Green Comes to Technosailor.com

July 30, 2008

Next week is a very special week here at technosailor.com. We are going to have a very heavy emphasis on “green” technology and all the major verticals will be contributing in one way or another.

Energy costs are sky high, Bush is badgering Congress to lift the ban on off-shore drilling, and computer manufacturers are bandying around trying to create the most energy efficient server – something I’m very interested in discussing with manufacturers, I might add.

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What does a Grocery Store scanner have to do with a PC?

July 30, 2008

I have a good amount of respect for Jeremiah Owyang. He’s an analyst at Forrester who has done some good work on social media.

On the other hand, why he isn’t well-informed enough to avoid asking really, really stupid questions makes me question whether I should take him seriously as an authority on technology, or at least makes me think he should avoid politics. He asks:

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Informalities Can Kill Your Job Search

July 29, 2008

The economy is way down and the pain is not only being felt at the pump. It’s being felt in the job market. Unemployment hit an all time high last quarter as more and as more and more people hit the streets looking for meaningful employment, bad habits are accompanying them.

Sarah Needleman of the Wall Street Journal wrote a story today about the informality used in social media, text messaging and other “typical” lines of communication. Often times, the informalities deep six candidates.

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Walled Gardens and Business Models in the 21st Century

July 29, 2008

Walled Gardens. Defined as media properties utilizing privileged access to provide information services or content to a user. The classic example of a walled garden was AOL, before they opened up most of their services. Users paid $23.95 or whatever the access rate was and got access to the “AOL Network.”

Then there was Facebook, the walled garden social network that restricted access to college and high school students, and businesses who had a Facebook presence. In all these cases, the confirming matter was a legitimate email address issued by the legitimate university, high school or business.

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Memo to Bloggers: Not Everything is Free.

July 29, 2008

Just a small, possibly controversial, thought on Redlasso shutting their doors for bloggers to use their content.
NBC and Fox filed copyright infringement actions against Redlasso for allowing users search, clip, and post excerpts from copyrighted video content on their blogs. Redkasso (rightly) closed up their free service, but continues to supply to (paying) business customers.
There [...]

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WordPress Plugin: WP-Brightkite

July 28, 2008

Some of you have noticed that I’ve been doing some experimentation in recent months with geolocation. Geolocation is a very powerful aspect of the next generation web. Particularly in the mobile space.

Boulder, CO-based Brightkite stormed on the scene a few months back as a location based micro blogging network.

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NBC, NFL Deal Puts Adobe One More Step Back

July 28, 2008

Quietly, a sleeping giant has been evolving. That sleeping giant is Silverlight, a Microsoft rich media technology to rival Adobe’s Flash/Flex platform.

On this date, July 28, there is a dearth of Silverlight content on the web. Almost all the major video sites use Flash players, with Hulu, an NBC property, being a probable exception. However, that is about to change.

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Inside the Beltway, Inside the SuitCase

July 28, 2008

The “inside the beltway” world is often deemed to be a crazy echo-chamber of pundits and talking heads who just want attention or to be re-elected or to get more power, because of all the perks and luxuries and what-not. Oh, and the decisions are all made by lobbyists in back rooms and it’s all scotch and cigars and back-slapping. News flash: it’s not.

I’m lucky enough to get paid to report news on technology and public policy. It’s pretty complex stuff. Making the decisions on what to support or oppose isn’t easy for the people I cover, either.

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Five Thoughts for New (and old) Bloggers

July 27, 2008

During the process of reorganizing things, I had to go back through all four years of my archives, a step that kicked me into a significant introspective mode. Where have I come from? Where am I going?

Honestly, much of my content from early years is downright embarrassing. And really, it goes beyond the content. I’ve spent the weekend thinking about the mistakes I’ve made as a blogger and wondering what I would do differently if I could. Keep in mind that my goals for this site were always professional and that I foresaw a day when it would be my only job (I hope that day comes, still!).

Here is my advice for bloggers who wish to do the same thing.

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Andrew Feinberg to Join Technosailor.com

July 25, 2008

Many of you know of, or have met, Andrew Feiberg. Andrew is a journalist working on Capitol Hill. He was instrumental in coordinating visits to Washington, D.C. by Robert Scoble and provided a great deal of information to me on the story I covered surrounding Congressional use of social media.

Andrew has proven himself a tremendous asset in bringing to light some of the issues facing the technology community from the government. He has a brilliant legal mind (though he is not yet a lawyer, but is in process) and access to many people in and around Congress.

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Loren Feldman Demonstrates Artistic Handiwork But is Not Racist

July 25, 2008

Do I believe racism still exists in America? Absolutely. It is one of the worst calamities ever wrought on this nation, and many others. Do I believe Loren Feldman, in his weeklong parody/social experiment, toed the line? Yeah, I do. Did he cross it? Eh… who am I to judge? Is he racist? Heck no.

Many of the people who have defended Loren have done so from the position of first hand experience. I, like many of them, know Loren personally. I’ve spent days with the guy. I’ve slept on his sofa when I was stranded in New York. I laughed with him in San Francisco and Toronto at two different events.

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