just 'cause you feel it

Meanwhile, on the steps of the California Supreme Court

2008-05-16T03:39:13Z

The SF Chronicle was at the courthouse for the California Supreme Court ruling today for reactions. You can spot San Francisco City Hall, where all of this began four years ago, kitty-corner in the background.

California Gay Marriage Ruling

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Beau's AIDS/LifeCycle Challenge

2008-05-13T20:38:12Z

Ride to End AIDS

Our office was featured last week as one of Valleywag's 10 best workspaces and a mention of our bike garage right before Bike to Work Day gave Beau an idea. Last friday morning Beau had that smile he gets whenever he comes up with something really good (he does it quite a lot) and I knew this was going to be good.

So many people here in the Six Apart office bike, walk or ride transit (we don't even have parking) already, I'd barely noticed the Bike to Work Day was coming up. Beau didn't need to convince anyone that we as should do something together as a company to support Bike to Work Day, so we'll be doing something special here on Vox along with TypePad. For folks in San Francisco, we'll be handing out snacks and drinks to cyclists out front. .

Beau is going another step further though, offering to donate $10 to AIDS/LifeCycle for everyone in the office who rides a bike to work on Thursday. This will be the third time I will be riding the 7 day, 545 mile fundraiser and this year Alex and Mike are joining me as first time riders.

You can help us too with a donation of support to (me) Jamison (rider 2008), Alex (rider 2004), and Mike (rider 2050).

And if you're in San Francisco, swing by Six Apart HQ thursday morning for snacks on your way to work. We're located at 548 Fourth Street, midway between Bryant and Brannan on the way towards the Caltrain station.

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Congratulations Theme Contest Winners

2008-04-23T14:48:02Z

We've announced the winners of our Design to Inspire Theme Contest, and while we haven't yet made an official Team Vox post, I wanted to thank everyone who submitted their banner and congratulate our winners.

Update: After announcing the contest winners, we discovered the first prize winner was not original artwork and was not eligible under the contest rules. Vox member Terri now joins the winners circle as our third prize winner. Congratulations again to everyone.

First Prize

River at Night by Teresa

Second Prize

Live and Learn by Gollykim

Third Prize

Vector Drips by Terri

It's time for a round of "who's the toaster"

2008-04-11T06:17:50Z

Ok, first off, spoiler alert for the first episode of season 4, action stations! So this week it looks like we're going to learn who the last Cylon is, well the commercial promises "all will be revealed" at least. I'm going to take that too mean we learn who the twelfth and final human Cylon is and have some theories...

Who I don't think is a Cylon:

Gaius because he represents what man will to his fellow man in his own self-interest. We don't know if he feels any guilt for causing the near extinction of his own species, not once, but twice. Caprica Six would also be free of the guilt It would also ruin the whole thing with Six being inside his head while Caprica has a version of Baltar in hers as equal and opposite.

Bill Adama or Laura Roslyn because they are the mother and father figures and stand in opposition to Gaius because they've put the survival of the human ahead of their own lives. They both believe in the rule of law, they've also subverted the law when they believed they had to and the justified the means with the ends. It wasn't that long ago Bill had thrown the president in the brig and she tried to rig an election. Bill challenges us to be better, "it's not enough to survive, we never proved we deserved to" and while the president struggles with internal and external religious conflicts. All very human stuff.

Helo shows us that love can conquer. He found out she was a Cylon and pregnant at the same time shortly after her people launched a nuclear holocaust on his people. And now they're married with a baby girl.

D or Gaeta, cause really?

Cally for a couple reasons. Would ruin the drama if it turned out both she and the Chief are Cylons. He's now got a secret he can't tell her and makes him different from her.

Kara for much the same reasons but with Anders, minus a kid. I think they're setting this up so she will be accused of being a Cylon for a complete mind-frak on everyone: Anders is already freaked out, and now that Lee is not in the military they have to make him useful with a reason for being on Galactica and being either her defense attorney or the prosecutor, either of which will be awkward. Adama will probably feel he's been betrayed by a woman he considers his daughter, and/or his son, and/or President Roslyn depending on her roll in all of it.

So that leaves...

Lee. Who could possibly be more shocking to Adama, Roslyn or Kara? He's been a moral compass for the president and his father. Everyone has repeatedly placed their lives in his hands and he's come through. Last week Lee asked his father a question, if his brother Zak still alive, but turned out to be a Cylon would it change anything? Well, what if Adama was faced with his son being a Cylon? Anders asked Kara the same question of himself and she said she'd put a bullet through his brain. Would she feel that way if she found out Lee was a Cylon?

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I need your support

2008-03-19T19:03:22Z

Guess what I'm doing for my summer vacation?

I'm spending 7 straight days riding my bike 545 miles from San Francisco to Los Angeles to fight AIDS. On June first I'll be setting out on my third AIDS/LifeCycle ride.

If you are not familiar AIDS/LifeCycle yet, this week long fundraising event for the San Francisco AIDS Foundation and LA Gay and Lesbian Center raised over $11 million last year alone to help those living with HIV/AIDS and through counseling, education and working with governments to develop policy that will stop the spread of the disease.

I've set a goal of raising $6,000 this year and I need your donation of support to get there. Every rider has pledged to raise a minimum of $2,500, but I know I can do more because with the support of friends and coworkers I've raised over $12,000 between the two previous times I've ridden.

Please consider making a donation of support to help those living with HIV/AIDS and stop the spread of this deadly disease. Thank you all.

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QotD: Meaningful Words

2008-03-14T23:58:07Z

What is your favorite quote and why?

America is at its best when given a challenge. I have two quotes that are very much in that vein. The first is from Thomas Paine's pamphlet Crisis. Written during the height of the Revolutionary War,

"What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value."

The other is John F. Kennedy's speech on why America should go to the moon. He challenged America to do what had been almost unthinkable a decade before. This time America was challenged to live up to its potential, and it did.

"We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win"

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Gaylord of the Dance

2008-03-06T18:32:18Z

Gaylord of the Dance

Bruising my tailbone snowboarding has had me off mike bike for the last month, and I already felt pretty far behind training for this summer's AIDS/LifeCycle ride from SF to LA, but I haven't raised much yet and while this guy has gone all out with a video which got picked up on SFist today. SFist's Brock goes a bit negative about the "fundraisers that will litter the city for the next few months or so", but with a government that places tax cuts over health funding we need to find the money to fight and treat HIV/AIDS somewhere. So why not make a party out of it?

Andrew, the fat one in the video, works for the AIDS/LifeCycle and hand delivered the rider information packets to me and everyone else who knew to so the money for stamps could go to fight HIV/AIDS instead. Please support the fight against AIDS, by supporting me with a donation.

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Separate is not equal

2008-03-05T00:09:46Z

The Wedding Line

The California State Supreme Court heard arguments over gay marriage today. Four years after San Francisco let the gays get married, when for a few weeks around Valentine's Day you could almost see that love was in the air.

Today, plaintiffs argued separate not equal, and the state is violating the equal protection clause while opponents made their case separate is equal with California's domestic partnership laws for gays that heterosexual-only marriage is a tradition and important to procreation.

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Vote for TypePad!

2008-03-03T20:53:23Z

This year your vote will be an important one, setting the direction of the nation and the world. So I ask you, please Vote TypePad!

Many of you know I work on Vox, I did much of the interaction design on it. Well, we've been working on bringing all these awesome Vox themes to our other Six Apart products and instead of just porting them over, we've been working on a design assistant tool to let users browser themes like you can here on Vox. Please take a moment and help us here at Six Apart out by voting for TypePad in the Techcrunch poll.

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Chinatown

2008-03-03T16:59:05Z

Saturday, Brian and I went on a walking tour of Chinatown and I got plenty of photos. Flickr photo set

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