Aug 18 2004
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Please spread this meme

Posted by | technology | No Comments

Let me repitch one simple thing that I believe would make the web more useful – ubiquitous use of one-line-bios. It’s something I have been banging on about for years, and is now built into Typepad but hasn’t taken off. So here’s the pitch (someone who is better at spreading memes, help me out if you feel like it): Back in the days, lots of people were looking at online syndication, news syndication in particular, and they set up large groups to look at it (NewsML ICE etc.). – and RSS, which actually has nothing to do with syndication, blew them all away (as Jason Kottke has pointed out, RSS is basically a hypertext link and headline that points to something – there is no movement of content and hence no syndication) . All you really need to create the same functionality as traditional syndication on the web is a…

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Aug 13 2004
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Chatango mini

Posted by | technology | No Comments

Chatango have just launched Chatango mini, a fully embeddable IM client that sits directly in the browser and has configurable size and look and feel. Click on ‘get your own Chatango’ in my version in the right hand side bar.

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Aug 12 2004
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The Olympics have jumped the shark.

Posted by | politics | No Comments

During the cold war, the stand off between the US and USSR channeled energy into substitutes for warfare that were actually interesting and benign. Superpowers flexed their muscles figuratively in the space race and literally at the Olympics. But there is something tawdry about the Olympics these days, it feels anachronistic without having the benefit of being camp, in the way that, say, the Eurovision Song Contest is. The Olympics are a colossal, committee driven, waste of money, vast sums being spent on facilities that flatter politicians

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Aug 08 2004
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Why we should all root for a successful Google IPO.

Posted by | search engines | No Comments

Google’s attempt at an auction could break a piece of the cronyism that has plagued corporate America and has caused huge failures from the demise of Enron to the collapse of the technology bubble. Middle men creaming large fees for little value-add and dolling them out to friends is not a good thing regardless of whether you are a free market evangelist or not. This is why I am so surprised that people like Dan Gillmor are choosing to attack Google’s offering. Google’s offer price is an attempt to derive price from real demand, not what generates profits for middle men. This benefits small investors in the long term. Why aren’t Google’s PR team on the offensive over this! “If Google’s offering works…then this IPO would legitimize an alternative to the traditional IPO that will diminish the power of Wall Street investment banks. Other companies, companies with lower profiles than…

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Jul 21 2004
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Bullshit statistics

Posted by | crime | No Comments

Two very different headlines in the UK press illustrate a truism in news – people always gravitate towards the sensational. Overall, crime has dramatically fallen. BBC: Violent crime figures rise by 12% Independent: New figures reveal that crime has fallen 39 per cent over the past nine years – the biggest sustained fall since the 19th century

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Jul 20 2004
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Reverse Air Rage

Posted by | trivia | No Comments

Classic – reverse air rage on an Aeroflot flight as drunk cabin staff attack a passenger, giving him a black eye. “… a medical examination after the flight showed the cabin attendants were heavily intoxicated. Another passenger told a forum on the avia.ru civil aviation website that the stewards distributed in-flight meals only when the plane started its descent, and managed to spill large quantities of food on the floor. “ BBC: ‘Reverse air-rage’ on Russian jet

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Jul 13 2004
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Googlebomb

Posted by | trivia | No Comments

Blogjam is trying to get Blur’s Damon Alburn to be the top entry for the word cunt (which if you are British or Irish or Australian, normally refers to a guy and can be used in general bar talk). Cunt, or quoint used to be polite speak for Vagina (which sounds a hell of a lot more rude to me) and appears in Chaucer. The word ‘quaint’ is actually the same word via a different route. Isn’t Damon quaint? blogjam: cuntbomb

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