Blogging Live from Coachella: 1:25pm

What I'm doing right now is overrated, but I'm doing it nonetheless. I arrived in Indio today at about 12 and got onto the fairgrounds at about 12:30pm. I just missed the opening acts.

Coachella has this big tent with laptops + WiFi for anyone to use. So I'm doing what I usually do, write posts.

Off to the festival, hopefully I don't get burnt. Off to Phraroahe Monch (sp) There will be plenty of pictures tomorrow.

Coachella Prep

A few months ago, we wrote a post or two about music festivals and their relative awesomeness. Well, tomorrow is the day I take off for Coachella (the weekend before finals at LMU). I'm making a list of essentials, although if you're going to Sasquatch! you may want to bring an umbrella and down jacket. Here are a few things I'm bringing with me or will be picking up along the way:

• Water. Two gallons of it. I sure as hell am not paying $7 for 12 ounces.


• Sunscreen. Tanning comes easily to me, but skin cancer does not.


• Digital Camera. I like bragging.


• Ass-crazy outfit.


• Sunglasses.


• One hundred dollars. Pimping is not easy.


• A good night's rest. Dancing takes energy.


• Headband. I have to fit in.


• Questioning why I decided to write this.


• Tickets.


• Set Times.

Did I forget anything? Oh wait, I can't hear you, I'm listening to Arcade Fire, RHCP, the Rapture, LCD Soundsystem, Steve Aoki, !!!, Sparklehorse, Girl Talk, Andrew Bird, Pharoahe Monch, Regina Spektor, Kings of Leon, the Decemberists, and Tiesto. Sorry.

HowTo: Sound Sophisticated

Digg is stealing away our job!

Here's a great find from the front page of digg that is sometimes a little too true. The post is aimed at guys, but it's a good read for both sexes.

I do believe it is time for tea: The Complete Guide to Faking Sophistication [DoubleViking.com]

Latin Phrases Ad Nauseam

Because of the expectations for astute discourse in distinguished establishments, the necessity of the deprecated Latin language is a must.

Brought to you by Mr. Conrad of Ohio State is a list of Latin phrases for your everyday conversation and papers.

Sacra bos! (Holy cow!): Latin phrases used in English [Ohio-state.edu/~econrad]

How To: Syncing Your Creative Zen Vision:M

The Creative Zen Vision:M was awarded Best in Show and Best in Mp3 and Portable Audio in the 2006 CES Awards. Because of that, I'm sure I'm not the only college student who owns one.

Therefore, I'd like to share with you the media software I use to sync up to it.

• MediaMonkey is a free mp3 Jukebox Player that will manage, tag, organize, convert, create, and synchronize all your PC music to your Zen. As a media player, it also comes with a "Party Mode", so you can set up what music you want played, leave it running/blasting on your laptop, and know no one can mess with it --which is very, very important if you plan on serving alcohol to the nontechnical. Also, another big thing is: MediaMonkey will also synchronize your Playlists. Yes, the ones that you create with:


• MusicIP Mixer is the original "mixer". Its best feature is the ability to select one track and then "mix" several tracks along with it --that are of a similar "mood". You can even specify how long you want your mix to be --1 hour, 2 hours, 5 hours, etc.

Oh, killing the iPod is pure art. (Though I'm sure Kelly owns an iPod!)

Study Stickies: Social note taking from books, videos, podcasts, and more.

Study Stickies allows you to better understand and remember books (both printed and online), videos, podcasts, online documents, etc.

In particular, you can use the service to add notes to your textbooks without using (real) stickies or marking them up in any way. This allows you to more easily browse and search through your notes in one place while keeping your books in good condition.

You can, if you like, share your notes with others. Sharing of notes allows users of the service to learn from each other. For example, if you get stuck on some topic in your textbook, you can see if anyone has made any insightful notes about it.

Check it out: Study Stickies

$10,000 Scholarship

So CollegeToolkit.com is offering a $10,000 scholarship for students. Submit an essay (i.e. you can submit one you've already written) and get other users of the site to vote for you.

Let me repeat that: There are no outside judges.

So if you've got loads of "friends" (via Facebook, Myspace, Friendster, Glee, whatever), you just get them to join the site and vote for your essay. Popularity contest? Maybe. Scheme to get a larger user base? Definitely.

Essays are due July 31st, but it's probably the best idea to submit your essay early and spend the rest of your efforts getting "votes". So hit the comments with a link to your essay, if you submit one. We'll vote. ;)

RSS Made Easy: Keeping Up With Stuff on the Web

There's a great video online over at commoncraft that beautifully explains RSS technology and how to use it. I predict RSS is going to as important to know how to use as surfing the Internet itself. If you still don't know how RSS works, watch the video.

I use Google Reader and recently I've tripled the blogs I read and halved the time I spend visiting them. Efficiency at its best. Don't forget to subscribe to the HackCollege RSS feed.

Video: RSS in Plain English [commoncraft]