We all know what a tattoo is. They’ve been around for centuries and surely will continue to decorate the skin for centuries to come. Time only enhances them by adding vibrant colors and ink that shows up best under black light. While mothers have always cringed at the thought of their baby getting a tattoo, most of us know someone with a tattoo or two and some of us have our own. Recently, I had a couple more done, so I thought I would post them and some that other people have that are equally as geeky.
I’ll go first
Above is a photo showing all my ink. Almost 3 years ago, I got a parallel port tattooed on my back. That’s the port in the middle that is a little lighter than the rest. I have been in love with computers since the first time I was on one in the early 80’s and it’s something I am very passionate about. Years ago, I wanted to get a bar code, but by time I got around to it, everyone else had one, so I opted for a parallel port instead. It was my first and when it was done, I immediately started thinking about what else I wanted done. Life kept me busy and I eventually started thinking about it again and worked out what I would want next. Last weekend, I headed to Americana Tattoo and added to my collection. The bottom row is a FireWire logo, followed by two FireWire ports. At the top, I finally got my bar code. I figured I shouldn’t care what everyone else has and did it anyway. However, I did make it a little more original. I used an online bar code image generator to generate a Code 128 barcode. I chose this standard because it’s easy to scan. The bar code should actually scan as “Joe” and the numbers underneath it spell out “Joe” in binary. These tattoos are just a small part of a much bigger plan.
Other geeky and nerdy tattoos
There’s a ton of geeky tattoo photos out there on the net, but I just grabbed all these from the Geeky Tattoos pool on Flickr. I had been planning a Matrix port tattoo to go with all my other ports, but I think it needs to be just a bit lower than the one below. I love the Tank Girl tat, because I’m a big Tank Girl fan. Of course, there’s the binary and the HTML-like tags (which are also on my list). Finally, there’s a bigger version of the FireWire logo, proving I’m not the only one crazy enough to ink that into my skin, and the “OMG LOL” tattoo, which has me thinking, well, “OMG! LOL!”.
Now I have questions for you.
1. Do you have any ink? If so, how many, what are they, and where on your body? (picture links are welcome)
2. What’s the geekiest (or your favorite) tattoo you’ve seen?
3. Any plans for geeky tattoos?
I have been slacking on site reviews for a couple reasons. Primarily, a lot of the reviews people want me to do for free aren’t related to technology or the web at all. Then there’s the paid reviews. $100 sounds nice, but not to review something you don’t care about. It’s not fair to you or to the person paying for the review. StylishDesign.com, on the other hand, is about what I have a passion for, so I present to you my first site review in a while.
(added note for clarification: $100 was not the price of this review. $100 was the amount offered by another company that I turned down.)
What is Stylish Design?
In this context, it’s a web site about the many ingredients that go into making web content. The About page still contains WordPress’ default example page content, but here’s the gist of the site, according to the homepage:
Stylishdesign.com is a blog about web designing and other stuff related to web design. On this blog you’ll find a lot of information about search engine optimization, web directories, different tools/softwares, CSS, website templates and so on.
Usability and Aesthetics
One thing I don’t like about a site is when it’s way too cluttered up and too hard to read the content. At the end of the day, the quality of your content is just barely more important than the usability of your site. SytlishDesign doesn’t have a super fancy site design. Instead, they have a very clean and still aesthetically pleasing design that makes reading SD articles what it should be: easy. The latest article is prominently featured at the top of the page and additional articles with preview snippets are below it. For a new site, it looks very professional, and that can make all the difference between success and failure.
Content is King
That is the saying, isn’t it? Stylish Design is still a pretty new blog, but they have already formed a content pattern. It seems that Robert is much more in tune with the server side of the web equation, writing articles about serving up static web pages, HTTP Request headers (very important to know about when developing dynamic sites), and my personal favorite, functions and codes.
While I still see a CSS article void that I imagine will be filled soon enough, there is at least one article that touches on SEO, as well. It talks about how submitting content to article directories can be good for traffic. Design is pretty negotiable and programming is straight-forward, but SEO is a tricky beast and I am anxious to see more articles from them in that arena.
I don’t think that I’ve yet mentioned that I am a amateur photographer, armed with a slightly older digital camera, little time, and some creativity. I think I have taken some good photos, but I still view myself as a newbie and I’m always looking for improvement. I could use a camera upgrade, but I’m learning new tricks and getting more ideas all the time, too.
A year ago, I found out about a site called JPG Magazine. The concept of the site/magazine is laughably simple. Photographers (amateurs included) submit their photography to the site. Members of the site vote on which photos should make the magazine. Chosen photos are then placed into the print magazine and the photographers, in many cases, receive compensation for their work.
I have an account. You should go check it out. What drew me to the site, initially was the thought of someone like me having one of my photos in a print magazine. Who wouldn’t want that? I still haven’t gotten anything printed, but the site has other advantages, even if you never make a print edition. Other people’s photographs often get my creative juices flowing and help me think about different things to shoot and different ways to shoot things. Lately, I’ve really been wanting to get a more professional camera with a macro lens for closer shots.
(click any image to see it full size)
One feature of the site that makes me go back pretty often is the themes. Every month, they release a handful of new themes to which you may submit a photo. Of those, a few will be themes for the next issue. You can only submit one photo per theme, which makes the photographer really think about which single photo to submit. The themes are one of my favorite sources of new ideas, mainly because I find myself looking for a new photograph to shoot that can fit in one of the themes. For example, the recent Delectable theme inspired my late night “Chocolate Alien” photograph. I should remind you that I’m an amateur here.
If you’ve been tinkering with your camera and looking for inspiration or for a place to share your photographs and get opinions on your work, check this site out.
I went for dinner at a new Thai place tonight and saw these animated figures across the street (see video below). I’m not sure if it is significant to a specific event at the Phoenix Art Museum, but I thought it was interesting anyway.
The display is rather large, as can be seen here during the day:
Hey Micah! Hail a New York City cab and tell the driver to take you to California. A site called ModMyLife aims to give users full control over some poor sap in New York. Tell him what to do and where to go. The possibilities are endless. OK, maybe not endless. I’ve requested my private beta account. We’ll see if I get one.
The domain is owned by Andrew Keidel, and while I couldn’t find much more on him, I did find some more information from NewTeeVee and WebTVWire, who both compared this (as they should) to the famous Subservient Chicken website that was successful in distracting many of us for 15 minutes while simultaneously making marketing teams everywhere think about how and when they should attempt a viral marketing campaign. I have a feeling that this will be just as big, with better longevity.
I have made requests for further information and await my beta account. Until then…
I don’t think that I’ve yet mentioned that I am a amateur photographer, armed with a 
A year ago, I found out about a site called 
