I already tweeted about this, but I couldn’t help writing a blog post also.

As most of you know, I read Reddit on a regular basis. Last month, I came across this thread where a Redditor made a custom theme for Reddit. A lot of us suggested that someone should turn the original photoshop mockup into real CSS that could be turned into script. A few people took a crack at it. but one person really nailed it.

Below is what the front page looks like without the script. It isn’t exactly aesthetically appealing.

Here is the front page with the custom script enabled.

This is what one of the subreddits looks like before the script.

And after.

As you can see, with the script enabled, Reddit doesn’t look like a relic from the 90′s anymore. One downside to the new look is that fewer articles fit on the page. I can live with that though.

If you are interested in the script, click here. I found it works great in Firefox with Grease Monkey and Chrome.

Around a month ago, I won an MSI Wind U160 netbook on MSI’s Facebook page. I didn’t have much use for a netbook. Therefore, I listed it on eBay as Buy It Now Or Best Offer. After two weeks of being on eBay, no one had bought it and the best offer I received was around 40% of MSRP. I realized that the netbook is probably worth more than that to me and decided  to keep it.

Ever since the release of the First Asus Eee PC that started the netbook craze, I have always wanted a netbook. I think it is because I liked the idea of an inexpensive, ultra-portable laptop that is just powerful enough to perform day to day tasks.  The Wind U160 fits the bill. It has a 1.6Ghz Intel Atom N450 “Pinetrail” processor, 1GB of DDR2 RAM, 250GB of HD and the usual netbook fare like 10″ LED backlit display, Bluetooth, 802.11N, etc. It also came with a large 6 cell battery that protrudes from the back and props it up when set on a desk. This battery is supposed to give this netbook 14 hours of life on one charge. I only got 9 hours while browsing the internet and 6 to 7 while browsing and watching videos.

The form factor is pretty nice. It isn’t too small like the 7inch netbooks, but it is still small enough to be considered ultra-portable. Here it is sitting on my 4 year old MacBook Pro.

This netbook arrived with two partitions and Windows 7 Started pre-installed on one of them. Since, I knew that I probably wouldn’t be using Windows, I resized the partitions and installed Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx Netbook Edition which is the latest LTS release. The installation process was relatively painless. Then, when I booted up, I couldn’t get the wireless to work. After some googling, I found out that 10.04 didn’t come with wireless drivers for the chipset found in my netbook. I had to add a 3rd party repository and download the drivers. I used Lucid Lynx for a week, but found it a little too clunky for my uses.

I downloaded the newly released 1.0 version of Jolicloud, the Ubuntu Jaunty based netbook OS and installed it over Lucid Lynx. immediately, I noticed that Jolicloud started up much quicker and has a slicker interface. As the name suggests, Jolicloud takes advantage of cloud based applications. The whole front end is built on HTML 5 and is very fast. Here is what the home screen looks like after start up and login.

All the applications are presented in an iOS-esque page system with large, beautiful icons. Some of the apps are native Ubuntu apps like Gimp.

Most are webapps. They are basically browser windows with toolbars absent. The Reddit “app” is below. As you can see, it is just the normal desktop version of the Reddit site.

Adding apps is as easy as it is on the iPhone. After clicking the large “+ Add” button on the top left, you are presented with a list of apps that is easy to sort and search through. When you want to install an app, you just click the add button and the OS takes care of the rest. When you go back to the home screen, the newly installed application will be there waiting for you.

The 250GB of storage and 10 inch screen make this a great portable video machine. I have been watching 720p episodes of Firefly and Gundam 00 on it.  As you can see, Gundam looks pretty good at the netbook’s native resolution of 1024×600.

There are a few complaints I have. First, for some reason USB drives did not automatically mount. I had to remedy the problem by editing the file system table. Also all utilities and built in apps are hidden away. I didn’t really care because I usually launch terminal by pressing atl+f1 and launch other apps through terminal. It was only when Caroline called asking me where terminal went (she had the beta version when terminal was easy to find) that I noticed that this may be a problem. For some reason, I cannot find any way to add any of these built in applications to the home screen. That is why you see the folder icon on my menu bar. It is a shortcut to the folder full of built in applications.

Other than these minor problems, the netbook experience has been much better than expected. I was expecting to be constantly frustrated by its small form factor and weak power. It isn’t going to replace my MacBook as my daily use computer anytime soon, but it will probably be my travel computer from now on.

Do you know what I hate? I hate it when people try to determine what is the “best” without establishing standard by which to measure how good something is.

For example, somewhat frequently on Reddit, a person will post something like, “I am going to college and I need a laptop. Here is what I want to do with it…” At first, the posts are all really well thought out. One guy will say get a mac if you want the support. Another guy will point to a deal on a cheap Acer. Then, it quickly devolves into a fanboy hatefest. Everyone starts listing reasons why one make or model is better than the other, or how everyone else is a bunch of idiots.

I have to admit that I am guilty of once acting like this. Until recently, I was a devout Apple fanboy and never wanted to touch a PC again. Now I have a Mac and 2 PCs running Linux and Windows. Each one is good for a different purpose. No one computer is the best.

The same thing goes for athletes. No one can be the “greatest” or “best” athlete. You can be the richest or the fastest or the tallest, but not the best. Best is meaningless. Without a benchmark, how can you prove that something is the best?

So in the future, before you say that something is the best, reconsider what you mean. Maybe you actually mean to say that something is your favorite or that it is the best based on a measurable standard.

My family and I went to New Jersey this weekend for my cousin’s wedding. We had the fortune of flying during sunrise on our way there and flying during sunset on the way back. Here are some beautiful shots of clouds that I captured.

From DFW to PHL:

From PHL to DFW:

Full Flickr Set Slideshow:

I just finished reading The 4-Hour Work Week. It is by far the best book I have read this year and possible the best I have read in the past few years.

The book is written by successful writer, world record holding tango dancer, angel investor, chinese kick boxer and expert language learner Timothy Ferriss. He is famous for deconstructing his goals and accomplishing them in record time.

The book basically helps readers find an autonomous source of income and spend the majority of their time on things they actually want to do. This is built around his four step process: DEAL (Definition, Elimination,Automation, and Liberation).

Everyone should read this book. It is the kind of book that can kindle a complete shift in thinking.

He also did a pretty inspirational talk called “Smash fear, learn anything” at 2008s EG Conference that is worth watching:

I got some new shoes over the weekend! I know they look like toe socks. They feel a bit like socks, but they are actually shoes. They are Vibram Five Fingers. The specific model I got is the Classic.

These shoes are part of a movement of barefoot athletes. Here is their argument: If we were given great feet and are meant to walk around barefoot, then why do we wear shoes with padded soles and raised heals?

Shoes were originally made to protect the feet from things on the ground that could hurt us. Thousands of years later, we have shoes that now alter the way our feet grow, change our posture and sometimes cause permanent damage. It just doesn’t make sense. I liken it to buying a Car but equipping it with the wrong tires. Wrong tires on a car could very well lead to a crash down the road.

Vibram solves this problem by giving customers the barefoot experience while still protecting the foot. Their shoes are very thin with no padding whatsoever. Each toe is separated from the others. They say that this design strengthens many of the muscles, ligaments, etc. in the foot that have become weak due to shoe wearing and scientific studies agree. The separated toes also reduce foot odor and prevent athlete’s foot.

After a few days of wearing them 4-6 hours a day, I’d say that these are the most comfortable shoes that I have every tried. My last 3 pairs of shoes have been Onitsuka Tiger Ultimate 81 (which is also extremely comfortable). I first got them because they have very thin padding and flexible soles. This results in a sock-like feel. The Vibrams take sock-like to another level. The allow the ability to feel details in the terrain that I am walking over.

I’ll use the Vibrams daily around the city and campus, but I am still going to wear the Onitsuka Tigers when I need more stylish shoes. If I can’t bear the winter cold, I might purchase some Injinji performance toe socks that are known to go well with Vibrams.

If you can find a pair in your size, then get the immediately. I say this because there seems to be a shortage due to the ten fold increase in sales since last year. This means that most stores only have huge sizes like mens 13,14, etc.

I have thought about building a dedicated computer for gaming ever since 11th grade. Last week, I pulled the trigger and built one.

The specs:

• Antec Nine Hundred SE Case link
• Antec Truepower 650W Power Supply link
• Gigabyte GA-790XTA-UD4 Motherboard link
• AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Quad-Core Processor link
• two 2GB Corsair XMS3 DDR3 1600MHz RAM link
• PNY GeForce 9800 GTX+ Graphics Card link
• two 500GB Hitachi Deskstar HD in RAID 1 link

As you can see above, the case has a massive 200mm fan, USB ports, Firewire port, 3.5mm audio jacks and a rubber lined shelf thing for keeping USB drives and stuff in.

In addition to the 200mm fan, there are two 120mm fans up front, one 120mm in the back and one 120mm on the side. They all have LEDs that make them light up blue! ^^

Above is the current peripherals setup. I have my almost 6 year old Logitech G5 mouse, cheap Dell keyboard, Playstation Eye (for webcam and microphone) and a 1600 x 900 LCD monitor that my parents weren’t using.

I ended up naming it Anduril. I was going to install Linux too and give it two different hostnames based on OS, but I was too lazy. In a few months, I’ll probably install an after market cooler and try to overclock from 3.4GHz to 3.8Ghz and maybe add 4GB more RAM. And maybe upgrade to a baddass graphics card.

“There are some things money can’t buy. For everything else, there’s forgery.”

-Sir John Hargrave

When I was looking on Amazon for some new books to read, I came across Prank the Monkey. Not only did it have five star reviews, the Kindle version is only $2.99. I hadn’t read many funny books in a while. So, I bought it.

The book is written by Sir John Hargrave (No he was never knighted. He actually changed his name to Sir John Hargrave. The book has more on that). He is the owner of Zug.com, a site dedicated to pranks.

Let me tell you. This is probably the funniest book I have read in years. The book chronicles many pranks that the author performs. The pranks are extremely creative and actually pretty high level. Some of them made national or international news.

Not only are the pranks extremely hilarious, the writing itself is unbelievably witty. While reading the book, I was writing down my favorite quotes that I would put in this post. I soon realized that the list of funny quotes is way too long. If you want some light easy reading and are willing to part with a mere $3, then you have no reason not to read this book.

I probably had the worst luck possible yesterday. First, I grossly underestimated the time it would take to pack and move all my stuff from Schapiro Hall at 115th street between Riverside and Broadway to Manhattan Mini Storage at 107th street between Amsterdam and Columbus. After spending the better part of the day moving, I was finally ready to leave.

I finally get my suitcases and head out to find a taxi. Then I realize that it is going to be extremely difficult to find one since the Law School graduation ceremony just finished around that time. So, Caroline (who is helping me with my bags) and I head down to 110 street to find a taxi. I finally find one, but he says that he won’t drive me to LaGuardia. After a few more taxi drivers said no, I finally found one that agreed to take me to LGA. I guess I should try to avoid flights that require me getting a taxi around rush hour.

When I arrive at the airport, I find out that my 7:50 flight is now rescheduled for 9:30. Fortunately, since I now how some sort of elite status on American Airlines, I was able to skip the massive line and talk to one of the first class agents. She tells me that my flight is cancelled and that I have to take the 1:30pm flight the next day and asked me why I didn’t get a notification from them. I ask her if they can pay for my transportation or accommodation, but she tells me that they don’t do that for weather cancellations. Great, I came all the way to Queens with three bags, they didn’t tell me that my flight was cancelled, and now they won’t even compensate me?

I was too tired to really have any emotions at that point. So, I call Caroline and tell her that I’ll have to stay at her place for the night. She tells me that she is actually at home and can meet me in Flushing for a late dinner on the way back. I say okay and take the Q48 bus to Flushing instead of the M60 bus back to campus. The bus almost reaches Main St when the bus driver stops and tells us that we’ll all have to get out. I get out to find out that most of Flushing has been closed down because of a “suspicious package.” Do they really think that terrorists want to blow up a bunch of asian people?

After taking the 7 train, missing my transfer from the 2 to the 1, and hauling my bags up and down stairs, I finally got back to Columbia. What was the only good thing that came out of yesterday? These pictures I took on the taxi ride:

Last weekend was my fraternity’s Annual Installs Banquet. It was also the first time in a while that I brought along my 30D and 30mm f/1.4 to shoot some casual candids. Here are a few shots: