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Thoughts and things I care to sharelinks for 2008-02-29
- Darren Waters of BBC News dot.life column had an interview with Andy Rubin and a demo of an Alfa version of Android on a 3G handset. Check it out.
- Dave Fleet has a great post on being more clear and approachable to the non-geeks on the topic of social media. There are many ways of communicating concepts and he’s taking the lead on making it easier to understand. Kudos Dave!
- Have you heard that there will be a 4th Jason Bourne movie? Check out Doug Haslam’s post on naming the movie! Great fun.
Bourne Again?
Twitter bud Doug Haslam has taken up the task of helping the producers name the next Jason Bourne flick. No name or plot has been released, but Matt Damon has signed on for film number 4 of the series.
Head on over and offer up your suggestion!
FriendFeed rockets to my toolbar
FriendFeed just made it on my browser’s link toolbar. Why is this important? Because, it delivers on the promise that Facebook seemed to offer to me, but was not able to deliver (like many social networks). Easy interaction with friends with the ability to simply share relevant information.
I can give you a laundry list of what’s wrong with Facebook from my point of view, but I’ll instead share the big secret of FriendFeed for me. Feeds. There’s more – it’s the way you use the feeds. It’s not another feed aggregator, it’s a tool that lets you bring feeds from your various online profiles and share them with friends. Yeah, sure, sounds like a “lifestream” right, and yes, you can do that with Plaxo Plus.
However, FriendFeed is different in that, like Twitter, you can view a combined stream of your feeds and your friend’s feeds. Within this feed, you can comment on anything – it’s fantastic as a conversation starter. You can see what other people have said about a post, a link, a picture, a news item, etc… whatever someone has happened to share in a feed.
I can’t describe it much better, like Twitter, FriendFeed rocks. Kudos to Louis Gray for really bringing attention to it. You can find my FriendFeed here.
Anyway, it’s made it’s way to my toolbar – which means it’s just one click away and not buried in a bookmark menu (like others). It’s that addicting useful.
links for 2008-02-28
- The iPhone & Apple is the example used to show how anti-competitive vendor lock-in has become in the wireless world.
- Check out this post for details on a number of important WP related news.
- I see Kevin Tofel, one of my favorite tech bloggers, has posted about AOL’s XDrive online storage service. Good stuff, and yes, you can set it up as a mapped drive on Windows systems. Should work excellently with the Eee PC!
Eee PC and online storage
Here’s an idea, and one I should have talked about sooner. As a cloud computing device, the Eee PC is the perfect example of a device that should take advantage of online storage.
Not only should mini-laptop, or Internet access devices be leveraging online software suites like Google Docs, Zoho Office, or ThinkFree, but also online storage as well. Services like Box.net, Microsoft’s SkyDrive, and AOL’s XDrive (thanks to Kevin Tofel for reminding me of it) all offer up free storage with options for additional storage as a premium service.
AOL’s XDrive is really exciting to any Eee PC device loaded with Windows XP as AOL offers a utility to map a drive directly to your storage account. All three of these options (I’m sure there are others I’m not aware of) will work with either IE or Firefox and with Windows or Linux, so even if you don’t try to have a mapped drive, you can easily upload/download files as needed to any of these services.
Just one more way to solve the data storage concerns for potential Eee PC users.
Define your personal brand
Here’s a question that many people don’t often think about as they begin developing their personal brand.
What is your personal brand?
I wonder how many people have actually sat down and defined what their strengths and skills are before diving in. Realizing that you’re as marketable as your favorite soda, not to mention more valuable to employers or clients, is a very powerful revelation. Making the best use of this concept for your career and family shouldn’t be taken too lightly.
Personal brand has been described as “Reputation 2.0”, and it is to a certain extent. However, it’s also much more than just what people remember about you. As you start online social networking, blogging, using social media tools and techniques to build an awareness, you are also building an easily indexed and searchable history.
At the same time, don’t put too much work into a personal branding plan. When it starts seeming like a flashy PR campaign by some high-end New York firm, you know you’ve missed the point. Just like you should put some thought and define goals for your career and life, your personal brand should have just enough structure and focus to help identify a direction and/or methods to work on.
Just like your life and career, things will come along that will change the course of your branding strategy. Keep it loose and follow the opportunities that arise, think about them a bit to make sure you’re not making a rash decision… but make the decision and move on.
I am curious though, have you defined your personal brand? What is the message (mission statement?) that you are working to present?
links for 2008-02-27
- One of my favorite bloggers has some feedback on the new Google Talk Chatback widget.
- Check out this post at PocketPC Thoughts on a new Daylight Savings Time update for Windows Mobile devices.
- Seriously. Bijan Sabet penned a fantastic guest post over at GigaOm. Recommended.
Mobile post test
Testing a mobile post via Pocket SharpMT.
Mobile post test
Testing a mobile post via Pocket SharpMT.
links for 2008-02-26
- From blogger and biz card cartoonist Hugh McLeod.
- Interesting new feature of Google Talk…
@MAC_Arms Pay taxes when you make your money, pay taxes when you spend your money, pay taxes when you successfully invest your money, pay taxes when you save enough taxed money to afford a house, pay taxes to live in your house, pay taxes when you sell the house that you paid taxes on to
Yup, taxes are criminal and we need serious reforms. I've always said that if you want to see a tax revolt, make withholdings illegal and have Americans write a tax check every payday. They'll revolt for sure. You don't miss what you never had.
I think it’s safe to say that @GovEvers should stop blocking audits in Wisconsin and open the books…
“Only AMERICAN citizens should vote.”
Sen. @berniemoreno says voter ID and proof of citizenship are simply common sense.
“We’re talking about a very low threshold — identify who you are and prove you’re a U.S. citizen when you register to vote. I think we’re getting closer to
Wrong. Democrats are solely responsible for hours-long airport lines.
They voted to defund TSA three times and won’t even entertain a conversation about reopening it. Why?
They’re using it as leverage to stop enforcing immigration laws.