Some of Nothing

Six Reasons Why Men Should Read / Watch Jane Austen
Saturday, September 29, 2007

Let's face facts...Jane Austen is hot! No surprise to many a male who sits at home while his special lady friend heads off to watch one of the recent Austen-inspired films. Or to the guy who scratches his head when said lady friend sneaks Pride and Prejudice off the shelf for the 86th time. Indeed, we might even say, Jane Austen is everywhere. And while, to most women, the reasons for Austen-mania seem self-evident, it has become obvious that men just don't get it. So, for all the men out there, here are six reasons why you should get Jane (or at least try to):

1. Chicks dig Jane. We might as well get it out of the way. One of the things we all want in life is to connect with others who share our interests. And just as men want women to share in your D&D, or your 1970s spy films, or your myriad other forms of geekiness, we want you to share in ours. And while you may ask yourself why chicks dig Jane so much, that is not really the issue. The issue is: if we can dig Spock, you can dig Lizzy. It's that simple.
2. Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa. Closely related to reason #1, having some basic knowledge of Jane Austen will help you shop for your Austen-loving lady around holiday time. Think of how much just watching an Austen-related flick or two can simplify your life. Along with Jane popularity, comes Jane swag; so getting our Jane (Austen) can help you get something for your Jane (Doe). Knowledge is (buying) power!
3. "Women!" How many times have you exclaimed this to yourself or to your Facebook friends? If so, it's hardly news to you that you just don't understand the ladies. They're unpredictable; they're mysterious; they're just plain confusing to you. Well, reading / watching Jane Austen will explain everything. Seriously, it won't take many Austen hours for you to figure out much of what women want and how they think. Let Jane be your guide to a higher level of awareness.
4. "Men!" If you've ever heard your lady exclaim this to her friends or fellow Austen fanclub members, you know that you've done something wrong. Wanna know what it is (and know she won't tell you)? Pursuant to #3, if you had read / watched much of Jane, you would very quickly have some insight into what you did and how to fix it (and you would know that the solution probably wouldn't involve jewelry or flowers). With your Jane-given higher level of awareness, you can save time (and money) by either preventing or knowing how to fix typical male mistakes.
5. Jane Austen isn't Danielle Steel or Oprah. The only reason Danielle Steel books exist is so that women will have something light and portable with which to beat men over the head for not being romantic enough. Sure, you're thinking that they're paperback and don't really hurt that much, but then you remember Oprah and how much it would suck to have to go on the teevee and defend your lack of romanticism in front of a live studio audience. Save yourself the concussion (in both cases) by just reading / watching a little Jane Austen.
6. And finally, Jane Austen is good! That's right. You may not want to admit it to yourself, but if you give Jane half a chance, she might just win over even your MMORPG-loving, Redford movie-watching, geeky heart. So, try to look beyond appearances (and chicks berating you for not being more like Darcy) and give Jane a try. And in the end, if you find that you aren't a Jane-lover after all, at least you'll know how to avoid Danielle Steel: simply hide it right behind your copy of Pride and Prejudice.

Author's note: Yes, this post is filled with stereotypes, and in that sense, is quite tongue-in-cheek. Nonetheless, Jane Austen is good--so read her.

Nothing New byslag at 10:56 AM 4 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Mr. Spock for President High-Res
Thursday, September 27, 2007

Here is Mr.-Spock-for-President in all his highly pixelated glory (300 ppi, to be exact; I believe Kirk would call this "extreme magnification"). This image is for your enjoyment and for the promotion of Mr. Spock's undeclared candidacy in the 2008 US presidential election. The only rule is that you are not allowed to sell it. Simply click on the image to get the full-size version. It is compressed, but hopefully, Blogger didn't degrade the quality. Let me know if you have problems with it.

Orig MSfP post here.

Update: Below are two reverse MSfPs (one with a transparent background, one with white). Looks funky, but hopefully, it will work for tshirts and stuff. And if you use any of the images, I would love to see a pic of your creation!

Nothing New byslag at 10:06 PM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Website Creation is Cheap and Easy (kind of like our Congressional Representatives)

(UPDATE: Actually started this post a couple of days ago but am too lazy to revise the first paragraph. Nonetheless, it does get good toward the end.)

Well, the fam is on their way to the airport, and I'm finally surrounded by solitude. I have to say that the last few days of being unable to focus on my empire and finding myself competing for oxygen has left me feeling a bit like a fish out of water. And what better way to relieve that feeling than by complete submersion? So, grab your snorkel and fins; it's finally time to dive into the depths of the Some of Nothing site-quarium (notice I didn't say you needed an air tank--it's not that deep in here). Don't be afraid: in this site-quarium, we'll be observing schools of .html and .css files in a very controlled environment.

First, the toe-dip:
1. The website and images (.html, .css, .png, and .jpg files) are currently being hosted (for free) by Google.
2. The vaunted www.someofnothing.com domain name was purchased (more cheaply than from Google) at Godaddy in spite of their hideously tacky ad campaigns. As always, we picked up a promo code off the net before purchase to save $1.00.
3. The original (free) site template is Simple Boxes from Open Source Web Design.
4. The PNG images are compressed using PNGOUT (have I mentioned "free"?).
5. The blog is syndicated by Feedburner and is embedded (free) into the site using Feed2JS.
6. Total cost of website to-date: about $8 (domain name), but we'll be donating some profits to our freebie sites once the empire gets going.

Second, waist-high:
Faithful readers may recall the harrowing tale of my google experience from a few months ago. While the usability issues I had then are still relevant now, I found that my previous experience enabled me to set up my website much more quickly this time around. In short, I knew that I didn't want to bother with the Google Page Creator, so I created my own pages starting with a .css template and .html file from a fabulous open-source web design site (see #3 above for links). The reasons for my choice of hosting and decision to use my own template are as follows:
1. Google will allow me 2GB file space for free, and I can use my own domain name (see #2).
2. While Google's free hosting is very generous, I found their Page Creator to be a big pain in the a--. And since I have Dreamweaver and rudimentary web skills along with the ability to score free online templates at-will, I saw no reason to put myself through that pain. Plus, there are only so many template options available with Page Creator, which would make my site look just meh instead of how it looks now: "meh!".
Here are the reasons behind my specific template selection--Simple Boxes:
1. I wanted a basic template that even I (with my meager abilities) could edit easily.
2. I wanted an unusual template (not too corporate-y). Plus, I was going for something that would look good in black and white...simple yet a little funky.
3. I wanted a cross-browser compatible template so that I wouldn't have to stress about how my site looks in IE vs. Firefox.

The drawbacks of my choices:
1. For Google web-hosting setup and domain issues, see harrowing tale: had to implement a JavaScript re-direct in order to use one of my uploaded files (instead of the auto-set Page Creator home page) for my home page. This re-direct solution has two drawbacks--page load-time is (minimally) increased for the user; if the user has a browser that blocks javascript, the re-direct doesn't function. I still say there's got to be an easier way; I just don't know what it is.
2. While Google's free web-hosting is (still! :) very generous, the interface for uploading files is a bit clunky: each file has to be uploaded individually, folders aren't an option so all files are stored in the home directory (eg, no separate folder for images), 2GBs won't last too long, no server-side scripting possibilities (eg, users can't sign up to receive a newsletter or whatnot online).
3. A bit of tweaking went into my template, and as a consequence, I could probably stand to do some cleanup of the .css file.

After all is said-and-done, however, it's great to be able to host a customizable website (for free), using my own domain name (for cheap) as well as my own template (for free). Nothing I've learned since creating it (what, like 3 weeks ago?) has made me wish I had done something differently. And the good news is that I still have all my own .html and .css files (another reason to use my own template and not Google's Page Creator) so if I want to move the site, I just need to post the files to the new location and redirect my domain name accordingly (redirecting DNS is easy).

Keep your fins handy so that, in our next site-quarium, we can go all the way into the shallow end: image creation and compression, blog feed, etc.

Nothing New byslag at 9:45 PM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Want to know what girls are made of? Read Jane
Wednesday, September 26, 2007

(NOTE: Image updated with a new and improved book and tidied-up overall design)

It looks like we'll have to wait a little longer for the website redux since I'm in a fonty phase right now. Again with the Jane Austen. And again with the not-entirely-new design (the cameo-style girl and all), but I like the idea of using Austen adjectives for the girl. I feel the need for a little female empowerment, and Jane Austen always makes it happen. Originally planned on just going with the cameo-words image but ended up adding the title and the book to make it more explicit. That book took forever (damn perspective problems!), but I'm still not sure about it. What do you think? Keep the title and book or lose one or both? Other changes? Is the big dark shape obvious or too subtle? What say you?

Nothing New byslag at 7:18 PM 1 dispenses karmic justice! (or just comments here)  

Artful

Well, the blog is back! The fam left yesterday morning, and I immediately sat down and started writing a post all about the development of the Some of Nothing website. To make a long story short, it was too much for the time I had available to me yesterday, so I'm hoping to finish and post it today. In the meantime, I'm playing with typography (a subject I've never quite gotten my arms around). The fonts used in this design are (respectively): Bookman Old Style, Imprint MT Shadow, Cochin, Hoefler Text, and Onyx. They are all the same size using original letter spacing. It's interesting to me how the same word can look so different using different fonts. Real typographers would probably hate this particular combination of fonts together, but I kind of like it. Still trying to figure out why.

The subject matter is simple. I enjoy the word "artful" because of its various meanings, and in re-reading Pride and Prejudice (again!), it's become obvious that it's a favorite of Jane Austen's as well. In fact, this design was originally going to be just "artful" centered in courier font, but that style seems a little cliche to me, and while this one may be also, in my mind, its various purposes make up for that. But then again, you can be the judge...

Nothing New byslag at 10:54 AM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Kittens
Thursday, September 20, 2007

Sadly, I won't be able to post for the next few days. I have family coming into town and they are unawares of my budding empire.

So, for Fox "News" Republicans everywhere (who, let's face it, would be happier to see people like me dealing in porn)...

Nothing New byslag at 9:46 AM 1 dispenses karmic justice! (or just comments here)  

Spock '08 -- Vulcans Never Bluff
Monday, September 17, 2007

Spock's even got a built-in campaign slogan as vulcans are incapable of bluffing. I'm thinking let's hop on the campaign trail and see where this takes us. You?

Nothing New byslag at 5:55 PM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Spock/Gore '08

Let's be honest, Spock is great, but he still needs a VP. Spock/Gore, Spock/Edwards, Spock/Clinton, Spock/Obama, even Spock/Richardson would do. This dynamic duo could rule the world (but wouldn't--even in parallel evil-spock dimension).

The geek-out may end here or it may continue. Stay tuned...

Nothing New byslag at 5:43 PM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Mr. Spock for President

David Brooks once compared Al Gore to Spock. What a compliment! Spock would make a great president: he cannot lie; he believes in science and logic; he speaks in short, pointed statements, using proper grammar; he's patient enough to put up with Kirk's foolishness. In other words, he is everything Bush isn't. What a refreshing thought! I feel like an image such as this one must have been done before, but if so, it hasn't been recent enough to come up on any of my searches. So, if none of my democratic choices make it to the general...

Ok, we know that however that sentence was going to end, it was going to be a lie. But still, vote for Spock along WITH whichever democrat ends up on the ticket. Ok, don't do that either...remember Florida.

Nothing New byslag at 5:10 PM 6 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Big Egos Fail to Compensate for Small Minds

Well, here's another image to go along with the confidence/competence issue. I feel like I'm stuck in a rut color-wise. Every color combo I put together just looks weird to me. Even so, I went big with this graphic, trying to make it intelligible. The original one left out the red box with Iraq, Afghanistan...in it. I feel like the main idea is pretty universal, but I wanted to tie it directly to this administration. It seems like it could go either way. Once I get a few more things done today, I'll try to bring this image and the previous one back for variations on a theme. Still many images in the queue (aka my brain) no less, so we'll see where it fits in.

Nothing New byslag at 12:41 PM 1 dispenses karmic justice! (or just comments here)  

Liberals Choose both Competence and Confidence

In my humble opinion, this image represents an important concept. Listening to, watching, and talking with Republicans over the years (I grew up with them) has taught me that understanding the difference between confidence and competence is, generally, where they fall down. Anyone with eyes has seen this happening with the Bush Administration, but I remember thinking this when Fox "News" first came on the air. It was amazing how they slowly crept into our lives, precipitated by Rush Limbaugh and other AM radio "personalities." Limbaugh, O'Reilly, etc all have big egos that, in the eyes of their followers, make up quite well for their small minds. And it's that ego that appeals to our primitive instincts.

And before that, I think back on growing up around Southern Republicans who had this in spades. In fact, as a child, I myself often failed to discern the difference between confidence and competence and, as a result, thought that the "grown-ups" around me knew much more than they did. They acted like they knew what they were talking about, so obviously they were right (and smart). And part of this style is that not only did they know all this stuff, they acted like everyone knew all this stuff. So, if you questioned their statements, you were a dummy. And being a dummy makes us feel both inferior and safe at the same time. Don't worry your pretty little head about it...the grown-ups will take care of you. (Note: plenty of Democrats --eg, LBJ--have had this style too, but right now, I see it as very much as the province of Republicans.)

We've heard some--but not enough--discussion of this problem when it comes to addressing the challenges liberals have of getting their message out. Right now, most mainstream Liberals have their critical thinking caps on. And when people see both sides of an issue, they often come off as uncertain about their position. Personally, I don't think this image is a necessary cost to thinking about things; I think two things need to be done about it:
1. Liberals need to work on our communication style (to me, John Edwards is doing great at this in his campaign).
2. As a society, we desperately need to focus more on teaching critical thinking skills in school. Obviously, this will alleviate a ton of problems, including protecting us by helping to prevent fundamentalist thinking (John Edwards is doing well with this too, by proposing that Americans spend some money educating people around the world--and at home).
Of course those two things go together. Liberals will never have the opportunity to work on education if we can't improve our communication. In my opinion, the biggest failure of the Kerry campaign was that he spoke as if he were speaking to a bunch of critical thinking adults. Obviously, the Bush-daddy style proved him wrong.

Well, enough for now...I'm thinking of making this image just one in a series. Not sure about the style (again!) but we'll see where it goes. Suggestions are always welcome!

Nothing New byslag at 10:02 AM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Today's Liberal Agenda
Sunday, September 16, 2007

Not an entirely new concept, to be sure. But I've never seen it done simply enough to work as a graphic. We laugh at this view of our "liberal agenda", but sadly, a lot of people think of liberals in this way. It's absurd on its face (just like it would be absurd if we really thought that Republicans planned our terrorist attacks--I mean, we all know that republicans can't plan;-), but oftentimes, this nonsense is couched in a way that makes it actually seem feasible to people. We sometimes can't remove the caricatures from the actual issues.

With that said, The Daily Show has a new segment called "You're not helping" where they show absurd things that a minority of extremist liberals do sometimes (screaming and whatnot). I know that most of the time, I want stupid (mostly Hollywood or Fox "News") liberals to zip it when they spout some nonsense that encourages the stereotypes shown on the above list--excepting the last one, of course. But this presents a conundrum. If extremism is the easiest way to get you on the teevee, and you don't want to be extremist, how do you still get your message out?

Some Republicans want us all to believe that rational, mainstream liberalism does not exist anymore. And no matter how regularly the latest (mostly really good) group of Democratic presidential candidates shows us that it does, Fox "News" Republicans treat them as if their rationalism is actually wacky extremism. The only way I can think of to deal with this situation is to boil down the absurdities to their logical conclusions. (warning: here's where we get to the long-winded rant)

As an example, if we look at #2 on our list (kill some babies), we can draw out the following argument:
A: Liberals want to keep abortion legal.
B: Abortion is killing babies.
C: Abortions are usually premeditated.
D: In the United States, premeditated killing is often called murder.
E: The US has laws against murder.
Two possible conclusions: Either people who get and perform abortions should be put on trial for murder, or liberal baby killers want to legalize murder.

Really? How many people who think of liberals as "baby killers" think that women who get abortions should be tried for murder? And what about miscarriages? Should women who have miscarriages be tried for manslaughter--or at least investigated? When should that "baby" get its social security card? Should we have a conception certificate instead of a birth certificate? The first question gets asked and ignored a lot: here it is on You Tube (in a lot of places, really). Anyone remember seeing this question asked in a debate? Of course not.

Some people would rather argue that our laws should reflect our "morals" but that women should not be punished for getting an illegal abortion. So what...we make abortion symbolically illegal? Are the people who argue this the same people who dislike the Equal Rights Amendment because they claim it was largely symbolic? Even if not, do we want to then make adultery illegal? What about drinking? Gambling? Pre-marital sex? What about creating an image that compares GW to a chimpanzee? That's not nice. So, let's make it illegal.

Obviously, there are arguments to be made for (and against) all these "morals" laws, so where does that leave us? And why are we only arguing about abortion and not about adultery? I mean, they're both reflective of a social ill. They both relate to sex. They both "harm the children" and are generally considered bad. They both start with "a". What gives? Well, we know what gives, but we won't say it (hint: it has to do with the same reason that people actually dislike the ERA). And instead of saying it, we'll make a graphic that mocks stereotypes and stereotypes Republican idiocy.

That may not be much...but it's sumthin'.

Nothing New byslag at 5:19 PM 2 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

New Mission Statement: Dispense Karmic Justice
Saturday, September 15, 2007

In the process of working on my website (www.someofnothing.com) over the last 1.5 weeks, I decided to change my mission statement. Instead of dispensing karmic retribution, Some of Nothing's mission is to dispense karmic JUSTICE. This relates to GG's comment about our mission statement being vaguely Tick-ish. And I liked that. Nobody loves justice as much as the Tick. Also, this works better because "justice" is more encompassing than "retribution". Some of Nothing isn't just about making fun of people (although there is a lot of that); it's about doing good stuff...whatever that means to us. So there we go: new mission statement accomplished! (I said we still make fun of people, didn't I?)

Nothing New byslag at 9:53 AM 3 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Miscellaneous Happens II (Miscellaneous' Revenge)
Friday, September 14, 2007

I'm not sure if this works any better. The whole point is that information architects and designers hate having "miscellaneous"-type categories in their systems (well, I do anyway). But the fact is that sometimes (or really, almost always), miscellaneous happens. Not everything can be categorized--as much as we hate to admit it. Strangely, this is a tough one for me. And it has such potential.

Nothing New byslag at 9:08 PM 3 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Miscellaneous Happens

Here's an information architecture joke that I don't think works very well yet. Kind of boring. Kind of esoteric. But I haven't decided how to fix it right now. Will think on it. The concept is funny in my head--just not in production. For peeps interested in information architecture, check out Boxes and Arrows (among others).

Nothing New byslag at 3:47 PM 1 dispenses karmic justice! (or just comments here)  

Bad Bills Farewell
Thursday, September 13, 2007

This morning, I posted my last Bad Bill (for a while, at least) at http://badbilloreilly.blogspot.com/. No time for a graphic here today. Better luck next time.

Nothing New byslag at 10:26 PM 0 dispense karmic justice! (or just comment here)  

Vexing Rubbed Out
Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Here's a question that I find interesting: Is this image violent?

Nothing New byslag at 3:22 PM 1 dispenses karmic justice! (or just comments here)  

You take delight in vexing me redux

OK, GG. Is this better? Interestingly, that eraser took way longer than I thought it would. And it's soooooo simple! I've got a long way to go with vector graphics (obviously), but this was a great challenge. Let me know if you still think this is too violent. And let me know what you think of the eraser. Personally, I don't think this image works as a stand-alone, but it was an interesting experiment! Feel free to agree or disagree.

Nothing New byslag at 2:57 PM 1 dispenses karmic justice! (or just comments here)  

MShaft

Turning that frown upside down...This rip on/off the Microsoft butterfly was inspired by a ridiculously unhelpful response I received from their tech support today. Here is the email I sent to them:

"--- Original Message ---
Sent : Tuesday, September 11, 2007 4:46:12 PM UTC
To : LPROD.WNLV.NA.US.EN.MSF.SEA.TS

.T01.RTG.00.EM
Subject : Windows Live Product Upload

Service:
Windows Live Product Upload

I have a .txt file that I'm trying to upload to Live Product, and
every time I try, I get an immediate error message that says file cannot
be uploaded with no further details. The file is tab-delimited from
Cafe Toolbox *http://www.cafetoolbox.com/* and I have tried both the msn-specific version and the google base compatible version of the file to no avail. I am using a Mac *OS 10.4.1* and have tried uploading with
the latest versions of Firefox, Safari, and Explorer for Mac *2005?*.
Firefox and Safari give the same error message, while IE does nothing at
all. I have also tried ftp using Fugu, to no avail. Please advise.

Which operating system are you using?
Mac OS X

What browser are you using?
Firefox 2.0"