Yesterday, VHX announced a new movie trailers channel curated by Keith Calder. This new Trailers Channel lets you sit back, watch a ton of movie trailers and not worry about the content being less than engaging.

On a side note, if you've not checked out the Channels option on VHX you're only experiencing about half of the greatness available to you.

Hands down, the Island Creek Oyster Bar site is the best restaurant site I've seen in ages. Maybe ever. There is no shortage of style in terms of design or animation. I love that they catered to a forward thinking web audience (people with modern browsers) and still managed to maintain a site that looks great. The code behind it is nuts but just makes me appreciate it all the more. Many congratulations to OAT Creative for such a successful creation.

There was some pretty big news yesterday regarding the US release of Spotify. Namely, that it's actually going to happen. Can anyone familiar with the service tell me what sets it apart from Rdio? I'm sure there are some UI/UX differences but isn't it the same thing? I think I still need some convincing on the whole No Local Copy of Your Music Archive mentality - especially given that 3G service doesn't exactly blow my mind, so mobile streaming still seems a bit far off.

What's better than a full-browser animated gif archive of ridiculous snippets? If NTRNTS is to be believed, absolutely nothing. I tend to agree. If you have a valid argument against any of this greatness,I'd love to hear it.

• Bacon Ipsum - forget the standard Lorem Ipsum generator and go with a more meat-centric generator. Granted, it's one of those eye-rolling Internet absurdities but it may warm a clients heart.
• jQuery for fixed position - stopping elements at a certain point when a user scrolls is something you may have seen on Times Fashion (or in Gmail recently) and now you can know how to do it easily!

I am slightly embarrassed to admit that the last three days I've spent a significant amount of time playing the new Nimblebit game Tiny Tower. This trailer gives you the basic idea.. you're overseeing a Tower consisting of residential homes and various businesses. You must employ the "Bitizens" and stock all the ...well, you get the point. It's completely addictive in its simplicity.

You'd think that the tale of Walt Disney creating a powerhouse of animation would be the only engaging aspect of the companies history but after watching Waking Sleeping Beauty I can honestly say that's just the tip of the iceberg. The movie lays out the events that took place leading up to the studios Second Coming and the ridiculous success they achieved for a solid ten year run. That decade of time just so happens to be the time when most of us grew up watching Disney films - Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Beauty and The Beast, The Lion King, etc. The list of names involved are ridiculously familiar - Roy Disney, Michael Eisner, Jeffrey Katzenberg, John Lasseter, Tim Burton, Spielberg, Zemeckis, etc.

My favorite portion of the film is a tiny little anecdote regarding Disney Chief Operating Officer Frank Wells who always carried around a little slip of paper in his wallet that read "Humility is the greatest virtue." Not exactly a sentiment you'd associate with a corporate exec.

Long story short, watch this movie.. it's a surprisingly riveting tale.

The NexusContraptions game is a fun bit of promotion for the Nexus S that involves building a series of obstacles to steer your Google Orb to its final destination. I dunno if this is good or bad promotion on their part - I don't care much at all about the actual Nexus phone but I'm spending a good bit of time fiddling around with this. Regardless of the impact, it is fun.. the perfect time waster for your day.

via Daniel.

Jeremy clued me in to the quarterly art publication The Thing - an apt title for the undertaking as they send out custom made objects four times a year. Each object is curated by a particular noted artist - among them: James Franco, Miranda July, Dave Eggers - and mailed to the recipients. While I have zero interest in paying that kind of money to receive an object in the mail I do find the whole project to be a fascinating bit of creation. Browse through the previous works and get your Art Think going...

I'll try not to indundate you with reminders to check out the Summer Mix Series but if you don't keep up you may miss out on some seriously quality compilations and then feel "too overwhelmed" to try at all. And, frankly, no one wants that. So, get over there - and go snag some music! Seriously!

My friend Blake recently relaunched his cinematography portfolio site and it looks great. It's powered by Cargo Collective so the interface / layout is clean and easy but it also means that the content shines through. I highly suggest watching this Music Video Montage, the After teaser trailer and absolutely do not miss the trailer for SuperZeroes... hopefully coming to a DVD / streaming location near you soon.

The collection at Every Day Posters are a cutesy bunch. I'm not smitten with everything there but I enjoy the idea of an event poster for a non-special event - like Enjoying a Sunny Day, Swimming Right After I Eat or, of course, Seeing a Band or Something.

Scout Mob is one of those "Deal" apps that I typically steer clear of but has such ridiculous savings that it's sort of a no-brainer to not have. The basic functionality: it provides you with a list of discounts at local dining establishments; often in ridiculous amounts (i.e. 50% off at some fancy pants place). I can only assume this is a loss leader for the restaurants involved but it's a total boon to the user. Available in the App and Android store. While ScoutMob gets you out and eating food, Fooducate might make you stop and think about what you're consuming. The app scans barcodes and gives your product a rating (usually something alarming like a D+), as well as suggestions for potentially healthier alternatives. There's some suggestion that this should be used while shopping to help aid you in making the best choices, I really can't imagine the practicality of scanning every product at the grocery to find what is best for you. That being said, it is informative and worth having around. The developers also have a pretty solid blog as well. Get it on the App or Android store.

This weeks playlist is a good one.. a healthy balance of incredibly weird, stupid and amusing.

• Google+ takes on Facebook - the NMA animation delivers in spades as usual. via Casey
• KFC Commercial - courtesy of Peter Serafinowicz. He really has a lock down on vintage footage combined with absolutely absurd (and vaguely disturbing) voiceover. Place on plate....
• Thoughts on Hairspray - Paul shares his nightmare fodder.. I think it's too ridiculous not to enjoy.
• VFX SR - I dare you to watch this whole thing. I dare you. If you can't make it, just skip to the 8 minute mark and receive an awesome treat.
• James Brown Miso Soup - rarely do I tire of enormous celebrities going to Japan and making absolutely ridiculous commercials. Gotta pay the bills!
• Transformers 2: Exclusive Clip - I realize Transformers 3 is the latest in the series but this clip still stands as appropriate and perfectly ridiculous. via Jed.
• RIP Ryan Dunn - an official Jackhouse video featuring Ryan Dunn. It's unfortunate the way he died but at least he has a grand archive of footage of enjoying himself with his friends.
• FAIL Compilation June 2011 - yep, I still can't get enough of these. I know better but I don't care. I love them.

BONUS

• We'll Kill U - the latest from Lonely Island.. it's the "Just 2 Guyz" duo once again.
• WikiLeaks Mastercard Parody - pretty brilliant in a way actually.
• ELO - Turn to Stone - nothing crazy here.. just a reminder of how rad ELO is.

Have a great Fourth of July weekend!!

I rarely post much actual personal news on this site but this is certainly worthy of mention. Today marks my first day as a freelancing designer/developer post-KNI. Back in 2000 I started a company with Daniel called Somatic Labs and somehow managed to land 100% of our work through Kurt. In 2001, we officially merged companies (we were acting like one already) and hit the ground running. The past twelve years working with Daniel, Kurt, Kate, Arlo, Eric, Madrid and Jack have been phenomenal.. to say the very least. There is so much work I am proud of that I wouldn't even know where to begin. I love so much of it.

My decision to go freelance has nothing to do with any relationship at KNI; they are the absolute best people - but more to do with a needed change in my own life. I venture into the world of freelance looking to work with smaller scale, potentially community oriented projects. It could end up being a hugely failed experiment and, I hope, KNI would have me back if I fall flat on my face.

Long story short, I am now a freelancing entity and have nothing but the greatest amount of love, respect and admiration for everyone involved at KNI.

Here's to the future!

I heard about this the other day but it's great to get some official journalistic affirmation on yet another not to do cocaine.

"Doctors say the cocaine hitting the streets in New York is now cut with levamisole, a drug that veterinarians use to de-worm livestock, causing cokeheads' skin to rot off. Snorting or smoking cocaine cut with levamisole can cause large patches of rotting skin on users' face and body. In 2010, the Drug Enforcement Agency said nearly 70% of the coke coming into the U.S. was cut with levamisole, up from 30% in 2008."

Seriously, skin rotting from drug use. Insanity. I'm not always one for conspiracy theories but I'd say if the government really wanted to wage a War on Drugs, this would be the way to win it.

The Camera Collection is a set of 100 illustrated pixel cameras ready for download and usage however you want. They've covered all the bases - from disposable, to lomo, to DSLR to polaroid and even flash storage cards. I've no clue when you might find yourself in need of this but they all look so well done, you might as well keep them around just in case.

via Chad.

At the recommendation of Arlo I downloaded a copy of Billings for keeping track of clients, time spent on a project, monies due, etc. The learning curve takes a little getting used to (i.e. Start a New Slip) but once you get the hang of it, it's an incredibly slick app with a great interface for keeping up with this sort of data. The last program of this nature I encountered was Quickbooks some ten years ago and it was nowhere near this easy to use.

Loving this collection of images from Linda McCartney capturing the bit of private life she shared with Paul and their kids. The appearance of the rest of The Beatles and an assortment of other musicians is an extra treat but seeing someone as high profile as Paul McCartney just hanging out and being a quality Dad is a great thing to see.

Seriously? This is what Frank Lloyd Wright's letterhead looked like? And his studio letterhead looked like this? Phenomenal. Absolutely phenomenal. Be sure to view the fullsize.