Author Archives: admin

APML

On Monday, as I may have mentioned, I attended MinneWebCon 2008. Looking back, I think Laurie McGinley’s presentation on microformats was my favorite session of the day. I had no idea I would find it as interesting as I did.
I think the concept that intrigues me the most is APML, or Attention Profile Markup Language.
How [...]

MinneWebCon 2008

I spent a great day at MinneWebCon yesterday talking with and meeting other folks in the industry at The Big U where I work and elsewhere.
It was really a good event for those of us in Minneapolis who are interested in current and emerging web technology. The interesting this to me is how much Twitter [...]

Access to Free Music and Emotional Connections

Last week after recording a podcast for Minneapoliscast with Stook, Steve McPherson, Kyle Matteson, Sam Keenan and Peter Lochner, we discussed (off mic) McPherson’s post on the Reveille blog regarding “classic albums”. Stook made the point that there’s such easy access to music now that consumers don’t have the same emotional connection with artists as [...]

Transparency

A thought struck me yesterday as I was toying with drop.io. Terms like cellular, mobile, and web 2.0 are slowly going to fade. The key to new social media is transparency. Usability is going to be a barrier to overcome so that the user doesn’t feel like they are taking a series of steps on [...]

Google’s AppEngine

Last week Google announced it’s AppEngine. It took a couple of days and a conversation with a friend to realize some of the potential for this service.
Google’s AppEngine service is a framework for developing web-based applications. Google provides free hosting for anything built with it. Right now Python is the only supported language, but Ruby [...]

Go Mobile Young Man!

I’ve previously commented that mobile technology is the next frontier in the technology sphere. It seems that Mike Arrington at TechCrunch agrees. Look for the next tech boom to be in mobile technology. It’s going to connect us in ways we never dreamed possible.
In the mid nineties when what we know as the web was [...]

Comcast using Twitter to Respond to Consumer Complaints

I don’t think it’s any secret that Comcast has an image problem. I have to give them some credit for trolling Twitter (or more likely going a Tweetscan), and responding directly to consumer complaints with e-mails and phone calls from the executive’s offices.
Do you see the value now?

Radiohead’s Chicken & Egg Marketing Conundrum

Radiohead does it again. By now you’ve probably heard that Radiohead is offering the raw tracks of their “Nude” single for remixing. A few years ago this sort of thing would not have been possible, but with advent of GarageBand and other free and low-cost digital audio suites, thousands of people can participate and engage [...]

Will Twitter Get Benched?

The Industry Standard put Twitter on it’s “predicted to fail” list.
Failings: There’s no compelling reason for most people to use it, and many existing services — ranging from AIM to FriendFeed to social networks — have overlapping functionality. And how is it supposed to make money?
That’s the $10,000 question isn’t it? (Pun intended.) Where’s the [...]

Amazon.com Announces TextBuyIt

Cell phones are quickly becoming the new frontier in emerging technology. I’m told that smart phone adoption rates are much higher in Japan and Europe. Here in the U.S., things are just heating up. Yesterday Amazon.com announced TextBuyIt, a service that will allow you to compare prices by sending a text message. Amazon sends a [...]