Of all the televisions shows that I have watched since I was little, none have left a larger impression upon me than a Japanese anime flick called Trigun.

Anyways while watching the Trigun anime many moons ago, I came across an interesting quote from the main character, Vash the Stampede:

“The ticket to the future is always open.”

With hyperinflation (via massive deficits), swine flu and pychotic dictators preaching nuclear war against their neighbors, I sometimes wonder if the future is going to be as open and friendly as I always dreamed it would be.

Despite the seriousness of these issues, the US is as polarized as ever, with both sides making childish remarks against each other (such as “the party of no” or Telepromter of the US aka TOTUS) instead of finding solutions on common ground.

What ever happened to the help thy neighbor attitude, even if you disagreed with most of their political views?

Perhaps I am naive, but I do know that if we don’t figure out how to work together, the US will be finished as an economic power (not to mention a military one as well).

Which brings me to another quote from Trigun by Rem Saverem:

“And if you can keep your vision clear, you will see the future. What happens in our future is our own responsibility.”

I think it’s time we start working together instead of taking shots at each other, as if the other party were the full reincarnation of the Nazi party.

Because whether we like it or not, it’s going to take ALL OF US to solve these unprecedent times–and if we can not even do that then we might as well dust off our passports and start taking classes in Manderin (aka Chinese).

–Posted via iPhone

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I hate to dissappoint the fan boys and girls on both sides of the fence, but this is not a post bashing one side or the other.

Rather it is simply my reflection of two of the most popular blogging services, Blogger (as well as it’s eternal beta Blogger in Draft) and WordPress.org (not to be confused with WordPress.com, which I would not recommend using due to it’s limitations, which I’ll explain below).

Where WordPress Excels

What I love about WordPress can be summed up in one word: design.

You’ll won’t find a larger collection of beautiful themes outside of this platform, which probably explains why do many Blogger themes are imported from WordPress.

While there are plenty of free WordPress themes out there, I would recommend purchasing a premium theme (like Elegant Themes which is inexpensive).

Another thing I love about WordPress is that it is comment friendly. Instead of using CAPTCHA’s or weird puzzles, WordPress users can use Askimet (spelling?) which uses geek magic to decipher between the spammers and the humans (WordPress.org users I would recommend using WP Spam Free which is better–and free!).

These anti-spam plugins keep make the WordPress commenting design much friendlier–unless of course you are a spammer.

Last but not least the ability to add pages is a plus, which allows you to create an “about me” section, making your blog much more professional.

Where Blogger Excels

Owned by Google, Blogger is the most popular blogging platform online. If I could sum up Blogger in one word, it would be this: freedom.

When it comes to posting media content (whether images, video or iframe documents) Blogger has IMHO no close rival. Users are allowed to embed content from anywhere, without the fear of it being blocked due to “security reasons” (which is why I don’t use WordPress.com).

You can also embed content from Google Docs, a feature I found to be lacking in WordPress (both of them).

Over in the Blogger in Draft arena, users can easily adjust the position of the image within the post by simply dragging it, a feature that makes “dressing up” the post all the easier.

This one feature saves me a lot of time, as I don’t have to muck with the code in order to find the perferct picture placement.

Users can also upload video directly into Blogger, without the need to upload it on YouTube or elsewhere, which is great way to keep the video on your blog instead of infront of the public masses.

Last but not least Blogger’s widgets make it very easy to add, adjust or remove content from your blog, without the need to enter within the admin arena.

Conclusion

While I could have mentioned other items (like WordPress Plugins or specific Blogger widgets), these above pretty much sum up the major differences between the two.

Since neither WordPress or Blogger are meeting my complete needs, I’ve decided to use both platforms until one of them steps up their game. I already have 8 blogs (4 on Blogger, 2 on WordPress.com and 2 running WordPress.org on my own server).

Both WordPress and Blogger are excellent services, although if you are short on cash I would recommend using Blogger (as you can blog on your own domain for $10/year) although if you prefer to host you own blog on your own server, I would suggest using WordPress.org.

–Posted via iPhone

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Ever since Yahoo sold it’s soul the mighty Yuan a few years back by illegally handing user information over to the Chinese authority (which resulted in this poor guy being tortured) I decided to boycott all things Yahoo.

While this may seem trivial to Google fanboys (and girls), this meant that I had to give up some very useful services, like Del.icio.us, Flickr and Jumpcut.

Even though Jerry Yang eventually apologized, I still didn’t feel like placing my info upon their servers until I felt like the company actually cared about keeping it’s users happy than about how many bearocratic rear ends they kissed.

After reading about Yahoo’s current spout with Belgium over user privacy (in which they are protecting the user rights of a few douchbags) I have decided to end my boycott by opening a new Flickr, Delicious and Jumpcut account, as well as unblock Yahoo ads online.

I may even join Yahoo Publisher, although for now I am quite satisfied with Google AdSense.

– Post From My iPhone

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My iPhone battery extender has just arrived in the mail.

While I didn’t expect it to arrive this early (as the USPS tracker was not updating) I am now glad that I can Tweet/blog/game/do excel sheets/game/heavily edit photos/game/Facebook/friendfeed without having to worry about my battery dying.

– Post From My iPhone

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Okay, before this reaches Techmeme, I just wanted to let everyone know that I am not suing Google, rather I am VERY frustrated that one of their online office suites, Google Calendar will NOT stop sending me text messages reminders despite the fact that I sent the STOP command, and even turned off reminders in my gCalendar event.

I thought this was an isolated case, but it seems that numerous folks are experiencing the same thing, on various carriers (AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile).

Since these texts are costing me money, I am going to ban Google indefinitely until this problem is either resolved, or Congress grants me a personal bailout.

Note: For those of you suffering under the same thing as well, just simply call your provider and have them block 483-68.

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Okay, for those of you who have no idea what GrandCentral is, it is like the Gmail for voicemail, organizing your calls and even blocking telemarketers/spam (giving them a “this number has been disconnected” message–heh).

Here is a video explanation below (I think before Google bought them out).

Unfortunately with the recent shutdown of several Google services, some are wondering whether or not Google will be shutting down other services like GrandCentral (which I use on my iPhone thanks to GrandDialer).

Even though GrandCentral is currently free, I am perhaps one of the many users who would be willing to pay a monthly fee to keep it alive.

While Google has not announced any plans to cut any other services, I am attempting to start a mini blog/twitter campaign in order to keep GrandCentral from falling under the Google Axe.

GrandCentral is not only one of the few Google projects that has the potential of revolutionizing its respective arena entirely (in this case voicemail), but also pull its own wait (with a premium feature).

So Google, if you are reading this, please DO NOT DISCONTINUE GrandCentral!!!

Pretty please? :*-(

I was wondering if anyone would


Update (1/27): It looks like Google has some big plans for GrandCentral. Stay tuned!

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