So I have this aunt…

She’s 87 years old and sharp as a tack.

She’s been a widow for twenty years, but has usually had a boyfriend since her husband died.

She lives alone next door. She’s always been like a second mother to me, but we both value our privacy and stay out of each other’s hair most of the time.

She drives (well) and uses a computer. She rarely asks for help with the latter.

She works in the yard and keeps a spotless house.

And now, after probably 70 years with the habit, she has quit smoking.

I fully expect her to be the first one in our family to make it to (and past) the age of 100. Hell, she’ll probably outlive me. And I fully approve.

It was twenty years ago today…

…that I bought my first computer: a Macintosh 6300CD, with a 100 MHz processor, 16 MB of RAM, a 1 GB internal hard drive, and a 15-inch CRT monitor.

Talk about your life-changing moments. I built the first version of this website a month later (at a time when most people were still a little fuzzy on the concept of just what a website was) and i was building them for pay within a couple of years. Twenty years later, I’m a librarian working in the IT department who generates historical web content for a living.

Let’s just say it beats the fuck out of managing a Kinko’s.

I’m on my fifth primary Mac now: a 27-inch iMac with a 3.4 GHz processor, 8 GB of RAM, and a 1 TB internal drive. I’ve also owned three other secondary ones, three iPhones, two iPads, and an AppleTV…all of which makes me little more than a third-rate fanboy.

And for the record, that twenty-year-old Mac still works.

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A very kine Christmas

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While watching Christmas specials from the 1960s on GetTV, it struck me that, while they would originally have been videotaped, the versions bring shown looked to be from a really bad film transfer process. I assumed it was some favor of kinescope (the process that allowed live black and white shows to be recorded on film for later rebroadcast in the 1950s, before videotape).

I knew videotape was still quite pricey even in the 1960s and was reused often, which is why so much TV from that era (particularly game shows, soap operas, and talk shows) just doesn’t exist anymore. But when I dived into the interwebz looking for stuff on “color kinescope” I was surprised to discover how common it had been to preserve videotaped shows this way, even in the 1960s and beyond.

None of this probably matters much to most of you, but after an hour or so passed, it occurred to me that this is why I never seem to get anything much done on Sunday afternoons.

Along with my habit of never finishing and old movie or TV show because I’m too busy trying to decipher where the location shots were done and finding contemporary views on Google Street View, this is probably why I will die alone and unloved. And I’m pretty much OK with that.

Otherstream at 20: 1996

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13 January 2016 will be the twentieth anniversary of the site that became Otherstream. In a rather egotistical observance of that anniverasry, I’m focusing on one year per day in the twenty days leading up to the anniversary, linking to some favorite and important (or just inane and disposable) posts from each year. Today, we start with 1996.

Otherstream did not start as a journal/blog site–or even one named “Otherstream.” Planet SOMA was more of a static site with information about San Francisco neighborhoods, some dirty pictures, rants about annoying aspects of faggotry, and some biographical info about me. It was the early days of the web and frankly, any presence at all was was still much more than 99% of people had in that pre-Wordpress, pre-Facebook era when most people didn’t even know what a website was. i didn’t start doing personal updates till several months in.

Aside from the birth of the website, 1996 was pretty pivotal in other ways as well. It marked the end of traditional full-time employment for the next six years, the end of the car I moved to San Francisco with, and several interesting road trips. It was really the beginning of a new era for me.

August

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October

November

December

Otherstream at 20: 1997

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As a self-indulgent tribute to twenty years on the web, I’m looking back at one year a day leading to the actual anniversary on 13 January 2016. 1997 was all about free time, road trips, building a new website, and the occasional bit of debauchery. It was also the year I started questioning my relationship with San Francisco.

January

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Otherstream at 20: 1998

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Looking back at twenty years on the web in prepration for my anniversary on 13 January. Today’s focus is 1998, the year I began doing web work professionally and realy began to question whether I wanted to spend the rest of my life in San Francisco.

January

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July

The Idiot Factor: Pilot for a  new series that never quite took off except as a running theme.

August

September

  • A Quinn Martin Production: This was actually the first “blog” post on the site, although we didn’t call them that at the time.

October

November

December

Otherstream at 20: 1999

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The big twentieth anniversary is 13 January 2016. Today, it’s all about 1999, when I lost a roommate, pissed off a lot of people talking about gentrification, and started obsessively documenting old supermarkets. I think this was my favorite year of the website (so more links than the other “retrospectives” today) though in retrospect it comes across as a trifle whiny at times.

January

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September

October

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December

Otherstream at 20: 2000

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Anniversary soon. Today? Y2K, when I apparently hated everything, especially San Francisco. OK, I still don’t care much for san Francisco.

Favorites and milestones from the textual diarrhea that was 2000:

January

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December