I Never Promised You an Organic Garden

I just completed an online survey hosted by A List Apart gathering information about what it is like to “be the people who make the websites”.  This is one of the fastest growing fields in the country, and A List Apart is gathering information to better demonstrate what it means to work in this profession.

So if are a designer, developer, information architect, project manager, writer, editor, marketer, or anyone else who makes websites, even you freelancers, I encourage you fill out the survey. It will only take a few minutes.

Spread the word: Tuesday, June 17, 2008 is the official launch date for Firefox 3, and Mozilla has set a goal to set a Guinness World Record for the most software downloads in 24 hours. All they want us to do is download the newest version of Firefox on the 17th.

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For those of you who don’t know, the title of this blog post is an often mis-quoted reference to a 1985 Sally Field utterance when she won and academy award.  I can honestly say that I understood the awe and shock that propelled Sally Field to speak these much parodied words this morning when I woke up and realized my blog had received 1600 hits overnight.

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I have been a Microsoft user for a majority of my life. I started out with a 66 megahertz computer running MS-DOS on a very fancy black and green monitor. However, I recently became a self-proclaimed Linux lover. For those of you who might not know, Linux is an open source operating system that competes with Microsoft Windows and Apple’s OS X. My first experience with Linux left me with a bad taste in my mouth, but the distribution of Linux known as Ubuntu 7.10 (aka “Gutsy Gibbon”), the version prior to the current version of Ubuntu, has impressed me enough to convince me to completely switch my personal computer to Linux. It has been a fascinating adventure, and I’ve learned a lot about the inner workings of my computer.

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Tomorrow Matt and I will be renewing our cell phone plan with Verizon and getting new phones. With this comes the option to finally get local cell phone numbers, which has not been a possibility in the past. Matt and I have had Virginia cell phone numbers the whole time we have lived in Indiana because we share a cell phone plan with his parents. However, Verizon has now changed their policy, and you can have phone numbers from different states on the same phone plan. This has caused quite a dilemma for me.

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This week’s Technology Today is not a brand new service, but I just used it for the first time this week and was impressed: Goog411. Goog411 is Google’s 411 service, and it is totally free. It makes it extremely simple to find and connect to local and national businesses.

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This week on net@night I heard about a very exciting new web service out called Animoto. Animoto is “a web application that automatically generates professionally produced videos” from a selection of your photos and favorite music. It is amazingly simple to get a high quality video you can send to your friends and family, post on your blog, or use in a presentation. And best of all…it is totally free! (for a 30 second video)

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South Park, ever poignant, aired an episode last night in which the internet disappeared. Total chaos ensued when no one was able to check their email or talk on IM. Even the news stations were unable to report any news with the loss of the internet.

Click through to see the clip.

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Since I forgot to post an item for Technology Today last week, I am going to post a second one this week. I am pleased to announce that Matt, my multi-talented husband, has now launched a blog of his very own. From Bits to Bites & Windshields to Worship will be about Matt’s four main interests — computers, cooking, cars, and Christianity.

He plans to post once or twice a week with interesting facts and insightful commentary on topics he is passionate about. There is already a few weeks worth of information ready for your perusing pleasure so — CHECK IT OUT!

I started a Technology Today section in my blog with the intention of posting each week about a neat item in the technology community, but have not bee very successful. Matt and I have been quite busy and will continue to be, but I will try and be more intentional about posting.

For this week, I want to highlight Geni (Chris Hardie also highlighted this in his blog). Geni is free web 2.0-style online genealogy software. It allows you to create an interactive family tree that you and your family members can join and update. The software has a social networking feel and allows each person on the tree to create their own profile, containing personal information, photos, and news updates.

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