Ain't nothin' but a G Thang

Google's new favicon - the tiny logo next to the URL bar that shows a user who's website they're on, was actually created by an undergraduate computer science major in Brazil. The new favicon is the third in a year for Google. Pepsi also redesigned their logo recently. Some theorize that the logo redesigns bring more attention to the company. Additionally, consumers look for companies that are constantly improving and reinventing themselves.

Some people think that the new icon is hideous. That's okay. The favicon might not be there for long.

Homokaasu.org

If anyone needs the full text of the "Lorem Ipsum" bit for design templates, you can find it here.

Also, The 80zer is a pretty hilarious thing I found, where you can type in any web address, and the program will make it appear as it would have in the 1980s. MIDI music, moving text and graphics, hot pink, Poison photos, rainbows... it's fantastic. I found it works best with simple HTML pages, as opposed to pages written in XML or XHTML.

The same page that hosts the 80zer has a program you can use either through the site or download to your hard drive to use. The Rasterbator takes uploaded images and blows them up, formatting them into a huge graphic pdf file that you can piece together, like a puzzle with a bunch of pieces that are 8.5 by 11, and put up on a wall as art. My house is planning on rasterizing a handful of images from Alice In Wonderland (the book) and using Mod Podge to adhere them permanently to the wall. Check out some of the cool examples that have already been done.

+3 Internet.

Angel or demon?

MSU's Angel and I have a love-hate relationship. I love the accessibility of resources, syllabuses, ability to contact classmates, and taking online quizzes. However, I think the interface could be worked on. It's very simplistic, almost to the point of being primal: very small text boxes in which to input huge papers, only one set of generic headings with no sub-headings, and my least favorite aspect of Angel is that when I'm typing in a text box to submit something to a professor, it doesn't periodically save my work, a la Gmail. I definitely lost a finished assignment by navigating away from the page accidentally in class the other day. Gmail saves your email drafts as you work on them. I think this is a relatively easily implimentable feature that would save students and professors a lot of time and grief.

Worse than Angel, though, is Lon-Capa. It's interface, navigation, and organization are equally bad, but the site is inconcievably slow. This is extremely frustrating when you're completing homework against a deadline, and the page won't even load the question or check your answer.

I'm so glad I don't have CAPA homework this semester. College of Nursing: look at me now!

Reincarnation?

For my WRA 395 class, Writing Center Theory, I had to create an avatar for myself on Second Life. For those of you unfamiliar with this software, it's essentially an expansive online environment, like a PC game like World of Warcraft, only people just have their characters just hang out and go to virtual concerts and... essentially have a second life. I think, although I haven't gotten to use the software yet because my video card is messed up, that that is an awesome way to hold class, conferences, meetings, and communicate with others. Like any other cyberspace, there are bad guys and spam and viruses, but they are easily avoidable. My professor wants to hold class in Second Life one day of the two that we meet each week. Provided I can get my video card fixed, I'm all for it. I love online learning, especially in the winter. Granted, for some classes, it just wouldn't work, but for this discussion-based class, I think it's great.

Way to go, gamers.

Inauguration on the Interwebs

So it turns out that Obama Inauguration streaming video and coverage created the fifth highest peak across news websites since it started recording data in August 2005.

The article says that, "The peak for web traffic, according to Akamai, came at 11.45am EST – 4.45pm in the UK – on Tuesday as 5,401,250 web users hungry for news of the inauguration logged on to news sites within a minute of each other."

That's insane. It's awesome that so many more people can easily access information and news relative to their lives, and keep them informed and up to date about the world around them.

In other news, a girl in this class just toured my (co-op) house. Awesome! Avalon rules!! :)

Vintage vs. Obsolete

I can not remember what the name of this PowerPoint-like slideshow program for Macs is. We used it in elementary school, but not middle school. The year was 1996-ish. I have to wonder if it was specifically made for children, a la Kid Pix. The interface was extremely user- (read: kid-) friendly.

I just did like twenty Google searches for it: "Apple software 1990s", "Clarisworks", "Slideshow applications". My hands are empty. I have literally come up empty-handed.

In slightly-related news, Apple is 31 years old.

In less-related news, I am addicted to StumbleUpon. If you're not familiar, it's a toolbar that you download and install in your web browser. After making an account and inventorying your interests, you can click the "Stumble!" button, and it will load a webpage or site that is related to your interests. From there, you can click the thumbs-up button, showing you like the page and would like to see more pages like the current page you're on, or you can click the thumbs-down button, and Stumble won't pull up pages like that for you anymore. You can also send pages to your friends on StumbleUpon or any email address using the Stumble toolbar. You can stumble categories, type in a tag, or stumble your friends's favorites. You can also stumble photos or videos exclusively. It's fantastic. It has changed the way I use the internet. I like it because I learn a lot about things I am interested in or passionate about, often through news pages that have been created the same day.

Well, I have four Stumbles my friends have sent me in the past twenty minutes. I can't help but to click that button. Until next time....

First post!

So, I went on to Angel and checked out some of the "Helpful Design Resources" under "Materials", mostly just for fun. I really like the Color Scheme Generator 2. I have another blog (that I rarely use), and I've always wanted to make it pink, but not so pink that any time a guy goes to the site he feels like he has to close the window, or else his masculinity is in question. Don't get me wrong: this scheme is cute, but what guy is going to want to stay on that page for more than, oh, three seconds? This scheme is so bright and girly, and I love it! But: same problem.

The male-accessible pink page is my goal this semester.

Also, I found this gadget, which is essentially a hex-to-RGB translator, but can also be used to find the exact hex code (or RGB values) of a color you want.

This page is kind of EPIC because it lets you take any image that you like the colors in, and it provides swatches and hex codes for the main colors in the image. Conversely, this site lets you pick colors via a swatch on the right hand side, and finds images on Flickr that have your selected colors in them. Fantastic.

Alright, I've spent way more than five minutes on this. I'm listening to M.I.A. and mentally determining appropriate color schemes for her music videos. Time to purge my mind of color and get workin' on my other homework.