If you’ve been reading this site for a long period of time now, you may have noticed that I often complain - I mean - bring light to, issues involving licenses, agreements, and terms of use/service… Fire up the License Investigator, here we go again!

The good news is, the issue I brought up has already been resolved! See this post at 43 Ideas/Things as well as this one to the yws-maps group.

In summary, I brought up a question, got some confusing information, tried to clarify the information, and now have even better information. It’s a win-win-win situation, baby!

I do understand how it can be difficult to lay out a terms of use/service agreement. You want to be open and sharing, but not so open you share yourself out of business… I think companies should take the time to re-evaluate their terms of use/service agreements now and again and see if they make sense to people who are not lawyers, and if they seem rational to the everyday (as well as very technical) user.

This event also highlights what can happen when companies take the time to have a dialog with their users/customers and actually respond quickly. Any company that just provides a feedback form that you’ll never get a reply to could learn a valuable lesson here.

Hmm, ah, yes… Seems I’ve been asked to write about books, which is so oddly appropriate that you don’t even know. Well, one person knows. On to the thingy:

On the shelf: Well, as far as an actual shelf, there is one at work, and it’s got maybe 20 books on it, all computer programming books and software manuals. Besides that there are boxes and boxes of books at home, probably over 100. If you count children’s books, then maybe over 200. If you count comic books, then maybe over 300. Or maybe I’m way off and it’s more like 100 total. (I don’t count ‘em, I just move ‘em every few years…)

Last purchase: I bought an empty notebook recently. Other than that, probably iMovie3 & iDVD: The Missing Manual, which I got used for less than 5 bucks.

Last 5 read:

1. An untitled art book I made many years ago. It consists of various collages done in a variety of media. Only one copy exists and it’s at my house.
2. An alphabet book I made many years ago. It consists of 26 pages, one for each letter of the English alphabet (or is it the Latin alphabet) combined with photos from a 1950’s textbook on driver’s education. Again, a one of a kind book.
3. I started reading Watchmen (again) last month…
4. Perl Cookbook
5. Various manuals for appliances, electronic devices, and othr things I own or use…

Ah! Also, someone read a book to me last week… A Really Super Book About Squirrels Does that count?

I’ve moved… My desk has once again been moved, and so I once again have moved…

I now sit behind the IT department, and the only way to get to my desk is to walk through the IT department. This leads to some interesting developments. For instance, when all of the IT guys are out to lunch (or wherever they get to) people stop by and do things like ask me for CD cases, or people mention to me that the printer’s output is of low quality. I think people believe I am a member of the IT department, which is not the case…

Not that I dislike the IT department, they serve a purpose (fighting Windows virii and security holes) but it’s not what I do, and I’m not one of them, and I can’t help you with Windows, or your email, or printing, or anything else those guys can help you with. Crazy Perl Hacking, sure, but you’ll get no General Computer Support from me dear friends…

I heard someone use the term Old Skool when referring to the method of the past of writing poorly formatted and invalid HTML.

I think the proper term is deprecated. In fact, I think the term deprecated should be used more in everyday language. For instance, any time you are talking about something from the past, that is decidedly not cool, feel free to call it deprecated…

Basically: s/old skool/deprecated/g;

Example: “Check out that punk kid with the green mohawk, man, he’s deprecated!”

I rarely watch things like CNN, or any television news really (Hello Internet!) but today I happened to see a bit, and there was a reporter in the field reporting on something, and the video was shot using a videophone!

The quality was poor, but as often is the case with breaking news, being at the right place at the right time, is more important than a polished, high-quality end product.

(Now all we need is more people to realize that they can be the reporter in the field, creating rather than consuming the media…)

I saw Scott and Dave yesterday before I left Milwaukee. Who? I’ll tell ya who…

Scott is in a band called Dashboard Confessional. (I told him they suck… I was joking… or was I? Ha!) Scott used to be in Self Denial, and Cleveland Bound Death Sentence (the original one) and probably some other bands. I’m pretty sure Scott and I were never in a band together, though he did mention that he heard one of my podcasts… Dave on the other hand was in a band with me, and that band was Hardware. (Dave was of course in Self Denial along with Scott.) Dave and I talked briefly via email a while back about releasing some of the old Milwaukee hardcore stuff we used to record. One of these days…

I should have filed this under Where Are They Now? but I didn’t get to talk to them enough to find out where they are now, besides Beans & Barley…

I’m off to the Land of Mary again… And as we all know, Maryland is for crabs…

See ya on the flipside crabby!

Wowza! 75 mph limit proposed for Wisconsin freeways:

…a higher speed limit would save drivers time, save some drivers money on speeding tickets and bring Wisconsin’s limit in line with a third of the nation’s states that already have the higher limit.

It would not save them money for gas, however. (Damn!)

“Cars are engineered these days in a way which can better handle a little higher speeds,” Reynolds said. “It’s a slowly emerging trend.” (Not mine! See below…)

“Speed doesn’t kill. It’s the speed differential that causes accidents.” (???)

My only worry is that my car (affectionately referred to as ‘the crapmobile’) starts to wobble pretty bad when going over 65, so there’s a good chance it’ll wobble itself off the road and down an embankment if I attempt to go 75 miles per hour, killing me and leaving no one around to update this web site…

Other than that little concern, Zoooooooom!

I would have called this Analog Video How To but I don’t really consider it a very comprehensive How To… It’s really just a description of my set-up.

I don’t have a digital video camera for the stuff I do on tinkernet, I use an old JVC VHS camcorder I picked up around 2000 or so. It records to little VHS tapes that hold 30 minutes of video. I rarely shoot more than 5 or 10 minutes for most stuff I do, and edit it down to less than 2 minutes for the final product anyway.

Besides the camera, I use two devices, a Griffin iMic USB audio adapter and an XLR8 InterView USB video capture device. These convert the analog signals from the camera into digital files on the computer. You’ll need to plug them into the USB ports on the computer. I’d try to plug the XLR8 InterView right into the computer instead of a hub, as you may see better performance. (If your computer has a sound input port either built-in or on a card, you probably won’t need the iMic, but I do for my Quicksilver - yes, I use a Mac.)

The image above shows the camera with two cables, the video cable has an RCA connector on each side. This one connects to the XLR8 InterView to carry the video.

The other cable needs to have an RCA connector on one end, and a small audio connector on the other, as it will connect to the Griffin iMic to carry the audio signal. (You can probably use an RCA cable with a small adapter on the end, ask your local A/V geek at Radio Shack.)

Once it’s all connected, you launch the USBVision Capture (well, that’s what the OS X app is called) and start to play the tape, and you can capture the video (and audio) to your computer. It’ll create a movie file, which you can then convert to another format using the USBVision Exporter application. (Both of these apps came with the XLR8 InterView, they can pretty much do what QuickTime Pro can as far as saving and converting formats.)

Typically I will capture the video, then convert it to a DV Stream file, which will make it huge, but will allow you to import it into iMovie where you can edit until you have a masterpiece worthy of the presenting to the videoblogging Yahoo! Group. ;)

I’m not going to get into the editing or encoding or compressing part of creating your final video, as the folks at Freevlog cover that much better than I can…

If you have any questions on this setup, or suggestions as to how to do it better or what not, let me know. I pretty much figured all this out by digging around the wonderful web, and a lot of testing and trial and error. Good Luck! Make some video!

So you want to start a videoblog? Go to Freevlog.org. That’s what I did before I started tinkernet.

The folks behind it are Ryanne Hodson and Michael Verdi. They’ve done a great job of creating tutorials and gathering up all the info you might need to get started. (There’s a focus on using free services, which is great for people just starting, but if you happen to decide you want to pay for things, see Steve Garfield’s FeeVlog.com which explains how to use for pay services and sites.) Oh, don’t forget to also check out videoblogging.info as well for more useful information.

Getting stuck? Confused? Totally lost? You might want to join the videoblogging Yahoo! Group where questions are answered by a fine group of folks willing to help.

Besides letting the group know once your first video is online, stop by the VLOGDIR and vlogmap.org and add youself to the lists so others can find you.

You know what Wired says: Blogging + Video = Vlogging… Or something like that…

Ok, now that we’ve got that covered, make some video! And don’t forget to let us know about it…

(Also see these posts: Ourmedia Archive and FireANT.)

Update: Wired News: Man Cleans Freezer, Film at 11

Huh? REO Speedwagon is playing at The Waukesha County Fair this year?

What, Cheap Trick wasn’t available?

The Summer Camp Program at Oakwood Manor for 2005 was a huge success!

There was canoeing and singing and swimming and ice cream and tennis and a bonfire and even a (short) hike!

The entire event went off without a single problem… Well, actually, a very large branch broke off of a tree, but you know what they say, “Gravity is a harsh mistress!” and we’re just lucky nobody was hurt.

We look forward to more exciting activities at Oakwood Manor in the future.

Tonight, when the guards are gone, we block out the sun.

People who sit inside all day staring at computer screens should not have bright lights shining on them. That what we call a “bad idea” around these parts.

Operation SunBlock is in motion!

As you may remember, I am not a big fan of Skype (Proprietary! Proprietary! Run Away! Run Away!) but when someone wants to interview you, and use Skype to do it. It’s time to launch Skype.

Or try to launch Skype. I haven’t used it in a few months, so it promptly told me I had to get a newer version, and then it quit itself. Luckily it made my browser go to skype.com to download a newer version. At this point I’m annoyed because I have to deal with downloading and installing a new(er) version. It gets worse, because during the install I have to agree to a new license as well. I mean, it might be new, or it might be the same as the last one. Who can tell? (Unless you saved and read each version. Even me, a member of the License Police has a limit…)

So remember kids, with each new version you (are forced to) install, check that license for what rights you may be giving up this time in using “free” software. Urgh…

Thanks Lifehacker! Thanks for this bit on iTunes 4.9:

Videoblogger Pete at The Last Minute posted a screencast of these steps as well.

Just to set the record straight (because that’s what we do here) it was Duncan at The Last Minute who posted about Video Blogs in iTunes 4.9 and included the text from an email I sent explaining things…

So Lifehacker got it slightly wrong. While I might be “Videoblogger Pete” over at tinkernet or the Videoblogging group, Duncan is the guy at The Last Minute, and he did the screencast. Oh, and I’m also the guy here at RasterWeb! in case you didn’t notice…