Some Rambling Randomness (Part 2)

New/Future Web Stuff

- I laughed when I read this today, because it's something I've been thinking a lot about lately. This is the new hotness (??) from the 37signals guys (the same ones that brought us Ta-Da) and essentially what it does is take an email and convert it into something more useful (like a Ta-Da list for instance). Cool.

- Ever really not want to give someone your real email? Well, check out PaperNapkin.net. Just give someone yourname@papernapkin.net (or use the lower key @paamail.com) and when the person tries to email you they will be sent a rejection letter. It's not exactly the nicest service in the world, but sometimes desperate times call for desperate measures.

- If you haven't heard about this Craig's List vs. Google Maps mashup, you must have been living under a rock. (In retrospect, that's really not a fair statement at all. You might just not be as big a dork as I am.) Anyhow, this lets you search Craig's List apartment listings using Google Maps interface.

- Let's end this post of randomness with a link to the post that's got everyone buzzing. It's from Janice Fraser at Adaptive Path and ends with this nugget (which I too will bid adieu with . . . so, adieu):

Invention inspires invention. Ideas are collapsing into each other, recombining, and having powerful effects. The Internet has always been a medium for democratization, and by reconnecting with our idealism we’re once again uncovering its poetry, nobility, and transformative power.

If you’re not yet amazed, inspired, and a little anxious, you might want to consider it. Then get a good night’s sleep and perhaps take a rejuvenating vacation. We’re going to look back at Spring 2005 as a milestone. Watch closely, ladies and gentlemen. Things are about to change in a very big way.

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Some Rambling Randomness

Here goes a quick post of randomness before bed. I'm quite tired, so if something doesn't make sense, let me apologize now. Anyhow, here it goes (style inspired by: Fimoculous):

NYC

- If you've ever walked through Washington Square Park in the Spring/Summertime, you've seen Tic and Tac. Now you can read their interview on Gothamist.

Food

- Ever wonder which salt is best? Me neither. But apparently Dan Crane at Slate did.

Brain/Thinking

- Noise Between Stations writes up four tips for strengthening your right brain (that's the creative side). They are: Wonderment, motivation, intellectual courage and relaxation.

- While I'm on the topic of brains and thinking, check out this Eide Nuerolearning Blog post on the Joy of Teaching Kid Geeks. It includes this great definition of geek: "Geeks are the people who deliver technological innovation." (By the way, if you have any interest in brains and thinking, start reading Eide Neurolearning Blog, it's quickly becoming one of my favorites.)

Blogs/RSS

- If you don't use an RSS aggregator, check out this step-by-step tutorial on how to use Bloglines.

- While I'm on the topic of Bloglines, everyone knows about the email subscriptions, right? Just go to "Add Feed," then click "Email Groups" and you'll see a link that says "Create an Email Subscription." Lets you set up temporary email addresses that are great for signing up for random stuff (and by the way, I knew this before I read it on Lifehacker today . . . just so everyone knows).

- RSSmix lets you mix a bunch of different RSS feeds into one. I'm sure this is useful, just can't come up with anything to do with it yet. But I'm sure there's something fun to do with it.

- Just as a note, this section originally appeared at the top, but in an attempt to seem less geeky I have moved it down.

- I'm pretty sure the attempt failed.

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My First Firefox Lifehack

Hello all, just wanted to let you know about this cool little thing I discovered in Firefox last night. If everyone already knows about this then please ignore this post.

Anyway, have you ever tried typing words into the address bar? Well, give it a try. Type your name. Or better yet, type my name. That's right, just type "noah brier" right into the address bar (you don't need the quotes). You know what happens?

You end up right back at my homepage.

It appears that the address bar is programmed to handle non-addresses by doing an "I'm feeling lucky" Google search. So whatever you type in will show you the first Google return on the search term.

It's so cool and easy. Why didn't I know about this?

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Blog Problems. Anyone Have Any Advice?

(By the way, if you're reading this, it only posted because it's short. My long entry is the one that won't work . . . although, in the future, when I do post something else, this post will look silly.)

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The Problem with Social Networking

I've written lots about the problems with social networking. It's generally not localized, online contact tends to precede physical contact, etc. When I ran across Jyri Engeström's entry titled "Why some social network services work and others don't — Or: the case for object-centered sociality," I was intrigued. Jyri adds some great points to the list of what's wrong with "social networking" as we know it today.

His big point (I think), is this:

The fallacy is to think that social networks are just made up of people. They're not; social networks consist of people who are connected by a shared object. That's why many sociologists, especially activity theorists, actor-network theorists and post-ANT people prefer to talk about 'socio-material networks', or just 'activities' or 'practices' (as I do) instead of social networks.

Social networks are made up of people, sure, but how do you know those people. Most often it's because of some activity. Maybe it's school. Maybe it's the gym. Or maybe they grew up in your hometown. But in most cases, social networks don't allow you to differentiate these contacts, as you would in real life. Why not? Why haven't social networking sites realized that this is such an integral part of real-life social networks?

Jyri talks about the success of Flickr as a social networking site and echoes something I wrote in a post a little while ago. In "Annotating Flickr with a Side of Social Networking," I wrote:

Social networking works best when it's not the primary objective of a website. In other words, sites like Flickr and blogs generally tend to be a more accurate picture of your social network than something like Friendster (and this may need to be a whole other post).

Approaching sociality as object-centered is to suggest that when it becomes easy to create digital instances of the object, the online services for networking on, through, and around that object will emerge too. Social network theory fails to recognise such real-world dynamics because its notion of sociality is limited to just people.

Exactly, social networking is not all about people and until these sites realize and embrace that, people will continue to fade away from them. Real social networking is most often about what people have in common. That's why you become friends with people in the first place, right?

This, again, is why I think Thefacebook makes so much sense. It is a social networking site that first revolves around a shared experience of going to college in the same place. By understanding that all these people share this important physical proximity, the site is able to satisfy their needs far better than something like Friendster.

Cool stuff. Thanks Jyri. And thanks to O'Reilly Radar for the heads up.

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My First Quicksilver Question (and Another Software Update)

So, my question is: Is there any way to set up Quicksilver to open multiple bookmarks at once with one command? I'm not positive this is really a Quicksilver question or a Firefox question, but essentially what I'm trying to do is open up three webpages into three different tabs at once using one simplified command (like typing in blog would open up my blog posting interface, my referrer states and my feed stats). Since I have Tabbrowser installed in Firefox, I imagine all I need is for Quicksilver to try to open three different webpages at once.

So, for all the Quicksilver/Firefox junkies out there, is this possible?

Also, have three more pieces of software to report:

1. iScrobbler: This is a must-have for me because of my Audioscrobbler extension. This is just the plugin that keeps track of what I listen to and reports it to my Audioscrobbler page.

2. BitTorrent: Again, not all that exciting, but another must-have program for downloading goodies online.

3. Cyberduck: This seems to be the best rated freeware FTP program around. It took a minute to get everything working because a few settings weren't quite right, but after messing around a bit it seems like a clean and easy interface with a nice bookmarks sidebar (not to mention a Quicksilver plugin that I just discovered). If anyone has another FTP program they'd recommend I'd be happy to listen, but this looks pretty good (and they got a pretty damn good rating in MacWorld to boot).

So that ends today's round of updates. Please send any help or recommendations my way. Either via comment (preferred) or email at nb [at] noahbrier.com. Thanks!

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First Thoughts on My New PowerBook

Last night I finally got my new PowerBook and I've started the initial messing around process. I've been reading up for the last few months, so I had a good idea of what programs I wanted to install immediately. But before that, here are my initial, non-software thoughts:

1. Apple knows how to package stuff. I felt like I was opening a present as I dug through to the levels of the box to finally reveal my new, shining silver PowerBook.

2. The keyboard feels great. I use an iBook at work and I haven't used this generation of PowerBook for any serious length of time. The keys are tight and responsive. I know it sounds geeky, but it makes you feel like you're really in control.

Alright, enough touchy-feely stuff, how about some software?

1. Obviously the first thing I installed was Firefox along with a whole suite of extensions. Nothing revolutionary here, all stuff I've covered before. However, I must explain that I chose Firefox over Safari on purpose. For one, you can't beat the extensions. But actually what first made me leave Safari was that when you close your browser with multiple tabs open, it doesn't ask you if you're sure like Firefox does. I can't tell you how many times I closed things I was reading on my work computer before I started using Firefox.

Next, it was time to consult the list of software and assorted lists I had been keeping on del.icio.us for the last few weeks (check it out, there's some good tips). My first stop was this list of "Must have Mac OS X applications".

2. First download off the list was VLC Player, which I use at work. Not exactly sure why I downloaded this first, I don't actually have any video on here, but it was something on the list that I knew I wanted and felt comfortable with (really I was just burning time before the "big install").

3. My third install was TextWrangler a freeware text editor. I have a tendency to keep everything in a text document and a good text editor makes life a lot easier (plus I need it for HTML editing). OS X's TextEdit is all well and good, but I wanted something a little more powerful and I've heard TextWrangler is the best freeware text editor out there.

4. Finally, I was at the point where I was prepared to install the one thing I couldn't wait to try. That's right, it was time for Quicksilver. To be completely honest, I still have basically no clue what this thing can do, but I did follow Dan Dickinson's tutorial on how to set up Quicksilver, which I highly recommend (even though I'm not so sure what I've done yet). It seems like a very cool program, essentially you bring up a command prompt which allows you to type in what you're looking for, whether it's document or program and launch it or perform any number of other functions. You can even associate different operations together, so you could open your IM client when you open Firefox, etc. Everyone seems to love this thing (especially Merlin Mann of 43 Folder), so I imagine I'll fall right into line in no time. I promise to keep everyone informed of my new discoveries with this one as they happen (whether you want to hear them or not).

5. Finally, I installed Adium, a multi-client instant messenger program. It allows you to talk to people on AIM and MSN, which are the only two messenger programs I use. I tried iChat, but didn't really like it and this has gotten some rave reviews. Mine is pending.

I think that about wraps it up. It's been less than 12 hours (and I did sleep for a fair amount of them). I'm just happy it's here and I'm not stuck wanting to throw my old Compaq laptop against a wall anymore. Word up.

UPDATE (4/24/05): Thanks to Merlin Mann, here's another great explanation/tutorial of Quicksilver. Starting to get a much better idea of just what might be possible with this thing.

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Picking on Picky Eaters

I have always thought that people who keep a long list of certifiably delicious foods that they avoid are at least as troubled as people who avoid sex, except that the latter will probably seek psychiatric help, while food phobics rationalize their problem in the name of genetic inheritance, allergy, vegetarianism, matters of taste, nutrition, food safety, obesity, or a sensitive nature. (True food allergies can be extremely dangerous, but no more than 1 percent or 2 percent of adults suffer from them.) The examples of neurotic food avoidance could take several volumes to fill, but milk is a good one.

I guess I just never understood why people were so picky. Most food isn't going to hurt them. They might not like the taste, but is that really the end of the world? Drink a little water afterwards and the taste goes away. Why not give it a shot? You'll never know if you like it if you don't try. Then, even if you hate it the first time, why not try it again? Sure, don't go out and order and waste your money on something you won't enjoy, but try it when you have the chance. See if you like it more. Maybe it was badly cooked the first time or it was spoiled. Too often we reject things based on their first impression without giving them a fair shot. So just try it again, see what happens.

Sorry to the picky eaters out there, I don't mean to pick on you, but I just can't relate. Probably because I've tasted the world your missing and it's mmmm . . . mmmm . . . good.

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Is Tagging Really Useful?

Are tags useful? Are there any questions you want to ask, or jobs you want to do, where tags are part of the solution, and clearly work better than old-fashioned search? I really want to believe that tagging is big, a game-changer, but the longer I go on asking this question and not getting an answer, the more nervous I get.

This I'm not so sure about. First off, as Scott Rafer points out, this can lead to spam. But even more than that, is tagging the best way for me to find the information from blog posts? Isn't using a PubSub or Feedster feed with specific keywords even more efficient? Yes, you'll run into some information you're not necessarily looking for, but for retrieving other people's content search seems like a much easier way. Why is this? Why don't I think tags extend as well to blogging?

I'm not completely sure, but let me take a shot. First, I don't tag my posts because I never remember to. It's not built into the interface with the same simplicity as del.icio.us. Second, I would expect that people are much more specific when they're tagging others work versus their own. It's easier to boil someone else's writing down to a few select tags than it is your own. It's only human to want to think that you've covered lots of areas and thus deserve lots of tags. As Scott reminded me, essentially tags are a way to annotate content to make it easy to find later. Using that definition, why would you annotate your own content? What's more, since you wrote it, aren't you likely to remember specific language you may have used? I often find myself searching my site for something I've written and it's almost always quite easy to find. I am pretty good at wording searches in my own words when I'm searching for my own words.

I guess what I'm saying is that I think people (or at least me) use tags first to help themselves. When you're tagging your own content, it's less useful to you and more useful to the group. It's nice to believe people would think of the group first, but they don't. Also, I'm not sure tagging with the group in mind makes for the best organization anyway. As I mentioned in my last post, the more specific I am with my tagging, the more likely it's useful to someone looking for information under that tag or combination of tags.

So, in conclusion, my answer is that tagging is really useful with some caveats.

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Aha Moment: Firefox is Becoming My OS

All of a sudden I realized that my browser was looking more and more like an operating system. The more extensions I installed, the less I ever had to go anywhere else. I could have lots of programs running in the background, all controlled with Firefox. It's a pretty amazing idea.

Then, this morning, as I was sitting on the toilet (where I do some of my best thinking), I realized that I've installed more extensions onto my computer than software. Thinking about the software I use at work, it's not a long list: mail, Word, PowerPoint (occasionally), Excel (occasionally), iCal, AIM, MSN Messenger, TextEdit and of course Firefox. That's nine programs. You know how many extensions I have installed at the moment? 13. Kind of interesting. Imagine five years ago telling someone you have installed more programs on your browser than you have on your OS.

Wow.

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Innovation Omissions

While companies such as Google and Microsoft are also experimenting with the idea of letting outsiders tap into their databases and use their content in unpredictable ways (see “What’s Next for Google?�), none is proceeding more aggressively than Amazon. The company has, in essence, outsourced much of its R&D, and a growing portion of its actual sales, to an army of thousands of software developers, who apparently enjoy nothing more than finding creative new ways to give Web surfers access to Amazon merchandise—and earning a few bucks in the process. The result: a syndicate of mini-Amazons operating at very little cost to Amazon itself and capturing customers who might otherwise have gone elsewhere. It’s as if Starbucks were to recruit 50,000 of its most loyal caffeine addicts to strap urns of coffee to their backs each morning and, for a small commission, spend the day dispensing the elixir to their officemates.

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Tagging: Individual or Social?

This is the question that Arienna of Blogaholics and I have been going back and forth on in the comments of my "Annotating Flickr with a Side of Social Networking" post. For me, tagging is an individual activity. When I tag something in del.icio.us, most of the time it's with little or no thought to who else is going to see that tag. I tag things so that when I go back and want to find them I can as easily as possible. Arienna, on the other hand, sees things a little differently. In the comments she explains:

I think that tagging is social, not individualistic.

Although you can tag for your own personal reference - like having a well organized database of stuff you are interested in, be it yours or others. However, I think that we tag because we want to share. The more tags we associate with a post, a picture, or a bookmark in del.icio.us, the more people are likely to find and benefit from our effort. The same is said when others tag a photo on Flickr - they are talking to you about what they think of your picture and are expressing their opinion to others who may search that term.

With del.icio.us, I started with a very limited number of tags because I was worried things would get too confusing. I didn't want to muddle up my system (or the system), so I tried to pack lots of things into little containers. Slowly, though, as I realized that this was all about me finding information I'm interested in faster and more easily, I began to expand my tags. At this point I have a whole lot of tags (I don't feel like counting, but I would guess it's in the hundreds). Then from tagging things openly, I started doing more social things, like the "needsafeed" tag, which allows people across the internet to contribute to a list of websites that need an RSS feed. It's kind of interesting to see how my use evolved, because I started with the group in mind when I kept my tags as clean and simple as possible and then moved to tagging things differently when they were for me individually and socially. But the best thing about tagging is that it's easy to do both.

I think this is what makes it so powerful. To me it has the ability to be both an individual and a social activity. I can't imagine ever going back to worrying about the group when I'm tagging things personally, but on the other hand, I also love using tags as a way to connect with other people (check out my WhatsInYourFirefox post).

Also, it's important to remember that the more individually you use tags the more effective they are for the group. If I use five very specific tags to describe something then someone who may have subscribed to that intersection of five tags is sure to find it interesting.

Essentially, the big point is that the power of tags lies in their flexibility. To quote an old favorite, "the medium is the message" (that's McLuhan by the way). Tags can do or be anything a user wants them to. It's the ultimate innovation tool because it's infinitely expandable.

I read a great article in the Times yesterday titled "Innovation Moves From the Laboratory to the Bike Trail and the Kitchen". It was all about how the most innovation comes from "lead users" (aka early adopters). The gist of it is that when you give someone a product, they will find their ways to use it. Often, they'll come up with entirely new products that you may not have imagine, but that other users will desire. It even includes some numbers from 3M:

In a study at 3M, he and several colleagues found that product ideas from lead users generated eight times the sales of ideas generated internally - $146 million versus $18 million a year - in part because lead users were more likely to come up with ideas for entire new product lines rather than minor improvements.

It just goes to show you that the more access to customize you give a user, the more it can benefit your company. Tagging is infinitely customizable (literally), so imagine what people can come up with. The sky's the limit.

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WhatsInYourFirefox

WhatsInYourFirefox
Originally uploaded by nbrier.

1. Tabbrowser Preferences

2. Word Count

3. SessionSaver

4. Filangy Toolbar (email me for an invite -- nb [at] noahbrier.com)

5. SpellBound

6. Down Them All

7. Forecast Fox

8. BugMeNot

9. Google PageRank Status

10. del.icio.us (I even just noticed it works again with Firefox 1.0.3)

11. Greasemonkey

12. Web Developer Toolbar

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Dealing with Information Overload

I, on the other hand, have taken the opposite approach. I have over 300 feeds now coming into my RSS reader and I don't find it overwhelming at all. I would actually guess that myy feed number grows about 15 a month. So how do I handle it?

Well, for me it's all about accepting the fact that I can't read everything. It's impossible. There's just too much information out there for me to possibly wade through it all. So what I've done is create a list of trusted media outlets (NYTimes, WaPo, Guardian, etc.) and a lot of blogs, del.icio.us feeds, etc. that aggregate other information for me. I am trusting these secondary sources (blogs, etc.) to provide me with what I've missed from my mainstream sources (as well as what the mainstream media has missed, additional commentary and other goodies). I truly believe that if something is that important to read, it's going to get to me somehow. Essentially I've embraced the overload. I say BRING IT ON! Why not?

When things get bad and I do feel overwhelmed you know what I do? I don't read it. I'll have 15 tabs open in Firefox with stuff I've been meaning to read for two weeks (all saved by Session Saver) and I'll just get rid of them all. If I missed something I deal with it. I can't get caught up in the past, there's too much out there. I often find that I'll even end up coming back to one of these articles later via a link from someone else.

In a Lifehacker interview, Danny O'Brien, the so-called "father of lifehacks" explained it this way:

One way of dealing with all this “stuff� is to realise its unimportance. For every person I found talking about how to deal with their million-item todo list, there was someone else who said “I just delete everything every few months�, or “Top tip: get off the internet and go down the pub�.

So just remember, it's not you AGAINST the information, it's out there for you to use. Embrace it.

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Do You Live in Massachusetts?

Well, how about a Movie? Peter Caputa's company Whizspark built the website for the MassBay Film Festival and he asked some bloggers he knows if they'd mind posting the schedule (I happened to be one of them). If I lived in Mass, there are definitely a few things I'd go see (especially Kung Fu Hustle, which I'm dying to see . . . just as a sidenote, if you haven't seen Shaolin Soccer yet, what are you waiting for?). So for those of you who live in Central Mass (or are just curious), check out the website and go see some movies.

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Need Something Fun to Read?

1. The Education of Elisabeth Eckleman: Freshman Year

Elisabeth Eckleman just left home, and has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Sarah Hepola follows Elisabeth’s life and lets you make the tough choices for both of them. In this installment, Elisabeth loses her high-school boyfriend and drives to college with her parents. You decide what happens next.

Elisabeth Eckleman just left home, and has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Sarah Hepola follows Elisabeth’s life and lets you make the tough choices for both of them. In this installment, Elisabeth goes to a party with her roommate and meets a new somebody. You decide what happens next.

Elisabeth Eckleman just left home, and has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Sarah Hepola follows Elisabeth’s life and lets you make the tough choices for both of them. In this installment, Elisabeth makes a new friend and isn’t sure if she should bring her boyfriend material to a party. You decide what happens next.

Elisabeth Eckleman just left home, and has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Sarah Hepola follows Elisabeth’s life and lets you make the tough choices for both of them. In this installment, Elisabeth goes to a sorority party and isn’t sure what to do once the theme takes over. You decide what happens next.

Elisabeth Eckleman just left home, and has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Sarah Hepola follows Elisabeth’s life and lets you make the tough choices for both of them. In this installment, Elisabeth decides that when her date becomes a ho, she will too. You decide what happens next.

Elisabeth Eckleman just left home, and has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Sarah Hepola follows Elisabeth’s life and lets you make the tough choices for both of them. In this installment, Elisabeth makes time for friends, but not for studying, and gets the grades to prove it. You decide what happens next.

Elisabeth Eckleman just left home, and has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Sarah Hepola follows Elisabeth’s life and lets you make the tough choices for both of them. In this installment, Elisabeth goes to the Bright Eyes concert with her R.A. and continues to avoid her T.A. You decide what happens next.

Elisabeth Eckleman just left home, and has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Sarah Hepola follows Elisabeth’s life and lets you make the tough choices for both of them. In this installment, Elisabeth tells Kat about what’s been going on with Geoff. You decide what happens next.

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A Step-by-Step Guide to Using Del.icio.us

Del.icio.us is a social bookmarking site. Essentially that means that you can save your bookmarks online for everyone to see, instead of hiding them on your computer. Along with just the title of the site you're bookmarking, you can also add a few sentences describing the bookmark and tag the bookmark. There are a few major advantages to keeping your bookmarks on del.icio.us instead of locked away on your computer.

1. Access: Thanks to del.icio.us I can now access my bookmarks from anywhere at anytime. Doesn't matter if I'm using my computer or something else, finding my bookmarks are never further away then typing in http://del.icio.us/nrb210.

2. Searchable: Bookmarks kept in a browser are generally not searchable, which makes it difficult to go back and find what you bookmarked.

3. Extended Description: Adding an extra sentence of context to a bookmark does wonders for remembering why it was interesting in the first place.

4. Tagging: I've talked about the wonders of tagging on any number of occasions but here's a one (somewhat long) sentence definition: it's a way to organize information in a more personally meaningful way by labeling things with tags that make sense to you.

Alright, so now I've gone through four major benefits, now let me step you through how to get started with del.icio.us:

Step 1: Go to the registration page. (If you're using Firefox, may I suggest you open the page in a new tab?)

Step 2: Fill out all the information (including the email). Don't worry you won't get any spam and your email address won't show up anywhere publicly.

Step 3: Go check your email, you should have a verification email from del.icio.us. Open the email and click the verification link. You'll be brought to a page that says, "email address verified!"

Step 4: Go back to the del.icio.us homepage and click the login link. Go ahead and enter your login name and password.

Step 5: Congratulations, you're now signed into del.icio.us, you're only a few steps away from posting your bookmarks. Right now you should be at the about page. Go ahead and read it if you'd like, but at the very least go to the bookmarklet section and drag the link that says "experimental post to del.icio.us" up to your bookmarks toolbar (that's the bar where you put all the links you click on often).

Step 6: Find something worth bookmarking (this entry perhaps?) and click the "experimental post to del.icio.us" bookmark on your toolbar.

Step 7: You should now be at the post page. If everything worked correctly the URL and DESCRIPTION field should already be filled in. Now go ahead and add the EXTENDED field with whatever comments/summary/quotes/anything you want and tag the page with whatever you feel appropriate. Since you're using the "experimental post" you'll notice the "recommended tags" section. Those are tags that other people have used that you have also used in the past. However, since this is most likely your first post and you haven't used tags in the past you'll be better off looking at the popular tags, which show you what tags other people have use. Go ahead and add some tags and this hit save.

Voila! You're now a member of the del.icio.us community. You're bookmarks are at the address http://del.icio.us/theusernameyouchose

If you've got any questions about this or something isn't clear, either leave a comment or email me at nb [at] noahbrier.com, I'd be happy to help you out.

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Mobile Phones: The Ultimate Platform?

In the last five years, says Lindholm [a higher-up at Nokia], "Nokia has become the world's largest camera manufacturer." Bet no one at Kodak or Canon saw that coming five years ago.

One of the things I thought about for my presentation (which has been postponed for anyone interested), is just how amazing it is that there are young people around today who have never really lived in a world without mobile devices. While most of us can remember back to what life was like when all we had to remember when we left home was our keys and wallet, young people will never know that world. I'm not making a statement about whether this is a good or a bad thing, just that it's something that's hard for me to comprehend.

Today mobile phones have become the ultimate platform. It's affordable enough that most people have one and replace it every few years and it's small enough that you truly never leave home without it. What's more, all your billing information is already intertwined with it, making it a great way for companies to encourage you to buy things without thinking about (kind of like credit cards). A recent BusinessWeek article titled "iPod Killers" put it like this:

The ringtone boom has made the record labels enthusiastic supporters of the wireless companies. "Carriers are a new kind of retailer with massive reach," says Eric Nicoli, chairman of EMI Group PLC, one of the four major music companies. "Plus, they have a competitive advantage over online services because their consumers can truly make impulse purchases on their phones."

1. It's wireless. It took a well-established technology in the telephone and let you take it anywhere. It maintained the advantages of the telephone while at the same time adding extra desirability and function by making it mobile.

2. It's expandable. One of the most important advances of the second half of the 20th century was expandability. Software allows you to build your own custom configuration on top of the default settings. What makes computers so powerful is the software that runs on them. Just look at today's software to understand the power of expandability. After I got over tabs, my favorite feature of Firefox is the ability to add extensions. Essentially you're using software on top of software to customize the look and feel of your browsing experience. Greasemonkey takes this a step further, by allowing you to customize your extension and, in turn, alter your experience past just your browser and right down to the webpage level. (Just as a note: I am aware I need to write about Greasemonkey . . . it's coming.)

3. It's everywhere. It's quite easy to understand that the more widespread a technology becomes the more significant it is in the lives of its users. When Alex Graham Bell (I call him Alex . . . we were tight) was the only guy with a phone it wasn't all that useful. He could pick it up and pretend to talk to someone, I guess, but really it's usefulness lies in its mass adoption. When everyone else has a cellphone it's hard to live without one because they all expect you to be reachable.

When you throw in some of those other factors (tied directly to your finances, small enough to fit in your pocket, etc.), it's not hard to understand why mobile phones are so important as a platform of the future. However, I write that with a caveat: the mobile phone we'll see ten years from now will be nothing like the one we see today. The building blocks of mobile is in place, but the future of the phone is in convergence. Not just of cameras and music, but of computers and later your whole digital life. As more and more of life moves digital, we'll need a place to keep it all and a device to access it with.

This is what Nokia wants to do with it's Lifeblog, whether it'll be successful is a question to be answered at another time, but it's certainly fun to think about.

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I Made The Switch

Friday was a big day in my computer life. The 15th of April, Two-Thousand-and-Five shall mark the day I made the switch. I purchased my first Apple. It's a 12" PowerBook, fully loaded that should be arriving on Monday and I couldn't be more excited. I've mentioned before that I've been considering making the switch, but the release (at the end of the month) of Tiger officially put me over the edge. With integrated desktop search and lots of other goodies, it's now or never for me (and, just as a note, although Tiger won't come loaded on Monday, I'll get it for just the cost of shipping when it comes out on the 29th).

So why did I do it, you may be asking yourself. (Or, quite possibly, you're just asking what took me so long?) Well, it all started last June when I started working at American Demographics magazine. Against my wishes I was given a Mac upon arrival. I had never really used one before and wasn't interested in learning how. The fact that OS 9 was installed on the machine didn't help either, it meant that I couldn't get the newest browser and in turn lots of pages didn't even work. However, about two months into my time at AD I finally convinced the powers that be to hook me up with a G5 with OSX. When it finally arrived in my office, all silver and sweet, I finally got it. Everything was so simple. I got so used to Expose that when I got home I'd try to get to the desktop on my PC by moving my cursor to the "hot corner" (which, of course, didn't ever work).

Around the same time I was starting to really enjoy my Mac, my laptop was starting to screw up for the umpteenth since I bought it two years ago. I have a Presario 1500 and it hasn't really ever worked quite right. I sent it back to Compaq about 10 times trying to get random things fixed that never seemed to come back working correctly. My hard drive would continually overheat and shut the computer down and other annoyances. (Including the fact that every time something went wrong and I called up Compaq it was an awful experience.) What really pushed me over the edge, though, was having to format the hard drive every three months or so. If I didn't do this, the computer would slow down to a crawl. This just isn't sane, I told myself.

All of these events also were happening as I was moving deeper and deeper into geekdom. It seemed that every blog or webpage I read was always talking about the wonders of Apple, which got the wheels turning. Why not? I asked myself.

Tiger sealed the deal. I decided as soon as it came out I would buy a PowerBook. I chose the 12" because I want a truly portable computer. This Compaq is an eight pound behemoth. I hate carrying it around when I have to and I wouldn't ever just carry it by choice. So yesterday, for whatever reason, became the day.

And I'm proud to say I made the switch. At work and at home I'll be using an Apple laptop (iBook at work). I'll be keeping the behemoth around for a couple things (especially Soulseek), but otherwise it'll be all PowerBook all the time for me.

I couldn't be happier. Hopefully I'll feel the same way six months from now.

For any Mac users, what advice do you have? Programs I need? I've been keeping this this list of links over at del.icio.us, but any recommendations would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

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Quotes, Quotes and More Quotes

Albert Einstein

"Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom."

"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."

"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing."

"Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new."

Da Vinci

"Iron rusts from disuse; water loses its purity from stagnation... even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind."

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication."

Pablo Picasso

"I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it."

I also included some of my own quotes (which I made up on the spot) but I thought were kind of fun. (Just as a note, I am in no way implying that I deserve to be on the same page or even near the same page as any of the people I quoted, I just thought these would be fun to include.)

Noah (If I get quoted I want to be like Madonna, only first name. Only problem might be confusion between myself and the ark guy, but I'll cross that bridge when I get there.)

"Sometimes erasing everything is the most productive thing you can do."

"Write it all down. That way it's there if you need it."

"Wearing pants to work is almost always a good idea."

"When you run into a problem try discussing it, another point of view is often all you need."

"If you start something new today, 20 years from now you can say you've been doing it for 20 years."

"Unplug and smell the flowers."

"No matter what anyone in advertising says, creative is an adjective, not a noun."

(Just as another note, most of these quotes are from the wisdom of others which I have compiled and added to my own. I would credit them if I knew where they came from.)

UPDATE (4/14/05): Lisa was nice enough to point out that the idea behind the quote about starting something new today probably came from this Creating Passionate Users post. Thanks Lisa.

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Newly Discovered: Firefox Extensions

This week's Newly Discovered is going to highlight a slew of Firefox extensions that I've recently found. If you're not a Firefox user yet, go download it. If you already use Firefox and don't know what an extension is, it's just a little program that you can install to add functionality to Firefox. (Check out the official Firefox extensions page.) Since my Firefox 101 post went over so well, this seemed like a natural thing to write about this week. The only problem is where to start.

1. WebmailCompose

This one's got one simple, but incredibly useful function. What it does is take those "mailto:" links and automatically redirect them to your webmail. That means no more opening outlook express when you click someone's email. It works with virtually every webmail out there (including the big 3: Gmail, Yahoo! and Hotmail). I've been waiting for this option for a while, glad I finally found it.

2. Bugmenot

For anyone who's never used Bugmenot, what it does is provide you with a username and password for all those news sites that require registration. This extension just makes the process that much simpler by allowing you to simply right click (or CTRL+Click for Mac users) and it automatically fills in the fields you need.

3. Google Pagerank Status

This extension adds a little notification in the corner of the screen that lets you know the Google Pagerank of the site you're on. For those that aren't up on Googlespeak, essentially the higher the Pagerank, the higher the site appears in searches. There's no real use for this, but it's sometimes interesting to look at.

4. delicious

This extension, as you might have guessed, integrates everybody's favorite social bookmarks depository, del.icio.us, right into Firefox. It adds right click post options and creates a popup that works quite nicely (and even works with the new experimental posting options). What may be the coolest part of this extension, though, is that it can handle multiple usernames, which is something I've been considering doing for a while.

Oh, and if haven't tried it yet . . .

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10 Links of Apology

1. (This one's not a link.) My mom's in China at the moment and I got an email from her with this choice quote that I thought I'd share: "I saw a huge billboard in Suzhou that said, "Development is an immutable truth" -- amazing!!!!"

2. Ran across some comments from John Paul II on the internet that are worth a read. (Just for the record, I am not religious and definitely not Catholic. I in no way endorse all the JC stuff, just thought he had some interesting stuff to say.)

3. Timothy K. Armstrong has an incredibly in-depth write-up from the MGM v. Grokster arguments.

4. Grant McCracken wrote a good entry about "How to Spot a Trend".

5. I missed it, but apparently Tiger Woods had a made-for-commercial moment at the Masters.

6. Got what it takes to create the next big viral thing on the net? Put your money where your mouth is with Eyebeam's Contagious Media Showdown.

7. Here's a coupon for a free 6" sub when you buy a 6". Let me know if it works.

8. Check out this New Scientist article about "Life's Top 10 Greatest Innovations", including the eye, the brain and sex.

9. The Guardian with quotes from scientists about what everyone should know about science.

10. Ever wonder what's on Bush's iPod. "No black artists, no gay artists, no world music, only one woman, no genre less than 25 years old, and no Beatles."

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Annotating on Flickr with a Side of Social Networking

Alongside "memorymaps" on my recent Flickr coolness scale is "whatsinyourbag. This is just a tag that lets people know you've emptied your bag out for the world to see. On most photos, the contents of the bag are labeled. Just like "memorymaps," "whatsinyourbag" is a fun look into other people's lives.

Moving beyond the fact that these are just cool things to do, there are two things that really stand out for me in using Flickr in this way. First, using annotation to provide context to an image is a brilliant way to create community around photos. Blogs are a place to annotate your life or the news, and the ability to extend this annotation idea to photos was a brilliant move on Flickr's part. It takes social software a step beyond just comments, which allow people to interact in more general ways. I think annotation is an important trend that we'll be seeing more and more of in lots of different spaces. Just look at YellowArrow and Grafedia, which allow you annotate physical space. It's a cool way to add extra context to almost anything. (In fact, that's probably pretty close to the definition of annotation . . . oops.)

The second thing that jumps out at me are how these Flickr users are using tags. "Whatsinyourbag" is not a tag that is used for yourself, otherwise it would be "whatsinmybag" (which is also a common tag on these photos), however, the point is that they're using tagging to create communities. Tagging is a great way to create a community without having to develop any additional backend. While you can create groups on Flickr, and in fact, there is a "whats in your bag" group, it only includes five photos, versus the 531 under the "whatsinyourbag" tag (ooh, that rhymes).

So, what's my point? Well, first and foremost it's to say these things are cool and you should look at them. But it's also that people will find entirely new ways to use cool features if you allow them to play around. It's amazing. I'm sure the Flickr people never imagine that people would take a satellite photo and annotate in such a way.

The lesson: users are really smart!

Lesson two (and this is a big one I think . . . not that lesson one wasn't): Social networking works best when it's not the primary objective of a website. In other words, sites like Flickr and blogs generally tend to be a more accurate picture of your social network than something like Friendster (and this may need to be a whole other post).

Arienna Foley touched on this in an entry on Get Real. While I was thinking about the whole thing this morning my mind somehow wandered to Gmail and I realized that the list of top 20 contacts that Gmail displays when you go to contacts is probably the most accurate representation of my social network that exists. I think the reason for that is because the primary use of Gmail is person-to-person contact through email and social networking becomes a secondary result. One of the big problems I've always had with Friendster and the rest is that people end up "collecting friends." That's not how real life works. With Flickr, you end up making friends through real shared interests, not random things you write down in a profile. It's never explicitly about networking, which is what makes any real networking event great.

Take college for example, is there any better place to network? You're all there for the same reason, to get an education. But the outgrowth of putting lots of people who are the same age and most likely have similar interests in one place is that lots of friendships will develop. You don't go to college to make friends (not officially at least), but that's what ends up happening.

I think it's kind of an interesting point (probably not all that original) and one that's worth exploring a little further. For all those who made it all the way to the bottom, I apologize for the tangent, that's just how my brain works. Most of the time I start writing about something without having fully explored it and end up somewhere completely different by the end. But before I go off in a completely different direction I better cut this off.

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Teaching New Bloggers How to Attribute

Peter Caputa had this problem a few weeks ago when someone copied something he had written and then was linked to by other people. (Full disclosure: I copied the title of Pete's post.) Here's what Pete wrote in that post (note the proper attribution):

But, this new blogger that doesn't know how to quote or attribute other people's original writing. I'll assume that Dominant Princess is new to blogging and is ignorant of acceptable quoting practices. Consider this a hand slap.

On the other hand, however.... Anyone that has attended grade school should know that what she has done is plagiarism. So, I highly recommend to dominant princess that she learns how to quote people and always attributes people's original writing with a link to the original post.

There are a couple important points for a site that just reposts other people's work.

1. Make it very clear what you are. Calling yourself a "link blog" is a good example.

2. Include links at the top that make it very clear that this is not your own work.

3. Don't include any of your own words unless you're going to make a clear distinction of where your words end and the work your copying begins.

Hope this clears things up a bit and makes known my feelings on proper attribution techniques.

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The Paradox of Wireless

I'm as bad as anyone. I never leave anywhere without my headphones on. Imagine the action I miss as I walk through New York City with my own soundtrack playing. And I'm certainly not the only one.

What's even more sad, though, is what could be lost in the future. Bird chirps may hold no meaning for the next generation. And how many more people will miss seeing a friend because their lost in the own world? In a Guardian article titled "A generation lost in it's personal space," John Naughton writes:

This will change with the maturing of generations who have grown up with headphones welded to their ears. And as a result, our concept of social space will change. Imagine the future: a crowded urban street, filled not with people interacting with one another, but with atomised individuals cocooned in their personalised sound-bubbles, moving from one retail opportunity to another. The only sounds are the shuffling of feet and the rock muzak blaring from the doorways of specialised leisurewear chains.

Then again, as we're closing ourselves out of certain parts of the world, we're also opening ourselves up to whole other aspects. Although this is certainly a whole other entry, I've been thinking a lot lately about whether you can measure (in degrees of separation) the real impact on social interaction. I have a feeling that the internet moves six degrees down to four. (But that discussion is for another time.)

That could mean while we're losing some interaction we're making up for it in other places. Maybe our social world is not wilting but evolving.

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Newly Discovered: Tricks of the Trade

Today's newly discovered is a great blog called Tricks of the Trade. As you might expect, the site covers the various tricks of different trades (wow, that was fairly redundant). It's like a clearinghouse for all those little secrets that can only discover if you're doing the same thing day-in and day-out. I actually originally ran into the site's author through his Morning News titled, appropriately enough, "Tricks of the Trade."

That original article contained a few gems like these and I remember enjoying it quite a bit:

Actor

Every actor eventually is called upon to act drunk. Most do this by slurring their speech, stumbling around, and perhaps drooling a bit. This is what a freshman drama teacher calls “indicating.� A better way to appear drunk is to act very, very sober. Walk very carefully, and try not to let anyone see that you’re inebriated. This is much more subtle and will register on a level the audience won’t immediately recognize.

Proofreader

If you’re reading too fast, your brain can “correct� typos, preventing you from catching them. That’s why it’s sometimes a good idea to read a page upside-down. It forces you to pay closer attention to individual words out of context, and you can’t race through pages too fast.

Bartender

To chill a bottle of white wine quickly, put the bottle in a bucket with ice, water and a large handful of salt. The salt reduces the freezing point of water and will allow it to become superchilled, which will in turn chill the bottle of wine in six minutes flat.

Negotiator

Most folks who bargain forget the cardinal rule: after stating your initial offer stop talking! Breathe normally, but wait for the other party to speak next. And after they make a counteroffer, continue to hold your peace for a bit -- faced with silence, many will immediately start to sweeten the pot.

The site also got me thinking about whether I have any "tricks of the trade" to share. I'm not sure I have any good ones for copywriting yet (after all, I've only been doing it for three months), however, one general rule I have found useful in business in general is: Clear the little stuff off your plate quickly. Not only does it give you a sense of accomplishment, but it also clears your time for the bigger projects that will be more consuming.

As for writing, the biggest lesson I learned while working at American Demographics Magazine was to not take criticism of your writing personally. Hold onto your thoughts, but don't get caught up worrying about your words. Let people edit away and don't ever be afraid to erase something and just start over. (For lots of great writing tips read this fantastic (and very short) essay by Paul Graham.)

So there it is. What are your tricks of the trade?

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A Note on Vanity Plates

I'm not really sure why I feel the need to share this in an e-mail but I'm going to so just bear with me (or ignore it, I will probably never know the difference).

I HATE vanity plates. I always have. They bother me in a way that I cannot adequately describe in words (though I am going to try). Do people think it makes them special to have dopey, usually misspelled/truncated words that only sometimes make sense to the general population? Are they too good for the randomly arranged combination of letters and numbers that the rest of us make due with?

Today I was particularly perturbed (even irked) by two that I saw on my way to work. The first one said 'punk'. Now, I give this person credit for having a correctly spelled word. However, this license plate appeared on a brand new Saab. That I saw in the parking lot of a Starbucks. In Darien. I can only hope that this person was taking a stab at being ironic. (Although a license plate is certainly not the place for irony. But I digress...) Either way I feel that 'tool' or 'douchebag' would probably have been more appropriate.

The other license plate didn't offend me as much, I just thought it was dum. (See how I left the 'b' off of the end of the word. Because I know how to spell it, but it's so dumb that it's dum. Get it? Look at how clever I am. Ok back to my point.) This one said 'burger'. Once again, spelled correctly (bonus points there). I just couldn't figure out why someone would want that as a license plate. Does he/she like to eat burgers? Does he/she want to be a burger? Does he/she work at McDonald's? Was this person called a cow in high school? Does this 'burger' have some deep, inner meaning that mere mortals (such as myself) are unaware of? Is it some sort of riddle? (Although let's be honest, license plates are NOT the place for deep thinking of any sort). Perhaps he/she wants to piss off the people that are stuck behind him/her. In which case, mission fucking accomplished.

So there. I feel much better now. Happy Friday.

~L

P.S. A note on Starbucks: I am an addict. What the hell do they put in their coffee? Crack? I literally cannot stop drinking it.

Lisa really likes encyclopedias and Jane Austen novels.

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I Heart Google

This is from Google's new features page:

G is for growth
Storage is an important part of email, but that doesn't mean you should have to worry about it. To celebrate our one-year birthday, we're giving everyone one more gigabyte. But why stop the party there? Our plan is to continue growing your storage beyond 2GBs by giving you more space as we are able. We know that email will only become more important in people's lives, and we want Gmail to keep up with our users and their needs. From Gmail, you can expect more.

I just hope this isn't one of those April fools jokes, though if you check the front page of Gmail (you might need to sign out), this appears to be their April Fools Day joke:

Fascinating stuff.

Oh, and by the way, if somehow you still don't have a Gmail account. Drop me a line (nb [at] noahbrier.com) or comment, I should be able to hook you up.

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A Thought on Bundles Before Bed

What's the big deal you're probably asking. Well, this means predictive tagging is now possible. This is huge. I'm not quite sure how it's huge, but I'm sure it is. Maybe when I wake up in the morning I'll have it figured out. But there's something magical about the ability to predict the tags you might use in the future by putting them in appropriate bundles (and of course, to avoid hierarchical problems, tags can appear in multiple bundles).

Here's an example: Let's say I put Japan under the bundle "countries" and "Asia," then, if I could tag the bundles I could put "Asia" into the bundle "continents" and just from tagging an article with "Japan" something/someone (is it the user? the computer?) could understand that Japan is a country in the continent of Asia.

Maybe it's late and I'm making no sense. Or maybe I'll wake up tomorrow and understand it all. Either way, I couldn't go to bed tonight without making some note of this.

If this was unreadable and insane, I apologize, occasionally you're going to have to deal with this kind of stuff . . . it's just part of the territory.

Now go to bed!

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