CHRISTIAN STELLA'S INTERNEXTUAL WEBULATING DIGITAZOODLE AS SEEN ON PERSONAL FUTURE SCREENS

Now that this here blog is more than 1000 posts old, I figured that it was about time that it actually worked.

The redesign is still a work in progress, but my goal this go around is to clean things up a bit. Sadly, that required the purging of all comments that have ever been made. My outdated version of the Movable Type platform left me more than a little bit vulnerable to spammers. In the past year, I racked up an astounding 81,000 bullshit comments, mostly in the archives.

A while ago, I remember someone high up at AOL proposing an e-mail tax. A penny to send an e-mail, any e-mail. Still forty-one cents cheaper than a stamp! The reasoning was pretty sound--spammers won't be able to afford it!

Sadly, when you want to encourage a talkback on a blip of a website like my own, you need the comment engine to be as easy for people to use as possible. Otherwise, the interest wanes and we all move on to Gizmodo or some other gadget porn website. (Certainly it isn't just me.) The easy commenting lets the robots walk all over it and some stupid ringtone website just got a slightly higher ranking in Google thanks to it's new link from my blog. So you see, it's all Google's fault that all of your comments are deleted. If you'd like to let them know how you feel about it, climb onto your roof and organize the tiles into a message for their satellite to photograph.

Also, get naked. You'll be three pixels high and famous one day.

That aside, I've finally introduced categories to my blog in a bid to catch up with 2002. Soon, I'll be posting scary food news in the Food Truths category as well as some interesting stories from My Friend, the Waiter in his. Both of these were ideas that I wanted to start as separate blogs, but never got around to. Now, they'll be something to post here! Something I'm allowed to post here, unlike the current project that I am working on.

Finally, the site should be more compatible than ever. Reading better on them fancy new devices, the iPhone and most importantly the Kindle. If a blog is all one big ego stroke, it might as well look the best on my device of choice.

By the time that I had an iPod in my hands the device had already gone through several generations and I'd already been through a long parting period with the medium of compact disc.

At first, it was a Sony mini-disc player back when you had to physically record music onto the discs in 1/1 (real) time. Then it was a chunky, clunky Archos Jukebox MP3 player with hacked firmware if only to make it a few more features closer to the iPod I should have purchased in the first place. Without iTunes compatibility, I was still just ripping copies of real-life discs.

There was comfort in that. That I could still make use of the trendy CD sleeve wallpaper plastering my walls. I didn't quite get that after the CD was in the computer, wallpaper was the ONLY thing it was good for.

When I finally realized that the most complete music collection I owned was in my computer, not thumbtacked to my walls, I broke down and purchased an iPod.

Though one day I may regret all of the DRMed music I've purchased from iTunes (where were you Amazon?), the iPod didn't just change the way I listened to music, it changed my quality of life. I was listening to a whole heck of a lot more music than ever before, discovering more artists and enjoying them in more places.

Apple has not been able to add anything substantial (for me) to the experience since, but today I have to wonder what kept me so attached to the physical "product" for so long?

Last week, I had to remind myself of this attachment to the physical and make one big jump. There would be no baby steps this time around--just my bookshelves that I love so much to this--

It's easy enough to say that the Amazon Kindle is changing the way I read books, but I think it's so much more than that. The Kindle is on the verge of changing my life and not just the quality of it.

There have been scores of failed e-readers in the past. Even e-ink e-readers like the Sony Reader, but Amazon has done what no one else has been able to do--connect us to all of the information in the world in a very practical way.

If you're an avid reader, or even just wish to be one, Sony's Reader can't provide a wide enough variety of books to seal the deal. While Amazon isn't 100% there either, they're far closer with far loftier goals to one day sell every book in and out of print.

This is why I thought this device was for me. To read more books without having to bend the spine from closing on me, without the words slinking into the gutter, without craning my neck to read the left side of the page, without the weight of a 500 page Dave Eggers hardcover. To pay $7.99 to $9.99 for books that I was paying $12.99 to $28.99 for in the past.

I didn't expect that there was an even smaller demographic that this device was even more suited to.

If you really love to read, buy a Kindle. If you really love to learn, you should really, really buy this thing.

The Kindle is changing the way I receive information. It's always online through Sprint's high speed cell phone network and without any monthly bills. It searches Wikipedia, for free, from anywhere in the country and it does it faster than an iPhone, with a bigger, easier to read, sharp as paper screen.

Its internet browser, limited by the 4 color greyscale of the e-ink isn't the full internet experience, but it IS perfectly suited for information heavy content like news and blogs.

Here it is, viewing my blog...

I'm pretty accustomed to carrying a book with me wherever I go, only now that book just got a whole lot lighter, thinner and connected to encyclopedias, blogs and the entire internet.

Did I mention that I'm getting Time Magazine beamed to it every week for only $1.49 a month? Or that I get The New York Times every morning at 4am without having to "sync" anything.

So, when I'm not reading 100 pages of a book in one sitting, I'm reading Time, or The New York Times or the digestive habits of fish (long story) on Wikipedia or a little bit of Waiter Rant. I'm reading anything and everything and fuck the price tag, it was worth every penny. When people talked about the internet being all of the world's information at your fingertips, this is what they were talking about. Not a laptop, not the iPhone--the Kindle.

Right now, I'm finally finishing Dave Eggers' What is the What. The version I'm reading is sitting atop the printed copy in this photo...

I'm reading mostly on my back in bed without killing my wrists. It's fantastic.

It's going to be a lot easier to detach myself from the physical look and feel (and smell!) of books than I ever thought before.

I sold my old camera to offset 3/4ths of the $400 pricetag, but now that I've played with it I would have definitely purchased it outright. It'll pay itself off in savings 30-50 books from now, but it's also paying itself off in the $20 a month internet access (that barely worked) I canceled on my phone. Oh and it'll save me $50 on another bookshelf 30-50 books from now as well.

Soon I'll shoot some food in the dishes. Yeah, this is what I've been doing lately. More to tell on that matter, but for now this picture of an empty bowl.

Ryan's new CD is being manufactured.

Watch this video... if you like it it's kind of a part of a contest so click here and vote for my friend Jeremy, the actor in it, to get cast in a horror movie. It makes you register to vote, but the registration is easy and fast.

Our lease is ending on our apartment and we had every intention on renewing until we received this notice in our door about a raise in rent. Please enjoy it thoroughly and then enjoy my response.

It's that time of year again to renew your lease with us. We would like to give you the opportunity to renew your lease. We have enjoyed having you as one of our residents and would love for you to stay with us for another lease term! Keep in mind that we would need a 60 day notice if you intend to leave. Here is your new rate if you are interested in renewing:

Current rent: $940 New rent: $965-$985 depending on length of lease

Why move when you can renew?

Did you know the high cost of moving in today's world? We have assembled some important information on moving costs, apartment fees and other monies you might accrue during your move. Here is a break down of what we found.

Cost to rent a moving truck..........$175 average for 4 hours!
Cost of gas for the moving truck.....$65
Cost to transfer utilities...........$150
Cost to buy supplies (boxes, tape, bubble wrap)......$200
Deposit for another apartment...........$230-$430
Administration fees.............$225-$300
Application fees..........$50-$65
Pet fees..................$200

Not to mention the hassle of changing your address, schools, additional toll monies for transportation, additional gas money, changing forms for work and school, deposits for utilities and most importantly taking time off of work or school to make the move!

So why move when you can save hundreds of dollars, maybe even thousands by staying right here in your home!

We look forward to preparing your new lease ASAP!

Management,

You have recently informed us that you would like us to renew our lease at a raised rate. Though we were planning on renewing our lease, we do not feel that an increase in our rent is justified. The $940 that we are currently paying, that our rent was raised to the last time we renewed, is the highest one bedroom rent we've seen in the area.

In the past few months we have referred two different people to your complex who toured the grounds but decided the apartments were overpriced.

Yet there are three units in our corridor that have been and still are vacant. The one directly below us has been empty for two months now, around an $1800 loss for the complex. The apartment across from us has been empty for ten days, for about the cost that you would like to raise our rent through the duration of a twelve month lease.

As loyal tenants to the tune of $27,000 in rent paid, we took your "renewal offer" letter as a slap in the face. It began with how much our rent will be raised and then spent the entire rest of the page detailing how much more expensive it would be for us to move out. To imply that you are saving us money by charging us more is not only incorrect but downright rude. You do not have us trapped here, paying whatever you wish us to pay, just because of the expenses incurred in a move.

However, your breakdown of moving costs intrigued us, so we went looking for a new apartment and crunched the actual expenses of a move. What we found was a two bedroom apartment with 140 more square feet within three miles of here for $910 a month, first month free.

Security deposit: $200
Pet deposit: $150
Utility deposits: $0 (good credit)
U-Haul Rental: $39.99
Gas: $10 - $30
Moving Boxes and Tape $10 (boxes are free in many places, you know)

With the free month's rent we will save more than $500 the day we move in and an additional $660 in twelve months, compared to the rate that you've proposed.

We are not trying to rub these numbers in your face, but merely satirizing the letter that you gave us. We are quite happy living here, but do know our options and looking at the numbers above, over $1000 saved doesn't sound so bad for three or four days work.

If you keep our rent at the current rate of $940, we'll consider a 7 month renewal. If you give us the first month of our new lease free we'll sign a 12 month renewal at your new rate of $965 tomorrow.

Sincerely,
Christian and Elise Stella