Remember Dave, he's got the Vatican on his side...

Who needs soap operas when you can sit down and watch this type of thing unfold...The Young and The RSS ;)

Learning From (and hurting?) Photographers

While not having the time to blog about anything in the last month or so, I have had the time to do a little more research in the area of photography podcasts. I'm now subscribed to four: The Secrets of Digital Imaging (with Dennis Hays), The Digital Story (with Derrick Story), Tips From The Top Floor (with Chris Marquardt) and the Martin Bailey Photography Podcast.

All are good, and more importantly, all are different. While I know quite a bit about photography (without managing to be very good at it surpisingly!), and while some of what I listen to is 'old-hat' for me, I still find it interesting and I manage to pick up quite a few good ideas along the way.

One such idea that I'm going to try is a self-assignment. Both Derrick Story and Chris Marquardt give photo assignments, and it really seems to force you into thinking more creatively about a subject. My problem is getting myself out to shoot. I think one of these assignments (or one that I come up with myself) might do the trick to finally get me going.

An interesting and somewhat controversial point that Martin Bailey expressed in one of his podcasts (and re-iterated in an interview with Chris Marquardt) is that photographers should not post high-res images online for others to use free of charge. His argument (or at least part of it) being that this hurts professional photographers who are trying to make a living.

This is one of those issues that I'm quite torn on. I can understand his point. If other structural engineers starting offering their services for free, before long I'd be out of a job. In fact, our code of ethics requires us to take fair or reasonable payment for any engineering work we do, that is, we are not supposed to do work for free or for an unreasonably low price. The point being that we are hurting our fellow engineer's chances for fair and reasonable payment for their services.

I understand this, but with photography I feel differently. I'm not sure if I want to limit my Flickr uploads to a small resolution to discourage their commercial use. Lord knows there are very few (and I mean very few) that anyone would want to use. I'm one for supplying creative fodder for others to use, not limiting it.

Without meaning any disrespect at all, maybe photography is going the way of desktop publishing. There were many people who used to make their living doing things in DTP that can now be done by the average computer user. I would assume that those people were pissed off too. Today someone taking pictures can generate high quality images and manipulate them in all sorts of ways to make them useful to others without spending large amounts of money on equipment. I would think companies who used to only go to stock photo agencies looking for images now scour the net for free alternatives.

I'm not sure how this will pan out. There are a lot of other industries that will undergo the same thing in the coming years and decades. Yet somehow our society shifts and changes to adapt. It will be interesting to watch how this happens with video, audio and photographic media in the near future. I feel it's inevitable, fighting it at this point is like swimming against the tide.

5 Steps and Some Good Writing

It seems to me that Kent Newsome is blogging a lot more frequently lately (or maybe it just seems that way to me). Not only that, a lot more of his posts have drawn my interest lately as well - maybe the two things are related.. I dunno. His 5 Steps to Good Blogging post begs comment and input. Go have a read of it.

First of all, the title is a bit of a misnomer. While he does indeed give 5 steps, it's not a preachy tutorial from up on high, but rather an insight into the things about a blog that draw him into reading it regularly. And as a result it really made me think about my blog.

"Don't Act Like a Rock Star, Because You Aren't"

I'm definitely not from this camp. I've said time and time again that while I'd love it if lots of people read my blog, it's not really the reason I do it. If it was the reason, then Lord knows I'd have given up months ago (I may be persistent but not stupid).

"Give me a link to someone I don't read every day who has something interesting to say. Be an equal opportunity linker. There are a lot of other smart and funny people out there- help me find them."

Guilty as charged. I don't do enough of this. But sometimes it comes down to the feeling that since I was pointed to this post by someone else, pointing to it again and putting some skimpy description of it sometimes feels a little cheap. Do I credit the last link in the chain of references or the first...or do I even know the first? I have no problem doing this for software or products that I find interesting, but for blog posts sometimes it's unsettling to me. I feel like I'm forced to make some kind of profound judgement on the subject of the link to make it interesting. Maybe I'm just a little afraid of link-blogging...speaking of which...

"Link posts are appreciated, but original thought is what gets a blog on my blogroll."

I am the same. I don't mind quick thoughts on a subject with a link attached but sometimes they just seem so quickly thrown together and regurgitated that I tend to move on without paying much attention.

"I like blogs that contain posts on a fairly broad range of topics."

People reading my blog will be stuck with that broad range like it or not. I've thought about focusing on one thing, but I'm all over the place in my interests from one day to the next and most of those things will eventually find their way to the blog. There's a reason for my blog url and blog title. It's because I've felt like a jack of all trades for most of my adult life. I'm into and out of different things all the time. Perhaps to my detriment but hopefully not, (at least according to Margaret Lobenstine). I have many varied interests and not enough time to engage in them all. So as I find bits of time to pursue them, I'd like to document them. Not necessarily for the masses, sometimes just for me.

"What do you look for in a blog?"

I prefer personal blogs rather than corporate blogs. I like to read something that lets me identify with the writer. I don't want to read something that sounds like PR copy or something out of a newspaper. I've got CNN and CBC for that. I want to know what the writer feels about the subject while they educate me. Yes - I want them to educate me; I want them to make me re-think things; I want them to make me sad or piss me off, and I want them to make me laugh.. ahh yes, that is the best. When you've made me chuckle or even smile, you've got me.

The skill of writing is something enchanting to me. I don't have much of it, but I'm trying to grow it. When someone does have it, it mesmerizes me. Read this short post by Tony Woodlief and see what I mean. That one itty-bitty post put a lump in my throat and made me want to grab my daughter out of bed and kiss her. That is talent. Or this one directed at Frito-Lay which had me grinning the whole way through. That is good writing. He sets the bar pretty high in terms of writing quality.

Now I'm not one to negatively criticize someone in public (I'm notoriously good at giving people the easy way out - to my detriment sometimes - maybe a post on that sometime *much* later), but there is one blog I just can't stand reading lately - it's still in my aggregator but teetering on deletion now. Of course I won't name it (would give me a cheap and tawdry feeling I guess). It's a blog where there is a hard edged pissed off attitude in almost every post, but it seems so contrived, so made up, that it falls flat. It also seems like the posts are so hastily written, complete with spelling mistakes and sometimes entirely missing or mis-used words that it pisses me off. For Pete's sake people, learn to spell! I'm no grammar whiz but at least I try to post something with general coherence and no obvious blunders (I'm still at a loss to explain where semi-colons go for instance. I use them at random but I'm never sure if they're in the right place or required at all.). Anyways, I guess you don't realize the benefit of good writing until you repeatedly read bad writing.

I like to be able to read a few posts on someone's blog and get a feel for who they are. That is why I regularly read Kent's blog. I feel like he's talking to me. That's partly because he's writing about something that piques my interest and partly because of the way he writes. Even among the big popular bloggers, I prefer the ones that don't write like they're speaking to millions but rather speaking to me.

4 Things

Thank you to Kent Newsome for tagging me in his '4-Things' list. It seems so trite and yet is so revealing at the same time. Here we go...

Four jobs I've had in my life:

1) Lawn Mower
2) Pipe Fitter
3) College Teacher
4) Structural Engineer

Four movies I can watch over and over:

1) Raising Arizona - we are on the same wavelength here Kent
2) Grosse Pointe Blank
3) Anchorman
4) Airplane

Four TV shows I love to watch:

1) The Colbert Report
2) Trailer Park Boys
3) Curb Your Enthusiasm
4) Bernie Mac

Four places I've been on vacation:

1) Quebec City
2) Las Vegas
3) Wales
4) Myrtle Beach

Four of my favourite dishes:

1) Pizza
2) Pizza
3) Special K
4) Pizza

Four websites I visit daily:

1) Bloglines
2) Flickr
3) Blogger
4) cbc.ca

Four places I would rather be right now:

1) Holding my daughter
2) In bed catching up on sleep
3) Practicing photography outdoors
4) Wales

Four bloggers I am tagging:

1) Janet Tokerud
2) Tony Woodlief
3) Tor Bjornrud
4) Stuart Langridge

Wikipedia and Humility - like oil and water...

Todd Cochrane is pissed off because he's trying to document his part in the popularization of podcasting in Wikipedia and he's getting repeatedly edited out. While I understand the frustration he's feeling, I think you can't have the power of something like Wikipedia without having some of these problems. I still think its a great source of information and a wonderful example of how the web can connect people and be a useful tool for society. Todd, do you really think that when Brittanica documents podcasting, everybody who should be included will be included? I think not. The problem there is that if you are not included in their encyclopedia, you won't have the chance to ever change that.

But don't eschew the whole project as if it were bunk. Maybe knowing you were a part of something and having been a part of something is enough. There are many other ways to get the message out that you were part of it. Wikipedia is not the be all end all authority on everything. Complaining about it does not help your reputation. The people who listen to you and read your posts know what's going on. Is that not good enough? See also, my post of December 20th for more thoughts on this subject.

Diving in Again

As is my usual behaviour, I'm diving headlong into photography and related subjects once again with having my new toy to play with. I was completely comfortable with, and did most of my learning with my two previous film cameras (a Canon AT-1 and a Canon Rebel Ti). That first camera was really what taught me the basics of photography (exposure, focus, depth of field and the like). It's built like a tank and really completely manual. It was the cheaper version of the classic Canon AE-1, and was purchased by my father sometime during 1977. The AE-1 had automatic exposure (hence the 'AE') while the AT-1 was basically the same camera without the auto-exposure feature and associated technology.The internet of course proved to be a huge source of good information on how to use that camera, and in the course of trying to figure it out, I learned a lot about photography.

Unsurprisingly, I've again gone to the internet in search of more information on digital imaging and the management of digital photos. But this time we are 4 years further on and I find myself really turning to blogs and podcasts for a significant part of my quest for information. I've found two good podcasts on digital photography: The Secrets of Digital Imaging with Dennis Hays and The Digital Story with Derrick Story. Both are really good, with the former being a little heavier on the beginning digital photographer and more detailed in specific information and help, and the latter being a little more wide-ranging. There are lots of good blogs on the subject as you might expect. I'm still on the hunt for more good sources of information about digital photography and digital image management.

One neat thing I did find was a very nice (and free for non-commercial use) image viewer/converter/basic editor called FastStone. I'd never heard of it before and caught mention of it in this post (thanks Wes). It's a nice photo viewer with some really nice features. It loads thumbnail images - including RAW files produced by my Canon Digital Rebel XT - very quickly and when you single click on a thumbnail it puts the image in a larger window in the lower left corner. The really neat part is it's magnifier. When you click over that image window in the lower left it almost instantly brings up a magnified view of the image that can be moved around the whole image. This lets you very quickly inspect your photos for quality without opening up a separate editor or application.

The other feature of FastStone that really stood out for me was its fullscreen editing mode. This mode displays the photo full screen (no menus visible including the start menu) and hides menus on all four edges of the screen. It's very intuitive to use and that wonderful magnifier is available in this view as well to inspect areas of the image closely. I just heard a description of the recently release iPhoto6 for the Mac that balleyhooed this type of full screen editing. Seems Apple weren't first to the party on that one.

One other great feature is it's comparison mode. You ctrl-click on at least two images and it brings them up full-screen side by side and lets you zoom in and out with the scroll wheel and pan to all parts of the photos simultaneously. Tremendously useful for comparing similar digital images quickly.

What don't I like about it? Well it's editing features are fairly primitive. It has basic contrast and colour enhancement controls, sharpening, blurring, cloning, cropping (which is done quite nicely I might add) and other basic features. It's no Photoshop, but then again it's not supposed to be. One other thing that I'd like to see is a way of tagging the images. It will display and let you edit jpeg metadata, but there are no convenient tagging and searching features.

The thing about this program that really gets me is not only its speed in bringing up thumbnails of even very large images but rather the fact that it lets you view a heavily magnified but high quality view of the image almost instantaneously. There's no disc whirring, no chugging or chirping, just BAM it brings it up and you're panning around the image immediately.

I've tried XnView, IrfanView, and Picasa among others, but for image comparisons, quick touch-ups, cropping and basic editing, the speed and functionality of FastStone is pretty hard to beat, especially for the price - my favourite price by the way ;).

After all that, I'm still looking for something to tag and organize my images. I'm either thinking about using Picasa for this (sure it's a very pretty program, but it seems so dead-slow at times) or something else. - Of course personally I'd like to use something from the open source community and I'm kind of afraid of locking myself into a library program and finding all those tags and all that metadata stored in some proprietary format that pisses me off 2 years from now when I decide to go with something else. I'm not a professional photographer (gawd I'd sure like to be but as they say, 'the grass is always greener....') - but I'd like something more 'prosumer'. If anybody's made it this far and has any suggestions, please let me know.

Y'know what I'd really like? Flickr for the desktop.

Will that be paper or plastic?

I just walked by a co-worker sitting at his desk with a plastic shopping bag tucked into his shirt collar as a bib, eating a plate of spaghetti. I'm not quite sure if it strikes me as funny, strange, or sad.

Building a New Blog and A-Listers Redux

Kent Newsome writes an interesting article about Why It's Impossible to Build a New Blog in 2006 . In it he writes:

"First, to have a successful blog, just like any other web site, you need readers."

Perhaps this sounds overly-idealistic, however 'success' is in the eye of the beholder. The blog I post to for family photos and family info is successful to me with only maybe 5 readers (click here to be the 6th! ;)). Indeed people may write to a blog to document things for posterity only; a kind of place to make an 'I was here' record for future generations to see. I have read many blogs which were not necessarily addressed to the general public or which did not have any intent of building readership. And many of them were interesting. I'm not sure success can be so neatly described by readership numbers or the intent to build and grow readership numbers.

But as I discussed with Kent and others back in July , I'm one of those who would sure appreciate more readers, but doesn't depend on it. I still feel the same way. However the really interesting point made by Kent this time is:

"...So you get the haves linking to one another (and largely only to one another) and ignoring (or at best tolerating) the have nots, in an effort to boost their status and, perhaps more importantly, protect their shares of the readership pie. Anyone who argues this isn't true hasn't spent much time surfing around the blogosphere."

So maybe in the same way that blogging zealots (and I don't mean that in a derogatory way) talk about 'routing around the mainstream media', the have-nots should be routing around the so-called A-listers. More and more, I find myself avoiding many of the mainstream top level blogs and using search feeds from IceRocket and the like to find more non-mainstream info. This is NOT a subconscious thing, I do it on purpose. I want to find out what the B and C-list bloggers are saying about topics that interest me and I search them out specifically. Sure there's chaff in amongst the wheat, but the wheat is damn good when you find it. I find myself getting tired of (maybe bored is the better word) reading the same people day in day out.

Although the big promise of opml-ized 'reading lists' will undoubtedly mean that not only can you read the same people every day, but you can read the same people that they're reading... every day. That doesn't sound like something that will interest me.

With the proliferation of blogs I agree that dreams of creating the next Instapundit or BoingBoing are misplaced for sure, but they can still be very worthwhile and rewarding. Anything that gets people to read, write and use their brains is rewarding. Being read by hundreds or thousands is a side benefit I think.

Christmas Toys

Well Christmas (and more specifically, my wife) brought another wonderful toy for me this year. A new Canon Digital Rebel XT digital SLR camera. Suffice it to say that there will likely be more photo related info posted to the blog in the coming months. However I also got 8 rolls of 35mm film in my stocking from my mother in law so the film SLR (also a Canon naturally) will not be shelved for a while yet either!

Magnatune has it right...

Dave Winer writes that he likes everything about Magnatune in response to this Techcrunch article about their business model. Sure they might not have any big artists in their stable, but I'm not sure they will have to. I found out about Magnatune months ago and have browsed it several times mostly looking for soundtrack music for my home video projects. There are quite a few really good artists there and their whole licensing structure is modern. Check out the music of Rob Costlow or Heavy Mellow for an indication of how good music doesn't always have to be big name music.

They have non-commercial licenses that allow you to either download 128kbps mp3 files or email in for higher quality audio files for no charge. As long as you are not charging any money with your project they don't expect you to pay them fees for the music. They use the Attribution-NonCommerical-ShareAlike Creative Commons license for this.

Incidentally, I picked up on Rob Costlow's music via P.W. Fenton's wonderful Digital Flotsam podcast (interestingly, P.W. is now working with Adam Curry at Podshow - likely a competitor to Magnatune in terms of new music artists). Recently PW switched to only playing podsafe music on his podcast. I'm not sure if this means only music from the Podsafe Music Network or 'podsafe' music in general.

Python Creator Guido van Rossum now working at Google

Well here I was thinking that the inventor of Python wouldn't necessarily need any extra income... of course was he really the inventor...maybe I should be checking the edit history of his wikipedia page.. ;)

Read more at www.oreillynet.com/pub/...

Humility - Look it up on Wikipedia!

This whole wikipedia self-auto-bio-egotistical editing thing is really getting annoying. People are editing their own bio pages (gasp!). People are blogging about how they would never edit their own bio pages (double-gasp!) My gawd, how the hell is 12yr old Johnny supposed to use Wikipedia to complete his science project on dinosaurs if it's so tainted by scandal??!! Improper credit given to the inventor of podcasting?...whats next...Einstein's entire contribution to science edited out of existence??

Get a grip! You're taking the piss out of something genuinely useful to the vast majority of people. I don't think you, you, or you realize that no one really cares if Wikipedia's creator edited his own bio or if Adam Curry edited his own bio page or if Dave Winer would never do such a thing. I think you're really missing the point of the whole thing: the open and free access to, and sharing of, knowledge. Whether or not Jimmy Wales created it all by himself or was too busy running a porn site I really don't care. The site is useful to me. Shallow as it is to say, I really don't care who invented it. Sure it's nice piece of information to know, but it doesn't affect whether or not I find the site useful.

This posting by Rogers Cadenhead is a piece of tripe and reads like something out of the National Enquirer, only with much less relevance to society as a whole... Get your faces out from in front of your vanity mirrors and get on with something more important.

Oh yeah...here's a word that fewer and fewer people seem to know: humility

Is this cool or what...

This ascii movie is cool...er...retro-cool....

NewsGator Online - Please tell me there's a better way...

I'm experimenting with NewsGator Online right now. Currently I use Bloglines for the bulk of my blog reading. However I am not averse to switching. I've imported my Bloglines OPML file no problem, however NewsGator shows all the posts for each feed as being unread - which is correct. However, I can't seem to find a way to mark all of them as 'read' in one fell swoop. I can mark them page by page however with 980 unread blogposts and 779 unread podcast posts it seems that it might take a while to clear them page by page. There must be a better way....right??

Firefox woes Resolved (well almost..)

So I've got my bookmarks back. I've got my bookmarks toolbar folder back in working condition (there was an empty dummy copy of this folder somehow created which screwed things up.) However I'm still puzzled as to why the changes I make to my toolbar buttons do not take. So if I add the 'Add New Tab' button to the toolbar it plunks it up there, but if I shut down and relaunch firefox it disappears?? It seems that themes will take hold and stay but the toolbar modifications still won't. I've re-installed a fresh v1.5 to no avail. Oh well, maybe better to learn the keyboard shortcuts than keep dicking around with it.

Blogger Web Comments for Firefox

Evan Williams points out the new Firefox extension from Google that uses blogsearch to show you the latest things other people are writing about what it is you're currently reading. I'm giving it a try (even as I type this in fact!) and it seems pretty useful in letting me dig deeper into a given subject if I want to. Although the slide-up comment window might get a bit annoying after some time. We'll see...

Read more at evhead.com/2005/12/blog...

Firefox woes - Part Two

Okay, I've managed to import a bookmarks folder that I saved a month or so ago. But what seems weird is that I can't seem to add anything to my bookmarks toolbar folder. When I open up the bookmark manager there is a duplicate entry for 'Bookmark Toolbar Folder' that I can't seem to delete. I've attached a screenshot above. I'm not sure what's going on here...

All My Firefox Customizations Have Vanished

What a wonderful morning. I come in to work and fire up Firefox and lo and behold all my customizations are gone!! No bookmarks, no live bookmarks, no bookmark toolbar visible and when I make the toolbar visible it is, of course, empty. All my bookmark keyword customizations are gone! The funny thing is that my history is still intact and the droplist that appears when I am about to enter my login ID for a site still contains my ID. What is going on here?

Also, since it's been so long since I set up all these customizations, I'm having trouble re-creating them. I had set up a keyword for google.com which was 'gg'. So that when I typed 'gg' plus some terms into the address bar, it would run a google search on these terms and show me the results. This doesn't seem to work anymore. Sure the 'gg' will take me to google.com but if I add terms in the address bar I get taken to various different pages which are definitely not Google!

I've ran a couple of spyware scans to no avail. It's like someone came in an uninstalled Firefox and then reinstalled it. Only I thought that this practice would usually leave all the customizations intact. No one's been on the PC since I left yesterday, and besides, no one here would be able to erase all those customizations in one fell swoop (would they?). I've also noticed that all the themes are gone (I only had a few since upgrading to 1.5) other than the base theme, and the couple of buttons I added (for creating a new tab etc.) are gone from the toolbar.

I guess I could look at it positively as a 'fresh start' but for now I'm pissed off.

Is this really what Wikipedia is for?

So it seems Adam Curry has found himself in trouble for some half-finished Wikipedia editing. And no sooner had this all come to the fore than Dave Winer weighed in on the concept of Wikipedia itself,

-- the bigger problem is that Wikipedia is so often considered authoritative. That must stop now, surely. Every fact in there must be considered partisan, written by someone with a confict of interest.

It's a difficult thing to settle on a single agreeable view of something so recent and so publicly debated. Does this mean it shouldn't be documented at all? Maybe. Would having some third party historian necessarily make things right? Surely the final interpretation of events would not sit equally well with everybody. Be glad you have a way of documenting history yourself and be glad you don't have to wait and hope that some third party organization sees things the way you do.

Anyway, isn't Wikipedia really about sharing knowledge? Isn't it about society educating itself? Collecting mankind's knowledge for all to share is probably one of the most noble things we could do with the internet (infinitely more noble than podcasting). Is it imperfect? Of course it is. The textbooks (history or otherwise) that I read throughout my education were not all accurate either. Were they still useful to me? Of course.

It is not just interesting but absolutely vital that this warehouse of knowledge be flexible. That's it's power. Hindsight is 20/20. So lets have a system that lets us use this fact to our advantage.
Let's not think of Wikipedia as a chronicler of recent history (that's what bloggers do effectively already), but as a tool for people to educate themselves collectively.

To devalue 1.5 million articles in one fell swoop because of a debate about personal recognition is not only shallow, it's just plain dumb.

Oh, and a note to Adam Curry in his suggestion of a definitive history of podcasting. Do you really think that a two year old technology really deserves a definitive history already?

An Amateur Web (or How I Don't Read Ads)

There are certain words or phrases, spoken or written so frequently and over such a short period of time, that they transcend mere annoyance and quickly become grating. "Monetization" is one of those words. More specifically, "Monetization of the Web". This phrase is in a dead heat with "what's the business model in that" and "web two-point-oh" for top honours in the grating category.

My writing this is a direct result of listening to Steve Gillmor's AttentionTech three part podcast with guests Dan Farber and Dave Winer. The specific point that sent me away thinking about all of this was Dave saying something to the effect of 'maybe the days of writers getting paid for writing is over'. If you want to hear some passionate discussion about the web and where it might go, this is really required listening.

A large part of the discussion focused on Google, advertising, and how businesses will make, and are making money on the web. Surely Google is making large amounts of money from their Adsense program. Of course people are making money from website ads and ads in RSS feeds. They wouldn't be doing it if they weren't. But how long can it last? Google is definitely NOT making money from me. Let's look at my situation specifically.

I'm a 30-something male. I have a decent career. I have a reasonable amount of disposable income. I am not rich by any -and I mean ANY- stretch of the imagination. I'm relatively savvy when it comes to technical things like utilizing the web. I would think I am smack dab in the middle of Google's demographic. One small problem however. I don't pay attention to Google ads. Or any web ads for that matter. I never have and likely never will. (I have been tainted by years of penis enlargement and erectile dysfunction solutions I guess) If I want to buy something like a new printer (which I just bought) or a new monitor (which I just bought) or a book, or a pair of pants, I don't go clicking on text ads. I try to find valuable information on what to buy. That might come from my co-workers, or it might come from the blogosphere or some other personal means. But in the vast majority of cases - no scratch that - in all cases, it doesn't come from web ads no matter how well targeted they are. I want personal recommendations from people who've built influence with me.

So let's take stock of my situation. I use Blogger (Google owned) to voice my opinion to whoever wants to read it. I use Google Maps almost every day to find places I need to go. I use GMail for most of my non-work email activities. And of course I use the Google search engine to find information I need many times every day. And what am I paying for these extremely useful services? Nothing out of my pocket, but I am giving them information about my search habits, my interests, my attention and where it's focused. This lets them create ads better targeted at me. I'm paying them with my personal information. They make money from companies who want to be able to target those ads at me. But they don't realize that the thing I'm NOT throwing my attention at is those very same ads! Am I the only one NOT paying attention to them? I would love to think I'm extremely unique. But I don't think I am.

Are they getting returns on all this targeted advertising? They're not getting any returns on ads placed in front of me, but just due to the fact that there are seemingly successful businesses built on it, I'd have to say some companies must find it useful. But how far can this go? Won't there come a time when either companies will say to Google 'this isn't effective enough' or Google will say 'we need to start charging for all this stuff people are using'. It doesn't matter how many people use Gmail if only a tiny percentage of them are giving the ads even one bit of attention.

I personally can't see Google extending the Adsense model much further. Are they just going to keep trying to focus those ads more sharply at me as they build up their data store? Or will they do something else with this data? Reading their privacy policy a few times makes good sense. They say that when requested to remove a person's data they will honour this, however they also state the following:
"we may decline to process requests that are unreasonably repetitive or systematic, require disproportionate technical effort, jeopardize the privacy of others, or would be extremely impractical (for instance, requests concerning information residing on backup tapes)"

So who decides whether it's unreasonable? Not a very definitive policy. Watch these guys! But I digress..

Will it be very long before companies find out that their ads can't compete with the sway of people who've built their own influence through blogs and podcasting? It's the influence that people have that becomes the valuable thing, not the ads they show on their pages or their feeds. Doc Searls had it right (and Dave Winer pulled it up painfully in front of everyone to see, or hear, in the podcast) when he said that the key is to be successful because of your blog, not with your blog. Dave stated quite frankly - as Dave inevitably does - that his blog is what let him make the big deals that made him the bulk of his money, it wasn't 'nickel and dime' ads on his website.

So how do you build influence then? Well in my mind, running ads on your website will neither hurt nor help it (remember? I don't read 'em). Running ads on your RSS feed however will definitely not help build it. You're throwing things up in front of me that I don't want to read. That will not build influence, if anything it will diminish it. And remember, you may not care about me personally, but I'm Joe Average. I'm not unique. There are many others like me. You want to influence me, but ads won't do it.

This is the conundrum. If you want to make money with - as in, directly from - your blog (or podcast or whatever) then you will have to put ads in there. You have no choice but to do it (unless you're unusually lucky in being employed to blog or podcast or whatever). But you don't build influence by doing it. You actually degrade your influence (on me) by doing it. So maybe Dave is right in saying that the old model of writers getting paid to write will wither.

So who will be left writing, or podcasting? A bunch of amateurs. People who are doing these things because they love doing them. Then my buying habits will be influenced and swayed by a group of people writing and podcasting about these things solely because of their passion for them. What a shame. ;)

Sharing My Pain With Microsoft

Recently I was sent a link to this video which touts a new way of sharing your pain with Microsoft developers. Quite funny and well produced. Perhaps Robert Scoble could interview some of these people for Channel9 ;)

Remember the Milk, My Pimp....

A quick note about some online personal information management sites. RememberTheMilk, MyPimp, and Ta-da Lists. You know, to-do lists, calendars, reminders and the like. All three sites are Web 2.0-ish (whatever that means), cleanly designed and sport nifty names and logos - seemingly a prerequisite for entry into the web 2.0-ish club these days. And I think all three support the use of RSS to keep abreast of all the things you're supposed to have done and haven't. Anyways, I can't speak from experience since I've only just found them, but they are potentially useful services. And of course all three are free so all the more reason to give one a shot. I registered for RememberTheMilk not because it has the best feature set, but because I like their logo the best ;)

I'm not sure how useful they'll be. Currently, my Palm Zire72 is now really only serving as an MP3 player for my commute and a short note-taking device. I've relegated my task lists to a Hipster PDA, probably the antithesis of the aforementioned online PIMs. But no matter. You don't know if you don't try. The hipster method is working fine for now, but it won't stop me from experimenting.

Is a Name Change In Order?

Dave Winer says:

"The "Long Tail" makes me want to barf. I'm not in anyone's tail. I'm a head, a heart, if I must choose an organ, kidneys or lungs. Anyone who calls bloggers a tail of anything has his head up his ass."

Huh? Maybe I'm missing some sort of sarcasm or quick-witted reference on this one Dave. Seriously, I just don't get it. Give me some indication of what set you off. Put it in context.

Aren't we talking about the long slender portion of a curve on a graph? In terms of weblogs (and it could be in terms of just about anything with a market or audience), there are a relatively small number of blogs read by a relatively high number of people. This is a fact, not an insult. The long tail of weblogs is made up of people like me (of which there are millions), that are read by very few.

And besides, there are many who find the 'long tail' the most valuable part. And being that it's a statistical fact, is there really any point in getting pissed about it? Let's just change the name. Maybe 'the Creamy Nougat'.

Anyways Dave, in terms of blogs, compared to me, you are nowhere close to the tail.

Inkscape - Draw Freely

One of the many things I've been fooling around with lately is Inkscape. This is an open source vector-based illustration application (phew..that was a mouthful!). So instead of creating raster based images like you would with Photoshop, PaintShop Pro, or the Gimp, you work with lines, shapes and fills to create Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) files. The advantage is that everything you create and work with is resolution independent and scalable. There are so many things you can do with a program like Inkscape that you can't with a raster based application (the reverse of course, is also true).

One of the most interesting things I like about the program is it's implementation of tutorials. There are several tutorials accessible from the help menu. Each one is actually an SVG file itself. So the informative text is interspersed with examples that you can play with right then and there. For instance it might describe how to scale, skew or rotate an object and it has several shapes right there for you to practice on. I've not met a tutorial yet that is as simple and effective for any application I've used.

In addition, if you need to, anything you create can be exported to a bitmap image the size of which is determined by you. So you could create a drawing and then save it out to be 80 pixels or 8000 pixels wide.

The new logo at the top of this blog is an example of my current doodling with it. Actually I used Inkscape to create the round logo and text and then used the Gimp to create the reflection. Don't worry, if you don't like the new header for the site it will likely change anyway...such is the nature of fiddling with a new program ;) I'll likely come up with something I like more anyway.

An additional side benefit is that it is available for both Windows and Linux. So I can use it in either environment with no discernible difference (that I'm aware of anyway).

So onwards and upwards. It seems I keep finding things to explore at the expense of the things that I really should be doing - I'm not quite sure how learning to use Inkscape will help complete my half-finished basement...ah well, all in the name of progress!

All Gussied Up For What?

A quick update on Microsoft Max. I realize this is a pre-release product. Probably it is meant to show what is possible with the WinFX runtime. It has an elegant and pretty interface. But I'm still trying to figure out what the heck to use it for!

So I can create slideshows (with apparently no choice of transitions) and then share them with people. But only on the condition that they have installed MS-Max as well. Is this not a very very closed system in the midst of what is becoming a very very open internet? I thought Microsoft was grasping this concept with their embrace of RSS, blogging and company transparency.

I know there are lots of programs and systems that can achieve the same thing. I myself currently use flickr to show off my photos. Anybody running Flash can view a fairly elegant online slide show with a few clicks. But even well before this, I used a freeware program called IrfanView. This little gem was a Swiss Army Knife when it came to image manipulation especially when dealing with batches of images. One thing it also did was create slideshows in either .exe form or .scr form for use as a screensaver. Nevermind Microsoft's own PhotoStory 3. Now there's a program that should get the WinFX treatment and enhanced online sharing capabilities. It is a vastly more compelling product (although granted it only generates .wmv files I think..)

The one thing it does do that I can appreciate is the "mantle" view of a collection of photos. This is where it takes your photos and arranges them with white borders and stands them up on a nice reflective surface (see the image at the top of this blog post). However, there are at least four major things wrong with even this feature: 1. You can't pick which photos or how many photos it will use in the 'mantle' shot. 2. The program sometimes crops off the top or sides of photos without warning when creating the 'mantle' versions, 3. There are visible gaps between the white borders and the photos themselves, and 4. There is no direct way to capture these 'mantle' shots to create a wallpaper or single image. The way I did it was to create a slideshow and hit the PrtScn key to create a screenshot, then crop and resize it for use as wallpaper. Why even bother releasing a product that's missing these kinds of key features for the only compelling component of the entire package! Grrrr.

A month ago I thought it strange that I hadn't heard much about Microsoft Max. Now it doesn't surprise me a bit. I can even understand (although not agree with) Microsoft trying to keep everyone locked into their platform, but you won't do it without a compelling product. This, in my opinion is one of the least compelling I've seen in a while.

Another Kick at the Can and What Is a LugRadio?

I've taken another kick at the Linux can... About 9 months ago I installed Suse Linux (9.2) on my machine and dual-booted it with XP. While I found it interesting, I didn't have the time to really get it up and running smoothly enough to really evaluate it. In the past couple of weeks, I took on the personal challenge of checking out how the other half lives again and removed Suse and installed Ubuntu.

I ran into several problems trying to get the dual-booting to work properly and figuring out how to get the sound up (it was working but the mixer volume was off!) so I'd have to still say that from my experience (albeit a sample size of 1), it still appears to be more of a OS for 'tinkerers'. Although to be fair, the problem was getting the XP dual-booting going under Linux, something which XP doesn't even allow (I don't believe MS even gives you the option of dual-booting anything other than Microsoft OS's).

Mind you, I'm running Ubuntu 5.10 ("Breezy Badger" for those in the know) which has not been officially released - that happens in two days I think, so things might have been a bit smoother had I waited for the stable release.

I'm pressed for time, so I'll save my comments for when I've got more Linux miles under my belt and can put a few coherent thoughts together.

One other thing though. In the course of investigating Linux and Ubuntu, I found a great podcast dealing with Linux. It's called LugRadio and I enjoy it immensely. Even if Linux is not your thing, these guys are truly great to listen to. I've heard lots of podcasts now, from the highly polished to those that are completely rough around the edges. In my opinion, these boys have got a great balance. They cover interesting stuff like open source software, programming, technology and even some politics with intelligence, passion and great humour. Probably not for everyone, but they've held my attention for hours of listening. Give them a try.

MAX'ing out with Microsoft

It's a good thing that I listen to podcasts in my drive-time. The latest This Week In Tech mentioned Microsoft's new MAX beta software. I hadn't heard hide nor hair of this. It appears like it's a competitor to Google's Picasa. I'll give it a spin to see exactly how it compares. One thing MAX isn't is light on system requirements. The recommended system is:

* Microsoft Windows® XP
o Home or Professional Edition
o Service Pack 2
o English only
* WinFX September CTP
* 2.4 GHz processor.
* 512 MB of RAM.
* 200 MB of available hard disk space.
* Windows Presentation Foundation capable 3D Video Card.
* Broadband internet connection.
* Microsoft Update enabled.
* Beverage and snack. The installation may take a while.

The 3D video card, broadband and MS-Update are not part of the minimum system requirements. And the system can be as lowly as a 1GHz processor and 256MB of RAM. So with all that layed out, hopefully it does something neat and does it well. Picasa is a nice piece of software and because it is completely useable even on my Win98 (!) machine at work, I find it extremely useful and it will likely be difficult to beat. Many have said that Google can't really develop any good software without acquiring it. Let's see if Microsoft can.

Speeding Up Firefox

There's a small 4 step speedup for Firefox users on broadband on Tom Raftery's site. I gave it a try and it does seem to speed things up. Of course I haven't benchmarked it or anything but it does seem to make the initial load up of a page significantly shorter.

Opera Joins the Free Browser Wars

It was only a few weeks ago that Opera gave away free registration codes for their browser for a single day to celebrate their 10yr anniversary. Now it seems that was all for nought. They announced today that they are providing their browser product for free and removing the ad banners. I use both Opera and Firefox and find them both pleasing to use. Opera seems a bit faster to me, but it's a little more complex in it's operation than Firefox in my opinion. And don't forget about Chris Pirillo's browser of choice Maxthon which is based on the IE engine. Either way, it's good news that there will be more competition in the browser market. I'm not so sure IE7 will have anything on these products when it ships with Windows Vista. The days of a browser monopoly seem to be dead.

Good Non-Political Link to Katrina Flooding Info

Dave Winer points to a very good article here on the science and modelling of the flooding and behaviour of the levees. Good reading for those interested in the scientific/engineering aspects of the problem.

Levee Info from Army Corps of Engineers - Designed to Category 3?

Checking out the Army Corps of Engineers-New Orleans District site and found this interesting fact sheet for the levee project in the affected area. From what I gather, this is a description of the ongoing project to improve the levee system. Interesting to note that their SPH (Standard Project Hurricane) - what they designed everything to withstand - was a Category 3. Does that mean that they were upgrading things to bring it up to withstand a Category 3? They don't go into any detailed design info or describe their methodology so it's hard to say what 'designing to a category 3' might mean. There is quite a bit of budget info and maps provided as well. This protection (however inadequate in hindsight) does not come cheap.

U.S. not accepting outside help??

As a followup to my earlier post, it seems that the US is denying help from various other nations, at least in the short term. Lots of conjecture about why, make sure you check out the comments to the post as well. You've really got to wonder about the decision-making. Sure there are a lot of considerations that you or I might miss, but c'mon, people are dying there minute by minute.

This whole thing is getting very very messy politically for Bush, and it ain't going to get any better.

More Thoughts..

Reading Dave Winer's emotional posts and reading and watching coverage from various sources, I have to admit that I come away feeling dejected about the chances of many people stuck in the worst hit areas. Looking at the news reports it appears that there is just too many areas and too many people to help. You can only go so long without food and clean water. I realize people die everyday in the world while we merrily go about our business. This whole situation will unfortunately be a rude awakening for most North Americans (like me) in the coming weeks. Will we be able to ignore the dying in our back yard? It's amazing what unfortunate things we people are able to put out of our minds.

And you look at the television news coverage (and yeah, they may slant their coverage for whatever motives they might have) but those are not white middle-class people crowding the streets, and filling the alleys. These people already had enough problems in their situation in life before all of this.

In many ways the coverage of this situation almost seems like the very antithesis of the 9/11 situation. Poor black people instead of rich white people, very little hope rather than the optimism of survival and retribution, massive disorganization, and absolutely nothing for America to rally around. Let's hope they don't need an enemy to pull together.

Katrina - Who's Going to Help?

As a break from the normal subject matter I write about: I was in a project meeting today and during a break we were discussing the Katrina situation. One comment that came up immediately by someone was this:

"just watch as no one offers help to the Americans in their time of need...everyone [as in other nations] expects them to pony up tons of relief cash when they are in trouble, but they [the Americans] will be expected to solve this one all by themselves."

I am assuming that they are contrasting the current situation with the Tsunami last year. Is this a fair comparison? The US is a relatively wealthy nation. Should they be expected to be more self-reliant than say Malaysia? Does it sound a little bitter?

I am Canadian. I am of the opinion that we as a country should offer assistance (monetary or otherwise) if there is a need. But will it be asked for? Should it just be offered? Do they really need the same kind (not necessarily amount) of emergency relief that the world provided during the Tsunami? Do they want it? I have always figured Americans to be people who pride themselves on self-sufficiency and resiliency (and that is not a shot - but a compliment). There might very well be many Americans who don't want outside help to solve their problem. (and of course I might very well be wrong in that assumption!)

It's a little different this time around. You have a million people in serious trouble and it looks like the problems will last months and not weeks. You WILL NOT be able to turn a blind eye after a week of news coverage. It's in everyone's back yard, and not halfway around the world. I feel so sorry for those affected, truly sorry.

MSN Searches RSS Deeper?

Sounds like the MSN Search Engine now searches fully within RSS and Atom feeds. I will give it a try. I still hop around between Technorati, Feedster and Bloglines to do this stuff. Adding one more will not hurt (even if it is from Microsoft..). Where is Google in this space? I'm surprised they are not providing the standards to which others are judged. Do they not care? Or are they working on something vastly better?

Free Culture on the Cheap

My local grocery store sometimes has a bargoon table with assorted childrens books and trinkets for sale. Yesterday I decided to browse the table for any deals on story books for my 3 year old daughter. Digging around a little, this softcover book with a zebra-like stripey patterned cover caught my eye. It turned out to be Larry Lessig's Free Culture in new condition. Needless to say, I forked over my $3.99 and picked it up. Now you know for sure that Internet culture has hit the mainstream when it makes the bargoon table at the local IGA store in the boonies of Southern Ontario. I'm sure I will enjoy the read.

OS X running on 3 Year Old Cell Phone!

Not to be outdone by the prospect of running OS X on a PC, I managed to get Apple's OS running on my 3 year old Audiovox CDM8300 cell phone. The install was pretty easy, but the screen is very hard to read and that joystick control is not very good for point and click. Sorry for the fuzzy photo, it was taken with my Palm Zire72 camera. I plan to outfit the PDA with the image sensor from a Canon EOS-1Ds-MarkII that I've got lying around here somewhere, so hopefully sharper pics will be available soon. Somebody get Steve Jobs a set of Depends...I think he just made a burger. ;)

EVDO, Earballs and Bob Newhart

I just finished listening to one of the most entertaining podcasts I've come across in some time. Steve Gillmor's one to one conversation with Doc Searls regarding EVDO and the 'incumbents' reaffirmed the true value in podcasting to me. It felt at times like Ralph Kramden having an argument with Bob Newhart. Both sides of the conversation were smart and perhaps more importantly passionate. You will not find this kind of stuff on mainstream broadcast. And besides, where else would you hear the term 'earballs'? Another one to add to the ever-growing list of adapted metaphors and catchphrases.

The Last Bastion of News..was it really?

Dave Winer laments the loss of the 'one last bastion of news' at CNN. Truth be told, I never much liked Aaron Brown myself anyway. My opinion is however, solely based on his coverage during the invasion of Iraq. I always felt that he was on the verge of breaking into an all-out smirk - even when he was dealing with serious subject matter. Just a peeve of mine I guess. Nonetheless, I wonder if Dave had a chance to check out Canadian television news during his recent trip through the country. Undoubtedly he would have seen the stark contrast of CBC or CTV network news coverage as compared to their American counterparts. Even more stark is if you take many of our local newscasts and compare them with, say, a local Buffalo newscast. The difference is shocking. I always feel as if I'm put in a state of crisis or panic when watching many American newscasts. Everything has to be shocking, tragic and many times over the top. Canadian news might seem a bit boring at first glance, but it is nice to get the information without all (or at least with significantly less of) the hysteria and hype. CNN has built a strong reputation on being the place most people (even Canadians) turn to for late-breaking news coverage, but they've never appealed to me for anything but crisis coverage.

On a mostly unrelated note, I just saw that Peter Jennings was named to the Order of Canada prior to his death.

Top 100 Lists - Ho Hum

Jason Calacanis has an post about Technorati's Top 100 and it's pro's and con's. In fact, he's offering 50 grand in advertising for a "better" top 100 list. Pfft. And I can say Pfft because I have nothing to advertise at this point -unless anybody is interested in buying half-finished amateur attempts at python programming ;). Personally I'm not a huge fan of top-whatever lists when it comes to blogs or podcasts. I am finding more and more that new and interesting online content arrives in my brain in two different ways. By chance and by search.

When I say chance I mean that if something is interesting to me, or something is really important, chances are that it will find it's way to me through the people I read or listen to. Or, someone I regularly read will point to the source of the info - and this may become a new source of content for me in the future. I'm not one of those people who feels scared that they might miss something. The beauty of blogs and linking is that 99% of the time that important information will get to me.

By search I mean that if there is something that has sparked my interest that is not necessarily part of any of the blogs or podcasts in my aggregator then I will search it out. And many times I find great sources of information and many times new blogs or podcasts that merit my subscription.

I don't need someone telling me what the 100 most influential blogs are, or what the top 50 podcasts are. Where is the excitement in that? This is a new medium, shouldn't we be exploring it freely instead of expecting someone to package it up the way they think is best and hand it to us.

Of course I'm not going to sit here and say that I don't subscribe to 'A-List' bloggers. Of course I do. But I personally find that the five or six in my aggregator do a pretty good job of pointing me to enough interesting content to fill my spare time (and then some). The really nice part is when one of them points to some obscure blog that turns out to be my cup of tea.

Dave Winer has summarized his thoughts on the subject in his usual efficient way:

Jason Calacanis wants to shake up the Top 100. Why bother. Just blog what you find interesting, what you believe in, and everything is fine.

Well said.

OPML Editor Released

I downloaded and installed Dave Winer's OPML application last night. It's going to take a bit of getting used to, and to be honest I likely won't use it much for blogging (although that might change), but I am interested in the outliner part of it. Anyhoo, I was able to quickly create a blog with it which you can see here.

It appears that it will be difficult for blogging with it from two different locations (someone correct me if I'm wrong) which I do quite often. I like Blogger because it's no fuss and I can access it from home or work easily. I think Dave's app depends on having the www directory for syncronization. Again, please someone tell me if I'm wrong here.

No time really to fiddle with it as of yet, but it's something else to put on the list of things to experiment with (along with python, xml, del.icio.us, feedster etc.. etc..)

He Likes It...I'm Quietly Proud

In typically Canadian fashion, I was immediately blushing at Dave Winer's comments about Canadian cities and Ottawa (I went to University for 7 years in our nation's capital). Something about a Yank of any prominence commenting on something Canadian seems to garner attention from a lot of us up here. It's just how most (I dare not say 'all') of us are..kind of sad I guess. I wouldn't call it a severe inferiority complex, but more a nation in need of some back-patting once in a while to ensure that we're on the right track as a country.

As you might expect, I took Dave's comments with a little more internal pride (gawd..us Canadians would never dare show it to anyone else...) than usual. Normally we hear quotes from celebrities at the Toronto Film Festival. Things like 'Geez the streets are really clean up here..' by people like Topher Grace or Sandra Bullock. Or we're spoon-fed examples of American ignorance towards Canada via shows like Talking to Americans to somehow boost our own egos.

It is relatively rare that I get candid, honest, intelligent and unfiltered opinions of our country from a visitor that has built respect with me. I don't agree with everything he does or says, but I respect him. I value his opinion. I think it's much easier to build that respect with blogging than with conventional mass media like TV, Film or radio.

Finding an Outlet

Initially I was going to leave a comment on Kent Newsome's post "More on Getting Heard". However, one particular paragraph demanded a proper post. He writes,

So while I obviously enjoy writing, I want this site to be more than an online journal or a living Christmas letter for my extended family. I want it to be my side of a discussion on whatever topics come up. If my extended family was more interested in the internet as a way to stay connected, I could community build around that. If our friends had web sites (fat chance, it took all I had just to get them to sign up on flickr), I could build around that. I don't have that luxury, so I look to build connections with other people who write about the things I'm interested in.

This mirrors my own situation (and likely lots of other bloggers) to a spooky degree. For this reason I started a separate, more family-oriented blog some time after this one. I've had the same issue of not being surrounded by any like-minded (in a tech-interest way) people in my social circle. I needed somewhere to communicate my own varied interests. I laughed out loud at the part about flickr. As a matter of fact, I was most proud to see my brother-in-law start his own blog shortly thereafter. Mine has so far been a mostly family event oriented blog, but - and hopefully this doesn't sound too snarky - I hope it will be a source of education and not just a family newsletter. I am trying to be careful not to scare them away. Lure them in with family photos and expose them to some interesting things in the process hopefully. Sounds kind of deceitful when put like that, but accurate I suppose.

Of course I'm not expecting many (or in fact any) of them to start blogging, but it would be nice to expose them to things other than e-mail, cnn.com and Amazon. Heck, I even coached my brother-in-law via email on how to edit the HTML in his blogger template to modify his link list and add a flickr zeitgeist. Amazingly, he didn't fall asleep reading the email, was successful at it, and found it quite easy!

With respect to Randy's A-List post that started all of this discussion and Brad Kellett's thoughts on the subject , it's interesting that my family-oriented blog will likely never see even 10 regular readers, but it may become just as important to me as this one.

Problems with Pubsub Search Feeds in Bloglines?

I've been fiddling with Pubsub searches and created a few search feeds there. When I add a search feed to Bloglines it shows the entry but the feed hardly ever updates. The one I've still got in there has updated twice in two weeks even though it's updating much more frequently when I check at the pubsub site. I found a blog post citing a similar problem. Anybody have any idea what the problem is? Anybody doing this same thing without any problems?

A-List Linking - The RSS Blog

Randy Charles Morin writes about A-list linking. Reading the comments there, it seems as if 'writing interesting stuff' is the key. Although I hasten to add that patience is another one. In my case I write because I enjoy it. Sure it's doubly wonderful if more people read it, but I am satisfied if even one person does. It's the writing that's satisifying to me not so much who's reading. That may change, but my current career doesn't entail a lot of creativity (with respect to writing anyway) so this is an outlet for me. For others of course that may not be true. If you're trying to make money with your blog (or maybe because of it..right Doc?) incoming links are crucial, and the seemingly incestuous A-list linking behaviour might be a right piss-off.

In any case, Randy writes that he'll return the favour if he's linked to, well for someone like me down here at the first step of the ladder, why would I pass it up.

Digital rights? Hey you..blogger..you have none...

Dave Winer's post about the EFF's love-in with bloggers cites this podcast. For some strange reason I missed this one when it first came out. I listened to it on the way in to work this morning and the first thing that came to mind about Cory Doctorow's demeanour was - what a rude immature prick! A discussion involves listening and consideration , not just foisting your views on top of everybody else. Being an influential member of the technology community and a published and celebrated author makes it even more astonishing how inconsiderate he was to Robert Scoble. Just totally unaccepting that someone else might have a point worth considering.

A few points for you to consider Cory (which you likely won't anyway):

1. I know you can't stand the term 'content producer' (you mentioned that fact ad nauseum during the podcast). Whether you call them 'people who write stuff' or 'content producers', I think people are smart enough to know you mean the same thing. 'Content producer' is just easier to say and to write than the other term. Are you trying to say that Joe Public can't understand the term? If so, you are treating the public like a bunch of idiots. They are smarter than you think. Besides, do we now have to devise names like 'people who record audio things' or 'people who video record things'. C'mon, they're all producing or providing content. Get over it.

2. The way I see it, these days more and more, the users ARE the 'people who write stuff'. They are becoming one in the same. Who are you protecting them from? You might be surprised to find that once people find the power in personal publishing (those people being users AND ..ick..content producers), they will in fact care about what they write. So much in fact that they will not want things added to that content nor will they want it changed.

3. Take my content, do something with it by all means. But do it somewhere else, use it to enhance your own, excerpt it, quote it, link to it, but don't change the meaning of what I wrote in my space. If I wanted a link to Amazon I'd have put one there. If I didn't then people can choose by themselves where they want to find the information. If you're pissed that I don't link ISBN numbers to a bookstore then too fucking bad. Go somewhere else.

4. It is ridiculous in this industry NOT to consider what might happen in the future. You are having a conversation about technology that is changing day by day. To squelch criticism by saying 'well they haven't done anything evil so we can't criticize them' is a bunch of hooey. Let them prove everybody wrong by doing the right thing, but don't take away my absolute right to complain or worry.

5. Although you're high up the chain, you'd better be careful, because from way down here you really sounded like a boorish, loudmouthed brat. And I wasn't the only one listening... far from it.

Structured Procrastination

Just came across an article while procrastinating this morning: Structured Procrastination. The 10 year old article is by Stanford Professor John Perry. What wonderful karma. It's about how most procrastinators actually do things to avoid doing other things and how to make that work for you. It's not that I sit here and do nothing instead of what needs to be done. I do other, seemingly more appealing things. Perry's article talks about how to choose those 'other' things that will make me more effective...(like reading an article about how to do it - Okay...I am now officially dizzy..). Anyways, it's a simple idea, but one I might actually be able to put to good use. Blogging about it of course is my way of justifying to myself the 10 minutes of typing spent on it instead of actually getting on with something. I am coming to the conclusion that putting more stuff on my plate is an effective way of avoiding the things that are already on my plate. What a vicious circle.

Sick of Innovation?

Fresh on the heels of the Steve Ballmer interview on Channel 9 and the resulting flurry of opinion, check out Comic:The Innovidiot for an interesting rant on whether all this hubbub about innovation is missing the point when it comes to software development.

Inkjet Print Life

During the July 12, 2005 Geek News Central podcast Todd Cochrane spoke about the concern regarding inkjet print longevity as noted in a recent Engadget post. There is no mention of it in the Engadget article, but whether your printer uses dye-based or pigment-based ink makes a huge difference in print longevity. Two very useful links if you want to know more are at Wilheim research. They have free articles as well as a free complete book on photo longevity. Look here and here for more information.

I'm Tired Of Squinting at the Back of Your Camera

Thank you to Scoble for his link. Being an avid amateur photographer (I am avid about a lot of things and undoubtedly amateur at all of them) it has frustrated me to no end to see family members get the latest whiz-bang digital cameras and start snapping images and do absolutely nothing with them. No, showing me the pics on the back of the camera does NOT count.

I have been politely pushing PhotoStory on these people (all of them happen to be Windows users). Not that I want to see endless slideshows of my dad's photos, but it's one way to do SOMETHING with them. It's rare that anyone I know actually gets any printed (or prints any themselves).Do everyone a favour and download the program (it's free, here are the system requirements). I found it extremely easy to use. It can't burn to DVD but it can create high quality wmv files which can then be burnt to DVD by the software that undoubtedly came with your DVD burner. And if you don't have a DVD burner, then burn it to VCD. It can also create lower resolution video files more appropriate for web or email transfer.

Of course PhotoStory is not the only program that will do this sort of thing, but it's free and does a good job in my opinion. There are lots of other choices. If your a Mac user you've already probably got iPhoto which I am assuming does a fine job as well. (I don't own a Mac but I do appreciate them).

One thing that I'd like to point out is that the right choice of music alongside your pictures can be a very very powerful thing. Don't underestimate it until you've tried it. This past Mother's Day I created a slide show for my wife kind of chronicling my daughter's first three years. I had seen those pictures dozens of times before, but they became very emotionally powerful when set to music.

As an aside, after all this rant, I have to admit that I own a 3year old HP 1.3MP camera but never use it. I use a 35mm SLR film camera and scan the photos myself. When digital SLRs get down in my price range I may get one. The upshot is that I don't have a myriad of photos I don't like, clogging up my hard drive, but rather I scan only the ones I do like. And I've got negatives and prints with arguable greater longevity than most CDs (if that's how you back up your images)..you do back up all those digital photos don't you... ;)