The fine people at Zurb do plenty of good with their job - designing websites - but it turns out they also do a great job of supplementing that job with a worthwhile blog and development playground. I mean, something like this is oh so simple but effective. If you're the developer type, I suggest giving it a good thorough browsing.

Grain & Gram has launched their second feature - an excellent interview with printmaker Nick Sambrato of Mama's Sauce. Once again, the feature takes on a very magazine-esque format with large format pictures, print text layouts and an overall vibe that requires you to spend time with it - not just browse it quickly. I love the accompanying video but you really should take it in within the context of the feature, it works best there.

Grain & Gram has always launched a blog that I can only imagine is a no-brainer to subscribe to.

The mixes are coming in quite steadily now. Be proactive and keep up.. you don't want to be overwhelmed and miss out.

• La Bicyclette - a mix about bikes and biking; courtesy of Ronnie.
• Tourist with Homburg - all vinyl ripped mix of classic (and some not-so-classic) songs. Courtesy of the one and only Rawk Hawk.
• Kahuna - A mix of tracks regarding surfing, surf music and the music genres associated with it - although intentionally excluding proper Surf Music and the obvious choices like The Beach Boys. Sort of a "New School Surf" if you will.

Joshua Blankenship has always been a busy guy - aside from having a day job and running a healthy blog he's now launched another project with his wife - Kingdom Boutique. The site offers a variety of one-of-a-kind artwork, postcards and even some lady apparel. I'm particularly into the Ciudad de las Ideas piece but I suggest you go check it all out.

Despite it just being a concept at the moment I have to say that the Holga Digital looks pretty well thought out and appealing. There is no LCD display involved so the "delayed gratification" is in place to simulate film use - you're never sure what you captured until you actually import the images. It is fairly bare bones in terms of features and settings but done so intentionally:

The original Holga camera has so few functions that you don't get distracted by the technicalities. The Holga D camera is also based on the same principal. Even though it has more functions and controls compared to the analog Holga but it is designed in such a way that it discourages fiddling around with camera-settings and and encourages you to just shoot without thinking much.

Check out the entire writeup and just try and tell me you wouldn't want one of these around (assuming the price point wasn't insane).

Hopefully this playlist will kick off your long weekend just right. Enjoy it.

• Panda Cheese - never say no to panda.
• Retail Rage - the G20 closed a shopping center and this guy is pretty erked. I find this highly amusing.
• 3 Dog Fish - this is absolutely terrifying and I am warning you now it could easily become nightmare fodder.
• Cat Lassie - so dumb and predictable but I'm drawn to this kids terrible acting.
• 100 Greatest Movie Insults Of All Time - ten minutes of movie insults. NSFW language but lots of memorable snippets.
• Dog vs Vuvuzela: Dog Wins - pretty much perfect.
• The Best Dinosaur - stand up comedian "berates" audience for their choice in favorite dinosaur. If it's not an Ankylosaurus, it's crap. This guys knowledge of dinosaurs is pretty incredible; even if the angry mode can be a little much. Via WAXY.

BONUS

• Fluffy McCloud - great little stop motion animation.
• Black Moon - excellent, and somewhat crazy, animation.

Have a great weekend.

I am indebted to Davis, his wife and Eurovision for the greatness known as Sexophone. The original is here but I never wanted to lose access to such never-ending pleasure so I copied it over to my own server. Viva la Sexophone.

Seriously, open that in another window and leave it there for a good ten minutes.. there's a mesmerizing quality to it.

Some 13 million year old fossilized skull was found of a colossal whale that outsizes anything previously known to inhabit the sea. The Leviathan melvillei was likely up to 60 feet long and had enormous teeth - a foot long by their best estimates. Basically this whale ate other whales - an interesting prospect. Hopefully they unearth more bones from said creature and put it on display somewhere convenient for all to partake.

I don't typically find myself too smitten with a lot of 'fine art' based on pop culture topics. Sure, an 8-bit gallery of art is a fun browse for a few minutes but it gets old after awhile. So, when I ran into the Crazy 4 Cult show preview - a group showing of over 100 artists presenting works about various movies - I was sure I wouldn't be that into it. However, turns out that you can really tell how passionate the artists are about the movies they are depicting. Sure, some of the art style is a bit kitschy but it is, at the very least, an entertaining browse.

All the mixes submitted to the Summer Mix Series thus far have been enjoyable in some way or another but I've been enjoying these especially:

• LCD Soundsystem: The Influences - great idea for a themed mix.. musically show where an artist came from in terms of their influences. This one is pretty great at doing so.
• Dark and Stormy - Rum, Ginger Beer, a lime and this mix will all go quite well together.
• Frisky Bidness - I knew Paul would not disappoint with his mix and I was right.

Sadly, there's not a ton to see but I've been enjoying the portfolio of JXNBLK - particularly this Icon Family and these subtle iPhone Wallpapers. I also suggest following his Tumblr - lots of design-y goodness to be found there.

I got the heads up on a new record label endeavor, Warmest Chord, the other day and have been digesting their format. Basically, they have chosen not to release any music physically - no CD's, no vinyl, etc - but will make their music available digitally along with a limited edition screenprint. Their first release is coupled with this print - at least as long as they last. It's a clever idea as people don't really seem to buy physical music anymore and that trend will only continue to grow stronger.. so why not create something people do want that compliments the music but doesn't end up cluttering a shelf?

I'm going to be keeping my eye on them...

I hate to say I agree but I totally agree with this article from the YouTube team regarding the wide adoption of the HTML5 <video> tag. Apart from the huge looming issue of a non-standard codec being used by the various browser outlets there's also the fact that HTML5 playback hasn't really shown itself to be as robust as what Flash can do. Imagine a standard YouTube embed and its ability to shrink the video playback down, show embed options, favorite, etc. All within the same widget-y area. I've not seen such a thing with HTML5. Or imagine a playlist of videos (you know - like these) done with the HTML5 video tag - how would it handle multiple videos? Would it be an iframe and a ton of complicated Javascript thats not entirely support across browsers (thanks IE!)? I'm not saying it's not possible but it really does feel like Flash is the better solution in most of the cases.

Obviously I'm not trying to say anything disparaging about HTML5 - I think it is exciting and very promising move for the web - but I do see some legit concerns for some of the video handling in the future. A lot of the HTML5 markup seems like a step backwards instead of forwards but I'll be happy to eat my words on that.

Arm yourself with a Webkit browser (Safari / Chrome) to understand the impact of the following:

• Pure Icons in CSS - insanely impressive and proves I have much to learn about CSS3.
• CSS3 World Clock - just like the iPhone app but without the use of images... I see a few artifacts in the clock face but, overall, super nuts.
• HTML5 Shiv - a promising method to make IE recognize HTML5 elements. If you can't wait until IE9 is released (and adopted), force the browser to understand. Approved.

Take a few minutes this morning to Test Your Focus and Test Your Multi-Tasking - both rudimentary little undertakings to find how you're fairing in this Internet realm of constant distractions. I did pretty well on both tests but it's not exactly a real world comparison of how you do in the work world; just a good gauge of what you're capable of.

Via Amir.

If this story is legit it will be incredibly infuriating to know that it's being road blocked as much as it sounds like it is. The basic gist: an Austin company called Quatra S has a EPA approved chemical solution that can absorb oil from the surface of the water that then turns into a semi-solid sheet that can be disposed of easily or recycled into a fuel source. Watch the video of it in action right here.

I don't claim to know the full story on this - maybe the chemical doesn't work in ocean water, maybe it doesn't work in such large quantities, maybe it does more harm than good and no one is talking about it, etc. It's difficult to take these stories at complete face value but it at least sounds promising. I can't believe it's almost July and we've got a massive oil leak in the Gulf. Ugh.

There are a number of enjoyable photo series to take in over in the portfolio of Romain Laurent. The Something Real and Tilt series especially caught my eye. Be sure to browse through the Editorial work as well - the first series for Amusement Magazine is not to be missed.

Tiny Showcase teamed up with Jay Howell and Arley-Rose Torsone to make a line of 'Fox Sox' tees and baseball caps. We should all get one. Just sayin'... seems like a good idea.

A Life Well Wasted is one of my favorite podcasts. If you aren't familiar with it I highly suggest subscribing and digging into the archives. I don't consider myself a videogamer but the interviews and subject matter are up the alley of any tech minded person.

That being said, there's a new episode and it has more of the quality content I expect from it. I will say that the third act of the show is completely out of left field, has little to nothing to do with tech / videogames and features a rather egotistical and aggravating piece of work.

You can also download the first "single" from the Life Well Wasted project - a musical arm of the project. Get it here after you've subscribed to the podcast.

As expected, Hulu has launched their Hulu Plus service - a $10/month ad supported subscription service. The full breakdown of what they're offering is pretty interesting; the last recent season of a bunch of shows and the full 'back catalog' of many others. That is to say, you can only watch Season 4 of 30 Rock but you could go back and watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer in its entirety. They're also rolling out apps for some Samsung TVs, iPad, iPhone and Android (soon).

It's interesting to think of the offerings of Hulu Plus vs. Netflix - where would your $10/month be better spent. The immediacy of Hulu is certainly their best draw but the immense catalog of Netflix, to me, trumps that out. Not to mention the fact that Hulu Plus is ad supported; so even if you're paying $10/month you're still getting commercials. No deal.

I'm glad to see they were able to get this off the ground and getting a TV option more in the vein of On Demand but it has long way to go before it's worth the expense.