I Just Accidentally a BusinessWeek

I’m not sure how that happened but a guy at BusinessWeek wrote an article about iTunes and when he mentioned the Digital Butler from Negroponte‘s book Being Digital he referenced the digital butler and linked the term to an article on this site.

For some reason he linked it to the Sunday post on last.fm. Not entirely sure why he picked that one, except that it was, in fact, an article on the kind of user preference agent capability that you see on last.fm, Amazon, Netflix, et cetera. Of course, I’d already published a post earlier that morning (I wrote it yesterday and scheduled it to post at 3:00 AM PST this morning) that made mention of the digital butler.

It’s not a new idea, but it is awkward when you are there to witness a futurist’s vision starts taking shape. If any of the guys who worked on the Manhattan Project were fans of H.G. Wells they must have felt the same thing.

RSS, Web 2.0 and the Future Part I

My dad is nursing an interest in blogging and just asked me a question about how blog posts work with e-mail.

It was a “yes or no” kind of question.

As is my style, I responded with the following treatise, which, to avoid ennui, I’ve broken into two parts.

Does it make it easy for the blogger to send out copies of his work to an address list he has (postings), and what if any limits are there to frequency of mailing, and quantity of addressees?

Before I answer this question, I’d like to see if I can help you skip forward into the “future” a couple of years to show you how the shape of web content delivery is, and, over the last few years, has been, changing and do my best to describe the path down which I believe we are heading.

You have already heard of RSS and Atom. These are primary examples of the Web Feed syndication technical framework.

Until recently, I didn’t “get” RSS. I could see why some people might use it and why some people might find it convenient, but I couldn’t understand what the big deal was. I’d tried it, but I guess I wasn’t surfing enough – more importantly, I hadn’t yet created a feed and I wasn’t using a reader.

Generally, there is a shift underway in web content delivery methodology. That shift is away from the traditional content distribution channel, e-mail, and toward something called web feed syndication, and its associated technologies, Aggregation and Readers. This is partially a precursor to the eventual development Negroponte’s concept of a Digital Butler (services like Netflix, Last.fm and Pandora are already making great strides in this area), but is also as a matter of inherent convenience.

As is currently the norm, most sites offering content welcome you to register your e-mail address and offer to send you electronic mail messages notifying you of new and updated content on their site, conveniently delivering the e-mail message with embedded hyperlinks that will take you back to their site. This is also a technique used by commerce sites as a business driver. We all just got through the double deluge of Holiday and New Year sales.

The big problem with this is that, for the end user, with just a few exceptions, the content delivery is pretty much just regarded as junk mail and is usually treated as such. Anyone who has tried commerce marketing through e-mail will tell you it has a fairly tall conversion ratio. But when you’re sending out a mass e-mail your costs are the same whether your distribution list consists of one person or one million.

The Segwii @ L.A. 2600

I’ve been wanting to check this out for a while. I’m still trying to figure out who I should invite. I keep thinking it would be a good idea to bring one of the physicians I work with. There are two of them that would probably get a big kick out of it. I’ll probably go solo at least once.

I wish I’d gone on Friday. The Segwii and it’s maker were there.

25 Random Things About Shakespeare

I just found this on Boing Boing.

I rarely actually laugh out loud from things I find on the world wide internet, and they are usually Flash files, audio files, or some combination thereof.

What we have here is written humor of the highest quality.

If you’re on Facebook, you’ve probably seen some of your friends have had status updates from a new app called something like, “25 Random Things About Me.”

Mike McPhaden satirized the posts – with spin.

Wm. Shakespeare’s Five and Twenty Random Things Abovt Me

The meme is older than anyone guessed! Here it is, something I just dug up at the library: the First Folio edition of…
Wm. Shakespeare’s Five and Twenty Random Things Abovt Me

1 Sometimes I Feele so trapp’d by iambic pentameter… Does that make me a Freake?

2 I haue been Knowne to cry at Bear-baiting.

3 I am not uery ticklish. I am Not. So prithee, do not euen try. Waste. Of. Time.

4 I cannot keep Lice, and know not why.

5 Sometimes I thinke plays are all Talke, Talke Talke, and wish for a cart-chase scene. I tried one in The Merry Wives, but it looked like Shitte, so I cut it. The men playing the horses were so Pissed at me.

6 I once threw vp on a man’s head, from a high Windowe. I was so fvcking Sicke that Daye.

7 I hate to wear a Ruff, for I haue such a pleasing Necke.

8 As a player, I am painful-slow to learn my part. Once whilst playing Edward I, I used the prompter so ouermuch that a groundling yell’d ~Stop interrupting, Will! And it was my Dadde. (Kydding!)

9 Sometimes when I am Stvck for a rhyme, I new-mint a Worde because I jvst want to get the Damned script ovt the fvcking doore.

10 I play the Flute yet poorly, but I can make any crumhorn beg for Mercy.

11 When I am happy I call Anne my Kicky-wicky. When I am cross I call her “Olde Fun Killer Hag-Ass.”

12 I keepe my Stashe hidden in our seconde best bedde. Shhh. Don’t tell the Fyve-Oh.

13 The people that loue my Wordes the best are always the most disappointed vpon meeting me. Is thisse List ouer yet?

14 On the topic of dating, my daughter Susanna loues to remind me: ~Jvliet was only thirteen! And I remind her that i) she was Italian, an impulsive race ii), she was actually played by a middle-aged Eunuch named Ned, and iii) she died. That always shvts her right vp.

15 I deteste it when the Low-Comedians improuise the scenes I writ them… becavse they always make them so mvch fvnnier.

16 I haue, on occasion, thovght abovt hiring a Boy to fixe my Latin.

17 When I was sixe, my Goode-Friend Charles brovght to Schoole a wood-cut of his mother, qvite naked. After that we called him Charles Nudie-Mummy, whiche did make him Crye.

18 I take my eggs ouer-medium. If I get them O’er-Easily, I tell my Porter, ~You may thinke this is what I ordered, but it’s snot. I thinke that one is a real Slap-A-Th’Knee.

19 I work ovt my calues thrice weekly, usvally three pyramid sets of Calf-Rises whilst holding a flagon of Meade. I knowe I should stretch afterwards, but it Bores me so I do it not.

20 As a boy in my Bed, I would shriek i’the night that Witches wovld come to eat me. My Mother (bless her) wovld smooth my Hair and whispr ~ Be not afear’d, the Witches onlie eat the Jews.

21 Whitsuntide has become so commercial.

22 Nobody euer forgets where they were the moment they heard that Thomas Kyd died. I was shopping for codpieces in West Cheape. I came ovt of the Change-room and the proprietress was i’tears. I said ~What is it, now?~Kyd is dead. There was a melancholy qviet, and then she said ~And that Piece is a mite too small on ye.

23 Euery time we do the Taming of the Shrew, some pvnter wants his Money backe, because we don’t actually show a shrew getting tamed.

24 I do not vnderstand all the Fvss over Currants. Sure, they are both sweet and Small, but must they bee added to EUERY FVCKING MEAL these days? Yestermonth, found I currants in a Tarte of Spinnedge. I meane come on, People. Seriovsly.

25 When I am feeling Melancholic, I console myselfe with the Knowledge that, aboue all else, I will be remembered for my Musick.

Last.fm

I’ve spent the better part of my online weekend integrating a number of online services with one another. I’ve unintentionally saved the best for last (again, that’s not me trying to be witty).

Among the various web 2.0 service built-in integrations facebook now offers is last.fm. I’ve apparently signed up for this service in an earlier iteration of its design. And I was apparently unimpressed at the time – or more concerned with personal privacy – as the site offers online journaling of your musical listening history.

The site offers a number of features, including iPod integration, and matches you with others with similar tastes. It can then make recommendations to you – a la the iTunes Genius – to help you find musical you are likely to enjoy discovering. We are really starting to see the beginnings of mainstream adoption of the “digital butlers” Negroponte foretold.

If you have the courage, check it out…