smartnotions

Moving On & Over

2006-02-27T22:29:00.000-08:00

My new blog is: http://monkeynotions.com/blog

It seems like this was never published. These were the problems with blogger at the time and why I left:

Well I decided to leave Blogger and move my blog to Wordpress. There are lot's of things I like about Blogger (besides the very fact that I'm used to it). But the one thing I really don't like is there is no Categories and I still havent' found a way to create categories for my blog entries. I think Categories are nice for myself and readers (and it's not cause I'm an organizing freak..seriously you should see my room!) I really like the amount of templates and the presentaton of those templates that Blogger has also... wordpress cannot compare with the presentation.

But most of all I'm able to move it to a new host and new name. The name of my new site is called monkeynotions. I figured what's the point of creating such a high standard for myself with a site and blog called smartnotions and forcing myself to sound quasi-intellectual all the time? I've relaxed and now can feel free to *monkey* around with notions or make it seem like the notions came from a monkey... some would argue a lower standard...heh heh... Well check out my new blog!!

P.S. I still have not quite understood Republish Entire Blog or just Republish Index... sigh who would havee thought blogging would be such a difficult thing?

Getting Naked & Crunched

2006-02-19T08:07:00.000-08:00

Yes as mentioned below, I was went to the Techcrunch Meetup, and was able to do some podcasting for AOL's Behind the Scenes in Mountain View (search iTunes for AOL Mountain View). I'll let you know when it gets published, but here is a list of cool & interesting folks and companies:

Mike Rowehl (Co-Organizer of Mobile Monday): Mobile Monday is a grass roots organization that gets together the first Monday of every month to talk about issues of Mobility.

Josh Elman (Product Manager): Zazzle is a market place where creative designers can display and sell their work. Check out the podcast to see how they are different from Cafe Press...ebay may have to move over soon!

Justin Smith(Founder): Standpoint is a real easy way to create a blog by stating a belief and building a case for it. It also allows you to find others in the community that share your beliefs. hmmm..sounds like the beginnings to a nice dating site or a place for budding lawyers to practice their articulation ;).

Richard Lusk(Founder) & Oliver Starr (CMO): Foldera is a new and easy way to access, organize and share your files seamlessly. They came all the way from Sunny Southern California to be here. Seems they will be heavily integrated with the phone, as they have Oliver Starr on board, author of Mobilecrunch. and you guys thought CMO stood for Chief Morale Officer ;). I got a snap of them flickring me as I was flickring them.

Ken Leeder(Founder): Real Travel is a way where people looking to travel can not only find recommendations from real travelers, but also have an end-to-end experience of sharing their trip. You can find a ravishing review of Tahiti by yours truly ;)

....and of course the whole reason for the party....*drumroll*

Robert Scoble & Shel Israel (Authors):See below for a more details of our interview, but they are the authors of Naked Conversations: How Blogs are Changing the Way Businesses Talk with Customers .

I'll let you guys know when the podcast is up. It was my first time podcasting, so I'm warning it could be rough. Maybe Mike will be able to work his magic ;).

Technorati Tags: techcrunch5,techcrunch,nakedconversations,robertscoble, shelisrael

Naked Conversation Madness

2006-02-19T07:55:00.000-08:00

So I went to a the 5th Techcrunch Meetup which was the Launch Party for the book "Naked Conversations" (by Robert Scoble & Shel Israel). It's about how companies have changed their relationships with their customers through blogging. Robert started a *behind the scenes* show about Microsoft called Channel 9. The whole story has been great and inspiring I big company, who is trying to become more open.

I met Robert & Shel who were really cool down to earth guys, as Dossy was able to give me a good excuse ;). I was able to ask each of them two questions. Instead of re-inventing the wheel I decided to ask each of them the same questions. I will summarize (which can lead to intepretation) their answers, for their exact words, I'd check out the podcast:).

1.Who is one person/position you'd like to see start blogging?

Shel: Anyone who is in a position and able to (I like his all hands on deck approach)

Robert: George W. Bush (and I was hoping Fidel Castro)

2. At AOL, there are a number of employees who are on the cusp of blogging, what would tip or encouragement do you have to say for them to get them to start?

Shel: Just start blogging ;)

Robert: Start reading blogs, and seeing if you are interested in leaving comments; if not, perhaps blogging is not your bag.

Thank you Robert & Shel for your time.

...Will be getting the podcast out soon (hopefully it will turn out okay. Warning:it's a bit rough) ...You can check it out on iTunes: Search for AOL Mountain View, which is behind the scenes look at our crazy campus ;).

Technorati Tags: techcrunch,nakedconversations,robertscoble, shelisrael

New Yahoo Design Library

2006-02-16T23:34:00.000-08:00

Man Yahoo is just solid. The other day they released a Design Pattern Library that has a blog component to it. It seems like a bottom - top approach has been the theme for the Web 2.0 and Yahoo is trying to include itself into that culture. Let me explain. From what I hear Yahoo created it's standards by first seeing what all their products are using and even created incentives for people to submit the design patterns. This is the first way they included themselves. Instead of creating a body of standards and disseminating, they looked at what was already been done and built on that. I'd like to think that, internally, the products appreciated that. The second thing that Yahoo did was to create a blog...verry Web 2.0, but what's nice is now they have opened up the floor to the public and anyone. I am glad to see Yahoo becoming Web 2.0 in their actions. To me they have always been very clean in their design that gave it a bit of a rigid feel, lacking an experience or a *ghettoness* to it, but if they can pull this conversation off and build a community around it, the rigid feel is only one minor detail.

Bubble vs. Boom

2006-01-31T07:53:00.000-08:00

Bubble vs. Boom
Originally uploaded by niallkennedy.

Is 2006 really what the .com Boom should have been in 1999? It would be interesting to think if we never had a 1999 boom and bust...I bet money would be flowing a little freer. On the one hand it's smart for VCs to wait until the market is proven. On the other hand, VC funding may be exactly what is needed to get the product/startup to a revenue generating state...

Asian Backstreet Boys:: Fantastic Video!

2005-11-07T08:24:00.000-08:00

This video was sent to a listserv that I'm on. It's a fantastic spoof of the Back Street Boys by two Chinese students in Guangzhou Arts Institute. "Their spoof music videos have been selected by Motorola China to promote mobile phones".

What amazes me about all this is the amount of participation from the masses to create and broadcast to a wide audience. This not a new concept, but for me I'm wondering if this is a step towards also breaking down stereotypes. Let me explain....

In the past, when I have seen Asian Males portrayed in American Media, they are mostly seen as effeminate and awkward. When people laughed at stereotypes (e.g. Long Duk Dong in Sixteen Candles), I was always hard-pressed to laugh with them because I knew people were laughing at them.

When William Hung came along with his rendition of Ricky Martin's "She Bang's", it was the laughing stock of America because people were laughing more *at* him. And of course this has happened whenever Chinese/Asians have tried to take American pop culture and seriously imitate or make it their own. Most people have just laughed at their efforts. But, here is the first time that I have seen Chinese folk deliberately making fun of American Culture and turning it on it's head.

This citizen journalism stuff ain't so bad ... Especially when underrepresented minorities (in the media) can take back their image/identity and make fun of the perpetrators of those stereotypes.

More info on the Asian Backstreet Boys can be found here:
Asian Backstreet Boys

Blogging

2005-11-02T12:57:00.000-08:00

This site is awesome!!!

Testing Flock

2005-10-21T05:25:00.000-07:00

Flock announced it's 0.5 preview browser release. I'm just playing with it. so far it feels like moz on roids....i do like the integration into my blog on blogger, but word is still out about the ui experience of it....it feels a *little* disaggregated.

Fanciest Time Out Chair I've Seen

2005-09-27T09:27:00.000-07:00

Man kids have it so easy these days! It even rocks. I can't believe it.

New 99 Cent Store

2005-08-22T23:18:00.000-07:00

Image_04.jpg
Originally uploaded by Hollyster.

Went to the Boardwalk in Santa Cruz, and thought this was a funny sign. I didn't know inflatiion of the 99 Cent Store has added $12. Man I need a raise.

Flickr

2005-08-22T23:17:00.000-07:00

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Chinglesh

2005-08-07T00:34:00.000-07:00

One of the things that I love when visiting China is their novel use of the English Language. This is a picture that my friend took when he was over there. This was at an HP Site in China. The last time I was there (1997), there were a lot of these. It's amazing how things can be syntactically correct when strung together never makes a lot of sense, or is not very nice ;-). Ah language...so many nuances...that's why humans love it so much!

My Ipod Shuffle thinks I'm Gay

2005-08-02T23:54:00.000-07:00

I saw this awesome post on Craig's List. It's interesting how people are using devices as a reflective of who they are:

"Dear Ipod:

After spending a few weeks with you, I am beginng to fear you think I am a gay man. (of course, not that there's anything wrong with that)

I recognize that there are several up tempo dance songs on my playlist, along with a few Madonna and Britney Spears tracks. However, I am curious why whenever I choose the shuffle mode, you select these songs and these songs only to play. I like Madonna, I do... I just don't need 10 consecutive hours of her. And yes, the Pet Shop Boys are fun, but I don't really want to hear "West End Girls" on a 30 minute loop.

The first time I thought it was just a coincidence, but lately I have been wondering if perhaps you think I spend my entire day singing and dancing like some flamboyant queen or like Ellen on that ridiculous American Express commercial. (Again, not there's anything wrong with that)... ummmm, because I really don't dance and sing that much, and sometimes just like to listen to a depressing song about suicide.

Anyway, if there is any chance you could include a little Wilco or Arcade Fire, next time you choose the mix, I would be very appreciate.

Sincerely,

-Your Listener"

How to be Popular

2005-07-21T22:32:00.000-07:00

So I found this book the other day and what a find!! It's a collection of advice from teen magazine of the 60's and 70's.

I love it because it has easy tips for me to remember on how to stay popular:

1. Wear clean underclothes
2. Wear deoderant
3. Avoid foods such as onions and garlic

These are things I need to be reminded of daily.

Citizen Journalism

2005-07-21T01:38:00.000-07:00

So my buddy Lance, just posted his first podcast. This whole thing got me thinking about Citizen Journalism and how it is spreading across the various media creators. Now you too can become your own author! your own radio host! and soon your own director!

The First Amendment
With the onslaught of digital, we have lowered the bar of entry, and I don't mean it in a bad way...This is what the visionaries of the first amendment had as a fundamental principle...not the idea of lowering the bar of entry but rather in search for truth we needed to get as many voices out there as possible. Once we open the floodgates, the garbage has been let in, but for the sake of truth we are willing to deal with it. The question is what is citizen journalism all about? I have a feeling it is not a large number of voices for the sake of truth...just noise.

Creating Editing Tools
So I've also been noticing that as mediums such as publishing, photos, video, and audio have become more and more pervasive, users learn to use editing tools. Remember the days of the 56.6 k dial up where the Rich Text Editor was and ? Now all we have to do is find it on the toolbar. With items that are mainly photo viewers, we are hard-pressed not to find the basic editing functions (rotate, enlarge, red-eye reduction etc...). I would say with the bandwidth getting larger and larger, video, and audio will have an introduction of this "Easy Edit Kit" (Media Professionals: Cover your ears) If you guys haven't checked out, Professor Marc Davis at SIMS had a visionary idea of automation of editing video to the beat of U2's numb (click on the 4th one from the left). I think there should be easy stuff for audio also...it would be nice to have audio-markings so you can fast forward to the right place...etc...

A Bit of Philosophy
So on posting on Lance's blog, i realized that I mentioned feeds being an answer to the growing amount of information and citizen journalism , I've seen this great question evolve from the following:

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, did it happen?

If a war is going on in the world and CNN does not cover it, did it happen?

If an event is going on and it isn't blogged about, did it happen?

Ultimately it will become a matter of getting the report to everyone, so soon it will be:

If an event occured and it wasn't on your blog feed, did it happen?

Okay it' s almost 2 am now, I wrote this to expand and hopefully correct my comment on Lance's blog. *sigh* enough for now.

The Things You See

2005-07-14T09:58:00.000-07:00

This morning I was driving to work and I saw this blind guy waiting for the pedestrian light to turn green. He wore sunglasses and had a white cane with a red tip. The strange thing is the guy had headphones on as if he was listening to music. How can he hear the sound alert to cross the street?? Maybe he wasn't blind. I should have honked.

2005-07-06T22:30:00.000-07:00

What a Trip!

2005-05-31T14:32:00.000-07:00

I hate to say this, but United Airlines sucks. I never have a pleasant flight with that airline. Don't they realize that adults are taller than children when it comes to leg room? I am only 5'3" and I can barely fit into the crash position without banging the person's chair in front of me. Those planes feel so dilapidated, I wonder what we are dropping in the friendly skies.

I get the last row and middle seat, between a rotund man and a disinterested man. The guy in front of me decides to put his chair back leaving me to practice good posture for the 5 hour flight. The rotund guy had this annoying habit of licking his fingers after each pretzel he pulled out the bag. No wonder everyone gets so sick..

As we turned to land the flight became quite rocky and people were silent...you know the bad silent as is everyone is thinking "oh man we may be dying" I hear some wheezing..the gal across the aisle is pulling out the barf bag and I think I've never seen anyone use it. It turns out that she was hyperventilating. They had to call the paramedics when we landed...the poor thing...and the airl ine stewards/esses didn't do anything until we landed even though you could hear her wheezing...

The airline stwardesses then pulled out an oxygen tank...I was quite surprised as she figured out how to use it relatively quickly...That will be another post for another time...emergency devices are they really useful??

The Business of Blogging

2005-05-12T22:16:00.000-07:00

I've been noticing that blogging has become a business for those that own it. Now with AdSense people can get an additional sense of revenue. I would think that the ramifications of this is that people would begin to write things that would generate revenue and not be true to themselves, or they would stick these ads in the most conspicuous place ...which is a general annoyance to the readers itself (a long list of ads before i can see th post...hmmm ... no fun)...it seems like 1995 all over again...

2005-05-04T14:20:00.000-07:00

So this blog thing has gotten out of hand... Is this just a monitored message board of folks who had all wished they were hall monitors in school but never got to be?