Protection Against Spys

I have read that the ActiveX that is installed in Microsoft Internet Explorer is the most common and easiest way for companies to put 'spyware' onto your computer. Spyware can at best slow your computer down and at worst instigate lots of popups and expose potentially dangerous information to intruders. The easiest way to fix this is to download a new browser Mozilla FireFox to use instead of Internet Explorer. Don't worry - the browser is great and even offers some cool features that MSIE does not. One of the cool features is that when you come across a webpage that offers live feeds via XML (keep reading if you don't know what that means but more and more web sites offer this feature) it gives you an icon that by clicking you can add to your bookmarks really simply. Thus you have 'realtime' links in your bookmarks. In fact, this blog has a realtime feed so you can simply go to your bookmarks to find my latest postings without having to visit the site first! Many new web sites have these and it can be very convenient. It is a pretty easy download (i.e. not too big). I would highly recommend it.

The other thing that I would suggest is to download a Spyware protection program and clean up what you have on your computer now. I like one called Spybot. Spybot is free but they do accept donations. If you like it, I would encourage you to help them out.

iPod Nation

I got a 20G iPod for a Christmas from my 'urban family'. So far I have loaded it with 2075 songs and I only have it filled about halfway. I also have my MS Outlook contacts loaded and a few notes files including my travel itinerary for my Christmas travels to my parents. It's VERY cool and I am enjoying it quite a bit. I thought that I would share some observations in no particular order.

The interface to the iPod is simply great. Great engineering, great ergonomics. Super.

The Apple music store is a great concept. It's very easy to buy music and have it loaded into your playlists. In fact, they make it so easy that it's very compelling to buy music this way. The only beef I have is that while I have bought about six songs so far, I really can't see buying whole CDs this way. First of all the price of a whole CD is not much cheaper than a real CD but the product is not as good. The bit rate is 128kbps which is inferior to a CD and of course it is a soft copy only. If the computer crashes, it's gone. Sure - you can make backups (to CDs!) but that's inconvenient. I'm hopeful that price pressure will make these electronic songs MUCH cheaper than the corresponding CDs - I think it will be good for the artists and the consumer. Simply put, more music will be sold. I was looking for Charlie Parker today and a very well respected three CD package goes on Amazon for about $50. It's about $40 on Apple iTunes. For about $20 to $25 I'd probably grab it online and live with the slightly less fidelity and hassle of making backups. That's $20 to $25 that the retailers and artists aren't getting now.

I think it's only a short time until some of our mobile devices get integrated better. I really believe it's kind of silly to carry around an iPod, a cell phone, a digital camera, a PDA, a satellite radio, etc... It is silly but right now we're at a point where we are only starting to see the integration of these type of devices. It won't be soon enough.

A tip: You can record streaming audio digitally and transfer it to your iPod for listening on the fly. I have used this to record some back programs on NPR (All Songs Considered, Fresh Air, audio articles on things that interest me, etc..) for listening to on the airplane. You have to buy additional software to do this. I bought a package called Total Recorder for $12 and it works great. Of course when you record a stream, you are recording in real time - but you can do other things while it is recording. Some may find that they want to record some of the great streaming digital music stations around.

Oh - I upgraded the headphones to Sony earbuds (MDREX71SL). They stay in the ear a bit better and eliminate more background noise. Not as good as my studio headphones but pretty good for 'going mobile'.

A Cultural Christmas

This December I have enjoyed more 'classical' art for Christmas than normal years. First was the play 'The Christmas Carol' as presented by the Dallas Theater Center. The DTC always does it a bit different each year though this is the first time I have seen it in more than 10 years. I was not disappointed. Then the Dallas Opera did 'Cinderella' by Rossini. While not really Christmas I suppose, the Dallas Opera tends to put their 'family' opera on in December. And I love Rossini - it was great. Finally I saw the ballet 'The Nutcracker Suite' by the Fort Worth Ballet. It was super and I continue to love Tchaikovsky's score. In fact I think I picked up a few arrangement tricks that I can use in my music. The only thing I didn't see was Handel's Messiah. I actually have never seen it so it's high on my list - there is always next year.

Those Were The Days

Yes, those were the days. The early days of the internet. Way back, say, in 1996. I found a site called Wayback Machine that is maintained by a group called the Internet Archive. The goal of this group is to archive and preserve old web pages. Do you want to see what CNN.com looked like in 1995? How about that web site that you cobbled together a few years ago that you would be mortified if anyone saw today? Well, it's there baby. History is not lost. For good and bad. Go poke around - it might bring a tear of nostalgia to your eyes... ;-)

Oh Really?

I just read an article by Bill O’Reilly where he says that Christmas is under “siege by the growing forces of secularism in America”. He cites evidence of this using four examples. Actually I have a lot of respect for Mr. O’Reilly and generally enjoy his ‘no spin’ comments. But here he is just wrong. Four anecdotal examples do not make a trend or prove any points – unless the point is that people do indeed do dumb things sometimes.

Consider this. America is a country where 53% of the population considers religion to be very important in their lives. That (which is correlated to church attendance) blows away other countries with similar levels of development – Canada 30%, Britain 33%, Japan 12%, France 11%, Germany 21%, Italy 27%. And consider this. The recent presidential election was considered by many to be a result of a largely religious voice. I wouldn't worry too much about any secularism conspiracies. Christianity seems to be alive and strong in the United States.

As a rebuttal to Mr. O’Reilly and as a fairly normal person, I will explain my own rationale for keeping my holiday cards and greetings to the more generic ‘happy holidays’ type. I have a number of friends and colleagues that reside all over the world that possess many religious persuasions so I choose to send greetings that are not potentially offensive (offensive is an exaggeration admittedly – they are friends after all - maybe I should simply say that I don't want to be thought of as unthoughful). Does the above mean I’m part of his "siege by the growing forces"? I don't think so. I've been doing it this way for years. I have no negative agenda nor am I trying to make a 'statement'.

The holiday season does resonate at many levels. Most people have trouble agreeing on religious terms (even people within the same faith) but I think we can all agree that the sense of warmth and kindness between fellow travelers on the road of life and rebirth and potential is at least part of the meaning of Christmas and the New Years holidays, don't you think?

Go Fish

I just had to tell you about this web site if you haven't run across it before. It is a extremely smart audio/video search engine called Singing Fish. I found it when I was wondering why I was all of a sudden getting more hits to my music site. A lot of those hits were coming from Singing Fish. The amazing and useful features about Singing Fish is that it is not only the most extensive search I have every seen but it allows you specifiy by format, quality and even clip length. I find length to be useful to avoid those 30 second samples (though often that's useful too). Now - in most cases you will not get high-quality full-length hits (there are pay-as-you-go sites for that purpose) but for getting a taste of some music, this is the best ticket going.

The Ubiquitous Andy Williams

Boy does Christmas love Andy Williams. You never really hear too much about this smooth-voiced guy since he had a couple of hits in the 50s and 60s. I remember a variety show he had on TV when I was a kid but I don’t remember any of his songs. As I write this, I am sampling his 1956 song called ‘Butterfly’ that is dubbed his biggest hit. It’s pretty bad. I guess he plays in Branson still but I think if it wasn’t for Christmas, he wouldn’t even be in the modern music vocabulary. But come December, he is all over the radio isn’t he? He seems to be THE guy to play for such covers as “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of Year”, “O Holy Night” as well as countless others. I mean no disrespect to Mr. Williams but he must be thrilled this time of year when he gets to hear himself on the radio, a medium that left him 50 years ago.