The Willy Name Generator

The Generator Land team apologizes in advance for our latest generator. Generate a random nickname for your willy with the click of a button.



read more | digg story

CBS Acquires Europe’s Last.fm for $280 million

Not sure if this sucks or not.

CBS Acquires Europe’s Last.fm for $280 million

This is Generator Land: On a Blog Spree

The last two generators we built on Generator Land got some shout outs. The Joke Opener Generator was posted on The Generator Blog and, lo and behold, The TV Show Pitch Generator appeared on AOL Television's TV Squad. Props to both blogs for the mentions!

We're working on some new features for Generator Land, as well as the next top secret generator (which is only top secret because we can't make up our minds which one to release next).

Web Worker Daily: So Your Co-Worker Isn't Your Best Friend. Now What? �

I thought this was a pretty good article about dealing with bastards at work. I've been in the "working with a jerk" situation quite a bit and I've found a lot of these techniques really do help, especially this one that they suggest:

"Get perspective. What you’re reading as a big personal insult in an email might not be the case at all. Ask a friend who will be honest with you what they think of the email you’re sending and receiving. Do they read the same negative tone from your co-worker? Do they think you’re being particularly biting when you don’t need to be? Try and see the situation from different eyes."

Of course you could also stay late and mess with their stuff, but that wouldn't be a real mature release would it?

Web Worker Daily: So Your Co-Worker Isn't Your Best Friend. Now What?

Avoid Your Neighbors, They Might Be Sick

In case you were wondering if the ailment you're faking to get out of work is rampant in your neighborhood, visit whoissick.org. The site allows you enter your symptoms (stomach ache, runny nose, severe malaise) and then see if anyone else around you has those or any other symptoms. Or you can simply browse with morbid fascination.

You can narrow your search by symptoms, age, sex, and time period. There's also the saddest little tag cloud I've ever seen (see image above). I imagine that's what the brain of a hypochondriac looks like.

Cameroid: Best Interface I've Seen in a While

If you have a Web cam, check out Cameroid. If you're a Web interface or application developer you should check it out too. While the site's intended use is harmless fun (taking photos with effects and sharing them), the beauty lies in the drop-dead simple interface.

When you visit the site you get some intro text and a button that says "Ready? Click Here." You will likely get a security prompt as the site connects with your Web cam and then that's it. Your ugly mug appears onscreen and you get a bunch of effects to try using a simple tabbed system.

The effects are nice, but not earth shattering. Applying them is simple and the changes happen in real time. You can move around to see how the effect will look from different angles. Then you click the camera button to take the picture immediately or with a 3 second delay. All this is handled in a way simple enough to pass the "my mom could do it" test.

When you're done, you can save the image or link to it using a URL provided. You can also use it as an instant messaging avatar, email it, or add it to your blog. If you just want to download it you don't have to provide an email address.

It's a shame more Web 2.0 apps aren't this simple.

How Much is Your Blog Worth | Dane Carlson's Business Opportunities Weblog

If you're a blogger and want to make yourself sad (and really, why wouldn't you?) check out how much your blog is worth at Dane Carlson's Business Opportunities Weblog.

You just type in your blog 's URL and hit submit. Within seconds you'll find out that blogging is easy, but blogging professionally is not. Fortunatley most bloggers are in it for the fun and attention. Technogeekboy is worth something, but not much (see below).

For some real fun check out what blogs like Lifehacker and TechCrunch are worth. Zoinks!

My blog is worth $564.54.
How much is your blog worth?

How Much is Your Blog Worth Dane Carlson's Business Opportunities Weblog

Brainstorming the Web Way

I just found a terrfic brainstorming site that I'm becoming quickly addicted to. It's called BrainReactions and it's a community of people who post questions like "What should newspapers be doing if they want to survive?" and "How can I communicate better to a large audience?" and then wait for responses from other users.

The addictive part of it is that you can scan through the list of questions and quickly post an idea in a matter of seconds. There is a truly diverse bunch of ideas to brainstorm about so you're bound to have something you can expound on. Posting your own question is just as easy.

While traditional group brainstorming is a mixed bag that's usually not worth the effort, BrainReactions is low maintenance and quick. If you don't get any good ideas from the community, it's not like you had to book a conference room, buy a bunch of doughnuts and spend hours getting nowhere.

BrainReactions.net Online Brainstorming and Idea Management Software - Open Brainstorms

Walk to Work then Walk at Work then Walk Home

I saw this on Reuters and had to laugh. In theory I suppose it makes sense. People walk all day on a treadmill instead of sitting in a chair. Miraculously, they lose weight!

I actually have a setup just like this at home. I secured a large Elfa shelf to the handles of our treadmill and set my laptop up on it. There's plenty of room and it works very well. However, working, even at a slow walk, is not exactly a sustainable activity. An hour is about all I can handle before the bouncing and movement begin to wear on my eyes and posture.

So, interesting concept. Not practical.

The Generator Blog Gives Us a Mention

We got a mention from The Generator Blog, which we appreciate. They featured our Froo Froo Menu Generator and drove us some nice traffic.

The Generator Blog features a crapload of generators so be sure to check them out. Especially if you're into those generators that create images with your text like the Beer Label Generator or the Bling Necklace Generator.

The Local Headline Generator

We're getting into a regular rhythm at Generator Land with a new generator launching today which I'll get to in a moment. We've also made some other changes to the site including adding a Top Rated Generators area, an RSS feed, an archive, and a few minor tweaks to cinch it up and hunker down.

The latest addition to our growing family is The Local Headline Generator. Given the similarity of small town newspaper headlines it seemed a natural to randomize. We took a list of odd small town names and mixed them with a common headline format and hit the random button. You can check out the results at Generator Land right this second.

Traffic is quickly building at the site and we thank you all for your support!

Alan Graham Seems to Agree About Subscription Music

I said this a few days ago, and it seems ZDNet's Alan Graham agrees. From Alan:

"You see, when Sonos started to support Rhapsody, I fell in love with the subscription model. In fact, since I became a Rhapsody subscriber 8 months ago, I haven't purchased a single iTunes track. Amazingly, I haven't even played a single track of music from my own music library (which includes a lot of tracks I bought from iTunes). Not once…in 8 months! My NAS drive just sits there on the shelf…lonely…and pointless. I just can't bring myself to purchase albums based on 30-second samples, when I can go on Rhapsody and listen to the entire album anytime I like."

Read Alan's Whole Post

Ridiculous Restaurant Menus in Seconds

Our latest generator at Generator Land is the "Froo Froo Menu Generator." It randomly produces a hoity toity-sounding dinner menu that, upon closer inspection is usually a bit disgusting (for instance "Jerked Mongoose with a Cask-Conditioned Mayonnaise.")

Please check it out and leave a rating and comment either positive or negative. Unfortunately, because we just finished building our own rating system, we had to start from scratch with the comments and ratings. Growing pains I guess!

Commenting on More YouTube Lawsuits

(Note: This is from a comment I made about YouTube on Profy.com. And don't worry, I have my own permission to re-use it.)

I think netizens have been spoiled by free content into thinking that they have an inherent right to get whatever they want whenever they want it. It’s certainly an easy state of mind to fall into. Copyrighted music and movie sharing on P2P networks is stealing and so is substantive re-use and gain from copyrighted content without the copyright-holder’s permission. I can’t strictly define “substanative” other than to say that showing a thumbnail image of a video wouldn’t be “substanative” but showing a certain amount of the video itself would be. Copyright holders get to make the call on if it’s fair use. Some might like the attention/marketing aspect of it, but some might not. Lately, not so much.

It seems that a site that simply aggregates links and information about videos on other sites in a user-centric way would be a smarter model than simply showing the videos directly. I assume those sites are out there. These sites can drive traffic to the copyright holders’ sites, which is what they want, and could provide the centralized hub that users want. Do we need to see it directly on the “hub” itself? Not really. Content sites just need to get their collective act together and create better, more user-centric sites while working with these hubs as much as possible.

YouTube should continue to aggregate user-generated content and video provided to them directly by copyright holders, but they need to get some common sense and quit acting like what they’re allowing on their site is something other than copyright infringement. Just because people want it doesn’t mean you should do it.

Steve Jobs is Back to Being an Idiot

I'm not sure what Steve Jobs was basing his comments on, but he seems to think that no one is interested in subscription music. Regardless of the fact that I am a huge fan of subscription music in and of itself, I think he's missing the point.

Subscription music services like Rhapsody don't JUST "rent" music, you can also purchase it forever if you want to. I burn a few CDs a month from Rhapsody and the per song cost is cheaper than iTunes. Subscribing doesn't mean you can't own whatever music you want, it means you get more music. Who wouldn't want that?

So while I do buy songs outright sometimes, mostly I just load up my MP3 player with as much music as I want, I stream as much music as I want, etc. I can listen to any album or song anytime in its entirety. I probably listen to music an average of six hours a day between my commute, the office, and on weekends and I never run out of new stuff to listen to. The thought of using a service where I have to buy every song I listen to for .99 cents seems ludicrous to me now.

Super Hero Name Generator

Things are moving along at Generator Land. We just created and posted our first homegrown generator called "The Super Hero Name Generator." I think it turned out pretty well. It's a good waste of at least 15 minutes of your valuable time.

We've got a few more in the works and our goal is to add at least one new generator each day. If you visit, feel free to rate and comment on what we post. You can also submit good generators you've come across. Everyone seems to know of at least one.

Map Your Site the Web 2.0 Way

WriteMaps is a basic Web sitemap outlining tool. It's low-frills but produces nice-looking sitemaps, good for planning out the architecture of your site. You start with a single page and build on it using the plus or minus icons on each new page. Branches can be collapsed easily. You can switch to an outline view instead of the icon-based view and zoom in and out with a slider bar.

And that's about it. Sitemaps can't be exported to any format (XML would be nice) and can't be downloaded. You can only print. In theory this might be a nice way to share sitemaps among team members, but there aren't any annotation or markup tools. This is clearly aimed at less technical users as developers, who are used to more complex tools like Visio, may feel limited. However, less technical users may enjoy the straightforward functionality.

Generator Land: Le Randomness Rule

After seeing how popular random generators are on the Web I felt it was my duty to create a site that brings them all together. I'm calling it "Generator Land." I'll be collecting all the sites that create fake band names, game characters, business speak, haikus, biblical curses, etc. and putting them under one roof so they can fight amongst themselves about who left the dirty dishes in the fishtank and who saw who's girlfriend getting out of the shower "by mistake."

In addition I'll let users rate them and comment on them so my opinion won't be the only one that matters. Don't expect too much right off as I begin collecting, but I hope to eventually collect enough random generators to make repeated visits a must.

If you know of any random generators, let me know on the blog here or submit them at Generator Land. I can't pay you, but I will say a prayer for your immortal soul. Or I'll at least generate a prayer with the Random Prayer Generator (if I can find one).

A Devastatingly Good Video About Vanity and the Media

This is some incredible animation work and a poignant comment on society as well. Enjoy.



read more | digg story

Flash Earth: Keeping it Simple

Flash Earth is a very straightforward and fast satellite image maps with one-click switching between the various map service images. It's actually a good way to see the differences in quality between them (Google wins). Easy navigation, zoom and rotation. It has a location finder, but I couldn't seem to get it to find any street addresses. Zip codes worked fine.

Flash Earth ...satellite and aerial imagery of the Earth in Flash