Fun Friday: Jezebel is Gone, Bugs are Edible, and Disposable Camcorders

Well, Jezebel is gone. Jezebel, for those who don’t know, was the jaguar at Happy Hollow in San Jose. All my kids loved to visit her when they were little (the oldest is now 20). I always thought she was smiling. We will really miss her.

For all those programmers out there – if you are really sick of those tedious debug cycles, there is hope. You can actually eat those bugs – in Mexico. “It’s just like eating a regular hot dog, but with five or six times the nutritional value.” (Juan Garcia Oviedo, Biologist).

Lastly, you know something is on the edge of complete obsolescence when it’s still expensive to make but they have to sell it as a “disposable”. That what Benny Evangelista tried in his review of the Pure Digital Technologies disposable (kind of) camcorder. The reason they say you want one – it does 640×480 30fps, and you can trade video files. Funny thing is, I can do that with a digital camera. And I own it. And it’s small. And I can use the latest memory cards. Oh, and did I mention I own it.

For example, the Canon SD200 is a 640×480 30fps camera. Costs about $200. Uses standard SD cards you can buy anywhere. Plenty of room for switching cards or using a gig card. Has a very good editing feature for clips. You’re not limited to most recent clip or anything like that. Also has great image capability. My son Ben Jolitz used this camera for a short comedy feature film festival entry (high school level) this year called “Bots” (see “Fun Friday: How Many Robots Can You Name?”). It’s very very small and light – fits in a pocket. And he did a pro level production with it.

It has optical zoom, unlike the camcorder. If you want to spend more money, plenty of cameras have auto-stabilization (look at some of those Sonys, will ya, and they’re 60fps!!!). You’re not limited to 20 minutes – just switch memory cards, and they’re getting bigger for cheaper all the time.

I suppose if you want a DVD fast, this might work. But there are so many DVD burners on the market. While I always love labor saving processes, I just can’t endorse this one. Now, maybe if they decided to offer digital cameras instead…

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