More Geekiness (Auto Signature)
Posted by Cody in 
Some new geekiness going on. I have a journal/blog over at SweetnLeo.com, where I talk about things relating to GaiaOnline. I wanted a way of making this available inside Gaia, so I came up with this.
It’s an image that shows the last 4 blog titles. How it works if I have a script that uses MagpieRSS to pull the feed from the blog, and then using PHP + GD I generate a simple image. When I make a blog post, it pings the update image script, meaning when I add a new entry the image will update.
It gives me a way to show what’s going on. Now to make it more pretty (as it’s just plain text right now).
Haiti Quake
This is the first time I’ve ever actually donated to any sort of disaster relief. Not because I was selfish, but because I was lazy. I did not have a credit card, so could not easily donate. I did not own our phone line, so could not donate this way.
This quake and relief call has coincided with me switching banks from National Bank to Kiwi Bank. Now that I’ve shifted I’ve a brand shiny new debit card, and I used it to donate to the Red Cross.
The forum I moderate (Gaia Online) is offering to match contributions made to the Red Cross up to the value of $10,000 US. Even though some call into question the motives for such action (we call them cynics), the point is if you donate to the Red Cross through Gaia, your donation will be matched by them. Ultimately it means more money going to help Haiti.
If you are going to donate to the Red Cross or another charity (try to stick to ones that are well known, there are a lot of scams going around right now), try doing it so a company of sorts will match your donation. Even if you aren’t a member of Gaia you can still get them to match your donation, information is provided in this thread.
Verizon forcing Bing on Blackberry Users
I’m an admitted computer geek, meaning I gladly take that label. Part of this responsibility (of geekiness) involves using different types of technology, not sticking to one thing. At home I run Linux on a machine as well as Windows on my personal laptop.
I also hold grudges when things annoy me. It’s silly, but if a program or company does something that really ticks me off, I may find myself going to their competition just to spite them. I’m sure I’m not alone there.
One example I can think of is with the browser search engines. I run Firefox, and I have my search engine set to Google as I like using Google to search, as well as Google for the keyword search. A year or so ago when GaiaOnline.com released their toolbar I installed it. Even today I’m still not sure how it happened, whether it was an unfortunate accident or intentional. Whatever the cause, the toolbar seemed to have some sort of contract with Yahoo. Upon installation my search changed to Yahoo, and worse (in my opinion) it changed my keyword search to Yahoo. The search bar could be changed back, however the keyword search was forced. If you switched it back (something you have to actually edit the config for Firefox) it would be forced back to Yahoo when the browser restarted. After reporting this, it was never fixed.
After that I’ve refused to use Yahoo (if I’m able to avoid it). Seemed tainted to me.
It looks like Bing (Microsoft) is heading in the same direction. Verizon has removed the search options from their Blackberries meaning users are forced to use Bing. Of course, forcing a specific setting (especially when forcing people to use a particular company’s software) when it was previously optional will cause users to hit the roof. Which it has.
Bing looks interesting, and I have tried it. But it doesn’t have that spark that’d cause me to jump ship from Google. The fact that it’s looking to force people on phones to use it just cements Google’s place as my search engine. I’m not a fan of tactics like these.
[polldaddy poll=2416800]
