GroovyMojo.com

As far as I’m concerned, iTunes has just been replaced.  This is the future of music distribution right here.  I stumbled onto Magnatune after hearing one of their artists on an Internet radio station … Claire Fitch … I had to immediately go find her album.  They had it on iTunes, but I Googled her for more information, and that is when I found this place.

She has two albums.  I picked up both.  And after sampling the other artists, I know I’m going to be spending a lot of time here.

Just the fact that they have some amazing music sold me.

But beyond that, check out what Magnatune features:

• DRM Free music in the format of your choice, including uncompressed WAV.
• They encourage you to share the music by granting you license to give it to three of your friends.
• You get to choose how much you pay for it.
• If you ever lose it, you can download it again.
• You can listen to the entire song or album online before buying it.
• 50% of the money made by any sales, including merchandising, etc., goes directly to the artist.
• They are all about the music, the promotion of music, and consider the RIAA as evil.

What more can I say?  Magnatunes is just plain groovy.

There are only a few books I can point to and say, “That changed my life.” David Allen’s Getting Things Done is the latest. It’s a very Zen and common sense approach to increasing your productivity and lowering your stress levels, and it has helped me tremendously.

The secret is to organize in a simple way, and empty your mind of all the things you need to do by putting them down on paper or PDA. The point is to have an uncluttered mind so that when you turn your attention to something, you can turn your entire attention to it. The system you set up enables you to not worry about forgetting this or that important thing, which really does lower your stress levels.

It’s made me realize, once again, that the simplest answers to problems are the best and often the most profound.

The book has spawned an entire subculture and influenced numerous websites, my favorite of which is Lifehacker, which I read daily. Lifehacker feeds you a continuous stream of tips to help “hack” your life and make it better, embracing the concept of Allen’s Getting Things Done (GTD is how Lifehacker refers to it). They, in turn, pull from a whole group of other sites that are dedicated to the same thing.

If you’re stumbling through life juggling 40 things in your head, and keep forgetting half of them, and never seem to have the time to do any of it — and stressing out because of that — then I highly recommend taking a close look at GTD. It worked for me

If you are curious about where a famous person is buried, or which famous people are buried in your local cemetery, there’s an online place called “Find A Grave” where you can find out: www.findagrave.com

You can search by person, by location, and by claim to fame. There are numerous other options, including the ability to search for your own ancestors, making this a virtual Google of the dead.

Best of all, it’s free.

If you spend too much time there, though, it starts to get creepy. Maybe that’s just me.

I am happy to announce another spin-off site has gone live this evening: GroovyGizmo.com

It’s just getting off the ground, but already we’ve got:

• Coke bottles set to “stun”
• Introduction of the “Wammer”
• Cold beer flying at your head
• And a guy who zooms through the sky like a genuine super-hero

If you’re into gizmos and gadgets, please feel free to go take a look. And, if you’ve got one for us to look at, please contact us.

Thanks!

An email showed up this morning warning me not to feed grapes or raisins to dogs, and I thought … oh that’s BS. I’m checking Snopes.com.

But sure enough, it’s true. It can cause their kidneys to fail. So I read on and found a number of things we eat that are poisonous to our canine family members:

• Grapes
• Raisins
• Chocolate
• Coco
• Macadamia Nuts
• Onions
• Potato peelings and green looking potatoes

I don’t currently have a dog, but plan to adopt one again sometime in the near future, and I’m going to keep this list handy (and updated here on the web) because I’m sure this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Ever wonder if some of those things that pop up in your email are real? Are people really raising kittens inside glass bottles? Did a turkey really bite President Bush in the privates? Is Starbucks really a money laundering operation for the mafia?

Fortunately for everyone, you don’t have to guess. Simply go to Snopes.com and look it up. If they don’t have it listed, give them a few days, it’ll show up.

Most of that stuff is complete BS … but more surprisingly, some of it is actually real. Urban legends have to start somewhere. But do yourself and everyone else a favor. Make sure to let that friend who keeps forwarding all that stuff know they should be checking Snopes before clicking the send button.

If you’re looking for a place to start a blog, and don’t want to invest in your own provider or bother installing software, here’s a list of the major free providers out there.  I created this mainly because I searched for such a list and didn’t find one.

• Blogger - the original, now powered by Google goodness
• Xanga - my personal favorite, but mainly because of my friends there
• MySpace - everyone loves to hate it yet everyone is there
• LiveJournal - lots of serious journalers here!
• Vox - new kid on the block, it’s feature rich and well designed
• WordPress - they make my favorite software and now do hosting too
• Yahoo 360 - well established user base, nice templates
• Windows Live Spaces - Mac and Linux users welcome too

Am I missing someone?  That is, one that’s free and doesn’t suck?  If so please let me know, I’ll add it to the list!

Anyone out there who’s interested in reptiles as pets, specifically lizards, may enjoy our spinoff website MojoLizard.com. It’s only one of many new sites under the umbrella of the newly christened “GroovyMojo Media.”

Why lizards? Because lizards are cool. I’ve been fascinated with them since childhood, and so this is my excuse for keeping up the interest. “I have to do this, you see … I own a website dedicated to them.” The end justifies the means.

Check it out if you’re so inclined… And thanks for reading!

If Monty Python had access to the University of British Columbia’s online English-Latin Dictionary, they would have known the name “Biggus Dickus” isn’t correct (it’s Maximus Erectum).

This Java based translator was written by Djun M. Kim, of the University’s Mathematics Department, and features a slick, fast, and uncomplicated interface.

Anyone who has a love for language will have fun looking up Latin terms, and then discovering the basis for many contemporary words.

Optimus oraculum, baby.

Direct quote from the Dalai Lama (via GMSV) from the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, last Saturday:

“Although Buddhist contemplative tradition and modern science have evolved from different historical, intellectual and cultural roots, I believe that at heart they share significant commonalities, especially in their basic philosophical outlook and methodology.

“On the philosophical level, both Buddhism and modern science share a deep suspicion of any notion of absolutes, whether conceptualized as a transcendent being, as an eternal, unchanging principle such as soul, or as a fundamental substratum of reality.

“Both Buddhism and science prefer to account for the evolution and emergence of the cosmos and life in terms of the complex interrelations of the natural laws of cause and effect.

“From the methodological perspective, both traditions emphasize the role of empiricism. For example, in the Buddhist investigative tradition, between the three recognized sources of knowledge - experience, reason and testimony - it is the evidence of the experience that takes precedence, with reason coming second and testimony last.

“This means that, in the Buddhist investigation of reality, at least in principle, empirical evidence should triumph over scriptural authority, no matter how deeply venerated a scripture may be.

“Even in the case of knowledge derived through reason or inference, its validity must derive ultimately from some observed facts of experience.”

Very interesting. Especially considering the recent endorsement of science given by the Pope himself. So what’s going on in the world when major religions start nodding approval at science?