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Thursday, June 06, 2002 |
Coming sometime tomorrow: Did I miss the point of the latest DaveNet?
Good night!
10:46:01 PM 
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MAKES ME FEEL QUITE SMALL
He's miles further along than I was on Day 2
Glenn White: "Today is my second day using Radio..." [jenett.radio]
10:32:11 PM
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INDIVIDUAL ACCOUNTABILITY FOR A JOB
WHAT WAS MISSING from Bush's speech. UPDATE: Here's a link to the Department of Homeland Security proposal. [InstaPundit]
10:27:31 PM
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WHEN STORIES SUCH AS THIS FLOW
through the weblogs and the news aggregator, I find myself wondering the following:
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Is this simply another case of "don't believe everything you find on the Internet?"
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Is this a story by someone with an ax to grind?
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Was this so insignificant that the mainstream media decided not to pursue it?
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Is some other dynamic at work?
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Have I found a weblog run by a top-notch person with great skills?
Clearly, there are times when I've read a weblog story and used the mainstream media to verify or fact-check it. As I come to know the weblog writers's styles and approaches, I find myself checking mainstream media stories against the weblogs.
I was engineering school at a time when electronic calculators were invented. I know it is hard for anyone to imagine today, but we literally "checked" our first calculators with the sliderules "we knew we could count on." It seems silly now, but it was the only way we could gain confidence in the new tool! Checking weblog reporting is sometimes like this! Once we get to know our "reporters" we'll gain more confidence.
 Talking with a British friend a few minutes ago, he told me of a recent story... The story appeared in Der Spiegel, and quite a few weblogs, but appears to have not been carried by US publications. Why? [Scripting News]
10:19:30 PM
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ALL THE EXCITEMENT IS OVER, BUT...
I think this is my weblog neighborhood. I'm not sure what good it is now that no one is using or talking about this stuff, but here it is late. I'm also unclear as to whether this is somehow being kept dynamically or maybe this dates back to the last "gather." Ok, it dates to the date of the gather. Apparently the Events that the instructions refer to is not the link on the right hand side, but instead it is one of the choices in the menu at the top of your local weblog page - up there where Prefs, etc. are located. Further, that Events link takes you to an EventsLog that only shows the weblogNeighborhood link immediately after a "gather." So, all of my searching there today isn't going to do any good, because that link is gone. Were it there, apparently it would have been of the form radio.userland.com/usernum/misc/weblogNeighborhood.html or weblogname/misc/weblogNeighborhood.html.
All of these are mere details to those who are lawyers, librarians or developers. To those of us lacking the requisite number of brain cells, those details made the difference in success and failure.
3:59:56 PM
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WHAT IS RSS?
The more I get into Radio Userland and the tools that come with this software package, the more I become curious about certain details. Today, it dawned on me that I didn't know or recall what RSS stood for. I found this site.
As I've browsed the web recently, I've tried index.xml and rss.xml on the end of URL's to see if the site I was visiting had the RSS feed. I'm not sure why some sites turn their's off, but clearly they do because they are using tools that come with the RSS feed enabled by default.
2:27:02 PM
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DEFINING THE USA's INTELLIGENCE PROBLEM AND SOLUTION?
I agree that a cabinet level post smacks of a political response to all of the sniping by the media and the second-guessing by many Democrats. That's the wrong reason to do anything.
Most of the problems stem from government bureacracy running away with itself. We need to define our needs and put leaders in place to meet those needs. Do we need the FBI, CIA, NSA et al? Probably, in some form. Do we need more agencies like them. Definitely, not!
We need to tell them what we want done and see that the metrics are in place to monitor whether or not they are doing it!
Another Cabinet. Dubya is about to announce the creation of a new Cabinet level post for Homeland Security. Great, just what [The Trommetter Times]
1:51:08 PM
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WELL...
Kangaroos don't pass gas: "Scientists in Australia are investigating whether kangaroos could help combat global warming. Australia's sheep and cattle produce huge amounts of methane, an important greenhouse gas - but kangaroos do not. Researchers believe it might be possible to use bacteria found in the stomachs of kangaroos to reduce methane output from cows and sheep." [From the Desktop of Dane Carlson]
1:40:33 PM
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DAVE'S ESSAY HAS LEGS
People want answers
IN LIGHT OF MY JOURNALISM-AND-COWARDICE POST... readers may want to check out these real-life stories by Dave Winer. Journalists say that blogs can't be trusted because there's no oversight. Read, and see what oversight means. Bloggers have biases -- but they're usually right out in the open. And bloggers don't pretend to be objective professionals. [InstaPundit]
It gets better:
12:36:36 PM
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ARE THESE SIMILAR SITUATIONS?
Read this story about the Air Force Colonel who got suspended for criticizing his boss. Then, read one of the best DaveNet emails I've seen. Are there similarities here? Do things change when we're talking about our nation vs. our employer?
What was the original historical context of "freedom of speech"? Can an employee openly criticize his or her employer? Can an employee openly criticize his or her boss?
We live in a time when some are becoming more strident in their criticism of governments, some consider it patriotic to "go along," and others won't say or write what they really think for fear of the government's newly-exercised powers of investigation.
Whether a government, business or church are there any limits on criticism? Do insiders to one of these have greater or lesser responsibilities than reporters, journalists or outsiders? When is one a whistle-blower and when is one merely a concerned party?
The DaveNet is relevant to nearly all of our current national news stories - Catholic priests out of control, accounting scandals, government intelligence gathering and analysis and the prosecution of a war. Who is "allowed" to speak out and how forcefully? Who should speak out?
Great stuff, Dave, and thought-provoking!
10:40:18 AM
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"OK, $20 FOR A RIDE...
$40? $100 for one lap around the block! What if I get everyone in the neighborhood to repave their driveways? No, I don't want the mail, I just want a ride! I know that, but what if I get everyone in the neighborhood to sell their dogs? No, I don't want your USPS regulation issued safety helmet, I just want to ride 5 mailboxes down the street and come back!"
Memphis was selected as another of the cities where the USPS will test Segways. Taking a Segway for a spin may come sooner than we thought.
Segways up for auction on eBay. Consumers are once again bidding big bucks for a Segway Human Transporter--but this time the auction is on eBay and it's being conducted without participation from Segway. [CNET News.com]
7:49:13 AM
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DIGICAM SELECTION PROCESS
What's the process for selecting a digital camera? Walter Mossberg covers the CBDTPA here, but he's also done a couple of articles on digital camera selections here and here. Good tips, but which brand?
Canon PowerShot A200. Canon has today announced the new two megapixel, fixed lens PowerShot A200. This compact, lightweight entry level digital camera is relatively high on features and yet will be low priced. The A200 is... [Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)]
7:37:58 AM
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DESIGN IDEA SOURCES
The Bloggys. Surprised when you saw the Webbys? I bet you were even more surprised to see the Bloggys! Yes, it's just like the Webbys, Oscars, Grammys, or any other awards thingy where you can vote for the best in different categories, except with blogs! And it's monthly! [C:PIRILLO.EXE]
This guy's LINKS page doesn't even provide a link to Radio Userland. How lame is that?
Maybe we can "skew" the voting!
7:14:37 AM
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© Copyright 2002 Steve Pilgrim.
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