August 2009
14 posts
“That kind of challenge — balancing openness, freedom, and choice with...”
– From Chris Messina: Joe Hewitt on the App Store | FactoryCity
CheckedProfile Is Out To Bust That Fake Profile →
How do you know if someone’s online profile is real? The question has plagued us for some time now, but it’s become increasingly problematic as vast swatches of the mainstream of society goes…
3 tags
Social Graph Segmentation or: How to Make Social...
Today I did something that I have been planning to do for a long time. For the last few months/years my Facebook news feed has become subject to a deluge of information that I didn’t really care to see, including, but not limited to, updates like:
“Joan just earned the ‘Cream of the Crop’ white ribbon in FarmVille!
Joan got a big ol’ reward for being such a great...
Build Your Own iPhone App with New Service from... →
A company called Sweb Apps has just launched a new service which lets anyone build iPhone apps, even if you don’t have a technical background. The service is aimed primarily at small to…
“In the early days it was said the Apple marketing department consisted of Jobs...”
– Steve Jobs: The man who polished Apple - Times Online
Google Books Offers Creative Commons Licensing →
Earlier this morning Google Books announced a program where rights owners would be given the option to modify their copyright licenses and specify them as Creative Commons (CC) works. The…
2 tags
The Free Debate Rages On
There is a very nice piece by Brad Burnham of Union Square Ventures (and Wesleyan University) on the problem with the Free debate.
“Free is not a pricing strategy, a marketing strategy, or the inevitable consequence of a market with low variable costs. It’s a symptom of a much more fundamental economic shift.”
Brad has some shed light on the dark corners of Chris...
A Hike to Remember →
The second track on Billy Joel’s 1993 album River of Dreams is a tune called “The Great Wall of China.” The song has little to do with the actual site, focusing mostly on Joel’s fallout with…
Kenny G and Gi Gi
Day 2 - Beijing
Yesterday was Great Wall day. We awoke at 6:30am, and headed downstairs to find a taxi to take us to the Simatai section of the great wall. After a short negotiation we got the driver to a reasonable price and began our journey. Using my faithful iPhone translation app, I was able to ask our driver what his name was: Mister Lee.
Mister Lee was more artist than driver, and as we...
Where Are All The Forks?
Day 0 - Beijing:
I arrived at Beijing Airport around 2pm Beijing time, 13.5 hours after taking off in Newark around 12:30pm EST. I watched a rousing 5 movies on the flight, with 0 hours of shut-eye. After meeting up with Cooper outside immigration we left the airport for our hotel in central Beijing. Our first exchange with a Chinese person was in the taxi where we tried our best to communicate...