onfocus

This weekend Ernest gave Matt and me an inside look at Bigha bikes here in Corvallis. (Ernest put together their website.) Hopping on one of them was a bit like learning to ride a bike all over again, but after a few seconds to adapt I was steering around the factory floor fairly well. It's definitely more comfortable than a standard bike, and I can see that it would be very nice for long rides. These top of the line bikes are a bit out of my price range, and I hope someone rents them around here—it'd be fun to take one out for a day and go on a longer trip. (I guess I could always try to win one.) I took a few pictures while we were there:


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Remember the PGP-signing I added to my comments system a while back? Srijith has created a Movable Type plugin that adds PGP comments to Movable Type weblogs. He's using Ben Trott's Crypt::OpenPGP to parse the PGP signatures. Update: He used the module as a guide for parsing PGP signatures—it's not required to run the plugin.

Srijith also adds a very clever bit of functionality by showing how you can include the URL of your public key within your PGP signature itself. This doesn't solve the web of trust/signing issues, but it makes it much easier to at least verify the signature you're looking at. This distributed method of securing identity is about small pieces loosely joined (so to speak), and the pieces are loosely joining.

Here's a page he has devoted to the plugin: PGPComments.

My site is already grey, so it would be easy for me to participate in Grey Tuesday next week. [via Anil 2/19]

Do I have to go outside when it's raining?

USA Today: Glitch identifies "anonymous" reviewers on Amazon.com. "Among those named were authors who posted glowing reviews of their own work, apparently to boost sales."

San Francisco approved gay marriage and there's a massacre of love (photos by Lance Arthur) going on at the city hall. [via Kottke] (And some more photos by Derek Powazek.) One Oregon blogger who writes What in the Blue Hell? took a road trip to get hitched. Congrats! Of course he blogged his adventure. [via Portland Communique]

Amazon updated their RSS information page: Amazon Syndicated Content. At the bottom of the page, they now have hundreds of sample feeds ready to add to your newsreader. If you spot a feed you like there, it saves you the time it takes to use a tool like the Amazon Feed Builder. Thanks for the heads-up, Alan!

If you're wondering what all the hubub is about web services, RSS, social software, and other alpha geekery—this interview with Rael is a good place to start: View from the Alpha Geek. I like this bit, "I use weblogs to find information more than I use Google. I follow trails. Google will find you obvious answers. Google will find you what you're looking for. Blogs, with RSS, will find you what you never expected to find." I couldn't agree more. I think the majority of people have yet to discover what a valuable information resource weblogs are, even after all this time. (And I think Google realized this exactly one year ago.)

new phrase: puppy leave.

I'm disappointed that I couldn't be at eTech, but I'm enjoying the coverage. It sounds like Joe Trippi's speech [notes by Howard Rheingold] about the Dean campaign and the web was inspiring. And I'm keeping an eye on the eTech wiki.

There is the serious danger that this weblog will turn into a puppyblog for a while. Here are a couple more pictures:





And another at Matt's photo site. She's an eight-week old Miniature Australian Shepherd.

There's a new creature in our house...





The cat is not amused.