World of Kent

Leaving a Vulgar Comment Online Might Cost You Your Job | School ...

SoulRiser — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 17:32:34 -0800

In fact, Facebook itself may even owe its success to how it forces users to post with their "real" name and identity notes blogger Kent Newsome. "With a name comes accountability, and there is a direct correlation between accountability ...
School Survival Blog - http://www.school-survival.net/blog/

Interesting: How to: Make Your Own iPhone Capacitive-Compatible Gloves!; http://bit.ly/66QrWI

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 09:08:40 -0800

Kent

Interesting: How to: Make Your Own iPhone Capacitive-Compatible Gloves!; http://www.theiphoneblog.com/2009...

yesterday from Twitter - Comment - Like

kentnewsome: Interesting: How to: Make Your Own iPhone Capacitive-Compatible Gloves!; http://bit.ly/66QrWI

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 09:08:40 -0800

kentnewsome: Interesting: How to: Make Your Own iPhone Capacitive-Compatible Gloves!; http://bit.ly/66QrWI

Twitter Kent Newsome 6 mile run tonight in adv

(author unknown) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 23:23:33 -0800

6 mile run tonight, in advance of big holiday meals this week.

Twitter Kent Newsome New Blog Post The Muppets

(author unknown) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 23:21:59 -0800

New Blog Post: The Muppets Rock: http://tinyurl.com/yhodmjs.

Twitter Kent Newsome New Blog Post Sorry in A

(author unknown) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 23:20:34 -0800

New Blog Post: Sorry, in Advance, But: http://tinyurl.com/ye8m3ue.

6 mile run tonight, in advance of big holiday meals this week.

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:58:29 -0800

Kent

6 mile run tonight, in advance of big holiday meals this week.

Wednesday from Twitter - Comment - Like

New Blog Post: Sorry, in Advance, But: http://tinyurl.com/ye8m3ue

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 21:36:37 -0800

Kent

New Blog Post: Sorry, in Advance, But: http://www.newsome.org/2009...

Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Sorry, in Advance, But

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 21:36:32 -0800

Kent

Sorry, in Advance, But - http://www.newsome.org/2009...

Tuesday from Newsome.Org - Comment - Like

New Blog Post: The Muppets Rock: http://tinyurl.com/yhodmjs

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:37:17 -0800

Kent

New Blog Post: The Muppets Rock: http://www.newsome.org/2009...

Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like

The Muppets Rock

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:37:10 -0800

Kent

The Muppets Rock - http://www.newsome.org/2009...

Tuesday from Newsome.Org - Comment - Like

kentnewsome: 6 mile run tonight, in advance of big holiday meals this week.

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:58:29 -0800

kentnewsome: 6 mile run tonight, in advance of big holiday meals this week.

kentnewsome: New Blog Post: Sorry, in Advance, But: http://tinyurl.com/ye8m3ue

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 21:36:37 -0800

kentnewsome: New Blog Post: Sorry, in Advance, But: http://tinyurl.com/ye8m3ue

Sorry, in Advance, But

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 21:36:32 -0800

For reasons I can't fully explain, I think this photo is hilarious.

kentnewsome: New Blog Post: The Muppets Rock: http://tinyurl.com/yhodmjs

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:37:17 -0800

kentnewsome: New Blog Post: The Muppets Rock: http://tinyurl.com/yhodmjs

The Muppets Rock

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:37:10 -0800

I am really happy to live in a world where this is possible.

Interesting: What Apps Should Twitter Acquire?; http://bit.ly/5RhasR

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:51:53 -0800

Kent

Interesting: What Apps Should Twitter Acquire?; http://www.readwriteweb.com/archive...

Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Interesting: PC Specs: De-emphasizing the processor; http://bit.ly/6hdSKB

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:49:08 -0800

Kent

Interesting: PC Specs: De-emphasizing the processor; http://blogs.chron.com/techblo...

Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Interesting: Using Technology to Organize Your Life Without Paper; http://bit.ly/8agxCS

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:43:27 -0800

Kent

Interesting: Using Technology to Organize Your Life Without Paper; http://www.dumblittleman.com/2009...

Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like

kentnewsome: Interesting: What Apps Should Twitter Acquire?; http://bit.ly/5RhasR

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:51:53 -0800

kentnewsome: Interesting: What Apps Should Twitter Acquire?; http://bit.ly/5RhasR

kentnewsome: Interesting: PC Specs: De-emphasizing the processor; http://bit.ly/6hdSKB

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:49:08 -0800

kentnewsome: Interesting: PC Specs: De-emphasizing the processor; http://bit.ly/6hdSKB

kentnewsome: Interesting: Using Technology to Organize Your Life Without Paper; http://bit.ly/8agxCS

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:43:27 -0800

kentnewsome: Interesting: Using Technology to Organize Your Life Without Paper; http://bit.ly/8agxCS

6 mile run tonight.

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:27:30 -0800

Kent

6 mile run tonight.

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

@ExpenseExpert Dude stop spamming people.

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:15:47 -0800

Kent

@ExpenseExpert Dude stop spamming people.

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Great Read: Microsoft once more proves you can indeed buy stupidity http://tinyurl.com/ydlaqh4

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:13:28 -0800

Kent

Great Read: Microsoft once more proves you can indeed buy stupidity http://www.inquisitr.com/49024...

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

New Blog Post: Are Good Ideas and Big Business Mutually Exclusive Concepts?: http://tinyurl.com/y8jss8x

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:59:30 -0800

Kent

New Blog Post: Are Good Ideas and Big Business Mutually Exclusive Concepts?: http://www.newsome.org/2009...

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Are Good Ideas and Big Business Mutually Exclusive Concepts?

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:59:24 -0800

Kent

Are Good Ideas and Big Business Mutually Exclusive Concepts? - http://www.newsome.org/2009...

Monday from Newsome.Org - Comment - Like

Microsoft once more proves you can indeed buy stupidity

Steven Hodson — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 15:22:56 -0800

I am not sure if you can put a price on stupidity or not; but I am pretty sure that if you could weasel out of Steve Ballmer how much this possible getting.
The Inquisitr - http://www.inquisitr.com/

Not OK [I eat sushi all the time]: Sushi "Tuna" Might Be Endangered, Dangerous, Or Fake; http://bit.ly/08DPgVc

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 15:05:54 -0800

Kent

Not OK [I eat sushi all the time]: Sushi "Tuna" Might Be Endangered, Dangerous, Or Fake; http://consumerist.com/2009...

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Proof that the world is doomed: FarmVille’s Parent Company Valued at $1 Billion?; http://bit.ly/6M5Nas

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 15:02:29 -0800

Kent

Proof that the world is doomed: FarmVille’s Parent Company Valued at $1 Billion?; http://mashable.com/2009...

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Interesting: When the hunters become the hunted; http://tinyurl.com/yzs6a8l

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 14:50:09 -0800

Kent

Interesting: When the hunters become the hunted; http://www.chron.com/disp...

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

kentnewsome: 6 mile run tonight.

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:27:30 -0800

kentnewsome: 6 mile run tonight.

kentnewsome: @ExpenseExpert Dude stop spamming people.

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:15:47 -0800

kentnewsome: @ExpenseExpert Dude stop spamming people.

kentnewsome: RT @ninjen: Ok, this is hilarious. Bolivian police release detailed police sketch. (I think it's Waldo.) http://www.wimp.com/policesketch/

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:14:28 -0800

kentnewsome: RT @ninjen: Ok, this is hilarious. Bolivian police release detailed police sketch. (I think it's Waldo.) http://www.wimp.com/policesketch/

kentnewsome: Great Read: Microsoft once more proves you can indeed buy stupidity http://tinyurl.com/ydlaqh4

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:13:28 -0800

kentnewsome: Great Read: Microsoft once more proves you can indeed buy stupidity http://tinyurl.com/ydlaqh4

kentnewsome: New Blog Post: Are Good Ideas and Big Business Mutually Exclusive Concepts?: http://tinyurl.com/y8jss8x

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:59:30 -0800

kentnewsome: New Blog Post: Are Good Ideas and Big Business Mutually Exclusive Concepts?: http://tinyurl.com/y8jss8x

Are Good Ideas and Big Business Mutually Exclusive Concepts?

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:59:24 -0800

I knew when Intuit purchased the up and coming personal finance site Mint, it was only a matter of time before Mint lost its freshness and became another stale online business. What I didn't know was that the transformation would begin so quickly. Let's be honest, trying to up-sell a "free credit report" is one more bad decision away from urging folks to yank out their gold teeth and send them to Cash4Gold. Or, even better, to Cats4Gold.

It just sounds desperate, doesn't it? I mean, if this is what Intuit brings to the table, why did it even bother? Seriously.

As we talked about yesterday, News Corp, perhaps trying to prove that it can do something even dumber than buying MySpace, is thinking about yanking its books out of the Google card catalog. Microsoft, trying to put the world back in order after a rare PR success with the launch of Windows 7, seems to be willing to pay News Corp to do so. Someone up in that cloud of arrogance and wealth has to know this won't work. Which means that they are really just using consumers as fodder in a jealousy-induced feud with Google. No thanks. I'll pass.

Elsewhere, the web is littered with the corpses of abandoned projects and services that were acquired by big companies, only to die on the balance sheet. Over and over, ideas are hatched, nurtured until some bigger fish takes the bait, sold. . . and die. Leaving all the users that created all that alleged value out in the cold.

There seem to be a couple of repeating patterns.

One, someone creates a service that is some combination of really cool or really hyped. Lots of traffic results, and some big company with lots of money gets fooled (again) into thinking all those eyeballs can be monetized. The big company buys the cool/hyped service, tries without success to stuff the free-formed service into a dollar-sized hole, and ends up shuttering it or selling it at a huge discount.

Two, companies realize that they can't beat the competition on the field by creating and promoting a good product, so they conspire to change the rules. This is kindergarten politics, engaged in by the super-rich, at the expense of the rest of us. Yep, it's the man getting one over on us. Again.

Even so, none of this is good for the purchasing company. Certainly, none of this is good for the consumer, who gets dragged all over the place and then abandoned. The only ones making any money on these deals are the serial service creators and the early investors who invest a little money in order to get a big chunk of the purchase price. Numbers being what they are, a few hits can finance a lot of misses. And, again, consumers get taken for a ride.

At the end of the day, I don't see how this does anything other than discourage innovation. With everything being based on either ads, which no one likes, or getting bought by Google, which is becoming more and more of a long shot, there is little incentive to try to create the sort of value that people would- hold your ears- pay for. When did paying for value become so out of fashion?

Or is it that many of these services aren't as value-producing as some would have us believe?

One thing is for sure- if the developers don't believe in their product enough to charge for it, then why should users believe in it? This is the root of the problem, because lots of people would happily pay for a good, reliable service that isn't likely to disappear or get sold to a big, clueless mega-company.

Want an example?

I pay for a premium account at Remember the Milk, solely because it integrates so well with Gmail and Google Calendar.

I would gladly pay for Disqus comments, if they could make the "Reactions" feature work reliably (it doesn't presently).

There are plenty of others.

We just need to figure out how to make good ideas and big business compatible.

@zigthiessen 1960 era A-5. It was on the easier of the two courses, though. I wouldn't do that well on the harder course.

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 08:53:44 -0800

Kent

@zigthiessen 1960 era A-5. It was on the easier of the two courses, though. I wouldn't do that well on the harder course.

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

Interesting: Finding Value Even If I Were the Last FriendFeeder...; http://bit.ly/5gMiXq

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 08:01:46 -0800

Kent

Interesting: Finding Value Even If I Were the Last FriendFeeder...; http://blog.louisgray.com/2009...

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

kentnewsome: Not OK [I eat sushi all the time]: Sushi "Tuna" Might Be Endangered, Dangerous, Or Fake; http://bit.ly/08DPgVc

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 15:05:54 -0800

kentnewsome: Not OK [I eat sushi all the time]: Sushi "Tuna" Might Be Endangered, Dangerous, Or Fake; http://bit.ly/08DPgVc

kentnewsome: Proof that the world is doomed: FarmVille’s Parent Company Valued at $1 Billion?; http://bit.ly/6M5Nas

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 15:02:29 -0800

kentnewsome: Proof that the world is doomed: FarmVille’s Parent Company Valued at $1 Billion?; http://bit.ly/6M5Nas

kentnewsome: Interesting: When the hunters become the hunted; http://tinyurl.com/yzs6a8l

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 14:50:09 -0800

kentnewsome: Interesting: When the hunters become the hunted; http://tinyurl.com/yzs6a8l

Interesting: Zoho Makes Another Move to be the IT of the Small Business Market; http://bit.ly/4urng9

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 06:24:39 -0800

Kent

Interesting: Zoho Makes Another Move to be the IT of the Small Business Market; http://www.readwriteweb.com/enterpr...

Monday from Twitter - Comment - Like

kentnewsome: @zigthiessen 1960 era A-5. It was on the easier of the two courses, though. I wouldn't do that well on the harder course.

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 08:53:44 -0800

kentnewsome: @zigthiessen 1960 era A-5. It was on the easier of the two courses, though. I wouldn't do that well on the harder course.

kentnewsome: Interesting: Finding Value Even If I Were the Last FriendFeeder...; http://bit.ly/5gMiXq

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 08:01:46 -0800

kentnewsome: Interesting: Finding Value Even If I Were the Last FriendFeeder...; http://bit.ly/5gMiXq

kentnewsome: Interesting: Zoho Makes Another Move to be the IT of the Small Business Market; http://bit.ly/4urng9

Mon, 23 Nov 2009 06:24:39 -0800

kentnewsome: Interesting: Zoho Makes Another Move to be the IT of the Small Business Market; http://bit.ly/4urng9

Twitter louisgray NewsomeOrg Screwing Over

(author unknown) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 20:59:39 -0800

Newsome.Org: Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business Plan http://tinyurl.com/ykvrp3y.

NewsomeOrg

(author unknown) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 20:19:37 -0800

TweetMeme finds the hottest stories from twitter for you to retweet.

Ginx louisgray NewsomeOrg Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business ...

(author unknown) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 20:05:40 -0800

New Blog Post: Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business Plan: http://tinyurl.com/ykvrp3y

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:28:58 -0800

Kent

New Blog Post: Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business Plan: http://www.newsome.org/2009...

November 22 from Twitter - Comment - Like

Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business Plan

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:28:49 -0800

Kent

Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business Plan - http://www.newsome.org/2009...

November 22 from Newsome.Org - Comment - Like

Re: Newsome.Org

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 16:41:10 -0800

Kent

Re: Newsome.Org - http://www.newsome.org/2009...

November 22 from Disqus - Comment - Like

"Louis, I agree. If there are two mega-companies that could convince themselves that this sort of thing is the answer, these are them. I thought the whole Bing thing was just to pressure Yahoo to capitulate. If this story has legs, it could do collateral damage outside MSFT's sandbox, and that's what worries me." - Kent

Interesting: What Twitter needs to add next; http://bit.ly/08vlZ1a

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 16:09:12 -0800

Kent

Interesting: What Twitter needs to add next; http://mnmlist.com/what-tw...

November 22 from Twitter - Comment - Like

WinExtra gets a new look : http://www.winextra.com/index.php/2009/11/22/winextra-gets-a-new-look-as-part-of-the-move-forward/

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 15:35:38 -0800

Kent

WinExtra gets a new look : http://www.winextra.com/index...

November 22 from Twitter - Comment - Like

kentnewsome: New Blog Post: Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business Plan: http://tinyurl.com/ykvrp3y

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:28:58 -0800

kentnewsome: New Blog Post: Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business Plan: http://tinyurl.com/ykvrp3y

Screwing Over Users Is Not a Business Plan

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:28:49 -0800

Let's all say it together: the way to make money on the internet is not to screw over your users.

Once more: if you have to make things worse for users in order to make money, maybe your business plan sucks.

First, I read a little more about this ad.ly thing. How in the wide world of sports can any portion of the legitimate internet embrace, applaud or permit what looks to me like nothing more than organized, high tech spam? Seriously, if I am going to un-follow someone for tossing another idiotic multi-level marketing scheme in my Twitter feed, why in the world would I accept blatant ads from people? Legitimize an in-Tweet ad-based economy within Twitter and you will be overrun by a horde of eyeball prospectors whose sole or substantial objective is to entice eyeballs inside their tent in the name of money. If the philosophy isn't enough to make you say "hell no," then spend about one second considering the impossible logistics. Twitter can't keep the spammers off the line now. Imagine how bad it will get if in-Tweet ads gets blessed by Twitter. You'll see a ton of automated links to stuff we've already seen, purely as a set-up for the ad-hosting, money seeking Tweet. Spam may kill Twitter as things stand now. Why make it easier?

If you still aren't convinced, then remember that Tweets are short, 140 character posts, most of which are either completely un-newsworthy or link to content elsewhere. If you want to pay people for Tweets, then you better pay them for links. And recommendations. And good karma. Word of mouth is the benefit of a good product, not the product itself. If I tell my friends to watch a particular TV show, I don't expect to get paid for it. And if I did, the value of my suggestion would be nil.

In sum, this in-Tweet ad business may just be the worst idea ever. Other than this one.

Microsoft has proven that it can't get its ducks in the same zip code where the internet is concerned. So rather than create something that gets the herd to migrate voluntarily, it is apparently considering trying to buy the herd via some thankfully doomed from the start deal with News Corp, the other big company that doesn't get the internet. Here's the thing: people are going to use Google, that's why it's a verb. If you take your content out of the Google search results, people won't see it. Merchants go where the people are, not the other way around.

And if you pay someone else to take their content out of those search results, I, for one, will consciously avoid whatever corral you're trying to force me into. That's just not OK. If you want eyeballs, create something people want to see, and make it easy for them to find it. There's way too much internet content supply to artificially manipulate the demand. So don't try to gain customers by making things harder. It won't work.

The things that make money are the ones that are good for users. Not unnecessary obstacles that only serve to leverage off of them.

@dsilverman Thanks Dwight. I think you were. I must have fallen off at some point :)

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 11:26:50 -0800

Kent

@dsilverman Thanks Dwight. I think you were. I must have fallen off at some point :)

November 22 from Twitter - Comment - Like

kentnewsome: Interesting: What Twitter needs to add next; http://bit.ly/08vlZ1a

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 16:09:12 -0800

kentnewsome: Interesting: What Twitter needs to add next; http://bit.ly/08vlZ1a

Twitter Kent Newsome Adly sounds to me like on

(author unknown) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 06:15:41 -0800

Ad.ly sounds to me like one more way for the in-crowd (> followers) to make $ off the rest of us; http://bit.ly/5RP2EE.

7 mile run tonight.

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 23:00:58 -0800

Kent

7 mile run tonight.

November 22 from Twitter - Comment - Like

@harrymccracken Yes, but it couldn't bait the hook so it didn't catch anything.

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 20:45:14 -0800

Kent

@harrymccracken Yes, but it couldn't bait the hook so it didn't catch anything.

November 21 from Twitter - Comment - Like

Ad.ly sounds to me like one more way for the in-crowd (> followers) to make $ off the rest of us; http://bit.ly/5RP2EE

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 20:38:28 -0800

Kent

Ad.ly sounds to me like one more way for the in-crowd (> followers) to make $ off the rest of us; http://scobleizer.com/2009...

November 21 from Twitter - Comment - Like

65/72 in sporting clays today. Not bad for a cold, rainy day.

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 16:11:51 -0800

Kent

65/72 in sporting clays today. Not bad for a cold, rainy day.

November 21 from Twitter - Comment - Like

Twitter Kent Newsomednwallace I dont know ab

(author unknown) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 17:09:22 -0800

dnwallace I don't know about that show, but based on the title it sounds like a snoozer :)

Mountain Lion Hunting: Who's the [Kitty] Here?

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 19:05:24 -0800

Let's start with a few facts. I'm from the rural south. I love to hunt, mostly birds, and I eat what I kill. In fact, I don't duck hunt much because I don't like the way ducks taste. I shoot skeet or sporting clays every chance I get. I drive a pickup truck. I have a beard, etc. So even though I'd probably disagree with the typical good ol' boy on a lot of social and political issues, I've been mistaken for a good ol' boy more than a few times. I am not some animal rights extremist. I have crapped all over PETA here and on Twitter for years for being so absurdly extremist that it has completely lost the power to convince.

Oh, and one last fact: the next to last fistfight I got in was after I called some guy a [synonym for kitty] for going to Africa and shooting lions and elephants and whatnot. It was a long time ago after a few beers and one too many great white hunter story. I proved to be a little tougher adversary than some oblivious lion a hundred or so yards away.

So, while I generally identify with the hunter/camper/outdoorsman culture, I draw a very bright line between those animals that are OK to hunt and those that are not. Dove, ducks and deer are one one side of that line. Lions, elephants and bears are on the other. So it really bummed me out today when I saw some dude on a hunting blog I read proudly retelling how some other dudes killed a mountain lion in central Texas. If I saw a mountain lion that wasn't about to eat me or my family, I would be really excited. Honored, actually. What I wouldn't be is inclined to shoot it.

I understand the argument that mountain lions adversely affect the deer population. Well, guess what- so do humans, and I imagine there are a lot more humans out there killing deer than there are mountain lions. I love deer meat and eat it all the time, but I certainly wouldn't kill a mountain lion just to ensure a few more pounds of deer sausage in my refrigerator. And let's not overlook the fact that the only reason most of these folks want to keep the deer from being killed by a mountain lion is so they can kill them themselves.

I have heard- and rejected- the argument that mountain lions are dangerous. The fact is that mountain lion attacks are rare. Dogs kill far more people annually than mountain lions do in a century.

And I understand, even if I don't completely believe, the argument that the mountain lion population is growing, with the decline of pesticides and goat and sheep farming. What I also understand is that in Texas mountain lions are not classified as a game animal, which means anyone can kill as many of them as they can find, any time and without limit. That's messed up. There are only 30,000 mountain lions in the western United States. There are 30 million deer in the United States, with deer population control becoming a major concern in numerous states. So I'm not buying the argument that there aren't enough deer to feed a few mountain lions.

So unless there is evidence that this mountain lion was an immediate danger to persons or expensive property and could not be trapped and relocated despite diligent attempts to do so, those dudes should have let that cat go.

If you are interested in learning about mountain lions- as opposed to just killing them, here's an informative article on their population, age distribution and mortality rates.

NewsomeOrg

(author unknown) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:55:58 -0800

NewsomeOrg Kent's blog and the related pages and content are solely the thoughts and opinions of Kent Newsome in his personal capacity and are not ...

Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Open Office

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:38:31 -0800

Everybody's talking about the office suite for the next decade. Microsoft Office 2010 is in beta. Google is waging a vaporware offensive, trying to convince people that it is about to engage in some much needed alchemy with Google Docs. Meanwhile, Open Office just plugs along. Being just as free as Google Docs, and, at least, just about as good as the ever-bloating Microsoft Office suite.

I'm all about free, and I live in the cloud. There are free and cloudy apps for just about everything. But the choices for word processing applications are slim, which is odd given that today's computers are the offspring of yesterday's typewriters. But fear not. Here's the bottom line on office suites, with an emphasis on word processors.

Google Docs

I have moved my email and calendaring activity to Google Apps, via the standard (e.g., free) version. With Better Gmail 2, Gmail is a great, free and accessible email application. Google Calendar is far superior to the calendar in Microsoft Outlook. On the other hand, Google Docs, Google's word processing app, is- to be kind- not ready for prime time. Sure, it's fine for a light home user who wants to write a letter every now and then. But to try to use it for business purposes is to submit yourself to a digital hell. Among the multitude of problems: no tracked changes feature, which is an absolute must for business users; and formatting chaos when you upload a formatted Word document. In sum, it's a non-starter. Google wants us to believe that this will all change. In the meantime, though, we have work to do.

Microsoft Office

Microsoft has a deep and valuable franchise in the corporate world. One that became a virtual, if not actual, monopoly when WordPerfect committed suicide at the hands of Novell and Corel. IT managers know Word. More importantly, secretaries and administrative personnel know Word. To monkey around with the status quo on the corporate desktop is to move a whole lot of cheese. In sum, inefficiency and rebellion would result.

Nevertheless, Microsoft is trying to open the door for a competitor. No one- and I mean no one- in a corporate office wants the menu structure he or she has used for years to be replaced by some confusing ribbon or whatnot. As Microsoft continues to force old dogs to learn new tricks, the remote odds of meaningful corporate word processing competition get less remote. The name of the game in 2010 will be simple and easy. Not bloated and complicated.

Ugh!

All of which favors the other alternatives.

In fact, for purely home users, I can't think of a single reason to pay for Microsoft Office. Fortunately for Microsoft, however, most home users require the ability to open, read and edit work-related documents from time to time. Documents that were almost certainly created in Microsoft Word. I certainly do, and that has complicated my effort to go completely free and cloudy for word processing.

Open Office

So I find myself uninterested in paying for Microsoft Office and unwilling to put myself through the agony of using Google Docs as my exclusive word processing app. Until recently, Open Office was sort of like Bigfoot. I'd heard of it. Maybe I'd seen a purported picture or two, but I was still a little scared of it. Recently, however, my dilemma caused me to read up a little more on it. Then I took a deep breath, downloaded it, and gave it a spin.

And was pretty impressed.

It feels like a slightly stripped down version of Microsoft Word. It opens Word documents without destroying them. There is a way to show and review document revisions. Shoot, it saves documents in Word format. There's even a plug-in that lets me open from and save to Google Docs.

All the votes aren't in yet, but I'm about ready to call Open Office a winner.

Leaving a Vulgar Comment Online Might Cost You Your Job

Sarah Perez — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 08:17:01 -0800

A backlash against anonymous commenters and trolls seems to be underway. Only last month, a court case was settled where anonymous commenters ended up having to pay big ...
ReadWriteWebComments - http://www.readwriteweb.com/

Leaving a Vulgar Comment Online Might Cost You Your Job

ReadWriteWeb - CA,USA — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 08:06:27 -0800

In fact, Facebook itself may even owe its success to how it forces users to post with their "real" name and identity notes blogger Kent Newsome. ...

Newsome.Org

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 23:18:40 -0800

Org, Kent's blog and the related pages and content are solely the thoughts and opinions of Kent Newsome in his personal capacity and are not associated with any other person or entity, including, without limitation, any partnership or ...
Newsome.Org - http://www.newsome.org/index.shtml

Compute Easily and Cheaply With Cloudy, Free Software Alternatives

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:22:15 -0800

My computer was getting a little long in the tooth, so when Windows 7 was released, I decided to buy a new one. I also decided, following my earlier move to Google Apps, to create my application toolbox with as many cloud applications and free software alternatives as reasonably possible. Here's what I did, for those who want to simplify their computer toolbox and put some extra money in their pockets.

The Computer

I bought an HP Pavilion Elite e9280t. I've had good luck with HP computers, both laptops and desktops, so I decided to stay with what was working. Plus, it seems to me that you get more bang for your buck from HP than other PC makers. I went with the 64-bit version of Windows 7 Professional, because it will give the computer a longer lifespan and I've only rarely had problems getting my software and hardware to work under the 64-bit versions. I also bought 9GB of RAM, because I do a fair amount of video editing and music mixing and the extra memory will make the computer faster at that sort of resource intensive activity.

When the computer arrived, the first thing I did was to remove the bloatware. HP has gotten a lot better about bloatware, but there is still some clean up required. I would rather bathe in computer viruses than use anything Symantec/Norton related, so I immediately uninstalled Norton Internet Security and Norton Online Backup. Rather, I'll use the free Microsoft Security Essentials and my HP MediaSmart server. I was a beta tester for Microsoft Security Essentials, and I think it works very well. Plus, it's free. I deleted the screen litter for eBay (which I use, but I don't need a shortcut on my desktop), and the various online services. Finally, I deleted all those HP games. It's absurd that HP makes you manually check every one separately during the uninstall process. I interpret that to mean that some of these game developers are paying HP to pre-install this junk. Regardless, they're gone.

My Data

Next, I copied over the data I need from my old computer, via an HP Personal Media Drive. Photos, MP3s, videos, in process song mixes, and some, but not all, of decades worth of Word files I have accumulated. My new documents are created via Google Docs, but I have some old documents I want to save, just in case. I like the Libraries feature in Windows 7, which basically lets you use multiple folders for your music, photos, etc.

I saved my old Outlook emails, now uploaded to Gmail, as PST files, and copied them to my new computer's "Old Files" Library, just in case.

Software and Applications

Now for the fun part. Here's what I elected to use in lieu of software I used to pay for.

My first download, of course, was Firefox. A quick install of Xmarks allowed me to import my bookmarks. I'm trying to go relatively light on add-ons. So far I have installed the mandatory Adblock Plus, Better Gmail 2, PhotoBucket Uploader, Read it Later and Xmarks. All of the foregoing are free.

No more Microsoft Office. I now use Google Apps (the "standard" or free version) for my email, calendar and documents. The Gmail interface, with (but not without) Better Gmail 2 is an excellent email application. Google Calendar is far superior to the Outlook calendar. And of course, I can now access all of my data from almost anywhere. And, again, for free.

For my task list, I use Remember the Milk. It works flawlessly within Gmail and Google calendar via a gadget. I have a premium account, but there is a free version.

Next, I installed my beloved Windows Live Writer, for blog posts. Yep, free.

In lieu of the bloated Nero, I installed CDBurnerXP. It works great, and it costs nada.

For photo management, I couldn't decide between Picasa and Windows Live Photo Gallery. So installed both. Both are free.

Photo editing may be a challenge. I use Picnik for basic (read easy) photo editing. I may try Gimp as a Photoshop replacement, but I am a long-time Photoshop user, and I have a license already. So at the end of the day the one expensive software program that finds its way only my computer may be Photoshop. We'll see. If anyone has a recommendation, please send it along via a Comment.

For video editing, I installed Windows Live Movie Maker. I'm a long-time Ulead VideoStudio fan. Corel bought it, though, so it's only a matter of time until it dies a painful, bloated death. Since I have a license for the current version (VSX2), I may install it on my new computer. I doubt, however, that I'll buy any upgrades. Hopefully, Windows Live Movie Maker or some other free or open source program will work for the long haul. If anyone has a recommendation, please send it along via a Comment.

Of course, I installed Evernote. I am a huge Evernote fan, but the developers' failure to add folders- or to even respond to my repeated inquiries about the possibility- are dampening my devotion. Either they need to listen to my good advice or I need to move on. Let me take a moment to digress. I have written about issues with HP and Microsoft products in blog posts, and been contacted within hours with offers of help or information. I have written to Evernote at least twice and asked about the plans, or lack thereof, for folders, and have never received a reply. That is simply bad customer management. For now, there are no better alternatives, but at some point there may be. We'll see, but for now, Evernote remains one of my most used apps.

For FTP, I use FileZilla, which is free and superior to every paid app I have ever tried.

For radio, I use Pandora and Slacker Radio.

Web site development and HTML editing proved to be a problem. I installed the free and wonderful Notepad++, which is great for text editing. I read good things about WYSIWYG editor KompoZer, but I hated the way it reformatted the text in my HTML files when I opened them. I uninstalled it immediately. I may not need a WYSIWYG editor, but if I do, I don't know of a free and powerful option.

The Cloud

For backups and large data storage and redundancy, I use my HP MediaSmart server. While I was immensely frustrated with my old server, the newer models have more memory and a much better GUI. I love the media collector feature, that automatically grabs media files from the various network computers, backs them up and allows network access to them. While I have not done it, you can easily configure your server to allow remote access over the internet. There's even an iPhone app.

For general cloud cover, I use Dropbox for most of my needs. I also have a Box.Net and a DivShare account that I use from time to time. If today's Google news is any indication, all of our cloud needs may eventually float over to Google. I want GDrive and I want it bad.

For online photos, I use Flickr for my family photos, etc., PhotoBucket for other image files I want to save, and Picasa for reference-related graphics (e.g., maps, reference cards, etc.). For online videos, I use YouTube, Qik and Vimeo. All are free, though I pay for a Vimeo premium account so I can upload larger, HD videos.

And of course, I share certain things with friends via Facebook and Twitter. Both free.

The Result

I have a lean, mean new computer with mostly free, web accessible, organized applications. It feels really good- and the change in my pocket jingles when I surf.

The Face(book) is Familiar

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:06:07 -0800

I've spent lots of blog space and podcast time pooping all over Facebook. Saying how it is for kids, that it's AOL 2.0, that it's the internet kiddie pool. I was right, and I was wrong. Mostly wrong.

Facebook is all of those things, of course, but perhaps in an evolutionary- and not a pejorative- way. More than anything else, Facebook is like Brawndo: it's got what people crave. Over time I have mostly capitulated to Facebook, simply because it's the only path to a lot of people I want to interact with. I create almost all of my content out here on the big, scary web, but I push a lot of it into Facebook. And I visit Facebook several times a week to see what all the non-nerds are talking about. Granted, there's a lot of talking over each other, but there's a little interaction. Which is more than you can say for Twitter.

With all that, I started to wonder just what makes Facebook so popular.

It's partly the ready-made platform to connect with other people. It's partly momentum. It's partly that MySpace sucks so completely.

But mostly I think it's the names. You know, those things beside the users' photographs. One thing Facebook got totally right is the absence of anonymity. Anonymity is like cars- it brings out the inner asshole in people. It has killed before, and given the chance would do so again.

Anonymity, with a helping hand from Google, killed newsgroups. Those of us who have been on the internet long enough to remember when news readers were for reading Usenet posts, as opposed to RSS feeds, miss the days of the old-school newsgroup. It was all kinds of good, until anonymous assholes and spammers killed it. I haven't read a Usenet newsgroup in years, and don't even have a news(group) reader on my computer.

Then came the message boards. For a decade or so, message boards proudly carried the banner of online interactivity. The combination of better technology and community moderation generally kept the spam under control. But a large population of anonymous users first diluted the perceived content value of message board sites to the point that advertisers stopped buying ads, and ultimately destroyed the entire message board culture, via bad information, bad behavior and general mayhem. All of which could be doled out at will without fear of reprisal because of anonymity. Sissies grow giant stones behind the safety of a windshield or a message board handle. It's gotten so bad that I don't even frequent the message board sites I founded. Rather, I create Google alerts or FriendFeed pages for topics I'm interested in. It's not as fun as the old message board days, but it's better than watching a revolving group of anonymous jerks litter my screen with nonsense.

Meanwhile, over at Facebook, people are sharing information under their real names. Sure, you can create a fake identity and set up a Facebook account, but users who are prudent with their Friends lists can easily avoid most screen clutter. You generally know who you are talking to. With a name comes accountability, and there is a direct correlation between accountability and behavior. All of which creates a better experience for the users. Which draws more users and, in turn, more advertisers. Ultimately you have digital high tide that raises all ships.

Which is why I ended up with the rest of the world on Facebook. Even if I still find it vaguely embarrassing.

Twitter Kent Newsome Interesting Dell's answer

(author unknown) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 10:01:38 -0800

Interesting: Dell's answer to Apple's Mac mini - The Inspiron Zino HD; http://bit.ly/Yevv7.

Twitter Kent Newsome New Blog Post Delaney's S

(author unknown) — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 16:36:44 -0800

New Blog Post: Delaney's Swim Meet: http://tinyurl.com/y8uut73.

Delaney's Swim Meet

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 14:30:07 -0800

Delaney has been a competitive swimmer for most of her 8 years. Currently, she swims for Rice Aquatics. She had a swim meet today at the University of Houston. She swam the individual medley, the freestyle and the backstroke, and did great.

Here are her IM and freestyle swims.

Delaney's Swim Meet from Kent Newsome on Vimeo.

She ran out of gas a little at the end of the IM, but she still had a great time. She swam a beautiful freestyle.

Twitter Kent Newsome Why why why Dell To Lau

(author unknown) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 11:01:15 -0800

Why, why why?: Dell To Launch Android-Based Smartphone; http://bit.ly/1FUOn1.

Newsome.Org

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 20:47:07 -0800

Kent Newsome on technology, music and life. ... Newsome.Org. Kent Newsome on technology, music and life. Here. Home · Err Bear Music · The Home Place · Rancho Radio · Headline News · About · Contact. Search. Elsewhere ...
Newsome.Org - http://www.newsome.org/index.shtml

Google: Partially Cloudy by Design

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 19:03:03 -0800

Larry Dignan at ZDNet says that Google's cloud storage price-break is a big missed opportunity, because Google "can't figure out a lightweight desktop client that would back up your entire computer." I suspect that Google could- and probably secretly has- done that. But by making the storage Gmail and Picasa only, Google stands to steal market share from its competitors. Market share that lands on Gmail and Picasa pages where ads can be displayed.

No one makes money hosting files in the cloud for free or close-to-free. But force more of the herd to the application front-end, and you can serve more ads. That's where the money is. Or, at least, that's where Google and 99% of the rest of the internet believes the money is.

As I noted months ago, I think Google's failure to dominate the cloud storage space is by design, not by inability.

Having said that, I'd love to be proven wrong. But I'm not holding my breath for a full featured GDrive at these prices.

Twitter Kent Newsome Interesting Google Okay W

(author unknown) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:42:21 -0800

Interesting: Google Okay With Blocking News Corp.; http://bit.ly/47aVbl.

Twitter Kent Newsome One of My AllTime Favorit

(author unknown) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:40:13 -0800

One of My All-Time Favorite Shows: 'Northern Exposure' Rewind; http://bit.ly/gtHLE.

Sunday Mashup: Camping, Sporting Clays and Shotgun Shells

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 15:45:11 -0800

This weekend we spent a lot of time outside, enjoying the beautiful weather.

Saturday morning Delaney and I drove north for a little over an hour to attend an Indian Princess campout. Delaney had a blast hanging out with her friends, and I had fun meeting some of the other daddies.

This morning we had breakfast and a closing ceremony, and headed back home.

We got home around 10:30 a.m., so I decided to try to beat the coming rain and shoot some sporting clays.

It was windy and it felt like it was going to start raining any moment- though it didn't. Still, I felt a little rushed, and didn't have my best day. I shot 61 of 72, for an 84% mark. That's a decent percentage, but it was on the easier South Course.

Station 10 killed me, and it's not particularly hard.

If you're wondering (and I guess even if you're not), the iPhone program I use to score sporting clays is ClayTracker (iTunes link). It's a $20 program, which blew my mind at first, until I thought about it. There's probably a pretty small market for a sporting clays scoring app, so if we want developers to write for a niche market, we have to be willing to pay a little more. On the whole I am pleased with ClayTracker. It is well designed and graphically pleasing. If the developers continue to add features, it will remain one of my favorite apps.

Among the features I'd like to see added are:

1. Skeet scoring, which the developers say is coming.

2. A "Notes" feature where you can quickly add notes about the various stations. This would be extremely helpful when you're scouting a new course.

3. More stats, easily accessible. For example, when I arrive at a station I shoot a lot, I'd like to be able to easily access my recent or lifetime stats for that station. Historical graphs would also be helpful. That would let me see my rabbit percentage approaching 30%. OK, 25%.

4. The ability to snap a photo of a station for future reference.

5. An online service, where your stats would be automatically uploaded and available for review or sharing. You could even create and link tutorials on YouTube or some other video repository. It would be cool to be able to access a rabbit tutorial while whiffing at a rabbit station (though miraculously I hit 2 out of 3 rabbit shots today, including the first half of a double).

Afterwards, Delaney and I went to Academy Sports to buy some gun-cleaning patches and a little Hoppe's No. 9. While there, I made an important discovery. As all shooters know, finding cheap shotgun shells is a never-ending quest. Generally, I alternate between Carter Country and Academy, based on who has what on sale. Recently, I have been frustrated at the local Academy to find that the shells I want are not on sale, when other similar shells are. For example, the last two times I have been there I found a big stack of 20 gauge cases on sale, intermingled among the identical cases of 12 gauge shells which were not on sale. Today, after telling Delaney we weren't going to buy any shells because they were too expensive, we wandered over to the camping aisle. There, far away from the hunting and shooting gear, were cases of Remington 12 gauge shells for $59. That's not the best price you can find, but it's close enough. So if you're going to Academy in search of shells, look around. They may have cheap shells in an unusual location. And based on my experience, they may not tell you they're over there.

So I stocked up on shotgun shells, came home and cleaned my guns, and put them away in the (locked) gun cabinet.

With any luck, Cassidy and I can prevail upon the rest of the family to finish off a great weekend with a sushi dinner.

Indian Princess Campout

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 12:12:41 -0800

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Indian Princess Campout

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 12:12:37 -0800

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Indian Princess Campout

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 12:12:34 -0800

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

So You Think You Can Ride a Bike?

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 09:15:54 -0800

That's not riding a bike. This is riding a bike.

Awesome.

Twitter Kent Newsome Dumb Question Of The Day –

(author unknown) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:00:35 -0800

Dumb Question Of The Day – RSS Full Feeds Or Excerpts?; http://bit.ly/44l210 [[[I hate partial feeds]]]

Twitter Kent Newsome Am I the only person who f

(author unknown) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:35:01 -0800

Am I the only person who finds Craigslist chaotic and unsatisfying?

Twitter Kent Newsome Interesting 10 Elliott Sm

(author unknown) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 20:33:24 -0800

Interesting: 10 Elliott Smith Songs; http://bit.ly/2KUp45 [[Rose Parade is one of my all-time favorite songs]]

Twitter Kent Newsome Marketing Run Amok Kellog

(author unknown) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 13:30:43 -0800

Marketing Run Amok: Kellogg Hints That Cocoa Krispies Will Save Your Kids From Swine Flu; http://bit.ly/2HDkKO.

Newsome.Org

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 04:42:23 -0800

Twitter Kent Newsome Interesting Microsoft Sec

(author unknown) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 14:13:22 -0700

Interesting: Microsoft Security Essentials rated best free antivirus for Windows; http://bit.ly/17yhIu.

Sporting Clays, Volume 3

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:32:07 -0700

After shooting Volume 1 and Volume 2 from a behind the shooter, stationary camera, I shot this round with a gun mounted camera. It works OK with high, arching shots where there is a lot of blue sky to provide contrast. It works less well on low, fast shots, where bushes or trees are in the background. I also learned on editing that I need to start shooting only after I have loaded and am ready to shoot. This video is pretty sloppy, but it taught me what I need to know for future videos.

It would also be really, really helpful to have a remote control for my JVC GC-FM1A HD camcorder. That would allow me to easily stop and start between shots while reloading.

I shot OK today, particularly considering that the pull delay wasn't working on several of the stations and I was shooting alone. But I still gave away too many easy points. I should be hitting at least 85% on the south course.

Sporting Clays Vol. 3 from Kent Newsome on Vimeo.

It's been slow going on the videos, but I'm getting there.

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:04:11 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Cassidy

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:04:09 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:04:07 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Luke

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:04:04 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Delaney

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:04:03 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Kent

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:04:01 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Cassidy

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:59 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

The kids

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:58 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Kent

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:56 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:54 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:50 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:47 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Greg

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:44 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Delaney

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:43 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Cassidy

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:41 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Raina, Mary and Yvette

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:39 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Delaney

Halloween 2009

nobody@flickr.com (Kent Newsome) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:03:36 -0700

Kent Newsome posted a photo:

Delaney

Presbyterian School's Main Street Choir

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 15:05:00 -0700

Cassidy's school choir performed two songs at an open house earlier this week for prospective parents. They sang "Woke Up This Morning" and "Lullaby of Broadway." They did great and I am so proud of her.

Cassidy is on the left end of the first row.

Twitter / Sam Sethi: RT @louisgray: Newsome.Org ...

(author unknown) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 02:29:34 -0700

RT @louisgray: Newsome.Org > Rebuking Scoble's Death of Google Reader http://ff. im/-aJbd1.

Twitter louisgray NewsomeOrg Google Reader

(author unknown) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 23:21:39 -0700

Newsome.Org > Google Reader: Putting Scoble In Time Out http://ff.im/-aJbd1.

Google Reader: Putting Scoble in Time Out

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 19:49:49 -0700

I like Robert Scoble. I really do. But, like my 8-year old, if I don't watch him like a hawk he gets distracted and starts doing all kinds of crazy shit. Like pooping all over Google Reader, which is really a stand-in for RSS readers in general. I know he doesn't really mean it. It's like the time my 8-year old announced that she was giving up Skittles. It was a radical thought. There was logic to it. Shoot, it made me proud.

But it wasn't real.

Two days later she was back in the grip of her Skittles addiction, insisting that no right-thinking person would choose a granola bar when those colorful, chewy, irresistible sugar pills were just sitting there on the shelf. Our battle over her junk food habit rages on, but I know in my heart that all the wishful thinking in the world won't make a granola bar taste like a Skittle.

So let's put Robert in virtual time out and see if we can get him to behave. One step at a time.

He says Google Reader is slow. I think that's more of a problem with the front end platform that pushes the RSS feeds (e.g., FeedBurner), but I see his point. But as I have said over and over, Skittles are bad for you. Uh, I mean, faster is not always better. I simply don't need to read about some dude's latest Farm Game achievement or Mafia Wars battle in real time. And the flexibility of Google Reader (folders, the ability to rename feeds, archive feeds, search feeds, etc.) outweighs any marginal speed benefit you might get from the other sources (more on those below).

Of course, there's a bigger flaw in that argument. Most Twitter posts are links to other content that got served by. . . RSS feeds or some other platform. The live on the scene Twitterer is the vast exception and not the rule. So even if Twitter is instantaneous, most of the information put on Twitter is not.

And while I'm debunking the speed canard, let's be honest. When we thought that kid was in the balloon flying all over Colorado, we turned on CNN, not Google Reader and certainly not Twitter. For live important news, the internet just ain't the place, and the difference between 5 minutes later and 15 minutes later just isn't that big of a deal.

He says Google Reader's UI is confusing. I agree that all that sharing stuff is unnecessary screen clutter. All we need to get our data out of Google Reader are the newish "Send to" buttons. But Google has gotten caught up in the sharing hysteria like everybody else. When all this sharing nonsense blows over, the internet will be a much more useful and fun place. But come on man, all you have to do is ignore all that crap, just like I do. And if you think Google Reader is confusing, then you must think Facebook is a big, non-intuitive mountain of Rubik's Cubes.

He doesn't like seeing all those unread items. I have a folder of traditional news feeds (CNN, USA Today, etc.) that fills up faster than a cheetah can run. You simply mark the entire folder as "read," with one click. It's not hard. Now trying to actually follow news topics on Twitter, that's hard (more on that below).

Speaking of Twitter, does anyone really go to Twitter to consume content? Be honest. All I see are over there are people pushing unilateral content, like a flea market-cum-mailing list. And social? There's more interaction on top of Mount Everest than there is on Twitter. Seriously, I get the sense that the Twitter hysteria among the general public is fading. If I owned Twitter, I'd sell it. Now, while there are still a lot of greater fools thrashing around with someone else's money to spend.

He says the social network features suck. I would completely agree with this if it was an absolute statement, and not limited to Google Reader. They probably do suck in Google Reader, which is one of it's strongest points. I don't follow (or whatever the right word is) anyone via Google Reader. I just find my content there, and push it from there to my blog, Facebook page, etc. Let's be honest, the social networks aren't all that social, so why does a feed reader have to be social?

About this interaction business. If you want to interact online with real people, the fact is that there is only one place to do it- Facebook. The infrastructure is there. The developers are there. And most importantly, the non-nerds are there. The battle for the mind of the so-called social networker is over, and everyone but Facebook lost. Hell, I did everything I could to stay off of Facebook and I failed. Lots of my real world friends are there, and none of them are on any of these lesser services.

He says he sees most news faster on Twitter than in Google Reader. Uh, OK. That's like saying I got to California faster on a horse than when I walked. The greatest myth in the history of the internet is that Twitter is the place to get news. First of all, you have to separate those who actually know the news and have the desire and ability to accurately describe it from the spammers and nut-jobs. Then you have to wade through the chaos and scrolling pages to find it. At least on the CNN and Google News pages, there is some semblance of an organizational structure that the nut-jobs must adhere to.

He says headline scanning is easier on Twitter. This is simply wrong. Robert, I challenge you to walk me through this and show me how it is easier on Twitter. If I'm wrong, I'll eat my pocket protector. Hell, I'll go one step further- it's impossible to scan headlines on Twitter. Because there are none.

He says the iPhone apps are better for Twitter. I agree with that. Of course they are better, because Twitter has enjoyed a lot of momentum. Like Hanson did at one point, and the Jonas Brothers do now. Pretty soon all the kids will gravitate to the next big thing and Twitter will be relegated to the opening act. Like Isaac, Taylor and Zac.

The only question is who will get rich before that happens.

What do use to get your online content? And why?

About this Google Music Thing

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:21:16 -0700

As we all now know, I have totally capitulated to Google. And I love me some music. So I was interested when I read that my new master was going to release a music search thingy. Until I read more about it. Then it made me sad. Not as sad as the lack of folders in Evernote makes me. But sad.

Partnering up with MySpace? Are you kidding me. Now that Geocites is gone, MySpace rules supreme as the most butt-ugly collection of bad web design on the internet. Lala? What about Tinky Winky and Po? Pandora has been a favorite of mine for years, but even they did their part to screw up the internet recently by letting people litter their Facebook and Twitter feeds with 30-second song clips, and then acting like that was a good thing.

I'd rather hear Edward Scissorhands play a Jonas Brothers song on a chalkboard that listen to a 30-second clip of anything. Is this 2009 or 1995? Rhapsody? It took me a decade to rid my computer of all the Real Networks bloatware. No way am I going to get snared in that net again.

But being a good little Google minion, I had to check out its new baby. So I dutifully searched for my new favorite band, the Wrinkle Neck Mules.

OK, nothing too horrifying there.

I clicked on the play button beside Medicine Bow.

And it played, via Lala. Hmmm. Cool, but I want to hear Lowlight, the biggest of my numerous Mules song-obsessions. So like the internet-savvy cat I am, I clicked on the "More songs" link. I got a list of 61 songs. No Lowlight, but I found the incredibly wonderful Mecklenburg County.

And it played too, not in a pop-up player like before, but in the player at the top of the Lala page.

OK, so what about the little sharing button up there. In the name of all that is sacred, no clips please. Let's send this to my Facebook page and see what happens.

Damn, the song plays right there. Now I'm starting to be impressed. I just know there's a catch. Let's look at the Lala help pages.

OK, now I get it. You can listen once. When I tried to play the song again from my Facebook page, I was confronted with the most horrifying thing.

A 30-second clip. The horror.

Actually, it's not all that bad. If I can let all my Facebook friends hear the entirety of a song once, that's still semi-cool. I don't know that I'll do it a lot, but I may send a song or two along. At the end of the day, this seems like a way for Google to capture a lot of the growing music search market, which it wants for ad-serving purposes, and for Lala and some of the other services to get (or more likely buy) a lot of exposure.

I'm not blown away by any means. But it's probably a worthwhile addition to our music sharing toolbox.

Two Sentence Movie Reviews: Halloween Edition

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 18:33:40 -0700

Three really good films. 5-point scale. Links to Netflix

Kill, Baby, Kill (4): This 1966 Mario Bava gem is a creepy, semi-gothic ghost story, that proves Italians did horror as well as westerns. It made me an instant Fabienne Dali fan.

Black Sunday (4): Another excellent Bava film (1960), with the great Barbara Steele in a double role as a witch and her look-alike descendant. One of my favorite vintage horror films, with perhaps the most interesting commentary track I've ever watched.

Drag Me to Hell (4; unrated version): A new to DVD, supernatural scare-fest that made me jump a lot, even though it doesn't break any new ground. It's the scariest movie I've seen since The Strangers, and you'll never look at goats the same way again.

Tag: movie review

NewsomeOrg

(author unknown) — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 20:56:25 -0700

I have used my NewsomeOrg email address on a dedicated server for many many years I knew changing to a Gmail address was not an option I wanted to keep my ...

Going All In With Google Apps

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 21:01:02 -0700

Why I did, and why you should.

Over the last year or so, my resistance to the Borg-like inevitability of Google has proven futile, as I have moved more and more of my online life into Google applications. First, I started using Google Reader to manage and access my RSS feeds. I have always used Gmail as a spam filter and a means to access my Newsome.Org email online and via my iPhone. I have used Google Docs for podcast and church-related stuff.

But a couple of weeks ago, I went all in.

The cost of upgrading Microsoft Office, my pending move to Windows 7 via a new HP Computer that is frustratingly delayed, and the convenience of one-stop, online accessible apps got me thinking about moving me and my entire family to Google Apps. I took the plunge, and boy am I glad I did. There are some gaping holes in the Google Apps experience (more on that below), but there are also many elegant, useful features that I wasn't aware of until I started to enjoy them.

Making the Move

I have used my Newsome.Org email address, on a dedicated server, for many, many years. I knew changing to a Gmail address was not an option. I wanted to keep my email address, as well as my massive set of personal folders and all the emails and data therein. So the only- and best- option was to move my Newsome.Org email services to Google Apps. Additionally, the move to Google Apps allows you to create a custom calendar site (e.g., calendar.yourdomain.com), a custom Google Docs site (e.g., docs.yourdomain.com), a shared Contacts site (e.g., contacts.yourdomain.com) and more.

Best of all, it's free.

And, believe it or not, really easy.

Rather than recreate the wheel here, I'll direct you to Mark O'Neill's excellent walk-through. Changing the MX records for my domain was really easy via Network Solutions' Domains Management page (don't forget the period at the end of the hostnames ).

And unlike in years past, the changes propagate pretty fast, sometimes within minutes. After I had my mail page set up, I used a similar process to create CName records for my calendar, contacts, Google Docs, and even a short links (Google Short Links) and discussion board (Google Moderator) service.

Note than none of this affects your web site, as you do not modify the www, @none or *(all others) settings. Any host (e.g., www) other than the ones you specifically change as set forth above will continue to point to their current locations.

After maybe an hour's work, I had dedicated, Newsome.Org-branded and web accessible email, calendar, documents and contacts pages for myself and my entire family.

Email

The first thing I did was to create and upload a Newsome.Org Web Apps logo (see above and below) and customize a theme to match the Newsome.Org color scheme. One annoyance that Google should address is that your custom theme only applies to Gmail. There should be a way to cause your theme or custom color scheme to apply across all the various apps. The custom logo appears in all the Google Apps.

As a Firefox user, the next thing I did was install the most excellent Better Gmail add-on. Among many other indispensible features, this add-on lets you create labels- Gmail's folder-substitute- in a nested tree structure, like folders and sub-folders. Since I want to keep my Outlook personal folders, this was a huge help. It also allows you to hide the Chat box and other screen wasting stuff. Then I used Google's Gmail Uploader app to upload my 10 or so years worth of personal folders. I was worried that 10 years of emails would use most of my allocated 7 GB of storage, but happily it only took 472 MB! In a few minutes, I had recreated my personal folders, as well as the primary labels (e.g., folders) I use for email and efficiency management.

Note how the Archive Songs folder expands when I click on it. I also added POP access or forward rules (on those third party email apps, like Yahoo, that don't allow free POP access) to capture my old AOL, Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo email. I have a filter set up to archive (e.g., move from my Inbox to the designated folder) that third party email as it arrived.

Next, I went to the Settings tab and added Quick Links (a way to create and save email searches, such as Unread or ones with certain attachments), the Google Calendar gadget, the Remember the Milk gadget (via the Add Any Gadget by URL feature under the Labs tab), and the Google Docs gadget. Now, I can access everything I need.

Note how elegantly the calendar is incorporated into the Gmail sidebar. I mentioned above that there are a lot of unexpected features. One great example is that when you get an email with an address in it, a link to a Google Map appears. Little things like that make the online world go around.

Calendar

I also moved my calendar to Google Calendar. Via the Settings tab, I added some gadgets (World Clock and Jump to Date). I gave and got access to Raina's calendar, and I added US holidays, weather and phases of the moon.

Notice how my custom color scheme doesn't work in Google Calendar

In order to create a centralized calendar, I synch my Office calendar with my Google Calendar via Google Calendar Synch.

Via the Settings tab, you can configure Google calendar to email you an agenda each morning and to notify you via text message and/or email prior to each calendar event. Again, this sort of small, but immensely helpful, feature is what makes these apps so compelling.

Documents

I uploaded my personal letterhead, a few forms I use a lot and some other key documents to my new, Newsome.Org-branded Google Docs page.

Google Docs is probably the weakest link in the application group, if only because word processing is so important in the business world. Tables and complex formatting in Word documents can be lost on the upload. And the addition of a tracked changes feature (or a close equivalent) should be job one for Google if it really wants businesses to use Google Apps. But, warts and all, Google Docs works well enough for me to dump Microsoft Office. I can't believe I just typed that- but it's true.

I don't think Google Docs is the best choice for archiving old documents, pdfs, etc. (though implementation of the oft-rumored GDrive would be a welcome addition). For that I use my other favorite (and free) app- Dropbox (sign up here and we both get extra free space). I happily pay for the premium 50 GB Dropbox plan, which gives me plenty of space for document archives, etc.

Contacts

As I have noted before, Google Contacts is a train wreck, that should be completely rewritten. In the meantime, however, consolidation trumps design, and I imported all of my contacts to Google Contacts.

Online Utopia?

At the end of the process, my entire family has easy, accessible and efficient email, calendar, documents and contacts, all consolidated and branded. It works really well.

But it could be better.

The individual apps still seem too much like individual applications tossed together, as opposed to an integrated suite of apps. The ability to customize the look and feel of the apps should apply uniformly throughout. Some of the apps, in particular Gmail, need to give us much more control over sidebar content, without the need for browser add-ons. I don't want the Chat box, but I do want customized links to my Dropbox and other sites I use a lot.

Google Sites is a really crappy, impossible to use, app. Google Moderator is only marginally better.

Picasa should be integrated into Google Apps, and certainly Google Voice should be. I'd like to see Google Reader integrated as well. There should be a way to create personalized, private and integrated Google Groups. Google Docs needs either GDrive to launch, or the ability to integrate another online storage service into Google Docs for document storage and retrieval.

In sum, Google Apps aren't perfect. But with a tweak here and there, they could be.

Sporting Clays, Volume 2

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 18:47:57 -0700

After inadvertently recording Volume 1 in standard definition, I made it a point to shoot in HD today while shooting the South Course with my buddy J.C. MacBarker (known to some as Robert Brannon). I had some camera angle issues, but the higher definition makes the clay visible, which is cool. Things will get much better after today, as my gun camera mount arrived in the mail this afternoon.

Sporting Clays Vol. 2 from Kent Newsome on Vimeo.

We did good on the South Course, other than my continuing difficulty shooting the rabbit. Later, we shot the harder North Course with another buddy. We all did good, but not great, over there. The gun camera mount is going to be handy for calculating some of the harder shot leads. When you're practicing and can take as many shots as you want, it's relatively easy to zero in on most targets. When you're shooting in a competition, it's important to get the lead right from the first shot.

All in all, a beautiful day. And there's no better way to spend a beautiful day than shooting some clays in the country.

Howl-O-Ween 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 19:24:34 -0700

Cassidy, Delaney, Luke, Lucky Dog and their friends Evie, Aiden and Loossee conceived of, designed (with help from the moms) and wore Wizard of Oz costumes for this year's Howl-O-Ween canine costume contest and dog parade. They won, for the second year in a row.

Here's the story in The Houston Chronicle

don't get caught news & info: communications strategies, training ...

Denise Graveline — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 08:51:12 -0700

Online video continues as one of the strongest social media trends, from ultralight camcorders to actual views. Here's a roundup of recent trends, tweaks and tips I've been collecting to keep you up-to-date: ...
don't get caught news & info:... - http://www.dontgetcaught.biz/webdocs/blog/dgcnews.htm

GoodSongs.Com, from Newsome.Org

(author unknown) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 22:32:23 -0700

Get Heard. If you are an artist and would like to submit a song or record for review or playlist consideration here at. Newsome.Org ...

NewsomeOrg

(author unknown) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 22:02:06 -0700

NewsomeOrg Kent's blog and the related pages and content are solely the thoughts and opinions of Kent Newsome in his personal capacity and are not ...

Sunday Mashup: JVC Pocket Camcorder & Sporting Clays

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 21:52:11 -0700

This week I bought a JVC GC-FM1A HD camcorder. Although I am starting to suspect that this camera might suck, other than the complete lameness of the included MediaBrowser LE software, which does not even recognize HD video on the camera, the jury is still out. I do like the fact the camera records onto a flash card, which allows me to remove the card and manipulate the video within Corel VideoStudio 12 (VS 12 users should note that non-HD video is in 4:3 format, to avoid the squished appearance that will result if you set your non-HD video project files to 16:9).

I decided to test the camera by combining two of my favorite things: tech and shotguns. When I went out to shoot some sporting clays today, I took the camera and my spider tripod and filmed a few shots at each station. I inadvertently shot the video in non-HD, so the resulting video is in lower than ideal resolution. One of the features this camera needs is a way to lock the resolution, to avoid accidental resolution changes.

When editing the video footage, it became apparent that my camera placement and, more importantly, the lower resolution made it difficult to see the clays in flight. It is likely that you would need to follow the clays with the camera to get a good shot shot (to coin a phrase). Since I was by myself, that was not an option today. Cassidy and Delaney often go shooting with me, so we'll have to try a moving camera next time. I hope that HD resolution will allow you to see the clays in flight, even with a stationary camera.

I love the fact that HD video cameras are getting smaller. What I would really love would be for the iPhone to shoot HD video. When that happens (and eventually it will), I will be a happy camper. In the meantime, I continue to search for a small, full feature HD camcorder that will let me shoot video and easily upload it to YouTube or Vimeo or download it to my computer for use within an editing application. Suggestions would be appreciated.

As far as the shooting went, I did good with everything in the air, particularly since the pull-delay wasn't working at some of the stations and I was shooting alone, and horrible with the rabbit shots, where the clays bounce along the ground. It's hard to believe I can hit so many of one and so few of the other.

Chipping the web: October 7th -- Chip's Quips

Sterling Camden — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 11:41:33 -0700

I'm not an aficionado, but I believe it's a form of prize fighting in which the ring is a high-walled cage to prevent anyone jumping (or being thrown) out of it. Reply to this comment ...
Chip's Quips - http://www.chipsquips.com/

Amazoncom NewsomeOrg The Kindle Store Kent Newsome

(author unknown) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 11:27:32 -0700

Newsome.Org - by Kent Newsome - Kindle Edition. http://tinyurl.com/y8h3sf8.

Chipping the web: October 2nd -- Chip's Quips

Sterling Camden — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 15:48:42 -0700

You may use <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong> in your comment. Notify me of followup comments via e-mail ...
Chip's Quips - http://www.chipsquips.com/

Google gags, volume 2 -- Chip's Quips

Sterling Camden — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 21:18:12 -0700

It's time now to review some more search terms that were used to reach my site, accompanied by my own unique reflections thereon: crawfish mythology art zodiac – please choose between the crab and the scorpion, I don't have a sign of ...
Chip's Quips - http://www.chipsquips.com/

RanchoCast #2

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 17:51:18 -0700

Here's another good set for your weekend listening pleasure. Willis Alan Ramsey, Travis Tritt, Slobberbone, Mercury Dime, CDB and more.

Newsome.Org #2 by Newsome on Mixcloud

I noticed the glitches in the first song, and am looking into it. It could be a problem with the original rip.

Tag: ranchocast

Newsome NewsomeOrg2 | Mixcloud Rethink radio

(author unknown) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 09:15:38 -0700

Newsome.Org #2 Cloudcast by Newsome on Mixcloud (created on 25 Sep 09). Re-think Radio.

Could Mixcloud Be the Holy Grail of Music Apps?

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 18:10:36 -0700

Maybe, if it can just stay in business.

Rather than bore you with a long discussion of what Mixcloud is, I think I'll just show you.

Newsome.Org #1 by Newsome on Mixcloud

That's right. An easy, legal way to create and share playlists.

The only tools you need to easily create your own playlists are a free Mixcloud account and a way to combine some MP3s into a single file. There are lots of options for that, but I use and recommend Merge MP3. It's free, easy and installs on a flash drive so you can take it with you.

In less than 15 minutes, I registered, installed Merge MP3, picked 10 songs, combined them and uploaded our first Mixcloud RanchoCast.

Pretty awesome, if you ask me.

Tag: ranchocast

New Avett Brothers: Hear it Now

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 17:51:53 -0700

One week from today we'll be blessed with I and Love and You, the new record by The Avett Brothers. If you don't know who I'm talking about, click as fast as you can, buy Live Vol. 2, and prepare to divide your musical life into before and after. If you're a parent, start with A Gift for Melody Anne.

The Avett Brothers are one of the two best American bands still making records (along with the Drive-By Truckers). They play old school, back porch, rural American music.

Best of all? You don't have to wait a week to hear the new record. You can hear it free right now, thanks to NPR. I listened to it tonight. I already love it. As I knew I would.

It makes me profoundly happy that in this era of Disney Channel media creations, there are young people out there making this kind of music.

And, of course, they are from the Carolinas Like lots of good things.

Chipping the web: September 15th -- Chip's Quips

Sterling Camden — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 21:33:17 -0700

Cassidy and Delaney Shoot Skeet

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 18:10:27 -0700

Well, sort of.

Cassidy and Delaney went shooting with me today. It was Cassidy's first time to shoot a shotgun and the first time Delaney fired a gun of any kind.

They worked with Jimmy Galindo, who is my shooting coach. I highly recommend Jimmy as an instructor, for shooters of any age.

After shooting, we went to Old Town Spring and had dinner at Wunsche Brothers Cafe & Saloon.

That, friends, is my kind of day.

I'd add more, but the web already has too much ADD -- Chip's Quips

Sterling Camden — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 11:50:30 -0700

I could only wag my head and chuckle sadly as I deleted the email notification of a new comment on one of Chad's posts. Looking ahead, I sa. That was 140 characters, so I need not continue. The Twitteritis epidemic that is sweeping the ...
Chip's Quips - http://www.chipsquips.com/

The day before | Team Newsome

(author unknown) — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 21:53:27 -0700

What do you do the day before a momentous birthday? Actually most birthdays for me are mostly spent looking forward. Forward to the upcoming year, dreams.

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #070 : FaceFriendBookFeed

Sat, 15 Aug 2009 14:38:02 -0700

EELS070
Thursday 13 Aug 2009

facefriendbookfeed logo?

Dave, Mike and Kent get together for this week’s conversation.

Dave has a new headset (Plantronics DSP400). High fidelity ensues.

Mike has been preparing for The University of Adelaide’s Open
Day and enjoying Science
Alive.

Social media marketing for District
9,
complete with confiscation of cell phones. Tweets ensue.

The Newsome family’s trip to New Braunfels, and the Comal River. Cassidy is a daredevil.

The Palm Pre pulls an ET, and phones home. Outrage ensues.

Facebook and the happiness or lack thereof behind the walls. Kent sort of
defends Facebook. Pigs take flight.

Facebook buys Friendfeed. Slumber ensues.

Delicious founder rethinks sale to Yahoo. Is Delicious relevant anymore?
Dave shows A.Tinythread.Com to Mike and Kent. Are we seeing the rebirth of
the message board? Mike likes RSS and messy things, and finds the
in-between things wanting. Usability does not always define the experience.

RSS is wonderful, but does anyone care? Kent and Mike mourn the treatment
of RSS. Dave says RSS is the infrastructure, not so much the destination.

Are stand alone RSS readers dead? Kent says it’s about monetization and
Google’s big war chest full of free. Dave and Mike praise
NetNewsWire.
Mike likes the archival abilities.

Dave is looking at microphones. Various alternatives are discussed. SAMSON C01U, RODE Podcaster or BEHRINGER C1U. Samson get points for being social.

Kent and Dave talk about how to make everything
better.
They have many good ideas for developers to ignore in favor of another
useless sharing feature.

Profiles: Facebook, Google Profiles, or just a free range web page? Dave
and Kent explore Google Profiles. More on this next time.

Pre Microsoft DOS for sale on eBay. Kent misses DOS. Dave tells the story
of how Microsoft acquired DOS.

The problem with YouTube.
Another problem is the music labels. YouTube’s audio swapper is a somewhat
acceptable work-around.

Kids think outside the box. Maybe that’s why they are the innovators.

Acknowledgements

- Image by me
- Thanks for the show notes Kent
- Intro music “Wake Up Now”, by steck [Graham Steel; Scotland; macblawg], via macjams.com.

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #069 : Just how gay is a Kookaburra’s life?

Fri, 31 Jul 2009 00:49:30 -0700

EELS069

Kookaburras have a gay life

Thursday Jul 30 2009

Just how gay is a Kookaburra’s life?

Dave, Kent & Mike are joined by VinBrown and talk tech news – mostly. With the odd rant on Kookaburras and the Lifekludger wiki launch.

* wtf with apple/google

- One Bad Apple Does Spoil the Whole Bunch of Apps

* kent on mac tablet

- Phones Down, Tablets to Go

*Internode

*TPN funders

* JP on scarcity

- The Death of the Download?

- The customer is the scarcity

* Discussion on new ways of music promotion.

* nirvana rickroll

* Men at Work copyright fight is stupid

– The first verse of the song is:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kookaburra_(song)

Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree,Merry merry king of the bush is he.Laugh, Kookaburra, laugh, Kookaburra,Gay your life must be!

- Mike changes the wikipedia entry to appease his ego

(Then finds out from his wife that it was the OTHER way around. Mike claims the last line is ‘gay your life must be’, Mandy is the one who asserts ‘HOW gay your life must be’. DOH!!!

* lifekludger wiki

http://lifekludger.net/wiki/

– Not mentioned but I found this funny.

* xkcd woodpecker

Woodpecker

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #068 : Vin Brown – Pyramids, Egypt and Evernote [again]

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 19:35:21 -0700

EELS 68

Thursday 2 July 2009 : Vin Brown – Pyramids, Egypt and Evernote [again]

Vin Brown joins as fillin guest host for Mile and tells us about his Egypt and Pyramid studies and the work he’s doing online around them. We also discuss some other online services recently come to our notice and rant about Evernote, again.

See http://delicious.com/dnw/eel068

*Guest – Vincent Brown

Skype: maxmobi

Twitter: http://twitter.com/vinbrown & http://www.twitter.com/bennu

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/vincentbrown

Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/vinbrown

- CU connection – Conecting Up Conference 2006

- Creative Commons

http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Case_Studies/VOCAB:_with_Bennu

- Egypt, pyramids

http://www.talkingpyramids.com

http://www.pyramidtextsonline.com

http://egyptianpyramids.tumblr.com

Tech Points:

*Evernote

-building themselves a social network? oh no.

- http://www.gottabemobile.com/2009/06/25/evernotes-learning-to-share/

*Blip.tv

- http://blip.tv/

-audio only

*Twitterforbusypeople

- http://www.twitterforbusypeople.com

*audioboo

AudioBoo

*VLC

- the antidote to iTunes

http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

*Walkman 30th anniversay

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkman

*Posterus

- Easiest blog in the world

http://www.posterous.com/

*Interesting: Stoned Wallabies Make Crop Circle

-http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8118257.stm

*mediamonkey

Acknowledgements

- Image from flickr by dhutchman

- Intro music “Wake Up Now”, by steck [Graham Steel; Scotland; macblawg], via macjams.com.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #067 – Last Mile Communication Breakdown

Sun, 21 Jun 2009 20:07:54 -0700

EEL 067

Thursday 18th June

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #067 – Last Mile Communication Breakdown

*Telstra should be shot

-is this me? http://xkcd.com/597/

*Genevieve Bell, Adelaide Thinker In Residence, Intel fellow. .. “the Internet has gone feral”

-Your invitation to a free public lecture by Dr Genevieve Bell in Adelaide early July -> http://bit.ly/13VQdJ #sastories (via @fang)

* Making Dave’s wheelchair a wifi hotspot SSID=LifeKludger

Get a battery powered device

Stick Telstra NextG card in

Rack up bills and get Telstra to pay em

- verizon mifi xyz

*Facebook vanity urls. Is it all vanity?

*Gran Torino was not overacted! Gran Torino (3)- overacting and the unnecessary verbalization of the obvious makes a great concept only a pretty good movie (nice ride, though).

-watch taken

-august rush

*iPhone 3S

*Rick Clise comment. Short head/Long tail discussions.

-http://extraordinary.thepodcastnetwork.com/2009/06/04/163/#comments

*LearnDog / PlanetMuse:
- and update from mike
- a possible skype interview with Dean
- an .mp3 or two

Senator Nick Xenophon at PlanetMuse launch party

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 8:28 PM

Last week I attended the PlanetMuse launch party courtesy of the LearnDog foundation. I have just been given a video recording of proceedings from which I extracted some audio of Senator Nick Xenophon speaking. I was quite impressed with the connections the good Senator made in relation to Gladwell’s tipping point and Winston Churchill’s wrestling with [...]

LearnDog and PlanetMuse – patterns beginning to emerge

Fri, 12 Jun 2009 10:50 AM

Just returned from the mysterious ‘PlanetMuse’ party at the Underground in Adelaide, supported by the LearnDog foundation. If you know me will you will understand this is of great interest to me because I left a great job at Microsoft and a 25 year career in I.C.T. to spend a very difficult year (2005/06) as [...]

*Mike’s iPhone 3.0 updated during the show.

Acknowledgements

- Image from flickr by dhutchman

- Intro music “Wake Up Now”, by steck [Graham Steel; Scotland; macblawg], via macjams.com.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #066 – The Bee did it all!

Wed, 03 Jun 2009 22:49:39 -0700

EEL 66

Thursday 4th June 2009

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #066 - The Bee did it all!

Mike, Kent and Dave chew the fat over some techy topics including:

. daves evernote munging - Munging Evernote as a blog publishing engine [ref http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/]

. kent tried the evernote trick using rss to email

- feedmyinbox [http://www.feedmyinbox.com/] *WOW mike needs this for his Uni work
- feedblitz [FeedBlitz - The Email Marketing Service for Blogs, Social Media ...]
- feedburner’s e/mail feature dashboard->subscribe via e/mail [http://feedburner.google.com]

. topify comment on show 63 – [http://extraordinary.thepodcastnetwork.com/2009/05/07/the-extraordinary-everyday-lives-show-063-authenticity-and-responsiveness/#comment-36665]

. kent’s positive comcast experience

. superduper! for mac is the best for disk duplication [http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html]

. for win kent recommends Casper [http://www.fssdev.com/products/casper/]

. Mike’s work getting interesting with Environment Institute Launch and other possible future work

. Discussion about backups started from Mike’s experiences recently

- losing backup.app since .mac divorce
- time machine ass backwards (dont wanna buy another leopard for old lappie)
- winXP evil of successful backup – restore completes without error msg but NO FILES!!!
- fecking with folder sync
- other ideas welcome?
- win home server [Introducing Windows Home Server]
- SynTwoFolders [http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/22644]
- synctoy [win-Synctoy 2 0]
- Mesh [https://www.mesh.com/welcome/default.aspx]
- dropbox [Dropbox - Home - Secure backup, sync and sharing made easy.]
- carbonite [http://carbonite.com/]

. #toto ‘FreedBacking’ for robust publishing infrastructure from Tanzania? ref Haystacks from Cerado discussion arond Lifekludger

. kents amazing photo of a bee in mid flight photo

- [Delaney's Birthday Party was Buzzin']

- [3579126528_6233a5fee2.jpg]

- [orig size - http://www.flickr.com/photos/kentnewsome/3579126528/sizes/o/]

- Image from flickr by kentnewsome

- Intro music “Wake Up Now”, by steck [Graham Steel; Scotland; macblawg], via macjams.com.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #065 – Tumbling along

Thu, 21 May 2009 23:39:20 -0700

EELS 65
Thursday 21 May 2009
The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #065 - Tumbling along

Dave, Mike & Kent get together and wax lyrical about the following:

.braindump

.mcdonalds wifi

..starbucks/steve gibson machine language programming

..wifi commons

.linux distro presto [kent post]

.tumblr [kent post]

..joint login to tumblr and adding comments via disqus

.. kent tumblr (and now dave and mike)

.evernote – folders (and decent offline cache)

.readit later [instapaper]

.linda thompson – the hector fund – fundable.org for new show promo, possible interview with brains behind the business model

- Image from flickr by exfordy

- Intro music “Wake Up Now”, by steck [Graham Steel; Scotland; macblawg], via macjams.com.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #064 – ConnectingUp 09 – Mike’s Braindump

Tue, 19 May 2009 19:49:03 -0700

EELS 64
Friday 15 May 2009
The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #064 - ConnectingUp 09 – Mike’s Braindump

Mike has a braindump debrief with Dave after attending the ConnectingUp 09 Conf.

ConnectingUp 2009 Conference.

watching #cua09

Keynote audio from #cua09 – Allen Gunn

Audio from #cua09 – Mike Seyfang

Aggregated feed

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #063 – Authenticity and Responsiveness

Thu, 07 May 2009 00:08:26 -0700

EELS 63
Thursday 7 May 2009
The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #063 – Authenticity and Responsiveness

talk to me

*mikes going syd – connecting up #cua09 & UniSyd – black beauty

- connecting up

- black beauty

*roys logo

- Evolution of a Lifekludger logo (set)

*student wikipedia hoax

- Student’s Wikipedia hoax quote used worldwide in newspaper obituaries – The Irish Times – Wed, May 06, 2009

*twitter accts blocked / authenticity

*livewriter and corporate responsiveness

- Frustrating Live Writer – Blogger FTP Problem

-my nten experience

*topify

- http://topify.com/

- Twitter Tools and the Art of Un-Following

*pogoplug

- http://www.pogoplug.com/

- Pogo-plugging into a Private Cloud

- Image from flickr Daniel F. Pigatto

- Intro music “Wake Up Now”, by steck [Graham Steel; Scotland; macblawg], via macjams.com.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #062 – Short Happy Life of Infinite Advertising Theory

Thu, 09 Apr 2009 21:00:10 -0700

EELS 62

Thursday 9 April 2009

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #062 - Short Happy Life of Infinite Advertising Theory

*Eric Clemons writes on techcrunch and kicks up a storm – rightly so.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/03/22/why-advertising-is-failing-on-the-internet/

“Professor of Operations and Information Management at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. In it, he argues that the Internet shatters all forms of advertising. “The problem is not the medium, the problem is the message, and the fact that it is not trusted, not wanted, and not needed,”

*Kent writes - The Short Happy Life of the Infinite Advertising Theory

http://www.newsome.org/2009/03/short-happy-life-of-infinite.shtml

Eric Clemons sums up the obvious to many but ignored by some flaw in the Infinite Advertising Theory, the somewhere between a wish and a belief idea that online ads can pay for everything forever:Pushing a message at a potential customer when it has not been requested and when the consumer is in the midst of something else on the net, will fail as a major revenue source for most internet sites.

*ABC Australia’s online store abomination.

*Shirky on Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable

http://www.shirky.com/weblog/2009/03/newspapers-and-thinking-the-unthinkable/
“If the old model is broken, what will work in its place?” The answer is: Nothing will work, but everything might. Now is the time for experiments, lots and lots of experiments
Experiments are only revealed in retrospect to be turning points.
Society doesn’t need newspapers. What we need is journalism.
[In time of revolution] it’s easier to see what’s broken than what will replace it. … We just got here. Even the revolutionaries can’t predict what will happen
…what real revolutions are like. The old stuff gets broken faster than the new stuff is put in its place.

*Evernote interlude (unsponsored)

*Continued discussion of where the value is for traditional media online.

*Somehow we get back onto evernote again.

(between recording and publishing, Kent turned up this gem that Evernote are indeed working on Twitter integration http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10216234-2.html%3Fpart%3Drss%26subj%3Dnews%26tag%3D2547-1_3-0-20)

- Image Times Square at Dusk from flickr by Stuck in Customs

- Intro music “Wake Up Now”, by steck [Graham Steel; Scotland; macblawg], via macjams.com.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #061 – A laid back chat with Andy

Fri, 27 Mar 2009 18:49:17 -0700

EELS 61

Thursday 26th March 2009

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #061 - A laid back chat with Andy

Rocket Man

In the absence of regular co hosts, I hook up on skype with Andy Delin [@delin] from Seattle and we have a rambling chat about technology now and possibly in the future. Some things we mention, in chronological order :

.where’s kent
.andy’s building a win2008 server
.dave’s sorting stuff for his new imac
.where are all your files
.interfaces are the issue / visualisation [coverflow on mac]
.cooliris (it’s not piclens you dill!) http://cooliris.com/
.sdks and design needs to get smarter and nicer
.pre-conceived ideas on how we use tech – we make simple complex
.andy thinks the Surface is ‘cute’ :)
.device-device interaction needs a fresh look
.voice the next frontier – “sorry, I can’t do that dave”
.what’s a natural interface
.adaptive walking robots
.netbooks, advertisers cluttering up their own sites with their own ads.
.tribes and seth godin
.leadership required for nurturing creative uses for technologically connected crowd
.seti revisited – a desire to be a part of something

.culture and technology – do we really know what do do with it … are we still searching for something

..the two-way conversation – “push to talk” – startrek

.network devices – who’s listening

.voice, the final frontier

.andy has a mac

.win 7

.netbooks – small gets bigger – RISC CISC MISC chips – smart cars

.the third age .. its all a mess.

.the long tail of people – more potential for stronger connections

.google search/ads – does microsoft need to respond

.online storage – is it viable – people want to own atoms

Tribes
Seth Godin

Free audio download:

Download Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us – Free Version (Unabridged …

Buy the book:

Amazon.com: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us: Seth Godin: Books
==========
Image from Flickr: Rocket Man (I Think It’s Going To Be a Long, Long Time) by peasap

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #060 – Things off the top my head…

Thu, 05 Mar 2009 00:22:20 -0800

EELS 60

Thursday 5th March 2009

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #060 – Things off the top my head…

* Dave gets the sack (retrenched – 18 months after being de-funded)
** Dave’s hompage/links to CV’s
** Landscape of IT work

* Daves sick of sync – and so is Mike
** Gmail, Windows Mobile, Leopard
** Gmail contacts import utility <<< use this excellent little app http://bborofka.com/A_to_G/A_to_G.html to export your Mac Address Book details and import into Google.

* Apple Releases
** Various models incl Mac Mini [link]
** Mike whinges about Mini Display Port and DVI
** Mike asks about Firewire 400-800 cables

* Discussion on no kindle in aust heating up on the amazon forums. my post http://is.gd/lSkN here.
* Kindle iphone app may be a kludge for non-us countries – if they can get the app.
* Any update on a stream url from kent for rancho radio?
* Wish I could pump out content like kent is lately.
* Talk about blip.fm.

–

Remember the TPN pledge drive – the network needs you.

Acknowledgments:

Intro music, “Wake Up Now”, by steck, via macjams.com.
[Graham Steel; Scotland; macblawg]

cc Flickr photo above by The albino

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #059 – Shut Facebook Down

Sun, 22 Feb 2009 02:22:45 -0800

EELS 59

Thursday Feb 19, 2009 – Shut Facebook Down.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #059

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 18.8Mb 00:54:15

Advance apologies for the audio glitches that start about half way through. Both Dave and Mike were having Skype/Network issues and Kent’s microphone was playing up.

* Welcome to 2009
* Regroup
* Kent’s back on the blogoshphere: tech for grownups
* Dave’s reconnected: finds a spare port
* Mac mini to record your TV – elgato eyetv

* Laurel @silkcharm Papworth on Sunrise morning TV, continuting the conversation…
* My BLOG POST with links to many of the background convesations
* @stilgherrian joins us
* http://stilgherrian.com/
* – great book on gossip and the evolution of language
* audio goes pear-shaped, sorry folks
* we finally decide to bail-out

–

Remember the TPN pledge drive – the network needs you.

Acknowledgments:

Intro music, “Wake Up Now”, by steck, via macjams.com.
cc Flickr photo above by avlxyz

Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #058 – 2008 Christmas Special

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 05:00:32 -0800

EELS 58 Thursday 18th December 2008 – 2008 Christmas Special

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #058

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 28.3Mb 01:22:00

Last show of the year. Another long one this time.

For this special show we pulled together as many of the guests who have appeared on this show during 2008 and have as many as we can on at the same time. We have a great time around asking them to respond to the same statement :

“* When I think about 2008 The thing that comes to mind is …………”

Here’s what happens, along with the usual great discussion and some unusual seasonal merryment courtesy of Silkcharm and my sharing a Christmas easter-egg on Flickr.

I’d like to personally thank all the supporters of the show .. and thank our listener for sticking by us.

Peace.

Enjoy!

Dave, Mike, Kent [hosts]

@dnwallace, @fang, @kentnewsome

Guests on this show:

laurel papworth – @silkcharm : Sydney

mark pesce – @mpesce : Sydney [via skype out]

beth kanter – @kanter : Boston

graham steel – @McDawg : Scotland [pre-recorded]

al upton – @alupton : Adelaide

Laurel:
- tipping points
– PanPa [presenting to media proprietors, now different, more strategic]
– Cute boyfriend
– mumbai / twitter / swarm-organising
- saudi (hilite)
- back to singaporeÂ Â Â Â

Mark:
- year of the iPhone
– always connected thru portal to social sphere
– evolution of social network tools

Beth:
- year of generous geeks
– against backdrop of tough times for NonProfits
– two truckloads of protien via comments
– qik schwag
- twitter adoption in NonProfits
– tweetsgiving 2 days, twitter,
– @pistachio http://twitter.com/pistachio
2009 year of social media indigestion…

Kent:
- tough economic times
– fluff shakeout (choice vs utility)
– mark thinks tools will improve

AL:
[- podiatry? ]Â @dnwallace on twitter: “off to the podiatrist. feet eh…strange things….don’t even use mine but still gotta have em Be back for this arvos eel058.Â about 4 hours ago” Â -

Â flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dnwallace/3117328740/

- the minilegends
– work / life balance??
– optimistic about next year!
– alupton.edublogs.org
– VOTE edublogs awards now:Â http://edublogawards.com/2008/best-class-edublog-2008/

Years highlights of this podcast

-shows #41-#58
-50 shows met
-sponsorship from unclenick hodgeÂ Â Â Â

* When I think about 2008 The thing that comes to mind is …………
Â [ ] how does that relate to our connections with each other?
Â [ ] any other connection stories? (ie when did our stories overlap)

beth’s live blog post about flickr easter egg -

http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/2008/12/ho-ho-ho-hat-not-so-happy-holiday.html

ponzi scheme -

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081212/bs_nm/us_madoff_arrest

[backchannel: "what scheme? ponzi? isn't that chris pirillo's mrs?"]

–

Remember the TPN pledge drive – the network needs you.

Acknowledgments:

Intro music, â€œWake Up Nowâ€, by steck, via macjams.com.
cc Flickr photo above by me

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #057 : Kent’s Back

Fri, 05 Dec 2008 01:17:52 -0800

EELS 57 Thursday 4th December 2008

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #057

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 31.5Mb 01:31:35

A long one this time.

Kent Newsome returns and we catchup on what’s going on on the interwebs now he’s back on the grid. Some interesting discussion around how the semantic web of the future will deliver value to you via everything you ever wanted to know from your friends crazy love affairs with their devices!

Here’sÂ the rough, kinda chronological semantics of how the show pans out.

- derek trucks plays a mean guitar

- kent catchup

- economic bubble burst

- online ads going away

- kent and his iphone love affair [iPhone in the corporate world] – http://www.newsome.org/2008/11/dr-iphone-or-how-i-learned-to-stop.shtml

- mike’s buying another iPod : iTalk RecorderÂ - http://www.sonomawireworks.com/iphone/fourtrack/
- sastories – http://pipes.yahoo.com/dnwallace/atir

- apple – display port /Â hdcp drm fiasco [High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP)] – http://www.macnn.com/articles/08/11/26/displayport.drm.conflict/

- microfinance Lifekludger idea : fundable.com – http://tinyurl.com/lkp001
- kents rave on semantic web and dscussion about what we think it might be – http://www.newsome.org/2008/12/preowned-semantic-web-cars-for-bigfoot.shtml

I think that’s about it.

Except I think I may’ve mucked up the ID3 Tags on last show (#56) by transposing numbers so it appears as (#65) – if so, sorry to mess up your neat list in your library. I might look at it and see if I can fix things a bit. If not, or on the other hand, maybe I’ll just tag #65 asÂ #56Â when we get there just to confuse our listener when they have a eels marathon listening session sometiome in the distant futur – probably about theÂ same time we all actually discover what the semantic web is … or teleporters come into being – whichever comes first. Okay, I’ll go now and try and remember never todo shownotes again on a Friday after work.

Oh, and remember the TPN pledge drive – the network needs you.

Acknowledgments:

Intro music, â€œWake Up Nowâ€, by steck, via macjams.com.
cc Flickr photo above by ashleyrosex

Grupy Superman image by dogwelder

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #056 : Pledge r ism

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 02:25:48 -0800

EELS 56 Thursday 20th November 2008

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #056

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 18.2Mb 00:53:00

Dave and Mike discuss the various pledge drives that seem to be a staple of the online world in recent times. Also we talk about some recent issues of cc that we’ve both been involved in lately and some interesting photo mashups of @marsphoenix.

Some Links etc:

LifeKludger Project Pledge model

http://tinyurl.com/lkp001

https://www.fundable.com/groupactions/groupaction.2008-11-06.2051953639/view?searchterm=lifekludger
Timeline – 11 days left???

- makers
- livers
- suppliers
- givers

TPN Pledge
http://tpn.thepodcastnetwork.com/pledge
TPN google-bowled

TPN Shop
http://tpn.thepodcastnetwork.com/shop/

WikiPedia
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate/Now/en

CC
http://lessig.org/blog/2008/11/jonathan_coulton_on_cc.html

DollarPortraits dude?
http://dollarportraits.com/

cc:by images on flickr turning into c
- george oates?
- ui / times
- attribution in general
- JP ribbit birthday
- unable to tag other peoples photos UI=?
- http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeblogs/2762543380/
- http://dnwallace.com/blog/2008/11/12/happy-birthday-jp-abundant-heterogeneous-creativity/
- photonics : http://flickr.com/photos/29005492@N07/3042629834/

MarsPhoenix photo mashups:
[We can't quit you, either! The team saw and loved this today -- very, uh, creative: http://tinyurl.com/65ou9y Enjoy. More news soon]

Acknowledgments:

Intro music, â€œWake Up Nowâ€, by steck, via macjams.com.
cc Flickr photo above by ashleyrosex

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #055 : Anxiety & Depression Awareness Day – BlueDay2008

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 15:40:41 -0700

EELS 55 Thursday 16th October 2008

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #055

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 18.6Mb 00:53:55

Dave and Mike are joined by Michael Specht to discuss the activities that were undertaken by those people in and around in our social network space to bring awareness of anxiety and depression for the month of October and in particular Oct 10, World Mental Health day. Michael setup BlueDay2008.org to aggregate activities and we talk about how that went.

We then talk about fish bowls, trading freedoms – locally / globally – and what we do to stay sane.

Some Links etc:

BlueDay2008
World Mental Health day
Inspecht
TedTalk – could fishbowl bey key to keeping depression at bay for the worried well (too much choice => paralysis)
beyondblue: the national depression initiative

The Blue Day Book- depression awareness
Journeys with the Black Dog

Acknowledgments:

Intro music, â€œWake Up Nowâ€, by steck, via macjams.com.
cc Flickr photo above by ashleyrosex

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #054 : National Innovation System Review – unlock it already!

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 23:05:41 -0700

EELS 54 Tuesday 16th September 2008

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #054

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 24.1Mb 1:09:55

Dave and Mike are joined by Laurel Papworth and Kristin Alford to discuss the recently released Review on Australia’s National Innovation System.

A lot of the discussion focuses on the locked nature of the PDF document as it was first released. As it turns out, between this podcast being recorded and published, the Review PDF is now unlocked! Just how this came to be and if in fact Laurel and Kristin’s blogposts had anything to do with it, I guess we’ll never definitively know. But it’s good to see that information ‘freed‘.

Some Links etc:

Interesting google search

Free PDF Unlock Online Utility (Beta)

National Innovation System Review
[Look at Call for Submissions paper. The call was made in February 2008, and the submissions were due on 30th April 2008.]

Review delivered to govt.

NOTE: the PDF settings have been changed. Document is now quotable and copyable.

Acknowledgments:

Intro music, â€œWake Up Nowâ€, by steck, via macjams.com.

Innovation Depot photo from Flickr by â–ŒÃ‡Pâ–

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #053 – Open Science

Mon, 28 Jul 2008 02:52:45 -0700

Update: A shorter and hopefully clearer version salvaged from Mike’s analog backup recording has been posted and feds should now be getting this clearer file.

Update: Apologies for audio quality, some interference gremlins snuck in somewhere. We are looking at fixing it up somewhat and will republish the audio as soon as that’s done.

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 00:53:31 18.5Mb

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #053 – Open Science
Thurs 24th July 2008

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 01:03:15 21.8Mb

This show is all about the intersection of Technology and Human desire. This year Dave and I have been focusing on ‘deepening connections’ with those we subscribe to via RSS. Having a chat on a podcast is a remarkable way of doing that we have found. Agenda is loose guide only, we are very stream of consciousness, no edits, no script kinda guys.

New intro music this show. Courtesy of Graham, one of our guests. I remixed it a bit for the intro and play the full song, “Wake Up Now“, after the discussions.

Open Science

Rough chronological talking points:
-mike had nothing more than a vague idea such a movement would exist prior to starting work at a University in April.
-his RSS reader provided some clues to a trail which I followed – Graham Steel was one of the first to respond to my thinking out loud
-how graham and mike hooked up
-richard discovered it after posting an experiment on his labrats blog, and people got in touch.
-two sides – open scientific publication & open notebook scientists
-trust and sharing of unpublished latest work
-tension between competition and openness
-openness – outwards facing and inclusionary of wider community – sharing of scientific data
-paradigm shift – involvement with and giving something back to community
-blogging science
-use of podcasts – big uptake in uni’s
-richard is attending a ‘Science Blogging’ event at the Royal Institute in London on Saturday 30th August
http://www.nature.com/natureconferences/sciblog2008/index.html. One of the science communications team at USyd interviewed me (richard) this morning about this conference. Very interesting: they’re really keen on the idea here. I’m also going to an Open Science meet at Southampton two days after the London meeting, organized by Cameron Neylon.
-guys will try to record and live blog the london event
-whats this about? http://blog.openwetware.org/scienceintheopen/2008/07/21/the-full-web20-experience-my-talk-tomorrow-at-iwmw-in-aberdeen/
-http://www.viddler.com/explore/CameronNeylon/videos/1/
-discussion about how to capture the esence of a event with blogging, podcasts etc. immediacy.
-http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=%22open+science%22&search_type=&aq=f
-going to use one of graham’s songs for intro to this show – http://www.macjams.com/song/34800 Wake Up Now
-http://www.music20book.com/ Gerd’s book
-posters in 2nd Life http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeblogs/195285627/
-mike talks about science in the sl community. specific uses of 3d environment….what are they good for in science? rf. mike crawling thru a molecule. [dnw]
-Knol – somewhere between closed and open science use? http://knol.google.com/k/knol# (A knol is an authoritative article about a specific topic.)

Graham Steel http://twitter.com/McDawg

“Networking between us public, science bloggers, scientists, researchers, physicians, Journals etc.”

Nature Network http://network.nature.com/profile/steelgraham
Public Library of Science (PLoS) blog http://www.plos.org/cms/blog
Open Access Directory wiki http://oad.simmons.edu/
MacJams Music Blog http://blog.macjams.com/?p=223
Personal blog http://mcblawg.blogspot.com
Do Bloggers Add a New Dimension to Conferences? http://scienceblogs.com/clock/2008/01/science_blogging_conference_vi.php

Richard Grant (twitter: rpg_twit skype: rpg7sky AIM/iChat: rpg7aim)

Nature Network http://network.nature.com/blogs/user/rpg
University of Sydney http://blogs.usyd.edu.au/labrats/ - Richard’s open science stuff
Personal blog http://rg-d.com/BioLOG/

LINKS and Random Stuff

The Royal Institution

http://www.science.usyd.edu.au/outreach/

http://www.oar2008.qut.edu.au/ – Open access & research meeting in Brisbane towards the end of September. Some impressive names.

http://blog.openwetware.org/scienceintheopen/2008/07/21/the-full-web20-experience-my-talk-tomorrow-at-iwmw-in-aberdeen/

On the subject of technology and human desire, check out this presentation from Prof David Wishart in Canada. http://www.scribd.com/word/full/2159511?access_key=key-29c44pnl25896imfykd1 I mashed it a wee bit.

This just in:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2008.05.004
Over the past few years, blogging (â€˜web loggingâ€™) has become a major social movement, and as such includes blogs by scientists about science. Blogs are highly idiosyncratic, personal and ephemeral means of public expression, and yet they contribute to the current practice and reputation of science as much as, if not more than, any popular scientific work or visual presentation. It is important, therefore, to understand this phenomenon.

Acknowledgements

Intro music, “Wake Up Now”, by steck, via macjams.com.

Image: ‘Culture Tubes‘, www.flickr.com/photos/10775233@N00/107326169

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #052 : Sharing, conversation, collaboration, collective action….

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 03:52:09 -0700

EEL052 – Thursday 17th July 2008

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #052 – Sharing, conversation, collaboration, collective action

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 00:58:40 20.2Mb

In this podcast, Dave and Mike share thoughts around some videos from Clay Shirky and how the principles apply to what they’ve been doing.

Shirky ‘Institutions vs Collaboration’ on TED.com
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/clay_shirky_on_institutions_versus_collaboration.html
Filmed 2005 – posted 2008

Recent: Shirky ‘herecomeseverybody’ at berkman centre 2008
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_0FgRKsqqU

Shirky on group forming;

Four Things:
3 easy:

Sharing, conversation, collaboration

4th hard, not here yet:

collective action

Lifekludger Shared Goal?

Provide a platform for collaboration around making and modifying devices for people living with disability.

Maybe need one for each group identified in Lifekludger eco-system.

Livers:
The Lifekludger goal is that a person living with disability who needs a technical solution to enhance their life can communicate and have that need fulfilled by groups of individuals collaborating.

Givers:

Makers:

Suppliers:

My notes on it over on Lifekludger blog.

EVERYTHING IS MISCELLANEOUS:
Weinberger – Blog
Colon Classification System
5 Library Laws -
JP post – http://confusedofcalcutta.com/2008/07/12/musing-lazily-about-library-science-and-the-web/
4 pillars
ThingLink – http://www.thinglink.org/tag/hat
Mike on cc – http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Mike_Seyfang

Closing remarks/announcements:
Like to host a podcast without the hassle?
or Just like to be a guest on te show? – Contact us.

Sponsors: After successful sponsorship Nick Hodge, looking sponsors.
- Especially looking to transcribe podcast – transcription sponsors.

Acknowledgements: – Jack in the Pulpit -Extraordinary Girl
Image above and for ID3 Tag Image: ‘boy and girl golf’
www.flickr.com/photos/23737784@N00/2690195505

Technorati Tags: clay shirky, dave weinberger, lifekludger, mike seyfang

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #051 : Mike Poole

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 03:22:09 -0700

EEL051 – Thursday 3rd July 2008

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #051 -

Mike Poole

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 00:57:00 19.6Mb

Guest: Mike Poole

UPDATE: Mikes post about being on the show.

Blog: Greetings Earthlings – http://greetingsearthlings.wordpress.com
Greetings Earthlings! is an attempt to show that we all might know a little less than we think, and to start a discussion on how we can begin to see things slightly otherwise.

Blog: http://adeathinhongkong.wordpress.com/
A Death in Hong Kong
Discovery Bay Residents Seeking Justice for Vicenta Flores

About Mike:
About – http://greetingsearthlings.wordpress.com/about-mike-poole/
PhD in Southeast Asian Studies at the Australian National University
Chief editor in Hong Kong for five and a half years for Armstrong-Hilton Ltd

Explore how we connected:
1st post – images used – http://greetingsearthlings.wordpress.com/2008/05/25/from-another-perspective/
Creative Commons issues.
FlickrCC – http://flickrcc.bluemountains.net/index.php
Fang @ cc! – http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Mike_Seyfang
Roy’s Flickr – http://www.flickr.com/photos/royblumenthal/tags/lifekludger/

2nd Risk and Redemption – http://greetingsearthlings.wordpress.com/2008/05/28/risk-and-redemption/
The benefits of connection.

3rd Getting Organised – http://greetingsearthlings.wordpress.com/2008/06/25/getting-organised-for-good/
“But imagine if a helper has just had her contract terminated unfairly, knows she must leave town in two weeks and needs legal advice? She can send a text to the central computer, which will distribute it to all other members in the network.”
-Discuss why a central computer. Do services exist tat could fulfill this role already, maybe with some ‘patch panel’ plugging?
-Maybe Beth might have some idea about this ‘feedback’ idea from Cambodia work.

A Death in Hong Kong:
Discovery Bay Residents Seeking Justice for Vicenta (Vicky) Flores
Who is Vincenta Flores?
Blogging for Human Rights
Blogs and activism (action…shirky?)
Are all bloggers activists in some degree? (personal)

Closing remarks/announcements:
Like to host a podcast without the hassle?
or Just like to be a guest on te show? – Contact us.

Sponsors: After successful sponsorship Nick Hodge, looking sponsors.
- Especially looking to transcribe podcast – transcription sponsors.

Acknowledgements: – Jack in the Pulpit -Extraordinary Girl

Image in mp3 Album art from Leo Watson on Flickr

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #050 : Half Ton

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 08:25:28 -0700

EELS 50 – Thursday 19th June 2008

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #050

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Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #50 – Half Ton

This is our 50th show…half a ton!

Mike and Dave catch up on what’s been happening in their own extraordinary everyday lives and Dave tends to dribble on with inane detail that probably loses you all in the process of getting to the point.

Besides that there’s some strange ‘bleep’ sound that crept in and appears now and then, so please, if you manage to survive these obstacles, you’ll to get hear some of these things mentioned:

extracting dna -
whats it look like
future collective dna action
dna extraction photos
Milton the Monster DNA

beth kanter -
Beth’s Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media: What’s the sweet spot between personal productivity and social productivity?

stowe boyd -
/Message: Overload, Schmoverload: The Myth Of Personal Productivity
network productivity!
personal productivity as relic of industrialization
(its hard doing network productivity without a network [alone])
It is about the psychological, spiritual, and work benefits of connection.

supernova:

clay shirky -
Density and Continuity are precursors to collective action (for “start actions”).
* Density — There are enough people
* Continuity — The relationships will continue
The act of “incorporation” (literally “embodiment”) is how society currently deals with enabling collective action.
Question: Is there a licensing structure that enables collective action?

Clay Shirky on why Lifekludger hasnâ€™t taken off
Supernova 2008: Clay Shirky, “Collective Action”

jp rangaswami -
openness as opportunity and talent attractor
openness thought grab

Links:

. Tweetbeep
. Tweetscan
. Summize

Acknowlegements:

The intro. music for the show is from the song ‘Extraordinary Girl’ by ‘Jack
in the Pulpit’ (http://www.jackinthepulpit.com/) courtesy of the Podsafe
Music Network (music.podshow.com)

>end<

Technorati Tags: beth kanter, clay shirky, dna, fang, jp rangaswami, openness, stowe boyd, supernova2008

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #049 : Catchup with Beth Kanter

Sun, 01 Jun 2008 03:28:46 -0700

EELS49

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #049

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Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #49 – Friday 23rd May 2008 – Catchup with @kanter

Beth Kanter is a trainer, blogger, consultant who writes about social-media tools in the nonprofit sector. She additionally develops curricula, researches, and evaluates technology for nonprofits. You can learn more about her at bethkanter.org.

Guests
Beth Kanter – http://beth.typepad.com/

In this short show we chat with Beth Kanter who came to OZ for the Connecting UP (cu08) conference in Brisbane.

The catchup is done via Skype to Beth’s mobile phone when she’s in a noisy pub, so excuse the quality.

Talk about cu08
karen?
Stuart Jones – Fritz and Sauce
beth keynote – fundraising

aus sim card with data – which one? = optus

Shirky – here comes everybody + vid from Beth’s blog – cognitive surplus (Beth just finished, Mike just started)
- p25-28 The birthday ‘paradox’
- n x (n-1)/2

Links:

- hashtag.org
- qik.com
- nonprofitpulse.org

* Acknowlegements

The intro. music for the show is from the song ‘Extraordinary Girl’ by ‘Jack
in the Pulpit’ (http://www.jackinthepulpit.com/) courtesy of the Podsafe
Music Network (music.podshow.com)

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #048 : Ustream I stream we all stream ramble

Sat, 17 May 2008 19:43:23 -0700

EELS48 This edition of the show is Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #048 – Thursday 15th May 2008 : Ustream experingmenting and a no-guest ramble

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right click – 15.3 Mb 0:44:40min

Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #48

Ustream experingmenting and a no-guest ramble

Notes in rough chronological order:

* no guests today

* kents overwhelmed

* doing some experigmenting with ustream

* talking about signal and noise

* recently favourited from my flickr [http://www.flickr.com/people/gleonhard/]

- Deborah Schultz [http://www.deborahschultz.com/]

* fourth anthropological space – see book Collective Intelligence by Pierre Levy [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0306456354]

- The Global Brain

* mpesce intro to a modest proposal – the poor sub cultures existing in our own backyard who need connecting

* is twitter becoming another short-head environment – # of followers etc.

* experingment – ustream.tv

- cohost feature

- how does one initiate request to co host?

- Bottom corner – cohost

- can we have more than 1?

- can we offer .mp3 download of recorded show?

- via RSS? (aka qik.com does)

* getting audio from .mov

[http://www.ecamm.com/mac/callrecorder/]

* Must watch – Catalyst: episode 12 2008 – 01/05/2008 [http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/vodcast/]

Acknowledgements:

The intro. music for the show is from the song â€˜Extraordinary Girlâ€™ by â€˜Jack in the Pulpitâ€™ (http://www.jackinthepulpit.com/) courtesy of the Podsafe Music Network (music.podshow.com)

This edition of the show was Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft. For sponsorship opportunities email us at extraordinary@thepodcastnetwork.com

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #047 : Mark Pesce

Fri, 02 May 2008 18:53:35 -0700

EELS47 This edition of the show is Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #047 – Thursday 1st May 2008 : Mark Pesce

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Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #47 – Mark Pesce

‘reality is that which will kill you if ignored long enough’

Mark Pesce – blog: Hyperpeople; http://blog.futurestreetconsulting.com/

Wikipedia:
Mark Pesce, (December 8, 1962, in Everett, Massachusetts) one of the early pioneers in Virtual Reality is a writer, researcher and teacher. The co-inventor of VRML, he is the author of five books and numerous papers on the future of technology.

* What happened in Adelaide?

Twitter whilst in adelaide – What exactly happenned at that point?
“mpesce Ok, I just witnessed a simulated death. I wasn’t warned about it, wasn’t prepared for it, and am unhappy about it. 18 minutesago from txt “

The Human Network – http://blog.futurestreetconsulting.com/?p=41

“I have focused my research toward an understanding of how technologies change the people who use them, and how people change the technologies they use. This emergent, or â€œautopoietic,â€ relationship between technology and society is now having a significant impact upon the organization of all aspects of human life â€“ and, in specific, the relationships between vast collections of individuals: that is, politics.”

* What is an autopoietic relationship?
* Is technology driven by culture or culture by technology? (Linda Stone) (Does technology free you? Or enslave you?) (We feel alive when connected to others. (LS))

mpesce on business – http://blog.futurestreetconsulting.com/?p=44

“The larger an organization grows, the louder the cry for conversation grows, and the more pressing its need. In each case some industry sector or institution confronts a pervasively networked public which can out-think, out-maneuver and massively out-compete an institution which formed in an era before the rise of the network. The balance of power has shifted decisively into the hands of the networked public.”

* How does an organisation that basically has no control and no power survive?

* Lets talk about Meraki and Mesh networks for ubiquitous wifi
(inspired by ‘Mob Rules‘ talk ) http://mseyfang.edublogs.org/2007/11/06/meraki-mark-pesce-urges-us-mob-to-sieze-control-of-the-spectrum/ )
Links:

LP:Game link?-
- http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2004/02/us_army_mmo.html
- http://www.americasarmy.com/

Book: Orson Scott Cart – Enders Game (the trilogy)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ender’s_Game

Gibson’s Law: Unintended consequences
How can DIRC survive ? (very pithy one liner of Dave’s conclusion)
Currency / Money (store of value for exchange)

Free Australia Wireless network – http://www.open-mesh.com/
Free Sydney Wireless – http://blog.freesydneywireless.com/
icanhazmeraki.net
Acknowledgements:

The intro. music for the show is from the song â€˜Extraordinary Girlâ€™ by â€˜Jack in the Pulpitâ€™ (http://www.jackinthepulpit.com/) courtesy of the Podsafe Music Network (music.podshow.com)

This edition of the show was Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft. For sponsorship opportunities email us at extraordinary@thepodcastnetwork.com

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #046 : horizontal dave, manic mike, grumpy silkcharm

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 00:11:35 -0700

EELS46 – This edition of the show is Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #046 – Thursday 17 April 2008 : horizontal dave, manic mike, grumpy silkcharm

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 1:28:19 30.4Mb

Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #46 – horizontal dave, manic mike, grumpy silkcharm

As usual we acknowledge the makers of that fine introduction music you just heard which was Jack in the Pulpit from their song Extraordinary Girl.

Dave, mike and laurel chat about Laurel’s recent trip to Saudi to work with women there on a social network, the cultural, and gender issues, similarities and tech hurdles. Also joined by Andrew & Steph Doust who work in Dubai, Iraq and Palestine. **

Journey to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
Tolerance in SL

Part 2 : Calling Andrew and Steph. Doust

Andrew – Dubai – trade
Stories

Steph – Palestine – good books
Book
Blog

Acknowledgements:

This edition of the show was Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft. For sponsorship opportunities email us at extraordinary@thepodcastnetwork.com

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #045 : get naked with biff

Thu, 03 Apr 2008 23:41:35 -0700

EELS45 This edition of the show is Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #045 – Thursday 3rd April 2008 : GetNaked with biff

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 1:15:23 25.9Mb

Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #45 – GetNaked with biff

Once again this edition of the show is sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft. Our thanks to nick for his tangible support.
As usual we acknowledge the makers of that fine introduction music you just heard which was Jack in the Pulpit from their song Extraordinary Girl.

This show we are joined by Richard Birkin (biff) from Naked. Biff is from Derby, England.

Intro and what we’ve been up to.
Mike: New job and timezone hell – http://mseyfang.edublogs.org/2008/03/30/daylight-savings-i-told-you-so-11years-ago/
Dave: Implementing email solution using Google Security and Compliance Services [http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/security/index.html]
Kent: Too much work, may never blog again.

What is the hubbub over at Naked?

“Naked isn’t a place to collect new friends.
It’s simply a better way of staying in touch.
With Naked, you enjoy an ongoing feeling of openness with the people that matter to you.”

Dave thinks Naked messaging is about finding personal signal. (ref. linda stone); extendable cones of silence – swarm up not down and gets the feeling of ‘inverse vulnerability’.

Biff outlines the Naked ideas and how it works and the ‘kernel’ of what the service offers. We talk about closed being the new open, notions of privacy and trust. There’s lotsa banter and ideas about what we as people want in our lives and how technology needs to meet that – and biff seems to take copious notes on applying all our ideas into Naked [poor guy].

Anyway, it’s meaty fun stuff…if you like meat. Great food for thought on what is a very interesting service.

Links:

http://www.getnaked.com
http://www.nakedyak.com
http://mseyfang.edublogs.org/2008/04/01/why-did-edubloggers-flock-to-diigo-over-the-weekend/

http://wweraser.com/

Acknowledgements:

The intro. music for the show is from the song â€˜Extraordinary Girlâ€™ by â€˜Jack in the Pulpitâ€™ (http://www.jackinthepulpit.com/) courtesy of the Podsafe Music Network (music.podshow.com)

This edition of the show was Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft. For sponsorship opportunities email us at extraordinary@thepodcastnetwork.com

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #044 : Al Upton and the miniLegends

Thu, 20 Mar 2008 00:36:43 -0700

EELS44 This edition of the show is Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft.The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #044 – Thursday 20th March 2008 : Al Upton and the miniLegends

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Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #44 – Al Upton and the miniLegends

Once again this edition of the show is sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft. Our thanks to Nick for his tangible support.

As usual we acknowledge the makers of that fine introduction music you just heard which was Jack in the Pulpit from their song Extraordinary Girl.

There has been a bit of a kerfuffle on the interwebs this week as Al Upton and the miniLegends class blog was Closed. Kent couldn’t join us today due to time zone issues.

Some points covered in rough chronological order:

intro to Al twitter.com/alupton

who are the miniLegends, what they do

whats been happening this week??

alupton.edublogs.org (count the comments) [mseyfang is #37] (read #151)

good summary posts linked to below

The intersection human desire/technology

why’s everyone always upset when someone’s asked stop blogging? – more than just stiffling of free speech.

we want to extend our geography

kids miss blogs – comment in ustream – exactly.

168 comments – all supportive, many from parents.

154. mini’s parent – March 18, 2008

I too am very disappointed that the kids blogs have been shut down. The kids have embraced the blogs with terrific enthusiasm and it is great to see my child canâ€™t wait to get to school. I believe Al Upton is doing everything in his power to make it as safe as possible while the kids learn and explore. This is their future and they are in good hands.

My favorite part about blogging is that people leave me comments. (english 2nd language student) – connection!

Links:
alupton.edublogs.org – Site of kerfuffle
mseyfang.edublogs.org – Summary post with more links
- http://aquaculturepda.wikispaces.com/Al+Upton
- http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/page.cgi?post=43768
- theedublogger.edublogs.org

Acknowledgements:

This edition of the show was Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft. For sponsorship opportunities email us at extraordinary@thepodcastnetwork.com

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #043 : Nick Lothian

Thu, 06 Mar 2008 17:09:42 -0800

EELS43 – This edition of the show is Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft.

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #043 – Thursday 6th March, 2008

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 1:00:20 20.8Mb

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #043: Nick Lothian

kent, dave and mike regroup and talk to Nick Lothian from education.au about opensource, code and what’s being going on tech-wise in their lives since last time.

Some network oddities cause skype drop-outs and reconnects that happen during the show. I left them in because it’s funny…and I use the term Skypeosphere (of which currently google says there’s very few results)

Some points to be covered in rough chronological order:

nickl in general (web2 spin) (nick.lothian on skype)
cool stuff from/about nick
sloppy science (? interested in Nick’s views on my plans for blogging about science research)
openDSM in particular
opensourcing software
helping Trent – what would linus do? [what would lifekludger do?]
flickr manager vs photodropper
http://blog.openwetware.org/scienceintheopen
‘credit’ (or recognition/attribution for writing a popular wordpress plugin) is a promise of future work (very LearnDog)
disposable identities

Links:

openDSM – search for edna10 in technorati / flickr
nicks blog:
http://blogs.educationau.edu.au/nlothian/2008/02/20/open-dsm/
http://nicklothian.com/blog/2008/02/19/shipping-software-part-2/

?whaddaya mean ’sloppy science’?!
last episode (grooveshark) ‘network’ via my blog post:
http://mseyfang.edublogs.org/2008/02/23/my-podcast-attacked-by-a-groove-shark/
daves post on photodropper:
http://dnwallace.com/blog/2008/02/24/is-photodropper-ripping-of-flickr-manager-antithesis-of-a-connected-culture/

Flickr Manager:
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wordpress-flickr-manager/

* AcknowlegementsThe intro. music for the show is from the song ‘Extraordinary Girl’ by ‘Jack
in the Pulpit’ (http://www.jackinthepulpit.com/) courtesy of the Podsafe
Music Network (music.podshow.com)

This edition of the show was Sponsored by Nick Hodge, Professional Geek at Microsoft.
For sponsorship opportunities email us at extraordinary@thepodcastnetwork.com

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #042 : Steve Spalding

Thu, 21 Feb 2008 02:38:22 -0800

EELS 42 Thursday 21st February 2008
Steve Spalding; How to Split an Atom blog (http://howtosplitanatom.com/)

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #042

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Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #42 – Thursday 21st Feb 2008

Steve Spalding; How to Split an Atom blog
(http://howtosplitanatom.com/)
Skype name: sbspalding
Twitter: sbspalding

Points discussed in rough chronological order:

Mike’s at car racing…piker.
Introduction: who is he; what does he do, etc.
How did he get into blogging?
Groveshark (http://www.grooveshark.com/). It’s in Steve’s email signature. What is it? What’s his involvement?
What are a few of his favorite blogs?
Kent asks the ‘Facebook’ question.
Widgets: the Siph lesson (http://howtosplitanatom.com/interview/lessons-from-entrepreneurs-siphs/).
We talk about Stumbleupon (http://www.stumbleupon.com/)
Techspoofs (http://techspoofs.com/).
What are his favorite online applications?
.gmail
.voice (http://vois.com)
.federated media (http://www.federatedmedia.net/)
Is requiring user registration an obstacle to growing users? Kent says yes.
How get eyeballs on your info. – filter
Microsoft & Yahoo

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #041 : Ajay Ranipeta and Bio Informatics- Laurel driving

Fri, 08 Feb 2008 20:28:33 -0800

EELS41 Thu 7 Feb 2008 – Ajay Ranipeta – Laurel drivingThe Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #041

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Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #41 – Thursday 7th Feb 2008

In this first show for 2008 Laurel Papworth is handed the reigns to drive the show and brings a guest Ajay Ranipeta to have a chat. Ajay talks about Bio Informatics while as usual everyone else goes off on other interesting tangents (Led by Laurel of course). Dave is missing for the first half of the show but joins later. (If any of you would like to do the same and bring a guest on the show and have a go at hosting, please send us an email – see contacts in the sidebar of the blog).Show notes in rough chronological order:

. first show 2008 – yes, we know its feb.
. intro mike, kent, laurel, ajay
. dave is stuck with other appts. so missed start of the show, joins later
. ajay works for Australian Museum, talks about GIS, Bio Informatics. 100 million entries
. laurel gets to know Kent
. ajay talks about Encyclopedia of Life and the Atlas of Living Australia
. mike suggest we have a eosl – Encyclopedia of Second Life
. mike talks about his early foray into mapping with hypercard
. google buying bebo?
. kent ponders how people will fail to monetize gps services in the future
. general discussion about location based services
. dave finally gets home and joins in
. discussion about virtual economies, trusted transactions, what is currency to us and barter (accessibility credits?)
. what do we value, where’s our attention and unlearning the lessons of the industrial revolution
. little bit of sl discussion
. gen Y

Ajay – @funkycoda – http://www.aggregatedsolutions.com/
Laurel – @silkcharm – http://laurelpapworth.com/

Links:

Bio Informatics Links
http://www.biomaps.net.au – BioMaps
http://gbifmapa.austmus.gov.au – GBIF Mapping and Analysis Portal Application
http://www.eol.org/ – Encyclopedia of Life
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yA_9zofX1ME – Digital Story: TDWG and Life Science identifiers
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9404is3RJ8 – Digital Story: TAPIR – TDWG Access Protocol for Information RetrievalTed Talk
Click here to see E.O. Wilson’s TED Prize WishGPS
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System
Keychain GPS Receiver with Bluetooth
http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/travelpower/9f95/
Geocaching
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geocaching

Extraordinary Everyday Lives #040 : American Cancer Society in Second Life – Live

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 05:04:13 -0800

EELS40 Thu 20 Dec 2007 – ACS

The Extraordinary Everyday Lives Show #040

DOWNLOAD AND SAVE – Right-click. 41:40 14.4Mb

Extraordinary Everyday Lives show #40 – Thursday 20th Dec 2007

8pm sl time; 2.30pm adl time

In this show we talk live in Second Life with people involved with the American Cancer Society in Second Life. How SL acts as platform/space where people can come together in their common desire to help efforts to fight and to support those who are effected by cancer.

Talk about stories, experiences of the people.
How has SL made a difference?
Focus on what the people behind the scenes do to make something so big work.
See how everyone has been touched in some way by cancer [avatar show of hands?]
How the SL Relay For Life raises more $ that the FL one?

Guests
Marissa Goodlife – SL Cancer care givers
Fayandria Foley – SL Relay for life

Audio Contributions from audience
Lachlan Campbell
Nevar Lobo

American Cancer Society – (RC Mars stared the relay in SL)

Examples of what activities in SL:
-National Health Fair
-relay for life
-meetings?
-other support/functions?

Other contacts in SL

Poppy Zabelin – [Chair of SL's Cancer Survivors Group.-SL Survivors] – have or going through
Synergy Devonshire – Making Strides – Breast Cancer Side

‘Until theres a cure there’s relay for life’

Links:
SL Relay for Life : http://slrfl.org/
American Cancer Society : http://www.cancer.org/docroot/home/index.asp?promo=gaw
Flickr photos : http://flickr.com/search/?q=eel040&m=tags

* Acknowlegements

The intro. music for the show is from the song ‘Extraordinary Girl’ by ‘Jack
in the Pulpit’ (http://www.jackinthepulpit.com/) courtesy of the Podsafe
Music Network (music.podshow.com)

-thanks to ppl helped [spec tim, cait, dave, from glob geek & pixel, doug, gary or anyone else who provided input or bums on seats to try things out] (collaboration)
-thanks cam for allowing use tpn land

* Text log of public chat during session :

[2007/12/19 19:53] YellowFang Schmooz: dave – im swapping machinese
[2007/12/19 19:53] WhiteFang Shiras is Online
[2007/12/19 19:53] You: ok fang
[2007/12/19 19:54] WhiteFang Shiras: edit schmetdit
[2007/12/19 19:56] Marissa Goodliffe: YEEEEEHAAAWWWWW!!!!!!
[2007/12/19 20:01] Marissa Goodliffe: Hello Arianna
[2007/12/19 20:01] Arianna Centaur: Hi Marissa
[2007/12/19 20:03] You: hy arianna
[2007/12/19 20:04] Times Short accepted your inventory offer.
[2007/12/19 20:04] Arianna Centaur: hey there Dave :-)
[2007/12/19 20:04] WhiteFang Shiras accepted your inventory offer.
[2007/12/19 20:04] You: glad you could join us
[2007/12/19 20:04] Arianna Centaur: thank you, very kind of you
[2007/12/19 20:04] Arianna Centaur smiles
[2007/12/19 20:04] Marissa Goodliffe: Hiya Nevar :)
[2007/12/19 20:05] Nevar Lobo: hello everyone
[2007/12/19 20:05] You: tag photos eel040
[2007/12/19 20:05] Fayandria Foley: Hi Nevar!
[2007/12/19 20:05] You: I nevar
[2007/12/19 20:05] Nevar Lobo: hello everyone
[2007/12/19 20:05] YellowFang Schmooz: eel040 eel00x
[2007/12/19 20:05] sundhi Joubert is Online
[2007/12/19 20:06] Kopilo Hallard is Online
[2007/12/19 20:08] Ember McKay is Online
[2007/12/19 20:24] You: please anyone with thoughts, comments feel free to chime in
[2007/12/19 20:24] Sylph Howe is Offline
[2007/12/19 20:25] Kevlin Canadeo is Online
[2007/12/19 20:27] WhiteFang Shiras: sweet
[2007/12/19 20:32] Nevar Lobo: its very importiant that we dont push on those too who do want to escape ….. and if they change their minds and reach out be there wiht open arms
[2007/12/19 20:32] Kevlin Canadeo is Offline
[2007/12/19 20:32] You: yes good point nevar
[2007/12/19 20:33] sundhi Joubert is Offline
[2007/12/19 20:33] You: part of that is being seen too, so those wanting to can connect?
[2007/12/19 20:33] Nevar Lobo: exactly
[2007/12/19 20:34] WhiteFang Shiras: Dave seems to cross the boundary from escape to involved frequently ;-)
[2007/12/19 20:36] WhiteFang Shiras: ok
[2007/12/19 20:36] You: yes i do
[2007/12/19 20:38] You: if someone has teir talk on
[2007/12/19 20:38] You: please relese it
[2007/12/19 20:38] In Kenzo is Offline
[2007/12/19 20:38] You: someone take it, I’m having issues hearing.
[2007/12/19 20:40] Nevar Lobo: 70
[2007/12/19 20:40] Nevar Lobo: 146
[2007/12/19 20:40] You: nevar haveyou got voice
[2007/12/19 20:40] Marissa Goodliffe: Thank you Nevar :)
[2007/12/19 20:40] Nevar Lobo: yes
[2007/12/19 20:41] You: wuld you like to join in?
[2007/12/19 20:41] Nevar Lobo: sure if you like
[2007/12/19 20:43] YellowFang Schmooz: good idea – can we save the chat from this little shindig?
[2007/12/19 20:43] You: s I’m saving it
[2007/12/19 20:49] Doug Insippo: Good watching/listening!
[2007/12/19 20:49] YellowFang Schmooz: thanks doug
[2007/12/19 20:51] YellowFang Schmooz: Important indeed – there must be a bunch of people who just dont know about this
[2007/12/19 20:52] Marissa Goodliffe: SL is a huge place, it’s a job in itself to get the word out that we are here.
[2007/12/19 20:54] Lachlan gives Marissa a deep sensual kiss.
[2007/12/19 20:54] Marissa gives Lachlan a deep sensual kiss.
[2007/12/19 20:54] Marissa Goodliffe: heheh
[2007/12/19 20:57] You: htp://extraordinary.thpodcastnetwork.com
[2007/12/19 20:57] Lachlan Campbell: .th or .the ?
[2007/12/19 20:58] Nevar Lobo: no i dont either
[2007/12/19 20:58] wonder Sands: hi arianna
[2007/12/19 20:58] Arianna Centaur: hi there wonder
[2007/12/19 20:59] YellowFang Schmooz: little PODCAST subscribing lesson happening now
[2007/12/19 20:59] wonder Sands: whats going on here
[2007/12/19 20:59] Marissa Goodliffe: http://extraordinary.thepodcastnetwork.com
[2007/12/19 21:01] Doug Insippo: ooohh another cyclist?
[2007/12/19 21:01] YellowFang Schmooz: cyclist indeed
[2007/12/19 21:01] Doug Insippo: Roadie?
[2007/12/19 21:02] Nevar Lobo laughs
[2007/12/19 21:02] You have offered friendship to Doug Insippo
[2007/12/19 21:03] Fayandria Foley: Bye Mari!
[2007/12/19 21:03] You have offered friendship to Nevar Lobo
[2007/12/19 21:03] Fayandria Foley: Love ya Lach
[2007/12/19 21:03] Nevar Lobo is Online
[2007/12/19 21:03] Nevar Lobo is Online
[2007/12/19 21:03] Fayandria Foley: Nevar talk soon!
[2007/12/19 21:03] Nevar Lobo: Love ya Fay!!
[2007/12/19 21:03] Lachlan Campbell: Tak care frins
[2007/12/19 21:04] Doug Insippo: haha night
[2007/12/19 21:05] YellowFang Schmooz: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/eel00x
[2007/12/19 21:06] You: http://www.flikr.com/photos/tags/eel040
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