Many years ago, my buddy Dave was hardcore into pixel art and would send me all sorts of tiny creations. I asked him to make a few pieces that included people and elements from my life, and he happily obliged. I then enlarged the pixels (in some cases) and experimented with creating little stories, draggable pieces, animations and site goodies in Flash. 

Given Flash’s recent infamy, these have been offline for probably close to a decade, but I thought I’d dig a few up and share with the class. Note that if you’re reading this on iOS, you’re out of luck (for obvious reasons). Also note that these are being presented entirely out of context as Flash pieces simply plopped on a blank page. Disclaimers out of the way, here they are:

‘House of Kyle’ Header (whatever you do, don’t press the button)

The Fords in Los Angeles (a sandbox)

Special Announcement

The Packers jacket is key.

(Source: youtube.com)

I’ve hit the six year mark at Ning. Clearly nothing has changed since I joined (insert Rodney Dangerfield collar pull). As has become my yearly tradition, here’s my first (pre-employment) Ning Blog appearance.

I never met Steve Jobs in person, but I make a living using his products and have admired him as far back as I can remember. When I was in high school, I wrote to him (he was still at NeXT at the time) for career advice, figuring there’s no way I’d ever see a response. I got one. I’ve posted this before, but after today I think it’s worth sharing again.

My note (excuse the high school-level writing) sent on 6/12/94:

Dear Mr. Jobs,

I am very impressed by your life. I am a 16 year old male and I’m typing this letter on a Mac. I have a question for you. I am positive that I want to go into a career in the computer field. I love to draw, I can read music, I like fooling around with stuff, I like e-mail and I can program in BASIC and I’m trying to learn some other languages. What kind of career involves any of those things? How does one break into the industry these days? What kinds of classes should I take? I know these are a lot of questions, but I would greatly appreciate it if you could mail me back.

Thanks,

Kyle Ford

Steve’s reply on 6/13/94:

Kyle,

My suggestion is to go to a great college or university, at least for a year or two. Don’t limit your study to just computer science, but rather explore everything that catches your heart. This will serve you well later in your life.

I have always remembered a phrase I read when I was your age: stay hungry, stay foolish. 

I believe it more now than ever.

Steve Jobs

R.I.P. Steve, from an Apple-product-loving liberal arts graduate that is both hungry and foolish.

The day has come. This morning I called DirecTV and cancelled my account. Cut the cord, if you will. As someone who used to work at a television network, this feels bittersweet. Not bittersweet enough, however, to keep me flushing money down the drain every month for programming I’m not watching. Here’s how I’m able to live in this brave new cable/satellite-free world…

1) I Don’t Care About Sports

Being a nerd, I have little interest in televised sports, with the exception of some nostalgia for the ‘85 Bears or mid-90’s Bulls. While the streaming options are getting better for sports fans (MLB on Apple TV, for example), this is often a deal-breaker for many people. A non-issue for me.

2) News is Everywhere

Between Twitter, Facebook and a slew of streaming news sites/apps, it’s amazingly easy to stay on top of what’s going on. Not to mention I don’t have to be subjected to the terror of local newscasts.

3) Roku and Hulu

The Roku 2 (using the Hulu Plus integration) lets me watch almost all of my “must see” shows right on my TV, with a dead-simple interface. What about shows they don’t offer (or offer on a super-delayed schedule)? For that, there’s…

4) Apple TV and Netflix

Not only does Apple TV have the best Netflix streaming UI by a wide margin, it also gives you access to Apple’s large iTunes library of rentable or purchasable movies and TV shows. Netflix has a ton of great back catalog titles (and is almost essential if you have kids for the SpongeBob catalog alone), and you can fill in the new release gaps with iTunes rentals. If there’s a TV show you really want to follow that’s not on Hulu, chances are that you can buy a season pass for it (still far cheaper than a monthly cable or satellite bill if done in moderation) via Apple TV.

After the initial investment in the Apple TV and Roku hardware units (around $99 each, cheaper if you go with an alternate Roku model), you’re looking at $8/month for Hulu and $8/month for Netflix (plus your basic Internet connection cost). Obviously if you want Netflix discs it’ll be more, ditto for a la carte movie rentals or TV purchases via Apple TV. Still, it beats a huge monthly cable or satellite bill.

A Few Drawbacks:

• I won’t be able to easily watch live events like the Oscars. To be honest though, any watercooler moments are going to pop up online within hours, and in recent years I’ve found myself fast-forwarding though most of these events anyway.
• I’ll have to be patient with certain shows. HBO, for example, tends to not put their shows on iTunes until the season is completed. This’ll make it tough if there’s another season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, but I’ll live.

A Few Added Benefits:

• Since Netflix, Hulu and Apple (obviously) all have great iOS apps for their respective services, I can easily watch shows/movies anywhere I happen to be.
• The Apple TV and Roku units are jammed full of cool apps/features that either don’t exist on most cable/satellite services, or exist in almost-unusable “added to check them off the marketing list” form. Between the two devices, I’m able to watch YouTube videos, get video content from Amazon (which I suspect will become more and more handy in coming months) check out movie trailers from different providers, view photos and videos from Facebook, listen to music from Rdio and Pandora, stream all of my iTunes and iPhoto content to my TV and more. Not to mention that AirPlay is flat-out magic.
• I can get rid of the giant coaxial cable running through the house that drives my wife insane.

It’s strange to me that the kids are growing up in a world without channel flipping. Not sure that Larry Sanders would approve.

I’m still fairly furious that I can’t easily watch Gummi Bears on a streaming service.

(Source: youtube.com)

Being a big fan of The Talk Show, I’ve been following along with their (nearly) weekly chronological journey through all of the James Bond films. I’d seen most of them before, but seeing them all in order gave me a much clearer sense of the overall series arc, and has made me feel qualified to rank them. I should note that I have omitted the non-canonical productions, which include a 1954 TV episode of Climax! based on Casino Royale, a 1967 parody version of Casino Royale and 1983’s Never Say Never Again (a Thunderball remake). I’d also like to thank my wife for enduring some major James Bond overload. Without further ado, here’s my list, starting with the worst:

22) The World is Not Enough (1999)
Generally weak, and we won’t even discuss Denise Richards.

21) For Your Eyes Only (1981)
I think I went into a coma through much of this.

20) Octopussy (1983)
Bond as a clown. Enough said.

19) Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
Jonathan Pryce is fairly entertaining, but the movie itself isn’t much to write home about.

18) Quantum of Solace (2008)
A generally decent movie, but not especially memorable.

17) The Living Daylights (1987)
Not bad, but again, not super memorable.

16) Die Another Day (2002)
Pierce went out with a bang with a pretty fun movie. The horrible CGI surfing scene, however, takes it down a few notches.

15) Licence to Kill (1989)
A polarizing movie, but I enjoyed it, and was haunted by some of the Leiter torture scenes (which were lifted from the “Live and Let Die” novel). And yes, the film’s title uses the British “License” spelling, so step off.

14) A View To a Kill (1985)
Many people (including Roger Moore!) don’t like this movie, but I think it’s 80s-tastic. Christopher Walken and Grace Jones alone make it worth your time.

13) Moonraker (1979)
Much of it is actually fairly solid. Then Bond goes into space. We won’t even mention the Jaws love interest situation.

12) On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)
Poor Lazenby. He’s definitely not my favorite Bond (in fact he’s my least favorite), but this is actually a pretty entertaining movie.

11) Live and Let Die (1973)
Definitely a different vibe than a lot of the other films (it was heavily influenced by the 70s blaxploitation style), but a great first movie for Roger Moore.

10) The Man With The Golden Gun (1974)
This one often gets labeled as one of the worst Bond films, but I find it to be pretty fun, though certainly over the top at times (cough, horrible flying car). I mean we’re talking about Count Dooku living on an island with Hervé Villechaize. What else do you want, people?

9) GoldenEye (1995)
An amazing way to restart the franchise after an extended time away. Super entertaining, and it also resulted in one of the best N64 games of all time.

8) The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
Roger Moore at his peak. The opening skiing scene is the 70s.

7) Diamonds Are Forever (1971)
Some of the weirdest henchmen in the series, but great old-school Vegas action.

6) Casino Royale (2006)
The best of the modern Bond films by a large margin. Rock solid.

5) Thunderball (1965)
The cheesy jetpack along justifies this ranking, but it’s an extremely entertaining film that’s done at a much larger scale than the earlier adventures.

4) From Russia With Love (1963)
Lean, mean and compelling.

3) You Only Live Twice (1967)
Amazing setting, amazing lair and my favorite title song of the series.

2) Dr. No (1962)
The first Bond movie, and one of the best. I almost had this in my #1 spot. The mysterious tropical setting is fantastic, and Jack Lord easily makes the best Felix Leiter.

1) Goldfinger (1964)
The quintessential Bond movie. The golfing scene is one for the ages, and it’s so good that it can even transcend the old man version of Felix Leiter.

My takeaways having watched them all in order? I’m a huge sucker for Connery and the 60s films, the 80s is generally my least favorite stretch of the series, and in my opinion Daniel Craig actually seems closest in tone to the Bond of Ian Fleming’s novels (which I’m now starting to read in order). Here’s my ranking of the film Bonds, starting with my least favorite:

6) George Lazenby

5) Timothy Dalton

4) Pierce Brosnan

3) Roger Moore

2) Daniel Craig

1) Sean Connery

Phew. I’m sure other Bond fans will have strong opinions about this post, so I’d love to compare notes/thoughts. Here’s to Bond 23 next year!

Not sure I’ve ever officially announced it, but I joined the Mogwee team within Ning in early April or so, and we’ve been hard at work ever since. One of the more substantial projects we started with was completely revamping the invitation and “Hangout” system, and while the new work has been live on Android for a few weeks, I’m excited to announce that the updated iOS version is now available. If you have no idea what Mogwee is, it’s a group communication and collaboration service that works on iPhones, iPod touches, iPads, Android phones and the web. Here’s a video we made about the service:



You can use it for all sorts of things, including:

• One-on-one communication without paying text messaging fees
• Group communication (you can create “Hangouts” to which you can invite up to 25 people and essentially have a chat room that follows you wherever you go)
• Photo sharing and YouTube sharing (with a improved new version of both coming very shortly)
• Fun social actions including gift giving and sheep throwing

It’s the kind of service that you can use for all sorts of different things, but a few suggestions include:

• Keeping your family connected
• Coordinating weekend plans
• Helping people wrangle/locate their crew at concerts, events, conferences, etc.
• Making a watercooler chatroom with your co-workers (the web version is especially great for this)

We’re adding in all sorts of interesting new features over the next several months, all while continuing to keep things playful. If you haven’t checked it out yet, I’d suggest you git ‘er done.

There’ll never be another Randy Savage. Hat tip to Devin.

(Source: youtube.com)

…And Paul Winfield as ‘The Mirror’

(Source: youtube.com)