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Via The Map Room, a link for old maps from the University of New Hampshire library. My favorite? Northeast corner of the St. Regis quadrangle (warning: 1.8MB image)

Yesterday I noted a print legacy in the online times. It was fixed today, thanks to Eliot.

So I’m reading the NYTimes Q&A with Barry Diller and I get to the end of the piece, online, and here’s what I see:

An extended version of this interview is online: nytimes.com/yourmoney.

I think, well, I’m reading this online, but not quite at that URL, so maybe, just maybe, there is more to read. But no, this is just an online vestigial appendix from the original version. Someone needs to relieve this “appendicitis” in the Times print-to-online conversion process.

With apologies to Michael Sippey, I had to use that title. What could be more obvious than the stats on DVR viewing habits? DVR = digital video recorder, and it’s the name of the category that TiVo has otherwise defined like Kleenex defined facial tissues. The Center for Media Research summarizes a Forrester Research report (well, press release) titled “Forrester Research Conducts In-Depth Survey Of DVR Users To Uncover Key Trends Impacting The Television And Advertising Industries.” Glad the survey was “in-depth,” but is any of the news really “uncovered” by this survey?

The bottom line from the survey: “consumers who own digital video recorders (DVRs) like TiVo, spend nearly 60 percent of their time watching recorded or delayed programs, in which they skip 92 percent of ads.” Ummm… that is the whole point of getting a TiVo, people: it’s one more tool in the (futile?) attempt to wrest more time out of each day. Or at least steal some of that time back without changing habits wholesale. Even if I happen to sit down in front of live TV I’m interested in, I pause it and try and complete some other short task, just so I can come back and skip commercials.

And this from a consumer who willingly subscribes to an AdForum email which shows me the top five ad campaigns of the week. I’ve even bookmarked two of the best from the last several months to note here, but the links (Nuts and AIDS) no longer work. Different mistake, but not my point tonight. Surprise me, interest me, engage me… and you win my time. Otherwise, I go to extreme efforts to reclaim seconds of my life.

All of this reminds me… I need to revisit a Season Pass for The Daily Show. Coming into the election endgame (if it only were a game…), Stewart and crew are sure to bring to light some of the moments that will make me laugh and cringe all at once.

Last night was the sixth straight Corporate Challenge road race I’ve run in San Francisco. In that time, the sponsor morphed from Chase to JPMorganChase. In that time, two kids entered the family. In that time, I moved from NBC Internet (now defunct) to CNET Networks, so I’ve gotten to wear a few different logos. In that time, the course has changed from running around Fisherman’s Wharf and Fort Mason to Crissy Field, an improvement in everything but accessibility from downtown, where many are coming from.

Obsessive that I am, I’ve recorded my times for each 3.5 mile (supposedly) race, and I dug them all up this morning.

• August 11, 1999 – 21:02
• August 9, 2000 – 20:08
• May 9, 2001 – 20:50 (last one pre-kids… coincidence?)
• May 8, 2002 – 21:47
• September 17, 2003 – 22:03
• September 14, 2004 – 21:32

I’m not getting faster, but at least I’m not slipping too quickly.

Jeremy Zawodny finds Flickr to be “one of the best examples of next generation web services.” I left a comment there, of which the main point is… how does Flickr intend to earn money to keep the service live and evolving? I set up an account a few weeks ago when I saw that the FeedBurner team was splicing away with Flickr, and the service is nifty.

But before I commit time and energy and data to another cool web service, I want to know whether it will be around in 6-12 months or more. No one knows the future, but how does Flickr intend to stick around? To their credit, I see that they are answering this question to the best of their current knowledge. “Yes, there will always be a free version of Flickr! There will also be “pro” accounts, with more storage and features.” Is that enough? I don’t know. And maybe they make it so easy to add photos that I hardly care about the time spent, etc. This isn’t aimed solely at Flickr… it’s just a larger, “I’ve been burned before by the bubble” sentiment. I want to be an optimist, but “free” worries me.

I wish I had the time and talent (are they connected?) to write like Paul Graham. His latest essay, on — of all things — the “The Age of the Essay,” collects historical tidbits, personal vignettes, meta-moments about writing, and a few otherwise unrelated threads into a meditation on how to share your thinking.

I also noted the following quote, which described my soon-to-be-4-year-old son’s defining attitude quite clearly:

Collecting surprises is a similar process. The more anomalies you’ve seen, the more easily you’ll notice new ones. Which means, oddly enough, that as you grow older, life should become more and more surprising. When I was a kid, I used to think adults had it all figured out. I had it backwards. Kids are the ones who have it all figured out. They’re just mistaken. [emphasis added]

When it comes to surprises, the rich get richer. But (as with wealth) there may be habits of mind that will help the process along. It’s good to have a habit of asking questions, especially questions beginning with Why. But not in the random way that three year olds ask why. There are an infinite number of questions. How do you find the fruitful ones? …

For different reasons, I nodded in agreement at this:

I write down things that surprise me in notebooks. I never actually get around to reading them and using what I’ve written, but I do tend to reproduce the same thoughts later. So the main value of notebooks may be what writing things down leaves in your head.

At work, I jot down tasks and things to remember, less surprises, but it’s true that the mechanical act of writing reinforces the mental chemistry of memory.

And one more quote, again unrelated:

Anyone can publish an essay on the Web, and it gets judged, as any writing should, by what it says, not who wrote it. Who are you to write about x? You are whatever you wrote.

I equate this phenomenon with the “nets” in Ender’s Game, where two pre-teens command worldwide political power, anonymously, via the power of their ideas, communicated solely by their writing. Democracy of ideas, taken to an extreme… either wonderful or scary or both, but I choose to be amazed and hopeful that words can move people so much.

The hardest part is just sitting down and getting the words out. Commenting on others’ thoughts and references is easier than the alternative, because commenting is reacting, rather than creating. But you have to jump in the water somewhere.

I’ve been saving a clipping from the WSJ for a few weeks, mostly to keep some possible book ideas around. Better to put them here, where I can get at them from elsewhere (and throw away the clipping). All recommended by Jim Fusilli, formerly book reviewer of mysteries and crime fiction for the Boston Globe.

• The Killing of the Tinkers, by Ken Bruen
• Some Bitter Taste, by Magdalen Nabb
• Flynn’s World, by Gregory McDonald
• The Spinning Man, by George Harrar
• The Nature of Midnight, by Robert Rice
• The Hell Screen, by I.J. Parker
• Southwesterly Wind, by Luis Alfredo Garcia-Roza

I won’t get to these immediately, but good to have a list. If you’ve got any personal experience with any of these, let me know.

I’ve been remiss in not welcoming Eliot to the circle of bloggers I know. I look forward to reading him regularly, and I hope he finds the practice personally interesting, if nothing more. Cheers!

I watched the finale of the Matrix trilogy last night, The Matrix Revolutions. Don’t see it. No matter how brilliant the first one was. I had low expectations after the disappointment of the second one, and I had to struggle to stay awake for this one. Argh. I’ve seen the first one at least three times now, and I can easily watch it again. But this was truly awful.