It’s probably no secret that Monty Python sketches have been available on YouTube for some time. What’s newsworthy is that official clips from Monty Python are now available on YouTube. High Quality clips are now officially and legally up there! And here as well….

Job Interview Clip embedded below the fold.

Just thought I would post to note that I’ve been working up a page devoted to Asheville area AM and FM radio stations. I may (in the future) be adding other AM/FM radio link pages.

Right now I’m not sure what form that would take, but in the case of the current page I’ve tried to list a link to both the website of the radio station and a link to their live stream (where possible.)

The new page also has had me trying to rethink the organization of pages in the sidebar here. So, you may see things “shift” from time to time as I play with the best way to organize pages.

Wow!

I saw a reference to this site earlier today and took a look. After spending a few minutes playing with it… wow - that’s just a neat idea. You know how when you listen to music you like things to match your mood. If you’re up and happy you don’t want to listen to down depressing music? And if you’re calm and content you don’t really want to hear upbeat, driving music… well musicovery.com has put together a fantastic interface to mix up your own custom music radio for now and then whatever mood your in tomorrow.

Before I saw it I thought it might be kind of interesting. After I saw it I was impressed with how well they’ve implemented the idea. There are about 20 check boxes for genres of music, by default everything is in the mix, classical, latin, blues, jazz, pop, rock, etc. By default every year from the 50s up to present is in the mix. You can specify a few genres to play though and by adjusting sliders you can notch in a certain range of years.

Do you want the mix to come from music released between 1965 and 1975 instead of the arbitrary 1960-1969 decade restriction? Ok, you can do that. The biggest flaw I see is that you can’t notch OUT a specific range. (So, you couldn’t choose 1960-1965 and 1968-1972.) I doubt many people would be too fussy about that though.

The really cool part though is the mood grid. It’s like a trackpad space on a laptop. Dark to Positive is left to right and Calm to Energetic is from the bottom to top. There’s also a dance tab where you can pick more dance-able tunes and the tempo of those. It looks as though you can also have several levels of dealing with favorites or exploring new music. The most conservative is to only play your favorite songs (I presume this requires registration.) The next up is to play music from the artists that are in your favorite list. Then there is an option to play your favorite universe’s (styles?) Then to play hits and finally the full discovery mode where you can explore all sorts of different artists and titles.

So, how do they make this all worthwhile? While a song is playing (and you get to see the next few songs in the playlist)… there are links to get the title at amazon.com, the itunes store and ebay. (I haven’t tested them all, but suspect some are probably album links.)

Good idea and good implementation.

I just heard from my brother about his request for a Digital Converter Box coupon as part of the digital transition coupon program. His original address was denied because the mailing address is a P.O. Box. Well, he petitioned the decision because they have no mail service at their house. (Really!)

Claim denied because the only exceptions are if you’re on an indian reservation or Alaskan native village. Their FAQ even mentions “other rural areas” …

From their FAQ at dtv2009.gov

The government can mail coupons to Post Office boxes in areas without home mail delivery. Post Office boxes will be accepted only for households on Indian reservations, Alaskan Native villages and other rural areas. The government may request additional information to validate the physical location of these households.

For now, I just have time to post a link to this great link listing internet broadcasting stations over at primetimeshortwave.com

This has been a long time coming, but it looks as though they will be the first major studio to agree to post full length content at YouTube. There are said to be other studios in talks with the main dispute being the type of advertising placement. The article credits Hulu with thawing the ice between the major studios and online video distribution like YouTube.

No word yet on which specific titles may be among the first, or a date, but it reads as though it’s on the way.

Previously to view the online tv over at joost.com you needed to download their client player. No more, now joost is accessible via the web browser and the flash player. Linux users now don’t have to jump through the hoops of trying to make joost work under wine. All in all this looks like a great move. They made the change around the 14th of October. Thanks joost!

Thank GOODNESS we don’t have a “smell” feed for this one. The Corpse flower is world renowned for the huge size of it’s blooms. (A blossom is approximately 6 feet tall and grows at the rate of an inch per hour.) It’s also known to only bloom once every 6 years. It also STINKS. That’s why they call it the corpse flower. So, be thankful that this flower (which is growing at the Milwaukee Public Museum) is available to see in streaming HD here (uses vlc) (although this has just hit the front of slashdot - so their video server could be a steaming pile of slag now…) If you can’t get the video stream - you can at least take a look at the auto-refreshing still photos. The stench of the flower when it blooms can be smelled for miles. This is apparently the first blooming for the plant at the Milwaukee Public Museum and it is also known as Titan Arum or Amorphophallus titanum. The flower is indigenous to Sumatra and grows at the edge of rainforests.

Wilmington, NC took an early transition to digital television broadcasting, cutting off their analog signals on September 8th (with the exception of an analog signal that basically provided information on who to contact if you can’t get the digital signal.) 1828 people complained to the FCC in the days following the test, 500 or so of them were complaining about not being able to receive a particular NBC affiliate. That NBC affiliates digital coverage area is smaller than their previous analog coverage. Given that the Wilmington is relatively flat, according to this article they have a lower “over the air” tv usage rate than some other areas… there are suggestions that the real transition could rank in the millions of complaints nationwide to the FCC.

Although….

There will be (as of current plans) NO analog signal explaining where to address complaints. So they may not get that many calls after all(!) After my experience in our mountainous area I’m sensing that the transition to digital broadcasting may be FANTASTIC for some people, but for others it may amount to a net loss in over the air viewing options.

I’m particularly concerned about this in the context of storm/weather events as local information is VITALLY important during these times and these are JUST the times when you are less likely to have cable service available. One of the things discussed in the article is the possibility of using repeaters to rebroadcast signals in weak coverage areas and I think that’s well and good, but they do cost money and I wonder if the government plans to subsidize stations efforts to improve their coverage areas? (I doubt it - but repeaters would help address a problem that bigger antennas simply cannot in some areas.)

In our mountainous area the valleys point different directions. So where I live we are sheltered from signals to the south. Unfortunately the south is EXACTLY the direction of our nearest city and tv market. So, our best signal is from a market some 30-50 miles away and our second best signal is from our near city market. Third and fourth best signals are iffy at best and I’ve managed to catch a couple of frames of video in the late evenings. (Yes a couple FRAMES of video) What’s remarkable to me is that signal is broadcast from the same tower that sends out the second best signal we can get. The second best signal is crisp and clear when it comes in, but unfortunately it is weak and not a steady digital flow. There are pops and jitters, digital distortion at times. With analog broadcasts it was at least possible to follow the audio of the news if not to be able to see details on the screen for ghosting/snow. With digital it is near useless. I’m fully expecting to have to invest in an outdoor antenna for those times when we have winter storms so we will be able to get local news. My main concern is that I may spend 60-150 on a good antenna and still not get much better reception just because of our location.

Repeaters can solve this kind of problem by broadcasting the signal from different points and can get better coverage through all sorts of terrain.

The sad state of things is as follows: In our area it’s fairly well known that if you want over the air HDTV you should buy a house on a south facing slope. Now, the HDTV signals are on the subchannels that the standard tv broadcasters use, so… essentially you’re saying after February of 2009 if you want over the air tv you should buy a house on a south facing slope.

I’m going to run the risk of being comment spam bait and open this one up to comments if anyone else has had any experience with problems converting to digital.

Oh, by the way, I still haven’t had the time or opportunity (or disposable income) to pursue any better OUTDOOR antennas in my quest to get better digital tv reception here on the “wrong side” of Elk Mountain…..

For those that may not always be in range of an internet connection…. Radio Reference has released their (excellent!) database on cdrom. From what I understand the price is $29.95. It will be generally available in October and sold through Scanner Master.