Scripting News

Today's links

Sun, 07 Oct 2007 15:29:32 GMT

Fred Wilson explains how he uses tags to route pictures from his Blackberry to Twitter.

The Sunday morning talk shows are showing up on my Podcatcher downloads page.

A travel day

Sat, 06 Oct 2007 12:39:22 GMT

Going from SFO to JFK via VA.

Reading material: Paul Graham on web startups.

Follow me on Twitter.

Virgin Laptop Airlines

Sat, 06 Oct 2007 17:28:49 GMT

I'm writing this from 35,000 feet, a few miles south of Interstate 70, and a few miles east of Grand Junction, CO. The airspeed is 527 miles per hour. I'm on a Virgin Atlantic flight from San Francisco to New York.

So here's the promised report on the experience. The networking features aren't live yet, it seems that will be the big differentiator. The only feature on entertainment system that's (imho) worth anything is the map that shows where the plane is at. Instead of the low-rez maps you get on international flights, which is a godsend on long trips, you get a beautiful Google political map, that you can zoom in and out on. It shows roads, cities and parks. It would be great if they also showed the terrain, esp since we're flying over clouds right now, and of course some of the most spectacular scenery in the world is below those clouds. No more guessing where you are, you know, with great precision, exactly where you are.

The power at the seat works. The USB connectors are for charging iPods and other devices that charge over USB.

The chat rooms, the feature people were most excited about, while inspiring, aren't being used by the other passengers. I don't like that they can see my seat number. Maybe that's why people aren't participating. I'll check back later in the flight, maybe then people will be more bored and will be trying out other stuff.

They offer a rich selection of movies and live TV, but I'm not that interested. If there were any breaking news happening right now (the Mets in the playoffs, or an impeachment debate in Congress, as examples), I guess there would be value in it. But I spend a fair amount of time before a trip accumulating videos, music, podcasts, etc. I have a huge surplus of stuff I already want to watch or listen to, it's ahrd for the airline to compete with that.

The flight attendants wear black and are young and all male. The lighting in the plane reminds me of a W Hotel, that is, very hard on my old eyes. But this is a daytime flight and the window shades are up, so we're getting good light. If it were dark, I'd have trouble seeing.

The crew is friendly, and geeky. There are two wireless LANs on the plane: secretva1 and walrus. I'm connected to walrus just for the heck of it. I asked a flight attendant what it was for, he said it's an internal network they use for the kitchen. Not sure what that means. I suggested it would be cool if we could share files among the passengers. I have a funny feeling we can. I can't log into the other network, secretva1. Not sure how to share just part of a Mac on a network, but I may try to figure it out. A file-sharing network among the passengers. That's an idea.

Anyway, I joked with the attendant that this seems to be the airline designed for laptop users, kind of like Virgin Laptop Airlines. I like the way that sounds.

BTW, now we're just south of Denver, and the clouds are gone. There are towns scattered across great distances. Pretty cool. Wish this were getting posted while I was writing it, as usual. Next year. Murphy-willing of course.

Yet another Feedburner problem

Sat, 06 Oct 2007 15:03:40 GMT

I got an email last week from an Italian blogger who I met at the dinner in Milan in June saying that a feature of Feedburner that allows people to game the subscriber count for a blog is wreaking havoc in Italy. I took a look and found immediately that the conversation is entirely in Italian, a language that I (unfortunately) do not read.

So I asked my Italian host and friend, Paolo Valdemarin, to look into it, and he sent me a detailed email, in English, explaining. I asked him to post the email and he has done so. It's a very interesting situation and calls into question some of the huge Feedburner subscriber counts you see on various blogs.

http://paolo.evectors.it/2007/10/06.html#a3354

The gist of the problem is that it's easy to add 2 million or 20 million subscribers to Feedburner's count for your feed. as Paolo explains.

Thanks Paolo for looking into this. It'll be interesting to see if a discussion develops in the U.S.

Twittergram update

Sat, 06 Oct 2007 14:49:35 GMT

Last night I opened up the picture processing part of the Twittergram service.

It's the second scenario in Thursday's post about web architecture.

That means that anyone can sign up for the service, and links to all their pictures will be posted to their Twitter account. A lot of new people are using it, but learning that too much of a good thing can be, er.. too much. So I'm going to have to put some constraints on it, like this: no more than five pictures per hour? So they queue up after that? Not sure. You could ruin an account by posting too many pics (it might take a long time to clear the queue). This is going to take some thinking and perhaps experimentation. Ideas are welcome.

Follow all the pics in the picstream account. I clearly should do a page on the Twittergram account that shows all the pics. Already some people are using it for R-rated pictures. Oy. This might get more "interesting."

Music-lovers liability insurance?

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 18:36:14 GMT

I was watching RIAA president Cary Sherman on CNN this morning. A reasonable guy, with a straight pitch. We know our future is on the Internet. We want people to enjoy music. We don't mind if you make copies of the music but don't go into competition with us, don't distribute the music. Hard not to sympathize when he says it so reasonably.

They got a $222K judgement against a Minnesota woman yesterday. We're thinking about it. And of course that's what the RIAA wants us to do, right. Think. Okay. We're thinking. Hopefully they'll do some thinking too.

First, Sherman seems so reaonable, makes me wonder if a negotiation is possible. I've always said I want to pay, but like Sherman, I want it to be reasonable. I've already purchased music on vinyl, then tape, then CD, if I'm going to do it again on the Internet I want a better deal than last time.

We got a good piece of what we want with the Amazon MP3 store. But I'd like to buy music in bulk, in MP3 form. Like I said, I don't mind paying, a reasonable amount of money. Half-terabyte disks cost $150, and the prices keep coming down. I'd like to go down to Fry's and buy a half-terabyte of music (they're not going to like this) for another $100. I'd like it already installed on the hard disk. Put the RIAA brand on it if you like. Make a deal with Seagate?

Anyway, I'm thinking, I'm thinking.

Another idea.

How about music-lover's liability insurance?

Companies, even small startups, buy director's liability insurance. Without it they'd never get high net worth individuals to serve on their board.

How about RIAA and MPAA insurance. Pay $1000 per year and download all you want, sure that if the RIAA wins a judgement against you, you're covered.

I bet a lot of people would go for it. Think of the peace of mind it would buy.

Then hopefully, the RIAA would get the idea that they could cut out the middleman.

PS: William Smith thinks someone is doing it.

PPS: Kim Jong Il may need some MLLI?

Virgin America travel day tomorrow

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 16:08:52 GMT

Flying from SFO to JFK on Virgin America.

Should be interesting. Power at the seats so I'm not going to bring an extra battery. They have USB ports, not sure what they do. For charging devices with USB chargers? No wifi yet. I'll take pics with my iPhone. People are curious about this airline. Me too.

Apparently it's really hot in the east. I'm still going to pack a couple of sweaters. It could get cold in NY in early-mid-October.

A bit of feedback to anyone at Virgin America who might read this. Your site could work a lot better with Firefox on a Mac. Come on! You're based in SF, not Redmond.

Ooops, look what happened when I tried to print my boarding pass. Repeatable.

PS: Virgin America is in the air today.

Today's links

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 15:19:57 GMT

Boston blogger dinner, Oct 18, 6PM.

Lance Knobel on the WSJ personal pages.

Declan McCullagh analyzes the RIAA victory in Minnesota.

Tim O'Reilly on the "Web 3.0 Nonsense Blogstorm."

Jackie Danicki's RSS sofa bed!

Sat, 06 Oct 2007 01:08:45 GMT

You can congratulate her on Flickr or Twitter.

Living room

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 15:17:17 GMT

Cloud & tree

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 23:35:45 GMT

Bill Clinton, First Lady?

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 23:49:42 GMT

Integrating multiple apps & services

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 01:41:16 GMT

Fred Wilson: "When will people start building apps/services that sit on top of multiple APIs?"

It's a good question, and the answer is -- we're already doing it. The services are now so reliable and flexible that you almost forget how complex the systems are.

Let's look at a Twittergram scenario:

1. Chris registers with the Twittergram site. That's App #1.

2. She takes out her iPhone and opens the phone app. That's App #2. (Yes, the mobile device is also a computer, it's running an app, with an interface, it can dial a number and transmit audio. It's old fashioned, but it works great.)

2. She calls BlogTalkRadio, 646-716-6000. That's app #3. Records a 30-second message.

3. She hangs up. BlogTalkRadio calls the Twittergram app. App #1, again.

4. Twittergram calls Amazon S3 to store the MP3. App #4.

5. Twittergram calls TInyUrl to create a short URL for the MP3. That's App #5.

5. Twittergram calls Twitter. That's App #6.

So there's a simple application that uses six different apps/services.

Another example, the Flickr-to-Twitter integration, also part of Twittergram.

1. Randy registers with the Twittergram site. That's app #1.

2. He goes to the park, sees a beautiful flower. Takes a picture with his iPhone. That's app #2.

3. He mails the picture to Flickr. That's app #3.

4. Twittergram is monitoring Randy's RSS 2.0 feed on Flickr. Some people might say this is another app, but let's be conservative. App #3, again.

5. It notices a new picture, grabs the URL, calls TinyUrl. That's App #4.

6. Grabs the title of the picture, appends the TInyUrl, sends it to Twitter. That's App #5.

Another app that uses five different apps/services.

We've been doing this stuff for a long time, all the way back to 1998, when XML-RPC first came online. It's always been about delivering functionality, quietly and reliably, to users.

Techmeme is officially a cesspool

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 18:04:55 GMT

It was intriguing for a day or two, but now it's clear that the Leaderboard was the dumbest idea ever, because now more than ever, people are gaming Techmeme so they can climb the list.

Reminds me of something Ted Turner once said about how the Forbes list of richest people in the world was the worst thing ever for philanthropy. If you're super-rich, now you don't want to give it away because when you do, you move down (or off) the list.

Techmeme was already severely polluted by people saying stupid shit to rise to the top of the page. That was an ephemeral high. Now there's a way to accumulate points toward more persistent rank, and everyone who isn't on the list, wants to be on the list.

I'm thinking of this idiotic post by an idiot who's known for saying idiotic things just to get attention.

Or Scoble, who started on the list near the bottom -- is rapidly rising. How's he doing it? By saying extreme things that people will react to. That's how you get points in the Techmeme universe. Scoble ain't no idiot. If he wants to rise on the list, he rises.

A mind is a terrible thing to waste.

Well, this ain't blogging, and we're still getting ready to start a war with Iran, and the stock market is still acting weird, and there are still big ideas out there to pursue, and now Techmeme isn't even worth reading when the top item on a weekday is guaranteed to be some idiot procliaming himself king of the hill. It's worse than AM talk radio.

PS: A piece I wrote in May offering a vision for "Web 3.0."

PPS: Mike Arrington weighs in. "Gabe sometimes edits stuff like this off of TechMeme to keep it stocked with real news." Hmmm. I'd be surprised if that were true.

My podcatcher is a publishing tool

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 15:11:57 GMT

I was subscribed to too many podcasts, my old podcatcher was downloading far more than I'd listen to.

So when I started the project to write a new podcatcher, I decided to start with a clean slate, and go for a minimalist set, the ones I really listen to, and add slowly, and make it very easy to remove or suspend a feed.

And as I announced on Tuesday, my podcatcher has a Twitter account, if you're interested in background programming while you twit the day away.

http://twitter.com/podc

And yesterday I took another item off the to-do list, and came up with a public web page that shows my podcatcher's discoveries in reverse-chronologic order.

http://dave.podcatch.com/downloads.html

This will develop of course, what you're seeing is totally pre-alpha, not even 1.0.

Would it be news?

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 03:04:06 GMT

I wonder if it would make news if The New Yorker article by Sy Hersh was the most pointed to page on the web.

Random evening pre-walk nonsense

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 01:23:58 GMT

When John Furrier started Podtech I told him to open a permanent blogger's space with great production facilities South of Market in San Francisco near Moscone. The press room for SF tech bloggers (professional press would be welcome too). He did a strange rendition of the idea, not at all what I had in mind at CES, called Bloghaus. I mention it now, because Loic is doing almost exactly what I asked Furrier for. His place isn't close to Moscone, it's in Potrero Hill, not close enough to BART into the city to visit. But there is parking, and what Loic lacks in location he makes up in charm. There's much more to his story, I hope to get some stock, so I guess I should disclaim that up front.

Sy Hersh's New Yorker article on America's plans for war in Iran. Scary shit. Must read.

The Older link is back in Twitter, along with a surprise, the UI has been spruced up and made to work in Firefox. We are reluctant to complain about Twitter, so it's very nice when they fix problems we never complained about. I'm having lunch next Tuesday in NYC with Fred Wilson, and plan to talk a bit about Twitter then. Fred is the VC with the arrows in his back. Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

The playoffs have started. The Mets are resting. I get work done when the Mets aren't in post-season play. The old silver lining thing. Wait till next year!

Communication is vital when there's an outage

Wed, 03 Oct 2007 18:34:56 GMT

This morning a key element of the Twitter user interface went missing, the "older" link at the bottom of every page. Without it, it's as if there was no past. Unless you're glued to Twitter around the clock, or follow very few people, you're going to miss some of what's happening. I like to keep up with it all. There was lots of speculation about where it went, and whether the disappearance was temporary or permanent.

At some point during the morning, a post appeared on the Twitter weblog explaining: "This is not a permanent change." Okay. That's good news. I was seriously thinking about what life would be like without Twitter, and didn't like the feeling. Now I know at some point the link is coming back, and the functionality behind it (also missing temporarily) and I can relax.

While you're deep in the server logs, and trying to figure out what's going wrong, it's hard to remember that there are people out there wondering what's going on. Over time, the frustration builds, but right now the Twitter community is still in its Happy To Use Something New phase, so everyone took it in stride and with good humor.

Suggestion: There's this perfect space on every user's page where they can communicate with the users. Make it easy for the staff to quickly post a note there, perhaps saying nothing more more that "we're working on it" -- to help keep the users in the loop.

Introducing Loic's new company

Wed, 03 Oct 2007 15:09:55 GMT

Random evening thoughts

Wed, 03 Oct 2007 05:00:39 GMT

Are we going to start a war with Iran? Listen to the Terry Gross interview with Seymour Hersh. What will Iran do after we attack? The British are evacuating Basra, will Iran invade to fill the vacuum? What will Bush do then? And will Iran move into Afghanistan? They share a long border. Will Pakistan then move into Afghanistan? Hersch says it will be a 20 year war. He can't imagine a President of the US trying everything before going that route, yet, of course, Bush is doing nothing. At this point, knowing what we know about Bush, we are complicit if we do nothing.

Don Park advocates comment gardening.

We have many beautiful streets in Berkeley.

Microsoft announces a new Zune in the NY Times. Okay, but did they seed any bloggers? Feels like they keep going over our heads. I've heard nothing from Microsoft PR. Do I have to buy a Zune to evaluate it? Unless it's an unqualified home run, wouldn't it be smart to first market it to people who might work with them to smooth it out? They say they want to build community. Wouldn't it make sense to use the communities that are already interested in this stuff?? (BTW, it looks like Engadget and Gizmodo didn't get briefed.)