellite service. That unfortunately was a no-go as well. But all was not lost! My savior came in the form of a website by the name: EVDOforums. It was there that I learned all about broadband through cell service.

I am currently with AT&T wireless but they were defiantly not an option considering how slow the EDGE network is on my iphone. In the end I signed a two year contract with Alltel just for their EVDO data plan. My speeds aren’t anywhere near what most people on DSL or Cable are accustomed to, but coming from 56k it feels like I’m finally set free<insert song: Born Free>. If anyone else out there is suffering like I was then I beg you, break the bonds of dial-up and give your local phone company the middle finger and a hearty F.U.

I’ve been playing around with a new comic building website lately. Its called Bitstrips.com and I had every intention of reviewing it on here but its almost 6 a.m. and I have yet to go to bed. Just trust me though this site is LOADS of fun. Here is a short strip I made depicting and actual call I received back when I used to work tech support for a very large computer company. Enjoy.

• Just downloaded Korn unplugged #
• Testing a wordpress widget #
• The sun just rose, I should go to bed #
• Netfirms SUCKS!!!! #

This page still isn’t looking or acting exactly how I would like. Yes, I realize the irony of having to put this much work into a page dedicated to my slacking life-style. Until everything is smoothed out please pardon my e-dust and check back often.