Good reads for 08.26.07

Posted on August 26, 2007 by Melissa Worden

>> Change your RSS feeds, Patrick Beeson (who previously blogged at huffyinthestreet) designed a new Web site and took over his name at www.patrickbeeson.com. “The redesigned patrickbeeson.com is now live, minor CSS and template bugs notwithstanding. And the word on the street is baseline grid. And Movable Type 4. And pink,” he says.

>> Need some Final Cut Pro tips? Doug Fisher found some on how to configure your Mac OS X for FCP.

>> Listen to the paper via iTunes. 24dash.com reports that “Slough Borough Council claims it has become the first local authority in the country to have its community newspaper available as a podcast on iTunes.” I couldn’t find it on iTunes, but a listen on their site leaves me less than impressed, particularly when the reader gives URLS way too fast. Actually, all of it is read quite fast. (Link via The Editor’s Weblog)

>> Vision 20/20 has created a national sex offender database/map mashup. (Link via Jack D. Lail)

>> The Sacramento Bee experimented with a Flash-made interface/style I’ve seen around for awhile, but never as the presentation of a news story. “I don’t care what you think of the interface or how ‘flashy’ it might be, BRAVO to them for even attempting, risking, trying, failing, etc,” says Koci. Bravo indeed. Robert Niles interviewed the paper to get the scoop on how/why it was created this way: “In all, this required two videographers, the multimedia editor, Manny Crisostomo (who provided quality control and designed the intro to all the videos), the multimedia reporter who designed the site and, of course, an uploading staffer, Dorian Francel, to make sure everything on our regular site pointed people to these extras.”

>> HD-DVD now has Paramount and DreamWorks Animation on its side in the high-definition platform war. “HD-DVD offers slightly cheaper players and media, but Blu-ray packs the better storage capacity,” Motley Fool reports.

>> Speaking of video, Bill Pryor shares the top 10 rookie mistakes. “If the concept and story are good enough you can sometimes get by with amateur production values, but it’s rare. Very rare. If you’re going to go to the trouble of making a film, you should learn to do it right,” he says. (Link via Angela Grant, via David Nolan)