I will make this very quick since most of it speaks for itself. I decided to check my MySpace account after about a year or so I guess. I am not sure how much time has elapsed, it is like a continual nightmare, but I thought I would report the highlights…

Latest Friend Requets

A Marketing Genius who believes in The Lord Jesus! wants to be your friend!

A HUMBLE Social Networking CEO wants to be your friend!

Tom Reassures Me MySpace is Free (heh. like ICQ)

My lawyers tell me that I need to let every MySpace user know that MySpace’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policy have been updated. Feel free to take a look at them:

Terms of Use

Privacy Policy

Don’t worry everyone received this message from me, and this doesn’t mean we are charging. MySpace is still free!

Whew. Close call Tom, for a moment I thought MySpace might cost people something which is not a bad idea. For one it would generate revenue and it would also be a barrier to entry! It would save me time every year or so that I check my account. If it did cost I would not have to delete dozens of these warnings and I do mean dozens…

Profile Has been Deleted

The profile you received this message from has been deleted. Either this user deleted their own profile or MySpace deleted it for spamming and/or content violations.

To remove this message click the delete button below.

Thank you.

P.S. If you’re seeing a lot of old messages in your inbox like this, it’s because someone you know who has written you messages has been deleted. If the messages are new, it’s probably a spammer that MySpace caught in the act.

Don’t worry though….Tom calms my worst fears. The thought that my friends, even my family, have been deleted out of existence is a false alarm.

My Friends Have Not Been Deleted

your friends have not been deleted!

Just wanted to update everyone on this issue. Last Friday we ran some database jobs to fix an inaccuracy in the way we were counting the number of friends each user has. WE DID NOT DELETE YOUR FRIENDS! We simply fixed the number that shows on your profile. You can read more about it in my blog! I know people are very worried they lost friends, but you did not - your friend count is just closer to being accurate. We’re only about halfway through, so your count will still decline until it’s completely finished.

The horror.

Please Intervene for My Sister

Unfortunately my sister is still there. She is on MySpace and I can’t find a tactic or strategy to get her off of the broken CSS, chain letters, scammers and spammers.

Bright Note- Self-Deprecation Works

On the flip side I can report that calling myself a “retard” in Twitter and linking to a blog post drives visitors. This should make my marketing and social media crowd readers happy. *thanks*

I am not sure what all of this means. I am trying not to think about the implications and what it says about the influencer crowd I hang with on Twitter…I do hope no one tells all the “deleted people” about micro-chunking and nano-blogging formats. I am running out of places to hide…

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Avatar Expression

I am still chewing over some comments on metrics and while I think it over I decided to take a quick look at avatars and expression. A question was asked in a forum along the lines of whether Second Life is a good medium or not for education?

I believe that yes for raw creativity, accessability, presence and simulation it is a great medium, but as learning relies heavily on communication it is hampered because much of human communication is non-verbal, we are hitting a hurdle and most do not realize it.

Someone asked if “non-verbal” communication would dissappear?

No. We will find work arounds for now. We have been for years.

IM and Micro Chunking

For example with Instant Messaging (IM) language has become compressed and we use emoticons to express emotion. Micro-chunked formats like Jaiku, Twitter, or Pownce also incite compression because in many instances Web to SMS services limit characters to 140 or so.This also exerts a force on how we express thought and use language. We adapt our messages and form “work arounds”. It is so common as to permeate popular cell phone commercials.

I have even played Uni-code characters in Twitter and thought how that might be used like a pseudo-cuneiform script. Cuneiform is one of the earliest known forms of written expression. Created by the Sumerians from ca. 3000 BC it started as as a system of pictographs. The pictorial representations faded and became simplified and more abstract.

Cultural Illiteracy

The same holds true in the work place and in different cultures. In other cultures there are numerous non-verbal cues as an American I never pick up on, because I do not know the language. Either we misunderstand or we adapt and find workarounds.

Online Board or Strategy Games

Even online card games or chess game strategies force us to relearn or change tactics. Even in logic games like chess opponents can “read” critical non-verbal feedback. A furrowed brow over moving a rook, or a smirk as a knight forks a king with check and limbs a queen. If chess is subject to this, it is no surprise that poker or blackjack or card games which use “tells” or non-verbal cues are really affected. I don’t know if anyone has monitored say “cursor” or “mouse behavior” or even eye tracking, but I think we send these signals because we are conditioned too.

The Misleading Avatar

Avatars, and there are many forms, can be extremely misleading. Even in expressive worlds like Second Life where customization is paramount. The Avatar may look healthy and fine, but the person or personality driving it might actually feel sick or have a disablity or send signals we cannot read because they do not translate.

I came to realize this when I realized how difficult it was for an avatar to express grief or another to provide solace to that Avatar and this has happened twice.

As a society we have not really “scripted” for that yet…we have scripted for lots of other stuff though…hugs, kisses, and other “behavior”, but a wide range of emotions or expressions are missing. Perhaps they are still too “synthetic” so we have to rely on overt behaviors and interpret them.

Somehow I think we will get there, or get closer, as 3D worlds become more integral to our lives because non-verbal communication is critical to everything we do. We cannot afford to “work-around” too much.

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There is nothing worse then having one/half hand to type with- (My left hand is practically paralyzed, but have regained some back in my right- so I am hopeful). It can be described as pure frustration. I will have to bore readers with just calling attention to things I find interesting, critical or poignant- then again maybe I won’t bore them. I admit I am behind on reading after four (FOUR) days of being unplugged completely and until the 30th, save for occasional game or writing that is the doc’s orders which I decided to heed. Forgive me for becoming an echo chamber, then again perhaps I am too verbose and it is better that way.

From Twitter- twitter tracking- a bit annoying as you must do it via SMS from what I read.

(Some edits per me)

track YOURKEYWORD

When someone (anyone who updates in public) mentions “YOUKEYWORD,” you’ll get it on your device in real-time. From there you can send “whois username” to find out more about that person, or “follow username” to follow his or her updates. Don’t want to receive anymore about YOURKEYWORD? Toggle it off with:

untrack YOURKEYWORD

*Note the word can also be a phrase.

You can create as many of these as you want, so send “track drinking tea”, “track iphone”, “track walking san francisco” and you’ll receive matches for all. Want to get a list of what you’re currently tracking? Send “track” alone (or “stats”). Turn them all off by sending “track off”.

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This will be coming up more and more so for the neophytes out there who ask- What is SIP as it relates to VoIP? SIP is an acronym for Session Initiation Protocol…or:

An application-layer control protocol, a Signaling protocol for Internet Telephony. SIP can establish sessions for features such as audio/videoconferencing, interactive gaming, and call forwarding to be deployed over IP networks thus enabling service providers to integrate basic IP telephony services with Web, e-mail, and chat services. Learn more at voip-architecture.com

(Session Initiation Protocol) Used for setting up communications sessions on the Internet, such as telephony, presence, events notification and instant messaging. The protocol initiates call setup, routing, authentication and other feature messages to endpoints within an IP domain. More at Engin.com.au

Short for Session Initiation Protocol, SIP is an Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standard protocol for initiating an interactive user session that involves multimedia elements such as video, voice, chat, gaming, and virtual reality. SIP works in the Application layer of the OSI communications model. Per NetworkMagazineIndia.

Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is a multimedia and telephony protocol that provides services including call forwarding, number delivery, authentication and other telecoms applications. The protocol can set up, control and tear down sessions including internet telephone calls and multimedia conferences. via computeractive.co.uk

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Sermo bills itself as the “MySpace for physicians”.

Here, physicians aggregate observations from their daily practice and then - rapidly and in large numbers - challenge or corroborate each others opinions, accelerating the emergence of trends and new insights on medications, devices and treatments. You can then apply the collective knowledge to achieve better outcomes for your patients.

O.K. I am skeptical- I have not seen it but I am still skeptical. This is based on my experience as a nurse of several years ago so I might be out of date. While it was some time ago, and I know more docs have adopted PDAs, etc. The one thing a physician (and a nurse) lacks is time…TIME. Seriously. Never, ever enough time.

I recall doing many late night and early morning rounds with doctors I learned very quickly that time was the most valuable thing they have or didn’t have. Don’t waste it, be efficient, and know your stuff. Now I am not saying Sermo is a time waster- I think it would be great if more physicians tuned into the Net. I still think most would do it to get a date first- they just don’t have time.

Nascent thoughts on where and how I would use the “Twitter Concept” in an enterprise. This is inspired after (caveat- haven’t practiced in ten years)

a) Having worked in various hospitals
b) Having to have been hospitalized
c) More than once, due to weather, having to work back-to-back triple shifts, sleep for eight, and get up and do it again. Man talk about the intercom being surreal.

The Problem: The hospital intercom. Nothing more annoying than that squak box. There is a reason we had:

Code Blue- cardiac arrest, resuscitation needed stat.
Code Whites- Hostile patient- back up needed.
Code Reds- Fire- we have a fire.

We didn’t want to alarm patients, never mind we interrupted them all the time.

Scenario: This could use more thought. This is just a five-minute brain dump…to get thinking aligned.

The hospital would employ an enterprise version of the twitter structure- yes I know some work would be needed for HIPPA compliance- but usually a room number will do. I am sure it can be done with more thought. Each nurse call station could easily send a short message that would go to the phone of the charge nurse, one particular charge nurse, or the med nurse, or to a Doc on call, broadcast all over, etc. Short, fast, quiet, use SSL and posts to the intranet too. You could color code the message for priority, have pre-made messages to save time,and/ or a program on the PDA could sort, rate, prioritize, etc.

By viewing the intranet trend data one could see problems that needed correcting, trends, shortages, surpluses, staffing and any abuse of course. I am sure modern Pixus machines already do this for pharmacists- they can look at a nurses’s PRN dosing patterns to spot abuse by comparing it to the standard deviation from the mean. Still simple problems solved can have real savings.

I remember coming up with the simple idea to use the antiquated dumb waiters in one hospital to do routine after-pharmacy-hour medication restocks. Doesn’t sound like much, but imagine 14 units, a nurse having to go up to the pharmacy and gather meds, (say on average 30 minutes off unit.), and three shifts 365 a year. Average wage of ~ $15.00 hour back then. That is a savings of about $115,000.00 a year, not counting increase in patient care with time spent on unit and maybe nurses could get a REAL break.

Twitter- Short Codes - SMS- etc-think short chunks of vital information that must be relayed and read quickly, quietly, and the ability to trend the information by type. Yes the whole micro-blogging concept has many uses yet untapped.

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VoIP Tangle Week…The VoIP arena Sees a Serious Techno Tango Slugfest among heavyweights, but I am watching the Social Media Infrastructure Plays…by the Mountaineers in Cisco Systems. They know what it is all about!

AVAYA SOA PROMISE

On March 5th Avaya promised Telephony 2.0 announcing new capabilities that bring SOA (service-oriented architecture) bred into telephony so companies can easily integrate this into their business processes. I decided to hold my breath on AV.

AVAYA and LENOVO UNITE AROUND FINGERS and SOFTPHONE

Avaya then announces their IP Softphone and the inclusion of biometric logins via a deal with Lenovo which promises authentication and therefore prevention of unauthorized calls- this makes sense. All through Lenova’s fingerprint reader and Password Manager (which I actually like). To boot the ThinkPads will also come with a message waiting light, transforming the keyboard illumination function (Function-Page Up Key) into a visual alert to check voicemail. Clever- I love the keyboard illumination light too- not sure if I will like it blinking though. However, it is those little features, like the light, that make you love the Thinkpad line.

THINKPAD BUYING TIPS & DEALS

Yes- I am a huge fan and I think everyone should get one- put Ubuntu on it for irony.

INSIDER TIP 1 Place your order, then have them call you back, (click the text box that says call back) sometimes, if you seem confused you can get that finger print reader for free- or weasel something- just be confused and they will often throw a tidbit or two in for free and my reps are always honest if something sucks. Thinkpads are just great machines. I am a loyalist and my Libretto nor Alienware compare.

INSIDER TIP 2- try the Lenova Discount Outlet - don’t bank on customization though- you might try their Special Offers Page. but if you like low prices and not afraid to up the power later…you might try looking at Ubid. I did by an X 40 Series off of ebay once, back when it was IBM, but I prefer the customization. Still try ubid it isn’t as flooded.

ME AND THE IMPENDING ThinkPad T60p WIDESCREEN SERIES

I just purchased one of the new, heavily loaded, Lenova T60P, (Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor T7600 (2.33GHz, 4MB L2, 667MHz FSB with an ATI Mobility Fire GL V5250 with 256MB, 15.4 WSXGA+ TFT and 3 GB PC2-4200 DDR2 SDRAM 533MHz SODIMM Memory…sadly all the jumbo hard drives were at 5400 RPM so I settled on a 100GB Hard Disk Drive at 7200rpm)) perhaps too soon, even with a 3-4 week wait- forgoing my love and tradition of the ultra-lite X series which I have had a model 20, 30, 40, and 60. I was never a fan of the R Series, Z Series, but I am now interested in the T series). If I had waited a bit? Maybe I would be all VoIP, because according to Avaya this is not a roadmap- this is reality…right after Avaya’s announced move into SOA they are actually going to do something “clever”.

Per Information Week

Avaya’s CEO Louis D’Ambrosio kicked off this year’s VoiceCon conference in Orlando, Fla., with a bang. D’Ambrosio, in an opening keynote address, announced a partnership with Lenovo to integrate Avaya’s Internet Protocol telephony capabilities in Lenovo’s notebook computers along with a suite of services for communications-enabled business processes. D’Ambrosio prepped the audience by making a bold statement that intelligent communications, a term Avaya uses to describe converged IP telephony networks designed for communications that go beyond voice, is happening today and is not a vision of the future. “We’re not talking roadmaps here. Intelligent communications is a reality,” he said.

Avaya wants to be the leader in that market. It’s teaming up with Lenovo to pre-load advanced IP telephony features on Lenovo’s ThinkPad notebooks in hopes of enhancing the communications experience for business professionals as they place and receive phone calls from their computers.

BACK IN THE BATCAVE in REDMOND

Meanwhile back in Redmond (NASDAQ: MSFT) Microsoft is getting set to release enhanced VoIP Solutions. The big deal- MSFT predicts in the next three years 100 million office customers will shift to software and click to call. No kidding with Let’sTalk’s incredibly low international rates and options like Skype for Business are now on the table. I don’t sense anything approaching brilliant from MSFT in that prediction- you don’t need hardware there- well minimal. Go ahead download Skype and try it- PC to PC calls are free, the video rocks (except for Mac- which appears to have moved in retrograde in latest version) and I use it more than anything else. Of course it sports AES Encryption, port agility, tunneling and other SOX and HIPPA inducing problems- but Facetime got the IM and VoIP Security call on that one- as did SYMT.

Google is allready distributing it well where else but among other goodies in their pack:

I wonder if they go all VoIP soon and cozy up to someone…if any company has problems it is Google (NASDAQ:GOOG). Problems…at any rate I imagine it will happen.

NORTEL RE-DELAYS THE DELAY

Last week Nortel (NYSE/Toronto: NT) announced that it will delay the filing of its 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2006, until mid-March 2007. The company will also restate earnings for 2004, 2005, and the first nine months of 2006… again- wow. Now that is a re-statement. I doubt it will have any real effect. This week they are preaching ACTA. The ATCA standards, organized by the PICMG espouse a generic telecom chassis, that allows systems vendors to buy a “shell of hardware” and some software from outside suppliers. In theory this shortens the design cycle and lowers costs which will free vendors to focus their braintrust on software development. Ahem.

CISCO SYSTEMS GETS “SOCIAL MEDIA CLARITY”

OK- intentional buzzword alert, oldy but goody, for Greg at SMOmashup.com.

As an afterthought- and actually a big deal if you think about it. Network Computing reports that Cisco Systems Inc (NDD: CSCO) unveiled its Unified Communications System 6.0 that’s UCS 6.0 for rest of you, packed with a bunch of powerful stuff and there is no end to the social media, social network snap-ups in sight- smart strategy if you ask me, that and SIP-based IM and integrated presence! I bet MSFT and Lotus noticed.

SIP-based IM and integrated presence were two of the major changes Cisco introduced this week in the newest release of its Unified Communications system., version 6.0. This is the first time Cisco has provided IM at the desktop and puts it in direct competition with corporate IM suppliers, namely Microsoft and Lotus.

,

Cisco Systems gets IM out of the gate…like the rest of the normal world- it is the future, heck it was a decade ago with ICQ. That and VoIP. E-mail sucks…ask any kid.

,
Previously, Cisco provided presence on a separate, optional server to what was then called Unified CallManager. Cisco also added the Cisco Unified Mobile Communicator, which puts presence, corporate calling, and unified messaging capabilities as an application on BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Symbian OS and, eventually, Brew handsets. Other additions to the Unified Communications System includes a new Wi-Fi phone; upgraded its MeetingPlace 6.0 Web conferencing with Flash for better PowerPoint viewing; the Cisco voicemail system, Unity 5.0, with handsfree and security functions; Cisco’s contact center with e-mail and chat integration and created special technology bundle for SMEs.

,

TEN MILLION NO SET BACK TO “SOCIAL MEDIA” BUYING BLITZ

Despite losing $10 million to a fraudster Cisco isn’t done with their social media acquisitions either. The company bought select assets of privately held Utah Street Networks, the operator of the social networking site Tribe.net and is on the lookout for more. Ugh. Tribe.net? OK…they wanted the infrastructure- not tribe.net- good.

So Tribe.net will remain independent and since the financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, we don’t know what they are paying, but I am sure it is a drop in the bucket.

Speaking of Cisco I recently found out their CEO and Board Chairman of Cisco is a native West Virginian (well born in Cleveland, but moved to Charleston as a tot), as were other key founders. Some WVU alumni, some Marshall. Eitherway chalk one up for the Appalachian technologists no one knows exists. Didn’t know that did you? Go ‘eers, go Thundering Herd.

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Events are now moving in a blur, a real fast blur- sleep is a premium…practice runs (Thanks Ken of RSA), tweaking presentations, events to attend, events to crash (Thanks Jeff of MSFT), events I had to miss due to fatigue and deals to do and more people to meet. PG and were able to meet or spot some true security greats (not to mention the nice letter from Mr. Gates- grand.), we played spot the Fed, and I met one guy who can remember when the RSA event was like 5 or so people. I’d say more about that, but he is one of those guys who would like have to kill me and stuff- my CEO even warned me this was so. I won’t go there, but security people, especially the security guns of old, are always really and simply *fascinating*. Just when I think my life is all pear-shaped- their lives are like…golly whiz.

Now I am so dead tired at this point I haven’t the effort to even tackle a proper blog entry- so i have conceded that to PaperGhost of VitalSecurity fame who seems to be holding up better despite his trip to Madrid where he was accosted by a pirate (ask him). After three + straight weeks on the road I can’t even muster up the energy to FTP up a photo string with nifty quips…ok so you get one…PG and I preparing to go into Bong Su to talk with various security-like types and eat strange things and drink wine- it was a good turn out and chance to meet up with colleagues, journalists and co-workers. Somehow we ended up at the Microsoft bash a few hours later- interesting and we met more cool people, although I think PG was more fascinated by the comic things on the wall.

Watch for more coverage at SpywareGuide.com’s Greynets Blog- if Chris hasn’t passed out. Sooner or later I am sure the Zango film or pic where I have a (or what I felt was a ) calm- ok- animated cellphone chat on the show floor with the Zango rep who missed me twice, it will probably make the rounds sooner or later…but no one was harmed. (Can someone tell ME where the FTC issues certifications? I doubt it.)

Photo below. We dressed up on our own accord, but after the event I expect we’ll revert to tee-shirts with obtuse slogans and jeans.

Oh yes… for those who asked me the last few days, the rumors about Facetime and Skype are confirmed true. Naturally I can not talk about unconfirmed stories…since it is no longer merely VoIP security speculation- there you go.

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I prepare to head off for the RSA conference (I’ll be sleeping on the plane…yet again.) and this time I must remember to pack my video gear…motivated by this post from Steve Rosenbaum on his Indiewire blog…I could not resist adding my own comments to what he is saying seasoned heavily with rolling metaphor.

Video is simply frozen knowledge.

Powerful. Portable. Compelling.

The tools to create, upload, and store this ‘knowledge’ are now in place. DV cameras,
YouTube and the other storage solutions, there’s even a nascent system taking
place to create revenue for ‘knowledge’ creators and sites that retail knowledge.
(by which i’m talking about Google AdSense, Revver, and Brightcove).

I grew up in the Ice Age my kids call “Only Three Channels?”. Now the cave people have discovered fire! Actually we knew about it…longed for it, but it was only by chance that we could interact with it on the rare occasion a bolt came out of a storm and ignited something.

And these companies tend to talk about ‘their audiences’ with a swagger and a sense of ownership that seems farily draconian given the trends that are clearly driving the change in media.

They don’t even see it coming, or perhaps they do. If they don’t they will soon enough. Like a giant locomotive that has jumped the tracks bringing hellfire to the masses. Blogs, videos, widgets, AJAX driven feedback tools, tags, clouds, pings, mass storage, broadband and new platforms (among many other things) will collide, stars of old will burn out and a new universe will be ushered into existence. We have been feeling the dull rumbling for some time, this inevitable Big Bang (or perhaps this is a collapse?), but it has risen to a roar now.

I’ll go so far as to say, i’ve yet to see an authentic and genuine acceptance of the changing role of the people formerly known as ‘consumers’ by any media company. There are contests, and various places for carefully vetted and managed user-generated material - but the excitement and innovation that’s taking place in what David Sifrey calls ‘The Participant Economy’ is being viewed more as a threat than an celebration by the current owners of printing presses and television stations and cable channels.

Bolded emphasis added by me.

Because Ice Age people aren’t supposed to figure out what to do with that burning brand left by the stroke of lightning- but it is too late- they have caged it, stoked it, fanned the flames and preserved it. Soon they will learn to cook their meat over it, recount the hunt, watch the flames and chase back the shadows no longer constrained by the limitations of the dark. (some will develop insomnia I am sure.)

And as a critical part of web 2.0, these bits will find their way into the communities, sites, and collections that embrace them. We see Magnify as map that help you discovery video on the web. And there’s a big map waiting to be drawn.

Steve is referring to the power of niche I believe. I believe this to be true when I see a niche video site run over YouTube by a magnitude of 10:1 with a video…When i see mean “stick times” per user at 10 minutes coming off of a highly contextual search in the organic SERPS. When I see community formation over a lump of similiar media- no other catalyst- no monetary rewards, people join and begin to organize it- fans of this similiar media being the only connector.

Video is tiny bits of frozen knowledge.

I think it is a great metaphor- and the big thaw is about to start…to quote a favorite film of mine “The Mosquito Coast“….Harrison Ford’s character says something to the effect of- “Ice is civilization…”

I know Sam Harrelson is may be listening as I was to him…I am going to cast a video runestone widget in his honor and I enjoyed the DNA parrallel he makes on his blog…the irony may not be lost on Steve either.

The Secret Life of Widgets

If you think about it- it is interesting to see the wild path this particular piece of machinima now makes as it goes from conception to broadcast to a widget format…All in the name of promoting IM and voice while having fun it is sourced from a video game by a production studio, from studio to MTV, from MTV to the Web, On The Web it rests at Google Video (soon to be just YouTube I hear), sucked into the Magnify system, outputted on a niche domain focused on metaverses, then tagged, reviewed, ranked. The end result is processed again, iframed and placed in the mark-up of this blog, where it is read and rendered through the lense of someone’s browser. Will it travel further? Who knows, who can predict the secret life of the widget? It may end here, it may travel further- it may prompt the selection of another of its kindred from the pack and that kindred will follow a completely different path.

In this piece- Dementia Myndflame was given the task of creating a commercial for Xfire (Ubisoft’s communication platform for gamers) using WoW Machinima. For those new WoW is World of Warcraft- machinima is “machine cinema” or “machine animation”, which can be a collection of associated production techniques and a film genre defined by those techniques- basically making a video inside of a game or a metaverse!). In response to the task DM created Hunter Squirrelbane, a backwoods hunter who taunts squirrels to come get his nuts…

ADDENDUM:

For more probing discussions on video, new technology and unleashing your content see these recent posts.

Adam Viener at Revenews.com

Wayne Porter at Revenews.com

Sam Harrelson at CostPerNews.com

PcWorld on BubblePly

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I have had to do some reading lately, while propped up again with the flu, and I can think of nothing more dry than SEC, NASD, NYSE, FDIC, FCC, FERC, HIPAA regulations….really- thank goodness for theraflu. I can’t really talk thanks to the infection, so I can’t questions, thus I am left alone to read what only lawyers would find fun.

While surfing around with the (NASDAQ: GOOG) Google Toolbar I considered installing the translation service. In short, the Google WordTranslator offers translations from English into Chinese, Japanese, Korean, French, Italian, German, Russian, and Spanish right from the toolbar, suddenly SOX reading kicked in. Interesting…a note!

Google DID, to their credit, which is more than I can for most, alert me to some potential privacy implications of doing this- and I could press a help button to take me to the complete policy….let’s take a look and the help button…..

Continue Reading »

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Updated Note: Skype 3.x is now “stable”. Download Here.

Thanks for the tip from my Skype friends(Jan G.) who are blazing fast on skype stuff. Read on!

Version : Beta release.
Version: 3.0.0.106.
Release date: November 8, 2006
File name: SkypeSetup-Beta.exe
File size: 19 MB
Time I was notified and finished this: 2006-11-08T12:37:36

Conducted a number of malware, spyware, adware scans- all clean so far…still testing.

New (and improved- well in theory- we don’t know)

- Connect with the world on public chats- THIS is pretty neat. Go to Live and you will see live events you can attend.

- Click to call ordinary phone numbers on any website
(optional install).

- Search the web with the Google Toolbar
(optional install). Ok Big deal.

- errr looks like shiny new interface….Much improve interface and direct in ability to make calls, see web cams,

Change Log to Date….

08.11.2006 version 3.0.0.106

known issue: call quality in video call can be low
known issue: http/socks proxy connections do not work
feature: Public chatrooms
feature: Extras Manager
feature: Sound Settings Widget
feature: API: MENU_ITEM and EVENT objects
feature: API: Command GET MAX_CONFCALL_PARTICIPANTS
change: UI redesigned
change: Improved Video device detection
change: New Language files: Arabic (Eriksen Translations Inc.), Bulgarian (Nikolina Filipova & Nikolay Filipov ), Chinese Simplified (Leon Yang from TOM Online Inc), Chinese Traditional (Carlos Lee from PChome Online), Czech (Petr Silon), Danish (Eriksen Translations Inc), German (Claudius Henrichs & Dick Schiferli),Estonian (Eve Loopere), Spanish (David Reche), Greek (Panagiotis Sidiropoulos http://www.magenta.gr ), French (Fabrice IMPERIAL & Bruno Lépaulard), Italian (Daniele Conte), Japanese (Mayu Shimizu), Korean (Susan Joo), Hungarian (Mark Bender & Laszlo Koncz & Gabor Stefanik), Norwegian (Stig Auestad), Dutch (Kees Koenders), Polish (Karol Szastok), Francisco Ferreira (Portuguese (Portugal), Portuguese (Brasil) (Leslie Predrotti), Finnish (Heino Keränen), Swedish (Anders Olsson), Russian (Eriksen Translations Inc), Romanian (Péter Henning and Mónika Iancu)
change: new Language Lithuanian (Viktoras Kriukovas)
bugfix: API: Command OPEN OPTIONS did not function for Updates page
bugfix: API: Workaround to handle usernames with comma in CALL, CHAT and SMS commands (use quotation marks for them)

Get it here : Download Skype 3.0 Beta Release more headaches for Enterprise Instant Messaging Security people though. Note- out of beta now.

True Fanatics Only:

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Mercury News has this piece on the demise of e-mail. I think it has a long way to go but with the rise of technologies like Spleak on the horizon….well my kids might need a CAPTCHA when they go out and chat.

Morton Lund (LundKenner) is at it again!

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Wayne … says: joe- can u resend contacts..
Joe … says: what contacts? Just get the lastest skype beta and join the shared group
Wayne … says: oh damn you sound like Jan now.
Joe  … says: I was not sending anything
Wayne … says: hmm.
Wayne … says: resist Jan’s logical Jedi mind tricks.
Wayne … says: its screws up the entropy in the world…ok…i let you back to work at…i hope your not at work anyway.
Joe … says: ever heard of pronoia? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronoia
Wayne … says: hmm no sounds like lunchmeat. i will check out right away
Joe … says: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronoia_(psychology)
Joe .. says: sorry, wrong one
Wayne … says: ahhh
Joe  … says: A person enjoying pronioa feels that the world around them conspires to do them good.
Wayne … says: hmmm
Wayne … says: sort of like abundancy mentality
Wayne … says: Ok this entry makes more sense then 11th century aristocrats.

Thus I am schooled on the contemporary meaning of Pronoia.

Sweet disambiguation…Pronoia could refer to a system of land grants in the Byzantine Empire, but in this case it was the sneaking feeling one has that others are conspiring behind your back to help you…to think I thought it was a Russian lunchmeat.

/ 4000 Educational Points Awarded to Joe +1.5 Modifier for being Russian and not Belgian like Jan.

/ 1000 Bonus Points if “Mystery Dave” reads this as he is the only Appalachian I know in rural Kentucky who has learned Russian through self-teaching and discipline. “Chi” Dave?

Говорите ли вы по-английски? К сожалению, я пока не говорю по-русски. Удачи и хорошего настроения!

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#650334

<@Malf> dude im pranking people on skype
<@Malf> i called this american pizza place
<@Malf> and i go “are you mexican”
<@Malf> “no”
<@Malf> “ok i’d like to order a pizza then”
<@Malf> “sorry we dont sell to racists”

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