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My Interview With Jason Salas

Joel Ross — Thu, 14 Jul 2005 11:19:00 GMT

This morning, Jason Salas of Digital Pontifications fame, interviewed me as part of his summer interview series. I had a great time doing the interview, and the audio quality was pretty good, considering it was via Skype and he's half way around the world from me.

Anyway, if you're interested in hearing me talk about Tourney Logic, sports, video games and podcasting, then give it a listen and let me know what you think. If I get enough good feedback, maybe I'll follow Jason's advice, and start making my own podcast...

Show notes | mp3

The Beaterator

Joel Ross — Sun, 06 Mar 2005 19:52:00 GMT

Mike (no blog...yet), a friend of me, has been working on something for almost a year now, and it's finally live. What is it? It's The Beaterator! He did it for Rockstar games, makers of the Grand Theft Auto game series. He's also done the past three games' websites. He did Tourney Logic, and he's done three other apps I've been involved with too. He's an awesome designer.

Anyway, his latest creation lets you create your own beats. It's a very cool tool, but be forewarned. You will waste lots of time messing with this thing. I would describe it myself, but I'll let his words do it:

The Beaterator, once considered an item of folklore originating from the dense White Pine forests of Western Michigan, is now a truthful reality.

Many of you have heard rumors, others have seen it in development. And most have never heard of it at all. What is "The Beaterator," you ask?
The Beaterator is the long-awaited follow-up to The Rhymerator, 2001's Rockstar Games + Median Group collaboration and the web's first rap lyric generator, providing countless wack MC's with the necessary tools to create verses that wouldn't get them booted from a rhyme cipher.
While one could say that The Beaterator is the instrumental counterpart to The Rhymerator, it would be a poor comparison. The Rhymerator is a crude flint tool; The Beaterator chops like a Ginsu.

The Beaterator far exceeds any existing online sequencer tool in power, capability, and sound banks. It is a real-time music sequencer that provides users with the tools to create complete beats, from scratch, for free.

- A series of massive loop and instrument sound banks have been created by musical auteurs: Matthew Dear, King Britt, Juan Atkins, and more.
- Flip a sample in the extensive effects console, with 5 ear-popping effects for dat ass.
- Got a sound you think should be up in da club? Upload it and drop it in the mix--another Beaterator first in the online sequencer arena.
- Build a beat like Legos with the Loop Crafter; 4 bars and a grip of 16th notes is the canvas upon which your snares never sounded so fly.
- Of the mind that it's not music unless it's got a melody? Tickle the keys, music snob, on the 2-octave keyboard.
- As if that's not enough, download the entire mix to mp3 and rock it in your iPod (or your iPod knock-off).

In case you didn't know, there's also a Rhymerator, so you can make your own beat, get your own lyrics, and put together your own song!

So, go out there, create your own beat, and let me know what you come up with. I'm hoping to have some time to put together a real beat, and get it up here at some point too.

Congrats, Mike. This is awesome!

Heading To California

Joel Ross — Thu, 10 Feb 2005 20:32:00 GMT

Friday nights tend to be my big blogging night, but not this week. I will be flying to San Francisco when I would normally be blogging. Of course, I could blog from the plane (and post later). I guess we'll see.

I have a few podcasts lined up for the plane, but in an ironic twist of fate, I caught up on all of my podcasts on Wednesday. So far, not many have been coming through. I have Robert Scoble's keynote from the Blog Business Summit, Dave Winer's News-Record discussion, and the latest Daily Source Code - maybe I'll get one more tomorrow? That should get me through the couple of flights. And I'm bringing my FM transmitter, so I can listen to them on my hour and a half drive from San Fran. to Santa Rosa, where I'll be staying.

I'll be in Santa Rosa for a week - I come back next Thursday night on the red eye. If you're in the area, drop me a line. I'm going to be busy, but I have to eat, right?

Tsunami Relief

Joel Ross — Wed, 29 Dec 2004 19:26:00 GMT

Scott Hanselman has a great idea about how to help victims of the earthquake and ensuing tsunami, but he needs some help to pressure Google.

He wants to donate all of his AdSense income. If everyone did that, we could make a difference (well, not me - my revenue from AdSense is less than a quarter).

He wants help to allow us to have a button to automatically do it, and he wants us to contact Google, asking for it.

Turning Caffiene Into Code

Joel Ross — Sun, 12 Dec 2004 22:04:00 GMT

Yeah, it's my favorite line from one of the DotNetRocks shows, but it's fitting. Dan Fernandez has a post that lists out the caffiene content of many popular drinks. Personally, Mountain Dew is the drink of choice (It must be - I even know it's homepage!). Given that I'm not a coffee or tea fan, that pretty much leaves the Mountain Dew family. While the original will always be the best, I actually do like all of the others - Code Red, Livewire, and the newly released Pitch Black.

Anyway, the next time you're looking for a quick pick-me-up, check out the list, and pick from the top. If you're like me right now (about to go to bed), try something from the bottom. Or, as my wife is constantly telling me, just drink water! Of course, my argument is that water is the top ingredient of Mountain Dew! And an interesting fact - Orange Juice is number three! That qualifies it as a breakfast drink, right?