Linked List: August 23, 2007

Thursday, 23 August 2007

Worth a re-link: Jon Ronson’s 2004 story for The Guardian on the archive of material Stanley Kubrick left behind at his estate:

“It’s Futura Extra Bold,” explains Tony. “It was Stanley’s favourite typeface. It’s sans serif. He liked Helvetica and Univers, too. Clean and elegant.”

“Is this the kind of thing you and Kubrick used to discuss?” I ask.

“God, yes,” says Tony. “Sometimes late into the night. I was always trying to persuade him to turn away from them. But he was wedded to his sans serifs.”

Nikon D3 ★

Ian Austen reporting for The New York Times:

The new Nikon D3 is the first camera from the company with a full-size sensor. Well, almost full-size. One side of the frame is 0.1 millimeter short. The sensor has 12.7 megapixels, which is not exceptional. Its light sensitivity, however, is another matter. The camera’s maximum ISO setting is 25,600, about 64 times what was commonly regarded as high-speed film.

ISO 25,600? Holy crap.

Pre-Order Link for New Kubrick Boxed Set at Amazon ★

Pre-order your copy of Warner Brothers’ new Kubrick boxed set using this link to Amazon.com and two good things happen: (a) you save $24 off the list price, and (b) I get stink-ass rich from affiliate revenue.

CBS 5 Report on ‘Faceball Craze’ at Flickr HQ ★

Reporter Allen Martin: “A lot of people would say… ‘Why?’”

Dunstan Orchard: “None of those people work here.”

Game Console Sales ★

“NPD reported domestic sales of 425,000 Nintendo Wiis, 170,000 Xbox 360s and 159,000 PlayStation 3s in July.” But how many Wiis would Nintendo sell if they could actually produce them fast enough to meet demand? They’re bungling a runaway success.

Lunchbox ★

Another “where should I eat?” tool, this one a mashup between Yelp and Google Maps, by James Allgood.

Dine-O-Matic 2.0 ★

Free Dashboard widget from The Iconfactory and Joseph Roback, “randomly selects a place to eat out when you just can’t make up your mind”.

Jeff Atwood on URL Shortening Services ★

Atwood’s title — “URL Shortening: Hashes In Practice” — is misleading, as the whole point of the article is that URL shortening services don’t use hashing algorithms to generate their URLs. To make the URLs as short as possible, they simply use ASCII-encoded counting systems.

New Transfers ★

Jim Coudal gets the scoop that the new Kubrick DVDs are, in fact, new HD transfers.

Tom Yager: ‘Closed iPhone Opens Road for Linux Phones’ ★

Tom Yager:

Linux developers have been dying for a phone of their own ever since Sharp killed the Zaurus Linux-based PDA. Apple’s decision to close iPhone to 3rd-party applications gave the green light to Linux phones and mobile devices. LinuxWorld Expo 2007 basked in Apple’s unwitting generosity, with one booth after another featuring fledgling mobile Linux projects prospecting for funding, direction, and developers.

“Prospecting for direction” is the only part of this I agree with. For one thing, Apple has not decided to “close iPhone to 3rd-party applications”. The iPhone is closed now; Apple has announced nothing regarding whether they intend to keep it so. As for developer enthusiasm, I see more development going on for the officially closed iPhone than for any Linux mobile phone platform I’m aware of. I’m not exactly looking for Linux mobile apps, of course, but still, it seems 180 degrees wrong to say that the iPhone is pushing developers to mobile Linux.

Use Mont Blanc Rollerball Refills in Pilot G2 Pens ★

“Transform a $3 pen into a $200 pen in just seconds.”

Paul Kafasis pointed me to this at C4 two weeks ago. Just tried it out. I’m not sure the Mont Blanc “fine” point is fine enough for my tastes, but it is a damn smooth pen. The heavier Mont Blanc ink cartridge gives the pen a nice heft, too.

Unrated ‘Eyes Wide Shut’ in New Collection ★

The pixelated heads in the orgy scene in the R-rated American release are just embarrassing — I don’t know why they’re even including that version on the disc. Who’d choose to watch the censored version if both are on the same disc?

Rangers Beat Orioles 30-3, Most Runs Scored in Game Since 1897 ★

They might as well have just gone ahead and pantsed them while they were at it.

Warner Brothers to Release New Five-Movie Kubrick Boxed Set ★

Digitally remastered and presented in their original theatrical release aspect ratios. Includes: 2001: A Space Odyssey, A Clockwork Orange, The Shining, Full Metal Jacket, and Eyes Wide Shut. Each comes with new commentary tracks. Hot diggity damn. Hard to tell from the marketing blurb whether these are new film-to-video transfers or just “remasterings” of the existing transfers. I hope they’re new transfers; I fear they aren’t.

Update: A joint Coudal Partners/Daring Fireball investigative committee has raised some troubling questions regarding the packaging of these discs. E.g. why are the numbers “2001” set in Compacta Black? And worse, what the fuck is up with the type treatment on the A Clockwork Orange sleeve?

Smoothya Later ★

Bruno Fernandes goes long on the differences between Mac OS X and Windows anti-aliasing, and why George Ou is a jackass.

High-Def Versions of New Kubrick Transfers ★

The only reason for anyone not to pre-order the new DVD boxed set of Kubrick films is if you’re waiting for high-def versions. The good news is that all five movies — 2001, A Clockwork Orange, The Shining, Full Metal Jacket, and Eyes Wide Shut — are going to be released simultaneously in both Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats. (Those are both make-me-rich links to Amazon.)

The bad news is that the high-def versions are not available together in boxed sets — you’ve got to order each film individually. $20 each, though, so it’s hard to complain.