CW 47 Friday Funnies

Nov 21, 2008 by Dan Taylor    2 Comments    Posted under: Humor

Comin’ back atcha with the weekly installment of Friday Funnies.  Without further adieu:

http://www.nytimes-se.com/ – ah if only the NY Times really would read like this.

http://adam.pra.to/public/pics/Killer_Biscuits_.JPG – note to self – NEVER buy biscuits in San Diego.

http://blog.twitad.com/ – Hmm, this requires further review.  If you’re not already – Follow me on Twitter

http://www.davezilla.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/12/wonder-sauna-hot-pants-lg.jpg – Seriously, who thinks/thought up this shit?

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2008/11/19/google-voice-browser-baffled-by-scottish-accents-86908-20906707/ – having lived in the UK for a year and spoken with a number of North Englanders and Scots, it was only a matter of time before this came to the forefront.

http://ranajune.com/post/58196230/omfg – did someone mention Cheezburger?

http://www.ridelust.com/road-rage-101-tips-to-piss-off-other-drivers/ – Are you fucking kidding me?  As a seasoned driver of the Belt Parkway, the Long Island Expressway, and the New Jersey turnpike, all I can say is Are you fucking kidding me?  Douschbags.  the rest of the site is kinda cool though.

http://static.pyzam.com/img/funnypics/2/busted.jpg – Becks is like any other red blooded male.  With an ass like that who WOULDN’T look?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJUBFkVrk9s& – are you KIDDING me?  What marketing team was stoned at 3am and came up with this brand name?  Say it with me now….Tiddy Bear.

http://www.yesbutnobutyes.com/archives/2008/11/candy_wrapped_b.html – mmmm…Bacon.  I love bacon, is that site still around? Apparently so, but sadly, a pail comparison of what it used to be.  That was one of the first sites I landed as a client while working at bla-bla.com.

http://www.freakingnews.com/pictures/41000/Gonzo-Journalism–41262.jpg – will the real Gonzo please stand up?

Enjoy and have a GREAT weekend!  Ooo look, it just started snowing outside.  Which is better than snowing inside.

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Passionato – iTunes for classical lovers

Sep 11, 2008 by Dan Taylor    18 Comments    Posted under: Music

Former Baltimore Symphony Orchestra president and music industry veteran James Glicker has recently launched his newest project: Passionato.  The online retailer will be first launched in the UK, with a potential rollout into US markets at a later date.  Why the favoritism for old world residents?

James Glicker – Founder and CEO of Passionato

“First, the UK and Europe have an incredibly vibrant classical music scene in terms of concert attendance, record labels and journalism – though of course the US is the biggest single country in terms of actual classical music sales,” he said.

“Second, the UK has several innovative entities that sponsor creative projects, including the Creative Capital Fund, which invested in Passionato. So another reason for setting up Passionato in the UK is to take advantage of the financial support that was being offered to us.”

Passionato features the world’s largest collection of high quality classical downloads, with more than 18,000 recordings available on the launch date.  But what makes passionate different from say…hmmm…iTunes?  Glicker and co. tackled this problem by first investigating what was prohibiting listeners from heading to the world leader in digital music downloads first.

Quality.  Passionato offers single track, work, or full album downloads at a high-quality 320kps MP3 or (for the slightly more technical) lossless FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec) files.  Glicker describes classical music aficionados as “a fastidious lot” which have been slow to adapt the digital revolution, often complaining of the poor audio quality of compressed files.

“Online music stores have typically offered MP3s at 128kbps, i.e. very compressed files, which is fine for pop music but it’s not exactly high-fidelity,” he said.

“There are a handful of online stores currently offering small catalogues of classical music at 320kbps. This is high quality audio and our research tells us people can’t readily distinguish between 320kbps MP3s and CD quality wavs. We are offering 320kpbs and also lossless FLAC.”

Glicker isn’t about to bury his head in the sand.  He realizes that the classical music arena is a difficult one, especially in a format connoisseurs have traditionally shied away from.

“This is a major motivation for us,” he said.

“It’s ironic that while classical music concert attendance is on the rise, labels are reducing their recordings and physical retailers are shutting down like there is no tomorrow.

“So the future of classical music distribution is online. The only thing that has stopped this inevitable shift from happening to date has been audio quality, plus the DRM issue.”

Speaking to the DRM (Digital Rights Management), Passionato tracks are free of DRM, therefore allowing purchasers to transfer the songs to another computer or portable music player (iPod).  A wise move as while the ‘industry’ tends to love DRM, consumers have often felt cheated as their ‘purchase’ has certain limitations after they’ve plunked down the cash.

Passionato’s online store features 60 second samples of all works, allowing users to give a listen before deciding to complete a transaction.  A free music player and organizer are also available, although I’m going to bet the farm that 90% of users will stand by the industry standard: iTunes.

As a special ‘Welcome to Passionato, how can I help you?’ launch promotion, anyone registering at passionato.com can download 10 free pre-selected tracks including a 30 minute work.

My $.02 – while Passionato currently features major label artists, what about hand selecting independent classical artists on a weekly basis and featuring them as an either free or minimal cost download?  It might be a great launching platform for a number of artists in a highly competitive industry, and provide Passionato a wealth of free press and all-important traffic.

Hvar, Croatia

Sep 3, 2008 by Dan Taylor    19 Comments    Posted under: Photography

When the wife first suggested taking a week off and heading down to Croatia for some fun in the sun, I have to admit, fun in the sun isn’t exactly the first image that comes to mind when I think Croatia.  I’ll fully admit that the whole Bosnia/Herzegovina/Serbia thing went relatively unnoticed by me, but I knew Croatia is somewhere in the neighborhood.  Ok, granted the whole thing came to an end by 1995, but I hadn’t really thought about Croatia since.

After spending a sun filled week on the island of Hvar off the coast of Croatia, near Split, all I can say is if there was a war raging there a 13 years ago, you’d never know it now.  The people, the food, the beaches, everything was just about as close to perfect as you’d want it to be.

We started our journey from Vienna to Split at around 6:30am.  Driving south from Vienna to the Slovenian border was a piece of cake.  Once in Slovenia, things started to get interesting.  It seems as though the Slovenians aren’t exactly building highways at the same rapid pace the Croatians are.  Needless to say, we had to follow some two lane roads the headed through the countryside.  All I can say is, the people that live along those roads must absolutely hate the summer and relish the winter, as every second car has a German, Austrian, Czech, or Polish license plate.  While the Slovenia countryside looks a whole lot like the southern Austrian countryside, once we hit the Croatian border, we were back on track (read: highway) and movin’ right along.

I’m not sure geographically where it happened, but at one point the entire landscape began to change before my eyes.  In the course of 15-20 minutes the green pastures dried up and the view was one of rocks and brush.  And when I say rocks, I’m not kidding.  If the Croatian Government ever found a financial value in (I think it’s sandstone?) rock, they could quite possibly be one of the wealthiest nations in the world.  Everywhere you look, rocks sticking out of the ground, rocks strewn across the ground, massive rocks that have been blasted aside for the motorway, and even bigger rocks that have been blasted straight through (tunnels).

In our inevitable fashion, both of us managed to miss the gigantic sign that read: To Ferry Boat, and had a small tour through Split’s adjoining suburb.  We got back on track eventually, and made our way down to the Jadrolinija ferry line with about a half hour to spare before the next trip to Hvar.  Pretty good timing I’d say.  The wife was driving, and I have to say, she managed to shoehorn the car in the ferry and up a ramp to the second parking deck.  Nice work babe!

A short 1.75 hour ferry ride across the Adriatic to Hvar gave way to my first sunburn of the trip.  Note to self: buy sunscreen BEFORE arriving.  Once on the island, you can pretty much throw the map out the window, as it’s completely unnecessary.  In other words, while not tiny, the island is small enough where getting ‘lost’ would be only half the fun.

Instead of staying in Hvar, we actually traveled over to the other side of the island and stayed in the unbelievably quaint village of Vrboska.  Vrboska is a former fishing village, not stocked with cafes and restaurants.  There is of course a marina, with plenty of flags from all over Europe moored in Vrboska’s natural harbor.  Let’s get one thing clear here, neither one of us knew about Vrboska, and full credit goes to a former work colleague of the wife’s.  Michael knew of the village and highly recommended it.  With her knowing just a little about Croatia, and me thinking it’s still a war zone (joke), we were up for pretty much anything.

We did drive over to Hvar for a day, as the wife’s need to shop had to be satisfied, and to be honest, getting up and going to beach everyday can be a bit grueling ?, so a morning trip to Hvar was a welcome distraction.  I might put it like this: if you’re up for people and cafes and a town square with million dollar boats moored along the harbor, Hvar is your place.  On the other hand, if you’re still interested in some cafes, can forgo the town square, but still want to drool over something you’ll never be able to afford, Vrboska is your place.  That and take about 90% of the population away.

The beach.  Talk about peace and solitude.  One thing I was unaware of before our trip is that there’s no sand in Croatia.  No joke, the beaches are not made of sand, but rather rock.  Ok, maybe not the best for lying around on, but I tend to get forced back in the water by Greenpeace activists every time I lie around on a beach anyway.  What the lack of sand DOES however contribute to is 100% crystal clear water.  It’s a fantastic sensation to stand on a rock ledge with water at your feed and be able to see directly down to the bottom so that you know what you’re jumping into.  We had our own rock each day, but to be fair, we did have to rent bicycles to get there as this wasn’t an ‘official’ beach, but rather just a place to be alone and go swimming.  A good book, beautiful water, and my favorite woman on earth?  How can you go wrong?

I must also mention that should you get the chance to make it to Vrboska, head directly to Restaurant Mediteran.  The food at this restaurant was so good, we didn’t even bother with any other restaurant after trying only a few.  Maybe there were better ones, but really, I’d be hard pressed to match one that can deliver a 50 pound tuna to your plate, accompanied by freshly grilled local vegetables.

Sadly, as all good things do, our trip to Hvar came to an end with a 4am wakeup call.  Yep, 4am.  The first ferry off the island leaves at 5:30, and it’s recommended to get there at least 45 minutes before.  I can’t say that our trip home was uneventful as it included losing the car in the dark while buying tickets for the ferry and almost not making it on the boat, and my not so smart ‘Oh, I’ll just put some regular gas here in the Diesel fuel tank’ moment.  Fear not, it was only 5 litres in a 70 litre tank, so, as the wife’s father said, “Meh…just makes it go a bit faster.”

But in the end, everything worked out for the best, and hey…getting up at 4am, DOES lead to an amazing sunrise over the Adriatic.

Absinthe back on the shelves in the US

Jul 21, 2008 by Dan Taylor    21 Comments    Posted under: News

Absinthe and Spoon

Sweet, refreshing, and green.  Absinthe.  While banned in the US since 1915, the anise flavored high alcohol content drink is starting to make a return to liquor store shelves in the US.

In May 2007, US government officials lifted the ban on absinthe.  A year later, the Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control Board approved one brand for sale in the state.  Since June 2008, the Swiss variety Kübler has found a comfy home on Virginia liquor stores shelves.  A 1 litre bottle of the swiss herbal intoxicant will set you back $59.95.

Absinthe is made from alcohol and distilled herbs, with the primary ingredients consisting of wormwood and anise.  The French (and often referred to as ‘The Pure’ version) tends to appear in a pale green color, while the Swiss version often does not follow through with the final coloring process.

Unfortunately Absinthe has fallen on some hard times, and been portrayed as a ‘Devil’s Drink’ and responsible for hallucinations.  In the late 19th century, pseudo scientists painted absinthe as a highly toxic and addictive psychoactive drug.  By 1915 absinthe was banned in France, Switzerland and the US.  However, it remained legal in a number of other countries including Britain and Spain.

Absinthe began it’s phoenix story in 1988 when the European Union relaxed it’s standards on thujone, the active chemical in wormwood.  Slightly late to the party, the US relaxed their standards in 2007.  In some scientific circles, thujone is still thought to produce effects similar to marijuana or opium.  Dr. Chris Holstege called that a myth. “My concern over the thujone is minimal,” he said. “The only thing I worry about with the public is that they’re not going to understand the high content of ethanol in it.”

The traditional Absinthe preparation.

Since most absinthes contain a high amount of alcohol – 45 to 72 percent (Kübler contains 53%) water is usually added to the drink before it is server.  The traditional method involves a 3:1 water to absinthe mix, poured over a sugar cube that is placed on a special absinthe spoon.  The mix brings out the essential oils dissolved in the alcohol and causes the drink to louche.

While Absinthe is now legal in the United States, experts warn against smuggling in brands that don’t meet US standards (commonly from Eastern Europe or Mexico).   Absinthe marketed around the thujone content levels are often an indicator of an inferior product.  In other words…enjoy this wonderful drink, but know what you’re drinking, and prepare it with the respect that it deserves.

For more info, give a visit to Absinthebuyersguide.com.

Umlauts for your English Keyboard

Jul 9, 2008 by Dan Taylor    3 Comments    Posted under: Technology

Many of you already know that I live in Austria.  A land of great skiing, beer, and würst.  It’s also the land of funny little letters with dots over them.  While they look more or less identical to their non-dotted cousins, the tone and sound of these vowels (and one consonant) sound quite a bit different.

For example:

o – sounds like the o you find in the word ‘whole’

ö – on the other hand sounds like a double o combination – ‘woot’

Normally, when I write in german I have to substitute the umlaut with an oe that creates the same sound.  The primamry reason being that I write on a mac with an international english keyboard.  I say international english, as there is a difference between the US english and UK english keyboards, as I quickly found out in 2001 while living in the UK.

While this issue is not normally a bother for anyone that reads my written German (as it’s probably filled with a number of grammatical mistakes, the umlaut are easy to overlook), it came to a head the other day regarding the work über.  I titled one of my DJ mixes ubertrance and sent it over to Ludwig.  A bit later in the day I noticed his Skype message read – “über, not uber”.  I sent him a message saying something along the lines of, “I know…I know…but I don’t have any umlauts on my keyboard and ueber just looks rediculous”.  He agreed that ueber did in fact look rediculous, and within minutes sent back this link.

After reading what it does and how very easy it is to install and activate…well, there was no reason not to have an EnglishGerman keyboard.  So…if you’re like me working on an English keyboard, but find yourself having to copy/paste umlauts from wikipedia everytime you need one, go grab the USGerman Keyboard Layout for your mac.

Axel says see ya PC – Hello Mac!

Jul 8, 2008 by Dan Taylor    6 Comments    Posted under: News, Technology

Axel Springer AG, one of Europe’s largest and leading newspaper companies with well over 10,000 employees and more than 150 newspapers in over 30 countries, including it’s Flagship print: Die Welt announced on Friday that it’s kissing it’s fleet of PC’s aufwiedersehen.

In the YouTube video below top man Mathias Döpfner listed four top reasons for going Mac:

• Most of the company’s layout work was already being done on Macs and that Apple is THE world leader in production of creative and graphics based computers.
• Macs are more user friendly than other computers with an easy to use/understand ‘What you see is what you get’ interface.
• Apple creates the most elegant computers and that every workers cube is a bit prettier with a Mac on the desk, and that hopefully workers will look forward to coming to work each day to work on a beautiful machine.
• Macs are cheaper to buy and easier to maintain than they were in the past

Döpfner also states that this decision is more than just a Technology and Cost decision, but also a modernization of Springer’s corporate culture.

Photos with Knef

Jun 25, 2008 by Dan Taylor    2 Comments    Posted under: Photography

Knef aka MasterKnef is really an interesting guy.  I’ve known Knef for about 6-7 months now through Ludwig.  While I’ve drank many beers with Knef, DJed his 30th birthday party, and had some good conversations with him, I still feel as though there is much more about Knef to be learned.  He’s still a bit of an enigma to me.

I know for example that he has (had?) a band.  Apparently the band was pretty darn good, as he vividly described a festival that the band played at in Slovenia (i think?) a few years ago.  From the sound and imagagry of his description, it didn’t sound like some 10 person festival in a field somewhere, but rather, a 10-15k person festival organized in a field just outside Ljubljana or Maribor.  I also know that Knef is the kind of guy that will (and is planning on) starting out in Upper Austria, and walking/hiking cross country and arriving somewhere in Salzburg.  All the while, never desending below 1000 meters.  In other words, 2 weeks alone up in the mountains, never coming down into the valley.  Likewise, I know that Knef is an avid mountain and rock climber.

I’m not exactly certain what Knef does to pay the bills.  I know he’s a radio DJ, but I’m not certain if that’s an everyday gig, weekends only, or what?  Somewhere in a former lifetime, I’ve heard stories that he was also a cameraman for ORF, the major television network in Austria. And so…it didn’t surprise me when he sent an email my way the other day and asked for my help both as a friend and as a photographer.

It appears that RedBull is now starting up an ‘arte’ format television program.  Knef is applying to be one of the hosts of this network.  These photos should serve as his ‘headshots’ and overall appearance.  Of course I wanted to make him look his very best, but I also wanted to try to get a bit of that enigma that I see in him in these photos as well.  I think I did a pretty ok job….what do you think?  Leave me some comment love below.

To view the entire series, visit the Photo page.

Oh, and if some super stunning pictures weren’t enough for you, Knef’s music video:

Audio section added

Jun 19, 2008 by Dan Taylor    2 Comments    Posted under: Music

Prompted by a new friend from New York, I decided to split out my DJ recordings and make them a seperate page, accessible via the top nav bar. Right now, the two classics, Mostly Naked and Fabrik are sitting in there waiting for your listening pleasure, with some one ones to arrive shortly…

As always, if you’re interested in speaking with my about music, Djing, or just about anything else….hit me up on the contact page!