Author Archives: Jake Spurlock

Jake is a geek, designer, and HTML+CSS lover. Taker of photos, and sometimes skiing and biking... He spends his time daydreaming about new WordPress themes and playing baseball and softball.

PicLens

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I found the coolest little plug-in for Safari called PicLens. It is similar to creating greased lightbox effect for images on specific sites like Flickr, Facebook, or Google Images. After getting a page full of photos, you can click on the bottom-left corner of one of the images, and be taken to a full screen slide show of the pictures on that page. Very cool, after your little brother posts a bunch of photos of his birthday part that he didn’t invite you too… Download it here.

Activism

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So, elections are right around the corner, and, this gives people the right to become total idiots. I won’t claim to be the most politically active person, so, I know to keep my mouth shut. At school I have a teacher who has been causing quite a stir in the last few weeks. It is interesting that only when there is a hotbed for political interest or intrigue, do people make a stand.

I think that Ferris Bueller said it right when he said,

A person should not believe in an “-ism,” he should believe in himself. I quote John Lennon, “I don’t believe in Beatles, I just believe in me.”

What are we believing in? Is it the issue, or is there a change that is taking place where we change, regardless of the result of an election?

I heard a person on the radio this morning talking about two very political issues in the area, gay-marriage and abortion. What was surprising was how she was able to completely discredit the need to worry about abortion but was disgusted with gay-marriage. I personally do not support either, but realize that these are issues, and we cannot sit around and wonder think that nothing will happen if nothing is done. College students in particular need to step up and start voting. Nothing will happen until everyone makes a stand, and does what is right by voting.

Make Ringtones With Your Mac and iTunes

A050801_JM_MOTO_SLVR_VELKY_V.pngAfter seeing a story here about making ringtones for your cell phone using some built in technology on an Apple computer, I thought I would take a moment to simplify some of the process. So, here it goes.

1. Find a sweet song that you like. Right now, as a devout fan of The Office I decided to go with this ringtone. (Thanks LITO!)

2. Drag and drop the song into iTunes.

3. If the song is to long for your taste, right-click Get Info and go to the Options tab. Adjust the start time and stop time to get to a length that you would like. Many phones don’t have a lot of space, and this may be an issue.

4. Press OK and then go to the preferences pane. (Command-,)

5. In the advanced pane, then the importing tab, make sure that your settings are turned to Import Using MP3 Encoder.

6. Press OK

7. Right click on the song and click Convert Selection to MP3. This will create a new file ant the length that you choose.

8. Drag this file to the desktop.

9. If you have your phone already set up for bluetooth connectivity, all you need to do is with the file clicked press (command-shift-b). This will pull up the send file box, and you pick which device to send the file too.

I hope this helps and makes it a little easier to make ringtones for your phone.If you need some help to set up your phone for bluetooth connection, I suggest that you read this article.digg story

Taking A Look At MarsEdit

Picture 1-1.pngI love online services. Recently, I have been looking for more client based systems to help me be more productive. I have spent a lot of time surfing the internet, only to go to many pages over and over again, looking for updates, when I could have been using an RSS reader all along. So, I picked up NetNewsWire, and have been pleasantly surprised at how I stay more on task. With that, I took a look at MarsEdit, and have to say how happy I am with it. I can type a blog, pull content from Safari, show what I have been listening too (Currently playing in iTunes: Above Ground by Norah Jones). Quite the app.

Initiation

Picture 1.pngI have to say, that I am a huge fan of the Office. Tonight’s episode was a great one. What was surprising was realizing that B.J. Novak, who’s character is Ryan the no-longer-temp is also the writer of many episodes. What a cool thing! I read an article where Kate Flannery (Meredith) wrote saying that while everyone is fooling around on MySpace, he is writing the episode for next weeks shoot. Awesome… And he happens to be a Mac user as well…

$45 For A Movie?

Picture 2.pngI admit, openly, that I love to ski. And, always trying to be as die-hard as I can, try to make the annual trip to the Warren Miller movie. More recently I have a hard time justifying spending $45 for two tickets to a movie… The only justification that I can find is that by doing so, I am going to get two free tickets to the canyons. So, is the value in the movie or the tickets? I suppose that people go for the movie, but, like me, appreciate the film, and then enjoy a day on the slopes as a wonderful result of a grossly overpriced movie ticket.

A Question For A Career

I have this nagging thought inside my brain that tell me I will never have a full-fledged career. Sure, I have no doubt that I will be successful, and that I will work hard for the duration of my life. The problem lies in what to make of a career. 

From the time that I was brought up, I was taught to get an education, and from an education, I would get a great job. A job that would give me a salary, and insurance. With said job, my wife could live at home, and be content bearing, and raising children. The older I have gotten, bear in mind that I am only 23, the more I see that as a great fallacy. Perhaps only to push people into lofty goals of educational, and professional grandeur. 

Life as it seems, is more then just education and careers. It is determined by struggle and affliction. At the time of education, we are to take great risks and stretch beyond the limits of an education. We are to reach out and ennoble our selves into the great task beyond that of learning, but living. Living is more then reading and writing, but growing into a greater person. Thus, upon graduation, and entering into a profession, we do not work, but continue to labor and to grow more. If we do not, we have nothing to gain, and are no greater then the ants that slave all day only to stay alive.

So, as to a full-fledged career, I think that life will take me in a slighter different path. I hope that it is a journey, from one place to the next. Growing, learning, and adapting from one outlet to the next. Whether it be in tech, film, business, consulting or anything, life is a journey… So dig it.