11.13.07
Zune v2: The Good
A few of the things that I do think are really very good about the new Zune software are both the Podcast and the social/community support. I have been using services like Last.fm, iLike, and a large variety of others for a very long time now and am really happy to see that kind of support built-in as a basic feature that is incredibly simple to use and visually fairly appealing. So far, in the couple of hours I’ve been playing around with it, it’s wonderful.
Podcast support also is very well executed. The v2 software was able to use my existing cache of downloaded podcasts to seed the Podcast view and while I did have to do some cleanup and am having some difficulty getting some of the really old stuff integrated into single items in the Podcast list I was able to get up to date with the majority of what I regularly listen to simply by finding the existing item and hitting the “subscribe” button in the interface. I can not say enough positive things about how well this got implemented that it almost makes up for the total absence of support for the past year.
Oh, and the software is very, very pretty. No really, it’s quite nice to look at which is a rarity.
Update: I can’t believe I forgot to link to my profile page!
11.06.07
Twitter Updates for 2007-11-06
- I’ll take credit for "Baby’s First Shooter", thank you.
The other one is all M’s fault. Well, probably whoever wrote the game actually. # - [From Google Reader] HiveLive’s Social Networking Platform Puts Users in Control: I’.. http://tinyurl.com/2jfsho #
- [From Google Reader] Ning OpenSocial Implementation: I have now confirmed that a vul.. http://tinyurl.com/3y9ujb #
- Lightbulb moment in the shower. I love showers. #
- Heading to work. Might use the S-word tomorrow night in mixed company. #
- Useful tip: If the glow plug light is flashing in your TDi, you should check your brake lights. #
- @Windswept: Solid State Precipitation? #
- [From Google Reader] Denial-of-Service Attack Against Electronic Car Locks: This was.. http://tinyurl.com/22jund #
- @lthomas987: Don’t apologize to anyone about the use of words descriptive of fixed volume dihydrogen monoxide atmostpheric precipitates. #
- is slightly disappointed that I could not do a civic twofer today: no voting in Mpls, but blood drive was good start. #
- Tempting: http://tinyurl.com/ys9nch #
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10.31.07
Twitter Updates for 2007-10-31
- [From Google Reader] Details Revealed: Google OpenSocial To Launch Thursday: Details.. http://tinyurl.com/2fjxw5 #
- [From Google Reader] The Acorn Wand, key to a magical puzzle hunt:
Puzzle hunts are.. http://tinyurl.com/yskyrs # - Tripoli launch for Nov is confirmed as Research launch. 1.5x safety distances, but might be _very_ interesting spectacle. Bring binocs. #
- (I won’t be there this month as I’ll be in Siren, WI for Omegacon) #
- [From Google Reader] Dasani Gets “Bad Product Award”: Consumers International, an in.. http://tinyurl.com/39ortd #
- [From Google Reader] Waiter! More Crayons (Dish): Is fine dining possible with kids?.. http://tinyurl.com/23sx62 #
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10.24.07
Netflix public profiles
I finally got around to looking at the new community features on Netflix this morning. There’s some interesting stuff they’re trying to do here that I can’t help but think would work better with a more open model for social graphs. It was only a month or so ago that I found that a couple of friends had Netflix accounts and managed to get they added to my friend’s list. More interoperability would make that sort of oversight very difficult, though there is the obvious (to me) caveat that these systems should also make it relatively easy to partition how some of that information travels.
Anyway, some items in particular with the Netflix Community features that I found interesting where the difference between “public” and “private” information and the “Reviewer Rank”. I am, unsurprisingly, pretty low on the ranking coming in somewhere just shy of 65,000th.
But you can see some of that by going directly to my profile.
04.17.07
Yet another social book site
Not that the books themselves are social, though I can think of a few fictional libraries where that might be true, but Revish is yet another social website with a focus on books. In some ways it’s closer to what I’ve been looking for than the other ones I’ve seen http://www.cavort.org/2007/02/21/while-im-thinking-about-books/. In any case, I have a profile there too now.
03.17.07
Too bad about the name, but…
Infodoodads pointed me to another social book site that I think might fit my needs a bit better than the other three that I’ve played with so far: goodreads.
My profile can be found here and I might play with the widget a bit and see what it looks like.
02.21.07
Widgets and Badges
Originally I had a lot of this stuff on the About Me page but I decided to move it all over here to reduce clutter. Essentially, this is where all of the badges and widgets that I don’t want cluttering up the sidebar but think are kind of interesting or at least are useful as reminders of various places on the net go to die.
My car mileage averages:
11.08.06
Little bits of happy
While I’m certainly not entirely happy with the results of the elections yesterday, the election of a socialist to the US Senate in Vermont makes my little socialist heart very happy.
10.14.06
New web toy
I’m playing with a new music social network web toy right now called Qloud. It’s very similar to Last.fm which I have been playing with for a couple of years now, but in some ways the service might have a better outlook.
So far the service is pretty rough. Searching from the main page can be painful. The interface is… difficult. The iTunes plug-in needs some very serious work (Advice: Whatever you do, try not to accidentally put a ‘\’ in any of your tags. I can’t use the plug-in at work anymore because I’ve got a tag with that in it and it crashes iTunes withing seconds of launching and there does not appear to be any way to remove tags outside the plug-in.). The track information database they have is problematic with some tracks having entirely wrong attributions, many albums not existing at all, no way to input new information, and horrible handling of non-english character sets.
But it’s interesting and different, and has some potential.
If you do decide to take a spin with it, sign up using this link and I get points for the referral.
![Strings of Life (Acid Brass [Mute])](http://images.metaservices.microsoft.com/cover/075/drd600/d658/d65847e21i5.jpg)
