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Hai!

Afternoon here... overcast, humid. Maybe it will rain. The landlady came by with an engineer to take measurements of the house or something, so we dashed around making pretty, but then they didn't come inside our place after all. So we have a nice tidy house in which to enjoy the rest of the day. Getting ready to take da doggy for a walk. I made yummy chili last night, so I don't need to cook (and set aside some of that way-too-pricey ground beef/pork for Sky, so she gets an unusual treat today).

All in all, a nice, slow, relaxing Sunday.

i've already somehow over caffeinated; i don't know if this hurts or helps my mild typoitis. Good thing i don't have to write anything important today for all i know.
Already let slip out some that what's and but put's but what puts buts that lolbutts butts lol?
Must tidy. Will tidy. Have caught most of Superbad and some of Enchanted on free preview, hope Ratatouille comes on again. That'd be nice to have on in the background as i've only seen it once.

Oh, taz, just skimming Stephen Fry's mention of having all the e-book readers (it also mentions these eco cranky gadgets, i've always been a fan of the crank powered radio) reminds me to skim him to see if he recommends one for any reason. (Seems the iPhone is winning by popularity.)

Where's that Fry article, eth? I'd love to read it.

I've heard that about the iPhone, but that's really a misleading slant.

The reporters are saying that since there has been X (high) number of the software downloaded for e-reading on an iPhone, that it's now more popular than any other e-reader or something... They are comparing completely different things, though.

Many people have iPhones, and many people have downloaded (free? I think it's free) software so that they can also read on their iPhones... but this kind of option has been available forever, for palm devices. People can also read books on their computers if they want to. So, you could say that because X (high) number of people have Microsoft Word, and you can read books using Word software, that Dell PCs are more popular for e-reading than any e-reader, and it would be pretty close to what's being compared here.

But dedicated e-readers use e-ink, which is much, much easier on the eyes and feels more natural, but which is also still an expensive technology - and this is why e-readers cost so much. But if one is actually reading all the time on a device, you definitely want it to be e-ink; there's no comparison. I have a difficult time even reading long articles on my computer, but read for hours at a time on my Kindle.

If you are just reading for 20-30 minutes here and there while you wait in line or ride the bus to work, an iPhone or Blackberry or whatever device you already carry around anyway is convenient to use as a reader, so why not? But you aren't going to give up paper books to read on your iPhone, for sure.

So... Are you thinking of getting a reader, eth?

No, no, not what i meant, i was just skimming this bit about what's going in his "geek bag" for "Dork Talk" while i was checking out the redesign (note the bunny to one side and octopus to the other, pretty nifty).
Yeah, i'd be interested in what he has to say, feel free to find out if it's in there. i'm interested in readers if one turns out to be worth it for me.

I don't know if it's really worth it yet, if one has access to reasonably priced books and used book stores and such, and doesn't do that much travelling. If I were still in the U.S., I'd still probably get one, though, because for taz, tech + books = tingly sensation - but for sure in my situation it's a godsend.

They are expensive. Yet, once you have one, you can have thousands of classic works for free. Check out the wonderful, wonderful manybooks.net, for example (isn't loading right now... PLEASE let this be a temporary glitch!). There are sources for free contemporary books, too, like the Baen Free Library of many of their sci-fi titles... and other publishers are beginning to offer free e-books to draw people in; and then there are extralegal sources like torrents and sites like rapidshare, etc.

i'd have a real hard time not sharing a book i really liked.
As much as i love books, they are hard to move, take up space, and even when they're really well done, i want to care more about the stuff inside rather than on it.
Someday, when the books never have to move again, i can care about having collections and books as objects, but i'm not one who really needs to own a book so much as read it.
i'm going to keep repeating that to this stack of unread magazines.

i can't find the links i was looking for, looks like i have even more organizing of stuff that will not make things looks less cluttered than i thought.

But a movie, which can be found conventionally, that i saw on google video a while ago was The Great Happiness Space: Tale of an Osaka Love Thief. Completely worth watching just for the strange niche it occupies in one of the few places it could.
It no longer seems to be as easily available online.