Apple’s “There’s An App For That” campaign is so good that I expect apps for all kinds of things, and have actually been disappointed. I recently searched for these apps that don’t exist:
IMDB — to add insult to injury, there isn’t a mobile version of the website.
Netflix — though there are approved 3rd party apps.
Google products like Gmail, Docs, and Reader — though their mobile browser versions are pretty good.
Kayako — a very popular helpdesk application I’m evaluating for Killer Aces.
Quantcast
Compete
ComScore
I’m not saying there aren’t plently of great apps on the iPhone. In fact, I recently contributed an article to Intel’s MyLifeScoop.com featuring the cool ways iPhone apps have made my life easier — 3 Ways Technology Makes Personal Finance Easier.
I’m saying that because Apple’s done such a good job with their app store (now with 100,000+ apps*), I now expect an app to exist for every web service or site I use.
* The link goes to a Wired article that says “But as the App Store continues to expand, an inevitable question arises: How many apps do you really need?” My answer is — more than what they have now!
This puts the pressure on developers. In addition to a Windows and Mac version, I now expect your service to have an iPhone version too. (And I suspect Android users feel the same way. If not today, then soon now that a bunch of second gen Android devices have rolled out.)
Fred Wilson talked about this a few weeks ago when Droid came out. He said the mobile web (meaning apps, not mobile versions of websites) was the next big thing in tech. He said:
I believe that mobile devices are bringing web services into our pockets and purses, onto restaurant tables and bars, and into schools and stadiums…
The “mobile web” is where “it” is at right now. And it is also where it is all going…
The mobile web sector is developing quickly and innovation is happening all over the place. It is very exciting to see.
I just finished reading William Gibson’s Neuromancer. I was in a scifi mood while looking to add a new novel to my Kindle for iPhone. Since it’s such a classic, I thought I’d give Neuromancer a try.
I was not that entertained. In fact, I was bored for most of it and it was a chore to get to the end.
I think if I read it in 1984 when it was first published, it would have been awesome. But reading it after his revolutionary ideas have become so commonplace (eg., The Matrix), it wasn’t that exciting.
This criticism of Neuromancer is unfair, I know. It was so ahead of its time that I can only imagine the thrill the reader would have felt reading it in the 80′s. But reading it for the first time 25 years after it was published, and expecting it to entertain me as a scifi/cyberpunk story, it didn’t live up to my (unrealistic) expectations.
I’m not saying that Gibson isn’t a talented storyteller. About a year ago, I read Pattern Recognition. It was my first Gibson book. I picked it up on a whim at an airport bookstore. It’s a novel about advertising/marketing with a scifi/action/adventure twist published this decade. That was a very entertaining read that I finished in two sittings.
I think I’ll give his latest, Spook Country, a read so my William Gibson experience doesn’t end on a down note. (BTW, the hardcover version of Spook Country is only $2.72 right now on Amazon.)
I wanted to add a “currently reading” list of books to this blog.
One of the better plugins I found was Aaron Forgue’s Amazon Showcase. It lets you create multiple showcases — lists of Amazon items you select using the ASIN or ISBN-10 number. Each showcase can then be used in the sidebar as a widget.
Pros:
Relatively easy to add items to the list. Just paste in the ASIN or ISBN number.
Multiple lists (showcases).
Easy to pick thumbnail sizes and displayed information from the input page, on an item-by-item basis.
Cons:
Can’t configure the template code universally, though it’s cool that you can tweak it on a per-item basis. Fortunately, I wasn’t too picky about this. I did add one line to my custom.css file to make the book thumbnails display inline.
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Another useful Amazon related plugin I found is Amazon Reloaded. It adds an easy way to search and insert Amazon links on the post editor page. I hated going to the affiliate dashboard just to get a link to
Tip: If you just want a quick way to link to an Amazon page with your affiliate ID inserted, without using this plugin, just add “?tag=gregorygo-20″ to the URI. Obviously, replace “gregorygo-20″ with your own affiliate ID.
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I started down this road because I added a book to my wishlist. Then I thought that it’d be cool to embed my wishlist on the sidebar here.
You’d think Amazon would have an easy way to embed your wishlist onto a site, but nope. No embed code that I could find.
This post makes me think they used to have an embed function, but I can’t find it anymore. It seems like the only way to share lists nowadays is to email them or post directly to Facebook, Twitter, MySpace or Delicious.
I’ve since decided against embedding my wishlist here, and opted for putting in a “currently reading” list instead.
***
Amazon is a genius company for so many things, but I’m still occassionally amazed at how clueless they are about certain things.
No RSS feed or embed code for wishlists? Ridiculously complicated affiliate text links just to link to a book page? Why??
Maybe they need a Chief Usability Officer for Power Users.
I’ve always wanted to learn how to fly. Ever since I was a kid, I dreamed of the sense of freedom I would have soaring through the air. Now that I’m in my thirties, I thought it was about time to start pursuing that dream, and I took the first step by reaching out to the one pilot I knew. And boy am I glad I did.
My friend Thanos gave me a great primer on learning how to fly. He graciously spent an hour on the phone giving me pointers on sites, organizations, and the general path to getting a pilot’s license.
Even though I had done some cursory Google searches on learning how to fly, the tips Thanos gave me in that hour long conversation were invaluable. Getting a pilot’s license is pretty confusing. There are different types, with their own restrictions and paths, and Google only provided a smattering of confusing advice.
Spending an hour on the phone with Thanos, he was able to give me a big picture idea of what it meant to learn how to fly. We talked about why I wanted to do it, what to expect of the 100+ hours and $10,000+ process, and what it was like at the end (when I have a license). We talked about how the general aviation world works and how he uses his private pilot’s license.
I love the one hour primer by experts. If you’re looking to learn something new and somewhat complex, do yourself a huge favor and find someone to give you a primer. Buy them a cup of coffee and just pick their brain. It’ll make the journey so much more productive and enjoyable.
Or you’re an expert in something a friend wants to learn, give the gift of a primer.
I’m looking forward to the start of the NBA season tonight. The Lakers are the one sports team that I’m not a fairweather fan of. Probably has to do with attending games at the Great Western Forum when I was a kid and growing up with them.
It’s nice that the Lakers are so strong again. Last year, when they started 17-2, there was talk of eclipsing the Chicago Bulls’ improbable 72-10 record in 1995-96. But they “only” ended up with 68 wins despite having Andrew Bynum go down in January and being pretty much out of commission the rest of the year.
This year, with the addition of Ron Artest, Bynum looking strong in the pre-season, and the Lakers coming off a dominant playoff run that culminated in the championship, the expectations are even higher. As you’d expect, there’s again talk of that inhuman 72-10 record (LAT).
Winning 6 additional games to end up at 73-9 seems easy enough — heh — but I’m not going to make any predictions at where they’ll end up. A key injury could be the difference between 50, 60 or 70 wins. (I can’t believe I’m talking about 60 and 70 wins so casually.) But that’s what the last 30 years of Lakers basketball has done to this city — nothing short of a championship is considered a successful season by LA fans.
Here’s a video of the 1987 ring ceremony presided over by Chick Hearn. Chick looks so young here — he’s definitely missed. (via LAT Lakers Blog)
Speaking of LA’s basketball expectations, there’s the flip side. The Clippers have the #1 pick in Blake Griffin and a bona fide star in Baron Davis, but nobody cares about that team. All expectations are that they will ruin the careers of those guys and have an early summer vacation yet again. It’s striking the difference in expectations between the two LA teams who play in the same arena.
There were so many things right with the U2 live webcast on YouTube tonight that I have hope for the world again. If you didn’t get a chance to see the webcast, click on the screenshot over there on the right — it’s been annotated with the things that struck me.
Brilliant example of leveraging the Internet to gain more fans and sell more albums. See, smart musicians in conjunction with smart organizations show us that the Internet is tool that is good for music. (Are you paying attention RIAA?)
I wonder what were YouTube’s share of the benefits. They must have spent a bunch on bandwidth.
2. Google is still a smart company.
Kudos to YouTube/Google for putting the Twitter stream front and center on the webcast page. They could have easily left out Twitter and just let YouTube commenters have the forum, but I’m sure they got much more exposure and reach by putting Twitter ahead of the YouTube comments.
3. On a personal note, this webcast brought back memories of my introduction to U2 via Achtung Baby, the first time I listened to Joshua Tree (and then listening to it over and over again), the anticipation (and honestly, slight disappointment) of Zooropa, and the U2 concert I went to at Staples Center years ago. Happy memories.
That U2 concert is easily in the top 2 live concerts of my life. The other was Radiohead at the Hollywood Bowl. I think U2 puts on a better show, but the Radiohead concert was downright transcendent for me (probably because of the weed).
Just discovered that head judge Tom Colicchio has a blog about the show and posts after each episode. To my surprise and delight, his posts are authentic and insightful, giving us fans something to tie us over until the next episode. Great job Bravo for the show blogs! And great blogging Tom!
Now for some predictions.
My sister has posited in past seasons that you can guess who the eventual winner is based on how often the producers interview the cheftestants (love that word). I’m talking about those short reality TV interviews within the episodes. As for my sister’s theory — maybe. I wonder if anyone has counted up the mini cheftestant interviews to see if the theory is correct. In any case, that theory is in the back of my mind every time the cheftestants do their reality show interview.
My guess is the final 3 will come down to Bryan, Mike V., and Jen. Kevin and Mike I. are strong candidates too, but don’t see them as strong as the three I’ve picked.
In the beginning, I thought Mike V. was the strongest, then I switched my bet to Bryan. But now, I think Jen is going to be the eventual winner. She seems to be the most consistently exceptional. Plus, she’s got a lot of interview time. ;)
PS: If you haven’t been watching, you can catch a few episodes of Top Chef on Hulu. Unfortunately, Bravo only allows a couple episodes on at a time, and not every episode gets on Hulu. Boo. +1 to Bravo (really, NBC) for the blogs, -1 for the Hulu decision.
I don’t understand this revamping of the search UI by Yahoo. I’m pretty ambivalent on whether their selling out to Microsoft is a good or bad thing. Yeah, it sucks that the search space is down to two players, but whatever. Yahoo’s never been that great at the engineering side of things. They are, however, a great content/media company. They should just embrace their strengths and stop trying to fiddle (unsuccessfully) with the geeky stuff.
My first taste of Drupal was the 4.6 version in 2006. I very clearly remember running into the flexinode module and thinking “OMG, custom content types! Woo! That’s exactly what I want in a CMS!” Haven’t looked back since.
Below are the slides that Dries used to present the State of Drupal at Drupalcon ’09. Yeah, it’s from 5 months ago, but I just ran into it and it was entertaining, so I’m sharing it here.
Watching the slideshow is entertaining, even without sound or the actual text for reference. It very clearly shows the rapid evolution of Drupal and the Drupal community.
I’ve worked in IT for nearly 10 years now. First as a help desk operator, then a Linux sysadmin, and now a Drupal developer/webmaster. In that time, I’ve run into a handful of really perplexing problems. ”Perplexing” meaning after hours (usually, days) of troubleshooting, I can’t figure out why the system is suddenly unstable.
You know those type of problems, right?
The kind that’s so perplexing that you’re sure it’s gotta be a hardware problem, even though your years of admin experience tells you it’s almost never (like 99.999% of the time) a hardware issue. But you’ve looked at (seemingly) all the possible software causes.
I was just reminded of this recently, and I’m here to remind you: It’s never a hardware problem. It’s always a software problem.
PS: If you’re looking for VPS or dedicated server hosting, Rimu Hosting is a great choice. When they say they have “professional technical support with a personal touch”, they mean it. Rimu has by far the best support team of the half-dozen hosting companies I’ve worked with. And great support is the only differentiator that matters when choosing a hosting vendor.
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National Novel Writing Month [greggohttp://greggo.tumblr.com/post/12188416215]
Hi, I'm Greg. I'm a cofounder of Killer Aces Media. We publish community blogs like 