Results tagged “cool” from The Cattle Grid

Peer-to-peer television Current TV launched its Italian version a few days ago. From the first time I saw it, and then visited the website, I thought it was a very interesting way of making TV and learning things.

It's difficult these days to find something which makes some sense on other video sharing sites such as YouTube. In Current it is quite easy, as there's someone behind it who actually cares for what is interesting to publish and what isn't. Plus, what you send can even be aired on Sky channel 130 if other users like it enough!

So, welcome to Italy Current.Com!

Ok, maybe it's not really true: FireBug and the Web Developer Toolbar might be better add-ons, but this one is really cool.

Flagfox (click here for its Mozilla Add-ons web page) displays a small icon representing the country where the web site you're browsing is located (the plugin traces the IP address). If you click on the icon, you get location details, coordinates, local time and a Google map and satellite view of the area!

After the Display Mail User Agent plugin for Thunderbird, this is the ultimate time-wasting application for Firefox - but it can even be useful. Be sure to install it!!!

It might be nearly useless, it might even be a waste of time, but this is my favourite Mozilla Thunderbird add-on.

It displays a fancy icon which immediately tell which e-mail client the sender of the message is using. As of today, it has got icons for 564 different softwares/webmails/... It's so fun to browse e-mails to discover who's using the strangest e-mail client. :-)

Last year it was so great we decided to repeat it: this year the Monkey crew changed its name into Hedgehog crew.So don't miss this event. As usual, nearest airports are Treviso and Trieste (Ronchi): if you land there, just call and we'll pick you up. :-)

There's a shop now on CafePress which sells some nice things with the Catalyst logo on them, so now I can but a polo and bring my faith with me everywhere. ;-)

By the way, there's also a new Catalyst vs RoR "article".

Here's a screenshot of my development desktop: since it's 1600×200, click on it in order to see the larger picture, or you'll understand nothing.

Getting the 1600×1200 on my development machine was (is?) quite a pain: at first I needed to change my video card as the (very) old ATI one wasn't able to handle this resolution properly. After the change, my PC begun powering-off at random, and it seems the problem is the Nvidia video card. So, now I have another ATI (newer but lacking great performance) and I still need to dig into this. Fun, uh?

Anche quest'anno ho partecipato ad InnovAction, sistemandomi nel padiglione InnovAction YOUng al fine di raccogliere curricula ed altri contatti. Il raccolto è andato discretamente, e sono stati 4 giorni strepitosi, soprattutto grazie alle persone che ho incontrato lì: le squisite Silvia (alla quale si deve il nome RintronAction) e Serena di Europe Direct, le loro colleghe Eleonora e Luisa, Daniele e Alessandra, il mitico barman Omar, Rubina, l'infaticabile Enrico, Monica, ... insomma grazie a tutti per questi bei giorni!!!

Cliccate qui per vedere le foto!!!

Ye all know the operating system I use is Gentoo Linux, and ye all know the browser I use is Firefox. If you can read Italian, please take a look at this PDF file, a document released by the tax agency of the Italian region of Sicily.

The document is about a major revamping of the tax agency web site, in order for it to be usable by visually impaired users, and also by technically impaired people who use non-Windows operating systems and non-MSIE browsers. While the whole idea is very good, it's quite disturbing that non-Microsoft users (including me) are seen as people suffering of "technical difficulties" by a Government agency. Or, maybe I'm really handicapped and I don't realize it...?!? ;-)

Yesterday evenin' I was in Villa Manin, UD, to attend at Bruce Springsteen's concert. It was my first occasion to see the Boss, which is one of my favourite songwriters ever: if I were to go to a distant planet alone and could only bring one CD, then it would be one of Bruce's.

Springsteen came to Villa Manin with the Seeger Sessions Band, a fabulous group of musicians who played in his latest studio work. There was some fear of rain among the attending people, since the sky looked quite bad, but luckily then it cleared and nothing else was to obstacle the concert. There were about 11 thousand people in the magnificent garden of the Villa.

When the Boss appeared I thought I was going to faint. He was surrounded by 17 musicians on a stage which looked like an old western theatre. Bruce was in outstanding shape and mood, and he played all the songs from the latest album, rearranging some of them in a spectacular way also thanks to his musicians. Amidst these new works, the Boss also played some songs from his huge repertoire, including one from Greetings from Asbury Park, NJ album (Growing Up)!!! He also played Johnny 99 (from Nebraska), The River and My City of Ruins (from The Rising). Every song was rearranged in a special acoustic way, for instance violins were used in The River. In the middle of the gig, Bruce also found the time to drink a glass of local grappa.

After 2 hours and 1/2 of uninterrupted concert, Bruce and the musicians said goodbye to everybody, and immediately the staff began to dismantle the stage. We stayed there some minutes, hoping that Bruce would come back, this time with his old Fender instead of an acousting guitar, and sing Born in the USA. But this was not the evening for that: it was the Seeger Sessions' evening, and it was fantastic. 10++.

It's time to have some fun!!! Come and visit me and some friends of mine at the San Giacomo festival in Maniago, PN on July 22 and 23, 2006. You'll find a lot of beer to drink and several good things to eat, such as grilled pitina.

We'll also feature the best entertainment in town. Our set list includes country music and dance, computer science conferences, and the fabulous Rocco "Trip" Siffredi on Saturday evening. For the "Trip" show, booking is strongly recommended.

Our sponsors are: Pizzeria Al Caminetto; Italpro di Michele Beltrame; Alkadia di Alberto Dal Mas; S. Pontello Auto; Panificio Coassin; MAC Coltellerie; Noè Antonini butcher's shop.

How to get here:

- From Pordenone: head north from the city center and look for signs indicating Maniago. When you get here, prepare to live through some pain while looking for a place to park your car: many streets are closed for works, please blame the major for any inconvenience this might cause you. There are also trains and buses, check at the station.

- From Venice: If coming by train or bus, ask at the station (I'm not a tour operator, sorry). If you want to drive, Mestre will probably make you change your mind. If you still want to drive, jump into the motorway following the green signs for Udine of Trieste; hop off in Portogruaro and stay in the new motorway until you get at the Pordenone exit. At that time, follow the instructions reported above.

- From London, UK: take a low-cost RyanAir flight, which will land in the desolate and discouraging Treviso airfield. Rent a car (or you'll lose the whole day while trying to figure out how to local transportation works) and find the motorway (green signs). Head then for Belluno, but jump off the motorway in Conegliano. You'll find yourself in one of Europe busiest streets, so calm down and follow the signs for Pordenone. At that point, read the instructions above.

- From the rest of the world: your flight will probably land in Venice airport (VCE), so follow the instructions I wrote above.

The University of Amsterdam funded a study regarding Internet blogs (such as this one, I guess). Many important things have been discovered, such as:

• People are more drunk at week-ends than in regular weekdays
• People talk more about Harry Potter when a new book comes out

Besides the obviousness of these discoveries, I'm really wondering why public money has to be wasted in funding this kind of researches. However, it's not enough: even the important British magazine New Scientist devoted an article to this research.

You can read it all in this story on The Register.

Today Elizabeth II, her majesty the queen of United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland - the best fucking country in the world - is 80.

Happy Birthday!!!

I attended at the Innovaction Fair in Udine, Italy, by running the Alea booth, along with some partners of mine.

The organization was a bit lacking: there was no Internet connection besides a busy and expensive Telecom Italia WiFi service; there was no logic in booth disposition; conferences were not advertised at all. However, the overall experience was OK, and I even managed to get some good commercial contacts.

Here you are a couple of pictures I took. In the first one I'm with Nemo, the mascotte of Alea booth, while in the second I'm an "evil guest" at the Omnia Studio booth, which was run by my brother and a friend of mine.

Well guys, I managed to go to London even this year, this time together with my friend no more Claudio. We explored some outstanding nightlife in gothic and metal places.
The most meaningful moments are coming to my mind at random. To most of the readers they will mean nothing, but here they go:

• Claudio's super uncomfortable bag
• dog races at Mida's Touch
• events regarding Flavia at Dublin Castle
• la doccia è rotta
• the Cabernet from Argentina
• Talkea Smidt
• the most horrific bathroom I've ever seen, at CroBar
• the very interesting discussion about "at worst, how much weird can a girlfriend appear to make it still a good idea to introduce her to one's parents"
• me falling in the tube
• Claudio who isn't able to make a proper use of bus tickets
• the turnib-based kebab we ate together with Patti at 3 am
• London is as boring as a small town, if not worse
• the missed Children of Bodom gig
• I don't understand English, I'm Irish
• 2 hours in the queue at Madame Tussaud's wax museum
• the cold and continuous wind
• Hard Rock Casino
• ma Vajont fa comune?
• French rap music

Riordinando un po' lo studio mi è capitata tra le mani questa foto scattata in un bar, quando ero ad Amsterdam nell'Aprile 2003. Queste sono cameriere con la C maiuscola, altro che nei bar di Pordenone. ;-)