Rand Baldwin .blog

I love sportscars and racing. Especially when a great-handling car is needed to make it through a curvy course the quickest. So I like autocross, rally, and track racing the best. (That is, tracks with right turns - haha - no offense to Nascar :p )

Gymkhana is an interesting driving sport… Sort of a fusion between drifting and autocross. I haven’t really been a big fan of drifting, but this hybrid is pretty cool and there’s no arguing it takes serious skill. To see what I mean, watch the video of Ken Block practicing…

–> Ken Block Video

Here are a couple other old favorites from Youtube… I found these a couple years ago before I knew what Gymkhana was. Both are super fun cars I would like to build…

Youtube video: Classic Mini Cooper

Youtube video: Lotus 7

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I don’t watch all that many movies or TV shows, so I’m finding enough online to satisfy me. It’s only getting better as new sites and better bandwidth come along. Technology is moving more and more in the direction of delivering entertainment online, so I’m looking forward to seeing this develop. Here are some of the links I’ve come across so far…

TV Shows

• Hulu
• Fancast
• Veoh
• AOL Video
• TBS

Movies

• Netflix (member login, then the “Watch Instantly” tab)
• Hulu
• Fancast
• Veoh

More (I haven’t evaluated these thoroughly yet)

• movie6.net
• watch-movies.net
• megavideo.com
• epguides.com
• fastpasstv.com
• joost.com
• americafree.tv
• free-tv-video-online.info
• chooseandwatch.com
• wwitv.com
• xtvi.com (looks to be torrent downloads)

If you know of another good online entertainment site, please comment!

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Mobile phones are sooooooo much more than phones these days. I love being able to have all the info I need at my fingertips, or the means to look it up on the spot. Or cooler yet, being on a road trip and pulling up a live GPS-powered map that shows your location and being able to get directions or search for nearby restaurants or hotels (with one click access to viewing their web site, or calling them).

Apple has the market majority with the iPhone. I love it, but I’m on the Window platform for now. I have an HTC Touch Diamond that does all the same cool stuff, and runs my Microsoft Office software suite. Plus I like having an unlocked phone that lets me use whatever provider I want. I’m not stuck with ATT or Verizon.

Oh yeah, I mentioned Google… Yes, now they are entering the market with the G1. Better keep an eye on this baby, as I expect a lot from it. It doesn’t have all the gazillion apps that you can get for the iPhone yet. But just wait, because they are promoting the open source platform and encouraging developers to go to town. Frankly though, it will come with all the useful stuff you really need out of the box, and will be by far the cheapest device of its type (less than the cheapest iPhone).

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If you are a music lover, you need to check out Pandora. Just visit www.pandora.com, sign up with your email address (don’t worry, it’s a safe site), tell it the name of one of your favorite bands or songs, and it starts playing music. It never stops - it’s your own custom radio station that plays 24×7 with no commercials. The more you tell it about what you like and don’t like, the better it is at playing only music you love.

Pandora is so good about picking music you like because of its vast database that is amazing at identifying why you like a song. It doesn’t just play all the songs by the band you submitted, or others that Joe Blow decided you might also like. It is based on The Music Genome Project, where hundreds of music characteristics were identified, going way past genres to details like “wailing guitar solos” or “driving beat” or “syncopated rhythms” etc.

The more you use Pandora, the smarter it gets. Each time a song plays, you have the option of rating it thumbs up or thumbs down. If you like it, you will hear more similar songs. If you don’t, it won’t play it again. It plays all your old favorites, and tons of new music you’ll love.

I have discovered tons of new music I would have never known about otherwise. I often “bookmark” those so I can refer back later and explore more songs and albums by those artists.

My “station” has become a nice reference for me. I can easily refer to my profile and see lists of all my favorite bands and songs.

If you love music, it’s worth checking out.

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