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Thursday, May 23, 2002 |
"Washington Post: Visions Of a Wild and Wireless Future. To get a few clues as to what may come, I went out this week to a little brick office park in Reston to talk with Kahn, co-inventor of the TCP/IP protocols, the language that is the foundation of the Internet." [Tomalak's Realm]
I'll have to try and read this one tomorrow.
11:57:12 PM Permanent link here
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"Okay, so today I went to my local record store to pick up the new CD by Warren Zevon. Imagine my shock and dismay when I discovered the price of this thing to be $26.99. Yes, twenty seven dollars for a CD ($18.99 US).
I asked the girl at the counter why this CD cost more than the usual amount, and she replied, "Oh, that's a Sony release. Sony just raised their prices."
Now, I know Fritz Hollings doesn't come cheap, but cripes, does anyone at Sony have a brain in their skulls? Let's listen in on the marketing meeting that must have occured:
'Gentlemen, we have a problem. Piracy is cutting heavily into our sales. Well, that or the sucky music we've been putting out. But I blame piracy. Anyway, people are moving away from music CD's because there are too many inexpensive alternatives. People are watching more DVD's, burning their own mix CD's from their music libraries, listening to satellite radio in their cars, internet radio at home, and digital TV stations have free music on them. Given all of these competitive pressures, what's our next move?'
'Well Chief, I say we raise prices, and shorten the content so that artists can crank out more records. The combination of higher prices and less content is a winner!...' "
[Happy Fun Pundit]
I got this link from InstaPundit, which also points to a great satire article: Sony Music Lobbies for Ban on Markers from BBspot.
However, I wouldn't have seen either of these links if it wasn't for Mr. Dane Carlson, who is scraping InstaPundit hourly. So everybody put your hands together for Dane, lean out the window, and shout thanks!
11:46:29 PM Permanent link here
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Give It Away Now
" 'You want to stop piracy?' asks Jack Scalfani, CEO of independent music site FightCloud.com. 'Make your CDs affordable. I'm not going to spend three hours turning and burning a CD ... if it's an $8 CD. I'm going to walk across the street to Tower Records and go, 'Here's my $8, thanks for the new Madonna.' My time is worth more to me than the money, so I will put the money out if it's a good price.'
At FightCloud.com, the price is right. Scalfani sells CDs for free. That is, if you don't count the $4.95 'shipping' charge. Of course, that would be a mistake. Buried in the shipping charge is the secret ingredient: a modest profit. Less costs of $2.31, the company nets $2.64 on each 'free' disc, half of which goes to the artist. But with only 1,000 or so CDs shipped to date, no one's getting rich. Yet.
In 2000, the average suggested list price of a CD was $14.02, according to the Recording Industry Association of American (RIAA). The CD itself costs about 32 cents in a large production run, according to Michael Pardo, V.P. of sales for CD duplicator Greenwood Solutions. Add packaging and the price goes to 54 cents. Add the cut for a new artist, somewhere between 10 and 50 cents, and your cost nears a buck. Add $28 million to cancel your estimated $80 to $100 million contract with Mariah Carey, as EMI recently did, and adjust your costs accordingly." [Salon.com]
Finally, a record label gets it! You can even preview the songs. Scalfani is spot on when he notes that my time is valuable and that I'm willing to pay a reasonable price for convenience. NetFlix is one of the best examples of this, which is why they had a pretty good IPO today.
I think I might be "buying" my first CD of the year!
Thought: FightCloud, meet Emergent Music. Emergent Music, this is FightCloud.
11:03:57 PM Permanent link here
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In regards to news aggregators, Matthew Eberle cruelly teases me with the following:
"I still like NewsIsFree, but I'm looking into Sitescooper to dump news sites, including RSS to Palm's DOC format."
I'm sorry, my dear boy, but you simply can't throw that sentence out into my aggregator without further explanation! I need details, lad, details! What exactly does it mean when you say "dump news sites, including RSS?" Are you able to duplicate some of the content from your aggregator on your Palm through synchronization? And this software is free?!
Because to me, that's the next logical step - mobile aggregation, especially as we move into the world of high-speed, always-on wireless connections. Here's what the Sitescooper site has to say:
"Sitescooper automatically retrieves the stories from several news websites, trims off extraneous HTML, and converts them into formats you can read on your Palm computing device for later reading on-the-move. It maintains a cache, and will avoid stories you've already read. It can handle 1-page sites, 1-page with diffing, 2-level and 3-level sites, and it's very easy to add a new site to its list.
Even if you don't have a Palm handheld, it's still handy for simple website-to-text conversion, and offline HTML reading. For example, here's some screenshots of an iPaq displaying sitescooper output....
Included in the bundle are site files for Slashdot, NTKnow, BluesNews, Linux Weekly News, Wired News BBC News, TBTF, Hacker News Network, Robot Wisdom weblog, Memepool, Jakob Neilsen's Alertbox, Ars Technica, I, Cringely, Kernel Traffic, Linux Today, comp.risks, and over 300 more."
Help!
A second note about news aggregators: Joe Gregorie continues to make progress on his home-rolled aggregator, called Aggie. He has lots of interesting ideas about aggregators, so I'm tracking this one.
10:32:41 PM Permanent link here
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History of Jazz: New Orleans
"In this OpenUW course, you'll examine the early history of jazz, from its roots in African-American folk and religious songs, ragtime piano music, and the brass bands of New Orleans, through the development of the first jazz bands in Storyville and the expansion of jazz from the South to the northern music centers of Chicago and New York. You'll also meet several important musicians from that time, such as Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, and Sidney Bechet, and learn about the contributions they made to this growing art form.
After you've completed this OpenUW course, you will be able to:
- Discuss the cultural "collision" in the southern portion of the United States that produced the new musical elements that formed the blues and, eventually, jazz.
- Begin to identify African-American musical elements that distinguish jazz from other musical styles.
- Identify the basic musical roots of jazz.
- Identify the birthplace of jazz and the cultural diversity that contributed to the establishment of the first jazz bands during the last decade of the nineteenth century.
- Examine several early jazz musicians and their recordings and identify important musical innovations that each contributed to the development of jazz" [via h2Oboro lib blog]
A dozen other courses are also available, all of which are free.
One of the best things I ever did while I was at KU was take Dick Wright's jazz course. Looking this up on the web, I just realized he died in 1999, which must have been a huge loss for the KU and jazz communities. He left his archive of some 20,000 albums and tape reels to KU, which you can now search online as the Richard M. Wright Jazz Archive. (Note: the database was down when I tried it tonight.)
On a side note, I want to study this site as an interface model for LibraryU.
10:04:42 PM Permanent link here
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"Borders to Let Publishers Pay to Manage Its Categories
"Publisher's Weekly Daily earlier this week reported that 'Borders will divide its book inventory into 250 categories and invite publishers to co-manage, or 'captain' the category. The captain will 'influence' Borders' buying decisions, including which titles, the number to be bought, and how the books get displayed, though Borders retains right of final decision. For the privilege of being 'captains,' publishers chosen as category managers will pay $110,000 annually and $5,000 per employee to be trained by Borders in how the system works. So far, HarperCollins will captain Borders' cookbook and romance sections, and Random House will co-manage the early readers category.' " Source: DOROTHY-L listserv" [h2Oboro lib blog]
This is just sooooooooo wrong. Borders nosedives in my estimation.
9:45:09 PM Permanent link here
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YAZ 1.8.7 Released
"A new version of YAZ has been released. YAZ is a C/C++ programmer's toolkit supporting the development of Z39.50v3 clients and servers. A sample client, a sample server, and documentation are included in the distribution. YAZ also includes experimental support for the industry standard ZOOM API for Z39.50. There are several changes from the last version (mostly bug fixes)." [/usr/lib/info]
9:29:01 PM Permanent link here
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Every Picture Still Tells a Story, but 'Family Album' Is Redefined
"Several old PC's that Mr. Baker would otherwise have placed in deep storage have been put to work in the capacity of dynamic photo frames or, as Mr. Baker likes to put it, 'picture flippers.'
Mr. Baker, a 46-year-old entrepreneur, cut holes in walls throughout his house in Corona del Mar, Calif., installed monitors and used the old computers to display slide shows of the 15,000 or so digital photos he has collected. The pictures change every three seconds. The frame in the dining room generates the most conversation among family members and guests....
'We're beginning to take pictures not to keep them around, but to reach out and touch someone with them, to extend the moment, that sense of presence,' said John Seely Brown, the recently retired chief scientist at the Xerox Corporation and author of 'The Social Life of Information.'
Dr. Brown cited the increasing practice of sending photos by e-mail as an example. 'There's a sense of using this to connect in the moment to someone else I want to touch,' he said. 'I'm more concerned about getting it to them and touching them than in having a photograph I can put in an album.' " [NY Times: Technology]
While I wouldn't go so far as to cut holes in my walls, we do have an old 486 PC that's doing nothing because it's running Windows 95 and has no internet access. It used to be the kids PC for games, but they won't even look sideways at it anymore now that the wireless network puts three other machines on the net. So maybe I'll turn it into a "picture flipper."
What I really wanted to highlight, though, are the Ceiva digital picture frames. I bought one of these for my Grandma because she's in a nursing home, and we don't get to visit her as often as we'd like to. It was incredibly easy to set up the Ceiva when I bought it, and then I just plugged it in a phone jack and power jack in her room and voila - instant pictures! Every night, it dials into the Ceiva server to see if I've sent any new pictures to it via the web.
Of course, the beauty of it is that I can snap a hundred pictures with my digital camera, find two that I like, and send them to the frame without having to worry about printing them out first. My Dad and my brother can even send pictures to it (perfect for those occasions when my niece Beans is being particularly cute).
Overall it's worked great, even though it gets knocked around a lot in my Grandma's room. In fact, this past winter the phone jack on the frame itself went bad, but Ceiva replaced it without any hassle or cost to me. I've been very impressed with their service, and we're thinking of buying a couple more for family that live further away (Bruce - hint, hint).
While I wish they would make an 8" x 10" version (actual picture size), I highly recommend one of these if you want to regularly send pictures to people that live far away from you.
9:13:01 PM Permanent link here
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"In Hollywood Wants to Plug the 'Analog Hole', Cory Doctorow reveals key points of the 'Content Protection Status Report' filed with the Senate Judiciay Committee by the MPAA — a document that lays out the Evil Empire's Internet-destruction plans, which involve turning humble ADCs (Analog/Digital Converters) into content permission valves that would govern approximately the full range of 'content' use:
'Under its proposal, every ADC will be controlled by a "cop-chip" that will shut it down if it is asked to assist in converting copyrighted material — your cellphone would refuse to transmit your voice if you wandered too close to the copyrighted music coming from your stereo.
The report shows that this ADC regulation is part of a larger agenda. The first piece of that agenda, a mandate that would give Hollywood a veto over digital television technology, is weeks away from coming to fruition. Hollywood also proposes a radical redesign of the Internet to assist in controlling the distribution of copyrighted works.
This three-part agenda -- controlling digital media devices, controlling analog converters, controlling the Internet -- is a frightening peek at Hollywood's vision of the future.'
You know what to do. If you don't, read Cory's report." [Doc Searls Weblog]
Be an informed consumer. Read up on this stuff. Make your voice heard. Librarians especially need to consider how destructive such a future would be on our ability to circulate digital content (as in, we won't be able to).
8:43:46 PM Permanent link here
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I was contemplating this topic on the drive home tonight, and I immediately thought of the following:
Of course, I haven't read any of these in years, but they immediately sprang to mind. I'm not even sure why I consider them "guilty," but there you go.
8:29:52 PM Permanent link here
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- "A View from the Back of the Envelope
- 'These pages are about approximation, and some of the fun it enables.' Examples, exercises, and links to help you grasp concepts of magnitude and scale, such as large and small numbers, the size of the world, and expressions of length, area, volume, and speed. There are sections on simplifying numbers, exponential notation, Fermi problems, using your body as a ruler, and other ways to help visualize size and scale.
- http://www.vendian.org/envelope/
- Subjects: Mensuration | Dimensions | Size judgment | Approximation theory | Cosmology
- Category: Specific Resources
- Created by: mg on May 19, 2002 - updated May 23, 2002 | Comment On This Record" [Librarians' Index to the Internet]
Indexed, cataloged records in online directories don't get any better than this. Great resource, too!
8:13:36 PM Permanent link here
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"Life with Bonnie" (half-hour comedy, Tuesdays at 9:00 p.m.) -- On the streets, in the stores and, occasionally at the office, local TV show host Bonnie Molloy has the life of a sort-of celebrity. Sometimes her fans actually remember her name. But when it comes to her family life, a little fame goes a long way. Especially when her husband and children catch a glimmer of themselves in the supposedly true anecdotes Mom tells her morning viewers.
Multi-talented Bonnie Hunt borrows a page from her own life in this comedy about having it all and then some. Bonnie writes, directs and stars with the same comic flair she brought to her film, 'Return to Me.' It's modern life as only Bonnie could live it.
Starring Bonnie Hunt as Bonnie Molloy, Brian Kerwin ("Beggars and Choosers") as Dr. John Molloy, David Alan Grier ("In Living Color") as David Bellows, Marianne Muellerleile as Gloria, Anthony Russell as Tony Russo, Samantha Browne-Walters as Samantha Molloy, Charlie Stewart as Charlie Molloy.
Production Company: Touchstone Television
Executive Producers/Writers: Bonnie Hunt, Don Lake
Director: Bonnie Hunt" [ABC Upfront]
Hopefully ABC will give this show more of a shot than her two previous shows have gotten (The Building and The Bonnie Hunt Show). It might take some time for it to build an audience, but Bonnie Hunt is one of the funniest women on the planet.
7:40:18 PM Permanent link here
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Label Tests MP3 in Song Sale
"In what may be a first for the recording industry, Maverick Records and Vivendi Universal's online division are asking listeners to pay just under a dollar for an unprotected MP3 version of a new single.
The companies put the track, a dance version of 'Earth' by Meshell Ndegeocello, online Thursday on sites run by Vivendi Universal Net USA, including MP3.com, RollingStone.com, GetMusic.com and MP4.com. People can purchase the file for 99 cents and then burn the song to a CD-ROM disc or transfer it to a portable device. The companies said subscribers of EMusic's MP3 music service will be able to download the track as part of their memberships.
Ndegeocello is releasing a new album, 'Cookie: The Anthropological Mixtape,' June 4 on Maverick/Warner Bros. Records. The original version of 'Earth' will appear on the album....
Phil Benyola, a digital media research associate for investment company Raymond James Financial, called the MP3 sale an "innovative" marketing maneuver. But he warned it might not be a successful one....
But 'I think you'll be able to count the number of sales on one hand,' he added. 'As soon as one person gets it, it's all over the (peer-to-peer) networks for free.' " [CNET News.com]
Good idea, bad implementation. I probably would have paid for this song just out of principle to prove to these guys that there is a market, even when they choose a song by a somewhat niche artist to lead an experiment. However, I'm a big Ben Watts fan (same for EBTG), and I like some of Meshell's stuff, so I paid my 99 cents. I wouldn't pay that day in and day out for one song, but today I did.
First of all, I almost missed the link buried on the bottom right of the Get Music site, poorly labeled, just to get to the song. Now, I know MP3s, and it took me a while to figure out how to get this file onto my hard drive. When I first clicked on "Download Now," the Windows Media Player opened up and started playing the file. There was no way for me to save the file, so I exited. Then I looked at their FAQ, and it told me to right-click on the button and choose "save target/link as," which I promptly did. Then I got an error message that the file couldn't download from their server.
I had to go into the file types and re-associate MP3s with another program to get it to download properly. Granted, everybody's setup is different, but I guarantee you that none of my neighbors would have known what to do and they would have given up in frustration pretty quickly.
Having said that, it's a nice change to download a high-quality, full version MP3, which I do like. Previewing was a plus, although the sample wasn't really long enough. I can put the song on my Archos Jukebox, burn it to a CD, whatever. I'll probably include it in mixes I make for people, but I'm not going to distribute it widely. In other words, I won't do anything differently than I would have five years ago with an audiocassette.
What do you know - the glass is half full.
6:48:57 PM Permanent link here
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Netscape 7: Nice, but I'll Stay with IE. Here's Why
"THE BEST NEW FEATURE in Netscape 7--new for Netscape, at least, but apparently lifted from the Opera browser--is a tabbed user interface that allows easy switching from one open Web page to another. You can, for example, create bookmarks that open a specific set of tabs; I used one such bookmark to open all the pages I use for reading the news each morning with a single click. These tabs sit just below the menu bar and are a nice feature, though not turned on by default." [ZDNet AnchorDesk]
Get out - David Coursey doesn't use a news aggregator?? He's still surfing manually? Someday should show him the light.
3:15:27 PM Permanent link here
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Next 'Star Wars' to Have a Dark Ending?
"Next up is 'Episode III,' a galactic train wreck in the offing. The last film in George Lucas' six-part saga of the Skywalker family inevitably ends in tragedy, the final prequel leading into the dark times of dictatorship that prevail at the opening of the original 'Star Wars.'
Figure that young Jedi Anakin has completed his transition to the dark side as villain Darth Vader, destroying the Jedi order and paving the way for the evil emperor to dash the democratic Republic. Jedi masters Obi-Wan and Yoda somehow wind up on the road to exile. Since she doesn't turn up in the original trilogy, Padme Amidala, Anakin's beloved, may end up a corpse." [CNN]
In order for Darth Vader and the Empire to destroy the Jedi order, they would have to eradicate the knowledge and history the Jedis have accumulated. Ergo, the Jedi Archive is going to be destroyed. I wonder if Lucas will actually show this happening, which would make interesting allegory for current popular culture (even in 2005).
11:25:09 AM Permanent link here
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Apples and Oranges: The Final Comparison
"The apples and oranges ploy is ubiquitous.... Indeed, there is an apples and oranges pandemic. Last year, the term was cited in the media 2,876 times, according to a Nexis search. The good news is that this is down from the year 2000, when journalists and their sources used apples and oranges an unprecedented 3,220 times, or nearly nine times a day. The bad news is that it's the first time the use of the term has dropped since it was first cited in Nexis in 1975. That year, apples versus oranges was found only three times—first and most notably in the Feb. 3, 1975, in Business Week. Treasury Secretary William E. Simon was being grilled on domestic oil price hikes versus OPEC oil prices. He told a reporter, 'I think you're comparing apples with oranges.'
It was used then as it is today: as a stopper. Apples/oranges doesn't advance one's own position; it puts a cork in someone else's. The person who uses it doesn't want to make a comparison, so they simply discount the validity of one. They're saying, 'It's not fair to make that comparison" and they probably think that too. What they mean is, "I'm not sure I'd be comfortable with what that comparison tells me about the situation.' It establishes authority on an issue with zero accountability. It ducks the question and serves as the last word. It is a genius cop-out....
The apples and oranges play was found in the sports pages and the front page. It was found in a column on computer security, written by a terribly busy writer under deadline pressure named Scott (the author of the column regrets the usage). It was found in Manila and Prague. It was noticeably absent from only one arena: law publications and stories about the law. It seems the burden of proof requires more than a fruit metaphor....
The use of apples/oranges peaked in the six-month period between October 1999 and March 2000, when it was cited in Nexis 1,713 times. During the same six-month stretch, the Nasdaq composite rose from 2,736 and change to about 4,573. When the Nasdaq fell in 2001, so did use of the phrase. Nasdaq is down again this year, and apples to oranges use is projected to fall again too, to about 2,500.
That's an awful lot of mileage for a metaphor that Scott Sandford of NASA proved invalid six years ago.
In 1996, Sandford sliced a Granny Smith and sectioned a navel, dried them, mixed each with potassium bromide, milled them into two piles of fine powder and then made pellets of the powder, which he put under a spectrometer. Then he measured their respective transmittance of infrared light. On the spectrum, Sandford says, apples and oranges are basically the same color. And overall: 'They are dominated by the same molecules. All I wanted to show was that the bulk of both of these things is very, very similar. And I did,' says Sandford. His five-page research paper was published in the Journal of Improbable Research, and it concluded that 'the comparing apples and oranges defense should no longer be considered a valid argument....'
My old college roommate, a molecular biologist now doing research at the University of Virginia, said, 'To say that something is 'like apples and oranges' as a way to signify differences is not impressive from a geneticist's point of view. It would be much better to say 'apples and quartz....'
The problem with the phrase 'that's like comparing apples to oranges' it turns out is not that the fruits are too similar to signify unreconcilable differences. The problem is that it assumes it's not fair to make comparisons without perfect analogs. But isn't it more desirable, in fact, to make comparisons between two different things than to compare something to itself? Using apples and oranges shouldn't end a conversation, it should start a far more profound one about similarities, differences and what can be gleaned from them.
Scott Sandford gives the impression he wishes he never did the damn apples and oranges paper. He admits to having nightmares about his own obituary: He has devoted his life at NASA to studying how chemicals that rained down on the earth billions of years ago may have seeded the world with the materials to create life; he's published 200 scientific papers on astrochemistry and the delicate intertwining of stellar dust and human existence. Comparing his serious work to that one stupid thing he did years ago on a lark, it's a joke. It's like comparing apples to quartz." [Darwin Magazine]
9:39:32 AM Permanent link here
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"Paraphrase from Brewster Kahle's presentation of his Internet Archive project: 'leaving everything up to the publishing industry is not the best way to run a culture.' The Internet Archive's policy with regard to archiving materials is to take first and ask questions later because the information on the Internet is too culturally valuable to lose. Damn the copyright laws, full speed ahead!
Brewster also said 'stealing from the library is dorky', but I can't remember the context." [Kottke.org]
7:22:48 AM Permanent link here
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eBookMan
"eBookMan Ok, so the Blackmask Online site informed me that Consumer Depot had these on sale for around $50 so I bit th ebullet and bought. I'm a technophile and a reader so I figured this ought to work. After some wrestlign with the Mobipocket Reader I was able to load In the Beginning...Was the Command Line, a fitting choice if I do say so myself. I found the experience of reading in this way to be pleasant, but different from the tactile feeling of reading a paper book. ANother good loo,ing site, besides Blackmask is, . Now I have to start reading through the Handheld Librarian." [Library Techlog]
For $50, I may finally buy one of these just so I can pass it around at my presentations and show what a bad technology ebook hardware devices still are. I don't know, though. I should be more excited about this, but it seems like a bad sign to me.
7:19:09 AM Permanent link here
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Will Americans go for mLife?
" 'I still have Japan-envy,' admits Matthew Hart. It's not that Hart doesn't cherish his new cellphone, or appreciate having a real 'mLife' before most Americans. It's just that 'the 3G videophones they have over there, the ones that open up with the big color screens ...' He trails off wistfully. 'We're getting closer, but we're still nowhere near Japan.'
Hart, a commercial real estate developer in Palm Beach, Fla., is a self-described gadget and cellphone junkie -- he keeps 15 or so retired handsets in his closet. He's the kind of guy who gets a kick out of using his Bluetooth-enabled cellphone as a cable-free modem for his Bluetooth-enabled PowerBook so that he can check his e-mail in a park (just for example). The type who hangs around in chat rooms explaining to innocents the difference between locked and unlocked handsets, and why you should pay more for the latter. The kind who buys a T68i handset -- not officially available in the U.S. yet -- off eBay because it's slightly better than his still-new T68 (a replacement for the Nokia 8890 he got in London).
And he's precisely the kind of guy AT&T Wireless must win over with the mMode service launched April 16 (in select US markets including Palm Beach) if it's to have any hope with more typical U.S. cellphone users. A central feature of the company's obscurely marketed mLife 'wireless lifestyle,' mMode is an imitation of imode, the highly successful, always-on data service offered by NTT DoCoMo in Japan.
Imode users (over 32 million at last count) can buy tickets, find the nearest Starbucks, download and swap pictures, set up group get-togethers and do far too many other things to list here. Charges for whatever digital content or services they buy simply show up on their phone bill -- no credit cards, no electronic wallet, no personal info, no fuss....
For many skeptics, imode-type services will never take off in the U.S, for one simple reason: the car. In Japan, the ubiquitous mass transit system is often cited as a primary reason for imode's success. The transit system creates a lifestyle full of 'microniches' of time. There's a lot of hanging around nearby bus, subway and train stations, usually waiting for friends or for transport. Imode and its competitors have filled this otherwise empty space with well-received services and cutting-edge handsets -- handsets that cellphone aficionados like Matthew Hart drool over....
But debates over mass transit versus car culture may miss the real point. Truth is, Americans just don't have the right tools to go online wirelessly. If imode had been offered in Japan over the kind of inferior handsets offered in the U.S. today, it would have failed miserably. In other words: It's the handsets, stupid....
For Americans who've never been to Japan and played around with an imode handset, there's really no Stateside parallel to help them understand how enjoyable the experience can be. 'I just cringe when I see handsets in America,' says analyst Berman. The best analogy may be this: Whereas Japanese handsets are fun, colorful iMacs, those sold in the U.S. are drab, grim DOS terminals. To get an idea of what using imode is like, imagine clear colorful screens, startling sound quality, and easy-to-understand, icon-based menus navigating you through services you really want to use. And imagine this: sitting alone in a cafe with a grin on your face because you're having fun with your cellphone. In Japan, you can actually see this happening. It's not that the Japanese are deranged gadget freaks, it's simply that the cellphones are a kick to use. (And cute! Even grown men agree....)
Matthew Hart is ready to do his part. He's already got his sights set firmly on the upcoming P800 handset, and he's dreaming up how he's going to use it. His killer app for his killer phone? The ability to find local movie times, pay for tickets and have the charges show up on his phone bill. 'Especially in Florida, where the movie theaters are huge and there's always a long line,' he says. 'That, to me, would be a great thing to use a cellphone for.' "
Question is, how many Americans will agree with him?" [Salon.com]
Ooh, ooh - Mr. Kotter, Mr. Kotter! Me! Plus, a whole generation of Net Generation kids.
12:25:59 AM Permanent link here
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" 'Hey Dave is talking about conferences and weblogging.
Guess what Dave: Pop!Tech will be that conference.
Last year they had 802.11 for everyone. Last year they broadcast the entire show in streaming video format. There were several bloggers in attendance (including Dan Gillmor and me -- Dan, by the way, says it's his favorite conference of the year).
This year they've asked Buzz Bruggeman and me to come up with a plan. A plan for getting weblogs used everywhere at the conference. A plan for using the wireless in new ways. A plan for building on this year's theme of 'Artificial Worlds.'
First on the list? Power strips. Last year I brought my own and my own extension cable. This year there'll be more. Of course there'll be wireless. Of course there'll be streaming video. Of course there'll be an official conference weblog that'll link to everyone's efforts.
Last year we blogged and took pictures. This year? We wanna do a lot more. But, this Pop!Tech is in October, so lots of time to reveal what we'll be doing.
One secret about Pop!Tech: I'm going just for the audience -- the sessions sound sorta ambiguous, just like last year. The audience is what makes this show, and sorry, you can't have dinner with some very smart people unless you come (last year I had dinner with Buzz and the president of the ACLU, try to beat that with your streaming video experience at home!). Did I mention that John Sculley and Bob Metcalfe served us ice cream last year?
Here's my Pop!Tech weblog from last year: http://poptech.manilasites.com Here's the official Pop!Tech Web site: http://www.poptech.org BTW: the WWW conference in Hawaii had an IRC channel running. I loved it cause it told me what sessions to go to.' [Scobleizer Radio Weblog]
I'm going to the conference this year. Buzz is into this deal big time and he has convinced me it is the greatest thing in the world. It would be great if Rick and Denise and Jenny and Rory and other bloggers could attend." [Ernie the Attorney]
Ernie, you don't know how much I wish I could go to this one! However, I'm speaking at NetSpeed in late October, and I'm going to Internet Librarian at the beginning of November, which leaves zero travel budget in my line item for anything else, probably for the rest of the fiscal year. :-
At least I'll be able to keep up through the video streams, chats, and blogs!
12:03:02 AM Permanent link here
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© Copyright 2004 Jenny Levine.
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