Smooth Harold, The Blog of Blake Snow

Top 5 biggest, brassiest, and march-inducing national anthems of all time

Blake Snow — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 23:14:43 +0000

For their patriotism, big sound, and classically-inspired writing, I adore national anthems. Every time I hear a good one, I feel like saluting someone. Every time I hear one of these, I feel like dying for a cause. They are the best-sounding national anthems ever. Does your favorite make the list? 5. France. As a long-time [...]

My thrilling status updates for the week

Blake Snow — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 02:00:00 +0000

enjoys disposing orange peels in the In-sink-erator. Such a citrus clean smell. # still eats PB&J. Anyone else? #

Decade in review: How the internet ruined everything

Blake Snow — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:07:15 +0000

Here’s a nice summary written by Newsweek’s Daniel Lyons on how the Internet “ruined” newspapers, movies, television, music, and even Microsoft in the last decade. Why waste time reading 1,000 articles on the subject when this does all the heavy lifting for you? Get that.

A better way to internet: Use keyword commands for faster searching

Blake Snow — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:44:22 +0000

Wanna search the web faster? Ditch your browser search bar and use URL commands instead. In minutes, you’ll be burning down the information superhighway (aka cyberspace) at neck-breaking speeds. To do this in Firefox, follow these three easy steps: Select the drop-down menu from you browser search bar, and click “manage search engines.” In addition [...]

From the depths of my hard drive: Reason No. 356 my logo is awesome

Blake Snow — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 00:10:32 +0000

Simple Photoshoping of my company logo turns an otherwise crappy stock photo into digital wonder. Did this years ago but never had any use for it… until now!

Magnets that “crush hands, cause things to go airborne”

Blake Snow — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:50:47 +0000

Magnets are fun. These magnets by United Nuclear, on the other hand, are no laughing matter. Check out this purchase disclaimer: The magnets listed below are very powerful, much more powerful than magnets most people have seen, and need to be handled with proper care. Our larger magnets can easily bruise fingers and even break finger [...]

Published works: October 2009

Blake Snow — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 13:32:31 +0000

Excluding blog posts and short news stories: Top 5 TurboGrafx games Top 5 most dependable publishers Top 5 best 16-bit games

Don’t run because you half to, run because you love to

Blake Snow — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 13:00:53 +0000

From Born to Run, p. 92: How do you make anyone actually want to run? How do you flip the switch that changes us all back into the Natural Born Runners we once were? Not just in history, but in our own lifetimes. Remember? Back when you were a kid and you had to be yelled [...]

Top 3 ways to build online communities

Blake Snow — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:00:52 +0000

I couldn’t have said this better myself, so I won’t: Make the user interface simple. Don’t emphasize “community” unless you really know what you’re doing. Most users don’t want to join a community; they want to accomplish a task. Focus on the tasks. Watch your users for inspiration. People won’t use the tools you provide in the way [...]

Actually, defense doesn’t win championships, dummy

Blake Snow — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:35:43 +0000

“Defense wins championships” is the dumbest thing you’ll ever hear in sports. Winning requires scoring and damage control, regardless of the competition. To prioritize the latter over the former is absurd. In fact, offense might be more important—not to mention more exciting to watch. Pelé, the world’s greatest soccer player, also made this point in his [...]