knownhuman

Dear Department of Homeland Security Immigration and Customs Enforcement, I don’t know exactly how you got to be the de facto copyright cops for the entertainment industry, but when you start putting out videos like this: …you might want to make sure you’re not putting foot firmly in mouth. See, downloading illicit movies might cost that boom mike operator her job. But you know what certainly will? Reusing and recutting NYC’s anti-piracy PSA for your own benefit, thus denying a boom... Read Full Story

Or How, After More Than a Decade, The Times Still Doesn’t Get The Internet Photo by Graham Biggs After years of talk , the New York Times finally released details regarding their new pay wall yesterday. Despite receiving mixed reviews, I am failing to see how anyone could see the new Times plan as anything but a bad idea. First, a little background. The New York Times has attempted a paywall before – and it failed miserably. So have other newspapers, and with the exception of... Read Full Story

Piece of cake, right After a sporadic five months, I can say with some certainly that Project Kingdom does not suck. It’s not great, but as you can see above, the bones are there. All I have to do now is go back, cut out the crud, rewrite the crap and fill in the holes. It was a bit of a rough road to get here, especially as I was sticking to the hard part of Hemingway’s maxim “Write drunk, edit sober.” If you’re wondering about the image, that’s the revised outline for the book. Those... Read Full Story

Check out my cool new twitter page! Earlier today I outed a Twitter spammer but publishing his phone number. Said spammer took offense to this and reported my account as violating the Twitter ToS. At approximately 5:32, Twitter responded to his request and suspended my account. I have lodged an appeal to have my account. According to the Twitter ToS: Privacy: You may not publish or post other people’s private and confidential information, such as credit card numbers, street address... Read Full Story

Driving used to be an occassion Before I hit the road this holiday season, I put together a decidedly non-holiday double album for the trip. Designed to allow for casual listening, nothing is challenging. Okay, none of what follows is remotely challenging. But that’s kind of the point.Hopefully these keep me entertained for the hours on the road. Anything But Christmas Music Disc 1 Flagpole Sitta – Harvey Danger The Way – Fastball Life on Mars? – David Bowie Thunder Road – Bruce... Read Full Story

I witnessed a rather awkward and interesting drug deal when I got off the bus this evening. One party was in his late twenties or early thirties, roughly a peer of mine. The other was older, hobbled, a broken old man from the nursing home across the street. I was on top of them quickly, catching both by surprise. A bottle of pills and a wad of cash changed hands. The old man walked away with the money. Back to the nursing home and away from the cold. Things, as they are wont to do in... Read Full Story

Would he look more scary, or less, with a turbin? Here’s a quick crash course in “How to be just a bit nerdier” or “Why the government can’t put Wikileaks back in the box.” I used to frequently use the phrase “DNS is magic” when working tech support. It’s not. It’s really like visiting a library. What is DNS? DNS stands for Domain Name System and it’s what translates a website name, bradleyrobb.net or google.com , into the IP address of a server. It’s part gopher and part translator... Read Full Story

You find a lamp, figure out how to work it, and Oscar Wilde appears. The long dead Mr. Wilde informs you that he’s a genie and makes you an offer. The Genie Oscar Wilde will give you three wishes with one caveat: after your third wish, or a reasonable period of inactivity, everything you say for the rest of your life will be a double entendre. You cannot wish your way out of the consequence. Would you accept the offer? Social No related posts. Read Full Story

First Draft and Celebratory Champagne Late in the evening on Labor Day, I finally wrapped up the first draft of Project Kingdom. I popped the champagne, invited over some close friends and threw some steaks on the grill, and promptly put the printed beast onto the shelf with all of my other work. It wasn’t easy. I wanted to jump right into editing, to maintain the momentum I had built up in August and early September to carry me through the writing period most easily described as “hell... Read Full Story

This weekend was the Ryder Cup. No, I didn’t watch it. But the Mail on Sunday photographer Mark Pain managed to grab one of the greatest shots in golf history . See below. Yes, I know, I don't have the copyright for this image Know what’s awesome about this photo? It’s not the look on Tiger’s face. It’s not that Mr. Pain had the wherewithal to snap that photo seconds before being struck ball the ball. Nope, take another look. When keeping it real goes terribly right You see that guy... Read Full Story