The Weekest Link

[deirdre]

But first, new blog theme on deirdre.net! I just changed it late last night, so I haven’t lived with everything quite long enough to figure out what I want to change. I need to do some work on the covers on the front page (to make them all the same size and work better within the theme).

Computers & Technology

• WordPress security best practices (video of a conference session)
• Model View Culture print subscriptions A literary mag about the “intersection of tech, culture and diversity.”
• Atari computer demonstration, 1979. Woman in the ad, too, very progressive for that era.
• Five programming tips from a seven year old. Yep.
• They’re breaking ground at the new Apple campus already. Woohoo!
• SelfieCity analyzes all the selfies out there.
• One of my favorite people in the Ruby community, Jim Weirich, passed away suddenly. His last commit. He made me feel welcome.

Writing & Publishing

• How Long Is the Average Book? Also includes relative frequency of POV (1st/3rd), broken by genre. No 2nd breakdown, though that number is probably vanishingly small.
• Considering self-publishing? Out:think group has some really interesting stuff, much of it free. Hearing Tim talk about why he thinks some people’s Facebook and Twitter strategies don’t work is a breath of fresh air. Basically: the real strategy is to have a mailing list.
• SFWA thing post from N. K. Jemisin. “But you don’t get to claim marginalization when you’re at the center of a thing.” If you’re tired of the SFWA train wreck, then just stick with that one pull quote.
• The semicolon’s breezy punctuality.
• Andrew O’Hagan on ghostwriting for Julian Assange. “It was exciting to think, in that very Jane Austen kind of house, that no novel had ever captured this new kind of history, where military lies on a global scale were revealed by a bunch of sleepy amateurs two foot from an Aga.” Note that this piece is 25,000 words, but it really does explain who Assange is. “I’ve never been with anybody who made me feel so like an adult. And I say that as the father of a ten-year-old.”

Arts

• How Olympic photographers get such stunning images
• XKCD, Slippery Slope
• The history of the Marber Grid, better known as the design ratios used in Penguin books of olde.
  (http://society6.com/zeruch/the-liason_Pillow#25=193&18=126) (SFW abstract).
• VHS vs. Communism Sometimes, we forget the power of art, especially when it’s not Art. This is why.
• Tatyana Fazlalizadeh wages an artistic war against street harassers.
• Photographer shoots one roll of film each week. This week features foggy San Francisco.

Science, Health, & Things Like That

• American Society of Breast Surgeons responds to Canada’s shocking recommendation against mammograms. I want to add that I’m really tired of the no-mammogram and no-PSA exam folks. Yes, there are some points to be made, but….

Miscellaneous Humor

• pnh: “[D]ingbats gonna ding.”
• When God closes a door, he opens a window. Our heating bill is outrageous & six raccoons got in last night. Please God, this has to stop.
• Dear people in the hotel room next door: I can hear you, and it sounds vaguely disappointing.

Originally published at deirdre.net. You can comment here or there.