The Cartoonist

Saturday, January 11, 2003

In case anyone's interested, I've designed the logo for Adrants. 9:37:02 PM     |

Don't mention the war. Because Robert has just mentioned it, here's The Unofficial Guide To Fawlty Towers. Enjoy. 6:35:34 PM     |

Rock'n Roll. Won't be easy getting out of this one, Pete. I'm no paedophile, says Who star. Pete Townshend admits downloading child porn but says it was for research, amid reports a rock star's details were passed to police. [BBC News | Front Page | UK Edition] 6:12:58 PM     |

British Poster of WWI. kellerkind and koewi are blogging old propaganda posters like crazy, so I guess I'll have to join in. As a proper converted English Gentleman I'm linking to Take Up The Sword Of Justice - British Posters of World War One from the Roger N. Mohovich Collection. Bätsch. 5:54:31 PM     |

Yeah, the old 'Freedom of Speech'. Peking Duck: "Yes, it appears the Chinese communist government has imposed a permanent nationwide ban on all blogspot.com sites." [Scripting News] 3:33:44 PM     |

The Underground Railroad. Another fascinating website about slavery in the US. Like the Poe website below, this also comes from LearningWorks. "The Underground Railroad was a secret network organized by people who helped men, women, and children escape from slavery to freedom. It operated before the Civil War (1861-1865) ended slavery in the United States. The Underground Railroad provided hiding places, food, and often transportation for the fugitives who were trying to escape slavery. Along the way, people also provided directions for the safest way to get further north on the dangerous journey to freedom." 3:28:05 PM     |

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary - very nice website about Edgar Allan Poe. Flash and RealPlayer alert, but worth it. "link" 3:10:41 PM     |

Ohhh ... look at those smiles. BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Blair due for Germany talks. Why do they remind me of sharks? Photo AP. 12:41:22 PM     |

Flying Wings. Fascinating website about the Nurflügel airplanes developed by the Horten Brothers, Lippisch, Northrop and others. History, technical papers, photos, articles. 10:44:32 AM     |

Well done! system.verbs.builtins.sys.appIsRunning changed on Sat, 11 Jan 2003 01:50:59 GMT: Added support for Safari on MacOS X. [Radio.root Updates] 9:34:51 AM     |

Friday, January 10, 2003

Open the Champagne. Tube celebrates 140 years [This is London: London News] 9:53:09 PM     |

Loriot. Well, I think I just have to include him ... and he certainly is a good one. 4:08:18 PM     |

Flora. I first came across him through a book with the title Gruselgeschichten (Diogenes Verlag Zürich, 1968), for which he did the inside illustrations and the cover. I must have been only 8 or 9 years old at that time, but it had a great impact on me. Ravens are a repeating object in his drawings and the way he uses pen and nib is amazing. His official site is here and you can order original and signed prints. Great stuff. 3:50:29 PM     |

Halbritter. Amazing; there was not much I could find on the web about the German cartoonist Kurt Halbritter, only 3 pages with a few of his drawings. Copyright problems perhaps? Anyway, he's certainly one of my heroes, he had a great humour and a fantastic drawing style. Kurt Halbritter died in 1978. (?) There really doesn't seem to be any info on the net about him ... 3:30:51 PM     |

By the way - no problems with Safari here whatsoever. I still can print, launch Classic and burn CDs. 2:51:03 PM     |

Going Underground. Again. Here are 150 Tunnel Links. Have fun. 2:14:18 PM     |

Comics. The Creating Comics resource site by Dave A. Law lists everything you need to know about creating comics. 11:22:18 AM     |

Thursday, January 9, 2003

Dozens of Dubious Duckland Data. Dominating Duckman links at ::: koewi.log ::: Unbelievable. How could I miss that? Great find. 9:27:28 PM     |

Heimatsicherheitshauptamt again. How strange. Now Google returns only 11 hits; last week it was 115. What's going on? Is Google being censored? Perhaps Robert Bruce Thompson is right? Is there a conspiracy at large? Ok, let's try to get it into the Duden then; this is not something American, but a proper German Institution that has got nothing to do with any conspiracies whatsoever. Apart from the reformed Grammar and Spelling... -: Heimatsicherheitshauptamt. Google, bugger off, here comes DUDEN! Heimatsicherheitshauptamt! Now just add the entry (with an exclamation mark at the end, please) and we're all happy. 4:55:23 PM     |

The more I'm diving into it, the more it gets exciting. Click the previous and next buttons. And visit Hans's homepage. It's worth it. 4:12:05 PM     |

Pen Love. More vintage catalogues of old pens, nibs, holders and fountain pens can be found at Hans Presto's website. This is actually the best website about pens I've come across so far. And let's not forget the Carl Barks Esterbrook! 3:56:04 PM     |

More on Links and Freedom. Slashdot | You Can't Link Here "Now a German law student joined the fight against linking restrictions and starts getting media attention in Germany." 1:54:36 PM     |

And Dave Hyatt of Safari fame blogs about the new browser: Surfin' Safari. Dave, we want tabs! 1:43:21 PM     |

Just in case you haven't been aware of this already: The Woz is running his own website. Woz.org...Everyone is Welcome. 1:38:50 PM     |

The Man of Bronze. Thomas Raus's website deals with the German Doc Savage publications and translations. "Still, in the early 80s, if you were at all interested in speculative fiction, you could not fail but notice the Doc Savage paperbacks. They were published by Pabel, whose paperbacks one could instantly recognize by their format, type, logo, spine. And since Pabel was one of the major places to look for science fiction, fans would develop an eye for the Pabel look." Well said indeed. Although I don't necessarily like the design, it's nevertheless Branding properly done - all across the Pabel range at that time. 1:26:46 PM     |

The Shadow knows. Lots of information about the superhero who's darker than even Batman at ThePulp.Net, with an extensive collection of links. "From the spring of 1931 until the summer of 1949, a slim figure cloaked in black fought mobsters, evil scientists, crazed old men and foreign invaders with two blazing automatics and a laugh that chilled the hearts of evil. The mysterious figure was The Shadow." Most of The Shadow novels are online here. 1:09:39 PM     |

Cambridge, UK. This is a somewhat lengthy entry about this picturesque little town, where I used to live and work for 6 years after I came to the UK in 1993. The picture on the left is taken by Derek Langley, who has about 250 Cambridge pictures on his website, all of which you can order as prints. The Cow and Calf pub was the place where I used to drink my beer. The pub was a time-warp back into the seventies. Unfortunately it has been closed down and demolished; Les, the Landlord, commited suicide. A really sad story. Here are Online Dictionaries maintained by the Cambridge University Press, where I worked as a book designer. Of course Pink Floyd are from Cambridge and Syd Barrett still lives in solitude in Cherry Hinton. Have a look at the Roots of Cambridge Rock. Because I once almost fell over him (and his wheelchair) while crossing a road (I was looking in the other direction), here's Professor Stephen Hawking. Last but not least some general information about the town, the history and - mostly important - the traffic. 10:06:26 AM     |

Tony in Trouble. Rebel MPs deliver war ultimatum. The government is facing a hardening mood among Labour backbenchers against an attack on Iraq. "The mood has hardened over Christmas. Labour MPs don't trust George Bush and wonder why Tony is so close to him. And the weapons inspectors haven't found anything. With a new UN resolution it [war] is manageable, but if Tony wants to do anything without UN support there will be serious mega-trouble," one influential moderate said yesterday. [Guardian Unlimited] 9:19:49 AM     |

Wednesday, January 8, 2003

Oh my. Bozzetto selling out? Neues Glück für Signor Rossi? [Der Kontakter] 9:47:42 PM     |

Safari is scriptable. Scriptable Applications: Safari 3:41:37 PM     |

Want Unix? Here's X11. X11 for OS X directly from Apple [Mac OS X Hints] 3:26:01 PM     |

More Safari. Safari mounts FTP sites in the Finder [Mac OS X Hints] 3:23:32 PM     |

After the party. Or before - that depends. The Mothership is a website devoted to the preservation of Apple Computer History. Timelines, LISA, old ads and brochures and - you can even switch to a classic Mac version of the site. I'm posting this only to annoy Robert, though. :-) 3:15:10 PM     |

Strange Sisters. Lesbian pulp covers. This is really trashy art, fabulous. I'm not sure if Schockwellenreiter had this already; I found the website through linkfilter. 2:40:36 PM     |

How to use Radio with Safari is detailed here. Andy, thanks! 2:11:20 PM     |

I'm not feeling well today. Flu again, it seems. See you all hopefully tomorrow. Bye. 12:06:18 PM     |

Tuesday, January 7, 2003

This is the last thing I'm going to post about the Keynote (Hmm, I'm using Safari). Horst of The Aardvark Speaks has rounded it up quite beautiful: "Boy, was today's Macworld expo keynote an experience. The folks at Apple must have been pretty busy over the past months - today Jobs revealed a number of exciting new products - iLife (Apple's iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie and iDVD rolled together into one integrated software suite), Safari (a slick and extremely fast web browser), Keynote (a presentation software that seriously kicks PowerPoint's butt) and the amazing 17" PowerBook, which does not only have a gorgeous big screen, but also a keyboard that starts to glow when it gets dark so that you can still type in absolute darkness (Wannahave factor: 1000). Not to forget Airport Extreme, FireWire 800 and the smaller 12" PowerBook. A written summary of the keynote in weblog style (reverse chronological order) is available from MacCentral, a videostream is available at the Apple QuickTime site" 11:32:29 PM     |

Maya 4.5 Personal Learning Edition for OS X is out. Have fun. Maya Personal Learning Edition 4.5 - VersionTracker 11:03:50 PM     |

Enough of that Steve Jobs Apple Keynote Stuff. Have a look at some proper computers. Now that's what I call technology! Safari needs an update - urgently... 10:47:35 PM     |

Safari Update: "Importing bookmarks from other browsers The first time you open Safari, it automatically imports your favorites from Microsoft Internet Explorer (no, it doesn't) At this time, Safari does not support importing bookmarks from other web browsers. You might be able to move your bookmarks to Safari by exporting them from your web browser as an HTML document. Then open the document in Safari and drag the links to a collection in the All Bookmarks view in another window." 10:13:17 PM     |

Wow. Safari is fast indeed. I haven't tried it with Radio yet, but it beats Chimera... Now how do I import my bookmarks? 8:09:58 PM     |

So what did we get? Software updates and a new Browser (I'm excited about that!). A super-thin Powerbook and a new super-small Notebook. And really crap advertising. For God's sake, Steve, get another agency...! I'm off now, until tomorrow. Hrmpf. 7:30:15 PM     |

The ads for the Powerbooks are all just testimonials (Chiat/Day?)...now this is not very creative, is it? I could have done better. Pfrrr. Chiat/Day used to be a really good agency once. One of the best in fact. Now they're doing testimonials. Very creative. Not what they're used to be, are they, Chiat/Day, hmm? Tsk..."let's do a testimonial campaign then, the client will buy it." Fab. Carry on. 7:13:05 PM     |

Keynote coverage: Small notebook. Now where's the beef? 6:58:12 PM     |

He's still talking. 6:50:49 PM     |

New Powerbook. 1 inch thick. Bloody amazing. G4, Superdrive, Firewire 800. 6:44:46 PM     |

grrr ... Imports and exports PowerPoint...Keynote...and it's 99 freaking dollars. 6:29:48 PM     |

Keynote coverage: Getting fed up with this. Wanna watch now. Goodbye. 6:23:22 PM     |

Keynote coverage: New WebBrowser: Safari. Seems to be very fast. Download now. Also iMovie and iDvd updates. Free download - for Safari. 6:09:49 PM     |

This keynote is getting boring. 5:49:29 PM     |

Keynote coverage: He's now introducing iPhoto 2... 5:45:37 PM     |

Steve is wearing a black rollneck and blue jeans... 5:44:24 PM     |

Keynote coverage: New software: Final Cut Express. Downsized version of Final Cut Pro. Yawn. -£299!! 5:32:24 PM     |

Keynote coverage: - and I'm slightly embarrassed that I'm actually watching this, but anyway: there's a snowboarding jacket out with a special pocket for the iPod - and you can fast forward with some buttons on the sleeve. Oh, great... - $499! 5:27:50 PM     |

"Little Joe, Hoss and Pa, Adam left the show..." The Ponderosa Ranch is right here; with soundtrack. Another Bonanza website is here - again with soundtrack. Good grief. A small part of Gurf Morlix's song Dan Blocker can be found here as a .rm (Real Player) file - I couldn't find an MP3 anywhere. Dammit. 4:56:49 PM     |

Brilliant story. Stolen straight from Armin. "[Careful with that answering machine!] Danish answerphone joke sparks police raid. As long as nobody misinterprets my message telling telemarketers to bugger off...." 3:39:07 PM     |

What's wrong with the UserLand server? It takes ages to access my (and other Radio sites) website?! Booo! 1:36:18 PM     |

Wild, Wild West. More images from America's past, again at Harper's Weekly: Buffalo, Wagon Trains, Gold, Railroads... "This website provides a look into some of the stories and pictures which kept 19th century readers informed and entertained, and thereby preserves a unique documentation of life west of the Mississippi." 12:42:34 PM     |

American Political Prints, 1766-1876. This fantastic collection is available at HarpWeek. "Warning: Website visitors should be warned that several of the words, descriptions, and images in these 19th-century caricatures are considered racially offensive by today's standards. The materials are presented in order to give an accurate historical picture of American political prints in the 19th century." 12:33:38 PM     |

Monday, January 6, 2003

Last one for tonight: Commander McLane, keeping a close watch on Station M88-12. 11:31:30 PM     |

Even more old American things. Dime Novels and Penny Dreadfuls, 8000 covers, all scanned in a good resolution. Amazing. "The dime novels were aimed at youthful, working-class audiences and distributed in massive editions at newsstands and dry goods stores. Though the phrase conjures up stereotyped yarns of Wild West adventure, complete with lurid cover illustration, many other genres were represented: tales of urban outlaws, detective stories, working-girl narratives of virtue defended, and costume romances." 10:49:04 PM     |

More old American ads. This time not that old. Ad*Access has archived over 7000 ads from 1911-1955. Again, browsing for hours is guaranteed. "Ad*Access concentrates on five main subject areas: Radio, Television, Transportation, Beauty and Hygiene, and World War II, providing a coherent view of a number of major campaigns and companies through images preserved in one particular advertising collection available at Duke University." 10:43:40 PM     |

Really old ads are at EAA - The Emergence of Advertising in America: 1850-1920. Fabulous website. One can browse there for hours. "The Emergence of Advertising in America: 1850 - 1920 (EAA) presents over 9,000 images, with database information, relating to the early history of advertising in the United States. The materials, drawn from the Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library at Duke University, provide a significant and informative perspective on the early evolution of this most ubiquitous feature of modern American business and culture." 10:19:16 PM     |

Check out the 404 Research Lab. Very funny. 5:29:42 PM     |

One for the bots. dvnklpjalt@tiudvxobsr.com, pqlqz@srnwkimzetqsxwy.biz, btye@jmjzdwmsnxxp.it, uayikdh@cweqhroztrecvp.de, mvmwp@illuabz.mil, wkqqchgp@dttfqcmd.it, ofqdtnoyth@qgefjwvvlfrxzjwcdxf.net, eatyc@liimnvjolzyvwee.biz, eayrl@rmji.com, tby@xxlojziaihl.ca, qeuflz@wmgialjzu.pl, owedljhbu@igxairslbhomlapbz.pl, jts@jwowkcepnvcvauudchxi.tv, usz@efjqhritep.dk, lmmkj@qfkgeggfi.tv, zfqlhbfrh@aaemjbfqcibkxjsn.pl, nmxd@dnpnzedz.ch, lomgqaxpl@wqgvwljtwvcznpp.nl, onmtsqzv@dhrkaeyfueqkcdvptcl.pl, cjvea@psfjvrupyfimvtznzu.st 5:26:30 PM     |

HTML Coding. I hate it. Anyway, I've added a search engine for my weblog on the right hand side. Phew... Hate that stupid logo, though. 4:32:58 PM     |

Al Mcintyre not only has the most extensive list of Radio UserLand document sources (I've already mentioned that), but also a list of Enhanced Radio Tools. Brilliant. Thanks, Al! Radio logo shamelessly stolen from Schockwellenreiter 2:51:24 PM     |

Don't use Microsoft Frontpage to design your website. It can be dangerous. Wired News: Help Wanted: Steal This Database "Such a security gaffe may have enabled unauthorized visitors to log in and access files undetected for more than six months on a server operated by Carmichael Lynch, a public relations and advertising firm with several big-name clients. The admin password was inadvertently published on a page that contained online job postings." 2:15:07 PM     |

Swansea goes German. Lot of German links at german-studies.net "link" 10:23:20 AM     |

Hey, Shackleton. Now the big freeze sets in [This is London: London News] 10:19:36 AM     |

Free Text. Mi is a text editor for OS X that does almost everything BBEdit does. Difference is, it's free. Via Kosmonautentraum. 10:13:36 AM     |

Sunday, January 5, 2003

Esterbrook Madness. A whole catalog from 1952 can be found here; fountain pens, nibs, holders ... fantastic. Why couldn't I find this before? Thanks to Hans; again. (see below) 7:10:30 PM     |

Carl Barks's drawing instrument. This is one of the pens Carl Barks used to draw his Duck Comics with. So it's not a fountain pen after all. Thanks go to Hans from Sweden! "Welcome to BLAM design. A site about Lettering, Comics, Handwriting, Vintage Pens and Calligraphy. Hans Presto is a free-lance letterer and art-teacher. He's running a fabulous website about Calligraphy, lettering, comics - and pens! Again, thank you, Hans. Seems the 'Esterbrook' picture on this page is simply wrong. 6:47:30 PM     |

This weblog is getting better and better. If you're interested in advertising. Ads Ads Ads....Advertising is Everywhere. adrants Jan 5 2003 9:38AM ET [Moreover - moreover...] 5:06:25 PM     |

Dear Doctor, please cut the crap and come forward with some proof. Three more 'clones' due. The doctor who says she has produced two cloned babies in the past weeks tells the BBC that three more will be born by February. [BBC News | Front Page | UK Edition] 3:09:20 PM     |

Yes, and he's Arno Schmidt's great nephew! So no surprise there. Steve Gillmor: "Opinionated, volatile, blunt, and disruptive, Dave Winer is an American original." [Scripting News] 3:06:23 PM     |

Watching the detectives. I can't seem to find any proper Nick Knatterton links. The German website knatterton.de has now evolved into something really strange, so all that's left is apparently an exhibit at Stiftung Haus der Geschichte der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (englisch) and an article at Flensburg online (german). Sigh... 2:56:56 PM     |

Old English Literature. The folks at Gutenberg Project have now started with an electronic edition of the works of Edward Bulwer-Lytton. The first 10 files are online. Woohoo! Gutenberg: etext05 2:28:30 PM     |

It's getting cold here in England. Reason enough for a Shackleton link. The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition is a recommendable exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History. 10:20:11 AM     |

In geheimnisvolles Dunkel gehuellt means wrapped in mystery in English? Long list of German idioms and the according translations. Quite a few of them are a bit weird, though. Idioms 9:56:39 AM     |

Update: Exeter offline. STARSHIP EXETER - NCC-1706. Starship Exeter "The Savage Empire" off line. The move came several hours after the Starship Exeter Website (www.starshipexeter.com) was featured on the front page of SlashDot.Org, a popular Website which thrives on, in their own words, "nerd oriented news." Immediately, the Starship Exeter site was deluged with visitors attempting to view Starship Exeter "The Savage Empire." During the next few hours, traffic to the Exeter Website rose to beyond 10,000 hits an hour. The bandwidth demands proved more than Mac.Com could handle and the decision was made to remove the Starship Exeter Quicktime movie files. Mac.Com has offered to make the movies available again with a bandwidth restriction of 500 megabytes every six hours. This would render the movies unaccessible to most visitors of the Website.The best fan related move online since Troops [linkfilter.net] Update 2: Exeter is back online at the Mac.Com address. 9:41:18 AM     |