On the Mac side I use Adium for chat and I love the Now Playing status script that shows the current iTunes track in your status. But since I don’t use iTunes most of the time I was out of luck. Well today I managed to whip up an AppleScript that puts the currently playing Rhapsody track (sort of) in the Adium status.

If you want the whole script, it’s after the jump.

Bear in mind this is the first AppleScript I’ve ever written so I’m sure it’s got issues (for example, deleting the temp file at the end doesn’t work). It’s also reading the now playing data from the user track history rss feed on rhapsody.com which never seems in sync. As for running the script regularly, I’m using the Scheduler in Entourage to make it run every five minutes. It would probably be better to use a cron job.

Note: WordPress is escaping all the characters so you can’t just copy and paste. Here’s a link to the script.

tell application "System Events"
	if (count (every process whose displayed name is "RealNetworks Rhapsody.app")) > 0 and (count (every process whose displayed name is "Adium.app")) > 0 then
		my SetMessage()
	else
		-- my tellAdiumStatus("")
	end if
end tell

on SetMessage()
	set locDir to "/Users/xxxxx/"  -- replace with your temp directory
	set locFile to "rhapsodyTracks.xml"
	set xmlUrl to ("http://feeds.rhapsody.com/user-track-history.rss?rhapUserId=xxxxxxxx&userName=I") -- replace with URL to your track history feed

	-- get RSS
	do shell script "curl \"" & xmlUrl & "\" -o \"" & locDir & locFile & "\" "

	set xmlFile to (locDir & locFile)

	-- get xml data from xml file
	set xmlData to getData(xmlFile)

	tell application "System Events"
		set root to XML element 1 of xmlData
		set channel to XML element 1 of root
		set myitem to XML element "item" of channel

		set artist to value of XML element "rhap:artist" of myitem
		set album to value of XML element "rhap:album" of myitem
		set albumid to value of XML element "rhap:album-rcid" of myitem
		set currtrack to value of XML element "rhap:track" of myitem
		set link to value of XML element "link" of myitem

		-- get album link
		set newlink to "http://www.rhapsody.com/album?albumId=" & albumid

		set statusMessage to "currently hearing: " & artist & " - " & currtrack & " (listen)"

		my tellAdiumStatus(statusMessage)

	end tell

	tell application "Finder"
		--try
		set fileName to locDir & locFile
		if exists file fileName then
			display dialog "exists"
			delete file fileName
		end if
		-- end try
	end tell
	return statusMessage
end SetMessage

on tellAdiumStatus(statusMessage)
	-- display dialog statusMessage
	tell application "Adium"
		set my status message to statusMessage
	end tell
end tellAdiumStatus

on getData(theFile)
	set theXmlfile to (POSIX file theFile) as Unicode text
	tell application "System Events" to return (contents of XML file theXmlfile)
end getData

From the start I was completely captivated, not only by the writing and ideas, but by the radical design and layout. If you remember the earlier days of Wired, it could be nearly unreadable at times. There were no columns or simple pie charts. Instead it was a seeming hodge podge of color and type set at oblique angles. Just picking apart the levels of detail in a single print page could be quite a challenge. But it was interesting and wild and completely different. 

A few months ago I started subscribing and regularly reading Dave Winer’s Scripting News. Yesterday while reading the transcript of his interview with Robert X. Cringely for NerdTV I realized Dave was one of the original contributing editors to Wired. And so it made sense that I enjoyed his current writing so much. I think there is something about the way his mind works that matches up well with my own thought processes. 

With some time to kill yesterday, I invested a few hours into learning the OPML Editor, Dave’s tool for creating outlines (and quite a bit more). It’s an interesting piece of software because it’s not immediately intuitive. But after a bit of exploration, it starts to just click. And with a built in blogging tool, it seemed natural to give it a try. So here’s my first (real) entry. This was composed in the Editor and then manually mirrored to WordPress on skaroff.com. The original exists at my OPML blog at http://blogs.opml.org/jskaroff/. 

My thoughts on the OPML Editor so far: 

While I certainly recognize the power of outlining (I’m already a big fan of outlining in the OPML editor’s scripting environment – hierarchical outlines make so much sense than curly brackets for code blocks) I’m not sure it makes quite as much sense for blogging. Not to say it doesn’t make sense either.

Now whether that is because the OPML editor itself has such a poor UI, or whether I’m simply not accustomed to it yet, or whether it’s just not how my brain works, I’m not sure.

But I’m willing to give it a try. I can already see the way that posts and paragraphs become a time stamped stream makes a ton of sense.

I think there are ways to integrate the editor into WordPress. That’s a project for another day.

As an aside, I desperately need to upgrade my WP install. 

So quickly, some things that are exciting.

• The new Macs are here, the new Macs are here!! Though quite poorly named, every computer nerd out there is salivating over the new Intel-powered MacBook Pro. Apple claims that these machines are 4 times faster than the previous generation, and combined with the news that these machines should run Windows, it looks like Apple has really created a killer machine. If only I actually needed one to justify the expense…
• Google is funny and worth a fortune.
• And surprise, Microsoft Windows is still dangerous!

I’ll make sure to hit up all the political news, including Bush’s illegal wiretapping, the Alito confirmation hearings, and Jack “Me” Abramoff’s plea bargain later. Check out FireDogLake’s live blogging of the Alito hearing for lots of detail.

These issues prompted Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales to change the rules that govern editing on the open source encyclopedia. While anyone can still alter an article, now only registered users are allowed to create new entries. All these problems, combined with criticism from many writers and established encyclopedia institutions have not dampened enthusiasm for the service, and a new study, along with one done by IBM that showed the median time for page vandalism to be fixed was only 5 minutes, further strengthen the legitimacy of the open source encyclopedia model.

Researchers at the British journal Nature examined scientific entries on Wikipedia and the Encyclopedia Britannica and compared them for accuracy:

The reviewers were asked to check for errors, but were not told about the source of the information.

“Only eight serious errors, such as misinterpretations of important concepts, were detected in the pairs of articles reviewed, four from each encyclopedia,” reported Nature.

“But reviewers also found many factual errors, omissions or misleading statements: 162 and 123 in Wikipedia and Britannica, respectively.”

Wikipedia is not perfect, as this study shows, but neither is any other source of information. The simple fact is that the open source model works, and seems to work remarkably well. Content will be created, shared, commented on, and remixed and altered by anyone and everyone. The sooner the elites from the science, journalism, entertainment and music industries wake up and realize that they must relinquish their oppresive grip on content, the better.

Want to see what thousands of random people can do? Check out SwarmSketch, a “Collective sketching of the collective consciousness.”

RealNetworks is to extend its currently Windows-only Rhapsody music subscription service to Mac and Linux users next week, the company said last night. However, even then, they will not gain access to the full Rhapsody package.

On Monday, Real’s Rhapsody.com website will go live. It’s currently in beta-testing mode, but once fully operational will allow Mac and Linux users to log in and stream any number of songs – provided they continue coughing up the monthly rental fee, of course. The site also incorporates links to Internet radio stations.

The Register article does a good job covering the caveats of the service – no purchasing on Mac or Linux and being limited to US-located IP addresses, but I think they’re a bit too negative on the service in general. I find $9.95 a month a perfectly reasonable price to pay for the unlimited ability to stream a very large music catalog, and now from anywhere I can find Firefox.

The hidden aspect in this is the incredible potential that Rhapsody.com has as a Web 2.0 app. Now admittedly, Real has to work with the record labels, so much of its innovation and feature set is likely to be either crippled or botched, but I’m so excited for ideas like RSS feeds of music I’m listening to, RSS playlists (hopefully taggable), embeddable players, and ideally someday a web service API that will allow anyone to write software that interfaces directly with Rhapsody. As they give away 25 listens a month to each subscriber for free, I could very well see a situation where I could post a review of an album and you could click a miniplayer right in the post that would stream the album to you. Or how about a Friday Random Ten with play icons next to each track!

Of course, as of last night, the Windows desktop client wasn’t really working and I couldn’t get web streaming working in either Safari or Firefox on OS X (another Web 2.0 “feature” – the perpetual beta), but I’m sure that they’ll work the kinks out soon. Now they just need to get The Beatles and Radiohead on board. Oh, and higher quality streams. And how about supporting WordPress from the blogging interface? And a Palm/Windows Mobile client…

Back on Oct. 3, Dianah Neff, the city’s Chief Information Officer, announced an agreement with Earthlink under which the ISP would finance and build a city-wide Wi-Fi broadband network for Wireless Philadelphia (WP), a non-profit set up specifically for this project. Neff, who also heads the WP Executive Committee, said that final contract negotiations would take 60 days, to be followed by City Council’s approval process and a January construction kickoff. The project would be complete by the end of 2006.

That 60-day period has just ended, but negotiations are still in progress, according to today’s Daily Pennsylvanian. Neff now expects final agreement with Earthlink later this month after Council has begun its long holiday break. The optimistic timetable now calls for Council to to start a one-month-minimum approval procedure Jan. 24, and finalize the contract in time for a rescheduled March construction launch. The completion date is still slated for the end of 2006, Neff says.

Construction consists of installing several thousand shoebox-size antennas mostly on city-owned telephone poles. Technically, new areas can go hot as soon as their antennas are installed, meaning that a gradual rollout is possible as construction progresses.

Neff often refers to the WP plan as Mayor Street’s project. She credits her boss, a long-time Blackberry user, as the visionary behind WP.

Earthlink, until now primarily a dial-up ISP, is moving into a new business area. They will finance, build, and manage WP as well as sell wholesale services to the various ISPs to which end-users ultimately subscribe. To “bridge the digital divide,” –a phrase often used by WP– discounted access rates of about $10 per month will be offered to qualifying residents. In its work with comunity groups and schools, WP plans to use some revenue to provide low-cost computers and train users.

You may have noticed that Windows XP has now been around for quite a while, and when it’s not getting attacked by viruses and adware, it’s starting to show its age. Longhorn was supposed to be revolutionary and exciting, but with the severe delays that have taken place — expect a 2006 release — everyone else has caught up and passed Bill Gates and Co. If any of you are using Mac OS X Tiger’s Spotlight or Google Desktop’s Quick Find, you know what I’m talking about.

No way will Microsoft die. It’s a huge company with huge revenues and storied history in the IT industry. However I think we are reaching a tipping point where the power of Open Source, folksonomies, and the Web 2.0 will make MS just another company, instead of THE company, providing technological solutions. I imagine the folks over at Sun and Google would argue we’re already there.

Yes, I did just buy another Apple computer. But that has nothing to do with this post.

I love my Powerbook.

I love my iPod.

I’ve got lots of other computers and electronic devices that I really enjoy using as well, but there is something about Apple’s products that brings out another level of joy and yes, techno-lust. Yeah, a Dell laptop or a Creative Zen may do the job, but a 12″ Powerbook is just so darn purty. Whether it’s the attention to the little details, like the the LED on the laptop charger that lets you instantaneously see the status of the battery, or the organic touches of the pulsing lid latch and that smooth fade-in/fade-out on the iPod, Apple in the past 5 years has upped the bar on consumer design and really left everyone else in the dust.

So while trying to not be too much of a fanboy, last week’s announcement of the new ever-sleeker iPod – now with video playback – and the announcement of new G5s and Powerbooks, totally got me excited. But try as I might, I couldn’t really figure out Steve Jobs’ “angle” with this new device. It still seemed a bit half-baked considering the screen is only 2.5″ and the battery life for watching video is only a few hours. Well Sam Sugar, over at SugarBank, an adult industry blog, seems to have hit the nail on the head IMHO:

Apple is selling cheap (just about) video capable iPods, for exactly the same price as its old audio only players, to lock-in market domination of video players. People who just want an iPod, now have to buy an iPod with video. Apple don’t have to sell the machines any differently and they don’t need video content to be a huge success – sales of iPods with video playback are guaranteed.

Then, when their lead is established, Apple will release a ‘true’ iPod video with a bigger screen, sell consumers on a ‘widescreen’ experience and use the extra bulk to hide a bigger hard drive and a lot more battery. That device will appear at the same time as a full-blown downloadable movie service. The studios will have been sold on the idea of ‘Eleventy Billion video capable iPods in circulation’ and Apple will make a lot of money from people upgrading the iPods they already have, because they don’t want to watch Toy Story on a square, two and a half inch screen. That might also be when all those engineers Apple’s hired to work on putting wireless capability into the iPod demonstrate what they’ve come up with.

In a nutshell, Apple’s solved the chicken and egg problem for selling video, by working out how to get people who want to listen to music, to buy video players anyway. They’re going to force old (clueless, greedy) industries to negotiate reasonable terms, because soon the iPod will be the majority platform for mobile video, and Apple will have total control of the hardware and online distribution. In doing so they’ve created a format which all companies selling video online (like us pornographers) need to prepare for.

As an interesting sidenote, Tuesday night on the Colbert Report, Leslie Stahl said that this week’s 60 Minutes will be fairly devoid of commercials. There will only be one sponsor and they are making every attempt to keep the commercial time as short as possible. The old broadcast television advertising model is dying. Will video podcasting – vodcasting (naturally built into the new version of iTunes) – replace it?

Purty. Though still not quite as nice as this working all-wood handmade 4G iPod.

And to make this post at least somewhat informational and not simply crassly consumeristic, I’ll mention that the rumors are flying about Steve Jobs unveiling either a video iPod or some type of Apple branded home video device at October 12th’s “One More Thing” event. There almost certainly will be a pink Madonna iPod joining the black U2 line. Hopefully whatever he reveals it won’t be an utter disappointment like the ROKR phone.

(via Gizmodo)

Meant to write this earlier, but I think I actually want this piece of vaporware even more. It’s a wireless charging pad that will charge your electronic devices (cell phone, mp3 player, camera, etc.) by simply placing them on the pad. Hotness. This one I would pay big bucks for it it actually came to market.

Splashpower Ltd., established as the result of a business competition at Cambridge University, has developed a wireless charging system that uses electromagnetic induction to accomplish wireless charging of devices.

“It’s basically the concept of creating a magnetic field that goes parallel to the surface of the pad rather than out of the pad and this has many benefits,� said Lily Cheng, chief executive officer and cofounder of the company, speaking at a news conference. “It enables us to deliver a very uniform output across the pad and enables us to make a receiver coil that is very thin.�

FEMA’s website for disaster registration requires:

“In order to use this site, you must have JavaScript Enabled and Internet Explorer version 6. Download it from Microsoft or call 1-800-621-FEMA (3362) to register.”

This means Windows Firefox users, and all Linux and Mac users simply can’t access the site. While not exactly an open source issue (this one is specifically a matter of accessibility and standards compliance) it chillingly demonstrates the danger in allowing our government to only use products from one vendor. Especially in mission critical applications such as emergency management, everyone – including federal agencies – must go to great pains to make sure that every internet user, no matter their choice of computing platform, has access to the necessary resources.

[And before any nerds get on my case, I am aware that this page doesn't properly validate. Philly.com doesn't properly URL-encode ampersands in their RSS links in the Sixers and Eagles links in the sidebar. D'oh.]