Sep 20, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
The New New Internet conference was somewhat interesting but I didn't really learn anything useful. Towards the end there was a Web 1.0 vs Web 2.0 discussion where the moderator asked something like "Can we agree that we are now web 2.0?". I was drifting in and out of email so perhaps I missed the real question but with Zeldman's "Designing with Web Standards" 2nd Edition still declaring that "99.9% of Websites Are Still Obsolete", I would say that most of the web is certainly NOT Web 2.0. While standards like XML were discussed most sites still ignore the 1st standard that should be used in building any web site, XHTML.
Robin Miller chimed in at one point and said that not all web sites should be Web 2.0... Some people on the panel tried to tell him how his neighbor's lawn service site might benefit from Web 2.0 community. I couldn't disagree more. Not all web sites should use Ajax and most web sites probably have no need for collaboration. A simple business needs a simple page that is well written and relevant, so that search engines can do their jobs and return it... when relevant. Slapping Ajax on your site or putting it all in flash will just lessen your chances of showing up in search results. One of the panelist earlier in the day did try to make the point that Ajax hides information from search engines and that was dismissed as a search engine problem that needs to be fixed. I wouldn't suggest waiting for that fix. If you need a simple site, keep it simple, and your customers will find you.
Jason Goldberg of Jobster gave and interesting talk about Web 2.0. It was mostly a sales pitch for Jobster but none the less it was interesting to hear the state of job search sites and how Jobster is doing them one better. I just hate the name "Jobster". Sorry. Is it possible that he is related to Shawn Fanning?
Rajen Sheth of Google gave a good talk about various Google things, both consumer facing and employee facing. He mentioned that EVERY Google employee has a profile that is updated frequently. This allows everyone in the company to find out who is working on what and to track down experts. This is a really good idea. Another focus of his talk was about simplicity. Some of this was around keeping interfaces simple for consumers but as a developer his statement "The simplest, most useful, standard wins in the end." the most interesting. In my mind this means REST over SOAP and even JSON over XML (for pages).
It was refreshing to see that many of the panelist appeared to favor REST over SOAP. Some of the discussions talked about SOAP being in the enterprise arena and REST being in the web arena. Michael Platt from Microsoft was talking about how consumer adoption of technologies drives the enterprise over time. For example PCs were for consumers and mainframes were for businesses. Now PCs are everywhere. In the same respect the technologies adopted by Web sites will eventually change the Enterprise market.
Ruby on Rails was mentioned several times in the conference. I must admit I have not had time to play with it. :-(
The coolest of the vendors at the Conference (as voted by attendees) was notefish.com. They have a simple browser plugin that allows you to select random content from web pages and post it to your notefish.com page. Want to build a site about sightseeing in DC. In about 10 minutes you can steal content from 10 sites, drag it around and you're done. The source of all the content is linked but I wonder what copyright issues are lurking here.
Here is a sample of some AIM Pages snags.
That's all for now.
Sep 19, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
Tomorrow I will be attending a Web 2.0 Conference outside of DC but I’m wondering how 2.0 it’s going to be. I’m getting the feeling that the organizers don’t really get it. Why?
Strike 1.
The 1st communication I received on this event called it “The New, New Internet: A Web 2.0 Conference".
Doesn’t everyone know the O'Reilly has a trademark on “Web 2.0 Conference”. ;-)
Its now called “The New, New Internet: Web 2.0 for Business"
Strike 2.
Yesterday I received a note from them indicating that “The dress for this event is Business Attire.”… Good grief. I was planning on dressing up by wearing a collared shrit but I guess I’ll be wearing a suit. :-(
The final pitch?
The conference is loaded and they still have a chance to hit this one out of the park. I want this to succeed because I’m sick of all the great conferences being on the west coast.
Sep 15, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
Growing up the term “drifting” was not yet invented (or at least we didn’t use it). But in the winter we loved to drift on the snowy streets in central New York. It was probably from watching dirt track racing growing up but as soon as we could drive (and the snow fell) we worked on perfecting our “Drift”. Back then (mid/late 80s) rear wheel drive cars were common and we wouldn’t dare drive one of those boring FWDs.
In addition to being fun it taught us how to control our cars in the snow, making us safer drivers in theory. In the snow this was a low speed maneuver, probably 10-25MPH (unlike the drifts kids do with FWDs today).. Drifting in the snow is a beautiful thing.
Now I’m old, I live in the south and I drive a FWD so no more drifting for me but I did hit an oil slick while going around a bend last year and the car behind me crashed while I safely got my car under control. See, it did make me a safer driver. ;-)
Aug 20, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
I can’t stand makeup. It’s fine for covering up a small blemish but when caked on you end up creating an un-human appearance. The issue is that people have been looking a people with makeup on for so long that they start to think that is what beauty is.
Beauty is in the blemishes and minor imperfections!
People instantly think of Tammy Faye but even people like Pamela Anderson look like aliens to me. It’s just not natural.
Of course for people who cake it on its hard to go back, because their poor pores are so clogged from the makeup, that their skin is just one big blemish. Its like a drug, get them started and its impossible to quit. Maybe we should be pursuing the makeup companies instead of tobacco companies. ;-)
Yeah. I know, I’m a guy and I have no idea what I am talking about but I can say that I prefer it when my wife wears no makeup. :-)
Jul 9, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
More than swimming I love to make big splashes from diving boards. My favorite dive is the “watermelon”, it’s a face 1st cannonball and with just the right amount of spin it results in a nice splash.
The problem with this dive as I just recently discovered is that it is pretty dangerous in small pools. I know because I have a handful of stitches in my head now after hitting bottom in a relative’s pool. I’ve been spoiled by my large neighborhood pool and I launch way off the board for dramatic effect. In a small poll this sealed my doom; I slammed into the part of the pool where the deep end slopes up to the shallow end.
As my head hit bottom and I thought “oh god, that was stupid and now I’m going to be paralyzed for life”. Fortunately I was not knocked out so I swam out of the pool and looked for help. This was pretty upsetting for my 4 year old daughter, whom I was trying to splash, as I came up pretty bloody. But at least I didn’t float to the top unconscious and I’m glad that I’m still walking.
Of course now I remember being told several times as a child to always dive straight down in a pool but the huge diving well in the neighborhood pool washed that lesson our of my head. Unfortunately that lesson is now literally stitched into my head. :-(
I'm looking foward to getting the stiches out of my head this week as I am not allowed to get my head wet and a week without washing my hair has been gross to say the least.
May 31, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
Although I work in technology I consider myself a technology laggard (see Geoffrey Moore’s “Crossing the Chasm”. It’s a great book for anyone in the technology field) . I like to think that my education as a software and electrical engineer has taught me that it’s just plain wasteful to live on the bleeding edge. Its fun to build things on the bleeding edge but I have little desire to consume products on this edge (I do have exceptions).
One technology area that I plan on waiting a long time before adopting is high definition television.
The HD-DVD and BLU-RAY format war means that someone is paying $500 today for a Betamax that is just going to be collecting dust in a few years when the other format wins the war. There aren’t many titles yet and the fact that most studios are picking sides means that EVERYONE is going to lose in the near term. This is just bad news.
As far as HD television goes they are still too expensive and HD programming is NOT pervasive. Also, because the technology is overly complicated at the moment, a large percentage of people who shelled out 1000s of dollars on HD TVs are watching them with standard definition. People just have too much disposable income I guess. Of course not all these people have disposable income… they just want to live on the edge even if they don’t understand it. Or perhaps they didn’t understand that the cable company was going to charge them extra to receive HD television.
Friends of mine who have HD have all started putting antennas on their houses. After all the BEST HD content is over the airwaves because the cable company hasn’t compressed it. It seems like we are going backwards. In the 70s everyone got cable television to avoid those silly antennas. 
Don’t even get me started on these HD fanatics who also watch shows on their video IPod. I can’t live without a large screen HD TV but I’ll shell out $2 to watch shows on a tiny video screen with poor quality encoding.
My Conclusion, Some people just want the latest technology regardless of whether it makes sense. While some people can afford to live on the bleeding edge for most people it just means credit card debt they can never seem to shake because they are slaves to the edge.
May 18, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
I have 3 modules on AimPages now. I added 2 last Sunday and they are getting adopted pretty quickly. My Fortune module has been out for a month but since most of the quotes are pretty nerdy I didn't think it would be that popular.
But my Eyes and Visitors modules are already generating more traffic than the Fortune module. It'll be interesting to see if I can keep up with the traffic once AOL starts promoting AimPages. :-)
Details on the services can be found on my wiki
May 18, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
I always think of great things to blog about while driving home but by the time I'm home I usually have forgotten about them. I think its time to put a notepad in the car so I stop talking about wind chill and freezing water.
:-)
May 18, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
While I have cold weather on my mind lets talk about wind chill.
Question: if the wind chill is 25 degrees Fahrenheit will water freeze?
Answer: There isn’t enough information to decide.
At 35 degrees with 15 MPH winds the wind chill is 25 degrees. Water isn’t going to freeze.
If there is no wind it is 25 degrees and water will freeze.
Wind Chill is about how cold it feels. Not how cold it is. ;-)
May 18, 2006
Published by Tony Primerano
Debunking stupid stuff. entry 1.
Hot water freezes faster than cold water. yeah whatever. I have heard this from many people over the years. I think they confused cooling speed with time to actually freeze.
Put 1 gallon of 90 degree water outside when it is 20 degrees out and 1 gallon of water that is at 60 degrees.
The 90 degree bucket is going to drop 10 degrees much faster than the 60 degree bucket but the fact of the matter is that the 60 degree bucket has a 30 degree head start and when the 90 degree bucket is at 60 it will have slowed down to the same speed that the 60 degree bucket was at at the start of the race. But its well below 60 now.
Maybe someone will google this and be enlightened. ;-)
Of course there is the Mpemba effect but that is a special case and it probably not going to occur when you put hot tap water into your ice cube trays. :-)