Dumping Grounds

Ever seen someone come up with an idea on the internet that was so cool, so useful that you really wanted it to work, even if it didn’t?

That’s where I am with Twitter. I know I have posted about this before. But at least I get it now. Imagine a mini-blog. Where you just post one liners. It’s WAY easier to keep up with than an actual blog. If I’m at work, and I come across a cool link, or have a funny thought, I’m way less guilty about posting it to Twitter, which I can do in 10 seconds, than I am about posting to my blog, which, of course, I am doing now.

Examples of recent tweets: “If the San Antonio Spurs love Avery Johnson so much, then they can have him.” And a whole array of commentary on jury duty.

See? Just super short blog entries.

There’s two main issues with Twitter. It really requires that you have a certain critical mass of “friends” or people following you. This, at the moment, I don’t have.

The other is, that in the words of John Gruber… it’s great, except for problems with “uptime, consistency, and reliability.” I could not agree more. Twitter could be far more of a phenomenon than it is already, if only it worked more often.

I use Twitterific as a client on the Mac, I don’t know what you can use on Windows. There’s even a really nice client on the iPhone called “PocketTweets” (it’s actually a web site, optimized for iPhone.)

I figure the second problem will take care of itself, someday. I assume that they are working to make it better.

For the first problem, if you read this, and you use Twitter, please try following “ender3″

This is by no means means to be an exhaustive review, as a) I have not had that long to play with the products, b) I’m hardly an expert on either one and c) I don’t care to type that much. But from a cursory glance, while Aperture 2.0 has closed the gap with Adobe Photoshop Lightroom… it hasn’t passed its rival, and still lags in certain key areas.

My reasons for this are many, and you can look up a number of comparisons and reviews of each in other places on the web. I’d like to focus on 3 key points:

• While Aperture 2 may be faster, I’m still not impressed by its speed. It seems quick enough when applying effects and filters and the entire photo is showing on the screen. But if you do the same effects with the display at 1:1 mode, Aperture slows significantly. Most effects, even what I would consider to be “complex” ones (sharpening and noise removal) are near real time as you drag the slider in Lightroom.
• Speaking of noise removal (this is a big deal for me, as I enjoy night photography, and I have not yet managed to buy one of the higher end Canon cameras [I’m on an Digital Rebel XT]), maybe it’s just luck, but Lightroom’s tools for noise reduction seem outstanding, and Aperture’s are lackluster, at best. I’ve even tried comparing to a dedicated third party tool (Noise Ninja) and I still thought Lightroom held up quite well.
• I wish I could quanitify why, but I simply get better results with Lightroom… maybe the tools are more clearly labeled, maybe Lightroom is just better suited to the way I think, or maybe there really is a difference in capability. But my tweaked pictures from Lightroom look better than my tweaked pictures from Aperture (1.5 or 2). I can’t explain what I may be doing differently, as I feel like I am following the same workflow, but the results are (even judged by other folks) demonstrably better with Lightroom. I have some examples on my Flickr page.

Keep in mind this is coming from a registered purchaser of Aperture. Version 1.0 of Lightroom didn’t impress me. It’s come a long way to 1.3.

Things I’ve learned

• Europeans LOVE Johnny Depp. He’s everywhere. I mean everywhere. You cannot step on the street anywhere without looking ol’ Johnny in the eye somewhere. It’s like God… that whole “He’s everywhere, and is always with you” kind of thing.
• The smoking bans in Europe have made the restaurants MUCH more livable, but has stopped EXACTLY no one from smoking. They just do it outside. How they afford it at almost $13 a pack is completely beyond me.
• Internet is not easy, or cheap to come by in Europe.
• Blogging time is more difficult when you are not traveling alone. For those of you who wanted more frequent updates, I’ll get to it when I can. Or ask me when I get back.
• ADDEDWell, we know what you people are worried about… Send out a link to the Flickr page… neato-pic of the Eiffel Tower, check. No click throughs. Awesome pic of the moon setting rising over the Seine. Check. Two click throughs. Pic of the ring? 13 click throughs. Wow. You people ought to be ashamed (Let’s be fair… Ames sent out a big spam email, and I’m sure all the click throughs were her girlfriends. Girls don’t know art when they see it. They are blinded by sparkles.)
• ADDED I have absolutely no idea why, but the French really do make croissants better than anyone else.
• Like I said last year, the French are not rude, they are, however, sometimes quite insistent that you accept their help, even if you don’t need it at that moment.
• French pronunciation guide: completely remove every third consonant. Slur all other letters as much as humanly possible.
• London children do not go to class. they spend all their time on field trip. Paris children do not go to class, either. They spend all their time at the Louvre.
• The Louvre is hot. Really hot. Like Africa hot.

To those who were wondering

Yes, I did, and yes, she did. See the pictures. Happened at St. Chapelle (the pics with ALL the stained glass, early in the set posted yesterday.)

But EVERY.SINGLE.TIME that there is some big event that I might actually be interested in using Twitter to follow what is going on… the Twitter servers collapse in a steaming heap under the load.

What a pile of crap.

After 20 long, excruciatingly painful, agonizing years… SMU has finally returned to Division I football.

They nutted up and paid a legitimate Div1A coach. This is the very first sign since the death penalty that anyone over at the hilltop even cared that they got the shit kicked out of them every week.

Now, it seems, someone cares. Whether that someone is Steve Orisini, Gerald Turner, or Gerald Ford is an exercise left to the reader.

In Jones’s first year at Hawaii, he took an 0-12 team to 9-4. With the same players. I don’t expect that sort of turnaround, but the Ponies have seen neither a winning season, nor a bowl, since they resumed play in 1989. Either would represent real progress.

Best comment on the Dallas Morning News Blog:

“I guess Pony Express goes air mail now”

I like it.

Justin Willis, your prayers have been answered.