…Well, not exactly; sadly, I haven’t been back since 2000. But because I am so very, very cool, I had an article in the December edition of England’s Computer Music magazine on using technology to improve lead vocals. It’s not online, but if you’re in the US, it’s the issue that’s currently on the shelves at your local Borders or Barnes & Noble–that’s where I picked up my copy tonight.

I haven’t been blogging as much lately about home recording because of all the Pajamas-related stuff that went on this fall here at Casa de Ed, which pushed that particular hobby of mine temporarily somewhat in the background. But I’m eager to get back to it this new year, if only for its theraputic value, and to not allow whatever meager music and recording skills I’ve honed off and on over the last 20+ years to go to waste. And as an offshoot, look for additional music-related articles online and on dead tree, from time to time this year as well.

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That was the slogan for a series of TV commercials for the old Atari 2600 game system in the late ’70s and early ’80s, as you can see in this ultra-cheesy vintage clip.

And if you’d like a history of the 2600, my latest bi-monthly “Micro Memories” column for Nuts & Volts magazine is devoted to the rise and fall of the Cartridge Family.

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Speaking of Electronic House, I have a piece on Digital Rights Management in the November/December issue of their sister publication, TechLiving.

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I have an article in the October issue of PC World that explains how to use Adobe’s Premiere Elements software to make surprisingly professional DIY DVDs–and it’s online now.

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I have an article on the Apollo Guidance Computer in my bi-monthly “Micro Memories” column in Nuts & Volts magazine, with several photos supplied by the Computer History Museum in Mountain View California that you might enjoy. Sadly, it’s not online, but it should be at your local Borders or Barnes & Noble, or you can click here to subscribe.

And for more old school outer space action, check out my piece on Spacecraft Films’ Apollo DVDs over at Tech Central Station.

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I have a short primer on blogs in the September/October issue of TechLiving magazine that you might enjoy–it should be arriving at your local Borders or Barnes & Noble shortly. I think the text is onnly available online to subscribers; if that changes, I’ll let you know.

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An article that I wrote last summer for the Unique Homes real estate magazine on high-end home theater is now online.

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I have an article explaining the basics of DLP-based TV sets in TechLiving magazine.

Makes for nice reading if you’re planning on a new 50 or 60-inch TV set to kick off another year of watching the NFL–whose preseason is right around the corner.

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Note: I wrote the bulk of this post late last night, before I woke up to the news of the terrorist bombing in London. I’ve only modified this piece slightly; I apologize if it sounds too exuberant after the news today.

I have two articles inside the July Nuts & Volts, that are curiously interconnected.

The first is an update to a piece I wrote for the July 2001 issue of N&V. Back then, I did a piece for N&V on Silicon Valley’s Computer History Museum. At the time, it was located in the oddest and funkiest of locations–a Quonset hut on the former US Navy air base at Moffett Field (now controlled by NASA). In early September, I spun that article off into a shorter and slightly less technical version for National Review Online, back when they had their now sorely lamented “NRO Weekend” feature. A new blogger, whose Weblog had only gone up back in late August happened to spot it, which I only found when I did a vanity search on Google. (All writers do Google–and now Technorati vanity search–usually a few times a day…) That blogger? Glenn Reynolds.

This of course was all in the weeks leading up to 9/11, which would cause literally thousands upon thousands of Weblogs to spring up in response.

Flash-forward to 2005. Glenn’s blog, and Power Line and their “Blog of the Year” sobriquet bestowed by Time magazine are both featured in my new article on Weblogs, along with numerous quotes from multiple interviews I conducted with Hugh Hewitt. The article includes explanations of how that term was derived, how to start a new blog, and what the Long Tail is, and how it benefits new blogs. If you’ve read the articles I’ve written for online publications since 2002 on Weblogs, a lot of this will be old hat, but I tried to write the piece as a primer for those coming in cold to the Blogosphere and wondering simultaneously what the heck a Weblog is, how they managed to raise so much hell last year, and how to get in on the fun.

If you’re thinking of starting a blog in light of today’s events, it could be a good starting point to get your ideas together before “going live”.

As for the Computer History Museum, they moved into swank new facilities last year, a huge step up from their old Quonset hut days. If you can’t make it out to Silicon Valley to visit in person, it’s a great primer (at least I think) on the museum, its origin, and some of the rare pieces of computing history that’s on display there.

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Brian Anderson is the senior editor of the the Manhattan Institute’s estimable City Journal magazine. He has a new book that’s just hit the streets (and Amazon) called South Park Conservatives. It builds on themes discussed in this Tech Central Station piece by Stephen Stanton a few years ago, and also Brian’s own article from 2003, in which he declared that the right had achieved parity with the left in the culture wars, thanks to a combination of talk radio, Fox News, shows like South Park, web-based publications such as NRO and the Weekly Standard.com, and of course, the Blogosphere.

Brian brings all of those topics up to date to cover The Passion, the Swift Vets, RatherGate, and their November 2nd d

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Get ready to start buying new versions of all your favorite movies! I have an article on high definiton DVD in the current issue of Smart TV & Sound. The dead tree version is at your local Borders or Barnes & Noble, the text is online, here.

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I finally updated the “dead tree” articles list to take it beyond 2001. There’s a gap much longer than 18 minutes during most of 2002 (and I know I churned out lots of material that year) that I have to fill-in, but at least the whole thing is no longer four years out of date.

Update: It’s not 100 percent complete, but most of 2002′s missing 18 minutes have been filled in.

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In addition to being linked to by the Blogfather, and my three pieces in PC World, I also have a review of the Sirius Sportster portable satellite radio in Digital World, the magazine-in-a-magazine that’s bundled with PC World. And I also have a review of Unledded, from Jimmy Page & Robert Plant, in this months’ Vintage Guitar. It builds on some of the material that Kevin Shirley, who engineered the DVD, told me for Blogcritics.

Ed Driscoll: on the Internet, at your local supermarket’s magazine rack–and beyond!

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Well, PC World that is, where I have an article on “HDTV on the Cheap“, as well as a couple of computer reviews, in the December issue. They’re all online (hence the hyperlinks), but don’t let that stop you from picking up a hard copy or three of the magazine.

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The text isn’t online, but I have an article about a fellow named Jean-Yves Archambault, who owns an extremely high-tech Canadian home. It’s in this month’s TechLiving magazine.

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I have an article on DVD burners in the latest issue of Videomaker magazine.

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I have a review of Samsung’s SyncMaster 173mw widescreen HDTV LCD monitor. It’s online here, but wouldn’t a nice dead-tree copy or ten make reading much, much easier?

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