Changes Is Good

Yesterday I posted a story from the FT that basically says Apple and the labels are talking about an unlimited download subscription for people who buy and iPod or iPhone. Angry about being scooped Bussiness Week posted a story saying the Financial Times has either been speaking with Snoop Dog or smoking his stuff, cause [...]

The recorded music industry has become the global icon of how to destroy customer goodwill and torpedo an industry, in the digital age. Their mis-steps go from the tragically self-defeating (suing fans, grandma and apple pie) to the spectacularly ineffective (seeding corrupt files on P2P networks, malware and DRM). The US recorded music industry isnt [...]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jn0QoUpPG80]
A must read article over at Rev2.org on the Digg rebellion and its outcome. Two items that I think are really interesting and deserve more thought:
1) spontaneous user protest
2) siding with your users is a winning strategy
DVD’s, cracked. HD-DVD’s, cracked. Blu-Ray disk’s, cracked. There has to come a point where the movie guys realize that [...]

Technorati has belatedly released their State of the Blogosphere report, which runs through some of the stats from their index of the Blogosphere. Its kinda like Yahoo or AOL putting out a report on the state of the Web, it may be great directional information but with more possible meanings then an interpretive dance. Some [...]

At this weeks VON 07 conference I was accosted by a fanatic passionate Canuck Podcaster. He regaled me with tales of the Internet’s future and helpfully suggested I spend more time online; so I could better understand online communities and the changes they are likely to have on big media.
One of the many points he [...]

Lite-Brite’s Shut-Down Beantown

That’s right folks Boston was brought to its knee’s yesterday by a number of suspicious looking devices planted all over the city. Police were called. Traffic was halted. Panic ensued, at least among panic prone politicos and Jack Bauer wanna-be ’s. Thankfully, the bomb squad was called out and blew up a number [...]

Last week I was inspired by the progress of my ultra-secret project to register a domain name for the project. Thats right my ultra-secret mission now has an ultra-secret domain name to go along with it. Anyway while I was getting things set-up I decided to register a vanity domain and upgrade my blog [...]

I’ve played with Second Life on and off for a little over a year and have been as underwhelmed by the experience as I’ve been overwhelmed with the passion of its users. Some folks “grok” Second Life and some folks dont. I’m definitely one of the donts. To me SL is just D&D 2.0 with [...]

(Pontificate 1999)
Two reports have come out this month that are worth taking a look at. The first is from the phoenix of Wall Street, Mary Meeker, who has survived greed and scandals to once again reign as one of the leading Internet pundits. The second is David Sifry’s quarterly report on the [...]

In ancient India, along the scenic Indus Valley, someone came up with a system of social control so good it survives to this day. It was called the Caste system and basically it codified the privileges reserved for the in-crowd and the drudgery dished out to everybody else. While the Caste system is no longer [...]