Rant - Laziness

I will have to paraphrase here, but this quote from Desmond Crisis really sums up some of the anger(?) I am feeling about lazy people.

"Moving sidewalks [and escalators] are for improving your ambulatory efficiency, not for allowing you to keep your lazy lifestyle."

I was thinking about this quote this morning when I was coming up from BART. Normally there is a nice unspoken agreement (at least during
commute hours) that you stand on the right and walk on the left. There was a person about 6 bodies ahead of me that stood in the middle
with a little rolling briefcase (what is the deal with those?). They managed to block the whole escalator and slowed the mass of people trying to
get on at the bottom.

Now I know that I am not the same as everybody else. I live on the 4th floor of my building and walk up and down the stairs unless I have
something heavy to move. I like to walk up the escalators! Why does the lazyness of one person affect me so much? Maybe it is the
inconsiderate nature that reads as "I don't care what other people would like to do" that gets to me so much. If I had been right behind that
person, I would have said "Excuse me" and walked up past them. As it was, I whas the sixth of many people whose lives were affected by one
lazy thinking and acting person. Ergh.

Trend - Data Stream Convergence

"DON'T cross the streams... It would be bad"

TiVo today announced that it will be providing Web content from companies like CNet, the New York Times and the NBA to stream to its customers' TVs.

Old media? New Media? As our points of consumption change (EV-DO anyone?) WHERE the information comes from, and HOW we consume it will be less relevant than our trust in the SOURCE of the information.

RSS already allows us one "futuristic" information channel. Anyone else remember the sci-fi concept of "your own personal newspaper"? You trust a specific author or website or newspaper's viewpoint. If you do, you allow them access to your eyes and brain. This is the last line of filtering that we have. Once we have accepted the source, how we consume it is up to us. Want a constantly updated, personal newspaper? Use RSS to build in just the pieces of information that you want or trust. Prefer video? On your timetable? TiVo or your iPod give you that. HOW the information gets TO where you want it should be simple, and it will be eventually. Look at the "Personalized Homepage" that most ISPs can provide you with. Maybe not exactly the format that you would like to see, but at least they try to make the information easy to modify.

TiVo sees how these lines are now blurring. They know that they are that trusted source to their subscribers and that they already provide the time-shifting capabilities their customers want. Hey, they brought this pioneering concept to the masses. Would you rather give your content to people to consume at their leisure or not at all?

I see this as TiVo (a trusted provider) acting as an "introducer" for new content (that they trust) to their consumers. You read blogs, you already understand this. Your friend (a trusted provider) sends you a link, or you see one on their blog, and you follow (consume) it. If it provides good information, you are more likely to trust all the way up the stream. Content -> Referrer -> Source -> Sources Author.

Now if there was some way to assign trust ratings (like eBay feedback) to all points of a stream to help filter what content I get/want/need/might be interested in...

Can anyone say spam killer?

Funny - Stephen Colbert Commencement Speech

If more people learned how to put cohesive sentences together in High School, practiced that same skill in College, and didn't let those skills atrophy after graduation, we just might have a generation that is not afraid of exit exams and could express themselves as well as Stephen Colbert.

Funny - Video

I have too many Star Wars Fan friends (My wife even has a tattoo) to not post this.

http://www.angryalien.com/1205/starwarsbuns.asp

Be sure to check out the rest of the great stuff at angry alien productions as well!

Now for a question.

Ettiquette: Insert the whole URL as the link for ease of copying or just a relevent text item with the understanding that most people know how to copy a link if needed? Remember, we may be extremely tech literate, but not everyone is.

Site - Google Trends

http://www.google.com/trends

As this site is rather hidden in Google's Labs area, I don't think many people know about it. I see this as a great way to grab a focused snapshot of the techconnected's Zeitgeist. Have you seen the info panels in your elevators at work? See how they say that "Searches for X are up 40% after the release of Y news story"? This is the place where you can do the same kind of searches, in real-time, with relevant news storys linked off the graph. The more I poke around Google Labs, the more I think this company might hold off competitors for a good long while.

Funny - Video

Let the laughing and forwarding commence...

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7628168193690745210&q=rejected

Probably, definately NSFW. Actually the first one or two are safe, but it goes downhill from there.

Want to help?

Think you've got what it takes? Got The Eye for cool new technology trends? If you would like to be a Team Member for That Place, contact me or just send me a sample of what you think is cool and a short description of why you think it will be cool.

Welcome!

Hey there InterWebsizens! Welcome.

Hopefully this will be a place that you and I can discuss this crazy, fast paced world of the internets. Somehow, I seem to find myself finding things interesting and cool before I see them in the general world of old media. I know that a lot of these things are brought to my attention by my web-connected friends and I hope to make this a place where we can collect and discuss what we think is not just cool, but what will be cool.

For now, I hope to just get this pig off the ground, but will be trying to get some moblog, podcast, photologging going as well. Just don't expect to see many pictures of me as if you know me, you know I am almost always behind the camera!