The Omni Group announced a public beta of OmniOutliner, the indispensable Mac outlining tool, over the weekend. The new features, including styles, attachments, inline comments, and incremental typing search, all look pretty cool.

If I have one gripe, it’s with the new icons. Don’t get me wrong—it’s really cool. But I kind of liked the easter-egg-like nature of the old icons, which rewarded close scrutiny with some pretty funny lists. The document icon, for instance:

becomes

For those with poor eyesight, the old icon reads:

• In AD 2181, war was beginning.
  • What happen? Somebody set us up the bomb.
• How are you gentlemen?
  • All your base are belong to us. You are on the way to destruction.
  • You have no chance to survive make your time.

Ah, 2000–2001. I remember it well… But with a new file extension (.OO3) for the new document format, Omni clearly decided to go with a slightly more professional icon. Has anyone been able to read the writing on the new icon?

Found on Plastic: the gay and Marxist subtexts of the classic Rankin-Bass Christmas TV special, “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Raindeer.” This isn’t a new thought, having been discussed on at least three other blogs that I found with some lazy Googling, but it’s the most thorough explication I’ve seen.

Um, merry Christmas.