guest post by Jason Schupp

Shortly after Prop 8 passed in California, a conversation on the Heather Gold Show about its passing prompted Heather and guest Tara Hunt of Citizen Space to gather several others and start organizing EqualityCamp. A one-day event to discuss new ways of gaining support for same-sex marriage, EqualityCamp is using the BarCamp unconference format, with event planning and proposed panels being orchestrated on the BarCamp wiki.

It happens Saturday, January 3rd in San Francisco from 10am-6pm, at Citizen Space, located at 425 2nd Street @ Harrison, 3rd floor. Tickets are $21 ($20 + $.99 processing fee) and limited in number, and are available through Eventbrite. There’s a student/unemployed rate of $6 (including processing fee) as well. An explanation on where that money goes is on the site, which mentions that any funds left over will be donated to an organization decided upon by the attendees.

For more info, the organizers made the video FAQ above about the event.

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The First EqualityCamp in San Francisco

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“The Times of Harvey Milk”, the Oscar winning 1984 documentary by Rob Epstein that tells story of San Francisco’s first openly gay supervisor Harvey Milk who was assassinated in 1978, is now available on Hulu. This is really amazing documentary and timing is great with the recent release of the Gus Van Sant film “Milk”.

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The Times of Harvey Milk on Hulu

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Danger Ranger and the Friends of the Rootless Forest present the 20th Annual Post-Yule Pyre this Saturday, January 3rd. Meet at the Carousel Diner in San Francisco at 7:30pm.

An essential part of the city’s recycling program occurs each year at this time when the last stand of sidewalk Christmas trees is logged by Friends of the Rootless Forest and piled onto the beach for some very rapid decomposition.

photo by Scott Beale

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Danger Ranger’s 20th Annual Post-Yule Pyre Christmas Tree Burn

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guest post by mikl-em

Comedy Central put out the above end-of-year rapid-fire compilation of The Colbert Report show intros.

For those of you unfamiliar with how The Colbert Report is opened, teh Wikipedias offer this helpful primer:

Typically, Colbert starts each episode with teasers regarding the show’s topics and guest, each headline structured to be a deliberate pun, followed by a verbal metaphor that promotes the show — for example, “Go out ten yards and button-hook to the left. I’m going to hit you with a perfect spiral of the truth. This is The Colbert Report.”

Other harvestable information nodules from the article include:

• The show’s opening title sequence includes animated words that describe Colbert. The last word shown used to be “grippy”, but has changed to other words and phrases including: “flagaphile”, “gutly”, “eneagled”, and (as of November 2008) “Factose Intolerant”.
• Colbert’s desk is in the shape of seriffed C, standing for Colbert.
• The word truthiness which Colbert coined was used in The New York Times crossword puzzle in June 2008
• Colbert’s 3-deep portrait was on display at the National Portrait Gallery for a limited time earlier this year. It was then officially donated to the permanent collection of the Smithsonian’s American Treasures exhibit. At the end of that show, a new 5-deep portrait was unveiled, with the newest Colbert holding his newly-won Emmy with another Emmy and a Peabody by the mantle.
• Beginning June 3, 2008, The Colbert Report also aired on the Showcomedy channel of Showtime Arabia, a channel which broadcasts in the Middle East and North Africa. The show is transmitted on a one day delay from original transmission in the US.

Below is a clip of the Smithsonian’s director officially accepting the portrait from Stephen.

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The Colbert Report 2008 Intro Compilation

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Reader ST discovered that aging data backup CDs he had burned had become unreadable, so now he uses QuickPar to make recovering data on disc with bad sectors possible. Here's how he does it.

ST writes:

I have some discs burnt years ago and recently I found them not 100% readable. I'm buying more reliable discs now but I realize even with better media as times goes by the data will become more precious and inevitably...damaged (due to the physics nature of optical media). So from now on when I compose a disc to nearly full, instead of wasting the spare space I use freeware QuickPar to generate recovery volumes and burn them together.

As Usenet mavens know, QuickPar creates "parity volumes" which can verify and recover information for a file or a group of files. If some files are damaged or missing but the needed information is contained in the parity volume, QuickPar may be able to reconstruct the originals from the damaged files and the PAR volumes.

ST explains how to use QuickPar.

Drag the about-to-burn files to QuickPar, adjust the redundancy level so the "recovery data size" matches the spare space on disc (I always drag files to the burning tool first to see how much space left), then press Create.

After a while it will generate bunch of files with extension .PAR2.

Then drag them to the burning tool. Together with original files they should fit on one disc perfectly.

From there, you're good to go burn your disc. Then, in case you need recovery, your PAR files will come in handy. ST continues:

One day when "bad sectors" occur I'll use the free IsoBuster (or any other bad disc saver like Badcopy) to extract the most from my disc, with of course some files missing and some files partially missing.

I only hope not all PAR2 files are missing. Then here comes QuickPar again: double click on any .PAR2 file, the QuickPar will open and start to scan every file it finds, hopefully and very likely (if the disc is not heavily damaged), it will repair your precious data!

Tip 1: QuickPar only accepts files but not folders. But here's a small hack: open windows search and search * in your desired folder then drag the result files to QuickPar
Tip 2: You can choose to only protect VIF (Very Important Files) instead of the whole disc with QuickPar
Tip 3: This method is Windows only, but the idea is universal so I believe Linux users have better solutions.
Tip 4: This is very useful when you back up a lot of movies.

Congratulations, ST! You just won yourself a signed copy of our latest book, Upgrade Your Life. Tell us your best time saver of 2008 to win your own.

Kenyatta Cheese explores the history and popularity of “The Lipdub” phenomenon on Rocketboom’s “Know Your Meme” series.

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The Origins of The Lipdub on Rocketboom’s Know Your Meme Series

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Eirik Solheim created a really cool time-lapse video showing all four seasons in 40 seconds using photos and audio form the same location over the period of one year.

via Neatorama

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

One Year of Photos of Four Seasons in Forty Seconds

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DM Fail is a website that lists Twitter direct messages that were accidentally posted to Twitter. Some of these are quite funny and many very embarassing.

I agree with Mike that it’s another reason not to send DM’s, which as many of you know are my least favorite thing about Twitter.

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

DM Fail, Direct Messages That Are Accidentally Posted To Twitter

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While Mac and Linux users may be the most vocal (ahem), the overwhelming majority of Lifehacker readers get here using some version of Windows. Let's review the most popular Windows tutorials we've ever published.

Format Your Hard Drive and Install Windows XP from Scratch (Published 2006)
"Hey, Windows XP users: The blue screen of death got you down? Missing dll errors making you frown? Frequent software crashes leave you yearning for that fresh, new PC you unpacked with glee three years ago? If you've scrubbed for spyware and viruses, defragged, chkdsked and done the requisite rain dance but things are STILL wonky on your computer, it may be time for extreme action."

Dual-boot Windows XP and Windows Vista (Published 2006)
"These instructions work if you have a PC running Windows XP and a Windows Vista installation DVD. If you already have Vista installed, and you want to dual boot XP, go here."

Automatically Back Up Your Hard Drive (Published 2006)
"Don't expect yourself to remember to back up your data, or stack your closet full of burned CD's or DVD's. Today we're going to set up automated nightly, weekly, monthly local and off-site backups for your PC using free software."

Slipstream Service Pack 3 into Your Windows XP Installation CD (Published 2008)
"Next time you wipe your PC's hard drive clean and reinstall Windows with that old installation disc, you don't want to connect your fresh, unpatched and vulnerable system to the internet only to download 176 new updates from Microsoft."

Trim Down Windows to the Bare Essentials (Published 2008)
"When you're installing Windows in a virtual machine or on old, slow hardware, you want the leanest, meanest and fastest-running configuration possible."

Make the Most of Your PC's Dual Monitors (Published 2007)
"Now that you've added another monitor to your computer setup, you've got double the screen real estate to get things done—but are you putting all that space to good use?"

Crack a Windows Password with Ophcrack Live CD (Published 2007)
"Whether you need to recover the lost password to a Windows account, you're looking to ensure that your passwords are secure, or you're a super l33t h4x0r, the Ophcrack Live CD is a pretty useful tool."

Download the Most Popular Free Windows Apps of 2008 (Published 2008)
"In the past year we've highlighted hundreds of Windows apps aimed at making your life easier, boosting your computer productivity, and powering up your PC."

Turn Your Windows PC into a Media Center Powerhouse On the Cheap (Published 2007)
"If you've purchased a new Windows computer in the past few years that's running Windows Media Center Edition or Vista Home Premium or Ultimate and you aren't taking advantage of its baked-in DVR Media Center software, it's time we change that."

Get Vista's Best Features in XP (Published 2008)
"Despite the fact that most of you prefer XP to Vista and would rather Microsoft extended XP's shelf-life, several new and improved features available in Vista would be great to have in XP."

Turn Your PC into a DVD Ripping Monster (Published 2008)
"Commercial DVDs are far too expensive to let scratches turn your video into a glorified coaster, but most people still don't back up their DVD collection."

Replace Crappy Windows Software with Superior Alternatives (Published 2008)
"It may be the year 2008, but a whole lot of sucktacular software still rears its ugly head on PC's everywhere, even when better-behaved options are freely available."

Any Windows topics you'd like to see us cover in '09? Burning Windows questions we haven't answered? Tell us in the comments.

Scouting New York is a really great photo blog by a film location scout who shares photos of some of their unique discoveries in New York City. Adding this one to the favorites list.

My day is basically spent combing the streets for interesting and unique locations for feature films. In my travels, I often stumble across some pretty incredible sights, most of which are ignored every day by thousands of New Yorkers in too much of a rush to pay attention.

via Neatorama

photo by Scouting New York

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

Scouting New York, A Film Location Scout’s Photos of Hidden New York

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Mingle2 founder and designer Matthew Inman has a great series of illustrations showing “How to Tell if Your Cat is Plotting to Kill You”.

See Also: “What Santa Really Does While You’re Asleep”

illustration by Matthew Inman

via Chris Glass

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

How to Tell if Your Cat is Plotting to Kill You by Matthew Inman

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Thanks to everyone who came out to our last minute Laughing Squid Unholiday Party II on Saturday. What an amazing event. Here are some great write-ups on the party from Laura Loves Art, All Shook Down (SF Weekly) and San Francisco Metblogs.

A big thanks to the following people for helping to make the event a success:

- Andy Fusso & Jeff Herzbach, our wonderful hosts at the “Gallery To Be Named Real Soon Now”, which is home to some amazing neon art, including all the jellyfish hanging everywhere, by New Orleans artist Eric Ehlenberger.

- Our surprise special musical guest the Mark Growden Trio. Mark will be playing with his sextet Thursdays in January at The Center for Sex and Culture.

- DJ Maubrowncow & DJ Timmmii who provided the party’s soundtrack.

- The watercolor light cover art by Doctor Popular.

- Tracy Feldstein, who jumped in at the last minute to help as our event MC.

- All of our guests who brought food, drink and ice, including Shannon Clark who baked a ham just for the party.

Event Coverage:

- Laura Loves Art

- All Shook Down (SF Weekly)

- San Francisco Metblogs

- John Adams

- Violet Blue

- K-J Blaque

- Enric Teller

- k0re

Here’s video of the Mark Growden Trio by All Shook Down (SF Weekly).

photos by Scott Beale, K-J Blaque, John Adams, Laura Loves Art & Enric Teller

This is a blog post from Laughing Squid For more content like this, subscribe to the RSS feed, Twitter & FriendFeed.

Laughing Squid Unholiday Party II Wrap-Up + Photos & Video

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What's being called the "first and only beta" of Windows 7 has made it onto BitTorrent tracking sites, and one early review, with screenshots, is already out. Get a preview of both below.

The leaked beta build, known as Windows 7 M1, was supposed to make its initial public release at the International Consumer Electronics Show (running Jan. 8-11 in Las Vegas), but, well, you know how the internet works by now. Adrian Kingsley-Hughes at ZDNet's Hardware 2.0 blog says the M1 build is strikingly similar to the M3 "preview" builds some folks (including one or two editors at this site) have been previewing for weeks. One big difference: The features previously hidden away (though un-lock-able with the "Blue Badge") are all offered by default in M1

Kingsley-Hughes says Windows 7 installs faster than XP or Vista, and likes many of the features we ranked as our Top 10 to look forward to, as well as the pared-down default apps in the system. Here's his summation, after using and stretching out Windows 7 a bit:

I like Windows 7, a lot. Microsoft seems to have put a lot of effort into developing a core operating system that is free from the pointless frills of the likes of XP and Vista. The OS is solid and fast and based on what I’ve seen so far I’d have no problems in rolling out beta 1 and using it daily.

Here's a preview of just a few of the wealth of Windows 7 screenshots posted over at ZDNet:

(All images via ZDNet).

Have you found and installed the Beta 1 of Windows 7 (you know, the one that fell off a truck)? What's your impression? Give your take on the build, or just the screenshots, below.

Windows/Mac/Linux (Firefox): FireTorrent's alpha-level release aims at letting anyone using Firefox start downloading torrents from any source, no separate software required. For quick or one-shot downloads, it's pretty darned convenient.

The add-on, technically in the alpha stage and pseudo-invite-only (the link below gets past that requirement, however), doesn't have any preferences to configure, and limits your upload speed to 15 kb/s, most likely to preserve Firefox's basic browsing ability while you download. What it does do is simply convert any .torrent link you click on into a download, handled by Firefox just as if you were downloading a file directly. So if you want to grab something and imagine you'll be done with the download by the time you're out of your browser, FireTorrent fits the bill just fine. Configurable preferences are expected to arrive in the next release, according to the developer.

FireTorrent is a free download, works anywhere Firefox does (but make sure you install the right version for your OS).