stuff on SWiK

A Quick Om Update

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 08:06:07 -0700

I just want to give you a quick update on why posting might be slow today. I have been researching some big stories, and I need to sit and think about all the information I have gathered and make sense of it all. On top of that, I need to prepare for WordCamp 2008, which is being held in San Francisco this weekend.

Typically, Stacey would fill in, but she is taking a well-deserved computer- and connectivity-free rest. Furthermore, after writing furiously for the past couple of days, I am giving myself a little pause. Of course, all that goes out the window if something major unfolds. To all our readers in India, Happy Independence Day. I miss flying kites with my mates.

As you know, we have great stuff on our network, and here are some highlights from this morning:

NewTeeVee: Olympics are boosting online sports
NewTeeVee Station: John Mayer, Mr. Uncool?
Earth2Tech: Wind power will generate 150 Gigawatts by 2020 in US
WebWorkerDaily: How to deal with corporate web-blocking policies
jkOnTheRun: How Dell is adding Instant-On to its new laptops
OStatic: Mozilla’s mobile browser, Fennec: an update.

Lessons From a Chance Encounter with Joe Torre

Sat, 09 Aug 2008 20:12:26 -0700

There are some days when you really don’t want to get out of bed. All you want to do is watch your favorite shows on Hulu.com. Today turned out to be one of those days — mostly because a thick fog enveloped the city of San Francisco and turned the morning into a dark haze. Since the daily regimen calls for a visit to the gym, I couldn’t laze around for too long. And I am glad I didn’t, for it turned out to be such a great Saturday.

Post gym, I ended up visiting our local book store, Stacey’s, to buy Blackout, the latest thriller by Brazilian writer Luiz Alfredo Garcia-Roza. Next stop, Nordstrom to buy my favorite shaving cream from The Art of Shaving. While browsing the aisles, I saw a man who looked oddly familiar, someone who has been part of my life, walking around the men’s section of the store.

It was Joe Torre - former New York Yankees’ manager, who is in town as his Los Angeles Dodgers take on the San Francisco Giants. He was with his wife and daughter, and on the phone. It took me a minute or so to recognize him, mostly because I have never seen him without pinstripes or outside the baseball context. With some trepidation, I walked up to him and introduced myself.

New York media, a pretty tough crowd, has said that Torre is one of the nicest guys and quite a gentleman. He turned out to be both. He was gracious in taking the complement, and a perfect gentleman while shaking my hand. His behavior reminded me of a lesson my parents taught me as a kid — humility and kindness are cornerstones of a civil society.

From the point of view of a startup guy, Torre exemplifies the fact that success and humility must always go hand in hand for people to appreciate one’s achievements. It also taught me another lesson: Life is too short to be spent lazing around. Laze around too much, and miss unknown opportunities and experiences.

Today’s chance encounter has been a standout moment in my life. Torre gave Yankee fans so many great baseball memories. For me these were moments that marked my slow transition to a very American life. The only bad part of today: Torre-less Yankees got pummeled by Anaheim Angels — again!

Joe Torre bobblehead photo via Flickr courtesy of Xero79

myiilab.com - Web Design, Web Development, Web Systems,Web, IT, Internet, Icon,Icons, Image, Images - Home

Thu, 07 Aug 2008 17:05:23 -0700

Too Many Gadgets, Too Little Space

Sun, 03 Aug 2008 19:12:37 -0700

With little to no desire to do any real writing this weekend, I decided to clean my work space. Once the papers were filed and the books were shifted to the right corner, a clear picture emerged, one of too many gadgets — and too little desk space.

Thankfully, some of those gadgets are review units, soon to be shipped back. But the amount of space they’ll leave behind is still limited. I’m wondering if it’s time to bring home a desktop. Mac Pro is a tad too expensive but would be the perfect machine. I have been trying out Apple’s 30-inch display, but I haven’t come to terms with the size of the screen yet, though the sharpness and clarity are pretty impressive.

Regardless, of all the gadgets sitting on my desk, the Ipevo Skype Desk Phone is the one device I find to be the most useful on a day-to-day basis. If you use Skype to stay in touch with your friends and contacts, I’m sure you would agree. And although you can’t see it in this picture, the Radiosophy’s $50 (after rebates) HD Radio is also a pretty good addition to any work space, especially if you like listening to jazz/blues while writing or surfing the web.

Looking at that photo, which I am sharing with you thanks to a most excellent application/service called Skitch, it is clear that as time goes by, the Edge will continue to become richer and richer. I wonder if this will mean “opportunities” for some software guys who can make sense of this personal data-rich environment.

What also became suddenly clear to me from looking at my living room set-up was that the EU-backed Nanodatacenter project isn’t as far fetched as one might think.

The so-called Nanodatacenters project is based on the idea that you don’t need giant data centers as long as you have increasingly powerful devices in millions of living rooms, capable of doing so much more than suffering through all those Law & Order re-runs.

Where’s Om Today? Pier Screenings Sizzled

Fri, 01 Aug 2008 11:13:32 -0700

It has been an exhausting two weeks. First there was the Brainstorm Tech Conference down in Half Moon Bay, then a panel discussion at the MobileBeat conference, followed by a pit stop to the TechCrunch Party (see photo), a visit to the Microsoft Campus up in Redmond on Monday, and quick visits with some startups down in Silicon Valley on Tuesday and Wednesday.

It ended yesterday with our first NewTeeVee Pier Screenings of 2008. What a fun event it was — from the video selections to the popcorn and heat lamps — not to mention the fantastic support of the video fans, who showed up in large numbers. (See photos from Joey & Liz’s wrap-up post.) Thanks to everyone who showed up, and to our sponsors, who made the screenings happen. We hope that you will join us in Los Angeles, New York and of course, back again in San Francisco for our final show.

The screenings last night were an awesome team effort. Nothing makes me prouder than seeing my dream turn into reality as the result of everyone putting their heart and soul into the work.

Speaking of the team, Stacey is keeping an eye on things today. I am going to take some time off and visit my cardiologist for a routine check-up. (Have you made an appointment get a check-up from your doctor yet?) After that, I want to spend some time pondering all the information that I’ve gathered over the past few days before I put it all together in posts that will be useful to our readers.

Of course, some time needs to be spent reading other blogs. By the way, I am loving Robert Scoble these days, because he is writing fewer — but more meaningful — posts. Ditto for fellow hack Mathew Ingram, who has a unique and different take on the hothouse we call Silicon Valley.

Later tonight, I am meeting with the folks organizing the Start Conference next week, and then onto a big bash at my buddy Jared Kim’s company, WeGame.

So if you don’t see me blogging, don’t think I’m slacking off. I’m just thinking!

Original Back to the Future Hoverboard on auction for $30K min!

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 17:56:31 -0700

Remember all the great hoverboard posts? Well, check out this original, used Back-to-the-Future hoverboard on auction at eBay with minimum bid starting at $30 grand!

via neatorama

Other fun stuff on Hoverboards

How to Make a PC Fan Hoverboard on Zedomax

Racing Homemade DIY Hoverboards

Download latest version of Flash to view video!.

Click Here to View in Full Screen Mode

Roboman Hoverboard probably comes closest to concept of a Back-to-the-Future Hoverboard.

How to make a Hoverboard!

DIY Real Hoverboard Kits

Hoverboard using a Vac

Another cool DIY Hoverboard

Hover Bike

Bluetooth Hovercrafts gone bad at Zedomax

Full link to everything tagged with “hoverboard” on zedomax.com. [Page 1 - Page2]

Hoverwing

Brought to you by: Zedomax.com

Original Back to the Future Hoverboard on auction for $30K min!

mootools - SWiK

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 12:55:17 -0700

WicketStuff Dojo - Wicket Stuff WIKI

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 10:54:06 -0700

The powerful and easy-to-use object-oriented web framework Wicket meets Dojo - a javascript toolkit which lets you make your webapps even more usable, responsive, and functional.

WicketStuff-Dojo-Examples

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 10:54:05 -0700

AsWing

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 00:50:56 -0700

AsWing is an Open Source Flash ActionScript GUI framework and library that allows programmers to make their flash application(or RIA) UI easily.

Free Vector World Maps Collection

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 03:50:15 -0700

Useful stuff - 2008 - first half

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:48:43 -0700

Having a Google account is sometimes useful in ways you hadn’t planned for. For example, at a few different employers I’ve been at, I’ve had to prepare for reviews by providing a list of accomplishments to my supervisor. One decent tool for generating this list is email, though it can take some time. Another useful tool is the Web History feature of your Google account.

Though this isn’t necessarily indicative of everything I’ve accomplished in the first half of 2008 per se, it’s definitely indicative of the types of things I’ve generally been into so far this year, and it’s interesting to look back. What does your Web History say?

Gearman - this is used by some rather large web sites, notably Digg. It reminds me a little of having Torque and Maui, but geared toward more general-purpose applications. In fact, it was never clear to me that PBS/Maui couldn’t actually do this, but I didn’t get far enough into Gearman to really say that authoritatively.
How SimpleDB Differs from a Relational Database - Links off to some very useful takes on the “cloud” databases, which are truly fascinating creatures, but have a vastly different data management philosophy from the relational model we’re all used to.
Reblog - I found this in the footer of someone’s blog post. It’s kinda neat, but to be honest, I think you can do similar stuff using the Flock browser.
Google Finance APIs and Tools - did I ever mention that I had a Series 7 & 63 license two months after my 20th birthday? I love anything that I can think for very long periods of time about, where there’s lots and lots and LOTS of data to play with, where you can make correlations and answer questions nobody even thought to ask. Of course, soon after finding this page I found the actual Google Finance page, which answers an awful lot of potential questions. The stock screener is actually what I was looking to write myself, but with the data freely available, I’m sure it won’t be long before I find something else fun to do with it. I’m not a fan of Google’s “Feeds” model, but I’ve dealt with it before, and will do it again if it means getting at this data.
Bitpusher - it was recommended to me as an alternative to traditional dedicated server hosting. Worth a look.
S3 Firefox Organizer - This is a firefox plugin that provides an interface that looks a lot like an FTP GUI or something, but allows you to move files to and from “buckets” in Amazon’s S3 service.
Boto - A python library for writing programs that interact with the various Amazon Web Services. It’s not particularly well-documented, and it has a few quirks, but it is useful.
OmniGraffle - A Visio replacement for Apple OS X. I like it a lot better than Visio, actually. It has tons of contributed templates. You shouldn’t have any trouble making the switch. A little pricey, but I plunked down the cash, and have not been disappointed.
The Python Queue Module according to Doug - Doug Hellmann’s Python Module of the Week (PyMOTW) should be published in dead tree form some day. I happen to have some code that could make better use of queuing if it were a) written in Python, and b) used the Queue module. I was a little put off by the fact that every single tutorial I found on this module assumed you wanted to use threading, which I actually don’t, because I’m not smart enough…. though the last person I told that to said something to the effect of “the fact that you believe that means you’re smart enough”. Heh.
MySQL GROUP modifiers - turns out this isn’t what I needed for the problem I was trying to solve, but the “WITH ROLLUP” feature was new to me at the time I found it, and it’s kinda cool.
Wordpress “Subscribe to Comments” plugin - Baron suggested that it would be good to have this, and I had honestly not even thought about it. But looking around, this is the only plugin of its kind that I found, and it’s only tested up to WP 2.3x, and I’m on 2.5x. This is precisely why I hate plugins (as an end user, anyway. Loghetti supports plugins)
Lifeblogging - I had occasion to go back and flip through some of the volumes of journals I’ve kept since age 12, wondering if it might be time to digitize those in some form. I might digitize them, but they will *not* be public I don’t think. Way too embarrassing.
ldapmodrdn - for a buddy who hasn’t yet found all of the openldap command line tools. You can’t use ‘ldapmodify’ (to my knowledge) to *rename* an entry.
Django graphs - I haven’t yet tried this, because I’m still trying to learn Django in what little spare time I have, but it looks like there’s at least some effort towards this out there in the community. I have yet to see a newspaper that doesn’t have graphs *somewhere* (finance, sports, weather…), so I’m surprised Django doesn’t have something like this built-in.
URL Decode UDF for MySQL - I’ve used this. It works really well.
Erlang - hey, I’m game for anything. If I weren’t, I’d still be writing all of my code in Perl.
The difference between %iowait in sar and %util in iostat - I use both tools, and wanted the clarification because I was writing some graphing code in Python (using Timeplot, which rocks, by the way), and stumbled upon the question. Google to the rescue!
OSCON ‘08 - I’m going. Are you going? I’m also going to the Oregon Brewers Festival on the last day of OSCON, as I did in ‘06. Wonderful!
Explosion at one of my hosting providers - didn’t affect me, but… wow!
hypertable - *sigh* someday…when there’s time…
Small-scale hydro power - Yeah, I’m kind of a DIYer at heart. I do some woodworking, all my own plumbing, painting, flooring, I brew my own beer, I cook, I collect rain in big barrels, power sprinklers using pool runoff to give my lawn a jumpstart in spring… that kind of stuff. One day I noticed water coming out of a downspout fast enough to leap over one of my rain barrels and thought there must be some way to harness that power. Sadly, there really isn’t, so I did some research. It’s non-trivial.
You bet your garden - I also do my own gardening and related experiments.
RightScale Demo - WATCH YOUR VOLUME - a screencast showing off RightScale’s features. Impressive considering the work it would take me, a lone admin, to set something like this up. The learning curve involved in effectively/efficiently managing/scaling/monitoring/troubleshooting EC2 is non-trivial.
Homebrew Kegerator - Maybe if this startup is bought out I can actually afford this thing to put my homebrewed beer in. The 30-year-old spare fridge in the basement is getting a little… gamey.
The pound proxy daemon - I use this. It works well enough, but I’ve crashed it under load, too. I’ve also had at least one hosting provider misconfigure it on my behalf, and I had to go and tell them how to fix it :-/
Droid Sans Mono - a fantastic coding font. Installing this font is in my post-install routine for all of my desktops.
Generator tricks for systems programmers - David Beazley has made available a lot of Python source code and presentation slides from what I imagine was a great talk (if you’re a systems guy, which I am).
The Wide Finder Saga - I found this just as I was writing Loghetti. There are still some things in Mr. Lundh’s code that I haven’t implemented, but it was a fantastic lesson.
Using gnu sort for IP addresses - I’ve used sort in a lot of different ways over the years… but not for IP addresses. This is a nice hack for pulling this off with sort, but it doesn’t scale very well when you have millions of them, due to the sort utility’s ‘divide and conquer’ method of sorting.
Writing an Hadoop/MapReduce Program in Python - this got me over the hump.
Notes on using EC2/S3 - This got me over some other small humps
BeautifulSoup - found while searching for the canonical way to screen scrape with Python. I’d done it a million times in Perl, and you can do it with httplib and regex and stuff in Python if you want, but this way is at least a million times nicer.

Well, that’s a decent enough summary I guess. As you can see, I’ve been doing a good bit of Python scripting. Most of my code these days is written in Python instead of Perl, in part because I was given the choice, and in part because Python fits my brain and makes me want to write more code, to push myself more. I’ve also been dealing with things involving “cloud” computing and “scalability” — like Hadoop, and EC2/S3. I haven’t done as much testing of the Google utility computing services, but I’ve used their various APIs for some things.

So what’s in your history?

addthis_url = 'http%3A%2F%2Fwww.protocolostomy.com%2F2008%2F07%2F11%2Fuseful-stuff-2008-first-half%2F'; addthis_title = 'Useful+stuff+-+2008+-+first+half'; addthis_pub = 'jonesy';

Leaflets

Mon, 07 Jul 2008 12:55:43 -0700

Destination: San Francisco. And Still NoGoBoingo

Sat, 05 Jul 2008 21:49:37 -0700

The week-long whirlwind of a tour to Israel is finally over. Waiting for my flight, I’m wondering when I’m going to get to sleep in my own bed. It is about 18 hours of flying time — London and Philadelphia are two stops on the way — with about six hours of layovers. Given that I am going to be flying on US Airways — an airline with a patchy track record of timeliness and service — I’m not sure if everything is going to work out. Never mind the fact that both Heathrow and Philadelphia Airports are shining examples of tardiness.

The nightmare ahead not withstanding, I have to say, the trip has been quite satisfying, for I am always amazed by the tirelessness of Israeli people. Tel-Aviv is a unique place, almost matching the pervasiveness of technology (and tech startups). Twice I got pitched while waiting for cabs on the street, a scene right out of a random meeting in Palo Alto. (Check out TypeMock, one of the companies I got pitched on.)

One of the promises I made to myself on this trip was that I would keep my computer time to a bare minimum and rely almost entirely on my mobile device of the month, the Blackberry Curve. The reason for my computer-free diet was to get some downtime and enjoy the lovely beaches of this country. I also wanted to take some time to write a longer-form report from Israel.

Well, the downtime didn’t quite happen, for I ended up meeting tons of companies — about 40 in all. Those meetings consumed a lot of cycles, not to mention the pages in my trusted MoleSkin notebook. I am going to use the long flight home to type out the notes about some of the more promising startups.

One of the highlights of this trip was an informal meeting with Yari Goldfinger, co-founder of ICQ, at the TWS 2008 conference in Tel-Aviv. Our chat was long, expansive and rambling, but enjoyable nevertheless, despite my jet lag.

Before I take off, one last word about the deplorable state of commercial Wi-Fi. The GoBoingo continues to fail the review, for the Tel-Aviv Airport is yet another location where Boingo — via its new client, GoBoingo — refuses to work.

The network shows up but error messages abound. You guys are aware of my troubles with Boingo thus far and how the service failed to work in certain major airports. The company’s spokespeople emailed and did some major verbal gymnastics, but the proof is in the pudding. Next stop will be Heathrow and then Philly. Maybe…just maybe Boingo can redeem itself, but I’m not holding my breath.

See you next week!

Destination Tel-Aviv: Some Work, Some Fun

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 16:04:03 -0700

Updated From Frankfurt: It has already been a long day! I got up at 3 a.m. to get ready and head to the San Francisco Airport in time to catch my early morning US Airways flight to Charlotte and then connect to Frankfurt and then to Tel-Aviv. US Airways doesn’t tell you that you that you’re flying through “some city” on your way to Europe, which was funny because I ended up at the International Airport and then had to head back to the domestic terminal.

I am going there for the TWS 2008 conference, where I am one of the judges. I fell in love with Tel-Aviv on my trip last year, but never got to really chill and enjoy the city very much. This year, I plan to enjoy the beaches and recover a little from Structure 08-related madness. I have to say, I am seriously nervous, because this is a long trip, my first one since my heart attack and my first attempt at normalcy.

While the first part of the journey turned out to be fine, at Charlotte I found out that the connecting flight was going to be late by three hours, so the day — which was going to be around 18 hours — is now going to be even longer. While waiting for the next flight, I tried to log into T-Mobile via Boingo, whose new offering, Go Boingo, is going to be released on Monday and I am testing out right now. You can try out their free day pass, and the best part is it’s ready for Mac users — and is pretty awesome.

Speaking of Mac, I saw dozens of people toting Macbooks of various kind in the airport and its various lounges. Something interesting or maybe just a coincidence? I’m not sure. Regardless, it’s nice to carry the AIR as it doesn’t break one’s back!

Without access, I had to come with a way to connect. My connection with my 3G Nokia N95 didn’t seem to work, so instead I turned to JoikuSpot, an application I’ve written about earlier. Now the connection via JoikuSoft isn’t fast and isn’t letting me download emails, but it is letting me surf the web. It’s better than nothing, and JoikuSoft delivered as promised. Now I’m glad that I wrote about this little application. (Anyway, if you have any tips on how set up a Nokia N95 as a 3G modem, let me know. The default settings aren’t quite working.)

Update: Finally got to Frankfurt at about 3 a.m. PT, or around 11 a.m. local time. The airport is a mess — chaotic and disorganized. It can’t be called “efficient” by any means, and reminds me how old this hub really is. In comparison to SFO’s International Terminal, Frankfurt is provincial. Lufthansa’s business lounge is nothing but a giant, messy hall. For some odd reason, the T-Mobile USA hotspot passwords are not working and it costs 18 euro cents to get a WAN connection. Nice to be a monopoly.

On Boingo: Well it’s proving to be utterly worthless. In the places you really need it — like my two stops thus far, the damned so-called Global Wireless Service hasn’t really worked. I’m wondering if the the dream of a seamless global network that provides endless connectivity will remain just that — a dream.

My flight isn’t till 11 pm tonight and I get into Tel-Aviv at around 3:30 a.m. in the morning. There is little or no chance of any sleep. It’s the last time I trust a failing airline like US Airways fulfill to my travel plans.

I will update the post when I get to Tel-Aviv.

Your WoW summer e-reading list

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 19:56:46 -0700

Filed under: Tips, Podcasting, Fan stuff, Guides So you've caught up on WoW Insider. You've read today's Dilbert. You<sep/>

Delicious Bookmarks :: Firefox Add-ons

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 11:01:18 -0700

Off-Topic: What To Watch This Summer: “Wall-E”

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 08:08:59 -0700

My inner nerd is thrilled at the prospect of Pixar’s upcoming movie “Wall-E.” Rich Greenfield, an analyst with Pali Capital who is typically very stingy with praise is waxing eloquent about the movie after watching the preview. In a note to his clients this morning, he writes:

…Investors have been wary of Wall-E’s box office potential given Pixar’s risky bet on an offbeat main character, who rarely speaks during the film. Nonetheless, the film substantially exceeded our expectations and was well-received by the audience.

We believe Pixar hit the mark, delivering a very rich story in Wall-E.: We see the film appealing to younger children who will be drawn to the quirky but extremely lovable characters (especially Wall-E).

The love story between the two main characters and the presence of a solid female character (Wall-E’s love interest, Eve) should also appeal to girls of all ages. Finally, we believe the film will resonate well with older audiences who will find much to like in Wall-E’s character and antics, the love story and the film’s other messages (e.g. the environment).

Our only concern: There is somewhat less action and the pacing is somewhat more measured.

Looks like this could be Steve Jobs’ other big summer blockbuster hit. Sure he doesn’t run Pixar anymore, but he owns a big portion of Disney. Greenfield expects the movie to make $550 million to $600 million (or more) at the box office worldwide, and says it “should be a solid contributor to Disney’s DVD sales in FY Q1 2009.”

Old School Telephone Kitchen Timer!

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:05:20 -0700

Want to make your kitchen look old-school? Then get the telephone kitchen timer, which looks just like an old school telephone.

The company claims:

Burnt roasts and cakes will be a thing of the past!

Great stuff guys, that’s top notch emerging technology we need.

via coolest-gadgets

Introducing Om 2.0: The Avatar

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 09:21:36 -0700

A few days ago, commenting on one of my posts, a reader inquired about my health, in particular whether or not I was behaving myself. While on the one hand I found it mildly amusing, as it felt like my mom was asking the question — which she does every Sunday — his comment also made me realize how much our little community cares about my well-being.

I’ve been meaning to write about my progress, but I’ve shied away from it because it always felt like I would be imposing on people’s time. And I’m still not ready to share it all.

But in the meantime, I can show off my new icon/avatar for the site. Gone is the old hat-wearing, cigar-chomping, newshound look. Instead, what you have is a simpler, more understated icon whose sparseness reflects my new mantra — less is really more. And doing more with less is really hard. Let’s call this version of me Om 2.0.

Simple food, simple clothes, a simple home and simple, clear writing. Hopefully I can stick to that plan. I have incorporated physical exercise into my daily life, given up smoking, gone almost completely vegetarian and taken to wearing jeans. Life, as they say, is uncomplicated. More importantly, about six months after my heart attack, I have resumed some of my regular activities — including playing tennis on the Wii!

PS: Check out this awesome little illustration Mivui did using the new icon. This is how I am supposed to look like in 10 years. Worthy goal - both from a fitness and a longevity standpoint.

Bike Powered Tennis Ball Launcher!

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 12:24:01 -0700

Download latest version of Flash to view video!.

Click Here to View in Full Screen Mode

Here’s a fun DIY, a bike that’s powers a tennis ball launcher.

Pretty good stuff…

Both cleanly powered and built from 2 recycled bicycles, scrap steel and wood, leaking 5 gallon water jug and a lacross stick, our pedal powered tennis ball launcher was created as a unique entry for the innovate or die pedal powered machine contest.
It allows players varying in skill levels to practice to be better at both tennis and cycling. The launcher is towed to the court on its built-in bicycle trailer. A bike is secured to it and functions to drive the device. Pedaling the cycle as one would on a trainer drives the two launcher wheels. The cyclist then aims using the bike handlebars to and pulls the lever to launch balls to the hitter.

via instructables

A Personal Note: Pause & Read

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 18:20:46 -0700

The passing of Tim Russert, a man I greatly admired, came as the result of a massive heart attack, an event that cannot be predicted. Having suffered a heart attack myself earlier this year, I know this firsthand — the heart is no match for the high-stress, multitasking lives that so many of us lead. And before we know it, our poor habits catch up with us. It’s why I urge you to get yourself to the doctor and get your much-delayed physical. You would be doing yourself, your family and even your startup a favor.

As part of my recovery process, my cardiologist Dr. Eduardo Rame of UCSF suggested that I take some time out of my busy life and spend it on projects that are focused on helping others. It is the best and most effective way to de-stress – doing good and breaking your routines. So I decided to get involved with UCSF and help them raise some funds. (If any of you would like to help, please drop me a note.)

Some of the encouragement to help UCSF came from Ron Conway, a well-known angel investor who is as passionate about charity work as he is about startups. He helped build the cardiology ICU facility at UCSF that helped save my life. (He is on the board of the UCSF Medical Foundation.) Today he unveiled another effort that I urge everyone to support.

UCSF along with YouTube have launched a comprehensive Internet video channel dedicated to the improved understanding of incurable neurodegenerative brain diseases. The YouTube channel is part of an overall Internet campaign that will help UCSF’s researchers and clinicians reach out to a global audience.

It was inspired by the “Fight for Mike,” an initiative by Silicon Valley leaders to save the life of former Apple/Netscape marketing ace Mike Homer, who was diagnosed last spring with CJD and is being treated at UCSF. Since June 2007, the Fight for Mike has raised more than $7 million for CJD research at UCSF. Maybe you want to join hands and help support the cause.

A Personal Note: Pause & Read

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 17:20:24 -0700

And before we know it, our poor habits catch up with us. It’s why I urge you to get yourself to the doctor and get your much-delayed physical. You would be doing yourself, your family and even your startup a favor. As part of my recovery process, my cardiologist Dr. Eduardo Rame of UCSF suggested that I take some time out of my busy life and spend it on projects that are focused on helping others. It is the best and most effective way to de-stress ??? doing good and breaking your routines. So I decided to get involved with UCSF and help them raise some funds. (If any of you would like to help, please drop me a note.)

UCSF along with YouTube have launched a comprehensive Internet video channel dedicated to the improved understanding of incurable neurodegenerative brain diseases. The YouTube channel is part of an overall Internet campaign that will help UCSF???s researchers and clinicians reach out to a global audience.

RIP, Tim Russert

Fri, 13 Jun 2008 17:20:25 -0700

Sundays will never be the same. Earlier today, Tim Russert, the man who hosted “Meet The Press~~Nation~~” on NBC, passed away. He apparently succumbed to a heart attack, although the exact cause of death has not yet been determined. It was a rude reminder of the fragility of life, and how quickly it comes to an end. It also reminded me of my own brush with mortality and how lucky I am to be around. Russert was a gold standard for many of us in the media business — a role model who never disappointed, constantly prodded and almost always informed.

Watching Russert, I learned how to ask tough and uneasy questions, be charming when charm was called for and indulge in indignation when an iron fist was necessary. Moreover, I learned how important it is to never be malicious, angry or improper — even though that has become the way of the world. At 58, he died too soon, for I think he would have liked to cover the historic upcoming elections. He passed while hard at work, and I suspect he wouldn’t have had it any other way. Not meeting him is the first big regret of my life.

RIP, Tim Russert

Fri, 13 Jun 2008 16:20:54 -0700

How Can You Not Be Touched?

Mon, 09 Jun 2008 21:12:34 -0700

Earlier this evening, I had something happen to me that made my day. I was sitting down in the Starbucks where GigaOM got going, talking to Liz, who happens to be in New York for Internet Week, while I waited for Tony Jebara, CTO of Sense Networks, a company I wrote about earlier this morning.

While I jawed on the phone, a kind lady by the name of Nina left me a little note on a Starbucks napkin, encouraging me to stay healthy and saying how much she liked reading us. (See photo). Nina, thank you, from the bottom of my heart. Your gesture really touched me.

The wishes and prayers of such readers is why I have been able to find to strength to deal with my medical setback. These random acts of kindness remind me of what Rocketboom founder Andrew Baron said on Twitter: “After Sysiphus’ bolder fell down the mountain, during his descent to get it again, his time was free for the beautiful things instead.” This was a beautiful thing!

Sit Back & Watch: NewTeeVee Station

Mon, 09 Jun 2008 21:12:33 -0700

Over the past 18 months, there has been quite an explosion of video choices on the web. The number of interesting shows keeps going up by the day, making it harder to keep up with the new, cool stuff that makes Must-See-NewTeeVee. I’ve often wondered, what if there was a web service that collated and curated the best of the NewTeeVee shows, finding cool videos before they became a meme, shows that genuinely entertain? In other words, a web app that took the time to scrub out the noise and deliver the best video experience according to select editors. I wanted a place on the web that would do all that but during the lunch hour — the new prime time — and without cutting into people’s daily Facebook fix.

It was a wild idea, I admit, but it seems like the guys in our little company were up for the challenge, and in less than three months have brought it to fruition. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you NewTeeVee Station, available now at station.newteevee.com.

Some facts about NewTeeVee Station:

Features editorial reviews of online videos written by a team lead by Liz Shannon Miller, who comes to us from Variety and the Daily Reel.
Has over 100 NTV shows & videos as part of the launch effort alone.
Sports a database of cast, crew and other details to map out the expanding web video universe.
Invites readers to become part of the editorial process by adding their own reviews, comments and ratings.
Boasts eight channels of the most memorable comedy, commercials, drama, music, news & talk, personalities, reality and zeitgeist picks.
Showcases what’s hot at that moment, right on the front page.
Can be subscribed to via the Station RSS feed or be bundled with NewTeeVee Feed.

It’s still a work in progress, and will be for a time, as we plan to tweak and improve it each day for the foreseeable future. I didn’t want to place the “beta” tag on it because I feel that the web keeps evolving, and web applications keep growing, just like all of us — and we never put a beta after our names. Om 2.0, however, is OK if you’ve had a heart attack and change your lifestyle and habits. Sorry for that personal digression, but it’s an important backdrop to this new site.

In my opinion, the most unfair part of the job of CEO/founder is taking credit for the work that everyone else puts into making your dreams and crazy ideas become real. So I wanted to set the record straight: This new effort is a testament to the intelligence and excellence of the GigaOM team. Apart from coming up with a harebrained idea back before my heart attack and some occasional Jobs-ian rants, this is the work of the following people:

On the editorial side, Liz Gannes, Liz Miller and Chris Albrecht worked with our tech team of Chancey Matthews and Kyle Johnson. They were all shepherded by Joey Wan, who rose to the challenge and became the project manager for NewTeeVee Station, in addition to helping us out on Structure 08. Mule Design came up with the design to fit with the original NewTeeVee look, and the folks at VodPod worked hard to help us build the viewing widget. Our editors, Carolyn Pritchard and Celeste LeCompte, helped add spit and polish to the editorial content.

Liz on NewTeeVee writes: “I haven’t meant to neglect NewTeeVee lately, I swear. But I have a very good excuse (and a newfound regard for product managers and PR people!)” Yes, it has been a great learning process. Thanks everyone, you made us all proud. When we all gather together soon — we will pop the bubbly! Now let’s watch some NewTeeVee.

Doxymacs = Doxygen + Emacs

Wed, 04 Jun 2008 12:52:23 -0700

D:Conference: Windows 7 First Look. Bill Gates Finally Funny

Tue, 27 May 2008 19:20:59 -0700

It didn’t quite have the sentimental feeling of the Steve Jobs & Bill Gates talk from last year, but it was interesting to see the dynamic of Steve Ballmer & Bill Gates. I think it was great to see Bill step back and let Steve enjoy the limelight, and not take himself too seriously. I think instead of writing about the whole conversation, I am going to share this tiny bit I captured on video that shows how relaxed Gates is feeling these days, now that he has shifted all responsibilities to Ballmer.

Click To Play

Bill was very candid about Vista and its problems. “We never ship a product that I am satisfied with 100 percent” he said. “There is always improvement. Vista gave us lot of opportunities for improvement.” Funny… anyway

What I did find strangely amusing: the Microsoft duo has a tough time using the phrase “Google” and constantly referred to them as the other guys. I really wish I could ask the duo about why they are so obsessed with Online Advertising? Are they acknowledging that all innovation and growth opportunities in applications and operating systems are done? Why not obsess about being the world’s best on-demand software company? Anyway that’s for another day. I picked up some great notes for my post about Search and the competitive landscape.

Now moving on to Windows 7. The company showed off a nice demo of the multi touch features of Windows 7 and how you could paint with your fingers, or open applications and use maps in the new version of Microsoft’s operating system that comes to market sometime in 2009. (More details and videos here.)

I think if you have used iPod Touch, iPhone and Coverflow, you are not going to be as wow-ed by multi-touch, but I have to admit, that even in its rudimentary form, it looked pretty darn good. I have a feeling Apple is going to bring this to market much before Microsoft. Stacey joked about the new features pointing out that the smudging caused by multi-touch would surely make money for companies like 3M.

Anyway more on the conference tomorrow!

Original Post

I have just arrived at the D6 Conference organized by Kara Swisher & Walt Mossberg. I will have an update in an hour or so. Our good friends at D tell us that Bill Gates is going to show off an early version of Windows 7. Now that is something to look forward to and dig into. I have my trusted Sanyo Xaacti in the tow and I will be doing some video updates from here. Given the noise at the conferences, don’t expect stellar quality but hey, it sure beats nothing.

Let’s Talk About Data Portability/Interoperability:

Fri, 16 May 2008 19:18:57 -0700

Weather in San Francisco Bay Area is especially nice and is likely to remain that way for a while. It makes perfect sense to sit outside and talk about the hottest topic to hit the Innerwebs: Data portability/interoperability. Whether it is Facebook, MySpace or Google, each has been coming up with ways to control the user. Somehow the noise has gotten ahead of the fact, and I would like to meet smart people about this over the weekend.

A frank conversation with non-conflicted parties that would help me write smarter and conceptually sound posts going forward. I propose: 2.30 PM at Starbucks on Clay & Battery in San Francisco on Sunday, May 18th, 2008. I will buy coffee and cakes, but please don’t pitch me your company. I want some honesty about this topic.

Looks like there is a lot of debate about this today. Check out Techmeme. I have confirmation from various folks including Marc Canter who has been a lightening rod on this issue for a while.

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A Personal Note: Pause & Read

A Personal Note: Pause & Read

RIP, Tim Russert

RIP, Tim Russert

How Can You Not Be Touched?

Sit Back & Watch: NewTeeVee Station

Doxymacs = Doxygen + Emacs

D:Conference: Windows 7 First Look. Bill Gates Finally Funny

Let’s Talk About Data Portability/Interoperability: