July 4, 2004

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!

Birthday Bananas - WOWZERS! Time certainly flies! As we celebrate our 3rd Birthday on the Net, we begin our 4th year on July 4th of 2004! And for your further enjoyment, we present a new set of FIREWORKS to enjoy as well as the old. What else is happenin' today? Here's the scoop:

• The United States celebrates 228 years of its official Declaration of Independence.
• The wilds cats from the Monkie Bunch, Tigger and Toenails, turn SEVEN years of age today!
• MacMonkies hits the trees with 3 Years on the Net.

At the time of our debut on July 4, 2001, we enjoyed an overwhelming 40 hits per day...Mmm mmm! Now we average a modest 5 million plus per month, serving over a third of a million pages in the same time frame. So, to all of you Monkie Readers, Contributors, and fellow Mac and PC sites, we offer a great big Monkie THANKS for all your Support!

Additional thanks go out to Scott Chitwood for the inspiration; MacObserver and MacMinute for the coverage; the late, great Rene for the iTools instruction; Dan Flax for the direction; Kara Kelly, Ed Allen, and Alan Sherwood for being the first contributors; Paul Sahner for TNT, and Ged and Mindy from The Iconfactory for their continued encouragement and support!

With all that said, we now get to the goods:

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT - Once again, in honor of our our all-too-cool readers, we will soon slip out of our sanity and begin Year No.4 with the Bungle In The Jungle Birthday Giveaway that will begin next week. Top prize in the Birthday bash includes a brand new iPod and other great prizes. We can't let all of the Monkies outta the bag, but be sure to check back next week for your chance to cash in on the goodies. See ya then! Ya say it's your Birthday...!

July 2-3, 2004

Icons | Community News | On The Net | Bananas

At The Top - Biff! Bang! Boom! Welcome to your 4th of July Friday Icon Edition! Though it's not the 4th yet, one can always use some added pixels to power up for the approaching Holiday. So along with the pixel popping good time, we've got a great taste of Community News, SW News On The Net, and Bananas to fire up the weekend.

And while you're having a blast this Independence Day, be sure to play it safe and Monkie around with responsibility in mind. With that said, let's crack into the goodies and have a blast. Light 'em up!

New GOO!

New Icons - Look up in the sky! It's a bird...It's a plane...It's, it's...Super Monkie! Well, not exactly. Actually, not at all! But this week's Friday Icon Edition is sure to light up your desktop "skies" as we have 4 New Icon Sets on hand in the GUI Gallery. So much for fireworks...Let's grab a glamorous look at this fine collection of non-combustible icon collections!

DV Graphics - Former Monkie man Paul Sahner wastes no time in the icon replication of goodies announced at this year's Developers Conference! WWDC 2004 comes straight from the fine designs of DV Graphics and Aqualiciously sports many of Tiger's new features as well as Apple's new family of Cinema displays.

Blurburger - Back with a blast of icon fun is Blurburger's incredibly talented Peter Joison! How does one follow up the tons of fun found in Blurburger Pack No.1? The answer is quite elementary, my dear Watson. Blurburger Pack No.2 picks up where No.1 left off and will leave your icon experience absolutely head over heels!

Elpincho - It's easy to see how Apple has inspired a world of computer creativity. And so is the same in the icon case of Elpincho's latest set to grace our Galleries with iBook Inspired Vol.1. This all-too-cool collection of icon inspiration pretty much speaks for itself by combining the iBook's smooth character with a class of mind blowing creativity!

Two Nerds and a Jock - Giving this GUI gathering the ultimate grin is an incredible frown buster titled Wood Critters! The collaborative icon crafters from Two Nerds and a Jock have assembled all kinds of little creatures; from the great outdoors to a sure shoe-in amongst the Mac Community by the name of FinderBunny. Enjoy!

Thanks Department --

Sydney, Amanda, Dominique, Pete, Elpincho, and Paul...

From the tips of my toes to the pies in the skies,

I salute you!

THANK YOU!!

Wanna share your work with the world?

Send Us Your Icons!

Community News

Live Pencil - Always lookin' to remove the long look from your GUI face is Live Pencil's Ramon Gonzalez Teja. And so he succeeds with an all new update. Here's the skinny:

• Emoticons -Hollow mouth Smilies.
• Wallpapers - Don't miss this very REFRESHING July calendar.
• Desktop ICONS -Our friend Smiley sticking out it's tongue-2
• SLIDE PUZZLE!!!! - Have fun playing this amusing easy game! You'll have a NEW ONE EVERY WEEK!!!

With all of this fun in one place, you're certain to find a smile a mile long. And it's all happening at Live Pencil!

Mandolux - The week is not complete without a trip to the desktop galleries of Mandolux! Mando makes everything great with this week's new desktop numbers. Let's look at the latest:

Mandolux has issued three new Art desktops: one Asian, Mesopotamian, and a Rodin.

The most recent addition is an Asian desktop is titled Kali. This is a close-up photograph of a wooden headpiece of the destructive goddess Kali, usually worn during the Daksha Yagam dance about six hundred years ago. All this history and art are now all in one place: Mandolux!

On The Net

GraphicConverter 5.2.1 - The most essential graphics tool for all Mac systems just got better! Lemke Software has just released GraphicConverter 5.2.1, a graphics tool to view, edit, and convert most image formats. The latest update features bunches of new enhancements, improvements, and fixes. For all the details and to get your copy of GraphicConverter, hurry over to Lemke Software and check out this amazing graphics tool!

Bananas

Just Plain Nutz!

HOLLYWOOD MARRIAGE Part I

If Yoko Ono married Sonny Bono, she'd be Yoko Ono Bono.

If Dolly Parton married Salvador Dali, she'd be Dolly Dali.

If Bo Derek married Don Ho, she'd be Bo Ho.

If Oprah Winfrey married Depak Chopra, she'd be Oprah Chopra.

If Olivia Newton-John married Wayne Newton, then divorced him to marry Elton John, she'd be Olivia Newton-John Newton John.

If Sondra Locke married Elliott Ness, then divorced him to marry Herman Munster, she'd become Sondra Locke Ness Munster.

If Bea Arthur married Sting, she'd be Bea Sting.

THINNEST BOOK

What's the thinnest book in the world?

"What Men Know About Women."

PERVERT PSYCHIATRIST

This guy goes to a psychiatrist. The doctor shows him an inkblot and asks him what it looks like.

"A naked woman."

He shows him another inkblot and asks him the same question.

"Another naked woman."

"You're a sick pervert!" the psychiatrist exclaims.

"I'm not the pervert. You keep showing me all these filthy pictures!"

INDEPENDENCE

A Kentucky teacher was quizzing her students. "Johnny, who signed the Declaration of Independence?"

He was older than some of the others. He said, "Damned if I know."

She was a little put out by his swearing, so she told him to go home and to bring his father with him when he came back.

Next day, the father came with his son, sat in the back of the room to observe, as the teacher requested. She started back in on her quiz and finally got back to the boy. "Now, Johnny, I'll ask you again. Who signed the Declaration of Independence?"

"Well, hell, teacher," Johnny said, "I told you I didn't know."

The father jumped up in the back, pointed a stern finger at his son, and said, "Johnny, if you signed that thing, you damn well better own up to it!"

July 1, 2004

Monkie News | On The Net | Network News

Monkie News

Tomorrow: New Icons - Making one last GUI blast before the 4th of July weekend is a fine collection of pixel goodies for your Friday Icon Edition! Great Icons, News, and Bananas are what can be found on Friday's menu of fun. So give your week's end a big bang by stopping by the Monkie Hut and join in on the festivities!

On The Net

Labels X 1.6 - The ultimate creative developers of Unsanity have announced the release of Labels X 1.6. This cool tool is a haxie that adds and customizes labels functionality in Mac OS X. The update adds Mac OS X 10.3 Panther compatibility. Also included in the update:

• Removed the Labels X "Label" Finder menu item in Panther
• Labels X will now modify the stripes shown in the Finder and open/save dialog boxes while running in Panther.
• Added options to specify whether or not to draw the name stripes or the icons with labels.
• Now sets label colors and names if set via the Finder.
• Added a "Relaunch Finder" button.
• And more!

Enable your labels with the latest release of Labels X from the fine folks of Unsanity!

A Better Finder Attributes 3.4 - Just in from PUBLICSPACE.NET is word of the release of A Better Finder Attributes 3.4. This tool is a contextual menu plugin for the Finder that allows users to change the file date and other attributes, such as the modification and the creation date of a file to be adjusted. New in this version:

• Updates the user interface to look more like A Better Finder Rename
• Can make modification dates and times the same as creation dates and times
• Can make creation dates and times the same as modification dates and times
• Makes substantial internal changes to include new Mac OS X 10.3
  technologies

Make your Mac life better with the latest version of A Better Finder Attributes from PUBLICSPACE.NET. Go get it!

Network News

the WebWorld - BeanHead

"I, Robot" Star Salutes iPod - Hollywood's leading Science Fiction actor has hailed Apple's iPod as the greatest gadget of the century. Will Smith, who is best known for his roles in films such as Independence Day and Men In Black, stars in a high-tech new movie in which androids try to take over. Though Smith gets his hands on all kinds of cool techie gadgets while filming, his favorite real-life gadget is the iPod. The movie star owns every model of Apple's iPod, housing his entire life's CD collection on them. - from Wired

Hiccups On Hold - A surgery in which an implant stimulates the vagus nerve has been successful in stopping a man's hiccups. The man had the hiccups for a year, after suffering a stroke. Surgeons suspected that the vagus nerve had been affected by the stroke, causing the man to hiccup continually. So they decided to implant a device that would control stimulation of that nerve, and there hasn't been a hiccup since. The implanted device has also been used to control seizures. - from BBC

June 30, 2004

Desktops | Community News | On The Net | Bananas

At The Top - Open up and say "Ahhhhh"! Hump day is here and that means it's time to fill up your GUI appetite with your Wednesday Desktop Edition. Along with great new desktop works in the Gallery, there's Community News, SW News On The Net, and Bananas to munch upon. So don't leave your yearning feeling empty. Let's fill 'er up with bunches of fun!

New GOO!

New Desktops - Everybody in! Pile into the pixel palace as this week's Desktop Edition offers 5 New Desktops for a rip roarin' GUI good time. 'Nuff said here. Let's get the party started!

Desktops - I knowed it, I knowed it! Dem GUI bones done rised again with the return of Victor Emert and his ever artistic abilities! Always using his head, Victor adds wide variety of vividry to the noggin with his latest entry titled Yellerskull. And just think; you won't have to bump your head to see stars with a flashy piece like this!

Oooo...The true blue cool comes through with Aqualicious style and taste of Influence by ever clever desktop crafter Jameson Sasser. This selection will alleviate the need to head for the high dive. It is simply certain to make a big splash amongst your desktop favorites. No lifeguard required...Let the swim begin!

Back in black with a big fat Mac attack is another signature selection from the galleries of EA Design. Mr. Ed Allen returns sporting his minimalist eye for design with Lost Passion. Being a fiery piece just asking to be viewed, one might consider it the antithesis of fixing a hole where the rain gets in...Just burn down the hole!

 

3-D Rendered - Slidin' into the show with a slick selection by Bob Wiley is made in the shade Shadow of the Spider. From sea to shining see, Bob makes the most of his beloved icon: the shadow. Like the wallpaper sticks to the wall, the shadow conforms to the terrain. I can already hear ya hummin'...Me, and my shadow!

Officially crankin' up the desktop tuneage and pumpin' out the pixel jams is an outstanding number by elpincho appropriately titled Speakers! If you're looking for a high class, hi-fidelity digital desktop design from a surround sound point of view, be prepared to rock the house as well as the neighborhood with this hot number! Enjoy!

 

Thanks Department --

Jameson, Bob, Victor, Elpincho, and Ed...

Like TOTALLY awesome!

Keep on pumpin' out those pixels!!!

THANK YOU!!

Have a piece you want to display?

Check out our Submissions guidelines and then send it in!

Community News

Mandolux - From the ever creative galleries of Mandolux comes another fine desktop selection titled Ashurnasirpal II. The new Mesopotamian desktop is a photograph of the king transcended into a god. This ancient face etched in stone will look great on your desktop and can be had by making a quick click to Mandolux!

The Iconfactory - The folks from The Iconfactory have released their latest freeware icon set from Factory founder Corey Marion. Smoothicons 10 is a super patriotic set that Corey created while on his flight from North Carolina to California and cruising at 30,000 feet! WHOA! This fine collection of 10 comes just in time for the 4th of July and is now available for download at The Iconfactory. Get to groovin'!

DV Graphics - On the heels of Apple's announcements at WWDC, DV Graphics has announced the release of WWDC 2004. Based on the products covered by Steve Jobs in the keynote address, this set of 16 new icons are just as eye catching as the 30" Cinema Display itself. Everything from Tiger to Automator, iChat and of course, the new displays are included in this stunning new set. Head over to DV Graphics and grab your copy today. Your eyes won't be disappointed!

On The Net

Snard 2.3 - Recently released by Gideon Softworks is the Swiss Army Knife of launcher programs: Snard 2.3. Snard can be used as a system menu, from the dock or as a hot key activated popup menu. Here's a list of what's new:

• Fixed issue with Snard not properly opening on some configurations
• Added configurable hot key support for snard menu popup functionality
• Added support for assigning hot keys to items in your Snard menu

Open up a whole new world of functionality by picking up your copy of Snard from Gideon Softworks!

Bananas

Just Plain Nutz!

WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM YOUR FRIENDS

Police spent two hours attempting to subdue a gunman who had barricaded himself inside his home. After firing ten tear gas canisters, officers discovered that the man was standing beside them, shouting pleas to come out and give himself up.

PARK IT!

A truck driver stopped at a roadside diner for lunch, and ordered a cheeseburger, coffee, and a slice of apple pie. As he was about to eat, three motorcycles pulled up outside.

The bikers came in, and one grabbed the trucker's cheeseburger out of his hand and took a huge bite from it. The second one drank the trucker's coffee, and the third wolfed down his apple pie. The truck driver didn't say a word. He simply got up, paid the cashier, and left.

When he was gone, other motorcyclists snickered to one another and congratulated each other on being so "bad". As the cashier walked up, one of the motorcyclists growled, "He ain't much of a man, is he?"

"He's not much of a driver, either," the cashier replied. "He just backed his 18-wheeler over three motorcycles."

RUN FOR THE MONEY

Confucius say: Man who eat many prunes get good run for money.

DOUBLY POSITIVE

A linguistics professor was lecturing to his class one day. "In English," he said, "A double negative forms a positive."

"In some languages, though, such as Russian, a double negative is still a negative."

"However, there is no language wherein a double positive can form a negative."

A voice from the back of the room piped up, "Yeah, right."

June 29, 2004

Monkie News | Network News

Monkie News

Tomorrow: New Desktops - Okay, folks...There's a Tiger at my tail, so I will get right to it! Tomorrow's mid-week Wednesday Desktop Edition will make your desktop king of the jungle as we have a fine lineup of digital designs ready to give your eye candy eyes a grand ol' GUI fun time. Slip on back tomorrow for all of this plus tons of fun!

Network News

the WebWorld - BeanHead

Tiger Tidbits - Hold that Tiger! Steve Jobs took center stage in front of a full house packed with 3500 developers at the WorldWide Developers Conference. As expected, he demonstrated bits and pieces of Apple's upcoming Operating System, Tiger. Some of the features previewed were:

• 64-bit processing
  
  
• New version of Safari
  
  
• Spotlight: Search tool
  
  
• Better .Mac integration
  
  
• Dashboard: Widget application
  
  
• Automater: Visual scripting
  
  
• New iChat with better picture quality, multi-way audio and video conferencing, and interface changes
  

It also appears from some of Tiger's preview pics on Apple's site that the User Interface may have been slightly tweaked to sport a glassy look, much like Max Rudberg's SmoothStripes theme. The appearance, as well as a preview of Tiger's 150 new features, are now available at Apple's site. The release of Tiger is not expected until 2005.

UPDATE: A Quicktime stream of the WWDC keynote address has been posted by Apple. Viewing requires Quicktime 6.

iPod Inventors Top Charts - Steve Jobs and Jonathan Ive have been named by Q Magazine as the second most powerful people in music for creating the iPod. Ive's innovative designs were demonstrated in Apple's iMac and iBook before iPod ever came out. Jobs paid attention to the European's potential back when he designed bathrooms in the UK, and brought him over to be a piece of the American Apple pie. The impact of the infamous iPod has now put Ive on the charts. It seems a bit of Ive's porcelain poddies made its way into the iPod's face! - from MacMinute and The Sun

Who Was That Unmasked Man? - Musician Eric Clapton was recently pulled over for "a caution," but drove away unrecognized. The curious cop commented on Clapton's classy car, wondering how he could afford his fancy Ferrari. When Clapton made mention that he was in the music business, the policeman pointed out that the musician must be making out pretty well. Even after taking Clapton's name, the officer failed to recognize the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer. - from Ananova

June 28, 2004

Community News | Monkie Business | Bananas

At The Top - Today's the day! Apple kicks off another year of anticipated fun for the WWDC convention in San Francisco! What cool new Apple products will we see unveiled? A new iMac? Speed bumps? A new case face? Well, one thing is for certain: Steve Jobs promises to kick off the event with a tantalizing preview of Apple's next OS X cat - Tiger.

Whilst you keep your eyes peeled for the fun from Apple, let's start this week with a Monk-eye's view of Community News, Monkie Business, and Bananas. Lights, camera, action!

Community News

Kebawe's Smellies - Tired of those yellow smilies and boring emoticons? Olivier Lebra tells us of Smellies, Kebawe's version of the smileys. Their design comes from a creature appearing in Marko and Olier's French heroic-fantasy comic series: Agence Barbare. These little creatures can be really cute, but unfortunately fart a lot. You can use the smellies on your IM software (ICQ, AIM, Jabber, MSN, AIM, etc.). Be sure to check out Smellies and tons of other fun at Kebawe.com!

Stockicons.com - On June 25th, the one-year anniversary of Stockicons.com, the fabulous folks from The Iconfactory announced the availability of three new products for developers and designers, just in time for Apple's WWDC convention in San Francisco. Here's a brief run down of what's new:

First up for release is Harmony: Database Add-On, an extension of the original Harmony stock icon set. This new set extends into the realm of databases with icons covering such specialized concepts as tables, scripts, records, and many others.

Second in line is the release of a new stock icon collection named Cricket. With a decidedly light approach, Cricket's look and feel is very friendly. The subtle color palette, line weights and unique angles all combine to create a suite of icons that is organic and fresh.

Finally, the Cricket collection is also available as scalable EPS's for use in large format, print and web applications. Web and print designers alike will welcome the flexible nature of Cricket EPS.

For further details and pricing information, click it like a cricket to Stockicons.com and check out all of the new offerings!

Mandolux - The master of desktop art is back with another artistic entry at Mandolux! Mando has issued a new Rodin desktop titled She Who Was. The title refers to a fifteenth-century ballad by the French poet Francois Villon, in which an old woman laments her lost youth and beauty. Don't let your desktop suffer the same fate. Grab the latest desktop beauty from Mandolux today!

Monkie Business

Odds and Ends

Fun With Numbers

First of all, pick the number 1 to 7 of the week

Multiply this number by 2. (Just to be bold)

Add 5.

Multiply it by 50. We'll wait while you get the calculator...

If you have already had your birthday this year, add 1752...

If you haven't, add 1750...

Now subtract the four digit year that you were born. e.g 1978 (If you remember!)

You should have a three digit number:

The first digit of this was your original number

The next two numbers are your age.

Faster Than A Bullet - The Earth moves in its 585-million-mile orbit around the Sun approximately eight times faster than a bullet travels.

Say Something Cute - In his autobiography, comedian Bob Hope acknowledged the importance of having good writers. He wrote, "I was in this crowded elevator, and this little old lady turned around and stared in my face. 'Bob Hope,' she said. 'Say something cute.' So of course I said, 'Avocado.' It's pretty hard to say something cute unless you have your cute writers right beside you."

Doesn't Add Up - Computers can figure out all kinds of problems, except the things in the world that just don't add up.

- James Magary

Bananas

Just Plain Nutz!

PROTONS

What do you call a proton with big hair?

A 'froton.

LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT

A man was eating in a fancy restaurant, and there was a gorgeous blonde eating at the next table. He had been checking her out all night, but lacked the nerve to go talk to her. Suddenly she sneezed and her glass eye went flying out of its socket towards the man. With lightning quick reflexes, he caught it in mid-air.

"Oh my gosh, I am so sorry," she said as she popped her eye back in the socket. "Let me buy you dinner to make it up to you."

They enjoyed a wonderful dinner together and had an extended relationship filled with bliss.

The guy was amazed and said one day, "You know, you are the perfect woman. Are you this nice to every guy you meet?"

"No, she replied. "You just happened to catch my eye!"

KATMANDU

Knock knock

Who's there?

Katmandu

Katmandu who?

Katmandu what Catwoman wants!

MOST LETTERS

What two words have the most letters in them?

Post Office!