Giving up Diet Pepsi in 2009 – so far so good.  Six days without Diet Pepsi or soft drinks of any kind.  Not as hard as I thought it might be, although the headaches did bug me once or twice.  I have had more chocolate than usual of late, though, so I suspect that it’s compensating for the lack of Diet Pepsi.

Going to try other good habits throughout the year.

Greetings. If you’re reading this post, you are probably a regular Broadcasting Brain reader and you may be wondering why this post is in a different location. The answer is that my hosting company is doing some kind of critical maintenance to the server that hosts Broadcasting Brain, making it unavailable for 24 – 48 hours. Since they have no back-up or emergency access to my blog, I’m writing you from this blog.

Note: this should only be a temporary thing!

This is the original Uncanny Broadcasting Brain Blog, renamed as The Mark Dykeman Web Niche. It still has a bunch of older posts that don’t exist anywhere else online, but it’s much less focused than my other stuff. I don’t use this blog very often anymore, as you may notice.

Whee.

Anyway, I just wanted to share a few thoughts with you today in a more informal style than usual.

• Congratulations to Obama/Biden on winning the US Presidency and Vice Presidency, respectively. Although I live in Canada, I watched this election with great interest. With all due respect to McCain/Palin, I would not have been very happy if they had won. I saw this election as a chance for the American people to vote for change and I’m very happy that a majority of them did. If nothing else, it’s time for changes in the thinking and actions that have mired the US in some very nasty situations. That’s not to say that there isn’t a lot of pain ahead, but I feel that Obama and Biden represent a highly visible statement that things need to (and hopefully will) change. I’ve read enough about politics and history to suggest to me that change never happens quickly enough (or way too fast in times of emergency) and that our heroes often disappoint us. However, it’s early, early times yet. Maybe this time will be different? There always has to be some hope, right?
• Heroes, one of the TV shows that helps make the wait for Battlestar Galactica and Lost bearable, is in trouble. Two of the show’s producers/writers, including veteran comic book writer Jeph Loeb, were axed over the weekend. I can understand why, if they’re really to blame, because the show has become a convoluted, horrible mess of characters, powers, plot lines, and alternate futures. Too much of… almost everything. I fear that it won’t last past the end of season 3. Simplify, simplify, simplify and focus on good stories and good characterization. Please?
• Pepsi changed its logo and packaging, as many of you know. As long as they didn’t change what was inside the can or bottle, or the price, then the rest is immaterial to me.
• The four main social media services that I use are: Google Reader, Twitter, StumbleUpon, and FriendFeed. I use some GTalk/GMail, Facebook, Netvibes, Delicious, plus a few other minor services on an infrequent basis. Almost everything else has fallen by the wayside. I don’t try out very many new services anymore. How about you? Do you focus your social media activity on a handful of services?
• I bought some comic books for the first time in months. They cost between $3.00 and $4.00 each. Sheesh. What kid (or adult) can manage to buy more than 3 – 4 of these per month? OK, there are a number of people that do but, man, that money really adds up.
• Oh, and for the record, I liked Iron Man better than The Dark Knight.

Thanks for stopping by and for your continued support.

Mental Floss had an interesting write-up about the Arecibo Message. This message was composed in the 1970s by a group of scientists, including Carl Sagan, who wanted to come up with a message to send to extraterrestrial life forms (should they exist). The message was transmitted by the Arecibo radio telescope towards the M13 cluster, 25,000 light years away.

Chris Higgins then challenged his readers to come up with their own message. I came up with the following, which is in the blog comments:

I wouldn’t necessarily advocate sending this particular message, but on the other hand it would be interesting to see if it got an answer:

Dear Alien Beings (Who May Or May Not Actually Exist):

Hello. We’ve written this message in the attempt to reach out to other intelligent beings in this universe.

Come visit. We have lots and lots of water to share if you don’t mind some salt.

We could use help with the following:

Energy sources
Pollution
Global warming (our polar ice caps are starting to disappear; this means more water is available than we actually need)
Overcrowding in certain parts of our planet
Communication problems
Disease
War
Human nature

On second thought, maybe you should not come visit. We are not at our best these days.

If you see God, could you please tell him to come back? Or to at least answer our calls? We need some help.

On the other hand, if you are God, just trace this message back to the source and let’s talk. Of course, if you are God, you should already know the situation. So answer already!

Regards,

Earth

I think I channeled a bit of Douglas Adams there…

This is one of those nights/weeks where the material just isn’t flowing properly.  So, back here to hide for a bit.

Thoughts from this week:

• Really enjoying Jon Morrow’s writing at Copyblogger, although there was an interesting juxtaposition between that and some Merlin Mann stuff from this week as well.  See link to Tumblr.
• Dr. Horrible was nothing short of wonderful.  I’d actually consider paying money for the DVD when it comes out.
• Applied for a part-time blogging gig – interesting to see if it works out.
• Two guest posts this week.
• My first podcast appearance should be available any time now…
• I spend too much time playing Mental Blocks on Facebook
• Listened to TWIT 57 (the video conference episode that included Calacanis, Winer, Scoble, Mr. Rocketboom, Dvorak, and a couple of others (AmberMac?)

OK, that’s enough for now.  Social media and related stuff is getting a bit…  less fun as time goes on.  At least blogging about it is losing a bit of shine.

If you’re stuck for ideas on what to write for your blog, I created a half-serious, half satirical list of good blog post ideas over at Broadcasting Brain.

Can’t hurt to give ‘em a try!

I wrote this note some time ago during a trip.  I was awake far, far too early due to time zone changes which my body hadn’t adapted to.

Las Vegas and the hills of Nevada face me, not like jagged teeth, but more like crumbling brown molars surrounding the city in the jawbone remnants of gigantic beast of the desert. All else is flat, mixed of asphalt, sparce greenery, stone and brick buildings and huge towels of metal, more stone, and glass. The glass is smoky and inpenentrable, a fitting companion to the haze and wispy clouds in an otherwise clear and blue sky.

A needle-like tower pierces the scant space between two large hotel buildings. Its tip prepares to deliver stinging pain to the blue sky above. A small red rectangular band shoots upward, then falls back toward the base of the tip. A ride, perhaps? Certainly a rise.

Its name is Stratosphere, toward which that sharp needle points with eternal readiness.

Ye dusty, broken, gigantic jaw of Las Vegas. Ye have us trapped.

From the Las Vegas Hilton (Sept. 8/07, far too early in the morning)

Hokay.  I figure that enough people know that Broadcasting Brain migrated that I can start to use this old darlin’ for other purposes.

This blog is now my scratch pad.  My anything blog.  My “whatever the heck that I want to write” blog.

This is now the Mark Dykeman Web Niche.  It’s my little corner of the blogsphere to do whatever I want.  If you’d like to read it, that’s awecome.  If not, that’s perfectly OK, too.

I’m just sayin’    

I’ve found a permanent solution to my problems, or so I think.

Just a reminder: this blog is only used in case of emergencies.  Catch the ongoing fun at Broadcasting Brain.

In case anyone thinks to check here at my old site: 

my hosted blog (http://broadcasting-brain.com) is experiencing some issues which are having a negative impact with response time and availability.

My hosting company is working on this problem.  I appreciate your patience during this time of instability.

I am also working on a longer term strategy to improve stability. 

Regards,

Mark Dykeman

Sometimes you’ve just got to take the next step, regardless of whether things are 100% ready or not.

The Uncanny Broadcasting Brain Blog has moved!

Our new URL: http://broadcasting-brain.com

If you have currently subscribed using Feedburner, I’m hoping that your feed got switched automatically. If not, here is the new feed URL:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/BroadcastingBrain

The “old” site (http://markdykeman.wordpress.com) has been officially renamed The Mark Dykeman Web Niche. It will continue to stay on-line and serve as an archive. Over time I will migrate certain posts to the new blog.

If you’ve been reading the The Uncanny Broadcasting Brain Blog, I sincerely hope that you join me over at the new site!  I’ve enjoyed interacting with everyone so far and I hope you join me at the new blog!

Remember the new URL:    http://broadcasting-brain.com

Cheers!