Linked List: July 25, 2008

Friday, 25 July 2008

Assuage your guilt with Richard Stallman’s performance of “The Free Software Song” as a ringtone for your iPhone, thanks to Dave Walker.

DF Feed Sponsorship ★

Speaking of RSS feed sponsors, now is the first time in a few months that there are near-term openings. If you have a product or service that you’d like to promote to Daring Fireball readers, get in touch.

The Start Conference ★

New conference next month in San Francisco from Jeffrey Veen and Bryan Mason, targeting would-be entrepreneurs. Here’s a report from Veen regarding their plan to have an onstage ombudsman to track the Twitter / IM / email backchannel from the audience.

Superbiate & Son, Inc. ★

My thanks to Superbiate & Son for sponsoring this week’s DF RSS feed. Superbiate is the studio of George Del Barrio, NYC-based portrait photographer extraordinaire. I often quote this remark by Stanley Kubrick: “Sometimes the truth of a thing is not so much in the think of it, as in the feel of it.” I have worked with Del Barrio, and what I like about his method is that he goes for the truth in a “feel of it” way.

Check out the Superbiate web site for examples of his work. For bookings, portfolio requests, or more information, please contact Matthew Bogosian at The Vanderbilt Republic.

Dan Lyons, Fake Steve, and Newsweek ★

Dan Lyons, who recently took over Steven Levy’s old spot as Newsweek’s technology columnist, on why he walked away from his Fake Steve Jobs weblog:

The truth is simply this. I began hearing a few months ago that Steve Jobs was very sick. I wasn’t sure if these rumors were true or not. Then I saw how he looked at WWDC and it was like having the wind knocked out of me. I just couldn’t carry on. I hope and pray that he’s not sick. But for now I just can’t carry on with the Fake Steve character.

I’m sure it had nothing to do with the fact that continuing the Fake Steve blog might have an adverse effect on the amount of access to new products Apple will grant to Lyons and Newsweek. Levy, while at Newsweek, was often seeded with new products a few weeks in advance of release, in the same rarified air as Walt Mossberg and David Pogue.

Even with Fake Steve on ice, it’ll be interesting to see what kind of access Apple gives to Lyons at Newsweek.

Tarantino’s Mind ★

Super cool, pitch-perfect short film. (Via Andy Baio.)

Field Tested Books, Live in NYC Monday ★

This Monday night in New York City, my friends at Coudal Partners are hosting a reading from contributors to their Field Tested Books series. Readers include Jeffrey Zeldman, Jason Santa Maria, Michael Bierut, and yours truly. They held a reading earlier this week in Chicago, and it looks like it was a swell time. See you there.

Fannie Mae Bailout: Taxing America’s Poorest Citizens to Help the Richest ★

Count me in with Philip Greenspun:

In Roman times the employees of Fannie Mae would be decimated, i.e., they would draw lots and 90 percent of them would beat the unlucky 10 percent to death with clubs. What would be a modern equivalent? At the very least taxpayers should have the satisfaction of seeing the highest paid 100 Fannie Mae employees fired with two weeks of severance pay (it can’t be that hard to find replacements given that the current staff’s primary achievements have been accounting fraud and then insolvency).