Tuesday, February 8, 2005

Mediaburn Spaghetti Straps ~ And YES girls, the original thongs are still available! 7:44:32 PM

Recommended - Art Kane Art Kane. Pictures from a visionary photographer. Via twoblog. [The Cartoonist] 7:56:32 AM

WiMAX Weblog Staying on top of WiMAX. If you're interested in keeping developments related to WiMAX technology on your radar, bookmark The WiMAX Weblog. For those who might not be familiar, WiMAX is a developing wireless network standard that has been described as "WiFi on steroids." If adopted, it would allow for broadband [Street Tech] 7:54:17 AM

More From Maui Some Good News for a Change. The press finally gives Apple some credit In a recent development quoted everywhere except perhaps the front page at MSN, Apple Computer has been named the brand with 'the most global impact.' I'm not really sure what 'global impact' is besides the result of a major earthquake, but positive press is a nice change. Years ago when no pundit could mention Apple without the word 'beleaguered' we dreamed of a day when the statement 'beleaguered Microsoft' would be common, but never imagined that Apple could actually be mentioned in glowing terms or the stock be worth more than lunch per share. But here we are, at a unique point in the twenty-first century when Apple is finally considered a beacon of commerce and value. You can read the whole story at Brandchannel "Global: Apple bites big" "After a two-year hiatus Apple has returned to win the 2004 Readers' Choice Awards for the brand with the most global impact--a title held by Google since 2002. It's hard to imagine a brand having a shinier year than Apple. Notably punctuated with iMacs, iPods and iTunes, Apple's 2004 presence was felt in the press, in ads and on the streets, with iPod coming to define the word "ubiquitous." Coupled with strong revenue, Apple reported a net profit of US$ 295 million in the last quarter of 2004 alone and a 2004 overall net income growth of 300 percent. Yes, 300 percent. And just in case any marketing majors miss the point, here's the secret of Apple's success: At Apple's core is great innovation, beautiful design and an ability to bring warmth and passion to those who may be completely incurious about technical gadgetry but need it nonetheless to survive in today's world." Then there's this case of Steve-worship from the Christian Science Monitor. "America's premier guru of gadgets is doing it again" The article mentions... "Steve Jobs and his unflagging obsession with originality, engineering authenticity, and design detail. This obsession has been the sine qua non of Apple's operating systems and consumer electronic products for more than 25 years, even though these qualities haven't necessarily delivered superior market share - until now." As well as the sort of acknowledgment certain to enflame the Windows drones... "I truly believe that we don't have anyone like him in our time." Man, are we lucky! There's only one. There's also only one Richard Branson and one Burt Rutan and one Dean Kamen. Right now, brilliant people are pretty thick on the ground, but they don't get the media attention that twits like Donald Trump, Bill Gates or George Bush do because wealthy, egocentric psychopaths are just so very popular right now. At least the press has taken a short break from telling us about that wonderful war and how children should go to jail for stealing music to shine its fading light on good technology and great design. [MacHelp From Maui] 7:51:36 AM

forwards Soren Kierkegaard. "Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards." [Quotes of the Day] 7:48:35 AM

Re: Negroponte Un portatile a 100 dollari. Un portatile a 100 dollari pare sia l'ultima idea di Nicholas Negroponte (Wiesner Professor of Media Technology all'MIT e presidente fondatore del celebre MIT Media Laboratory), raccontata in un'intervista pubblicata ieri dalla BBC. L'idea mi piace molto, oltre che per le sue implicazioni per i paesi in via di sviluppo perchè è molto simile a un'idea che ho in testa da anni e che ho riportato qui in tempi non sospetti. Fa piacere vedere che qualcuno di decisamente famoso e con ampi mezzi a propria disposizione si sta muovendo nella stessa direzione. [ via Boing Boing] [Qix.it] 7:45:42 AM

From John Battelle's Searchblog It's Official - Bloglines Sold to Ask. If you recall my 2004 predictions, I claimed Bloglines would be sold to a major search engine. I just didn't think it would be Ask. But come to think of it, it's a good fit - Yahoo is well on their way toward the Bloglines space with its integration of MyYahoo RSS, and Google, well, Google doesn't seem to have the appetite for RSS many wish it did. MSFT is busy getting its index up to speed. "Ask was the best fit," Mark Fletcher told me last week. "They have a mutli-brand strategy - we will not be going away." Fletcher, who together with Larry's brother Carl Page and a few others sold his other company - eGroups - to Yahoo back in the golden era for a whole lotta dough - does not need to sell. So his choice of Ask is instructive. "Ask got it," he proclaimed, indicating others were in the hunt but did not, er, get it. "We had a lot of choices, and this one made the most sense." So, I asked Jim Lanzone, Ask's head of search and the architect of the deal, what are you going to do with Bloglines? "Our plan is to leave it alone for now," Lanzone answered. "We'll integrate it across properties, but if it never makes us a dime directly, it will make money for us indirectly." In other words, Bloglines is growing like a weed, has tons of users, and more interestingly, tons of data about what those users read. Those profiles might make for some serious endemic advertising plays down the road. Both Fletcher and Lanzone concur. "The profile a user makes on Bloglines is a pretty good proxy for a user's interest," Lanzone said. "But step one is to let Mark blow it out,... [John Battelle's Searchblog] 7:43:06 AM

Tyromaniac Bold prediction: By next year's SuperBowl, Napster will no longer exist. [Tyromaniac (Alfredo's Blog)] 7:40:11 AM

iPods Spotted in Washington State iPods Invade Redmond. Adam Curry's blog for 2-2-05 points to this wonderful article at Wired: Hide Your iPod, Here Comes Bill! Microsoft's leafy corporate campus in Redmond, Washington, is beginning to look like the streets of New York, London and just about everywhere else: Wherever you go, white headphones dangle from peoples' ears. To the growing frustration and annoyance of Microsoft's management, Apple Computer's iPod is wildly popular among Microsoft's workers. "These guys are really quite scared," said the source of Microsoft's management. "It shows how their backs are against the wall.... Even though it's Microsoft, no one is interested in what we have to offer, even our own employees." One manager "... stirred up considerable controversy claiming Apple is locking in consumers with proprietary file formats, despite Microsoft's long history of using the same tactic..." Well, the truth is out. Another Microserf is quoted thus: "I don't really care if it pisses them off," he said. "I'll argue why they're doing it wrong. If you want me to stop using it, give me a product that works and is as easy to use." It's the Rapture! [MacHelp From Maui] 7:36:51 AM

Green Day in April Green Day's North American Tour starts in April, via Yahoo News. 6:30:25 AM