Captain Digital

Random musings on politics, society, and pop culture from the Internet's marketing curmudgeon.

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Random Stuff

A technical note…

I am informed by my friend, web host provider, bon vivant, teller of tall tales and singer of sea chanties (let’s call him “Major Disaster”) that  we have a failure to communicate with the fine folks that provide him with the dedicated server hosting. In short, the company he uses for dedicated hosting sold out to some new guys. He’s found the service provided by the new guys to be, shall we say, “less than optimal.” (I’d say more, but I think you can read between the lines on that one.) As a result, the Major and the old hosting company have come to a parting of the ways. The Major has already contracted with a brand spankin’ shiney new web hosting company (this is a good thing), so this blog (and the many fine websites we have created for ourselves and clients) will have a new home shortly. The downside is that there may be a slight interruption of service, as we get all the files transfered over. (Read: I’m not sure how long or how bad, but I got a bad feelin’ about this, Sundance.)

Of course, this couldn’t have happened at a worse time, as I am on vacation, at my family reunion. The box I do all my site management on is several hundred miles away. So if this blog goes away for a day or two (or three), rest assured, it will come back, hopefully beter, faster, (cheaper would be nice), and perhaps a little more bulletproof, this time around.

I am outta here…for a long weekend.

It’s family reunion time, and I’ll be away from the blogosphere for a bit. I have to make a pilgrimage to Captain Digital’s ancestral home – Shreveport – which is Hell-n’-gone from Amarillo (Centrally Located Between Two Oceans!™). The offspring (our Digital Mini-Me) is making the trip with me (should be fun), but Mrs. Digital has opted to stay behind and convalesce. I may – or may not – have a chance to log-in, tune-in, and write-on (this blog), so it may be a week or so before I’m expounding on whatever is bugging me. (Not to worry…I’m sure I’ll have plenty of stuff to write about, after dealing with my family for a week.) So enjoy the weekend. Lord knows, I’ll try to, between the scheduled spontenaity of the reunion, a 10-year-old on HER first pilgriage to Sam Moon (the merchandising Mecca for All Things Jewelry), and the joys of driving two-lane-blacktop for several hundred miles. Catch you on the flip-side.

(Why) Wonder, Woman?

My wife thinks she’s Wonder Woman. Not the cartoon character. Not the Lynda Carter TV icon. But she does think she’s invulnerable, super-strong, and impervious to pain. And she’s not alone. A lot of women that came of age in the 70’s and 80’s bought into that superheroine myth.

In the five decades I’ve been on God’s green Earth, I’ve learned that what you believe is every bit as influential regarding how you react to something as is the stimulae itself. In other words, the way you react to a given situation is largely going to be dictated by your belief system. Here’s an illustration that I think will clear things up…Three people are locked in a room. One grew up around an uncle who ran a snake attraction, and was used to handling snakes. The next grew up traumatized, as a favorite relative died on a camping trip, from a snakebite. The third has no exposure – positive or negative – to snakes.

A panel opens in the ceiling, and a snake is lowered into the room. One event: three dramatically different reactions. The first person says “Oooh, what a cute snake!,” and picks it up to play with it. The second person hyperventilates, panics, and attempts to claw their way out of the room. Third goes back to reading a book. [Read more…] about (Why) Wonder, Woman?

I’m working on something cool…

And I thought I’d let you know about it.

Here’s the deal…I’m always thinking about ways to make the things I use better. I’m also good with my hands, and notoriously cheap, when it comes to buying something I could make myself – especially when I can make something that’s better than what I can buy.

The other day, I was looking for a guitar stand, one that would hold several instruments at once. I didn’t like anything I found at GuitarCenter – too expensive, and cheaply made. I figured I could make something that would cost less and work better. And I was right. Turns out, a bunch of people agreed with me, and want to get me to make them a stand like the one I made for myself. What a novel idea. [Read more…] about I’m working on something cool…

My two cents.

The Captain is IN.I’ve been in the business of using computers, in one way or another, since 1982. I wrote my first college paper on an Apple III. I owned one of the original IBM PCs (Hercules Graphics Card! 512K RAM! Two full-height 5 1/4″ Floppy Drives! Dot Matrix Printer! DOS 2.0! Ashton-Tate Framework! All for the low, low price of $4,000!!!). I’ve worked as a software engineer, product manager, project manager, marketing manager, and user interface evangelist for software publishing companies. I was around for the birth of Windows 1.0, the life and death of COMDEX, the rise of the common user interface, the Year of the LAN, and a slew of other things, long consigned to the dust bin of computer history. I’ve been a user, author, coder, beta-tester, evangelist, designer, and planner. In short, I’ve held just about every job you can hold in the software industry.

Now I’m writing reviews. [Read more…] about My two cents.

Music that’s eclectic.

ek•lek•tik As some of you know, I’ve been a musician since an early age. Up here in Amarillo (Centrally Located Between Two Oceans!™), I haven’t had many opportunities to play professionally.

All that has recently begun to change.

Andy (the Brother I Never Had) Chase and I have put together a group, and we’re calling it “eclectic” ek•lek•tik.

Tonight, we’re playing at Randy’s of Wilderado (which is actually not in Wilderado at all – it’s in downtown Amarillo on Polk Street in the Paramount building), from 6 to 9 PM. As the band’s name suggests, our playlist is eclectic. Come on down, and you’ll hear everything from James Taylor and Jim Croce stuff to Nat “King” Cole and Hoagy Carmichael – with everything in between. Tonight, we’ve added a really excellent bassist to the mix, so there’s now four of us. Andy and I share lead vocals duty, and we switch off between guitar, mandolin, percussion, and harmonica. Describing our sound is a little tricky, because there’s nobody else doing what we do here in the Panhandle. I guess it’s kind of like [Insert name of artist here] Unplugged, because everything we’re doing is acoustic. However, that doesn’t mean it’s mellow, nor is it all ballads, all the time. We can rock the joint, too. And do.

So if you’re interested in an evening of live music, come on down to Randy’s tonight and check us out.

Everything that’s old is new (again).

I’ve actually been blogging for years – far longer than this blog has been up. While my old blog died with my old company, it occurred to me that it would be nice to have a lot of the old posts I’d written online. The answer is a bit of database manipulation, where I pull the old articles from an archive I have, and posting, then resetting the post dates. That way, the posts remain in their original, chronological order, and I’m not faced with old posts getting in the way of the new stuff. So, if you’re of a mind to look over some of my oldies (but, IMHO, goodies), feel free to scroll back to the older stuff. It’s not all there (yet). but as I get time to upload it, eventually, the old posts will live again.

How ideas happen.

I get to be creative for a living. In fact, my livlihood depends on me coming up with creative solutions to problems, and creative ideas in marketing, advertising and design. I’ve given a lot of thought to how ideas come into being, largely because the more ideas I get, the better off I am (within reason). There’s an old saying I like, “necessity is the mother of invention.” You could argue that it’s also the mother of creativity, or at the very least, the spark that lights the match of imagination. Case in point… [Read more…] about How ideas happen.

Babes with Bullets.

EmpoweredmentHere’s the deal. We live in uncertain times. The one thing we can count on is that we can’t really count on anybody but ourselves. Now I’m a big believer and supporter of both our military, and our public servants (police, fire, EMS). I believe they are ALL underpaid, overworked, and unappreciated. However, no matter how good they are, they can’t be everywhere at once. And when it comes to defending yourselves against the wolves of the world, your best bet is not to hope a shepherd is around when you need one, but to stop acting like a sheep. [Read more…] about Babes with Bullets.

There’s no place like Home (Depot).

I like to build things. Particularly out of wood. I grew up in a woodworking shop – it was my Dad’s hobby. (Kind of a weird hobby for a musician – using tools that could end your career in a split second – but I digress.) I love everything about woodworking – the smell of fresh sawdust, the math skills needed to take raw stock and turn it into something useful, the feel of a piece of wood just sanded – you name it. I’m there. I like to work from a rough sketch, working things out in my mind, then putting down the bare minimum info on paper. It’s more fun that way, rather than creating some really detailed, isometric drawing, with dimensions accurate down to a 64th of an inch and so forth. I find that when I work from a rough sketch, that I oftentimes improvise solutions to problems I’d not anticipated, and end up with a better finished product. Some call that “listening to the wood,” but I’m not so mystically inclined. Still… [Read more…] about There’s no place like Home (Depot).