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Who doesn't love a good manifesto?

Sure, they can be long, repetitive and self-righteous -- but there's still something thrilling about someone sitting down and tapping out a declaration of what they believe, how they function, and what's best for the world. Most of them you'd never actually want to read -- but the idea is sound.

This week there are two new manifestos online that I can get behind -- and to which I should pay more attention.

First, Dutch design collaborative Platform 21 offer The Repair Manifesto.

The basic thrust - ideal for these economic and social times - is that we should as a people stop designing things to be thrown away and start embracing the idea that repairing the things we use and extending their lives is good.

Of course, because it's a manifesto Platform 21 take a deeper - and more poetic - stance than "fixing things makes more sense than throwing them away."

"This isn't about money," the manifesto says. "It's a mentality."

Another good point: "Repairing things is good for the imagination."

There's also Bre Pettis and Kio Stark's Cult of Done Manifesto.

It's point: don't be frozen by the desire to be perfect. Instead do things. You may need to revise or self-correct. You may fail. But if you do you'll almost certainly learn something and that's better than having done nothing.

I struggle with this every day.

My favorites from the 13 point plan:

2) Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done.

5) Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it.

6) The point of being done is not to finish but to get other things done.

7) Once you're done you can throw it away.

8) Laugh at perfection. It's boring and keeps you from being done.

After hearing what sounded like a much diminished Hank Williams Jr.'s spin on Johnny Cash, his dad's tunes and right wing versions of his own songs last week, I'm cleansing myself with two country albums streaming online today:

*All Aboard: A Tribute to Johnny Cash - Groups like The Hold Steady, Dresden Dolls, MxPx and The Bouncing Souls take on Cash songs like Cry, Cry, Cry, Man in Black and Folsom Prison Blues. The album will is available on four colors of vinyl , with access to digital copies included in the sleeve. All proceeds go to a breast cancer charity.

Cardinalology, the new record by (maybe overly) prolific alt-country guy (and North Carolina native) Ryan Adams and his band The Cardinals, is streaming for free online for 48 hours. It's available in stores Oct. 28.

It's Web Junkie Wednesday, and as the new television season is about to begin, I thought we could talk TV online.

By now, you should know about Hulu - the game changing Web site that legally streams a number of old and new TV shows and movies for free, at your convenience, no downloads necessary.

But like YouTube before it, Hulu has pushed networks to start posting their shows on their own Web sites - in higher def, with minimal ads and streaming whenever you like.

This season there are a number of networks posting their shows' season premieres before they actually hit the TV. Among them:

Showtime is allowing viewers to see this season's first episodes of hit shows Dexter and Californication now well before their Sept. 28 premieres.

But if explicit shows about serial killers and drunk, masochistic writers aren't your bag, NBC may have what you want.

Right now you can see the premiere of the new Knight Rider revival and this season's first episode of Lipstick Jungle ahead of their Sept 24th premieres.

Next week the network will let you watch the season premieres of Life, Chuck and 30 Rock before they hit the airwaves as well.

It's another Web Junkie Wednesday and this week we're looking at getting more bang for your DVD buck.

If you're like me your inability to keep track of series television (especially large, complicated serial stories like those on Lost, Heroes and 24) has led you to give up, wait for the DVD and watch it at your own pace.

This can be leisurely -- an episode or two a night -- or you could stay in your pajamas, get a giant punchbowl full of breakfast cereal and create your own Saturday catch-up marathon. But however you do it, it can get expensive.

That's where Just The Disc comes in. By ditching the packaging and selling you just the disc of movies, shows and music CDs they cut the price dramatically -- CDs are just $2.99 and DVDs $3.99. You can buy one disc at a time and if you buy five, you get free shipping. All discs are pre-owned but in excellent condition and fully guaranteed.

They don't have everything -- but they do have a lot of popular shows, movies and CDs.

Example: On Amazon.com the cheapest price for the First Season of The West Wing is $37. Even used, the best you can do is $21. You can buy all four discs of the same series at Just The Disc for $16 -- or just buy the first disc to see if you get addicted (you will).

I don't know about you, but I rarely keep DVD and jewel cases nowadays anyway. I slip them into a disc wallet to save space. From now on, when possible, I'll be buying them this way, saving money and cutting out the middle man.

It's another Web Junkie Wednesday and today we're celebrating those brave, industrious souls who have faced down their e-mail, stemmed the tide of spam and junk, fought the digital pack-rat urge and completely cleaned out their inboxes.

Inbox Victory is a site where people share the amazing feeling of getting down to zero messages.

From the site:

Have you ever been in the situation where you spend days trying answer all of your email only to accomplish your goal and have no one to share in your victory? All you want is a high five, a pat on the back, and a “job well done soldier!”, and yet most likely all you are left with is an empty room and a cold cup of coffee. Inbox Victory is an initiative that says, “you deserve that high five!” And here is how you get it:

3) Leave your screenshot in the comments of this post.

Here are some of the newly liberated:

Inspired by these brave individuals, I'm going tackle my work Outlook inbox (162 items) and my personal Gmail inbox (913 items...no...now it's 914).

Wish me luck!

Holy Chocolate Salty Balls!

South Park Studios is now live -- a South Park internet hub from which you can legally stream every episode from all 12 seasons of the show, right up to last Sunday's installment, all for free.

The site also has clips, games, news, an episode guide (when DID Kenny come back, and when DID we find out who Cartman's father was?) -- as well as this really weird avatar maker.

The San Francisco Chronicle has a great piece about a woman selling a Mastodon skeleton on eBay.

The woman, Nancy Fiddler, said she's had no bids so far -- which could have something to do with the $115,000 starting price.

My favorite bit from the article:

Mastodon experts say that six figures for a mastodon is several figures too many, and that fossils belong in museums instead of wine bars and garages.

"That's an incredibly inflated price," said UC Berkeley paleontologist Mark Goodwin. "Mastodons are not uncommon. And the commercialization of fossils is a huge problem. It's undermining the science. This is our fossil heritage, and it shouldn't be for sale."

I just love the idea that the paleontologist is upset because she thinks that whoever buys this skeleton is getting hosed. What's the Blue Book value on an extinct animal's fossilized remains?

Well, it's Web Junkie Wednesday again -- and in this week's edition I want to talk about online juke boxes. You know, those free online tune repositories that keep you singing through your workday (and distract you from any actual work as you search their catalogs).

My personal favorite right now is Soundpedia, an online collection of music, videos and community features that allows you to listen to an astonishing number of songs and full length albums in their entirety -- and even shows you the lyrics as the songs are playing.

It is Web Junkie Wednesday here at Culture Shock.

Because I just said it is, that's why.

I'm going to start using Wednesdays to talk about and point you to amazing web things to which you can become debilitating addicted (if you're not already)!

Let's get started...