Knaddison.com

So, this is the confluence of the "Google Video" subject I've talked about in the past and my housing interests:

A producer of a Strawbale DVD has uploaded a promotional video to the Google Video system. Now, how neat is that?

Pretty freaking neat. Who needs a TV when you've got Google video to find the movies and some DVDs that you want to watch.

So, I already wrote about why I like my website host so much but then today I got another reason to love them.

I have owned several domains over the years. One trick about domains is that you register and update the domain either every 1 year or 2 years or some other amount, and you use different registrars and you, well, forget your login information for that one registrar from 6 years ago and you no longer have access to the stupid college email address you used to register there and, and to protect you they don't just let any geek off the street change the email address, you have to fax in a signed form with a photocopy of your driver's license because signed forms with photocopies of your drivers license are impossible to fake and that fax proves who you are, and then they just ignore that fax so a few months later you call and they tell you the process again and you send it again and they ignore it again. Fun process, right?

Don't look at them, don't listen to them, just don't. As much as you loved watching Mr. Rogers touring the tuba factory, this is not the same thing.

4. Surgery. Espcially on yourself.
5. A mechanic fixing your car.
6. Home repairs - on your home.
7. A short order chef, preparing your dinner

That's it. Just don't do it. The person doing the work probably knows what they are doing, it's not going to kill you, but the process involves some gruesome details that you just don't want to know about.

Prefab and Modern Design

I've been reading Design Magazine "Dwell" for about 3 years now. It's generally full great and relatively practical information. It's a little more academic than, for example, the very practical and often cheap Ready Made Magazine, but I still like Dwell very much.

They've been preaching about the coming of "prefab" housing for a while. Not so much the "piece of crap trailers" kind of "prefab" more of the "this is really awesome design and it was at least partially built in a factory which makes it cheaper for the quality and makes assembly time shorter" kind of prefab.

Prefab books

There are two really good books on the subject that I recently read Prefab, by Alison Arieff and Prefab Modern by Jill Herbers. I had heard of the Arief book from Dwell Magazine and found the Herbers book when doing a library search for the Arief book. They are both good, but oddly enough much of the content is the same. Also, they seem to mostly follow in the "Dwell Magazine" format - that is looking at the houses from the Academic point of view with less focus on the every day practical concerns like cost and usability. The houses are almost all gorgeous, but some of them are just wicked expensive or funky useless layouts - or both.

The "big" time

Then, you can imagine my surprise the other day when Businessweek ran an article covering several of these same resources, people and homes Businessweek isn't the best of the business magazines I read, but it's a decent one and they are occasionally ahead of the curve in predicting trends. So hopefully this gets more popular.

Prefab benefits and drawbacks

All the same, I'm very glad personally to see growth in this area. It's something where almost everyone wins: housing can be higher quality, lower cost, more efficiently produced, better designed, etc. etc. The main drawback in my mind is that it could lead to more "cookie cutter" homes - but looking around suburbia and exurbia these days, I don't think we could have a housing trend that takes us any further in the wrong direction on that one. The other perceived drawback is that prefab makes a shift in the labor market. I say "shift" rather than "would force people out of jobs" because I view it as a movement from one area to another.

The short answer: for most, the Griffin iTrip is the best.

Questions about Technology

I get asked questions about stuff. Sometimes, the answer might be useful to other people - so why not share it here... Like this question about car adapters for ipods:

> I want to buy a car adapter that lets me play my iPod. I know how the iTrip
> works, but also assume there are lots of other options. What's the best in
> your opinion for large city use? Do you know of sources I can review
> (consumer reports is one, but any other reliable tech source)?

An entry by Neil Drumm caught my eye today.

His basic summary of how to be a good member/developer in an open source project. Sure you can sit around and read the Cathedral and the Bazaar if you have a few hours to get a good basis and understanding. However, the points Neil makes are short and if you grasp the ideas and their implications, you grasp how great Open Source can be.

1. Create a page that is image heavy and largely static
2. Get a buttload of traffic
3. Don't use any caching directive

   Lots of the time, I'm just plain amazed by the intelligence of people in the world.

Some of the time, I'm really not.