Stephen Johnson mentioned the Weblog Bookwatch in an article at Salon: Use the blog, Luke: He calls it "An interesting corrective to ordinary bestseller lists, in that it measures which books get talked about, rather than which ones get bought." I couldn't agree more. You may remember him as the author of such books as Emergence (currently on the Weblog Bookwatch Top 10) and Interface Culture. He'll be speaking at eTech next Wednesday.
Macromedia Vice President to employees: blog or you're fired. It'll be interesting to see how "the blog strategy" works out for them. Can someone sustain an interesting weblog if they're compelled to do it as part of their company's developer relations strategy?
And it seems the strategy has a few problems. Meg points out: "Passing off a 'work' site as a truly personal site when it's obviously not...can be misleading to its readers." Transparency and honesty are key pieces of personal opinion weblogs like these. Also, Matt notes that they're on the right track, but the content restrictions show they "...don't trust their employees to be human in a corporate setting."
And it seems the strategy has a few problems. Meg points out: "Passing off a 'work' site as a truly personal site when it's obviously not...can be misleading to its readers." Transparency and honesty are key pieces of personal opinion weblogs like these. Also, Matt notes that they're on the right track, but the content restrictions show they "...don't trust their employees to be human in a corporate setting."
You learn some interesting things in spam. Evite.com is wholly owned by Ticketmaster. TMCS also owns Citysearch.com and Match.com. (It cost me an extra $12 just to mention them in this post.)
"There is no such thing as writer's block. There is only failure to make a decision." - Michael Bremer quoting one of his writing professors in UnTechnical Writing. I can't decide if I agree. Maybe that's the first decision I need to make.
If you administer Windows 2000 servers, you might want to check out their new Baseline Security Analyzer. It will scan for missing hotfixes and known vulnerabilities and return XML reports about the machine. (Conveniently translated to HTML for easy reading.) It also checks out the security status of SQL Server 7.0+.
I'm guilty of using javascript: in my hrefs. Scott's rant has changed my ways.
Meg has some great advice for working with clients in her latest O'Reilly article. Having a review process can take the personal politics out of project decisions. And it's another reason why persona-based design decisions are better than the results of an internal battle-of-wills.
Went for another spectacular hike this weekend. Mt. Hood in Sugarloaf State Park near Santa Rosa is a tough hike, but the views all the way up are worth it. It was very hot, but we found a cool spot next to a waterfall for lunch.
a great lunch spot
We all agreed that if we could teleport to a location for lunch every day, that would be the spot. Very relaxing.
view from gunsight rock
We didn't know this at the time, but there's a geocache at the top. Those geocachers are everywhere.
a great lunch spot
We all agreed that if we could teleport to a location for lunch every day, that would be the spot. Very relaxing.
view from gunsight rock
We didn't know this at the time, but there's a geocache at the top. Those geocachers are everywhere.
Finally, finally, finally I'm free from the incompetent boobery of Network Solutions/Verisign. This domain has been transferred to another registrar. (I use register.com.) I've been wanting to do it for a long time, but I'd heard horror stories about the registrar transfer process. Luckily, transferring was a breeze.
Based on Verisign's stock, it looks like the title of Internet Capital is being taken away from Virginia. That story from 1999 shows they've always been clueless: "'Virginia is the home of the Internet, and we are the leaders of this historic business revolution,' said Mike Daniels, chairman of domain registrar Network Solutions..."
This link describes an instance of domain hijacking/re-selling thanks to the incompetence of Verisign. This sort of thing should be illegal if it isn't already, but I guess you can get away with it when you live in the Internet Capital. Security is all about trust, and instilling trust doesn't seem to be their core competency.
Based on Verisign's stock, it looks like the title of Internet Capital is being taken away from Virginia. That story from 1999 shows they've always been clueless: "'Virginia is the home of the Internet, and we are the leaders of this historic business revolution,' said Mike Daniels, chairman of domain registrar Network Solutions..."
This link describes an instance of domain hijacking/re-selling thanks to the incompetence of Verisign. This sort of thing should be illegal if it isn't already, but I guess you can get away with it when you live in the Internet Capital. Security is all about trust, and instilling trust doesn't seem to be their core competency.
Krzysztof Kieslowski's series Trois Couleurs (Blue, White, and Red) are three of the best films of all time (especially Red—skp's favorite movie). For some inexplicable reason, the company that has distribution rights in the US has not released them on DVD. They're available in Europe, but they're PAL encoded so they won't play on US DVD players.
Two weeks ago, I spotted a brazilian version (Azul, Branca, e Vermelha) through a Google search and ordered them on the spot. They arrived today. The packaging and on-screen DVD controls are in Portuguese, but there are English subtitles for the film. The video quality and extras aren't spectacular, but it's still way better than VHS. If you haven't seem them, they're worth renting. If you've seen them, you've probably already clicked to order the Brazilian release. Pel
Two weeks ago, I spotted a brazilian version (Azul, Branca, e Vermelha) through a Google search and ordered them on the spot. They arrived today. The packaging and on-screen DVD controls are in Portuguese, but there are English subtitles for the film. The video quality and extras aren't spectacular, but it's still way better than VHS. If you haven't seem them, they're worth renting. If you've seen them, you've probably already clicked to order the Brazilian release. Pel
Spent a spectacular day yesterday at Pt. Reyes walking from the Estero trailhead to Limantour Beach. I've been on the Estero trail a few times before, and part of the trail is on ranch land. So you often end up walking through a heard of cows. And they just stare at you with this evil look in their eyes. Like this:
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More inside. (And they're not all pictures of cows.)
more >>
More inside. (And they're not all pictures of cows.)