I was sorely tempted to go to bed tonight instead of watching the end of the Tour of California stage. I had a long day and really could use the sleep, but I felt like the climb up Bonny Doon might get a little exciting. Between seeing how Armstrong's legs are and seeing the overall race play out, I decided sleep would have to wait.

Boy, was I right to sit through the last hour.

Levi Leipheimer took control of the race in a big way today, with a serious attack. Starting off with a “Light it up, Popo” to get the super domestique's motor running, Levi then rode away from the pack and into the leader's yellow jersey. Moves like that are exactly why I love bike racing. Great stuff.

It's been so long since he was truly relevant to me, I almost forgot how much I used to like John Woo's work. While I was always particular to Ringo Lam's substance versus Woo's style during the height of the heng dai era, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a fool for films like The Killer, Hard Boiled and A Better Tomorrow. I greedily devoured those classics (as well as everything else Woo did that I could get my hands on,) so it's with no small measure of joy that I report that John Woo has once again made a good film. After a mildly nauseating decade and a half parodying himself for Hollywood dollars, Woo has delivered Red Cliff, an engaging, sprawling epic, full of stunning visuals (including some grand special effects) and, not surprisingly, killer action pieces.

Woo has talked for years about doing a historical epic and, thankfully, he knew what to do when finally faced with the challenge.
(more…)

In the middle of moving all those underscore delineated URLs to dash delineated URLs*, Google went ahead and announced the rel="canonical" scheme for defining the preferred URL for a piece of content. While it's not the biggest deal for me, other than the "/" vs "/index.php" question, for many people with more dynamic systems it's a big deal. Bravo to everyone involved as it's a really straightforward, easy-to-implement solution to a common, troublesome problem.
(more…)

To continue the trend I started with last night's post, I present:

The problem in many people’s thinking is the belief that there’s always a magic business model lurking around the corner that will circumvent the normal laws of capitalism just because the internet’s involved. There isn’t. Reducing marginal costs certainly opens up a few doors to businesses, but it doesn’t mean that any product can suddenly be profitably supported by advertising alone.

"there’s always a magic business model lurking around the corner" describes the attitude of a lot of folks these days. I guess they deserve points for optimism, but when there are hundreds of millions of dollars at stake and thousands of people's jobs, optimism should cede some control to reality-based worldviews.

From: MattMaroon.com » Blog Archive » The Gray Lady

Expect to see a few more films set in Rome over the next few months. I just thought I should point that out.

Roman Holiday isn't my favorite Audrey Hepburn movie. It is my favorite Audrey Hepburn movie set in Rome that also features Eddie Albert, so it's got that going for it.

Seriously. Eddie Albert is in this one. That's cool.

Know who else is in this film? Gregory Peck. Damn fine actor.

Add it up. I dare you. Rome + Audrey Hepburn + Eddie Albert + Gregory Peck = a damn fine movie.

Math doesn't lie.

Except when it does. But it doesn't here. Here it's totally rock solid and uncovers fundamental laws of the universe.

So, what I'm saying is- check out Roman Holiday if you get the chance.