onfocus

Solarized is a color palette for code editors. I've been using these colors in TextMate for a day or so and I'm enjoying it.

"Diesels are wildly popular in Europe, accounting for roughly 50 percent of the car market there. So why don't automakers simply bring the European cars here?" An older article that explains why diesels are hard to come by here.

"The truth is that individual health insurance is not easy to get." I second this. When I was a young, single, childless freelance developer I also found that insurance was difficult to get. I can't imagine what it would be like now that I'm older with a family. I'm lucky to have an awesome employer who provides insurance but we should fix this problem. [via rafe]

Interesting thinking about the current state of weblogs. Will all blog-like activity be consumed by Facebook, or will new tools emerge to help with privacy? And how do private blogs mix with public tools like Newsreaders? Complicated questions to answer.

Nelson has a good roundup of the issues surrounding the Wikileaks story.

"Whatever restrictions we eventually end up enacting, we need to keep Wikileaks alive today, while we work through the process democracies always go through to react to change. If it’s OK for a democracy to just decide to run someone off the internet for doing something they wouldn’t prosecute a newspaper for doing, the idea of an internet that further democratizes the public sphere will have taken a mortal blow."

"If you host your content on a commercial provider or on a social network, there are different points at which you can be cut off." The Wikileaks case is pointing out a weakness in the completely libertarian web ideal.

The case for Instagram. I must be a photography snob. I can not see the appeal of a community based solely on heavily-filtered photos. 

Nice sanity check in the mobile Web App vs. Native App debate. Often a Web App will do.

"A naval officer told the present writer that he had often, when on deck, been both amused and surprised at the accuracy with which some of these girls used this form of signalling out of pure fun." People have always found ways to communicate over distances.

Interesting take on Montessori-inspired apps: "In a Montessori classroom, children work from the concrete to the abstract. I fear that exposing young children to virtual Montessori materials may hamper this important developmental process."

Tax patriotism is on the rise!

"There is an error in most photography scaling algorithms." Wha? This is hard to believe.

I think we're safely out of spoiler territory now so I can post this great analysis of Toy Story 3.

Neven Mrgan has a great point: when a satire gets too close to the subject it's taking down is it still satire?

Great 50's comic art.

Frozen bananas in a food processor = ice cream? I need to try this!

Great idea, I'd use them.

Jay Rosen's question/answer site that tries to wed unanswered questions with journalists. "The eventual plan is to recruit journalists, or partner with an existing news organization, to answer the ones that a.) interest the most people and b.) require reporting, investigation and explanation--in other words, real journalism."

What Jay Rosen will say at SXSW about desperately needed explanation of major stories in the news.

"We have all our story elements in place. It's all politics from here on. Bring in the sports and war metaphors and let automated processes carry the rest. Don't dig, just dine. The sausage-machine rocks on." A nice explanation of how journalism's stories need to change. [via mneznanski]

"Unicode 5.0 encodes exactly 98,884 graphic characters on different planes...we collect information on every single character."

Cartoon intro to Neil Postman's book.

I had this reaction to Avatar too, glad to see io9 spend some time explaining this problem. Hadn't made the Dune connection, that's spot on. [via mathowie]

argh, burned by this on my personal mail server.

Regex snark traced back to Unix snark.

Anil collects more thoughts on the coming storm of apps vs. open web. "This, for me, is a social issue, a cultural issue, and a political issue, not just a technological issue. Perhaps we need to speak of it that way more often, to make the stakes clear."

"...it's time for developers to take a stand. If you don't want a repeat of the PC era, place your bets now on open systems. Don't wait till it's too late." Tim O'Reilly on the coming platform storm. [via anil]

I find myself referring to this classic by Eric Raymond frequently. I can't believe I haven't bookmarked it already.

If you wonder why people care about Net Neutrality, take a look at this image. It's going to give me nightmares. [via torrez]

"It turns out that milder sanctions can be swifter and more certain." Interesting article in the Economist about alternate strategies for curbing crime.

A TextMate plugin that provides a better "find within project" feature. Nice!

A hidden mode in OSX that you can use to group open apps. Click in the dock, then Command-Tab to open others. Works well!

A nice collection of pictures of the new season from across the globe.

"Being a long-haired beardo has its ups and downs. One of the ups is that if you’ve got a dozen friends and a lot of beer and a questionable idea, you can make something like this happen."

President Obama reacts to his selection as the winner of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.

Andrew Sullivan on Obama's Peace Prize: "...there are two obvious points: this is premature and this is thoroughly deserved. Both are right."