I completely agree with the restaurant group. The state subsidizing the Panther’s stadium is a ridiculous idea.
Category: Culture
A really good discussion between two of the people experimenting with pricing models in the digital space.
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Gaming Girls Photoshoot
Molly McIsaac and friends get together for a geeky photoshoot about girls and gaming. Anyone who knows Ms. McIsaac knows she is about as you can get from the [fake geek girls](http://www.themarysue.com/fake-geek-girls-pulp-cover/) that were chastised by certain parts of the internet a fews months ago.[^fn1]
[^fn1]: Of course, I would argue that there is no such thing as “fake geek girls” in the first place. I will point you to John Siracusa’s now defunct podcast [Hypercritical](http://5by5.tv/hypercritical/96) for more discussion about that.
> I wonder if Musk’s overreactions to negative press will discourage future Tesla reviews. He accused the New York Times of pretty nasty things, and Tesla fans are going after them hard. (Some of what he wrote might even be legally actionable, although the Times probably wouldn’t pursue it.)
> The Times will be fine, but what if Musk’s target was a smaller publication without as strong of a reputation? What if it was TIME? The Columbus Dispatch? Car and Driver? Motor Trend? His inflammatory, defamatory post would have been… a malicious hit piece, potentially devastating to their reputation.
Maybe the Times will be fine, but can’t we still hope that more people start to view the Times and other traditional media entities as people who find facts to fit the story they want to write[^fn1]?
[^fn1]: I am not arguing here that new media outlets do not do the same thing, just that people’s reverence for the allegedly unbiased media days of old is misplaced.
Devastating.
(via [Daring Fireball](http://daringfireball.net))
J.D. Bentley:
> I’ve turned to reading non-technological sites and subjects, primarily cultural and religious. It’s much more interesting and edifying to take outside ideas and see how they relate to technology, rather than reading tech pundits and cybertheorists spout their pompous opinions.
> If you read one of them, you’ve read them all. Almost constantly, everyone in this sphere is saying the exact same thing, even if they disagree. They approach the topic from the same place. They are two sides to the same coin.
Writing like this is why I signed up for Mr. Bentley’s [The Handshake](http://ths.jdbentley.com/about/)[^fn1].
[^fn1]: Also, I completely agree with the substance of what he is saying.
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North Carolina’s Year for Reform
Becki Gray writing for the *Carolina Journal*:
> The theme for the 2013-14 session likely will be “Economic Recovery and Job Creation.” The leadership’s priority list includes reforming an antiquated tax system, expanding school choice, rolling back government regulations, repealing renewable portfolio standards that drive up the cost of energy, protecting North Carolina’s right-to-work status, enacting regulations to produce natural gas with hydraulic fracturing, and rebuild and protect the state’s infrastructure. Everything else should be considered a distraction.
I am interested to see how many of these items actually get addressed.
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F. Scott Fitzgerald on Writing
From a letter to his fifteen year-old daughter:
> Nobody ever became a writer just by wanting to be one. If you have anything to say, anything you feel nobody has ever said before, you have got to feel it so desperately that you will find some way to say it that nobody has ever found before, so that the thing you have to say and the way of saying it blend as one matter—as indissolubly as if they were conceived together.
That, right there, is why he is the best[^fn1].
[^fn1]: Interesting note: Fitzgerald spent some time at the Grove Park Inn in Ashville, NC. In fact, they have had [special weekends in his honor](http://events.groveparkinn.com/ashevile-events/asheville-nc-memorial-day-weekend).
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It is Triangle Restaurant Week
Take advantage of $30 a person dinners at some of the best restaurants throughout the Triangle(*Seriously, when else can two people go to Ruth’s Chris and come out with a bill under $75?*).
I still love these kind of “process” posts.
The recent end of two of my favorite podcasts[^fn4] opened up two slots in my “must listen” podcast rotation. After a few weeks listening toh various different shows, I selected three shows to fill the void:
* [Unprofessional](http://www.muleradio.net/unprofessional/) – Hosted by Lex Friedman and Dave Wiskus, this show features interviews with various [internet famous](http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=internet%20famous) people[^fn1]. The interviews are normally free flowing, and, most importantly, hilarious.
* [The Crossover](http://5by5.tv/crossover) – A new show from Dan Benjamin that features various hosts from other 5by5 shows. The topics so far have been wide ranging and the discussion has been extremely strong. This show is Dan at his best.
* [The Impromptu](http://theimpromptu.net) – A weekly roundtable of semi-rotating hosts that discusses technology news and culture. The hosts do an excellent job of turning a critical eye to companies, especially Apple, without falling into the “trolling” that can occur on similar shows.
These podcasts join my existing list of “must listen to” shows:[^fn2]
* [The B&B Podcast](http://5by5.tv/bb)
* [The BS Report](http://sports.espn.go.com/espnradio/podcast/archive?id=2864045)
* [CMD+SPACE](http://www.70decibels.com/cmdspace)
* [Debug](http://www.imore.com/category/debug)
* [iFanboy](http://ifanboy.com)
* [In Beta](http://5by5.tv/inbeta)
* [Old Tech News](http://5by5.tv/otn)
* [The Talk Show](http://www.muleradio.net/thetalkshow/)
* [The Tony Kornheiser Show](http://sports.espn.go.com/espnradio/podcast/archive?id=5543849)[^fn3]
* [The Two-Headed Nerd Comicast](http://twoheadednerd.com)
[^fn1]: I do not intend “internet famous” to be meant as an insult. I was only trying to describe the class of people that you normally see in “tech podcast”-type interviews.
[^fn2]: There are a lot of other podcasts that I listen to most, if not all, episodes of. The ones listed here, however, are the ones that I listen to *every* episode of.
[^fn3]: *NOTE*: I listen to the ESPN feed, that filters out most of the music and the “Old Guy Radio” segment, since it’s available about 30 minutes after the show ends. The “raw” ESPN 980 feed, that has the complete show, is on a 24 hours delay.
[^fn4]: [Build and Analyze](http://5by5.tv/buildanalyze) and [Hypercritical](http://5by5.tv/hypercritical)
> They’re betting that the city, busy cutting budgets and scanning want ads, wants to loosen its tie and smile at a pretty girl.
I have a feeling Mr. Seward enjoyed photographing for this article.
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Lessons from 31 Self-Help Books
A quick summary for people who do not want to read a whole bunch of self-help advice.
Now you pay your registration and taxes at the same time. I prefer the old system, especially because it did not require $10.36 million dollars worth of upgrades to do it.
It opened on New Year’s Eve. I was there. It was delicious.
Clayton E. Cramer first breaks down why new weapons bans are not the solution, and then gets to the real issue:
> If we are serious about reducing these relatively rare (less than 1 percent of U.S. murders are incidents of mass murder) but terrifying tragedies, we need to be looking at the root cause: untreated or inadequately treated mental illness. Focusing on the weapons may be good politics, but the experimental evidence suggests that it is bad public policy.
I strongly recommend you read the whole piece.
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What If? – Three Wise Men
The questions they answer:
> The story of the three wise men got me wondering: What if you did walk towards a star at a fixed speed? What path would you trace on the Earth? Does it converge to a fixed cycle?
The answer includes the phrase “[i]f the three wise men had a hovercar.” Do you really need more information to help you decide if you want to read the rest?
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S.F. supervisors back micro-apartments
A 220-square-foot apartment? I am getting claustrophobic just thinking about it.
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How to Hack Chipotle
Information for life.
Sweet. Now I can finally deposit some money with them[^f3901].
[^f3901]: I refused to pay Bank of America’s wire transfer fee to make a deposit previously.