Apple Listens!

I suggested a streaming service for iTunes...

And now they've patented it!

But will they also "push" iTunes store purchases? Syncing music to my iPhone and my laptop, after buying it on my iPhone? I don't care if I have to be WiFi connected to do it! Gimme!!

I downloaded a bunch of free songs from Starbucks the other day - they had these little takeaway credit card sized ads for songs and their artists, with download codes for redemption at the iTunes store. I figured what they hell, they're free. Not sure how good they are though, have to listen some more.

Clark Ashton Smith

I knew that Zombie Chic would bring Clark Ashton Smith back.

http://www.amazon.com/Collected-Fantasies-Clark-Ashton-Smith/dp/1597800287/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218153967&sr=1-1

He's been reprinted again, this time in what looks like a fairly professional binding. Smith is the ultimate dismal fantasist; he writes stories in settings at two ends of the spectrum: Hyperborea, and Zothique. Hyperborea is the pre-historical Conan-era fantasy setting, and Zothique is the post-apocalyptical end-of-Earth setting. They are surprisingly similar, though the tone of the Hyperborea stories typically tends to be quite a bit more upbeat than the tone of the gothic filled-with-zombies-and-necromancers tales of Zothique.

I highly recommend him. He's a great mix of both Lovecraft and Howard, but without the overly-stodgy hard to read quality of Lovecraft, and with more sophistication than Howard could muster up.