mary.codes

Five-ish things that I loved this week. I didn't publish one of these last week. I just didn't have a good list of things to show and tell, and I was also dealing with a lot going on.

Hear Grace Slick’s Hair-Raising Vocals in the Isolated Track for “White Rabbit” (article/video)

This article discusses the history of Jefferson Airplane's song "White Rabbit". It's an excellent backstory to a great song, but what surprised me the most was the isolated vocal track. The vocals and instruments meld together in the finished song, but the isolated vocals really showcase the power and precision of Grace Slick's voice.

Behind the scenes with Disney's baby elephant (article)

This article goes much deeper than just covering Corra, the new baby elephant at Disney's Animal Kingdom. It's a behind-the-scenes look at how the animals are cared for and trained. It also discusses how Disney works with conservation groups to protect endangered species in the wild, including elephants.

Radio Garden (website)

I stumbled across this site years ago and found it to be a great way to listen to music from across the globe. Back when I was learning Dutch, I enjoyed listening to 100% NL, which features music in both Dutch and English and commercials in Dutch. Lately I've been listening to J1 Radio as I've been learning Japanese.

Speaking of Japan...

Sneak peek into Fantasy Springs (video)

Disney released a 2 1/2 minute overview of the new lands being added to Tokyo DisneySea. It looks absolutely beautiful. Frozen Kingdom in particular looks great. I plan on going to Japan next year, and I will hopefully see it in person!

It's OK to abandon your side-project (article)

Excellent advice in this article. In my opinion, it's better to focus on iterating on interesting ideas, learning new skills, and sharing knowledge than trying to make money from a side project. This article talks about how shipping a project shouldn't always be the end goal, and even when it is, you might realize that the end product may not be successfully monetized or used in the way you expected.

"Despite what some tech recruiters might have you believe, the success of a side-project doesn't need to be defined by a beautiful, shipped product. We work in a practical medium and any build experience, good, bad or abandoned, is still valid experience. If you are able to remove the pressure to ship and instead approach them like throwaway prototypes, side-projects become a great scratch pad for experimentation."

The author may not have found his project useful once it was done, but he did gain experience from building the project, and identified an interesting experience to write about.