New idea: Social Cameras! 

Here's an idea that came to me while waiting for a train to Genova. I was standing on a platform, across a pair of tracks a man was taking a picture of something in my direction. I was in the picture, the camera seemed to be pointed at me.

I thought to yell my email address across the tracks asking him to send me a copy of the picture. (Assuming he spoke English and I could be heard over the din of the station.)

Then I thought my cell phone or camera could do that for me. It could be beaming my contact info. Then I had a better idea. What if his camera, as it was taking the picture, also broadcast the bits to every other camera in range. My camera, sitting in my napsack would detect a picture being broadcast, and would capture it. (Or my cell phone, or iPod.)

Wouldn't this change tourism in a nice way? Now the pictures we bring home would include pictures of ourselves. Instead of bringing home just pictures that radiate from me, I'd bring home all pictures taken around me while I was traveling.

Of course if you don't want to broadcast pictures you could turn the feature off. Same if you don't want to receive them.

A standard is needed, but the first mover would set it, and there is an incentive to go first because it would be a viral feature. Once you had a Social Camera, you'd want other people to have one. And you'd tell them about it.

Not sure what technology would work best here. Bluetooth isn't fast enough. Is wifi overkill? Maybe a low-power radio transmitter?

When I told this idea to a bunch of friends at breakfast they said they probably already have these cameras in Japan. Do they?

Personally I think this idea is as good as Checkbox News or HyperCamp, neither of which have been done yet, btw.

Kevin Marks says wifi is the way to go.

Gulllp 

Five years ago today: "Lots of non-Internet stuff going on."

That was an understatement.

I choose to remember 6/14/02 as the day I had my last cigarette. On my way to the doctor's office I bought two packs of Marlboro Lights. I smoked one on the way to the appointment. That was the last cigarette.

It was a Friday. I would spend Saturday and Sunday in the hospital, and on Monday I had heart surgery. A life-changing event, for sure. A life-saving event too.

Over the years I've written lots about it. As my body recovered from the surgery little victories seemed pretty big. First, a walk down the driveway. Then a five minute walk down Manzanita Way. Then ten minutes, then twenty. My first trip to the city. Dancing with a 6-foot cigarette in my dreams. And on and on.

I think today is a big milestone in that I didn't remember to look at the calendar until 2PM, and I had to go back to the archive page to be sure I had the day right. I am so not a smoker that I didn't even remember to mark the day until well past lunch.

I owe a lot of gratitude to people who helped me get through the toughest part of the recovery.

And I thank Murphy for letting me live another five years. Whew. Think I'll go walk in the hills.

Today's song: Respect Yourself.

Kudos to Progresso 

Vlad: "I'll probably be the only one to make this comment, but it's about time someone noticed the awesome jobs Progresso and Campbell are doing with the gumbo soups."

I haven't tried Campbell's, but Progresso's gumbo is an excellent soup. I buy four or five cans whenever I can. True, most markets don't stock them. Good food!

BBC piece 

I wrote a piece for the BBC a few months ago.

It's on the BBC website today.

AT&T, day 2 

Re yesterday's post on AT&T.

Gary Secondino wonders if Apple supports them. AT&T is the exclusive service provider for iPhone.

Jake asks if they might also guard against Slingbox users on behafl of Major League Baseball.