Blogcritics Author: Cale Corbett

Review: Amazon Kindle - Books Were Just A 'Gateway Drug'!

Cale Corbett — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 06:14:47 EDT

Built-in wireless (called Whispernet) downloading is also free with purchase of the Kindle.
For those who may not know what the Amazon Kindle is, it is, in short, an eBook (electronic book) reader. eBooks provide users with the same content as dead-tree versions (with some exceptions on illustrations and footnotes, depending on the conversion). The Kindle, which sells for $359.00 on Amazon, is one of many such readers on the market....

Announcement: Short-content feeds

Phillip Winn — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:00:00 EDT

Sunday, August 26, 2007, marks the switch of all Blogcritics.org article feeds from full-content to short-content. This is the result of several converging factors, and is unfortunately a permanent decision (as permanent as any decision can be on the web, that is). We are aware of all of the reasons that this is a Bad Idea, and we are aware that some of you will be quite upset about having to click on something to read the free content, and we're sorry. Unfortunately, despite great effort, full-content feeds are not currently economically viable. Two other factors are involved: full-content feeds have resulted in an unprecedented level of content theft, with BC content appearing on many websites, usually spam sites, without attribution or permission. This duplicate content causes a cascading set of problems, not the least of which is that search engines generally aren't favorable to duplicate content, and don't always guess correctly. Finally, our RSS advertising partner is strongly in favor of short-content feeds. We hope that you'll continue to subscribe to BC via RSS, and when an article grabs your eye, it's only a click away, still free on the BC website. Thank you for your understanding.

Omaha. It's Icky. A Lot.

Cale Corbett — Wed, 18 Aug 2004 22:42:13 EDT

I cannot take credit for the origin of this catchy little blog entry title, but I can take credit (or blame) for the following contents: Omaha, somewhere in middle America (my apologies to the Counting Crows). For those fans of mine who are not familiar with it, let me paint you a picture. OK, get ready, here it is. Think overgrown cow town festooned with "buy here pay here" car lots, constant road construction, frigid Antarctic Winters, sticky Louisiana-like Summers, beautiful Autumns that last all of 15 minutes. There are about 20 jobs in the town that aren't either insurance or telemarketing company executives or low-paying "Would you like to Biggie size that" jobs. If you are a 25-45 year old technology professional, just keep driving. That's what I did. I spent almost 15 years of my life in Omaha after being dragged there by Uncle Sam during my Air Force days. It was small, quiet, fairly safe and an easy place to raise a kid or two. If you are looking for excitement, career advancement or direct flights to anywhere I would suggest that you keep driving. A dear friend of ours pestered and cajoled my wife and me absolutely buggy until we finally gave in and decided to pull up our roots (not that many really) and move west. Oh! I almost forgot one thing. Omaha has a great view of... wait for it... wait for it... Iowa! That's right. No mountains, no water (excepting the sewage-laden Missouri river), no breath-taking valleys or vistas. Just Council-fricking-Bluffs, Iowa.