ANtics Comics Highlighted on Plasq Site

I got a pleasant surprise late this evening, when I visited plasq.com, the creators of Comic Life, the software program I use to create the ANtics comics each week. After having traded e-mails with the company's marketing manager about a month or so ago, he had elected to promote the ANtics on the site's user gallery, as an example of how customers were benefitting from Comic Life.

http://plasq.com/comiclife/gallery/

The gallery features a "thumbnail" image of one comic, which when clicked, pops into the browser and shows the comic in full-screen mode, with a "Next" button to take you through 18 selected ANtics episodes. The final page links back to my own gallery on the louisgray.com site.

I'm pleased in a very nerdy way. (It's the only way I know)

Listening to ''Saints & Sinners - Pushin Too'', by Bedrock (Play Count: 4)

Wal-Mart Trying To Stop Apple Movie Store

You've no doubt seen how Apple has reinvented itself beyond being a computer-focused company to one that also is best represented by iPod and iTunes. The iPod/iTunes brand has really become the dominant player in the online music and MP3 player market, beating Sony, Dell and a host of also-rans.

Now that rumblings are out there saying Apple will add movies to its iTunes store, Wal-Mart is trying to use its own market power to stop it before it gets started. BusinessWeek says that Wal-Mart, who represents 40% of the $17 billion DVD market, is threatening publishers, saying that if they post their titles on iTunes, Wal-Mart simply won't carry them.

BusinessWeek: Wal-Mart and Apple Battle for Turf

Part of this is because Wal-Mart is also planning an online film service, and they don't want to support companies that work with the competition. Part of it also is that they are afraid Apple will win in online movies the way they won in online music, and that they will set the rules for costs, etc. Current rumors have the store debuting in mid-September with new films at $14.99 to own, and older films at $9.99. Disney and Lions Gate Films have signed up, with more studios to come, no doubt.

With that said - should Wal-Mart act this way, or is it acting like a monopolist? What's your feeling?

Listening to ''Get Up on It Like This'', by The Chemical Brothers (Play Count: 5)

Online Window Shopping: A New Car!

It's often said that one of the biggest concerns any e-commerce Web site has is that too many people are filling shopping carts, and then abandoning them before the sale is complete. While some point to slow page loads, or difficulty in page navigation, I'd argue the Web is a fantastic way to go window shopping, both to compare prices, and to fantasize spending money we may not have anyway.

I, for one, have been caught every once and again with my cart fully loaded at the Apple store, working to see if add all the bells and whistles to the newest laptop or desktop, just how expensive I can make the darn thing.

Assuming I had all the cash I would need, I thought I'd present you with my new car - the one I keep thinking I'm going to get someday, if money fell out of the sky, yet somehow didn't lead to inflation or a devaluation of the currency. (Tough economics there!) On BMW's Web site, you can design your own vehicle - coupe, convertible, sedan or SUV, and even get pricing terms. I present to you my new 333-horsepower 2006 BMW M3 Convertible, with all the options.



The above includes:

* Mystic Blue Metallic exterior
* Dark blue top
* Gray Leather with Shadow Trim
* Heated front seats
* On-Board Navigation System
* Adjustable lumbar seats
* AM/FM stereo/CD with MP3 capability, 10 speakers
* Harman Kardon Premium Sound System
* Floor Mats

All this, and more, for a mere $62,000. Now, would I ever really by a BMW online? Probably not. And if I had so much disposable income at hand as to consider really buying a top-of-the-line BMW, would that be the wisest choice to spend all my cash? Probably not - but who cares? It's online window shopping, with no car salesmen!

More fanciful shopping lists sure to come soon...

Listening to ''Live at Aria Montreal'', by Dj Tiesto (Play Count: 1)

Asypta: Acela - Amtrak Speeds Ahead

Not just companies get the honor of joining the Asypta fold. Sometimes, the most ordinary-looking and most ordinary-sounding firms will debut products or subsidiaries that follow the Asypta guidelines, as Amtrak did in 1999 when they debuted their new line of high-speed trains, dubbed nothing else but... "Acela". Though clearly derived from the root word "Accel", Amtrak followed the mantra many companies do during the process of naming, throwing an "A" at the end for good measure. And try as they might, Amtrak made an attempt to explain just what "Acela" stood for anyway.

From the March 9, 1999 announcement:

"Acela is more than just a name for Amtrak's new high speed trains, Acela is a brand representing a whole new way of doing business," according to Amtrak President George D. Warrington. "A combination of acceleration and excellence, Acela means high speed and high quality - we are changing the journey for every customer on every train with faster trip times, comfortable amenities and highly personalized service."

In an era of commuter jets, carpool lanes, and telecommuting, it's no wonder that Amtrak had to do something to juice passenger statistics on trains - more-commonly associated with the 19th century than the 20th or today. While other countries have lapped the US in their ability to roll out highest-speed transportation, including "bullet trains", Amtrak and its new Acela line has seen very limited success. As Wikipedia states, "Technical difficulties have led to a joke about Acela standing for "Amtrak Customers Extremely Late Again" trains."

Now there's a fantastic acronym we can get behind.

It's always interesting to see when a company does such a poor job of naming itself and identifying the name with the brand that consumers go out of their way to apply their own definitions. Acela clearly falls in that category.

For going through the process of announcing a new name that fully meets the Asypta criteria, and introducing confusion into the marketplace, Acela is the second entry to the hall of fame!

Overall Asypta-Meter Score: 10.0

Listening to ''Miami Sunset 2005'', by DJ Irish (Play Count: 1)

Google CEO Joins Apple Board - So What?

The somewhat-stunning after-hours news today was that Google CEO Eric Schmidt has joined Apple's board of directors, joining former Vice President and would-be world supreme leader Al Gore, and the CEOs of Intuit, J. Crew and Genentech. Fresh off of the news that Google was introducing new applications that could be co-branded for business' domain, the expectation is that Apple and Google have teamed up in a joint fight against the Redmond behemoth, Microsoft. But what's not seen is that the usual direct impact a board member has on the company's products is very slim indeed.

One need only look as far as Apple to see this. When Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, a close friend of Steve Jobs, was on the board, the Macintosh did not make much headway in running Oracle's business suite, and Intuit hasn't exactly wowed anybody with their support for Macintosh in the last decade or so. While we can dream of further collaboration between the two companies, beyond a Google search bar embedded in Safari, and $1.75 iPod wrappers with the Google logo, this doesn't guarantee a streamlined plethora of joint product announcements - so don't hold your breath for a Mac OS X version of Google Desktop, Google-branded Mac Minis and X Serves, or the debut of GTunes, powered by iTunes.

At least... that's my expectation. A board of directors' role is to ensure the company is growing smoothly and that all activities are above board, from compensation to product roadmaps - not to sit in a dark room and merge business lines.

But this of course won't thwart speculation. TechCrunch writes, "Could close collaboration between online giant Google and Apple hardware pose the most viable threat yet to Microsoft’s long held personal computing leadership? It certainly seems possible.", while Om Malik somehow finds a dark corner in his soul to poo-poo the relationship, saying this "portends potential headaches not just for Microsoft, but for anyone with digital media ambitions." Right. As if with one swoop, iPod and iTunes are going to get that much more market share in the face of Zune and other challengers because some guy gets to visit the Cupertino campus every two months.

What it does do is further validate Apple's rise to prominence in a once-skeptical Silicon Valley. I know Google spends millions every quarter in new Apple equipment for employees, and at some point, those MacBook-carrying Webheads are going to want the latest and greatest Google gear to go. I hope that some of the speculation comes true and can prove me wrong.

Listening to ''Under One (JK Walker Remix)'', by Todd Tobias (Play Count: 6)

Asypta: Altria is a Smoking Gun

The Asypta model is somewhat flexible. If you look at Altria, you have a slight variation - extending to A consonant, vowel, A, but the phonetics of the word are the same, as the "ria" sounds like "riya", which maintains the Asypta rule verbatim.

With that said, Philip Morris' choice to rebrand as Altria in January 2003 is a classic example of selecting a name without any meaning and plugging into what I term the Asypta name generator. As widely reported, the company, which owns a wide variety of cigarette brands, ranging from Marlboro to Benson & Hedges and Virginia Slims, was looking to divorce itself from its life-long relationship with tobacco, and instead, highlight a healthier, more anomalous self.

From the press release on January 27, 2003, the company opted to change its name to Altria Group, Inc. As they said in the release, "The Altria name and logo powerfully express these enduring qualities: its drive toward excellence, its companies' focus on building brands, its passion for success, its openness to innovation, its commitment to its communities and societies, and its focus on its people."

And just how do they do that? If you look at the Altria logo, It's a 5 by 5 pixelated square made of many colors. A 25-grid square, symbolizing nothing. The word Altria doesn't demonstrate quality or excellence or success or innovation, unless you believe it does. Just like when the tobacco companies had you believe that "Nicotine is not addictive", this too has to be taken at face value, when there is in fact, no value.

More about Altria can be found on the company's "Who We Are" page, where they say "By changing its name, Altria Group has clarified its identity as what it is: a parent company to both tobacco and food companies that manage some of the world’s most successful brands." Gotcha.

For fitting the criteria set out in the rules of Asypta, and further befuddling corporate identity, we give Altria a near-perfect score. They just miss the hall of fame, due to a lacking consonant before the second A. Sorry, guys.

Overall Asypta-Meter Score: 9.5

Listening to ''Silent Words - Chiller Twists'', by Jan Johnston (Play Count: 25)

Web Office: OfficeCube: What Might Have Been

Speaking of OfficeCube, my curiosity got the best of me - to see if there was any hint out there on the Web as to what our plans at 3Cube were, and only through Google's cache can we get anywhere to discuss OfficeCube itself, though some of our media coverage from the early part of the decade remain up for only the most ardent of communications application service provider afficionados.

As we find in a press release from early 2000, we had announced, "PhoneCube and FaxCube are the first two members of 3Cube's growing family of online office services soon to be combined in one office portal called "OfficeCube," an entire suite of integrated virtual office productivity solutions to be announced in the first half of 2000."

Those were exciting times. Unfortunately, as we know, the best products don't always make the best businesses, and though I still believe in those early products' features, functionality and promise, the customer traction was never there.

For more on the 3Cube story, here are some obscure gems:

InformationWeek: Innovation (October 2000)
TMCNet: FaxCube and PhoneCube review (January 2001)

Listening to ''Live @ DI.fm'', by DJ Irish (Play Count: 1)

Google Launches First Salvo Against MS Office

Six years ago, while at 3Cube, we had huge expectations for moving software to the Web. Following some success with our fax over Internet product, FaxCube, and our phone conferencing and Web meeting solution, PhoneCube, we had plans to debut something by the name of "OfficeCube", which in theory, would let customers not only hold real-time chats and full desktop sharing, across OS platforms, but would give you an online vault where you could create, edit and save documents or presentations. This vision of the Web office was but a gleam in our eye in 2000, and for a variety of reasons, we never quite made it. Six years later, we still see the business world tied to software - and most of those are tied to Microsoft Office, despite challenges from Apple, Sun and now, Google.

Google started out as a search company, aiming to gain access to all the world's information, quickly and easily. But the company has branched out into a variety of Web applications, from Gmail for E-mail to Google Talk for instant messaging, Google Desktop for local search, Google Earth for mapping and much, much more. This week, Google takes it all a step further with the debut of enterprise-targeted applications that would be branded by third-party companies, but provided by Google. That way, you could keep your company.com domain but leave all the grunt work to Google's servers and staff. Sounds good, right?

Much of the conversations in the last several years were that in order to unseat Microsoft Office, a competitor needed to build clones of those apps that made Office what it is - Excel, Word, PowerPoint, and Outlook. But now, people recognize that the new office has a lot more to it - with a very real focus on real-time interactive communication, regardless of location. Google's debut includes the aforementioned Gmail and Google Talk, but also Google Calendar and Google Page Creator - which hopefully bears absolutely zero resemblance to Microsoft's horrid Front Page for WYSIWYG Web design.

As a consumer, we can't help but root for anything that enables more choice, and more variety, especially as it takes advantage of new technologies. I can't say that Google's will be the winner, or that we'll be adopting it soon. Google has no equal as a search engine, without doubt, but for me, GMail is a second-class address, on par with all the other free e-mail addresses I've accrued over the last decade, and the rest of the apps are just for fun. The only one I'm truly waiting with baited breath for is Google Desktop for Mac OS X, if they ever get there. Interestingly, despite Google's failings there, leading blogger Robert Scoble writes that Google is even further ahead in Mac support than Microsoft with some of its tools saying, "They (Microsoft) are gonna get their ass kicked in this space because of their lack of attention to the Macintosh."

As you can expect, anything Google does gains plenty of attention. You can see further discussions of the launch at SiliconBeat, Searchblog, and InformationWeek.

To check out the solutions for yourself, go to https://www.google.com/a/.

Listening to ''Escape Velocity 007", by DJ Irish (Play Count: 1)

ANtics Episode 2.26: A's Fun and Games

The A's are a young team - there's no doubt about it. But part of the team's allure to fans is their kiddish behavior, their smiles and laughter, and some have given the team's attitude and camaraderie a great deal of credit for their success. The pictures prove it - as we find our men in green and gold simply acting like kids. Explains why I feel so old when I see their birthdates on the DiamondVision.


Click to See Larger Comic
2005 Comics | 2006 Comics

Kendall Leads A's In Statistical Anomalies

Cross-posted at Athletics Nation...

I have to admit that for me, there was some anxiety around Jason Kendall smacking a home run earlier this season. That's not what we really what we expected, for in our mind, he fulfilled the role of "slap hitter with no home runs and many GIDPs", just as the Red Sox once filled the role of "the team who gets to the playoffs only to lose in heart-breaking fashion". As a baseball fan for nearly all my life, once you button-hole a player or a team in a spot, you expect them to stay there, and when they break the mold, you have to check your bearings and make sure all the other things you held true have not changed. But Jason has surprised a lot of us here beyond his solitary dinger, which still looks like a fluke.

As OaklandAthletics.com points out today, nobody has been swinging hotter lumber in these last few weeks than our gritty catcher.

In fact, in yesterday's win against the Rangers, Kendall had three hits, and both drove in and scored a run. And as the leadoff hitter, Kendall has done, all season, what you want a leadoff hitter to do - take pitches, get on base, and threaten to steal. In the leadoff position this year, Kendall is batting .304. But there's more!
Did you know...

* Kendall is batting .329 with runners on base in 2006?
* Kendall is batting .343 on the road in 2006?
* Kendall is fifth in the American league in BB/K at 1.03?
* Kendall is tied for the A's lead in steals?
* Kendall has more doubles (19) than Chavez (18) or Swisher (17)?

And if you somehow got the impression that Kendall hits a lot of ground balls, you wouldn't be alone in that thought. In fact, Kendall is also fifth in the American League in ground ball vs. fly balls, at 2.05. Lest you think that's a statistic for a slap hitter, other leading batters in this stat include Derek Jeter (#1), Pudge Rodriguez (#4), and Miguel Tejada (#6). That's right, Jason Kendall is ahead of Tejada in a number of batting categories!

I'm not saying I think the A's would be world-beaters if they featured Kendall in spots 1-9 in the batting order, but I don't cringe as often as I used to when he comes up to the plate with a mouthful of chaw,  his helmet slumped low on his eyes, and choking up on the bat, because in 2006, Kendall has been a major part of why the A's have forged their Western Division lead, and why after the All-Star break, the team has been practically unstoppable. We hope that this version of Jason Kendall is the one we get to keep.

Listening to ''Enervate (Original Mix)'', by Paul Oakenfold (Play Count: 6)

Will Second Half of '06 Be Huge for Apple?

Although the most die hard of Mac fans were less than enthusiastic about the lack of product introductions at the recently-concluded Worldwide Developers Conference, the media continues to be abuzz about how Steve Jobs and others promised to take on Microsoft's Windows Vista directly, as the operating system release continues to be more about delays, unfulfilled promises and bugs than about real benefits for customers. While we didn't see an update iPod, or an iTunes Movie Store, everybody got the message that Apple, with Mac OS X, is delivering an operating system today that is already well ahead of Redmond's empty promises, while Leopard, coming soon, will take the Mac maker that much further into the lead.

Newsfactor, in a piece titled, "Can the Mac Counter Windows Vista?", says that the real operating system wars are not behind us, but instead are yet to come, and that with Leopard, Apple intends to "present a direct challenge to industry behemoth Microsoft". With the move to Intel processors, and the adoption of the ability to run Windows on the newest Macintoshes, Apple has eliminated any price differences once expected between Macs and PCs, while also pushing their strong television campaign comparing Macs vs. PCs. (Get A Mac archive)

An analyst from Forrester Research mentions in the article, "In many ways, Apple doesn't have to respond to Vista's specific functionality, since Apple is already ahead of it."

But that doesn't stop others from speculating Apple's next moves. Even as other companies make announcements around downloading full-length feature films to PCs, Apple has remained quiet. But nobody expects the company to sit still and let this market pass them by, as they continue to build out their music empire. The Investor's Business Daily says that it's expected Apple would bridge the gap between the Internet and television by introducing both an online movie store, and a set-top box, similar to today's Mac Mini, which would play the films on your television.

In fact, an independent survey stated that "many respondents who were interested in an Apple set-top box showed no interest in set-tops from other companies," meaning the Apple brand, behind the power of the iPod, has come a long way.

While we're huge TiVo fans, we don't see it as the end-all, be-all of options. If Apple could somehow debut a single device to act both as a movie conduit from the Internet to the television, and as our personal video recorder, we would have to give it significant consideration, and I don't imagine we would be the only ones to do so.

If Apple even debuts half of what people expect - a new iPod, a new cell phone, a new set top box, and powers past Vista with Leopard, the next six to twelve months will be very interesting in Cupertino. That's why we're long Apple (AAPL) shares.

Listening to ''Fifteenth Letter of the Alphabet'', by O (Play Count: 6)

IKEA is a Zoo

When I moved to Belmont just after graduating from UC Berkeley in 1999, I certainly didn't have a whole lot of furniture, having been a starving student, so I started over from scratch - buying a new desk, a new bookcase, and a new dresser, assembling each at the apartment, after somehow squeezing them into my small car, and lugging them up three flights of stairs. While the desk didn't follow me along to my next two moves, the dresser and bookshelf did, so they've given me about 7 years of good service - at least until my dresser began to fall apart, making the morning's search for socks just that much more memorable each day.

After a few weeks of going into the other room to get my things out of each drawer individually, my wife and I set out to a number of different stores on the peninsula to see if we could find a good-quality solution for something less than what we pay each month on our mortgage. At our first stop, one of the more-promising dressers was $650, while others were $999 or above, and some peaked at $1,500. Our next two stops weren't much better. In fact, one store didn't have much below $2,000, which seemed a little steep for something I couldn't live in, drive around or surf the Web on. That left IKEA as one last stop. I was skeptical, knowing the low-price leader is often the high-crap leader, and it was certain to be a not-so-exciting experience.

After making our way through a series of parking garages, we entered the IKEA maze as hamsters in a Habitrail, missing only the sawdust and an exercise wheel. Packed in like sardines into narrow walkways, with arrows telling us which way to go, we darted past bunkbeds and stoves or dining sets, past housewares and beanbag chairs, to find anything that resembled a dresser - and to our surprise, we did find some options after all. They weren't nearly the quality of the previous stores, but the prices, in the range of $149 to $249, were significantly less. And as my wife has now mentally committed to our purchasing flat-screen TVs for the house, that's where any of our available money should go, not just a glorified wooden box for shirts, socks and pants.

Though we chose a good dresser, we didn't much feel like dragging it out of the store, packing it in the car, and taking it up the stairs today. But we marked it down, and will try IKEA's catalog or online store, and make someone else do the grunt work. But I am not so sure I want to step inside an IKEA again - to be pushed through like schools of fish among the masses, in a claustrophobic mess of wood, bright paint and screaming kids. I'd rather throw my things in cardboard boxes than do that.

Listening to ''Envio - Time to Say Goodbye'', by Armin Van Buuren (Play Count: 3)

Why I Didn't End Up a Journalist

At the end of my high school days, and throughout college, I was sure I was going to end up a reporter. I didn't know just what I thought I'd be covering, and at times my whims floated from covering baseball to becoming a technology reporter. While attending UC Berkeley, I covered a number of beats for the Daily Californian, including crime, the UC Regents and city council, and majored in Mass Communications, as well as Political Science. So what happened?

The Internet happened, and the Internet changed everything.

Alongside my writing efforts at the Daily Cal, I was also the paper's Online Editor, and helped the Web site grow from its earliest stages from 1996 to 1998. The site lives on today, but in a much different state, of course. But working on the site and seeing how Web journalism was rapidly extinguishing the one-time glory of newspapers, I no longer was wowed by the idea of being an ink-stained wretch toiling away for the San Jose Mercury News or MacWorld, as I believed the medium had to make a dramatic change to stay relevant.

After my time at the Daily Cal, I derived two versions of the resume - one for becoming a reporter, and a second, for becoming a Webmaster. In 1998, you can only guess which one gained a lot of interest, even for a student without a degree (yet), and which one didn't. By October of 1998, a month and a half into my senior year at UC Berkeley, I was commuting over the Bay Bridge to Burlingame every day working at an Internet startup, and the dreams of being a reporter were being replaced instead with the hopes of helping  a new company grow. Now, instead of calling companies and people to hear their side of things, I was on the other side - able to make news and not just follow it. Meanwhile, news media on the Internet has grown dramatically, eclipsing the one time leadership of traditional papers.

One gets the feeling that traditional papers are still very leery about the Internet. They are very afraid that their one-time cash cow, classified ads, is going away, replaced by CraigsList and eBay. And by the time their stories are published, the news cycle has already left them in the dust. So you are seeing an increased emphasis on newspapers' online reporters to get the story out early and continue updating it, if simply to keep pace with more nimble outlets. I read the San Francisco Chronicle and Mercury News online, but primarily to keep updated on the A's more than anything else. Especially in the Silicon Valley, technology news doesn't go their way first, and circulations are getting hammered.

An interesting discussion on that subject can be found in The Economist today, in a piece titled "More Media, Less News". As they write, "Newspapers are making progress with the internet, but most are still too timid, defensive or high-minded." Simply put, if they don't find a way to compete with blogs and Digg and news aggregators, they're toast. I'm glad I went the way I did, even if it meant changing the dream, just a little bit.

Listening to ''Nautical Bodies (Original Mix)'', by Paul Oakenfold (Play Count: 8)

Avaya Receives 10 on Asypta-Meter

Avaya is a classic example of a company built out of the "Asypta" school of naming. A, consonant, vowel, consonant, A. Avaya was spun off from Lucent at the end of 2000, and during the era of dot-com frenzy, the company didn't define exactly what it did very well.

From the company's spin-off press release in June of 2000, Lucent's president and CEO, Don Peterson said, ""We chose a name that would set us apart and capture what we're doing with the company - focusing on communications solutions for business customers. Avaya sounds open and fluid-reflecting a company that's open-minded and that provides seamless, effortless interconnections among people and businesses."

Source: Lucent

But what does that mean? Open, Fluid? Open-Minded? Sounds like some nice words to explain "Don't Know Exactly".

The Daily Telegraph, in a piece from December of 2005, ties into that very issue - company names that don't really stand for squat. They partially blamed Landor Associates, a San Francisco design group, for the name, and many others like it.

"If you ever wondered where those bizarre unpronounceable company names come from, look to the Landor crew. Avolar, Midea, Avaya, Spherion, Onity, Lucent. And Lucent's rival, Agilient. You know, like Lucent - but agile! Nice. Soon lots of big branding companies were picking up briefs and now our world is littered with Arrivas, Aptivas, Achievas and Avandas."

Source: Igor International

For fitting the stern criteria set out in the rules of Asypta, Avaya scores a 10.0 and is the first inductee to the Asypta hall of fame!

Evening Notes: August 24, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

It's odd how even in what could be considered a small wave of bad publicity, some companies wait out the storm and somehow come out unscathed. After yesterday's $100 million lawsuit settlement with Creative Technologies, Apple followed on today with news that they - like Dell - have issued a recall for more than 1 million laptop batteries which may catch fire. It's highly possible the PowerBook I've got is in the listed serial numbers eligible for replacement... but even with both of those announcements, Apple stock didn't take any kind of hit. In fact, Apple (AAPL) rose less than one percent on the day, even with the news. For what it's worth, my most-recent investment in Apple is doing fairly well, up 24 percent. I had sold some of my holdings for a loss, because I could use it to drag down my total income at tax time by the end of the year.

Of interest to those who follow Apple closely, as I do, an unlikely foe has beaten them to the punch for an online movie store - AOL. The would-be owners of Time Warner (oops!) announced today that for  a mere $10 to $20, customers could download full-length films, with no option to rent. Sounds steep.

Earlier this month, I mentioned how Topix.net's newly-introduced one year news archive search tool could bring huge benefits to companies and PR agencies. Apparently, my feelings are not just mine alone. Steve Rubel, who works for Edelman PR, said Topix "doesn't get the attention it probably deserves", and delves further into the site, to help track companies or individuals and use advanced search features.

The A's have an off day this evening, which means activity on Athletics Nation should be significantly lower than normal - as I, as well as many others, are probably taking the day off as well. For a good fix on AL West baseball, you can check out the LA Angels site at Halos Heaven or the much funnier Seattle Mariners blog at Lookout Landing. Also, be sure to catch Blez' input on why ESPN has lost all relevance for him and many west coast sports fans. The worldwide sports leader is a mockery of its old self these days.

Listening to ''Forever Today'', by DJ Tiesto (Play Count: 14)

Update: Money Transfer Still In Limbo

The Players: Wells Fargo Bank, eTrade, and Bank of America

(Follow on to "Give Me My Money. Now.")

For those keeping score at home, the financial issues between eTrade and Wells Fargo still have not sorted themselves out. In a highly wired world, it seems the only "instant" way to send cash is to use PayPal - and I don't know anybody who has yet managed to tie their stock brokerage into the online payment eBay subsidiary.

To recap:

* On Thursday at noon, I sold half of my Apple stock holdings in eTrade, both to diversify, and to raise needed cash.

* Friday, Saturday and Sunday went by. No sign of my cash in eTrade being available to transfer out of eTrade.

* Monday night, after checking throughout the day, the money became available, and I immediately set up to transfer $5k to Wells Fargo.

* Tuesday and Wednesday... nothing. Now that it's early Thursday morning, the money is no longer in eTrade, and certainly is not at Wells Fargo yet, let alone ready to be spent or written out in a check to my wife. (One potential recipient)

Are you telling me that with some of the most online-savvy brokers, it takes a whole week to sell stock, and transfer the proceeds from one account to another? Color me unimpressed.

Listening to ''Summer Sun (Ibiza Mix)'', by 4 Strings (Play Count: 8)

Unfettered Internet Access at Work: Required

I have often made the comment that there are a few essentials to life. Food, water, sleep and high-speed Internet. I don't even want to go see the family or go on trips if I'm out of range of the Blackberry. I even type out e-mails or check sports scores while I'm driving, as anytime instant access to information plays such a key role in what I do - for a living, for my hobbies, and as a consumer. So when I hear that some companies still expect people to spend eight or so hours of the day without access to the Web, or only a minimal subset of it, it's enough to make me want to form a union for these oppressed souls, being stuck by "the man".

Surprisingly, today brought news that Microsoft is advocating employers to release the bonds of Internet inequality, because they're finding young jobseekers especially are turned away from companies that don't get it. As Anne Kirah, Microsoft Senior Design Anthropologist (whatever that is) says, "These kids are saying: forget it! I don’t want to work with you. I don’t want to work at a place where I can’t be freely online during the day."

Now, I'm not advocating that workers of the world should unite behind poorly-designed MySpace pages, streaming MP3s and emoticon-filled chatfests on AOL instant messenger, but as we move more and more of our communications, business and information to the Web, you may as well tell employees not to read or eat while punched in on the clock. Companies will be differentiated through their ability to offer full access to the Internet - not so much as a perk, but as a core element that defines the work experience.

"Okay... so the job pays $9.95 an hour? Does it have benefits? A T-1 line? Cool."

Kirah even went so far as to say that taking a mobile phone away from a teenage girl is tantamount to child abuse. We certainly aren't interested in seeing a new wave of harassment claims from the Net deprived now, do we?

Listening to ''Watching Windows'', by Roni Size (Play Count: 3)

Apple Can't Win Them All, But Vista Still Buggy

Today, after the conclusion of regular stock-trading hours, Apple announced that it had settled five outstanding lawsuits from Creative Technologies surrounding the company's iPod interface, to the tune of $100 millon. Creative had been awarded a patent for an iPod-like interface last year, and immediately filed suit against Apple, in an obvious attempt to extract money from the high-flying computer and gadget maker. As the iPod has marched along, destroying everything in its path, including Dell and Sony, Creative has seen their market share stagnate, despite a valiant attempt to compete. Now, instead of revenue, the company gets cash the old-fashioned new fashioned way - through the courts.

But don't let that make you think Apple is rolling over, a loser on all counts. While they clearly didn't win this round, it clears the way for continued iPod development and announcements, and sweeps that nasty thing under the rug. Meanwhile, as Apple continues to draw accolades for its upcoming Leopard release, its Redmond foe, Microsoft is taking a beating for what some have called "the buggiest OS I've seen this late in development." And that's not some Mac fanboy or jaded MS developer making noise. That particular comment came from analyst Joe Wilcox of Jupiter Research, a firm which tends to be pretty straight-forward with its analysis.

Windows Vista is hardly seeing feature creep, as many operating systems do as they near shipment. Instead it's seeing feature droop, as highly-anticipated functionality has been eliminated in an effort to ship. But was has shipped is full of  bugs, that even the most ardent of Microsoft veterans won't stand. Analysts say the system is the most bug-ridden of any release from the company in more than a decade, and given Redmond's track record, that's truly saying something indeed.

Listening to ''Mind of the Wonderful'', by Blank & Jones (Play Count: 7)

iPod Juggernaut Claims Dell As Latest Victim

Today, multiple reports noted that Dell has withdrawn all mention of their MP3 player lineup from the company's store and site. Originally having launched the Dell DJ years ago to take on Apple's iPod, Dell retrenched behind the flash-based Dell Ditty, competing with Apple's incredibly popular iPod Shuffle offering. But it seems that they have admitted defeat and are walking away from the market altogether, removing yet another competitor from Apple's way.

But it certainly can't be as simple as that.

It's my expectation that Dell will heavily promote Microsoft's "coming zune" Zune MP3 player, either through offering it at cutthroat prices on their site, or in bundling to consumers looking for desktops and laptops. There really are only three potential scenarios:

1) Dell admits Apple has won (25% probability)
2) Dell will soon be branding the iPod themselves (5% probability)
3) Microsoft is the company's new MP3 partner (70% probability)

It will all get very interesting soon, as Microsoft threatens to muck up yet another market with their half-baked me-too offerings. They've done it before, and it won't stop them this time around either. Dell, unfortunately, may be an all-too willing partner in the war on the side of mediocrity.

Listening to ''Dirtbox'', by Dave Clarke (Play Count: 6)

A Third NorCal NBA Team? San Jose Says Yes

Cross-posted at Sactown Royalty...

A few weeks ago, we talked about "Kings Country", the theoretical make-believe border between where Kings fans ended and Warriors fans began, etc. But now, there are rumblings of some trying to bring an NBA team to San Jose, to share the HP Pavilion with the Sharks, which would make northern California a three-team region - taking it a step further than every other professional sport, including MLB and the NFL, who are comfortable with their Oakland and San Francisco representatives.

In today's San Jose Mercury News, a piece titled, NBA team still on S.J. agenda, says that an investment group recently courted (no pun intended) the Seattle Supersonics in an attempt to bring them to Silicon Valley. Now, arena owners are openly discussing the need to make accomodations, in the event an NBA squad were brought to the South Bay.

"If you're not prepared and if something were to come up, you're really in trouble,'' said Greg Jamison, SVSE's chief executive officer. ``We want to be prepared in the event that possibly an NBA team becomes available.''

As you can expect, even the rumblings of potential sneakers on the hardwood has got San Jose's northern neighbors just a little peeved.

"I am not in the business of telling cities how to do their business,'' Warriors President Robert Rowell said Monday. ``However, I am sure there are better ways they can spend the taxpayers' dollar than on this project.''

Is Northern California strong enough to support the two teams it already has in professional hoops, let alone three? Are these Silicon Valley financial overlords enjoying recreational pharmaceuticals? And would the Kings be as impacted as the Warriors by the San Jose Motherboards? Your thoughts...

Listening to ''The DJ - In the Mix'', by ATB (Play Count: 13)

Evening Tech Notes: August 21, 2006

In the "yet another iPod competitor" category, Sandisk debuted devices that scale all the way through eight gigabytes - double that of the iPod Nano, with a similar style to and price of the Nano, giving Apple what some have termed its most formidable competition in years, since the iPod's having grabbed more than three quarters of the MP3 player market. Oddly, after decades of being trumped by Microsoft's inferior software and hardware, Apple has the shoe on the other foot when it comes to the iPod, as even if they were to be trumped on technology (and there's no indication that's happened here), their immense market share and momentum will make it very difficult for competitors to make inroads. In fact, Wired News says that iTunes has become such a dominant entity in the music business that even the initial holdout bands will have to make their music available.

In fact, in the face of competition from online sales, such as iTunes, Tower Records announced today that it is filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection amid declining sales.

Interestingly, some media pundits, including GigaOm, are saying that Apple has such interest in the music and video space that they are suggesting the Cupertino company make a play for online video site YouTube. Although I don't see it happening, Apple is one company who could potentially strike a deal for the $1 billion-valued Web 2.0 giant. However, Apple does not have a history of purchasing content sites. The company's middle of the road .Mac services were all home grown, and acquisitions have tilted more to the software arena.

Lastly, there was considerable fallout at AOL after the company inadvertently leaked thousands of search queries from users in a massive violation of privacy - as discussed earlier in "Privacy On the Web Is Gone". The online services company reacted swiftly by forcing the resignation of AOL's chief technology officer and other minions who had a part in making the breach happen. As Good Morning Silicon Valley writes, imagine how that would look on the resume... "Reason for leaving last job: Violated the privacy of 600,000 company customers". Ouch. (More)

Listening to ''Aphrodesiac'', by Nu Mood Orchestra (Play Count: 7)

A's Win 12-10 After Being Down by 8 Runs

A typical 2006 A's game is one where the winning team claims victory by benefit of sharp pitching and defense, so a slugfest like tonight's game in Toronto, where both teams tallied double digits on the scoreboard, is highly atypical. What made the game even more atypical was the way that the A's fell behind early to the tune of 8-0, and rallied back for the win, matching the franchise's biggest comeback of all time, achieved only once before.

Though at the office when the game started, I periodically checked in on the score early, only to find our heros on the short end of an early deficit, first 3-0, and later 8-0. On Athletics Nation, loyal posters were committing faux suicide and claimed the game was over. Usually, it would be, but tonight was one for the record books. In the top of the 3rd, the A's got to starting pitcher Ted Lilly, and banged him up to the tune of 7 runs, knocking him out. In fact, the knockouts didn't end there. In front of the TV cameras, Lilly had words with the manager, and news services are now saying the two exchanged blows, drawing blood. That can't be good for team morale.

But the A's were the ones with punch the rest of the way. On the back of a 4-5 night by Jason Kendall, three hits by Eric Chavez, and home runs by Bobby Kielty, Milton Bradley, and Jay Payton, the team most known for its light offense didn't let up until they had pulled off the unimaginable. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why they play baseball, and why every game goes nine innings. It ain't over until they say it's over. And after it's all done, the A's still have a five game lead in the division, and look like they have a strong chance to make the playoffs. We've already purchased our tickets, and are looking forward to it, especially after this night to remember.

Listening to ''People'', by Paul Van Dyk (Play Count: 4)

Microsoft LiveSpaces? Empty Spaces

There's been a bit of discussion on the blogosphere over the last few days about Microsoft's claim that their Microsoft LiveSpaces service is the most popular blogging service in the world, if one tracks it by the total number of bloggers. But if that is so, how come I have yet to see any useful sites on Microsoft Live? Why are all of the most-popular sites powered by WordPress or TypePad, or for those consumer-level folks among us, by Blogger?

(For what it's worth, I'm sticking with RapidWeaver)

Robert Scoble goes head to head with one of the Microsoft Live drones, after doing some investigation and seeing that all of the blogs he found on Microsoft Live were absolutely devoid of content. No big surprise there.

Regardless of the statistics, it is hard to believe that Microsoft is first, nimble enough to make the kind of transition needed to truthfully move from an OS and software suite company to an Internet leader, and secondly, that they can obtain the trust of the end user community, as others have. MySpace and Facebook and other success stories were organically grown, not manipulated, as MSN and Live are. The fact Google bought Blogger shows they knew to ask out the prettiest girl at the dance, not to build her out of spare parts.

Listening to ''Damaged (Ford's Trancendental Radio Edit)'', by Plummet (Play Count: 7)

Give Me My Money. Now.

The Players: Wells Fargo Bank, eTrade, and Bank of America

The Hypothesis: I should be able to get my own money when I want, as fast as I want, to do whatever I want.

The Reality: Although each of these institutions offers Web-based transfers, and in the case of eTrade, stock purchases and sales, I don't really get access to my own earned money immediately, despite the fact it's mine. While they have made it relatively simple to move money from one institution to another, and have even gone so far as to make it without charge (that's good!), I find myself consistently frustrated that I can't get to my own cash, in the event I need it.

I have been a loyal Wells Fargo customer since 1998, and opened an eTrade account during the online stock boom in the 1999-2000 timeframe. My wife, a loyal Bank of America customer herself, was acquired following months-long negotiations involving multiple parties. While we've so far avoided getting a joint checking account, something that may change soon, it is common for me to need to write her checks to cover outstanding items, or to spot her on excess spending. And every once in a while, what she needs exceeds the cash I have on hand, meaning I need to draw from the till at eTrade to make ends meet.

One easy way would be to transfer to her Bank of America account directly from eTrade, but we've learned that can take 4-5 business days, and lots of waiting around to figure out if it's really happened yet. The same is true if I transfer from eTrade to Wells Fargo, but the onus would then be on me to wait - more accepted, obviously. I could write her a check, and post-date it, but that'd be silly.

And there's one more option - move all my banking to eTrade. After all, they do say they offer competitive savings rates. But that's not happening any time soon.

Until then, we still have two major issues:

1. I can't figure out why I first can't send my money from eTrade to Bank of America or Wells Fargo immediately.

2. Why doesn't money I gain from selling stock on eTrade become immediately available, either for reinvestment or for transferring?

This Wednesday, I sold half my Apple holdings, to diversify and to gain cash. But the money hasn't appeared available to transfer to either Bank of America (her) or Wells Fargo (me), several days later. Foolishness. It's not as if eTrade is going to bounce a check if they send me my money. Last I checked, they were doing fairly well. And as a strong customer for both them and Wells Fargo for several years, one would think that the skids would be greased a bit for simple transactions like buying, selling and transferring. They're basic. But instead, I need to deplete my savings to give my wife the money she needs, and then wait a week or so, optimistically, to get my own money out of eTrade and into Wells Fargo to refill the money pit. It's real simple - make a change. Give me my money. Now.

Listening to ''That's Life'', by Paul Van Dyk (Play Count: 6)

Saturday Sees Six Hours of Driving

Let me first apologize for the lack of non-ANtics updates to the site of late. Schedules haven't been all that forgiving. Yesterday alone saw us spending "quality time" in the car to the tune of six hours or so, and we didn't arrive home until after 2 a.m. Needless to say, until they've perfected the technologies of voice-to-text blogging while driving and can upload while I'm behind the wheel, you're going to see gaps.

Earlier this week, one of my best friends and colleagues had the sad news that her father had passed away after a long battle with cancer. With his services in Stockton, we first drove up to my parents' home in Sacramento, to drop off our beagle, and then turned right back around to Stockton for the service. After the service, we returned to Sacramento, and then had the trip back to the Bay Area to take us through the late hours. With 2 hours 20 minutes to Sacramento, and an hour between Stockton and Sacramento each way, you can see how the time added up.

But it was all well worth it.

My colleague's father lived to a ripe old age of 91, and shared some of the same passions we do - including a love for A's baseball. The well-decorated ceremony included a floral arrangement in the shape of an A's baseball, with an A's logo, and we were even asked to sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" during the service, which otherwise closely followed Buddhist traditions. The man, who passed on his love for the game to his daughter, had held season tickets behind home plate for more than 20 years, had managed youth baseball leagues, and once, many decades ago, had played against Joe DiMaggio, in semi-pro baseball. Though I only met him a few times, it was clear he loved his baseball, and his family. The service's program had his smiling face on the front, wearing an A's cap - of course.

Aside from the baseball elements, the service itself was beautiful - honoring the Buddhist traditions and ceremony, full of incense and Japanese song. We were very lucky to have the opportunity to share in that, and we hope he knows how much we appreciate the contributions of his family.

Following the service's conclusion, we headed north to my own family, ostensibly to pick up our dog, who languished without us for a few hours. We spent the evening with yet more food (I was full from the reception after the service), and played plenty of cards, as we tend to do when we get together. After several rounds of Uno, a family staple, we played hearts until I lost. I lost because I took too many risks, and never shot the moon, but we still had fun, and didn't mind driving the midnight hours back to the Bay Area, only to start off our Sunday routine hours later.

Listening to ''Engreossing Moments'', by ATB (Play Count: 3)

ANtics Episode 2.25: Looking for Loaiz-ove

The A's have come out of the All-Star break on a tear, maintaining their first-place spot. Many have pointed out the rise of A's off-season acquisition, Esteban Loaiza as one factor to the A's strong play. After what can only be described as a dreadful first half, the A's 4th starter is showing signs of the promise that led the team to sign him in the first place. The ANtics looks into his rise in "Looking for Loaiz-ove".

Click to See Larger Comic

Also: Take the Poll: What's behind Loaiza's resurgence?

2005 Comics | 2006 Comics | Poll

Morning Notes: August 18, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

In politics, some of the biggest news surrounded the court's call for an immediate halt to the illegal NSA-sponsored domestic wiretapping that Bush and his right-wing cronies have been saying is an integral part of our security against terrorists at home or abroad. Interestingly, in the judge's summation, she wrote, "There are no hereditary Kings in America and no power not created by the Constitution. So all "inherent power" must derive from that Constitution." Her comment on hereditary kings sounded particularly apt when one looks at this administration, and that of the 1988-elected George Bush Sr., a man who towers over his son in intellect and scruples, Iran-Contra aside.

Vanity Fair's James Wolcott piles on in a piece called "Turd on the Run", where he asks, "Is Bush an idiot? Is water wet?"

In technology, gadgets reign supreme. The Web is abuzz over the first leaked photos on Gizmodo of Microsoft's wannabe-iPod killer, Zune. The pictures don't show the device on, or even its true color, in an effort to mask the leaker. But that didn't stop a wealth of discussion on iLounge, Engadget, Slashdot and CrunchGear.

In other news, this morning, a judge ordered that EchoStar has to stop selling its digital video recorders, and must pay TiVo approximately $90 million for patent infringement. It's good to see a company have the opportunity to successfully defend its intellectual property. (Tivo's response)

And finally, in sports, the A's play a rare doubleheader against the lowly Kansas City Royals, after a rainstorm thankfully interrupted a would-be A's loss earlier in the season, forcing a makeup game. The green and gold take on the AL Central's cellar dwellers starting at 2:10 p.m. Pacific. Until then, check out Athletics Nation's interview with A's pitching legend Dave Stewart.

Listening to ''Play For Today'', by The Cure (Play Count: 6)

A's Win 15th Straight vs. Mariners

Cross-posted At Athletics Nation...

Tonight, the A's extended their streak against the division rival Seattle Mariners to 15 straight victories, tying a major league record for the longest such streak against a division opponent since the introduction of division play almost 40 years ago.

In contrast to the two previous games in this series, which saw an A's blowout on Tuesday and a breath-taking comeback on Monday, tonight's game rested on the back of great starting pitching by Dan Haren (and impressive bullpen work), and a 3-run shot by Mark Ellis that provided all the offense the A's would need.



Haren struck out eight, and didn't walk anybody, in one of his most impressive pitching performances on the season as he made a strong case to be the team's ace in 2007 (Harden permitting). Seattle somehow managed 10 hits on the game (2 more than the A's), but couldn't get anybody past third base, and as anybody would tell you, "4th base is the important one".

With some sadness, we see the Mariners leave Oakland for the final time this season, but by no means is the series over between these two clubs, who resume their mismatch at the end of September at Safeco. The Mariners leave Oakland 12 games out of first, and with the A's sporting a 6 1/2 game lead on the Angels and Rangers, a six-game winning streak, and some serious momentum.

Listening to ''Energize'', by Nick Lunn (Play Count: 5)

Apple and Google in Denial

Sometimes in technology, the biggest news is no news at all - and the absence of something anticipated makes more noise than the debut of something unanticipated. Confused yet? Take a look at two separate announcements today from a pair of the most-scrutinized companies out there - Google and Apple, both of whom had to discount rumors that they had big plans in the works.

In the last few months, and especially so following Microsoft's pre-announcement of Zune, there has been a hotbed of discussion around the possibility that Apple would be adding wireless capabilities to their incredibly popular iPod lineup. While Microsoft has recently dialed back expectations on Zune's wireless capabilities, rumormongers have discovered patents from Apple that would indicate the company is looking to add wireless, even if just for synchronizing away from the host computer. In fact, one report said that Apple had dispatched company representatives to Asia to help train people on the music players new features.

Turns out that's a bunch of hooey, if Apple's denial of that news today is true. The company took the unusual step of commenting on rumors by denouncing them outright. This could be a typical Apple ploy to downplay expectations, but if they were to consistently lie to reporters and customers, that would be a very poor PR move, and I don't expect that's the goal here.

In parallel, Google recently announced that they had enabled wireless Internet access for the search engine's home community of Mountain View, California. Given their interest, everyone expected the next move for Google was to debut a nationwide wireless network under the Google brand. But, as with many dreams, it appears that it too will not come true. Just as Apple did, Google said they have no plans for national Wi-Fi service, despite efforts in Mountain View and San Francisco. They said that the goals were to demonstrate the "value of competition" in providing Internet access, and to experiment with new business ideas. 

So, while other companies would salivate the opportunity to get press and fans talking about what they are doing, Google and Apple are going out of their way to slow down the discussions. Maybe they're hiding secrets up their sleeves, and maybe it all depends on what the definition of "is" is. We'll all wait and see.

Listening to ''Sandstorm'', by Pete Tong (Play Count: 3)

Privacy on the Web is Gone

Last week, AOL made headlines through a huge public relations gaffe where the Internet giant released the search records from hundreds of users. Though the users were not identified by name, their very personal searches were unearthed for all to see, and it didn't take detectives to rapidly match some names with their search terms (New York Times). This once again has the Web abuzz over what data should be kept private, and what should not.

With that discussion ongoing, Google has very publicly stated that they have no intention to stop recording user searches, and will use this data to help shape future services. But the time to worry about being anonymous on the Web is long gone. Savvy marketers and blog owners know your every click. They know what search terms you used, what Web site directed you to theirs, and what pages you clicked on when you got here. They know whether you use Mac or PC, and whether you use Firefox, Safari or IE. That's standard, whether content owners are utilizing the highly-popular SiteMeter, or more advanced tools, like WebTrends and LeadLander.

In parallel, Amazon.com has raised eyebrows by its acknowledging that they are going to request even more data from their users, including sexual orientation and religion, in addition to the standard address information and accumulated preferences through ongoing site purchases.

If there is a tool that marketers can use to more nimbly target their products and help you to buy more, they are going to use it. With technology improvements taking place all the time to aid the selling process, we're naive if we think we can surf idly from site to site without somebody paying attention. And it's not a moral crisis either. It's big business. We should just accept it. As Tom Formenski writes, "this data never goes away," adding "Your every click and keystroke online is being collected by many different organisations, and that means that at some point it will be possible to track it all, and identify most of it. Welcome to the future transparency of your life."

Listening to ''The Hush - Think'', by Bedrock (Play Count: 4)

Site Endorsement: Guy Kawasaki's Blog

Although it has been a while since we officially endorsed another site, it's certainly not for a lack of quality reading, learning and entertainment out there. Though I've referenced Guy Kawasaki's excellent site off and on since the beginning of the year, he's not received the official louisgray.com stamp of approval - until now.

Kawasaki, who rose to prominence as the chief evangelist at Apple Computer during the iconic computer maker's earliest times, has tremendous credibility in the Silicon Valley marketplace, and continually offers advice to those who want to break in or expand in the market. This evening, he posted a great "how to" on obtaining a job in Silicon Valley. Both informative and humorous, the piece gives job prospects that edge that may mean the difference between winning a position, and finding yourself back on the street.

As I had commented on the blog, one of the major things to do before any job interview is research the heck out of it. Learn as much as you can about the company and what they do before setting foot in the office. Make sure you not only can discuss their product, but also their market. Learn who their potential customers are, and why they have advantages over the competition. If you're just there because you badly need a job, and you haven't done your homework, that will be quickly discovered.

A few years ago, when speaking with a prospective employer, I was asked if I felt I could take on the task of running the Web site of one of their competitors - a major public company. If I said I couldn't do it, it would show weakness, but it was a large proposal. When I said, "Yes I could do it, but it would be a major cleanup job," the interviewer said, "That response just earned you an offer." That showed me that a little bravado can do you well, especially if you not only show the willingness and energy to excel, but the knowledge of the competition, to say what you believe they would want to hear.

Guy Kawasaki is a guy (no pun intended) who knows his craft, and is doing a great service by extending his consultancy to the blogosphere. If you're interested in business, technology, marketing, presenting or venture capital, his site is a must read.

Listening to ''Primer'', by Christopher Lawrence (Play Count: 6)

Proposed: A Giants Fan Amnesty Program

Cross-posted at Athletics Nation...

As you can see above, it's pretty clear the San Francisco Giants aren't going anywhere this season - except to their vacation spots and retirement homes, come October. In contrast, the Oakland A's are very much a part of playoff contention, having won 9 of 10, pushing the team to a division lead of 4.5 games.

As you can imagine, there are probably a good number of Giants "fans" who are unhappy with their horse, and would give anything to join the bandwagon to follow the hot team on the other side of the bay. Yet, they are tied down to expensive season ticket packages at Phone Booth Park, and can't financially make the move.

I propose that the A's aggressively market to this unhappy group of baseball fan wanna-bes through a one-time amnesty program aimed at converting them and their friends to the A's fold for good.

I propose:

* The A's will grant 2006 playoff ticket rights to those Giants fans who turn in their remaining 2006 season tickets. To gain full playoff rights, the Giants fans will be given the opportunity to purchase an equivalent number of equal or lesser value A's tickets for half price.
* The A's will offer half-price day of game tickets in exchange for any two used 2006 ticket stubs from AT&T Park.
* The A's will offer a 25% discount on 2007 season tickets of equal or lesser value to any holder of 2006 Giants season tickets.
* The A's will offer a 40-50% discount on A's merchandise in exchange for Giants merchandise in very good to excellent condition. We simply want it off the streets, for the betterment of our community.
* Upon trade-in of any active or future Giants season tickets, the A's will gift the Giants ticket holders new A's caps, free of charge.

The questions to you:

* Would the A's be interested in converting Giants fans?
* Do you want to sit next to these bandwagon fans?
* Do they deserve to take playoff seats from true A's fans?
* Would this program be successful?

If You're on a PC, It's Time to Switch to Mac

In the dark days of the mid-1990s for Apple, the rallying cry wasn't to move people off of Windows and on to Macintosh, but instead to keep the doors open at the iconic computer company, who was on its last legs financially after a series of missteps that coincided with the absence of co-founder Steve Jobs. A decade later, it's no secret that the Mac maker is alive and kicking. Following a strong WWDC conference last week, many in the media are discussing if it's finally time to make the switch to Macintosh, as Apple debuted more powerful systems than the competition (Dell) at a lower price point, and the company's newest operating system leapfrogs Windows Vista, which is still struggling in early beta.

As Michael Gartnerberg, an analyst for Jupiter Research, told the New York Times, "much of what Microsoft is promising for Vista is available today at your local Apple store," and Gartner analysts followed that up by saying "Apple is winning mind share, which leads to market share."

All the old adages and excuses of why people would not consider the Macintosh are gone. The Macintosh is compatible with all networking standards and corporate networks. The newest Macintoshes offer Windows as an option, and the entire product lineup features the latest Intel processors. Additionally, as mentioned, the price differential between the two (Mac and PC) is gone at any level except the very lowest price band.

As the company's series of "Get a Mac" ads have shown, every new Macintosh, at factory install, comes bundled with an array of creative applications, that if purchased for the PC equivalent, could cost hundreds of dollars. Additionally, the Macintosh platform continues to be the leader in security and is virus-free, while Windows continues to be rattled by virus warnings, worms, spyware, and instability.

With all that said, the mainstream media is now getting the picture in a big way. A second New York Times article asks openly if it is "Time to trade Windows for Mac?". As Apple continues to grow mind share with its ubiquitous iPods and expanded advertising, it's definitely coming to the fore in a big way. (See also: Red Herring: The End of Wintel?)

A colleague of mine at work wrote just last week, complaining that she was beset with spyware and detested the plagues of Windows, from pop-ups to viruses.

She wrote, "I don't know anything about MACs.... Would I like one instead of a desktop PC? Are they easier or harder to manage? I keep getting hackers attacking my PC at home... Viruses, spyware, etc..." Minutes later, after visiting the Apple store online, and finding the Mac Mini, the story was different. "$599!  SOLD!!  SOLD!  That one is MINE!  :)"

If you're on Windows, and you're tired of the computer running you, and not the other way around, it's time to come to the light. Apple offers you a better way of life. The Macintosh platform is built to help you get things done, not to get in your way. Switch today.

Listening to ''Out Of The City (City Slickers'', by 2 Heads (Play Count: 17)

ANtics Episode 2.24: A's Defense 101

The A's defense rocks. It's that simple. Chavez is putting on a nightly clinic at 3rd, and the rest of the team is consistently awesome as well. The ANtics try to learn the secret sauce in a piece called, "A's Defense 101".


Click to See Larger Comic
Also: Take the Poll: What's the A's Ideal Infield Defense?
2005 Comics | 2006 Comics | Poll

Will Terror Woes Mean Big Bucks for Some?

With the recent news that British authorities thwarted a potential terror strike on multiple airliners headed from the UK to the United States, where the alleged perpetrators were set to ignite liquid-based explosives disguised as carry-on drinks or even digital devices, many travelers are lamenting not only the extended lines making a bad situation worse at airports, but others are distraught over potentially being separated from their iPods and laptops for the duration of the flight.

But the end results aren't all bad for all companies. Some are sure to find a way to capitalize on any opportunity. Here's a not-so-tongue in cheek look at who benefits, and who loses, from the recent new security guidelines:

WINNER: WebEx

The Web meeting powerhouse has extinguished dramatic challenges from Microsoft's NetMeeting, PlaceWare, Centra and many others to remain the king of the hill in holding meetings and presentations online, rather than forcing executives to fly in to meet on site. If enough businesspeople tire of the long lines and forced inactivity at airports and on flights, WebEx might see increased business by customers and increased adoption from those who have been holdouts.

LOSER: Apple

I can't think of a better use for an iPod Video than on the airplane. There have been a few trips where I wish I could just break out the iPod and catch an episode of CSI or Law and Order, or even South Park. Additionally, the airplane is where I most frequently use the iPod Shuffle, just after the airlines say it's okay. While just about everybody who wants an iPod already has one, the airlines are a great place to display the white earbuds.

WINNER: Amazon.com

If you can't use your laptop, and you can't listen to your iPod on a flight, what are you going to do, start up a card game with your fellow passengers? No - you'll probably read, or sleep. Amazon is the de facto standard for purchasing books of all kinds on the Web, whether for business or for pleasure. Considering that the pleasure quotient at airports will be diminishing, maybe a good book will help take the edge off.

LOSER: United, American Airlines, etc.

The airlines have not been in good shape financially for a long time, and any incentives to drive customers away from flying certainly don't help. For United and American Airlines, the two largest domestic carriers, bankruptcy has never been that far away. Additionally, increased security requirements and more unhappy customers can further diminish margins and revenue for a business who doesn't need more of the same.

WINNER: JetBlue

While the rest of the airlines have been slow to adapt to new technology, being very reluctant to even offer power ports on seats, and have instead focused on wedging as many passengers in a small area as possible, JetBlue is well known for offering customers DirectTV to every seat, in flight, whether you're first class or coach. If you think you absolutely need to be entertained during your flight, and who doesn't... JetBlue is a great alternative to the cattle pens of United and Southwest.

LOSER: Evian, Arrowhead, etc.

While airlines have done a fairly good job of keeping fliers near soda or water throughout a flight, others prefer to bring their own on the flight. With the latest news, this certainly will go away. While it may be an immaterial knock on the bottled water providers' bottom line, it will certainly break the habits some have and force them to go another way - maybe toward the $5 shots of hard liquor to keep them in a stupor until the plane lands...

Listening to ''Praise the Lord'', by Paul Oakenfold (Play Count: 6)

A's Playing Well, Extend Division Lead

For the better part of the last half-decade, the Oakland A's have been the best second-half team in all of baseball, seemingly putting behind any struggles they had in the initial few months of season, and surging forward to grab the lead in the American League West, or to extend it if they were already out in front. With a 19-9 record thus far following the All-Star Break, 2006 is playing the same tune, and the A's, following tonight's 6-3 defeat of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, now are the proud owners of a 4 1/2 game lead over the second-place Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, who dropped their contest against the mutually hated New York Yankees this morning.

In my first year as an A's season ticket holder, I've gone to a lot of games this year, and I'm not complaining, even though it now seems a considerable amount of my time is now spent driving up and down Interstate 880 to and from the game. Tonight, and yesterday, I was able to see these A's at their best, as Friday night saw them come back from a 2-0 deficit to win 5-2, and today, they won again, but instead capitalized on an early 5-0 lead, to win 6-3. Though the outcome was the same in both games, they certainly followed different formulas. Friday saw a 2-run home run by Bobby Kielty put the team ahead, and Saturday instead saw the patience needed to draw bases loaded walks, and no home runs were put on the board by the green and gold.

The A's have now won 8 of 9, are 12 games over the .500 mark, their high point for the season, and they have clinched their fifth consecutive series win. The team is on a serious roll, so long as we can all ignore the occasional aberration (See Wednesday's 14-0 blowout, for example). But while the team gets more comfortable in the midst of a pennant race, questions remain on injuries to key players, and if the Angels will stop acting like pretenders, and instead turn into contenders the last few months of the year. I know we'll be in our seats, pushing the A's forward in an effort to see them take on the postseason. After all, this week, we just ponied up the dough to watch them all the way through the World Series. Games like tonight and yesterday certainly help to make that dream more of a reality.

Listening to ''Nukleuz Trance Sessions, Vol. 1", by Various Artists (Play Count: 5)

Topix Launches One-Year News Search

Earlier this week, online news service Topix.net unveiled a new feature that enables visitors to search the news for a search term over a 12-month period, and displays the results, as well as a graph showing the intensity and frequency of news coverage over that time.

If the tool continues to develop, it could become incredibly useful for public relations and corporate types who are looking to measure long-term success of branding and media coverage, or for fans of products and companies who would like to align events with anticipated response. In fact, PR teams, if the service is tuned for accuracy, could be measured in graph form, rather than through the old-fashioned clips or more manual reporting.

For the largest companies, like Microsoft or General Electric, the spikes in day to day, week by week, media coverage is less dramatic than that for specific keywords or lesser-known brands. But even for strong brands, like Apple, you can see spikes in activity around Macworld San Francisco in January, and the recently-completed WorldWide Developers' Conference (WWDC). (See the below examples for Apple and Zune.)



The Topix news search covers more than technology companies, of course. You can even see a buildup around senatorial candidate Ned Lamont, with a dramatic spike this week, leading up to and just following his defeat of Joe Leiberman in the Connecticut Democrat party primary. (Also above)

The tool is very interesting, and if you have topics (Topix!) you would like to track, be sure to bookmark the resulting page. But the news search function isn't ideal. While it does differentiate between blogs and more standard press, it doesn't quantify results or designate between a mention and a feature story. Maybe in later iterations, if there is sufficient interest, we can see that develop.

Listening to ''Love Shines Through'', by Marcella Woods (Play Count: 8)

Dog-Gone Hot

It's no secret that this summer is one of the hottest ever recorded across the Northern Hemisphere. After 100+ temperatures for more than a week, we saw the mercury lessen to the 90s range here in the Bay Area, unfortunately coinciding with our trip to Boston, where upon our arrival, the East Coast chimed in with their own version of a sticky heat overload. With temperatures pushing 100 outside, I did my part to stay indoors at the convention hall, keeping my external wandering to a minimal level. But the heat was certainly noticed by many outside. Even every Conan O'Brien monologue that week started out with a lame joke about the heat...

Now that we're back in the Bay Area, we're finding things a bit warm again. Not oppressively so, but enough that our fourth-floor condominium with cathedral ceilings, facing the sun, is storing more than its share of heat. And to make things worse, our housebound beagle, playing the part of a latchkey dog while we've been away at the office during the day, has been panting her way through the eight or so hours, without respite.

Yesterday evening, after arriving home from the A's game, the indoors temperature was a balmy 88, so I of course started up the fans and air conditioner in a feeble attempt to knock down the thermometer a few points. Hours later, we were still at 85, and we didn't seem to be getting anywhere. To my chagrin, I then noticed the air nozzle aimed to push hot air out of the house had detached from the window, and instead of cooling us off, we had started a circle of heat pouring right back into the room we were trying to chill. Dumb, dumb, dumb.

Needless to say, we reattached it, and immediately saw a drop - never perfect, mind you, but a slip from 85 to 82, to 80, and just over 75 by midnight or so. The dog, patient through all this, lifted her eyebrows at me as if she had known, but in all seriousness, if she saw something, she could have told me, rather than keeping it to herself.

Today's been a bit better - but not great. As of 7 this evening, we're at 80 indoors, down from 85 when we started, and as seen in An Inconvenient Truth, this will become more normal as time goes on if we don't make changes in our activity to thwart the gradual warming of the planet. Our dog may not be around to see it, but we will be.

Listening to ''No Reason", by Chumi DJ (Play Count: 5)

A's Get Pummeled 14-0 As We Watch, Helpless

Given how many Oakland A's games I have had the opportunity to attend this year, it is no surprise that some of them don't turn out the way I had planned. Even the best teams in the league will lose 2 out of every 5, and while the A's had won six consecutive games, and were leading the American League West by 3 games at the beginning of play today, we saw the team completely fall apart in a 14 to 0 pounding at the hands of the Texas Rangers, who avenged the two previous days' losses in dramatic fashion - socking five home runs, and refusing to give the A's any kind of chance to compete.

After finally making it to the city this morning - about 90 minutes behind schedule, we connected for our meeting, and having knocked out the big to-do items, we, as a group, headed to Oakland expecting to give a good demonstration of the Bay Area's best team, but it was not to be today. A's ace Barry Zito started off the proceedings by giving up a home run in the first inning, and continued to struggle through 5 ugly innings. When relieved by a team of relief pitchers, they managed to fare worse, seeing a 4 run inning followed by a 7 run frame, and the rout was definitely on. In fact, I understand that the 14-0 blowout was the most lopsided shutout the Oakland A's have ever suffered. Yay... history. Woo.

It is well documented that the A's offense isn't exactly a barnburner. They simply manage to outscore their opponents more often than not, relying on strong team defense and starting pitching. But today, none of those elements shone through in any way. Not only did the team fail to score, and didn't see a base runner past the second base bag, but they also had three ugly errors, which only made things worse.

That's not to say the day wasn't fun. As they say, the worst day at the ballpark beats the best day at the office. With 80-plus degree temperatures, and an optimistic 30,000+ crowd for a day game that featured one-dollar hotdogs, we had a good time, and shook our head as the A's turned a challenging game into a comedy. Despite giving up the two touchdowns and extra points, the game counts as one in the standings, just like any contest, and the team's most-hated rival, the Angels, also managed to be shut out themselves, so the A's, though stunned, continue in first place by three games, and can press forward to their next opponent, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, who return to Oakland on Friday. We will be there, doing our best to ensure a different outcome.

Listening to ''Technologic'', by Daft Punk (Play Count: 13)

Bay Area Traffic Can be the Worst

In the dot-com heyday, it wasn't uncommon to expect commute times of over an hour, just to go ten to twenty miles or so up and down the San Francisco Peninsula. Traveling highways 101 or 280 between San Francisco or San Jose in either direction could be a life-halting event, as, in what seemed to be a good thing, there was a vast surplus of jobs and people with automobiles needing to get from one side to the other, more than the highways had been built to handle. When that was coupled with skyrocketing housing prices, commuters were often compromising on their distance to travel to work in order to save a few hundred thousand dollars.

When the stock market bubble burst, hundreds of thousands of jobs were seemingly erased overnight, and some of these commuters similarly disappeared. Traffic got better, even as the economy was getting worse. So there was an upside. And while the economy showed signs of revival and has picked up again, we haven't seen the out of control hiring and resulting traffic to make up the difference - which makes today's experience especially frustrating.

With a 9 a.m. meeting in San Francisco, the plan was to take Highway 101 to catch BART, the Bay Area's Rapid Transit system, and coast into the big city in time to make the appointment. But it was not to be. The freeway system in the Bay Area is built without room for error - meaning a single accident anywhere on 101 can dramatically stop the traffic flow - and leave its remnants for hours afterward, even if the glass has since been cleared and the cars dragged off to that great big scrap heap in the sky. And without warning, I found myself in this mess today, as only two or three exits north of home, I found nothing but brake lights as far as the eye could see - without police or fire engines anywhere in sight.

I watched the minutes creep by, and even told my appointment that things looked VERY bad. Since my car wasn't moving anyway, I could punch out a coherent message via Blackberry and take phone calls without any concern that I was making the problem worse. Half an hour went by and I hadn't moved. And even after we started to creep along, it was no picnic. After having "enjoyed" this for about an hour, we found a cohesive collection of glass in the middle of the road - where some traffic architect genius had conspired to have five lanes merge to three. Undoubtedly, some more-aggressive drivers had decided to share a lane with another vehicle only to learn about the physics behind what happens when one object in motion attempts to stay in motion, but is brought to a stop.

Brilliant.

Needless to say, the schedule has been blown to shreds. I didn't even make it onto BART until 15 or so minutes after I was already supposed to be in San Francisco, and we'll need to be creative on how we now put our heads together.

I'm not one to lobby for any kind of economic downturn, or wish ill will on those who are creating the traffic surplus, but if the Bay Area expects to grow further, and expects to be a world-class city (or group of cities), as we keep hearing when the San Francisco mayor makes bids to host upcoming Olympic games, the basic essentials of providing people a reliable system of getting to and from destinations on time has to be achieved. I for one can't trust that I'll get anywhere outside of a 5-mile radius in a given time. There are simply too many variables and not enough trust in the system. And I really, really would like my morning back.

Listening to ''Animal'', by The Neanderthal (Play Count: 3)

WWDC 2006 Roundup

As I wrote on Sunday night, WWDC is one of the most hotly-anticipated days on a Mac aficionado's calendar. And just about every year sees an incredible amount of hype and predictions of software, hardware and magic - expectations that Apple CEO Steve Jobs can just pull products out of a hat, regardless of their ease of development, or practicality. This year was no different - as a little after 24 hours following the event, Apple is recognized for having made some strong, solid introductions, but still a cry goes up from the Web by those who expected quite a bit more.

Gone are the visions many had of wireless iPods, and a downloadable movie store, an iPhone, or the introduction of integrated Windows compatibility. Instead, we saw the company complete its move to Intel processors with the introduction of the Mac Pro, we saw a preview of Mac OS X 10.5 (a.k.a. Leopard), and we heard Steve talk about how the new Mac OS X operating system was delivering features beyond even Microsoft's wildest imagination. Steve said that despite $5 billion in R&D, Microsoft is learning to copy Apple and Google, and isn't coming up with anything new. Also, he hinted at some "Top Secret" announcements and features that will be withheld until Leopard becomes closer to reality.

In the 1990s, the build-up to WWDC was a small affair, celebrated by a select few. Now, with Apple enjoying a resurgence with the success of the iPod, adoption of Intel and delays from Microsoft, the company has enjoyed overwhelming attention by more mainstream press. Now, instead of us Mac-heads whining in private Internet forums or stock boards, we now see reaction from Wired saying that Steve Jobs has lost his magic, and CNET claiming the blogosphere is disappointed. You reap what you sow, and Apple, so far, has held strong in the face of increased scrutiny.

For me, I'm looking forward to Leopard, and hope we see a lot more in the way of its functionality. The Mac Pro line is very strong if I were in that market, but being completely laptop-oriented now, I can't ever see why I would need a quad-core Intel Xeon workstation. That's crazy talk. I can't wait to ditch the two machines at work and merge them to one, a new MacBook Pro. Now, all I have to do is convince the boss, and get it expensed.

And until then, I'm going to go back to the recorded stream and take a look at it all myself for the first time.

Listening to ''Nessaja'', by Scooter (Play Count: 5)

Where's the Snooze Button?

If you take a look at most of the posts to this blog, it's fairly clear I am a night owl by nature. I'm often more productive from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. than most people seem to be from 8 a.m. to noon. I am commonly up late, and when I do get up early, it's only to race into the office, not to saunter around the house and grab a leisurely breakfast or any of that nonsense. Today was a whole other matter. With my wife and mother-in-law on an end of summer trip to Idaho and Montana (of all places), the pair needed to catch an early flight out of San Francisco, and you can guess who got drafted to play chauffeur. That meant we were up at 4:30 a.m., to leave home by 5, pick up the mother-in-law at 5:30, and drop them off at SFO by 6.

By the time I turned around and made it into the office, it was 6:30 a.m., and as anybody knows, you never gain brownie points with management for the extra hours you may put in that they don't see. If you're not sending out e-mails and making calls immediately, it really doesn't count in a world where you don't punch a clock.

Sure, there were others there, but mostly those who deal with customers on the East Coast, necessitating a regular early start. For me, it was something resembling alien territory, and I still felt somewhat guilty leaving the office by 5, even though I had effectively put in what could be considered a 10 1/2 hour shift, mainly to make sure the dog was fed.

With my wife out for the week, the beagle, at home by herself all day, would no doubt have started consuming the furniture and wreaking general havoc were I not home exactly by 5:30 p.m. to give her dinner. She does, after all, seem to have an internal alarm clock that's more accurate than most watches. I think we made it by 5:27, and she ate at 5:40, just within the levels of acceptability.

That catches us up to my appropriate amount of whining that I'm fatigued. Maybe when I was younger I could handle big shifts in schedule, and pull all-nighters, but not any longer. As with Saturday, I'll be lucky to keep my eyes open through the full nine-inning game tonight. But we'll give it our best shot.

Listening to ''One Eye Shut (Original Mix)'', by Robbie Rivera (Play Count: 5)

Apple In Focus: WWDC Kicks Off Today

For every good Apple rumormonger, there are really two big days on the calendar that one should mark at the beginning of every year - the beginning of MacWorld San Francisco in January, and the first day of the company's WorldWide Developers Conference (WWDC), held in the summer. At both events, CEO and mogul Steve Jobs takes the stage and often wows attendees by unveiling the latest software and hardware with his own unique flair.

Sometimes, we are surprised and in awe by the announcements, and many other times, we are disappointed, for the pre-event hype often outweighs reality, as no company could provide the level of excitement and the wide breadth of introductions that we ourselves could dream up.

This year, like every year, the rumors have been flying fast and furious. Nearly everybody expects that the company's next-generation operating system, Mac OS X 10.5, or Leopard, will be previewed, and offered early to developers. Most expect to learn more about the newest professional desktops, dubbed the Mac Pro. Others anticipate updated iPods, or even the much-discussed, but never seen, iPhone. Other potential updates include the Xserve, or the company's displays.

Rumors are so widespread for WWDC that sites are dedicated to summarizing the potential announcements, and so many different sites are offering to stream live updates that there is even a page dedicated to summarizing all the live text feeds. Amazing, isn't it?

And while all that fun is going on as Steve, clad in a black turtleneck and blue jeans, is doing some of the best marketing on the planet, the Wall Street Journal continues to bang the drum on the story around the company's alleged stock option irregularities. In a piece coming out Monday, the WSJ now says that stock option grants to directors were issued just days before stock price increases, making the beneficiaries millions almost instantly. While few specific details are known yet, uncertainty is never a good thing in today's financial markets, and it threatens to put a dour mood on today's proceedings, at least as far as the markets are concerned. (Also: Reuters)

Though still keenly interested in Apple's announcements, I'm not as much the diehard I once was, admittedly. In years past, life would stop as Steve took the stage. I would stream the QuickTime to my computer, at home or at work, and fiddle while he introduced items. In the background, either a Web chat or a stock discussion board would take my initial reactions one by one, as collectively, many of us would react - sometimes violently, to what we saw. At times, we would see Steve stall, and know a new feature had fallen out of the keynote, and at other times, we would gnash and wail when that which we had most hoped for wouldn't materialize. But tomorrow, when Steve's on stage, I'll probably be in a meeting at the office. And that, honestly, will be okay. I'll catch up after it's all done, and see the verdict then.

Listening to ''Lush 3-3'', by Orbital (Play Count: 5)

Web iTunes Library Updated

You've probably noticed I spend quite a bit of time while on the computer listening to iTunes. A friend of mine, Andrew Zamler-Carhart, a software developer behind all the great Mac OS X software at KavaSoft, released an application that helps Web developers and bloggers highlight their own iTunes libraries on the site, called iTunes Catalog.

Recently, Andrew issued an update to Kavasoft's iTunes Catalog program, and my own library was updated this evening - as you can see at http://www.louisgray.com/music/.

If you like iTunes and have a blog or a Web site, you can download iTunes Catalog from here.

Some highlights: iTunes Catalog even lets you jump directly to playlists, artists and songs, just like you can with regular, plain-old iTunes.

(Examples: Top 200 Songs Played, Recently Purchased Songs, Top 100 Most Recently Played Songs)

Airplane In-Flight Movie Selection Is Improving

In January, following a trip to the East Coast, I complained that the in-flight film selections left a lot to be desired. It seemed then that any tripe that had Ashton Kutcher, Adam Sandler or Will Ferrell would bubble up to the TV screen on my United flights, and, as a captive audience, I would be forced to watch it. 

Yet, it already seems that things have improved, just in the last few months, surprisingly. In May, during my trip to Chicago, we were treated to King Kong. This last week, we saw Ice Age 2: The Meltdown on the way to Chicago, and Mission: Impossible 3 on the way back from Chicago to San Jose. All three of those films were potentially on my list to catch that I hadn't yet seen, for whatever reason, on the big screen.

Now, I have to admit that each of the three aforementioned films likely lost quite a bit of their luster through being displayed on what couldn't be more than a 13-inch screen, and during the showing of Ice Age 2, we particularly had to look through some sort of pink film that didn't give the graphics their due. But it was much better than being stuck in front of some horrendous tripe like Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo, or something of that sort.

I don't know if this is just coincidence that we've seen an uptick in film quality since the beginning of the year, if the sample size is too small, or if the future months will return to previous depths, but if it is a real trend, I applaud it, and wouldn't mind taking calls from United or others on just what I personally think should be on their list in the future. After all, my cell phone's listed up in the top right corner of the site. I'll await your call.

Listening to ''Into Your Eyes'', by Armand Van Helden (Play Count: 5)

ANtics Episode 2.23: Intensity for the Long Haul

In the heat of a playoff race in the middle of a 162-game season, wear and tear and fatigue can dramatically impact a team. Into the dog days of August, the ANtics takes a look at how the A's players keep up their intensity all season long.


Click to See Larger Comic
Also: Don't miss the "ANtics One Year Anniversary" thread.

2005 Comics | 2006 Comics | Poll

Apple's iPod, iTunes Competitors Stumbling

Ever since the debut of the iPod, and through Apple's sustained market share growth, critics have said the company cannot maintain its significant lead in MP3 players, or in the online music sales arena. But quarter after quarter, the company's piece of the pie has held steady at the 80% level, despite competition - real and imagined, from those like Creative Labs, and the biggest names in the business - Sony, Microsoft and Google.

Microsoft made significant headlines in July, with the pre-announcement of Zune, which in theory would present the biggest impact to the iPod lead, a hard-disk MP3 player, tied with a brand-new online music store, and anticipated features including video and photo playback, and even wireless access - something Apple's not yet debuted in its iPod line.

But, as is typical with Microsoft products, features have fallen out, even before the debut. Engadget now says that Zune may not launch with video support. According to the site, "Microsoft called up some content providers and said the video portion of its Zune device... was being delayed."

And Microsoft's not alone in its struggles. Google, long rumored as the potential big fish in the pond, has now come out and said they have no interest in selling music online, and competing with iTunes. With Apple holding a nearly three and a half-year lead in the space, it will take some amazing introduction (or a reversion back to illegal, free downloading) to knock iTunes off its pedestal.

For years, critics and observers have eagerly awaited any potential slip-ups from the Cupertino company, hoping that its iTunes/iPod market share would follow the two-decades old story with the Mac, dropping down to eventual single-digit marketshare. But they have confused different markets in a different time with different leadership, and continue to not recognize the momentum and comprehension shown by Apple in a very competitive space. Maybe it will take some high-profile failures on the part of Microsoft and Google to bring that home.

Listening to ''Spin Spin Sugar (Armands Dark'', by Sneaker Pimps (Play Count: 6)

Jet Lagged

Conventional wisdom has it that traveling West to East is harder on the body than going East to West, but for the large part, I find the reverse to be true. Often, I overcompensate for the time shift by staying up into the wee hours while on the East Coast, with 1 and 2 a.m. bedtimes being common. Last night, following the conclusion of the A's game, which wrapped up around 1:00 Boston time, was no different.

For me, the struggle comes after the coast-to-coast travel when I arrive home. Today, that was exacerbated by our being forced awake at 5:30 East Coast time to just barely make our flight, which means for those of us in California, I've been up since 2:30 a.m., not a good thing. And my body has never taken to sleeping on flights, so while others dozed, I read and listened to the iPod.

Upon arriving home, the travel and lack of sleep caught up with me. After unpacking, we found the A's on TV again, for a 1 p.m. start. But I couldn't make it through the fourth inning before my body gave in to the jetlag, and I zonked out on the couch, eyes fluttering awake only to see the final score, and Huston Street shaking hands with Jason Kendall to close out the 5-2 win over the Mariners. Funny how even subconsciously, I wanted to be sure the A's had won.

This isn't the first time the East to West travel has caught up with me. On other business trips, I've come home, only to struggle through the 10 o'clock primetime of CSI or Law and Order. Makes me look like a wuss. But it's just the way it is.

On the flip side, it is amazing, even in this modern age, to have seen both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, as well as the Great Lakes, in the same day. Flying from Boston to Chicago to San Jose will do that for you. I'm still in awe with some of the modern amenities we all take for granted.

Listening to ''Shivers'', by DJ Armin van Buuren (Play Count: 12)

RapidWeaver Continues to Expand Feature Set

In the world of Web publishing, there are a number of ways to go - each of which offers a variety of benefits, depending on your technical expertise, your patience, and your budget. Some packages work for commercial environments, and others are much more appropriate for individuals and blogging.

As noted previously, I selected RapidWeaver from RealMacSoftware at the beginning of this year, to act as the foundation for the Web site, because it enabled me to update the blog from my computer, on my own domain name, without requiring server-side SQL. The system isn't perfect, but the authors continue to make updates, and each rendition of the software gets closer to perfection.

Since the mid-1990s, I have utilized BareBones' BBEdit for all HTML work, both at the office and for the home page. In fact, I still use it at work, and have been able to use it as we scaled from a few dozen to a few hundred Web pages. It's a fantastic product, and the site-wide search and replace functionality is one of the main reasons I've continued to use it year after year.

I'm also familiar with many Web-hosted tools, like TypePad and Blogger. While simple, they are often too cutesy, or demand you host your blog on their site. RapidWeaver offers the best of both worlds, delivering customizability, and the flexibility of my own URL and the option to host data via FTP on my own server.

This week, RapidWeaver rolled out 3.5 beta 3 of the application (Version Notes), making it the 4th version I've used. We adopted version 3.5 the night it came out, and installed the following two betas each month they came out. With version two came permalinks and subpages, and the latest betas have improved stability and tweaked existing features.

My feature wish list for RapidWeaver is there, but diminishing. To truly eliminate any interest I have in iWeb or TypePad or WordPress, we need to see better integrated comment systems, the option to publish remotely, away from the desktop storing the application, and code editing, to name a few, but it's still pretty darn good. We'll keep watching any and all updates and hope the site continues to grow.

Listening to ''Ready Steady Go'', by Paul Oakenfold (Play Count: 16)

Digg The Man a Pit To Hide His $60 Million

By a significant margin, the story demanding the largest amount of buzz on the Web in the last 24 hours has been BusinessWeek's cover story on the latest generation of Web 2.0 leaders who have developed some of the Web's biggest brands in a short amount of time. This week's cover boy is Digg founder Kevin Rose, smiling giddily, with two thumbs up, and a headline saying he made $60 million in only 18 months. If only that were true. It's a great headline, one that has drawn a lot of attention, but it just isn't true.

BusinessWeek makes a number of critical errors in its jump to a monetary stat. It first assumes that Digg is worth a valuation north of several hundred million dollars. It then assumes that this valuation is liquid, and that Kevin can access his share of the large pie, netting him what they approximate as $60 million. Truth is that Digg is only netting the single-digit millions yearly in revenue, let alone profits, and it remains a very small company, run by a determined young entrepreneur, verging on the edge of becoming an Internet media powerhouse.

Those who remember the first wave of Web worship no doubt remain skeptical over BusinessWeek's adoration of Kevin and others who have made tremendous Web products and not yet made the connection from leading brand to leading profits. And now BusinessWeek has made Kevin, a good guy from all we can tell, the posterboy for the latest wave, for better or for worse.

Digg, scarcely known a year ago, in the shadows of Web giants like Slashdot and CNet, has developed organically to be a real kingmaker for all media. The brightest of old-school newspapers like the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal and the LA Times have incorporated new tech tools like Digg and Technorati into their Web coverage to assist with linking and the word of mouth that can springboard a story to the next level. But Kevin's not worth $60 million yet. He has a lot of work to do yet to achieve what is a tremendous potential.

All that aside, nearly all the leading publications have taken the Digg story and run with it. Here are a few of the best responses: (Jason Calicanis, GigaOM, Good Morning Silicon Valley, MicroPersuasion, ValleyWag)

Listening to ''A Rush of Blood to the Head'', by Coldplay (Play Count: 7)

On Harvard's Hallowed Ground

With one last day here in Boston, my wife and I traveled on the Metro to the Harvard campus, and though we didn't pick up an admissions form, we did get to see landmarks of the Revolutionary War, monuments to those students who lost their lives in the Civil War, and in a more modern twist, we stepped inside the campus' bookstore and a number of the nearby shops and eateries.

As I had expected, regardless of an institution's interpreted valor, nearly all college campuses follow the same format - large lecture halls, narrow stairways, cement, brick and columns. Having attended UC Berkeley myself, and returned several dozen times post-graduation (mostly to attend Cal football games), it was fairly simple to note the similarities between Harvard's setup, the surrounding Cambridge community, the meandering tourists and the streets' cast of characters.

Really, the only superficial differences between Harvard and UC Berkeley was Harvard's lack of a central bell tower, and the age of its buildings. While UC Berkeley was the first UC institution to start up in 1868, Harvard had been well under way in the previous century. Notes throughout the campus and its diameter remind you of this. Monuments celebrating George Washington and Abraham Lincoln also dot the area.

The homage to history got me thinking - in two centuries forward, what of today will be marked and kept holy, preserved for future onlookers? Will it be our capitol buildings? Our ballparks? Sites of riots and disaster? What will be erected to remind others of what we will someday leave behind? It's an answer none of us will ever know.

Listening to ''Motion'', by Paul Oakenfold (Play Count: 5)

An Evening at Fenway Park

There's something about the exuberance of 36,000 Red Sox fans that has you rooting for the team, even if you know that you secretly should be rooting against them. That's the situation I found myself in this evening, as my wife and I shared a visit to the historic venue for the first time together. I had previously made  a stop at Fenway Park in May of 2005 on a business trip, but this was her first time.

The Red Sox led early, taking a 3-1 margin into the 3rd, when Cleveland struck back with a solo shot. In the fourth, Travis Hafner clubbed a homer around Pesky Pole, and tied it up. That was not to be the end of the scoring, however, as little-heralded Shin Soo Choo stepped up to the plate with the bases loaded in the 5th, and hit a grand slam, clearing the bases, and drawing a hush over the sellout crowd. With a 7-3 lead now, the Indians held on to win, even with David "Big Papi" Ortiz and Manny Ramirez coming up in the bottom half of the ninth. Though both sent soaring shots into the outfield, that's as far as the balls went, staying in the yard and extinguishing the team's hopes.

Being a baseball nut, it's hard to play the role of tourist, but we took a few pictures of the park, adding to the dozen or so I took last May. Below are some from this evening's experience.



 

Click images for larger versions

Listening to ''Mainline'', by Narcotic (Play Count: 4)

Web 2.0 Companies Play With Error Messages

It used to be that error messages were by far the least interesting thing you could run into on a Web site. It wasn't too uncommon to hit a 404-File Not Found, a 403-Forbidden, or other simple numbers that didn't exactly tell you why your Web journey had come to an end. Now, with the latest generation of Web-focused companies tailoring their offerings to younger viewers, and less so to the initial Unix-loving geeks who dominated the Web at its beginning, even the error messages have been upgraded.

YouTube, the video sharing site which has gained an overwhelming amount of publicity of late that saw the site's traffic compared to the New York Times, and is rumored to be valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars, took itself off-line late tonight, and threw up a silly image to explain just why they had to ask users to accept the technical difficulties, along with a note that "We're currently putting out some new features, sweeping out the cobwebs and zapping a few gremlins. We'll be back later. In the meantime, please enjoy a layman's explanation of our website..."

Below is that image.



Just last week, when teen-home MySpace went on the blink, users were asked to satiate themselves with a Flash game of PacMan. At least the sites are having a sense of humor about them amid the stress of being down. Now, if only they'd learn they need to forge a redundant fail-safe infrastructure like the rest of the for-profit world.

Listening to ''Together We Will Conquer (Radi'', by Paul Van Dyk (Play Count: 5)

Charles Barkley: Role Model

"I was a Republican until they lost their minds."

Listening to ''Pizza For Eggs'', by Underworld (Play Count: 5)

Common Valley Stock Practice Biting Apple

Having always worked in private companies, and having not yet ever reached the promised land of an IPO and public markets, the world of stock markets and public trading always has belonged to other folks. I'd often hear stories of how some saw their options first become real, and then rise and fall with the whim of the traders, but it wasn't brought home to reality - sounding more like fairy tales. But some got new cars, and some got new scars, and most lived to tell about it.

I can't recall whether it was through the gossip mill or from friends who worked at these newly-public companies, but many would tell stories of how their options would be priced at the lowest point of the stock's crest in the most recent month or quarter - meaning that regardless of its present condition, they were guaranteed to have been in the money, at least a little bit. This was normal, and if I remember right, was used as an incentive - like a company perk.

However, with increased corporate scrutiny from the SEC following all the mega-scandals at the beginning of this decade, more than 60 companies are under fire for such shenanigans, and among the most well-known is Apple Computer, where a good chunk of my investments are right now. (Okay, a huge chunk.)

After market close today, the company disclosed that it may have to restate previous quarters' earnings due to the practice, which they originally hinted was not going to be significant. As you know, any uncertainty is not good news to the markets, and it's highly unlikely that Apple stock will get away with not being punished tomorrow, even if the issues took place years ago, and the people involved are themselves gone.

As the Wall Street Journal notes, it's not clear "just what the irregularities are", and that today's announcement marked a "noticeable shift" in the company's position on the option grants. Just two weeks ago, Apple said it wouldn't need such an adjustment.

For those of us holding Apple stock, the next week or so should be a bumpy ride. Next week is the kick-off for WWDC, and many new products are anticipated. We could go down before we go up, and then back down again. Buckle up.

Listening to ''The One (Driftwood Remix)'', by Dee Dee (Play Count: 7)

Set to See Sox at Fenway Thursday

My wife is a history buff. I am a baseball buff. Our two passions will intersect tomorrow evening when we take a trip a few blocks over from our hotel to see the Boston Red Sox take on the visiting Cleveland Indians at historic Fenway Park, site of back-to-back walkoff wins by the Red Sox in the last two nights. I first made the trip to Fenway Park myself in May of 2005, when on a business trip, I had planned ahead and scored the much-prized tickets. Though I enjoyed the game a great deal, the outcome was not what I had hoped, as the A's, coincidentally visiting Boston that week, managed to cough up the lead against Boston in the 9th inning, capsizing on a Kevin Millar home run over the Green Monster.

It seems that the Red Sox play amazingly well while I'm in town, for some reason. They came back against their rival Yankees in the 2004 ALCS from an unprecedented 3-0 deficit. They had a record of 0-3 prior to my coming to Boston, and were 8-0 the rest of the way, including the 2004 World Series. In 2005, I saw them defeat the A's in brutal fashion, and it was repeated the following day. On this trip, the Sox have wowed fans in the bottom of the ninth both Tuesday and Wednesday. Needless to say, if you're a betting man, it's clear the Indians aren't going to give you any kind of returns tomorrow. You can put it in the bank.

While I'm very much obviously an Oakland A's fan, I am absolutely a baseball fan first and foremost. In the last years, I've capitalized on business travel to see Fenway (now twice), Wrigley Field, Camden Yards, and Bank One Ballpark. My hope is that I can someday catch all 30 teams, and somehow get work to pay for it. That would be grand.

Listening to ''Track 06'', by DJ Lithium (Play Count: 4)

Evening Tech Notes: August 2, 2006

In a surprising move, Lycos (remember those guys?) is now offering a larger mail repository than Google's famed GMail. Instead of 2 Gigabytes, which GMail offers, LycosMail promises that users can save as many as 3 Gigabytes, effectively raising the bar again for e-mail storage. You may remember that when Google first announced GMail in April of 2004, Yahoo!, Hotmail and others limited users to a mere 50 Megabytes.

TechCrunch writes that Lycos has a number of strikes against it, not to mention the strength of Google's brand name, saying, "Whether Lycos can offer search and spam filtering as good as Gmail’s remains to be seen. It also stands at a disadvantage via Gmail’s integration with the rest of Google’s offerings."

As mentioned this morning, the tumult over Microsoft Windows Vista's delays continues. As Good Morning Silicon Valley writes, not even the bugs are stable yet. It's now rumored Vista won't show up until February.

Continuing on the Microsoft bent, it looks like the failed MSN brand will go away, in favor of the new moniker, Live. With MSN always running a distant second, third or worse, in basically every category, it's time to knife the baby.

Lest you think we've switched over to loving Redmond, don't be alarmed. There's plenty interesting going on in Cupertino as well. With WWDC rapidly approaching, the rumors are flying thick on just what Steve Jobs will pull from his sleeves. Think Secret says that the second generation of iWeb will simplify the use of external site data - outside of the typical .Mac services, and integration of Google's AdSense. Being a RapidWeaver user, we're not affected, but will still watch with curiosity. Additionally, a MacRumors source anticipates Xeon-powered XServes, New Mac Pro desktops, and a preview of the new operating system, Leopard, which will no doubt debut before the much-maligned Vista.

Listening to ''Seven Ways (Star Ways)'', by Paul Van Dyk (Play Count: 7)

A's Win 2 of 3 From Rival Angels

In a critical latter-season series with the Angels in Anaheim, the A's extended their lead in the division to 1 1/2 games today, following the team's second one-run win in three days against their bitter rival, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Although the A's haven't exactly blown anybody away with their inconsistent offense, they are doing what is needed to win, and are winning with a frequency that has kept them in first place for the better part of the last few months.

Last week, I enjoyed one of the most A's-drenched weeks I've ever had, attending games on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, five games in a seven-day span. The A's won three of the five in that time, again just eking over the .500 mark.

With the team having a day game that started at 1 Pacific and 4 Eastern, it was all I could do to not stay attached to the Blackberry and follow the game pitch by pitch until our show floor activity was complete at 6. But somehow, we stayed focused, only to "see" the last inning and a half from the hotel room. With the calendar having recently turn to August, we're nearing the crunch time of the year, and the playoffs may await, should the team execute as we expect. But it's always that more sweet to accomplish it against a stiff rival like the Angels. The less seen of that team, the better.

Listening to ''Integral'', by Pet Shop Boys (Play Count: 8)

Microsoft Expanding Despite Vista Collapse

Microsoft is in an odd space right now, as mentioned previously. Nobody appears to have much confidence that the company's next generation OS, Vista, is going to ship in time for PC vendors to pre-package it before the end of the year, and some prominent bloggers, including Robert McLaw and Robert Scoble, are campaigning for the software giant to hold off on its release until all the kinks are worked out.

As Scoble writes, "This sucker is just not ready. Too many things are too slow and/or don’t work." But that's not stopping Microsoft from continuing to balloon - as the company announced recently it had expanded corporate headcount by an additional 10,000 in the last fiscal year, turning nearby streets into parking lots, according to Mini-Microsoft, who laments, "10,000 More Microsofties - What Do They Do?". You know that line about throwing good money after bad? I don't see that Microsoft can continue to throw people at the problem. After a while, they reach a point where they simply don't add value and contribute to the slowdowns...

Listening to ''I'm With Stupid'', by Pet Shop Boys (Play Count: 5)