PIED TYPE
SciTech
R.I.P. Steve Jobs
What a remarkable individual he was. He defined a generation, an age, a revolution. In one way or another, he touched the life of every American. Somehow I thought he’d find a way to beat it. He’d pulled so many other rabbits out of his hat; I’d hoped he had one for himself. R.I.P. Steve … Continue reading
Grandma fixes Lion’s pinch-zoom function in Firefox
Mac users who’ve recently installed OS X Lion (Ver. 10.7) may have noticed the touchpad’s “pinch-zoom” function no longer works in Firefox. (It still works in Chrome, but not in Firefox.) Distressing, since this was one of the Mac functions I’d very quickly come to love. I prowled around a few forums and discovered that … Continue reading
A reminder about online privacy
I just saw a CNN report on Internet privacy and how so many entities track your every move for fun and profit. Far too many Internet users never give and thought to privacy — and then they wonder why they get so much spam, junk snail mail, and robocalls. The story reminded me that since … Continue reading
NASA space shuttles fly into history
In pre-dawn darkness, with appropriately dramatic lighting, U.S. space shuttle Atlantis made its 33rd and final landing this morning at Kennedy Space Center. The landing marked the end of America’s space shuttle program. Thank you, NASA. It’s been the ride of a lifetime.
PC to Mac: The journey begins
A week ago I finally got my long-awaited hand-me-down MacBook Pro laptop from my son. As I explained way back when, it was originally configured to meet the needs of a developer, so it has a lot of capability — certainly far more than my old dying Dell. Faster processor, bigger HD, more memory. And … Continue reading
Atlantis marks end of an era; future vague
Space shuttle Atlantis, the last of the U.S. space shuttles, is currently in orbit on its last mission. There will be no more manned space missions launching from the U.S. in the foreseeable future, although Pres. Obama has predicted we’ll be landing on an asteroid by 2025 and Mars by the 2030s. And while the … Continue reading
Miss me?
No doubt you’ve been concerned that I might have fallen off the edge of the earth or something. Well, no, but I did wake up Saturday to discover I had no Internet connection. That’s a catastrophe of the first order around here. Nothing I did could breathe life into my connection, so as a last … Continue reading
Rediscovered — my all-time favorite screensaver
I feel like a kid in a candy store right now. You remember screensavers, don’t you? Back in the day you absolutely had to use them or you’d burn weird images into your monitor’s screen. And there were screensavers galore to choose from and play with, settings to tweak just so, etc. Everyone had a … Continue reading
Gadgets that changed the world
There was an intriguing new (to me, anyway) program on the History Channel this evening: “101 Gadgets That Changed the World.” For reasons I can’t even explain, a title like that was a guaranteed gotcha. I just had to know what those 101 gadgets were and how they were ranked. The list was compiled by … Continue reading
Media dumb down the news with ‘bug expert’
It’s no surprise, I’m sure, that I have another gripe about the media. And this time, “nit-picking” may be a particularly appropriate term. Everywhere you turn, you hear about the Casey Anthony murder trial, and if you’ve paid any attention at all, you’ve probably heard a reference to a “bug expert.” Reporters everywhere are referring … Continue reading
Playing with sound
Looking for a little relaxation? Something to take your mind off your troubles? I can think of lots of great, expensive, time-consuming ways to occupy your time. But for a little distraction right here, right now, check out these two delightful timewasters at the André Michelle Laboratory: Pulsate and ToneMatrix. Simple instructions for each appear … Continue reading
Hail or hoax?
This melon-sized “hailstone” has been a hot item on the Internet the last few days. Supposedly it fell in Norman, Okla., during the recent tornado outbreak. Really? I lived in Oklahoma most of my 68 years, and I’d bet my next Social Security check that this is no hailstone. I’m guessing, as have many others, … Continue reading
Earth Day 2011
««« ♦ »»» Teach your children what we have taught our children – that the earth is our mother. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. If men spit upon the ground, they spit upon themselves. This we know. The earth does not belong to us; we belong to the … Continue reading
About that California radiation thing
Count on the media to keep stirring the pot. They report on radiation from Japan; people on the West Coast get concerned. They report that people on the West Coast are concerned; everyone gets more concerned. The more the media talk about it and try to explain it, the more people get worked up about … Continue reading
My (page) designing mind
Pied Type has a new look — again — and the simple explanation is the lady changed her mind. But there’s more to it than that. The dark Choco theme is warm and cozy. It focuses attention on the posts by treating everything else with brown tones. But its limitations frustrated me. Dark themes can … Continue reading
Newspaper Guild takes swipe at Huffington Post
Even retired editors pay attention when something strange occurs in the publishing industry. And a recent little union kerfuffle definitely qualifies. It seems the Newspaper Guild, a union representing 26,000 U.S. media workers, has called for a strike against the Internet’s well-known Huffington Post. Why? Because, according to the Guild, Huffpo doesn’t pay contributors who … Continue reading
Lieberman’s moratorium should be on earthquakes, not power plants
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) wants a moratorium on the construction of nuclear power plants in the U.S. It was only a matter of time until someone in this country freaked out over events in Japan, and the Senator stepped up. On “Face the Nation” this morning, he opined: “… I don’t want to stop the … Continue reading
Those amazing Japanese ‘nuke factories’
It’s difficult to imagine anyone hasn’t heard about the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Personally I’ve had the television on constantly since Thursday night, when the first live feeds began airing. It was both horrifying and fascinating to witness the real-time unfolding of a monumental natural disaster from half a world away. I’ve watched … Continue reading
PiedType is now on Twitter
Readers can now follow Pied Type on Twitter. Click this button or the one at the bottom of the sidebar. You’ll receive a tweet whenever there’s a new post.
Incoming — my first Mac after 25 years of PCs
My employer bought my first PC back in the ’80s after I was smitten with an Apple computer running PageMaker, a page layout program that had a black-on-white display (wowee!) and absolutely had to have it. Unfortunately, an Apple didn’t play nicely with the other computers I had to work with, so I ended up … Continue reading
Subscribe Via Twitter
Click to get new post alerts via Twitter:
Pied Type
on Facebook
