So far over 25,000 people have watched it on YouTube. Many have asked how to play it, so I’m posting a tab and how-to video here for those who’ve watched, commented, and liked. I’m blown away by your enthusiasm, and I’m truly grateful that you enjoy it!

I promise to post more music too. Again, thank you!

Here’s the original, and the how-to is below the tab.

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Bethany’s younger brother just had his retreat, and she’d asked me if I could think of any man-to-man stuff that might not occur to a big sister. I marinated on it for a few days, and thought the results valuable enough to pass on to my younger brothers and to you.

1. Everything will be fine in the end, no matter what.

   You’re unbelievably lucky to have a family that will always be there for you. You have the ultimate freedom — no matter what you do, where you end up, or who you impregnate, you know your family will help support you. That’s one less set of worries attached to each risk you take. You owe it to yourself and to them to use it to your advantage.

2. Good stuff happens when you say yes.

   When confronted with an unexpected opportunity, I’m usually hesitant, even if only for a split second. Sometimes the decision is harder, and I think about it longer. When in doubt, do it. I’ve NEVER in all my life regretted taking the chance and doing something instead of nothing. Keep in mind that good stuff happens not only outside your place, but outside your comfort zone.

   On another note, if making a decision is taking a long time, it’s because the options are roughly equally good, meaning you’re likely to be satisfied with either option. Go for the more exciting one.

   Also, think about how you’ll look back on it 5 years from now. Will you regret not doing it and wish you had?

3. Don’t settle (in love or anything else).

   Many people end up entering or staying in relationships because they’re comfortable. Date as many people as you can so you have a good sense of what’s out there and what you want out of a partner. Do the same for situations, activities, anything.

4. Life is a value exchange.

   Value may seem like a hazy concept, but it flows all around us as we interact with others. Next time you’re talking to someone, ask yourself, “What value is each of us getting out of this?” People hang out with you because you provide value, like an awesome attitude, a great sense of humor, or knowledge of the coolest events. You derive value from them too. Jobs pay you because you create value by working, and they provide value in the money and perks they provide to facilitate your lifestyle .

   Being conscious of this and trying to maximize the value you provide will help you be a better friend, teammate, partner, employee, and person in general.

5. Don’t be afraid to start small.

   I spend a lot of time online, and there’s always something I want that doesn’t exist. Being a developer, I can usually just make it myself. All the mp3 players for blogs sucked, so I made a better one in a weekend. Now it’s been downloaded 60,000 times and people pay me (more than I make at my job) to customize it for them. I never imagined that would come from something so small.

   Jeff was working at a bulk coffee roaster where he received coffee shipments on pallets. The pallets would pile up, then he’d have to go out of his way to dispose of them, and he saw other companies in his industrial park had the same problem. He asked around and figured out he could charge a few dollars per pallet to remove them, then he could sell them to someone else for a few dollars more. The few businesses around his office would make him around $400 a month. If that situation existed everywhere, he could service a few areas and have a solid business. If it only existed there, he’d be one step closer to supporting himself independently with multiple little businesses.

   Maybe you’re looking for a club at school and it doesn’t exist. Start it! Shayen loves acrobatic yoga and juggling, so he started a “circus arts” get-together on Sundays behind Barton Springs in Austin. Now hundreds of people come, DJs spin, and it’s a huge party with all the things he loves.

   Starting small is satisfying in and of itself and can lead to big things. Also, not everything you’re going to do will be successful, so (like dating) it’s best to start getting a feel for what works and what doesn’t as soon as possible.

6. Set goals, no matter how loose.

   Anderson was sleeping on the futon for a couple months while he saved up for a van in which he’d live and travel the country. He wasn’t saving as much as he wanted, but all of a sudden he made something happen and bought a van on the exact day he’d originally intended without realizing it.

   When I visited Rachel last year, San Francisco just felt right. Ready for a change after ten years in Austin, I half-decided to come out for a few months and give it a try. Though there was little conviction and no conscious effort, I eventually found myself speeding toward California exactly when I’d said I would.

   Your goals won’t magically manifest Secret-style, but you’ll subconsciously move toward the plans you keep in the back of your mind. Keep something good back there.

After my iPod was stolen, I figured I’d play music with my phone, anticipating replacing it with a modern device and wanting to avoid a potentially redundant iPod. That hasn’t happened yet.

Anytime I tried to check out The Golden Filter’s new record, I was denied. Pocket Tunes, the preloaded music app, just couldn’t access the folder containing the mp3s.

The folder was named “The Golden Filter – Völuspà 320,” and since nothing else was inaccessible, I figured the special characters (the umlaut and grave in Völuspà) were the culprits. Renaming the folder worked, but I immediately switched my memory card with another containing the original name.

I’ve tried to listen to the record at least five times now, and the name has made it unplayable on my (admittedly ancient) device. Maybe I’d have loved it and become their loudest evangelist, or maybe it would’ve inspired me to drive my car into a swimming pool. But most bands would never consider that an exotic-looking title might make playing its album physically impossible.

I take it as a reminder that many decisions, especially related to design, have unintended consequences.

BSS have released a “double A-side” single today. Not nearly as exciting as “World Sick,” but pretty good. Between the two, I vote “All To All.”

Broken Social Scene – All To All

Broken Social Scene – Forced to Love

Get them in MP3 and FLAC.

lighttpd 1.5.0 has been in the works since at least 2006 and doesn’t look like it’ll be out anytime before Duke Nukem Forever.

nginx, on the other hand, is leading the pack of extremely resource-efficient C10k-answering web servers these days.

So let’s jump into a CentOS/RHEL install. First, download the latest stable version and your desired modules. Unzip it all and issue your typical commands. Here are mine.


./configure --with-http_ssl_module --with-http_gzip_static_module --add-module=/root/ngx/mod_zip-1.1.5 --add-module=/root/ngx/nginx-accesskey-2.0.3 --add-module=/root/ngx/ngx_http_secure_download --add-module=/root/ngx/nginx_upload_module-2.0.10 --add-module=/root/ngx/masterzen-nginx-upload-progress-module-2bf172d
make
sudo make install


I chose a bunch of modules, but they’re all optional. You probably want the HTTP SSL module and the upload module (without which you can’t accept file uploads or multipart forms?!). Secure download is particularly useful to me for Sendshack, allowing for download links.

If you have problems with ./configure, make sure you’re using a stable release. Trying to configure 0.8 wouldn’t work with many of the modules I selected.

Let’s set up PHP first. We’ll be running PHP via FastCGI, so make sure your PHP build supports it (you should see cgi-fcgi if you type php -v at the command line).

Make a file named fastcgi.conf in your nginx conf directory (default /usr/local/nginx/conf) that dictates what variables nginx passes to PHP. It should contain this:


fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
fastcgi_param QUERY_STRING $query_string;
fastcgi_param REQUEST_METHOD $request_method;
fastcgi_param CONTENT_TYPE $content_type;
fastcgi_param CONTENT_LENGTH $content_length;
fastcgi_param SCRIPT_NAME $fastcgi_script_name;
fastcgi_param REQUEST_URI $request_uri;
fastcgi_param DOCUMENT_URI $document_uri;
fastcgi_param DOCUMENT_ROOT $document_root;
fastcgi_param SERVER_PROTOCOL $server_protocol;
fastcgi_param GATEWAY_INTERFACE CGI/1.1;
fastcgi_param SERVER_SOFTWARE nginx/$nginx_version;
fastcgi_param REMOTE_ADDR $remote_addr;
fastcgi_param REMOTE_PORT $remote_port;
fastcgi_param SERVER_ADDR $server_addr;
fastcgi_param SERVER_PORT $server_port;
fastcgi_param SERVER_NAME $server_name;
# PHP only, required if PHP was built with --enable-force-cgi-redirect
fastcgi_param REDIRECT_STATUS 200;
fastcgi_index index.php;


Reference it in your nginx.conf — your http section should begin:


http {
include /usr/local/nginx/conf/mime.types;
include /usr/local/nginx/conf/proxy.conf;
include /usr/local/nginx/conf/fastcgi.conf;


Next, make sure you have spawn-fcgi installed. If you don’t, a quick yum install spawn-fcgi should take care of it.

Here’s where I bring something different to the table. Most people will tell you to set up a TCP socket for PHP, but I run a tight iptables ship and think it inelegant to bounce around TCP ports, so I brought my lighttpd Unix socket config over to nginx.

Edit /etc/init.d/nginx and change your start and stop functions to:


start() {
[ -x $nginx ] || exit 5
[ -f $NGINX_CONF_FILE ] || exit 6
echo -n $"Starting $prog: "
daemon $nginx -c $NGINX_CONF_FILE
/usr/local/bin/spawn-fcgi -s /tmp/php-fastcgi.sock -f /usr/bin/php-cgi -u ngninxuser -g nginxgroup -C 5 -P /var/run/spawn-fcgi.pid
retval=$?
echo
[ $retval -eq 0 ] && touch $lockfile
return $retval
}
stop() {
echo -n $"Stopping $prog: "
killproc $prog -QUIT
killproc php-cgi
retval=$?
echo
[ $retval -eq 0 ] && rm -f $lockfile
[ -f /tmp/php-fastcgi.sock ] && /bin/rm -f /tmp/php-fastcgi.sock || :
[ -f /var/run/spawn-fcgi.pid ] && /bin/rm -f /var/run/spawn-fcgi.pid || :
return $retval
}


Substitute your nginx user and group for the placeholders nginxuser and nginxgroup.

Now you can set up a virtual server. nginx doesn’t, but should, allow some global (for me) directives to be set across all servers, so include them by referencing a file to allow for easier editing.

Make a file called vs_std.conf that contains:


location / {
index index.html index.htm index.php;
}
location ~ \.php$ {
fastcgi_pass unix:/tmp/php-fastcgi.sock;
}
location ~* \.(jpg|jpeg|gif|png|swf)$ {
access_log off;
expires 7d;
}


You may or may not want to include an expires directive like the last location item. Purely optional.

Then reference that file from the server declaration in your config file.


server {
listen 80;
server_name wpaudio.com;
root /home/wpaudio.com/public_html;
include vs_std.conf;
}


You can also enable gzip for text by including this in the http section:


gzip on;
gzip_types text/html text/css text/xml application/x-javascript application/atom+xml text/mathml text/plain text/vnd.sun.j2me.app-descriptor text/vnd.wap.wml text/x-component;
gzip_disable "MSIE [1-6]\.(?!.*SV1)";


The disable line is particularly important if you’re worried about IE compatibility, since gzipped content breaks anything before IE6 SV2.

For WordPress, the easiest way to manage permalinks is to route 404s to WordPress. Then you can create whatever outlandish permalink scheme you like and WordPress will happily recognize the request URI and return your golden post.

Here’s my configuration entry for this blog.


server {
listen 80;
server_name todd.is;
root /home/todd.is/public_html;
if ($host ~* "www") {
rewrite ^/(.*)$ http://todd.is/$1 permanent;
}
if (-f $request_filename) {
break;
}
if (!-e $request_filename) {
rewrite ^.*$ /index.php last;
}
include /usr/local/nginx/conf/vs_std.conf;
}


That about does it. Let me know if I’ve omitted anything or if you have any questions.

The Pomegranates’ latest record was released in April, so I’m a bit behind the ball on this one, but the first three tracks are worth a listen. They’re not really chaotic, but I wouldn’t call them smooth either. “Beachcomber” has polished edges.

Pomegranates – “Beachcomber”

It reminds me a lot of the movie Adventureland. The high-hat, toms, and repeating riff at the beginning sound like an overexposed cellphone video of your adorable hipster ex-girlfriend smiling her way down Venice Beach on a clear night. Then you get a piano break and a funky resolution.

It’s three songs in one. Enjoy!

Google’s release of free turn-by-turn navigation in their newest release of the Android 2.0 operating system for mobile phones has turned the entire GPS industry upside-down. The incumbents’ and would-be competitors’ responses are a case study in desperation.

For example, the VP of Marketing for the makers of VZ Navigator:

The reason it’s sad for me is that Google is attacking the most profitable part of the mobile software development community.
…
And that brings us to the next point, which is that, if they’re going to make this part of the Android platform, who’s going to do all the dirty work? Who’s going to do that integration and porting work for each new device, each new screen, each new chipset, each new set of firmware, each new tweak to the OS.

Networks in Motion: Google Attacking Developer Community

I’d be sad too if Google took over my entire market because their business model allows them to offer my most valuable product free. If you want to read something truly pathetic, follow the link and read the entire article.

Questioning Google’s engineering capacity is also pretty silly, especially since Android runs on standard hardware and handset manufacturers will decide whether to build compatible phones.

[Google is] willing to destroy value just so others can’t get at it, even if it means destroying value for itself.

How Cloudmade Will Deal With Google Navigation Monster

Google’s providing phenomenal value to consumers and handset manufacturers. Unfortunate that you can’t compete.

But the real story here is the pattern behind Google’s disruption. Nokia, HTC, Palm, Samsung, and LG used to pay a lot to develop operating systems for their phones (or pay Microsoft for Windows Mobile). They passed those costs on to Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile.

Now Google is giving away a OS that can compete with the iPhone and offering to pay partners a percentage of revenue earned on searches conducted on the devices. The same model will apply when their Chrome OS is released for PCs.

This is a total shift. The industry used to spend millions, if not billions, on mobile OS. Now they can EARN money, and in most cases end up with an improved product.

Mobile, the next frontier of personal computing, is an obvious target for this model, but mapping and navigation are natural expansions, too. Whether Google Maps was created as a cool improvement to the then-current best maps available online or a tie-in to search, the potential as a business is enormous.

One solution to diluted advertising dollars is going local. Media giants are experimenting with localized news sites for good reason. Google has long offered advertisers the ability to display ads regionally, because roofers in Albany will probably find sales leads from the Albany Minigazette to be more valuable than leads from the New York Times. Imagine searching for Ethiopian food and being offered a coupon for a restaurant a few blocks away. What could be more powerful?

Google’s investment in geographical services starts to look pretty smart and integral to their core business. Increased relevance leads to more valuable advertising, which leads to higher payouts for device manufacturers and service providers, which leads to increased adoption and search growth.

Look for expansion in areas where Google already has service offerings. Their foray into books is the only other currently-visible service I can see with huge distribution potential. Meanwhile, mobile is the safest of bets.

Ended up catching the tail end of a party last night. Seven of us sat on the floor telling stories and playing catch with a tiny pumpkin, a sleepy pop playlist drifting in the background.

Digging into LAKE’s Let’s Build a Roof this morning was like an extended outro. Goes to show you that tons of personality can play nicely with low-key.

LAKE – “Breathing”

“Breathing” is a good preview and a nice opener — understated bass out front and treble-heavy piano and guitar accents.

LAKE – “Don’t Give Up”

Classic indie aesthetic and adorable female vocals.

LAKE – “Madagascar”

A funky Whitest Boy Alive groove.

LAKE play in Austin November 11 and in San Francisco on the 22nd. I’m planning on SF.

“Second row from the back.”

“Why?”

“That’s where your odds of survival are greatest.”

He laughs for 30 seconds and asks if that’s really true, and I can’t remember where I read it. I just fired up my laptop to do a little work, and I’d hate to be spreading misinformation, so I look it up.

Shit. “I’ve heard this myth so many times and there’s just nothing to support it,” said Nora Marshall, who’s spent 24 years investigating plane crash survivability at the National Transportation Safety Board, in an ABC News article.

But Nora appears to be wrong. The very next result is a Popular Mechanics analysis of 36 years of NTSB crash data from flights with fatalities and survivors that concludes passengers in the back are indeed more likely to live.

They calculated the average fore-and-aft seating position of fatalities and survival rates for four sections of the aircraft.

“Both analytical approaches clearly pointed to the same conclusion: It’s safer in the back.”

Still wasn’t enough to keep me watching until the end, but it’s a great example.

(via Ignore the Code)