Web/Tech

  • “Now” Widget

    I saw this and spent some time watching the items change. 

    It's got lots of
    tickers and content that change as you watch.  You just weren't aware
    that you would enjoy knowing how many emails are being sent or spam
    emails being received.  There are also recent news updates from The New
    York Times, CNN, Newsvine, top Google searches of the day, and lots
    more.

    Here are some tidbits from the background audio patter.

    • "Welcome to Now," the computer says.
    • "How about a big bowl of Now?"
    • "Please keep your hands inside the moment."
    • "Your hair has grown 5 millionths of centimeter in the last second."
    • "It is Now in all timezones."

    Very clever and well-done.

    Below is a limited version.  The link to the complete version is below. 

    Click to play with the full widget.  Here is a screenshot of it – and, yes, that is me in the middle.

    081108 Now Widget Graphic 630p

  • “Now” Widget

    I saw this and spent some time watching the items change. 

    It's got lots of
    tickers and content that change as you watch.  You just weren't aware
    that you would enjoy knowing how many emails are being sent or spam
    emails being received.  There are also recent news updates from The New
    York Times, CNN, Newsvine, top Google searches of the day, and lots
    more.

    Here are some tidbits from the background audio patter.

    • "Welcome to Now," the computer says.
    • "How about a big bowl of Now?"
    • "Please keep your hands inside the moment."
    • "Your hair has grown 5 millionths of centimeter in the last second."
    • "It is Now in all timezones."

    Very clever and well-done.

    Below is a limited version.  The link to the complete version is below. 

    Click to play with the full widget.  Here is a screenshot of it – and, yes, that is me in the middle.

    081108 Now Widget Graphic 630p

  • Staying Informed and Up-To-Date

    Library Computers 250p
     Last week I went to visit my son, Ben, at a Duke University parents weekend. This April, I will return for my 25th reunion. A lot has changed since I was in college.

    One of the biggest changes I noticed was how much information the Internet puts at each person's fingertips, regardless of where they are on campus. Doing research no longer means a trip to the library. And books, magazines or newspapers are a distant second-place to online research and news items.

    Staying informed is a big part of my business as well. I used to receive several newspapers daily; and my morning routine started by scanning them cover-to-cover and clipping items that might be of interest to me are someone I knew. I rarely read a newspaper anymore, except when I'm on airplanes.

    Now, my daily routine uses news-feed readers and web sites to access a wide variety online content. This is a great way to sort, sift, filter, and act on relevant information.

    So, this week, I want to share some of the news sites that I find useful.

    News Aggregators:

    These
    are sites that combine news from many sources and create an updated
    mash up of information it gives me a quick view into what's happening
    each day.

    The Basics: There are no surprises here; still Google News and Yahoo! News are so good that I have to list them anyway.

    Next Generation: Some of the newer aggregation sites are quite clever.  Here are a few that I really enjoy:

    • NewsCred: Easily personalized to pick sources and rank by credibility.
    • Topix: Comprehensive and well categorized. Has a nice look and feel. Uses RSS well.
    • Newser: Nice summaries and related links. Uses pictures well, too.
    • Daylife: an example of an intelligent content service platform (read: little human editing).
    • Newsvine: well done; with social-sourced news flagging.
    • Regator: Specialty is organizing and finding blog posts.
    • Slate: A little different than the others; more editorial content.

    Slate Logo
    Slate has a number of interesting features.  Today's Papers summarizes current newspaper coverage.  Another summarizes current magazine stories.  And a third, called Today's Business Press, does just what you'd expect. 

    All three are quick to read and well done.

    Also worth checking: Digg, Technorati, and Techmeme.

  • Staying Informed and Up-To-Date

    Library Computers 250p
     Last week I went to visit my son, Ben, at a Duke University parents weekend. This April, I will return for my 25th reunion. A lot has changed since I was in college.

    One of the biggest changes I noticed was how much information the Internet puts at each person's fingertips, regardless of where they are on campus. Doing research no longer means a trip to the library. And books, magazines or newspapers are a distant second-place to online research and news items.

    Staying informed is a big part of my business as well. I used to receive several newspapers daily; and my morning routine started by scanning them cover-to-cover and clipping items that might be of interest to me are someone I knew. I rarely read a newspaper anymore, except when I'm on airplanes.

    Now, my daily routine uses news-feed readers and web sites to access a wide variety online content. This is a great way to sort, sift, filter, and act on relevant information.

    So, this week, I want to share some of the news sites that I find useful.

    News Aggregators:

    These
    are sites that combine news from many sources and create an updated
    mash up of information it gives me a quick view into what's happening
    each day.

    The Basics: There are no surprises here; still Google News and Yahoo! News are so good that I have to list them anyway.

    Next Generation: Some of the newer aggregation sites are quite clever.  Here are a few that I really enjoy:

    • NewsCred: Easily personalized to pick sources and rank by credibility.
    • Topix: Comprehensive and well categorized. Has a nice look and feel. Uses RSS well.
    • Newser: Nice summaries and related links. Uses pictures well, too.
    • Daylife: an example of an intelligent content service platform (read: little human editing).
    • Newsvine: well done; with social-sourced news flagging.
    • Regator: Specialty is organizing and finding blog posts.
    • Slate: A little different than the others; more editorial content.

    Slate Logo
    Slate has a number of interesting features.  Today's Papers summarizes current newspaper coverage.  Another summarizes current magazine stories.  And a third, called Today's Business Press, does just what you'd expect. 

    All three are quick to read and well done.

    Also worth checking: Digg, Technorati, and Techmeme.

  • Election Tools

    With the election coming in less than two weeks, I wanted to share some of the election websites that I check for updated information about how the race is going.

    The first website (called Five-Thirty-Eight.com) is graphically compelling, contains lots of updated information, and is done by someone whose primary job is communicating statistical information. The name comes from the number of electoral votes.

    081024 538 Electoral Projections 600p

    The second website (called Real Clear Politics) has a lot more news, and I like the summary showing how much of a lead each candidate has in contested states. Here's an example of that chart.

    081024 Real Clear Politics 600p

    And, here is a link to the top-10 election tools on the web.

  • Election Tools

    With the election coming in less than two weeks, I wanted to share some of the election websites that I check for updated information about how the race is going.

    The first website (called Five-Thirty-Eight.com) is graphically compelling, contains lots of updated information, and is done by someone whose primary job is communicating statistical information. The name comes from the number of electoral votes.

    081024 538 Electoral Projections 600p

    The second website (called Real Clear Politics) has a lot more news, and I like the summary showing how much of a lead each candidate has in contested states. Here's an example of that chart.

    081024 Real Clear Politics 600p

    And, here is a link to the top-10 election tools on the web.

  • Tune-Up Your iTunes Music Collection, Automatically

    For years I took my music collection for granted. I ripped many of my
    old CDs to disk, and simply allowed the computer to save the
    information anyway it chose to. Over time, it became clear that there were
    mistakes, missing information and, in general … a mess.

    After several limited attempts to clean my collection manually, I
    started looking for a better way. I certainly found something that
    worked for me. It's called Tune-Up.

    080919 iTunes Tune-Up Service
    Tune-up is a software add-on designed to clean your iTunes music collection. For me, that means fixing and standardizing the artist, album, song titles, and other data that helps me find the right music for my mood. I also appreciate how well it finds and updates cover art for songs and albums.

    Tune-Up accomplishes a lot of its magic by connecting to various data services (like Gracenote's MusicID).  While Tune-Up does most of the heavy lifting, I appreciate that it
    allows me to have the final say. It's very easy to accept its
    suggestions; yet, I still have the ability to ignore or override it
    based on how I want my music categorized.

    There's also feature that recognizes the song you're playing and displays other relevant information, like related concert dates in your area, links to videos by the artist, and recommendations about other songs or albums you might like.

    Bottom line:  This tool saved me a lot of time and works better than the other tools I've tried.

    If you don't use iTunes, or just want to check-out another good alternative, you can also look at MediaMonkey. And if you want a clean your music collection by finding duplicate tracks or to clean-out entries where you deleted or moved the actual music file, I recommend looking at Marklesoft's Dupe Eliminator.

  • Another Type of Image Toy – Deep Zoom

    The new Deep Zoom technology in Microsoft's Silverlight is pretty cool.  The smooth in-place zooming and panning that Deep Zoom allows is a true advancement and raises the bar on image viewing. High resolution images need to be prepared for use with Deep Zoom to control the zooming experience.

    Here is an example.

    Also, here are three links worth exploring about Deep Zoom:

    • This is a Deep Zoom site of Hard Rock Café Memorabilia (Hard Rock)
    • This is a Barack Obama supporter site using Deep Zoom (Obama)
    • And finally, here is a demo of a web site designed for Deep Zoom (Vertigo)

    If you want a little more background on this, here is a post about why this technology is new and different.

  • Another Type of Image Toy – Deep Zoom

    The new Deep Zoom technology in Microsoft's Silverlight is pretty cool.  The smooth in-place zooming and panning that Deep Zoom allows is a true advancement and raises the bar on image viewing. High resolution images need to be prepared for use with Deep Zoom to control the zooming experience.

    Here is an example.

    Also, here are three links worth exploring about Deep Zoom:

    • This is a Deep Zoom site of Hard Rock Café Memorabilia (Hard Rock)
    • This is a Barack Obama supporter site using Deep Zoom (Obama)
    • And finally, here is a demo of a web site designed for Deep Zoom (Vertigo)

    If you want a little more background on this, here is a post about why this technology is new and different.

  • New Imaging Tools Will Change How You Access Information

    Photosynth is a new technology from Microsoft. 
    It is software that could transform the way we look at digital images.
    Using still photos (and more), Photosynth builds a breathtaking new
    form of composite image, and lets us navigate them.  This service turns multiple photos of a scene or site — say, an art gallery or a building — into a 3-D scene you can virtually "walk" through on the Web.

    080829 Photosynth of Venice Canals 600p

    Ten-years ago I saw something like this; it was the interface to a game called Myst.  It was ground-breaking at the time.

    In the early phase of adoption for Photosynth, I expect to see things like the 3-D rendering of the Canals in Venice.  It is an easily accessible way to explore the concept.  Soon, however, this could evolve into a new way to hyper-link a wide range of data, meta-data, and business information.

    To get a better idea of what this can do, watch this video from the Ted Conference introducing Photosynth.

    Think about how much the web has already changed how you do research?  Also, because it is so easy to do now, think how much more research you do.  For example, I'm amazed at how often I search Google or Wikipedia. Similarly, I use sites like Digg, Technorati, Regator, and various blogs to find relevant information – even if I didn't know I was looking for it.

    Photosynth is different, and in some ways a step beyond, those research tools.  It is graphics-centric instead of text-centric.  And I can imagine a new type of front-end (a new framework) for accessing information stored virtually anywhere.  Consequently, I expect to see a lot more of this, and things like it.

    Click here to explore some interesting Synths.  You can make your own, too.  For example, here is a link to a Photosynth of, my son, Ben's dorm room at Duke.  It took him about a half-hour to make it.

    Note: you can use arrows on the screen to navigate a Photosynth image; and the "Space Bar" is helpful, too, because it jumps to the next cluster of 3-D images.