Oh Brian!

My New iPad Stand

2010-04-12T15:19:00.004-04:00

Now that I've had my iPad for a week I've managed to read the NY Times and USA Today every day as well as check out all of my favorite web sites. I also bought my fort book form the iBook store and do a little reading each evening. I pushed a bunch of pictures from a recent vacation to the iPad and experimented a bit with the Photos app is slide show mode. The only problem is that I needed a stand to position the iPad in horizontally rather than ion portrait mode. After leaning it up against some books and such I went to the shop and cut out a stand. Over the weekend I cut out several more prototypes. I think this looks and works really well.

The Awesome Foundation

2009-07-07T11:50:00.002-04:00

i found this very interesting; the Awesome Foundation (in Boston). soliciting ideas and offering $1000 USD and a place to work the idea to those selected for an Awesome grant.

Geez. How did I find this? I was reading a post in Google Reader from Scott Kirsner's "Innovation Economy" blog. Scott has some great ideas.

Free Credit Report: Catchy Commercial & Not Free

2009-03-15T19:19:00.002-04:00

Interesting that there isn't a bigger storm brewing around the catchy commercials for FreeCreditReport dot com. It seems the reality is that the credit reports they offer are far from free. The US Federal trade Commission is trying to take them on with a competing commercial. I can understand how the government sees the financial system is in crisis but what's up over at the US Federal Communications Commission? We have pharmaceutical manufacturers required to create and run new commercials about their wares (seen the new Yaz commercial?)

Best Laptop Bag EVER! (?)

2009-01-14T20:33:00.002-05:00

I saw this on Dvice earlier today. It is a three-in-one modular bag made by Ohmetric, a new brand from Allsop.

First reaction was "Wow. Lot's aof pockets". Follow up reaction was "Wow. That will be a bightmare to get through the securty checkpoint at the airport".

It seems rather than laying flat these designers went a different way. Inside a compartment in the back of the pack is a laptop sleeve with a plastic lap tray attached too keep the hot battery from roasting your thighs. Inside a front pocket is a vertical organizer sleeve with four peripheral pockets. When you're on a plane, you slip this out to keep your toys with you at your seat while storing the bigger bag in the overhead bin. And there are even more top and side zipped pockets.

Inside the bag are two other compartments, side pockets, and a chest strap to relieve the stress on your shoulders when you're schlepping your digital gear all over creation

Recycling Electronics & Gazelle

2008-12-24T12:12:00.003-05:00

I've been on a cleaning binge recently. I removed almost 120 pounds of old, obsolete networking equipment from my office and storage. Rather than simply placing it at the curb for the garbage people on metal recycling day I decided to take the equipment to a local metal scrap dealer. I did a little bit of sorting. The scrap folks did more sorting and in the end I would up with about $15 and a good feeling knowing that the gear was not going to be part of a huge mountain of trash here on Long Island.

I also located some older cell phones, PDAs, and amazingly a couple of pagers. I had heard about an online site called Gazelle dot com. Gazelle and others allow you to enter what you have. They then value it. You ship the equipment to them and after it's checked in they remit you a small payment. Well, that's if they think your equipment has any value. I entered a recent cell phone (Moto), a Palm Vx, and one of the pagers.

First off they couldn't find the pager. They did offer to let me describe it but I didn't find the interface friendly enough to want to spend my time trying. The reason; they asked too many questions and for several questions they didn't help me with any clues as to where on the device I might find the information.

What bothered me the most was that after I entered the cell phone and the Palm both were located in their database but had absolutely no value. So my transaction (according to their site) was for 2 pieces which according to their own database had no value. They then proceeded to tell me to finish entering data to establish an account and how to ship my worthless equipment to them. Oh, and I should pay for the shipping. They were good enough to create a shipping label. Thanks!

Since I have not shipped anything to Gazelle I have received several emails from them. All ask me not to respond to the automated email. All have asked me about the status of my shipment. the last offered to let me print the "paid for by me" shipping label again.

In my mind the "model" of electronics "recycling" that Gazelle offers is badly broken. If they can't offer some small payment for devices; don't bother continuing on. If they can't pay for shipping they should point to some place local to the user where equipment can be dropped off.

Gazelle: not recommended.

CNet reports on SSL Vulnerability, Again.

2008-08-23T14:50:00.001-04:00

CNet is reporting that Google making SSL changes based on an SSL vulnerability that would allow a hacker to easily intercept someone's communications with supposedly secure Web sites over an unsecured Wi-Fi network. This vulnerability has been bouncing around for a little over a year. The SSL vulnerability potentially impacts Google services like GMail that support using SSL technology. The vulnerability has been around for a while; having been presented last year at DefCon 2007. See this message by Mike Perry to the BugTraq list for more details.

Adding Endpoint Defenses in the Browser

2008-08-18T10:23:00.000-04:00

Having been involved in much of the early work around developing Network Admission Control (NAC) I realized that the weakest link is the endpoint. Time after time the objection was raised; "but what if they hack the endpoint". Everyone in the NAC world tries to respond to this the same way - by pointing out that there are already many different ways of protecting the endpoint such as anti virus, anti phishing, anti spyware, and personal firewalls.

The folks at the Mozilla took this a step further in Firefox v3 by adding additional controls in the browser. I was a little concerned when I first read about these controls because they seems to be "list" based (a white list and a black list) and seemed to point exclusively back at Google to source those lists. I like Google a lot but going there alone for this data is too much like Microsoft asking everyone to trust them for security.

What's needed here is a protocol that allows the browser to be configured to retrieve these lists securely from a trusted source. I had hoped that the IETF Network Endpoint Assessment working group would eventually get here (I now doubt that will ever happen). I saw this article on SecurityFocus and it seems to be saying the right things but doesn't define that protocol (yet).

You want immediate Security Cred?

2008-08-08T11:02:00.000-04:00

CNet and TG Daily (and here) are reporting that a group of French journalists covering the BlackHat conference in Las Vegas were booted for allegedly attempting to hack (actually sniff) data of fellow journalists in the press room. The reporters were not only ejected from BlackHat and the follow on DefCon conferences but permanently banned from Black Hat.

Anyone want to wager on future sales of their magazine?

Thank You to the Watch Prince

2008-08-06T18:02:00.001-04:00

I love my Swiss Army watch. It looks great. It's the right size for my wrist. It is usually very comfortable to wear. About the only thing that I didn't like about the watch was the original band. It looked good but something in the construction irritated the skin on my wrist as the band was breaking in. After just a few months I sought a replacement band. While I was looking for a replacement band a friend told me about a "deployant". A deployant is a clasp type release that fits on the band and I find makes it much easier to get the watch on and off. Deployants come in different types. The first time around I tried a "flip" deployant. It was good but sometimes I would notice it poking out from under the band. The more the band aged; the more it stuck out.

I recently decided to buy a new band and a new deployant. This time I chose a "butterfly" deployant. It is really great. It's much more comfortable than any clasp on any watchband I have owned. I highly recommend the online store where I bought this; The Watch Prince. The folks there are really good. After I put together the order and asked that they assemble the new band and deployant (they do this for no charge); they noticed that the band I ordered required a different size deployant. They alerted me both by phone and email and let me know how to fix the issue (different sized deployant). I had the order in hand just days later. Really smooth. If you are looking for a new band or a deployant; give these folks a call.

Bletchley Park restoration short on funds!

2008-08-04T23:57:00.000-04:00

CNet reported that England's historic Bletchley Park needs a financial helping hand to save several buildings used by World War II code breakers. I've been lucky enough to visit Bletchley twice; but just once when it was open and I was able to join the tour. It's a great place and a real treasure of computing history. If you have a chance and can pass on your StarBucks for a couple of days (OK, 4 days) why not donate $20.

Dan says my ISPs DNS is OK

2008-08-04T23:28:00.001-04:00

This was the result when I ran the DNS check at www.doxpara.com; which is Dan Kaminsky's personal web site. Good stuff.

Help me get this Kiva loan funded!

2008-04-17T09:14:00.000-04:00

Pushing Paper Out the Door - from the NY Times

2008-02-10T13:52:00.000-05:00

I read this great article in the NY Times this morning about going paperless. This was a great read and offered real practical examples of how a home or home office could move towards being digital AND paperless.

Eureka! Not so fast...

2008-02-03T12:23:00.000-05:00

I read this great article from the NY Times about creativity and how innovation is actually a slow process of iterative learning.

Good Tips

2008-01-23T17:15:00.000-05:00

Joel Spolsky's Guides at Inc. dot com
20 Foods to Snack on from LifeHack.org via LifeHacker
Staying Productive & Sane While Working Form Home via Digg
and this great Guide by Marc Adreessen

Schneier says Steal This Wi-Fi

2008-01-10T20:54:00.000-05:00

From Wired, Commentary, Security Matters today Bruce Schneier says "Whenever I talk or write about my own security setup, the one thing that surprises people -- and attracts the most criticism -- is the fact that I run an open wireless network at home. There's no password. There's no encryption. Anyone with wireless capability who can see my network can use it to access the internet.

To me, it's basic politeness. Providing internet access to guests is kind of like providing heat and electricity, or a hot cup of tea. But to some observers, it's both wrong and dangerous."

It's a well thought out and researched essay about why providing some bandwidth for open wireless isn't such a horrible thing.

Why America needs Obama

2008-01-09T17:18:00.000-05:00

Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick in the Boston Globe:

"For years, candidates have appealed to voters by arguing how they can win or why any Democrat would be better than any Republican. They miss the fact that voters are more interested in why Democrats should win than how we will. They mistakenly believe that discontent with Republicans will assure a Democratic victory, when in truth most of us aren't buying 100 percent of what either party is selling. So, election after election, we end up with the same old debate and commentary about competing electoral tactics rather than a vision for the future.

We have a chance this time to choose a different kind of candidate, a different kind of president."

I couldn't have said it any better.

Yahoo to test OpenID?

2008-01-08T18:36:00.000-05:00

Yahoo appears close to implementing OpenID, a Web authentication standard that relieves people of the need to remember multiple passwords to log into different Web sites. Yahoo controls a domain me.yahoo.com, which shows a short message indicating the company will act as an identity provider for OpenID.

Google Gears

2007-06-01T08:22:00.000-04:00

Google Gears allows Java based applications that would normally run online to be downloaded and run in a browser from a PC that is not connected to the Web.

The Gears page is here and the FAQ is here.

A Google Gears walk through... Gears coverage in eWeek.

Google defines an "inheritence" policy

2007-05-30T12:39:00.000-04:00

I came across an interesting article this morning on digg that describes Google's information inheritence policies. Things that I noticed right away were that Google has defined separate policies for minors and adults. The adult policy requires that the survivor have power of attorney over the GMail account. This is a link to a Google groups discussion of the inheritence problem.

Microsoft Product ID and Product Key

2007-05-25T19:20:00.000-04:00

My son's PC has been giving him fits as of late. He uses the PC for school work but also plays a number of online games. When he started having problems and asked me to take a look the first thing that I noticed was that the Trend Micro anti virus solution that I had installed was not running. After much angst and discussion of what sites he'd been to and what software he had downloaded and installed we discovered that the problem was simple. He ran out of disk space on the system volume.

I was able to free up about 400 MB and get the PC running again. We are looking at some quality father - son bonding time as we back up the hard drive, scrape it clean and then install XP all over again. This time we'll make sure the system volume partition is larger than 8 GB (seemed OK when he was 9 playing Tonka).

Before you can re-install you need to have the XP product key. I make a label for each my OS CDs and DVDs and then p[lace that label on a case (with another label that has the OS name and version). I don;t have one of these for my son's PC. We found the product key easily enough (My Computer, right click, Properties, it's the 20 digit number below the owners name). How to find the original installation product key?

I learned of this program years ago. I have it on a USB key I use for disasters. I never wrote down a we link to where I got it. Now I have. It's Magical Jell Bean Software's Key Finder. Great stuff.

DNS Lightning!

2007-05-25T00:19:00.000-04:00

Preston Gralla wrote this article for ComputerWorld on how to speed up your web browsing by hacking your DNS. He features OpenDNS, which is a small company out of San francisco that run a series of DNS servers. So rather than using the DNS from your service provider the suggestion is to use this DNS other service.

One of the (other ComputerWorld) articles referenced at end of this peice was "Is your DNS server configured wrong?". This is a short and very interesting 2006 article about the DNS Report Card, a report on DNS by The Measurement Factory. If you have any interest in DNS check out their DNS Expertise page.

Microsoft Network Monitor...

2007-05-23T22:01:00.000-04:00

Microsoft Network Monitor. A "sniffer" from Microsoft? Where have I been?

Installing Ubuntu under Parallels on a MacBook Pro

2007-05-22T09:00:00.000-04:00

After five attempts last night I have still not been able to make this work.

I found these instructions for installing Ubuntu Fiesty Fawn v7.04 under Parallels on my MacBook Pro to be helpful. After two failed install attempts I found this earlier article on that same site.

No matter what I tried I was not able to get the Ubuntu install to finish. When using a burned DVD image it would hang when copying files. When I downloaded the iso image and used that it generally seems to hang around the point of installing the Intel network adapter. I was initially using wireless but Unbuntu showed no network connectivity when I booted a Live image under Parallels so I switched over to a wired connection. No change in connectivity and it hangs in the same place during the install.

The New Microsoft IP Stack

2007-05-22T07:29:00.001-04:00

Last I heard at Microsoft across America workshop (March 2007) "Longhorn" is going to be released as Vista Server.

The Cable Guy article 'Next Generation TCP/IP Stack in Windows Vista and Windows Server "Longhorn" ' from Technet September 2005.

Cities Struggle With Wireless Internet

2007-05-21T12:15:00.000-04:00

From the article:

"Across the United States, many cities are finding their Wi-Fi projects costing more and drawing less interest than expected, leading to worries that a number will fail, resulting in millions of dollars in wasted tax dollars or grants when there had been roads to build and crime to fight.

More than $230 million was spent in the United States last year, and the industry Web site MuniWireless projects $460 million will be spent in 2007.

Without revenues they had counted on to offset that spending, elected officials might have to break promises or find money in already-tight budgets to subsidize the systems for the low-income families and city workers who depend on the access. Cities might end up running the systems if companies abandon networks they had built."

Wireless Mesh Networks

2007-05-20T20:51:00.000-04:00

From their about page... "Meraki’s mission is to bring affordable Internet access to the next billion people. Meraki’s new approach to wireless networking empowers individuals and groups to bring access to local communities, anywhere in the world.

Meraki has focused on changing the economics of access since its beginning as a MIT Ph.D. research project that provided wireless access to graduate students.

Using their research, Meraki got its start at a low-income housing community in the US. News about Meraki’s products spread by word of mouth into over 25 countries around the world. Every day, new Meraki networks bring access to locations ranging from urban apartment complexes in London to villages in India.

Meraki is based in Mountain View, California, and is backed in part by Google and Sequoia Capital."

DNSSEC Deployment

2007-05-20T10:19:00.000-04:00

Shinkuro's interests and expertise lie in secure Internet capabilities, and the company provides leadership in community activities such as the Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) deployment initiative.

What I'll be doing this weekend...

2006-11-16T15:54:00.000-05:00

There is strong Leonid meteor shower activity predicted for this weekend. Right now the weather for Saturday night also looks to be clear. Looks like I'll pull out the telescope and a comfortable chair and spend some time in the backyard looking up at the eastern sky.

Rest In Peace: Ray Noorda

2006-10-09T21:07:00.000-04:00

I learned this evening that Ray Noorda, the founder and genius behind what was Novell passed away today.

Years ago I was a software engineer for a defense contractor who wanted to get out of the defense contracting business. The people that I met and worked with when I pursued Novell's Certified Netware Engineer (CNE) certification taught me much about networking but even more about technology and the Internet. I had the pleasure of meeting and listening to Ray Noorda several times at BrainShare; Novell's annual user conference.

Thank you Ray!

SNL 32 with Dane Cook: Not funny?

2006-10-01T08:45:00.000-04:00

In case you missed it check out Saturday Night Live's season 32 premiere from last night (9/30/2006) check out the content from 1:15 through 1:20 AM (I did via the science that is Tivo). Five minutes without any content at all. This started rights after the Killers second set and continued straight into the Farrah Fawcett bit (which was dumb). They did have an brief SNL Dane Cook head shot transition graphic between commercials but this was a five minute "not funny" bit. All in all the TSA bit at the beginning was probably the best sketch.

ComputerWorld article on why you'll love Vista for networking

2006-09-29T12:08:00.000-04:00

Preston Gralla wrote a good article over at ComputerWorld about the networking features to be delivered in the upcoming Microsoft Windows Vista operating system. I've been looking at Vista beta and I agree that there is some great stuff in there (IP v6) and they seem to have fixed some less good stuff in the XP stack (the data presented in the network pop up from the task bar). Gralla covers some fluff (the RSS reader?) but overall this is an excellent read.

In Remembrance

2006-09-11T08:46:00.000-04:00

Believe in something.

My Views on Outdoor Broadband - Long Island Wireless

2006-08-26T09:50:00.000-04:00

I've started developing my ideas for outdoor broadband Internet access for Nassau and Suffolk Counties on Long Islnd, in New York. I've created a web site to post this information over at Google using their Page Creator.

Google WiFi

2006-08-16T11:21:00.000-04:00

I saw this interesting article from Reuters that I saw at Yahoo! News on Google WiFi service in Mountain View, California. I couldn't find a link to Google WiFi at the Google site but I did find the FAQ.

An (Google) official map of Google WiFi access points is here. The Google WiFi disucssion forum is here.

This is a picture (maybe) of a Google WiFi access point.

Update(8/19): Here is a Wired News article about their tests of the Google WiFi service. HowStuffWorks also published a good article on Municipal WiFi.

Interesting Betjlich Post at TaoSecurity

2006-08-07T19:37:00.000-04:00

Rich Betjlich had an interesting post this afternoon over on TaoSecurity.com. It seems that a cartoonist (Brian Schearer) put a reference to Rich into his comic titled "Memory Leak". A link to the cartoon is here. Rich doesn't know what to make of it (yet). I think it points out that there are real sources of knowledge and then there are those who just make slides to show at conferences.

If anybody knows about an archive of these Mempry Link comics please drop me a note!

VMWare Appliance Directory

2006-08-06T12:14:00.000-04:00

The folks from VMWare Technology Network (EMC) are maintaining a nice directory of VMWare appliance images. The list is long (10 pages at approximately 25 entries per page) and appears to be mostly open source operating sytstems and many feature add-on applications. The rating system seems a little weak; in that who ever contributes the application and registered VMTN users can supply ratings. VMTN also lists the size of the download and the date (that the image was submitted to this directory).

Elton's Red Piano at Caesars in Las Vegas....

2006-07-22T14:14:00.000-04:00

[Warning: This is not a Tech post!]

This past week my wife and I saw Elton John's "Red Piano" show at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas while on vacation. What follows are some thoughts and notes about this show.

- It was very expensive. We were in the first balcony in seats that cost over $200 each.
- Elton performed for barely 90 minutes. For that kind of venue you'd of thought that he could go a little longer.
- Maybe because it is Vegas Elton and company felt that the music had to be performed loud. Very loud. Elton doesn't do loud very well.
- What's with all the breasts? There were breasts in the movie clips and huge inflatable breasts hanging from the rafters at one point. They seemed out of place.
- I was dissapointed that many (at least 3 or 4) of the stage props didn't work.
- There were no dancers other than those folks invited up from the first row for one song.
- I'm not a big Celine Dion fan; but what's with all the trash talking about her during the show? The show is in the Celine Dion theatre at Caesars. Elton (who appears to have gained some considerable weight as opposed to his likeness at Madame Tassaud's down the strip) called her a "Q Tip" (amongst other things).

If you are thinking of seeing this show I'd suggest savinbg the money and buying the music on iTunes.

For what it's worth; the Blue Man Group show at the Venetian is fantastic! I also highly recommend the Penn and Teller show at the Rio.

Google builds their own servers

2006-07-10T18:24:00.000-04:00

ComputerWorld has a good article that talks about how Google build their own servers to save costs and because standard products do not exactly meet its needs. Google does not actually need very reliable servers because it has written its software to compensate for hardware outages.

Another reason that Google builds its own servers is equally simple: it can save costs on power consumption. The power supply is one place that energy is unnecessarily lost. One-third of the electricity running through a typical power supply leaks out as heat. That is a waste of energy and also creates additional costs in the cooling required because of the heat added to a building.

The $0.05 Heads Up Display for My Car

2006-06-30T07:22:00.000-04:00

Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Found thanks to a MacGyver tip over at Lifehacker.

Airplanes and Power

2006-06-29T13:30:00.000-04:00

Two interesting articles.

The first one is about why Boeing is dropping out of the wireless Internet on airplanes business. It seems that in the end the secret is power. How can the airplane hope to power all the PCs that passengers are now going to want to bring along and use for flights that often last longer than the batteries in the PC? Adding more power generation to airplanes is impractical; especially now with the price for oil (and jet fuel) rising higher each day.

The second is a little doodad that I will buy and use all the time. This adapter let's you power (trickle charge?) a USB device from an airplane seat headphone jack. Brilliant!

What if rather than using airplane power to charge the batteries in a laptop we use gadgets that just trickle charge the battery so that it will discharge slowly. If PC battery could be extended through this technique from the current 2-3 hours to something more like 6-8 hours - this would be a very viable idea. Hmmm.

Ten Emerging Environmental Technologies - Very Interesting Read

2006-06-12T09:43:00.000-04:00

Livescience dot com has a great article (slide show) on emerging environmental technologies. Very interesting stuff with links to some of the companies that are working on the different ideas. I found this via digg.

Money: How to create a Great Startup.

2006-05-26T19:00:00.000-04:00

Money magazine online had this article on "How to create a great startup". Looks interesting.

How to install ANYTHING (software) in Ubuntu (from digg)

2006-05-14T08:21:00.000-04:00

This looks like a good reference.

Crusher - futuristic Unmanned Ground Combat Vehicle (from gizmag.com)

2006-05-13T07:24:00.000-04:00

Here is a really interesting article about the state of the art in unmanned vehicle research. What I found interesting in these articles was the references to these vehicles being capable of autonomous operation. I would have thought at this point based on our militaries experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq they would focus on remotely piloted versions of these vehicles.

Drowning at MIT. Really.

2006-05-08T19:25:00.000-04:00

Seems that they have a mandatory swimming test at MIT that all students must complete in order to graduate. This gives pass / fail type classes a whole new meaning.

LED Sign (from digg)

2006-05-07T16:34:00.000-04:00

Too funny. I found this on digg. It's a link to an application that lets you enter a message or a graphic that is then displayed on an LED Sign. I have no idea where the sign is but the execution is pretty good.

Stopdesign | Google Calendar tips

2006-04-30T22:01:00.000-04:00

Here is a list of useful Google Calendar tips from Stopdesign. Nice web site.

When you need a lined page...

2006-03-26T20:43:00.000-05:00

Even though I am a total computer geek I often find that I need to write things on paper. Writing on paper really helps me flesh out ideas better. I found this great site; Incompetech that has various types of lined papers available via PDF.

Thanks (again) to Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools site.

How-To: SSH tunnels for secure network access - Engadget

2006-03-22T12:10:00.000-05:00

A good How-To article on using SSH tunnels for secure network access that was published over at Engadget.

Daring to dream

2006-02-19T13:28:00.001-05:00

Daring to dream

How to tame PowerPoint

2006-02-13T09:00:00.000-05:00

Even though I hate the sitting through meetings where this product is used; I found this article "8 mistakes when creating PowerPoint presentations" by SympleByte to br right on target. There are a couple of basic mistakes here but others that anyone who ever has to use PowerPoint (or use slides to deliver a presentation) can learn from.

I'd also recommend reading Guy Kawasaki's "10/20/30 Rule for PowerPoint" in order to get the structure of the presentation right.

Hugh on how to be creative...

2006-01-26T08:00:00.000-05:00

Hugh MacLeod of Gapingvoid fame wrote the some time ago and I think he is trying to turn it into a book. I've been laughing at Hugh's art for years. He can be very cynical. In any case it contains some really great advice that has value to almost everyone.

gapingvoid: how to be creative (long version)

Probably the best "blonde" joke ever...

2006-01-20T09:00:00.000-05:00

While I'm not blonde myself; I am married to a blonde so when I saw this I thought it was really funny.

gapingvoid: Oh my god...

I-Hacked.com Taking Advantage Of Technology - RFID Blocking Wallet

2006-01-02T10:00:00.000-05:00

Interesting stuff. i-hacked dot com has an article on building an RFID Blocking Wallet.

Blogger Web Comments

2005-12-16T12:07:00.000-05:00

This is my first attempt at using the Blogger Web Comment feature in Firefox (1.5). I'm a little concerned about how the comments get associated with a web site. When I look at this web site (ohbrian.blogspot.com) I see a post that I made at my other Blogger site ( onthefirewall.blogspot.com ). When I try to post the comment from the pop up window in Firefox I get login errors to Blogger.

It's a Matchbox Christmas

2005-12-03T21:30:00.000-05:00

Despite having a very nasty head and chest cold with the help of my wife and son I managed to install a Christmas themed display of my Matchbox collection in lobby display case at the Port Jefferson Free Library. I'd done this once before (last May) and it was fun so I signed up to do it again. The kids passing through really seem to like it. I have a number of 1950's and 1960's Lesney and Matchbox vehicles and accessories on display. The display includes the Conestoga Wagon, the Comer Ice Cream Truck, the Denver Fire Truck (the #29 truck, the 1967 catclog open to that page, and the Matchbox puzzle), the Fire Chief's car, and the 1959 Service Station with the Esso pumps and sign. For books I included the "Matchbox Toy Reference" by Dana Johnson and Charlie Mack's "Lesney Matchbox Toys 1948-1969".

Looking at the world through Google Video

2005-11-30T17:45:00.000-05:00

If you haven't had a chance to look at it yet you should probably take a look at Google Video. I also found the Google Video of the Day blog which aims to distill the best out of Google video. There is also an official Google Video of the Day site. Let me warn you in advance that looking at these sites could turn into a huge expenditure of your time and not all of what's posted there is safe for work or even safe for home for that matter. I particularly like these videos "Fat Ass + Thin Glass of Copy Machine + Security Camera = You're Fired" and "When Videoconferencing Goes Bad".

Added to links BugMeNot dot com

2005-11-27T08:30:00.000-05:00

I've been using this servce for a while now: BugMeNot.com. It's especially great for those sites that I don't look at very often or don't care to share my personal information with.

Why Apple's Not Scraping the Bottom of the Barrel

2005-11-26T13:00:00.000-05:00

I don't know how many people saw this article by Arne Alsin over at TheStreet dot com - Apple's Scraping the Bottom of the Barrel. Arne's ranting on about how investors should dump or avoid Apple. Most of the article is an attempt at justifying his own analysis. I think he is way off.

Arne says "Don't tell me about the dazzling products that Apple introduces from time to time. Because I'll agree with you -- they can be impressive." and "Successful investors don't invest in cool products, though -- they invest in profits.". O.K. But Apple seems to be not only leading but defining the portable music player market with the iPod. While it may be far from perfect iTunes seems to be the premier site for downloading music. I don't know what circles Arne travels in but I see more and more Apple computers (many running OS X) in the hands of young people at colleges and universities, and in airports. It looks to me like Apple is shaping what the next couple of generations of consumers are going to consider buying.

He goes on to rant about the business model over at Apple. "It's safe to say that the business model at Apple is terminally flawed. ". I think he's wrong again in that Apple isn't Windows. You can't (shouldn't) directly compare the Windows PC and the Apple computer market. They are not the same.

As to the balance sheet Arne seems to be saying that Apple's sales are lower now than three, five or ten years ago. The problem I've got with this is that 5 and ten years ago Apple didn't make iPods. The revenue model (specifically what products that Apple sold) was totally different. It would seem given Arne's logic that Microsoft will have to sell ever more expensive software in order to have a positive balance sheet. Hey, wait a minute...

The article closes by blasting Apple's retail stores. O.K. In the grand scheme of things the Apple stores are a kind of oddity. But Aren, have you been to an Apple store? They are different. They do totally showcase the Apple product line and in addition show just about every add on product and book. The stores are helping Apple tell their corporate story.

How to find free music on the Internet

2005-11-21T08:15:00.000-05:00

I saw this post over at digg the other day about how to find free music. I noticed that the link referenced Lifehacker.com, a site that I've found a lot of interesting material on in the past. Lifehacker covers technology and productivity with what I find a great balance; concentrating on the practical rather that the gee whiz. I noticed that many of the articles I like in "Geek to Live" written by Gina Trapani. Good stuff.

Map Gas Prices . Com - nation wide gas prices on Google maps!

2005-11-13T10:30:00.000-05:00

This is a great application of Google maps. This site tracks gas prices and puts them on a Google map. When you slect a station it shows you the last reported price for a gallon of regular and lets you enter a new price.

Forbes.com: Ten Things You Communicate Unintentionally

2005-11-07T09:00:00.000-05:00

Looking at digg this morning I saw a reference to an article at Forbes.com about leaving yourself an email message to be delivered in the future. This sounded sort of interesting so I clicked over to take a look. While the email time capsule idea is best effort at best I saw another interesting article while I was there. Published a couple of weeks ago (10/24/2005) was an article on "Ten Things You Communicate Unintentionally"by Leah Hoffmann; an interesting article with technical and non technical components. The article is set up as a slide show but I found the selection of items and their presentation was really interesting. Both articles were part of a special report on "Communicating" which I'd recommend as a worthy read.

Is digg the new slashdot?

2005-11-06T18:15:00.000-05:00

As time goes by we always seem to improve our tools. For years I've looked almost daily at slashdot (or slash). I can recall talking to friends and co-workers about dozens of times about references to stories that appear there and pointing out comments and stories that I had posted there. But over the past several months I've started hearing and reading more about digg. Looking at both today I think I figured out what's going on here.

From the first glance digg comes across a lot cleaner than slashdot. These days about a third of the screen space at slashdot is dedicated to advertising. digg runs a leader board type ad from Google right across the front of the page. Both sites feature a frame down the right side of the page. slashdot completely fills this with ads and content from other sites. slash also has a menu down the right side of the screen that displays the various categories that your user profile says you are interested in. The problem I have with slash is that the categories they have defined seem to all still be there. Categories that made sense 4 or 5 years ago are still there.

Look at the differences in content. digg and slash both covered a recent story about "safe cigarettes" based on a story that appeared in the UK Times Online. digg had the story submitted very late on Saturday night. It was categorized at digg under "science" and gathered 26 "diggs" and 2 comments as of this writing (on 6 PM Sunday evening). slash posted the story on Sunday afternoon just after 2:30, about 14 hours later. At slashdot there were a total of 357 comments to this article. Based on my profile setting a little over a hundred were under the threshold of being displayed.

What's the difference? At digg I didn't even see this story because given it's rating not many people "dugg" it (found it interesting enough to read). At digg the comments were simple and to the point; one was "I'm glad I quit" while the other one could be summarized as "we all know that smoking is bad". At slash the comments were all over the place. And the ratings of the comments was in my opinion just stupid. One comment was titled "We need deadlier cigarettes" and suggested that cigarettes be 100 times more lethal. That comment was scored a 5 (highest rating) and deemed "funny". And there were another 24 comments listed in this same "We need deadlier cigarettes" thread.

Am I going to stop reading slash? Probably not. I will be looking at digg more often.

Googled. Brian Ford on eBay?

2005-11-02T08:30:00.000-05:00

Today I did something I have not done before. I looked up my own name in Google or "Googled" myself. While it was interesting to see that there are several other characters sharing the name "Brian Ford" with me on the Internet; Google displayed a single advertisement on the right side of the display. It read : "Great Deals on Brian Ford". OK. So I must check this link.

The funny thing is that moments later when eBay popped up on my display there actually were a number of items that matched "Brian Ford" on eBay. The item that appeared several times was "Brian Redman's Ford GT 40", a 1:32 scale slot car. The other item that appeared was the movie "Presumed Innocent" starring Harrison Ford and Brian Dennehy. The best though was "GERMAN SECRET WEAPON BLUEPRINT FOR MARS - BRIAN FORD", a book offered by a North Dakota based auction house. Nope. I didn't write that.

Playing Poker on the Internet

2005-10-31T08:15:00.000-05:00

I play poker online. I watch the World Series of Poker on ESPN and the World Poker Tour on the Travel Channel. I don't watch it all the time (no matter what my wife says). It's a game that combines some skill with some chance. I find it a lot of fun.

I should also point out that I have played poker at few casinos. To date I have played in cash games or tournaments at casinos in Atlantic City, Connecticut, New Orleans, Las Vegas, and San Jose California.

I got started online after seeing advertisements for poker sites online. I can't say I am an early adopter here because by the time I decided I want to play online I could not use a credit card. Visa and Mastercard have both adopted policies that prohibit the use of their branded cards to put money into accounts at online poker sites.

How will online poker and Internet gaming in general evolve? Will there ever be any money in Internet gaming if the credit card companies don't relax their policies? Will new channels for funneling money into online gaming challenge the credit card business? Right now most Internet poker sites use a proprietary agent (some program that a user has to download and install). Yahoo games accomplishes this via an Java applet. How secure is this technology? I think these are all good questions that I think about.

Startup School: The Presentations and MP3s

2005-10-30T15:30:00.000-05:00

Even though I took lots of notes while I was there; I was glad to see that the presentations and recordings of the Startup School have been posted at the Startup School site. Listen close and you'll hear a number of my questions.

While all the content was great, if you get a chance check out:

Paul Graham's "Ideas for Startups",
Chris Sacca's notes (posted in his blog they're better than the original slides), and
slide 9 of Olin Shivers "A Random Walk Through Startup Space".

Getting Started with Ubuntu on VMWare

2005-10-29T23:23:00.000-04:00

I installed Ubuntu Linux v5.10 as a VMWare machine. The initial install went very smooth. Ubuntu doesn't ask a lot of questions during the install process. After Ubuntu install finished and the image was running I installed VMWare tools via the (VMWare) v5.0 interface.

Using the "VM" menu option VMWare places a folder containing the needed files of the Desktop. In the folder there are RPM and tar directories. The RPM option doesn't work in Ubuntu. I extracted the tar files into the folder and ran the "vmware-install.pl" script. Ubuntu was able to provide the install script with enough data so that many of the questions (what directory are various functions located in) were answered with the default.

Before the device drivers could be installed the install script needed to gain access to gcc (C compiler) and the system make files (to recompile the Ubuntu Linux kernel). Using the default install Ubuntu; gcc is not installed.

I did a Google search looking for hints as to how to complete this install (and found lots of poor info). After a couple of attempts I figured it out. I needed to execute:

"sudo apt-get install build-essentials"

which installed gcc (and a few other things). After that I re-executed the VMWare install script and had no problems.

After that I spent a couple of hours working with Ubuntu. It seems like good stuff. Finally a Linux that doesn't install every possible application, tool, or toy during the initial install.

Google Reader

2005-10-25T18:00:00.000-04:00

I was exploring Google Labs the other day and happened upon the Google Reader. This is a web based RSS reader that the folks at Google are developing. My first impressions are that it's pretty great. Google continues to show that most of the functionality I've become used to seeing exclusively on my own computer can be transferred out on to the Internet.

I especially like the fact that I can catch up on my RSS feeds without having to power up the PC at home were I use Thunderbird to read RSS feeds. This is a great solution for reading feeds on the road during travel.

There is limited integration with other Google tools. While reading at an item I can select a "Blog This" or EMail the item (or selected text).

Too funny...

2005-10-21T21:37:00.000-04:00

Hugh over at Gapingvoid is sometimes just too funny.

On Startup School

2005-10-18T21:30:00.000-04:00

Last weekend I had the very great pleasure of attending Startup School.

This was an absolutely amazing event. I've attended VC workshops and conferences before but none had the depth of speakers and the enthusiasm of the audience of this event. In fact; nothing that I have seen or heard of so far can even come close.

Startup School was organized by Paul Graham and his company Y Combinator. Paul is what I call a serial entrepreneur. He's been down the venture capital road several times and based on what I learned had some good success along the way. He does much more than start companies as evidenced in part by his essays and books. Paul comes across as an Internet age Michelangelo. Y Combinator is a very early stage venture capital (VC) company that seems focused (based on the presentations by the group of people they recently funded) on Web software applications.

What made Startup School great?

It was free. I got up at 3:00 AM on Saturday and drove to Boston to attend this. I drove back home to Long Island late that night (arriving home 22 hours later). It was well worth the lack of sleep, the mileage and other expenses.

The quality of the speakers was amazing. Hearing from Woz was exciting but listening to and getting the chance to ask questions of finance guys, lawyers, and VC partners was valuable (and also entertaining).

The energy and the enthusiasm of the speakers and the participants was outstanding. Instead of thinking "if" I left Startup School planning for when.

Verizon & Naked DSL. Yeah right!

2005-04-18T20:53:00.000-04:00

Yahoo! News via AP has a story about how Verizon is going to be offering "naked DSL" to customers in the northeast; specifically in the old Bell Atlantic coverage area. "Naked DSL" is DSL service without having to have a standard dial line at the same premise. That's real attractice to me because I'd use the DSL to connect to an Internet based VoIP service for my ocasional personal phone calls.

So I surf on over to the Verizon web site to check if DSL is available in my exchange area. I enter my area code and phone number into fields right on the main page and hit enter. I get the great Verizon DSL ad that tells me how I'm going to be bale to surf the web, use email, listen to music, play games and all the other cool stuff that comes with high speed access. After about 90 seconds the site finally reponds and...

needless to say I won't have "naked DSL" anytime soon. DSL is not available in my area. But Iwas invited to sigh up so that I can be contacted when DSL is available, Seeing how I filled this same web form pit over 18 months ago (before I got high speed cable from Optimum Online) I'm not filling this out again.

You go Verizon!

From TechNet: 10 Immutable Laws of Security

2005-03-12T13:44:00.000-05:00

Larry Seltzer, one of the security columnists over at eWeek wrote a column about the "10 Immutable Laws of Security" from Microsoft TechNet. He seemed to like the idea and I do too.

And so it begins...

2005-03-12T13:41:00.000-05:00

The start of another blog!