The Otterman Empire @ work

Do we hurt ourselves this way? Is your lack of lunch making your thought process naked?

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 11:20:45 GMT

I was reading an article in a UK magazine about motorcycling Bike! which is actually making me hunger for Europe. Pages and pages of non cruisers, pages of people that don't think it's worth trusting the effectiveness of a t shirt as body armour. Bikes get me to work on occasion, hard to do with a toddler or would be daily, and I have to say there's one thing that I don't do consistently.

I don't get on a bike when not mentally aware,or fully awake with no pains, nagging or even arguments in mind. This is the frame of mind in which I do my best work yet this is the frame of mind that's really easy to lose , especially in an extreme environment such as Phoenix.

It's even worse in the UK though since for the most part people that live in Phoenix know how to dress, hydrate and generally survive the type of temperatures that our summer tosses out. Not so in the UK and hot days when they coincide with people wearing leathers and not drinking can get into trouble really fast.

Got me thinking though about the regimented lunch regimes in many companies and how much harm regulating people's metabolism en masse could be doing to the bottom line.

So off I went to get some research to see if anyone had worked out just how fast we tail off when we allow ourselves to be forced into a routine that's convenient for accounting systems but not for those of us that have to interact with and mostly what I have found is the detrimental effects of "skipping" lunch rather than the regimentation of them. Still looking but in the meantime it's a light snack for thought.

effects of lunch breaks on cognition - Google Search

Will the iPhone kill anything other than common sense?

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:03:39 GMT

Today I was going to be quiet and study some more flash , alas a couple of items appeared on my reader in close proximity that suggested that iPhone isn’t just a neat phone but it’s also the future of handheld gaming and the death of terrestrial radio.

It’s also the death of common sense least for the current incarnation of the iPhone. Which network is going to have the ability to support that many real times streams? If you don’t have immediacy it’s not radio. Sure you can DL the playlist 1st over night then just add in the hosts locally may work, but why bother what are we trying to achieve here? Replication of radio? Why? if it’s so bad would we want to?

Apples target… 10 million phones.

Yep that kills radio’s more than 1 unit per person. > 300 million.
that kills Nintendo’s ( just one companies) 20 million DS base.

It doesn’t even kill XM/ Sirius merge with 17.3 million paying users. It’s a bit late to walk by the bleeding corpse of radio and get your friend to take a picture of you standing with your foot on its chest. That’s the perception of radio anyway. Sadly it doesn’t jibe with these results.

Radio reaches more than 235 million listeners over the course of the week according to the RADAR 97 June 2008 Radio Listening Estimates. (link)

20 times more people than Apple expect to sell phones to. Radio Two controls, no computer needed to keep it in sync and oh battery life can be in weeks/ month range.

As to handheld gaming? Would you pay $70 a month for your kid to play games on it? Beggars belief really that it’s being seriously considered as a question.

Can we start using the iPhone to do excellent iPhone related things rather than trying to recreate the old world?

For whom the ringtones it does not ring for free . ( comparing apples to oranges you have to plant yourself)

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 12:56:05 GMT

5 reasons to avoid iPhone 3G - Free Software Foundation

Usually I am annoyed by the insistence that free and freedom when confused. Usually I defend companies and their right to offer whatever hare brained and insulting restrictions they think they can get away with , which in a fair market , e.g one that isn't regulated by the state, don't last too long. What I do like to do though is point out some fun holes in the arguments of both fan boy and detractors alike.

The 5 real reasons to avoid iPhone 3G:

* iPhone completely blocks free software. Developers must pay a tax to Apple, who becomes the sole authority over what can and can't be on everyone's phones.

No more annoying than most phone companies. While I can see were the principle comes from I am hard pressed to see how anyone could dev/ create an Iphone app and not have access to the cheapest part of the puzzle. You may as well bitch them out for not making free hardware while you are at it.

* iPhone endorses and supports Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) technology.

Despite what that nice Mr Turtleneck said? I'm shocked really I'mm zzzzzzzzzzzz

* iPhone exposes your whereabouts and provides ways for others to track you without your knowledge.

Same with any modern phone, inherently built into the system thanks to your masters and not an Apple exclusive.

* iPhone won't play patent- and DRM-free formats like Ogg Vorbis and Theora.

Most phones , hell most media players wont play OGG or Theora for the same reasons most vcrs were vhs. Heck apple won't even do flash so it's not a slight at free apps more a we have QT, our store is QT based and we want you to carry a mobile sales kiosk with you , and if you're really good we'll letyou make phone calls with it.

* iPhone is not the only option. There are better alternatives on the horizon that respect your freedom, don't spy on you, play free media formats, and let you use free software -- like the FreeRunner.

Oh yes, don't whine if you are not going to offer alternatives.. Oh come on how many people want terminal access on their phone? It's time to get a fricking grip with this idea that consumers , I do hate that term but in this case I need to conjure up the grazing accepting masses and humbly suggest that a phone that's 2x the cost of the iPhone won't work on the mass level. Now a phone co ( MVNO) that makes up a better platform, a company that creates and integrates a phone into their structure I totally get why this phone is cool but I can't for the life of me see where the non hacker is even remotely served by this.

While MR Ford's model T is a breakthrough in functionality and reliability for the common man we find that our oxy acetylene, bar stock and DIY bearing factory while be far more useful to the new driver.

Netflix on the 360 , oh and I have to pay more for it... or do I?

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 09:01:24 GMT

It's so nice that Flix and MS are going to get together. Again for the first time I don't pay a Xbox live sub so the chance to pay to see movies via my xbox which I can already do via my current set up is not exciting me. As I've been saying most technology news fails to be anything other business news with shinier widgets.

Xbox 360: Turn Your Xbox 360 into a Streaming Netflix Player

Mobile Opportunity: Hypenotized by Apple

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 10:53:23 GMT

I agree with most of this post apart from the relative weight it places on each of the three problems that Apple’s competition faces. Firstly any person that doesn’t evaluate a tool on what it can do for them, rather than what people think it does , has a problem. For a great example of that hang around any gun store on a Saturday afternoon

The second problem is that Apple's skill at PR has somehow turned into an excuse for reporters not to do their jobs. The implied message in the CNET article is, "if you don't put on a spectacle, the press will ignore your products." Excuse me, but isn't the press's job to dig out the real value and separate it from the hype? Don't we pay you (or sit through your ads) to look past the PR and fancy speeches and advise us on what really matters? If we just wanted someone to echo the latest hype, we could get all our news from blogs.

This should have been #1 reason . Technology “news” in the US should find another name which rhymes with shill. Press releases are rarely news.

The technology filter/ tab on most mainstream media sites could easily be called advance consumer warnings. While stories about advances within the material sciences get a look in it’s unlikely that anything that’s not a breakthrough in acronym cramming , or naming an inherent property of a device as a feature, will stick around long.

So that the biggest problem ? nope wanting someone to tell you what really matters , the biggest conceit of the last 100 years of MSM , rather than being able to evaluate it for yourself.

Mobile Opportunity: Hypenotized by Apple

042

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 09:18:38 GMT

A pre-posterous idea.Involved setups, filling the needs of the software prior to the user. Posterous blogging by mail.

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 08:47:45 GMT

I see dozens, possibly even three figures worth of new apps/ ideas and attempts to be cute daily. This one ,Posterous , a blogging by mail service ,has been one of the few worth it's own post.

Why ?

I can explain it to "normals*" in minutes and demonstrate it in even less. Having had the joy of trying to set up online tools for a group too busy to care or ,more often the case, willfully ignorant I wish I'd had this to fall back on.

It sounds silly to people that don't join 10 or more services a day but the setup was getting in the way of anything that the underlying tool had to offer. These "normals" are research scientists, attorneys, traders etc not the run of the mill apathetic, in other words ,but people with no time to help you with the info you, as in you the application developer, need to set up the account.

With regards to blogs/ forums "why can't I just mail this" came up time and time again. It's as if the people at Posterous hang out in the same crowd.

If you can mail :

your usual email, links are happily converted.
Add a photo , it shows up. add more than one and a gallery is created. resizing occurs automatically.
If you send a link from a supported video service it's embedded in a player.
If you send audio it gets it's own player.

All this from as familiar an interface as your mail client and all without jumping through set up hoops to gather info that most applications need just to make sense of their world. There are comments, there is a feed and there's nothing inherently micro , apart from effort, about this blogging tool, for normals

Want to get started?

Send a mail to post@posterous.com enjoy.

* People that don't hit Techcrunch from their Blackberry before leaving bed.

Netflix decides profiles can stay after all. Woo hoo

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:11:12 GMT

In a recent post What the Flix! Netflix decides that UGC can be destroyed without explanation I was , to say the least, rather upset that a fundamental feature was to be removed with no apparent thought for those that had maintained an account for a long time. The good news today is that they have announced profiles will stay.

I'm glad to say I don't have to find another provider in a few months.. Phew Thanks to all that wrote or called in on this. Here's the letter.

"You spoke, and we listened. We are keeping Profiles. Thank you for all the calls and emails telling us how important Profiles are.

We are sorry for any inconvenience we may have caused. We hope the next time you hear from us we will delight, and not disappoint, you.

-Your friends at Netflix"

The Tao of whale time.

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 11:12:24 GMT

When you audience have a Facebook profile / webpage, a sculpture created to "honour" your uptime then
other than a stunning viral campaign for demotivators what's left to say about Twitter?

That's not as interesting a question as where is it being said?

Dot woohoo.. Scarcity gets kicked in the ass once more ,then reapplies it to kick yours.

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 13:06:21 GMT

BBC NEWS | Technology | Internet overhaul wins approval

It's often said about real estate that the inherent value rests in " god's not making any more land". Virtual real estate on the other hand isn't handicapped by such problems. Icann (internet gods ) are making more
"land" But .contain your dot self since the chance to be your very own tld .comes at .dotty high price. ( Ha in $US anyway may end up being a bargain for other countries ) Yep you will need $50k to $100k for your vanity URL effectively taking this out of the league of regular people. Now I need to find $50000 friends to help me claim . wtf

[The views expressed on this website/weblog are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of Go Daddy Software, Inc.]

well I thought I had a viable idea.

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 18:35:00 GMT

Next post starts lobbing ideas

Least that was my intent and then I was distracted.

The set up: Posting on one service sets of a cascade of notifications that cause other notifications. It’s not so much a stream as a life snowballing.

Why do so many of the life stream aggregators behave as they are going to be the only service used?

I had to go into the services section on my XP box and disable “irony” detection lest the machine crashed at the prior sentence.

None of the ideas I’m having on this are panning out , or would, due to the small problem that somehow at the end of it all people have to get paid and I don’t think we can rely on selling our friends out via Adsense or in sweet talking tech VC’s for ever.

I’m coming down to it’s own or be owned. If you can think of a better person to manage your online identity than yourself good, you get what you deserve. Don’t get me wrong you should have a choice of tools available to manage this problem and the dearth of such tools is making anything I come up with impractical.

The Otterman Empire @ work: the guid , the bad and the ugly. repetition is what lifestreaming is, lifestreaming is repetition...

What the Flix! Netflix decides that UGC can be destroyed without explanation, oh wait,it’s to “better” serve me.

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 14:19:54 GMT

Woohoo a chance for the market to prove themselves useful. E.g everyone that’s really mad about Netflix’s mealy-mouthed handling of the profiles can get a chance to cancel and STAY canceled for a reasonable time. Mostly they won’t but hey that’s their loss.

What is it?

Netflix is a online DVD rental co that lets you have X many DVD’s out at a time depending on what you pay. They also have a streaming service that lets you watch X many hours a month of online video tied to the same subscription. E.g On the whole a really good service for those with non mainstream tastes or that live miles away from a real rental location.

One of their neat features is that I can have a queue of movies, and so can my wife since we have different tastes. I like to think, she doesn’t , at least were movies are concerned.

This is a feature that Netflix plan to take away.

“"While it may be disappointing to see Profiles go away, this change will help us continue to improve the Netflix website for all our customers.”

100% total self serving crap. This change does not help me, does not help those that have reviews created under separate profiles and even worse seems remove a mass of useful information that’s been created by the users. That’s the part that’s most worrying the more of this that occurs the less likely people will invest the time creating them.

It’s a massive problem for social networks in general but there’s a huge difference from a company that you provided material to folding versus a wilful act to trash a lot of work especially when you’ve been paying them all along for a service.

They enact this on Sept 1st , least they claim they will, remind me to cancel then . K? Tnx bai.

WOW even they thought it was a good idea, still touting it on their site

Netflix: Welcome To Profiles - Free Trial

Soon garages will be used for their real purpose.An exodus from the factory model of work.

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 14:21:49 GMT

It's barely a story the promise of the net has been dangled in front of us for years. The only thing that motivates business in the end is money, otherwise you have a hobby , you don't have a business. Nope it's only interesting with regards to whose saying it. Seemingly my posts on the matter have the viral properties of a flu shot.

If you can't attract people locally , and let's be blunt there's not that many places that have a high density of smart people that could commute by alternate means other than private transport, then working within a reasonable distance is the next best choice after that we're way out off the corporate comfy zone.

Looks like a great time to be building internet apps or in the home office remodeling business.

Vint Cerf: High Oil Prices Could Help the Web - ReadWriteWeb

Remember that time Indy should have died? Nuke the fridge.

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 13:40:13 GMT

So that's how franchises die.. Oh wait there was a bang. That was the point I started hating the movie, then again at the sword fight between trucks and let's just say that It didn't ruin the series for me. Let me have a pet peeve.

Peeve People that stop liking bands because a later more commercial release attracted more fans. You my friends are morons. That CD contains the same data. It's the same fricking song!

Hence this travesty of a movie hasn't spoiled the first three but at least may add an interesting new phrase to the language.

Indiana Jones and Nuke the Fridge (kottke.org)

American Express: Virtual service is just that . virtual.

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 09:14:09 GMT

Call it my UK upbringing but Amex was always thought of highly. Maybe there was something about having to pay for a card that was accepted in few places and required you to actually pay your bill at the month's end. One of my criteria for making it as "one of youse guys" was getting my credit rating and history up to the point where I could get my green card , that is my American Express green card and that would do nicely.

When I first came to the US, despite a decade of fiscal responsibility in the UK, my credit rating was worse than a high school student with 0 income. ( and you thought banks were sane? Ha check the mortgage crisis ) I couldn't qualify for a cellphone without a $1500 deposit if I wanted it to actually work on long distance/ international and funniest of all I could not get financing for a used car but buying a brand new one at nearly three times the cost yes sir

Anyway Amex to me stood for a level of service that Crapital one , Providian or any of the other vanilla cards failed to provide. Until today were the not only took a pooch and had their wicked way with it. Yep their new innovation, which they are proud of to the point of sending me a mail to ask me to try it is...

A friggin' bot.

Their question? What methods of communication would this "service" replace for you. So let me see. What's worse thatn a search that thinks it's human , that they have the balls to call professional and that has an understanding of language that my toddler could match is part of what the annual fee is buying me. It even has a "is typing delay " which goes so well with a folded arms shot. Holy crap they just beat their offshore call center Maybe they know what they are doing after all?

American Express Company Information

the guid , the bad and the ugly. repetition is what lifestreaming is, lifestreaming is repetition...

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 09:47:53 GMT

No man may be an island, though I bet you could have made a good case for Robert Maxwell , but when it comes to data spread out amongst the 2.0 services we're at best an archipelago with a free ferry service between islands or at worst a gulag were your data can check in anytime it likes.....

In the real world I wouldn't bank on island 1, get the groceries on island 2, drink on island 3 , stop off to pick up a paper at island 4 just to make it back in time to take the kids to islands 11 and 23 for their respective sports. What's stupid and inefficient in the real world is just as stupid but because it's quicker to do online.

Let's kick this virtual crap to the side ( Until Gibson's or R K Morgan's visions are in place anyway) and get back to consensual reality.

One thing that would be nice as a standard is a content Guid , a personal 64bit number attached to anything you send out online. That's about 4.3 billion items prior to needing a reset which let's face it even the most ardent twitter fan would have worn their fingers down to the bone which is convenient as they would already be dead, downloaded or resleeved by the time that occurred.   That's just single items if you coded the number to be,    personalid:media type: Date then    oh you still have several million unique items in a year.

Yet I get the Tom Baker ( WHO? ) voice in my head pirating a Douglas Adams line "The concept is simply staggering. Pointless, but staggering."

So I went to check.

After a quick chat at work with Steve , someone that knows enough about the topic to it sounds like my idea is as ever unformed, is already possible for the most part and what exactly am I trying to solve?

Here's the problem. I have several services that collide on my Facebook profile. I use Seesmic, Twitter, Friendfeed and Iminta. When I post on seesmic , it tells twitter, both tell friendfeed and Iminta then all of these update in Facebook. Now while some of the fault is mine for setting up this cascade it's just a tiny part of the problem. There are now places people can comment on Seesmic, facebook,kinda on twitter,Friendfeed Friendfeed, Twitter and since my blog uses the same service there too.

I'm atypical re the number of services I am running. Most people , and by that I mean   people that are online and have one main network   and gather   the other services they use under that umbrella

The problem is that many of the features that make social networks useful are replicated throughout and as time goes on it's hard to see this not repeating over and over again.

S/N ratio is the biggest issue we have to deal with and the people we pick to do that for us is going to be one of the key questions on the kind of web we weave. That and ill conceived regulation to make it "neutral"

There's the set up.     Next post starts lobbing ideas

LA times decides not to let facts get in the way of a "good" environmental story. Claims motorcycles pollute more than cars

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 10:19:59 GMT

" I'd like to begin this column with an apology. I'm sorry for ruining your day." writes Susan Carpenter at the LA Times.

I'd rather she apologize for an incorrect , incomplete at best, piece on the impact of motorcycles on the environment. She is wrong about advancements in emission technology on bikes, wrong about Cats not being available and really wrong to compare scooters/ dirt bikes and 2 stroke engines in general with the polluting ability of a modern bike and is hopefully ignorance rather than malice. Note she may not make that explicit but the type of bikes mentioned are not modern road bikes but recreational vehicles.

This issue sticks out.

Motorcycles and emissions: The surprising facts - Los Angeles Times

But extracting more energy from the fuel has a downside. It produces greater amounts of a smog-forming emission called oxides of nitrogen.

More energy? Where's this energy coming from ? So the same gallon of gas knows when it's in a car and holds a bit back. Why is a 1.5 litre inline 4 bike engine going to get more out of the same explosion in a similarly configured engine than the same one in a Scion? Er it's not.

What it's able to achieve is moving a lighter object which, oh may take less energy hence more efficient use of the engine. Less metal, rubber, plastics to make a bike. Less congestion when many people use one, less wear on the road and so on. To take one figure as the sole factor in demonizing bikes is akin to claiming all articles in the newspaper are as half baked as this one.

Discussion over at Wired

TANSTAAF(I)L ( there ain't no such thing as a free iPhone Lunch

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 08:41:59 GMT

Still amazed by the number of column inches spent on lauding what's an upgrade to current tech rather than a breakthrough. #1 on CNN, er get some fricking perspective people all that coverage and I still don't know if McCain/ Obama have an opinion on it

In fact, the extra $10 a month fee for unlimited data access works out to $240 over the course of the two-year contract. Which adds up, basically, to the original iPhone cost.

Not device bashing just perspective. You're getting quite an improved device for the money though. Come two years you'll want a new one anyway so the ongoing $10 premium is likely not relevant.

AT&T details iPhone 3G fine-print

Better for Profit, People and Planet. Sun's Openwork program

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 18:01:04 GMT

At last something that shows the term materialist isn't the pejorative the tree huggy types would like it to remain. In fact materialist has been wrongly applied to people that have little ,or no, understanding of what a material is or can be used for. People that have understanding tend to make the best possible use of the wood, metal or plastic.Or they build servers the uses less resources created and managed by staff that work as near as they have to be to be effective and aren't stuffing CO2 out the tailpipe to commute or filling landfills with as much crap.

Nope that's the consumers job

Talking of jobs though Sun have a program which shows that employees, the company and the place we all live benefits from 21c technology more so than the industrial revolution that most people find themselves playing out day to day.

The average worker only used 64 watts per hour at home, compared to 130 watts per hour in a Sun office.

Commuting was responsible for 98% of each employee’s carbon footprint.

Working from home two and a half days per week saves two and a half weeks of commuting time per year.

The same amount of work at home saves 5400 kilowatt hours of energy per year.

Web Worker Daily » Archive Telework: Sun Runs the Numbers «

politics. 08 Conversations network

haltse@gmail.com (Hal-Tse) — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 19:09:00 GMT

The Conversations Network has created a new channel for the 08 election. Anyone that's been bitching about the lack of depth and quality of discourse hasn't really been looking too hard online for it.

There's more good material in a day than you have time to listen to but '08 Conversations makes find it a lot easier. There's a really cool personal playlist that queues up a personal feed , a la Netflix, for RSS delivery, or on the site if you don't read that way.

Don't like the politics? Good I like to meet adults

The really important stuff e.g ideas on how we innovate our way out of the mire of mammalian politics can be found on the main site but it's often important to keep track of the body politic since reality has always been open for interpretation by those with the biggest gun, er most votes, and voting on reality while fun to watch doesn't get us anywhere in the long run.