MIX06 lesson ONE. Don’t walk to the strip from the Airport….


Yes, I have been to vegas several times but after finding that the stupid strip shuttles they have from the Airport could take an hour to get to my place I thought “hey, I’ll just WALK”. I walk about 2-3 miles every day so how far could it be? FAR. I suppose if I had not had backpack and a suitcase it would have not been all that bad -approx 3-4 miles I’d estimate. I walked for about 90 minutes.

But the good news is I’ve got all that excersize under my belt and now I can eat with reckless abandon. I was here in November for WebmasterWorld and boy was the food and drink ….. GOOD.

And more good news is there are some WIFI spots here so I don’t have to sign up for the usurous 9.95 per day at the Imperial Palace. I’m with Scoble in being pissed at all the high WIFI charges at Airports and Hotels. At SLC Airport I couldn’t even use the spring PCS WIFI because though I’m a sprint customer, and a PCS Vision subscriber, I’m NOT a SPRINT+ PCS VISION+ WIFI subscriber.

Show me some ads and give me free WIFI!

Off to MIX06


No Mom it’s NOT about the glitz, glamour, and free huge nightclub tabs picked up by Microsoft!  It’s WORK and SOMEBODY darn well better get down to Las Vegas and do what has to be done!

MIX06 starts tomorrow morning with keynote by Bill Gates and leads into a large number of concurrent sessions which appear to be focused almost exclusively on how MS applications and future developments can be used in online applications.   That’s OK because this is put on by MS, but somewhat ironically I think the concept here was to have a very “open” environment that tried to get feedback from the community about what they need, want, and where they are going.   I’m anxious to see if MS is sincerely interested in ….. us.

Yahoo and Google certainly are interested as evidenced by the way they interact at other conferences.   I think part of their corporate culture is to say “damn the torpedos, full speed ahead!” even when that approach could threaten some aspect of the company’s revenue.  I’m not expecting this from MS but I’m hoping for greater responsiveness than they’ve shown the web community in the past.  

$100 Laptops Rock. Bill’s wrong. But the Gates Foundation still rules.


I was sorry to see Bill Gates bashing MIT’s $100 Laptop project

Gates’ credentials as an advocate for the developing world are unsurpassed, but I’d guess he’s reacting more to the fact this is a Google sponsored project than legitimate concerns about it’s viability.

I love the $100 Laptop Project not so much because it will bring tech to the poor, especially children (though it will do that), but because it will help to rapidly and aggressively break down what I see as the key barrier to development which is the lack of communication and exchange between “them” and “us”.

A dictator’s tyranny or a famine in Nigeria will take on a whole new relevance when THEIR kids are all playing video games and instant messaging with OUR kids.

Bill, you got this one wrong, dawg. But the Gates Foundation remains the world’s most heroic development effort.

Don’t overestimate the power of Pizzazz – but don’t UNDERestimate it either!


We are working on a new project at Online Highways – a regional search engine for travel.   It could be great because our former excellent programmer Marvin has already developed Kinosearch and it’s well suited to this task. Vertical search is really hot as a Web 2.0 theme and we should be able to put out a great spam free travel search for the Oregon Coast and should be able to scale it up if it gains traction as a spam free alternative to the increasingly problematic big engine searches for local travel information.

But I’m worried about the name, which currently is “CRSE.com”.   “Cooperative Regional Search Engine”.  Yikes – that sucks.

My partner is right that that people usually have too MUCH enthusiasm for Pizzazz and too little for the substance of a project, but that’s a problem with the wrong emphasis, not a problem with Pizzazz which can be important to the success of a project. 

Lies, Lies, and silly programs


SPONSOR RESULTS BY INTELIUS (What’s this?)
 

I always wondered what was going on when I’d search Yahoo people for somebody and Intelius, not to find them but to have Intelius say they DID find them! Now I know. The above was obtained FROM an INTELIUS SEARCH! Those bozos just put whatever you enter and then LIE, saying they’ve found it, pushing you to the next screens to sign up. I don’t like it.

Leaving Las Vegas?


A great movie but a bad choice to watch last night was “Leaving Las Vegas”.  I’d seen it long ago and again was mesmerized by simply brilliant performances by Nick Cage, for which he won the Oscar, and Elizabeth Shue, who was nominated. But this is one of the most depressing films of all time.  I also learned that the writer of the book on which this movie is based – a loosely autobiographical account of the destructiveness of alcoholism – killed himself about 2 weeks into the production of the film. 

My problem with this?  I’m off to Vegas in a few days for the MIX06 conference. MIX06 is Microsoft’s effort to gain some traction in the growing mashup/Web 2.0 space.  It’s at the splendid Venetian Hotel and I’d rather be marvelling at the architectural extravagances and enjoying the huge MS party at “TAO” than worrying about how many of the people walking the street are doomed to untimely and lonely deaths at the hands of their obsessions.

 

Time gets Web 2.0


Time Magazine notes:

From politics to movie-making, from NASA to NASCAR, exciting new changes are occurring — and so is the very process of innovation. For one thing, corporations and universities no longer dominate the world of new ideas. Instead, we’re living in an age of individual innovation spurred on by the Internet as well as a form of group project best represented by resources like Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that is edited by the masses instead of an elite cadre of professional editors.

I like it.  I’m big on the implications of the explosive growth of global online communities, the programmable web and all the other cool things that happen when the notion of social and corporate networking is extended to an increasingly robust global information network (aka “the internet”).

How the money will flow in this brave new networked world extravaganza is less clear than how the information and innovation will flow.   Wall street still views and invests as if heavily capitalized, large corporations will dominate the landscape for some time, though they are again warming up to the idea that little companies can make a big difference.  Myspace.com’s 580 million valuation and Skype’s even higher number give even the humblest small biz programming people cause to work a bit harder to find “the next big thing”.

Cleverness should be copied, Yahoo and MSN and Google!


Although I’m in the growing crowd that suggests Yahoo and Google search results are comparable and MSN is not far behind, Google remains the leader in simple cleverness.

Why Yahoo and MSN don’t copy these little ideas from Google is a great mystery to me.
C’mon MSN, I don’t think many who search for “17 x 3” want this:
RAD Mfg. 2005 Application Chart & Pricelist
19×2.15 17×3.50,16.5×3.50 Front 17×4.25,17X4.50, 17×5.00 Rear CRF 250R 04-05 (36)Hex or Eagle 21×1.60 (32, 36)Hex or Eagle 18×2.15 19×2.15 17×3.50,16.5×3.50 Front

Yahoo you are no better with this:

Start Start 3 Portfolio – 17 x 22 x 1′ – PriceGrabber.com Open this result in new window

Find the lowest price on Start Start 3 Portfolio – 17 x 22 x 1′. PriceGrabber.com delivers instant bottom-line prices on millions of products from thousands of merchants

Google wins HANDILY with this:

  17 x 3 = 51

It’s hardly a copyrighted thing, so why don’t Yahoo and MSN do this?   Or the temp function of Google calculator where you type  “77 F in C”  to get the F to C temp conversion?

I actually think part of this stubborn foolishness is that competing company people get a sense of pride in the status quo and actually  stick to the wrong approach until they come up with something much better or they are forced by forces outside of their own control to copy the cleverness.

Self Help or Self Ish?


I’m sure there is some virtuous stuff amidst the current swirl of motivationally spoken self-helping new ageified banter, but I can’t [self] help but think “hey, this is mostly just a license for people to feel comfortable about doing whatever they darn well please”.

At least with much of the bible thumping old time religion there is an undercurrent of helpfulness and broad social responsibility. Also the new and improved and globilized business models are paying more than lip service to the idea that business responsibility goes far beyond profits for shareholders. This includes the big beneficiaries of big biz. One needs look no farther than the Gates Foundation or Google.org or the Omidyar (Ebay founder) efforts with Microloans to see how powerful this new business ethic has become in solving real world problems.

Many new age folks would suggest that there is some form of collective consciousness and that participating at that level does much good for the world. I’m very skeptical. Tell that to the kid in Africa with AIDs or Malaria or no clean water. They’ll (correctly) choose water purification to soul purification, and we should all get that set of priorities straight.