After receiving a few requests to add features to my Google App Engine project, Sprint, I decided to put the source up on Github. If you are interested in contributing improvements now you can fork the project, add your changes, test them, and send me a pull request. If I agree that everything looks good, I’ll push the changes up to GAE for all to enjoy.
You can find the project here: http://github.com/twebb/sprint/tree/master
Those who know me well are likely aware that I like to sing. While I’ve got a good ear for relative pitch and I can sort of carry a bearable tune, I’m no singer. So I try to keep my singing to a minimum, even when among friends. And though singing is just another one of the interests that I dabble in, it is a talent that I deeply admire in others. Like many of you I watched and laughed at many American Idol auditions and I could tell which singers really had great talent and which did not. Interestingly though, there always seemed to be a number of singers who clearly sounded good but lacked…something, but I could never put my finger on why.
Well, in January 2008 I came across a video that opened my eyes and reinforced my admiration for great singers. In A Master Class with Barbara Cook a number of aspiring young singers undergo a remarkable transformation under Barbara’s tutelage in front of a live audience. The transformation she achieves with a few of them will blow your mind and the central lesson she shares is be authentic.
The main thing to learn is that what the world wants is you. You are enough. You are always enough.
– Barbara Cook
That’s a great lesson for singers and I think it’s also a great lesson for all of us.
At the end of PRI’s The World: Technology Podcast 204 Clark Boyd shared an interesting story about George Orwell, the blogger. Starting on August 9th, 2008, The Orwell Prize will begin publishing his personal journal as a series of blog posts. The date is significant because it marks exactly 70 years since Orwell originally began the journal.
I am interested in reading Orwell’s journals mainly because he was a proponent of economy of words, a quality I aspire to in my writings. Moreover, in his essay Politics and the English Language he penned a list of rules for all writers that resonates with me and should be required reading for anyone who aspires to write better.
i. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
ii. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
iii. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
iv. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
v. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
vi. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.
I wonder how much his personal writings reflect these rules and if his journal entries will have the same tone as personal blog posts written today. Join me in reading Orwell’s personal journal beginning August 9th. Maybe we’ll learn something.
The following is a favorite quote that I came across several years ago:
It is not difficult to be great occasionally; the real challenge is to be good consistently.
— Richard Avedon (photographer)
I discovered the quote in a photography article from the Washington Post. For more on Avedon, the context of the quote, what it means to be an artist, and the application of the term artist to photographers, check out Frank Van Riper’s article.
… Avedon’s comment goes to the heart of what it means to be an artist: of the camera, the pen, the piano, the scalpel, the kitchen – anything in the long catalog of human endeavor.
Todd Webb 