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ODDS & ENDS
• TurboTax sponsored a rap contest, and they’ve actually had a few entries. Even a few good entries.
• There are strange experiments in journalism, including a guest editor at the Los Angeles Times.
• Some students at Grinnell University have been receiving anonymous threatening letters for several years. One recipient was finally able to track down the sender, (it took her a couple of years) and tried to get answers behind his strange obsession. There’s more to the story — others have been able to collaborate her research.
• R2-D2 has a new job: Collecting mail.
• Nine Inch Nails has downloadable GarageBand files. Interesting marketing, but you’d really have to be into NIN, wouldn’t you?
• A ficlet is a new way to write short stories collaboratively. You write a short story and post it, then others can add a sequel or prequel to it. But I haven’t found very many good sequels or prequels …
• Kevin found a great new site — still in the beta stage. Basically, you can take video (yours or someone else’s from YouTube, Google, or a similar host), and add captions and sound effects. You can then share your edited video.
• A Los Angeles fertility clinic has started a program dedicated to gay men who want to become parents — the first of its kind in the U.S. (After we discussed the photo accompanying the story, I promised Kevin that if he wears jeans in his “symbolic wedding ceremony,” I am allowed to shoot him. And take a lot of photos.)