Tuesday, March 25, 2003
Embedded in Scottsdale
Day 3 at PC Forum. Lots of live coverage happening here and here.
Observations:
Da Show —
One of the most amazing things about the show is how much attendees are becoming the main event.
For example, in the past the show had one assigned photographer (still does, and he's very good). Now, thanks to a helpful company called Preclick, everybody with a digital camera is chipping in. And the results, projected up on the big screens between sessions, are equally abundant and good.
We're in a loaf & fish economy folks. Deal with it.
Relationshipping:
Mitch should be here with the rest of us, talking identity trash. A sample:
With the identity infrastructure and quality assurance for transactions, the infomediary business can take root. It cannot be a closed system, because we know there is no way a single entity can enforce its standards for information on many organizations. Some industries may adopt their own standards, but they need to coexist with other networks of identity/assurance data in order to address all aspects of Doc's life.
There you go. A $100 billion business laid out for the taking. Go for it. Consulting and business planning services available from yours truly .
More photoblogging:
A pointer to Greg Elin's handy Fotonotes. I have an awesome photo of Greg and Clay that should be up today. Keep looking here. Thanks to Marc for the pointage.
[Later...] Okay, the whole gallery is now up here. The best shots are here and ... shoot. They're not up. Durn. Okay, I'll put 'em up here.
James Hong, creator of Hot or Not is here. I thought it might be fun to hook all the pictures up to a Bright or Not engine, but James (far the wiser) gave the idea a zero. Still, it would be fun to do something.
Who's not here:
I tend to think that the human capstones from the tops of the HR pyramids that comprise large companies can't be expected to see and understand, much less represent and discuss, the skunkworky use of open source and free software inside their companies, and their customers' companies. But maybe I'm unfair. In any case, I'm saving my questions for the open source panel this afternoon.
Rock or Not?:
This rocks.
Scott Heiferman's Meetup is amazing. Developed and runs on Linux. 10K meetups. 34 countries. 225k members. The Meetup Game: Name a city and a hobby on Google and some meetup is the top link. Bonus Link: here's Scott's Fotolog.
Ross Mayfield: We're developing social infrastructure. Indeedy.
(b)adwords?
Steve Mallett has a question about advertising in Blogspot blog banners.
By the way, to answer this question, I've been seeing the same two ads for two days in the same banner.
During Q&A after his talk on stage with Esther at PC Forum, I asked Sergey if what we're seeing in Blogspot banners are indeed AdWords. He said yes. I also asked if Google was after a kind of holy grail: Advertising people might actually demand; and he said yes (in a few more words) to that, too. More here from TIG.
Peace meal
Amidst today's war stuff...
On the issue of lefty mojo, Lance Knobel reiterates the need to correct a problem George Lakoff has been lamenting for many years: we need more lefty think tanks.
Thanks to Patrick Nielsen Hayden, here's a nice tankful of lefty blogs:
I'd like to put those in a tagged list, but I don't have the time to hack the html. Maybe later.
This is unpleasant. But this may put it in context.
Jupiter Research has a blog covering the war. Very interesting.
Another big-J reporter gets de-blogged.
From the mailbox:
...what I keep thinking is that we are going to learn the same lesson the French learned when Napoleon invaded Russia.
PageGirl
RageBoy is the proud father of a new blogger.
FrontNet reporting
Nothing has given weblogs more respect, in less time, than the extreme convenience of having a lone Iraqi covering the war from Bagdad on his weblog.
Thanks to Salam Pax, little j journalism is earning its big J, big time.
If he survives, give him a Pulitzer.