Aaron Antrim’s blog

I have 4 different email addresses that collect into one inbox that sorts messages automatically. I also have about three different phone numbers that don’t do that are are a pain-in-the-a** for everyone.

No more! I’m starting to use GrandCentral. You can call me here: (707) 633-4464. It rings everything. I can send you an invite if you want to use GrandCentral, too.

You can even use this web-form to call me:

aaron :: Jul.19.2007 :: Uncategorized :: No Comments »

I’ve said it before: the United States is addicted to our cars.

Check out my friend Megan Miller’s collage she’s working on (which expresses this, among many other themes):

aaron :: Jul.18.2007 :: Uncategorized :: 1 Comment »

My friend Brandon Hemenway has proposed a really big project to change the political debate in the United States.  Instead of our shallow “Hard Ball”/”Crossfire”/”Ann Coulter” political debates, which are often not evidence-based, he has conceived of a way of using online tools to facilitate more logical debate — users on the internet will be able to participate in creating these graphs.

As an exercise, we decided to map out a current debate here in Humboldt County, the rail/trail debate.   Here’s what we produced.  I think it’s a pretty useful way of visuallizing information.

Download the entire rail banking debate PDF file (with two conclusions mapped out)

If you want to participate in this project — in brainstorming, developing the technical tools, art, visuals, marketing and promotion, or just watching it take shape, go to the “Our Country” Google group.

aaron :: Jul.18.2007 :: Information tech, U.S. Politics :: No Comments »

Check this out:

I made two “bookmarklets” that let you browse through books at Amazon.com, and then with one click, search for it at the HSU Library and in the Humboldt County Library.

To use ‘em, just drag these links to your toolbar.

Humboldt County

Humboldt State University

Then, when you’re at a book’s page on Amazon.com, just click one of the links to search for the book at the library. I wish I could have made bookmarklets for the CSU System and the Northern State Co-op Library system (you can have book’s inter-library loaned to you). I like this because it allows you to utilize Amazon.com, which, in most ways, is more powerful for browsing titles than the library catalogs, but also makes getting books FREE! And plus, it just strikes me that libraries are wonderful, underutilized, and resource-efficient (paper should never be used for things that are read only once).

Here’s where you can go to generate bookmarklets for other libraries.

I discovered this at 43folders.com, an inspiring resource for cultivating zen-like efficient organization and work habits I’ve read in the past and just added to my Google Reader.

aaron :: Jul.14.2007 :: Humboldt County, Information tech :: No Comments »

Way back in 2006, I helped start Appropedia, a wiki site for appropriate technology. I’ve gone from doing the initial research to choose MediaWiki to being less and less involved with the project, but I still love seeing its success. On July 7th, Appropedia hit 1,000,000 pageviews!

Oh, and just for good measure, I’m including a pic of the solar hot water system worked on a team to design and build last summer in Parras. Relevance? The project is on Appropedia.

aaron :: Jul.11.2007 :: Uncategorized :: 2 Comments »