I tell everyone I know to use VLC if they are looking to play videos on a computer. It’s quite simply one of the best and most useful computer applications available. Playing videos on a computer hasn’t been novel for about 20 years, but playing the videos you want is still oddly difficult in 2012. [...]
Aaron Sorkin gave the commencement speech to Syracuse University’s graduating class of 2012. Sorkin giving life advice to fellow members of the Cuse? Obviously, this was going to get posted as soon as it was available on Youtube. Sorkin has a knack for giving great advice and not sounding like a pretentious resident of Douchbagistan [...]
Speaking of secrets and sharing, the great irony of Facebook is that it’s brought more people together than any other technology but simultaneously makes us more lonely. What Facebook has revealed about human nature—and this is not a minor revelation—is that a connection is not the same thing as a bond, and that instant and [...]
Dan Lyons attempts to live life in the absence of any Apple or Google products for a month. Lyons called his experiment “the month with Microsoft” to determine if the once-dominant tech company could become great again. I’ve spent the past four weeks using nothing but Microsoft products—Windows computers, Windows phones, Xbox, Bing, Internet Explorer—instead [...]
Alexandra Molotkow has piece in the NYT’s that is ostensibly about coming to grips with no-longer being a music snob, or how being a music snob makes one the least cool person in the room (on Twitter, whatevs). However, with that said, the article is about so much more than that and it’s really difficult [...]
Yesterday, there was a longish thread at Reddit about the onset of depression stemming from being a “forever alone.” One particular Redditor, who identified themselves as a 43-year-old forever alone, chimed in with a deeply moving answer on having the right perspective in life. Sometimes on a warm day, a cool breeze will come along. [...]
Sam Anderson of the New York Times goes really long on the history and cultural impact of “stupid games.” In the nearly 30 years since Tetris’s invention — and especially over the last five, with the rise of smartphones — Tetris and its offspring (Angry Birds, Bejeweled, Fruit Ninja, etc.) have colonized our pockets and [...]
Farhad Manjoo makes the interesting observation that Microsoft’s Xbox is already ahead of the curve when it comes to bringing television into the Internet-era. Over the last few months, Microsoft has turned its video-game console into your TV’s best friend. Late last year, the company revamped the Xbox’s interface, adding a wonderful voice-search feature through [...]
When Derek Sivers was a young man, he met his mentor Kimo Williams. Sivers was about to attend Berklee College of Music and that’s when Williams changed his life. Kimo’s high expectations set a new pace for me. He taught me “the standard pace is for chumps” - that the system is designed so anyone [...]
