Akkam’s Razor

I was just reading an article on the economist, titled American media - On the brink. It’s a favored topic on the internets - that the newspaper as we know it will not survive. Conversely, a favored lament from the newspaper industry is that bloggers are parasites, aren’t trustworthy, and use naughty words.

When looking at the print landscape, we see declining circulation, dropping revenue, and rising costs.

The Google System Blog lists some of the hardware that is supported by Google’s Android SDK:

• Application framework enabling reuse and replacement of components
• Dalvik virtual machine optimized for mobile devices
• Integrated browser based on the open source WebKit engine
• Optimized graphics powered by a custom 2D graphics library; 3D graphics based on the OpenGL ES 1.0 specification (hardware acceleration optional)
• QLite for structured data storage
• Media support for common audio, video, and still image formats (MPEG4, H.264, MP3, AAC, AMR, JPG, PNG, GIF)
• GSM Telephony (hardware dependent)
• Bluetooth, EDGE, 3G, and WiFi (hardware dependent)
• Camera, GPS, compass, and accelerometer (hardware dependent)
• Rich development environment including a device emulator, tools for debugging, memory and performance profiling, and a plugin for the Eclipse IDE

When you look at the hardware on a fully-optioned phone, you get an opportunity to rival the iPhone interface (let’s be honest, that’s what’s sexy). I’m particularly thinking of the ability to run a server on the device, and the possibilities to tie in location, hand-movements, speed, time, directionality, and context (based on previous use) into the interface.

No, you read that correctly.

Some of the people I read have love for the (Amazon) Kindle , whilst others bring the hate or at least skepticism .  After skimming this rather comprehensive review via arstechnica , I'm having a hard time justifying as more than a solution in search of a problem. 

I don't read enough to justify the purchase of one and prefer to get my RSS and web content on LoFi less-is-more devices such as my phone (a quite battered Nokia 3650 ), PDA (Dell Axim x50v ), or via Google Reader (either in the full application, via iGoogle, or the mobile version).  At the very least, $399 gets you a cheap (in both senses of the word) laptop, or an OLPC for you and someone else (or an ASUS EEEPC) .  The core advantage here is the free (but limited) EVDO wireless service for book and content delivery which is included in the purchase price.  An EVDO wireless plan is typically worth ~$20-100 per month if bundled with your cell phone service, for comparison sake.

I don't know if it's part of Amazon's plan (and if it isn't, it should be), but I wonder if they have contemplated using Kindle for academic textbook delivery?  It seems like a good complement. 

One of the cranky old men (Morley Safer) on tonight's 60-Minutes covered Millennials in the workforce.

The usual ground was covered - they're narcissistic, dependent on praise, and they don't know how to be 'professional'.

They also brought out a trio of experts, namely a Stepford-Wife that teaches twentysomethings to use utensils, two twentysomethings who appear to confirm the espoused stereotypes, and the cranky near-boomer WSJ columnist.

Although I am technically a Gen-Xer, I certainly feel closer to Gen-Yers /Millennials. These formulatic "damn kids today" rants bore me to tears.

It started with an announcement that Google was going to delay the announcement of their social networking plan so as to not get lost in the noise surrounding Facebook's pending debut of their advertising (and AdSense) competitor for their own platform.

The Wall Street Journal (via Mashable ) later announced that Google was actually about to announce their plans for the gPhone (previously), with other rumors indicated Verizon (US) had been courted, along with British carrier '3' and German carrier T-Mobile, as well as Chinese hardware manufacturer e28 (who produces handsets for LG and HTC - you'll recall an earlier rumor that Google was going to supply 50,000 units produced by HTC to developers around Christmas-time).  e28 most recently has had a GSM-WLAN-VOIP Linux-powered phone, the R2821, before the FCC for approval.

Also of interest is the focus on inter-operability between the various Google Products, and the possibilities as to how they may converge in the mobile space (think Picasa + Talk + Maps + Docs + Gmail + Open Social). 

The keystone of their plan may be that of Open Social implementing a bundle of open API (application programing interfaces) for interoperability between several networking platforms (such as Marc Andreeson's Ning, LinkedIn, Hi5, Friendster) and related services (such as iLike, Plaxo, and Slide).  This new platform, codenamed "Maka-Maka" as reported by TechCrunch (more links via Buzzfeed) will tie these services together and more importantly, as stated by GigaOm, provide a common authoring language to make application development easier.

Valeria Maltoni wrote a short post heralding the power of Meet the Press, giving examples from host Tim Russert as to the power of the medium. 

There is a tremendous problem with the use of Russert as a sterling example of journalism, but as an example of public relations, absolutely. 

There's a lot of hubbub over Rapleaf, a company that datamines email addresses from MySpace, Facebook, and other places.  They are "supposed" to be about reputation monitoring (kind of like eBay's seller and buyer reputation) but they are also affiliated with another company, Trustfuse, that sells aggregate data but not emails.  You can view a sample of a typical Trustfuse-Rapleaf report here (PDF).  After they got spanked by the blogosphere, they altered their privacy policy and softened the language regarding the sale of data, but I suspect at this point the damage is done.  They have the following info regarding removing your profile on their privacy page:

A tweet from Colin DeVroe regarding ads on blogs made me pull and paste the following from a business plan I'm working on… 

Akkam’s Razor has been advertisement free for nearly all of its online life.  After a great deal of thought, that will change. 

One of the areas that I struggled with, besides that of my own financial situation, was what effect the presence of advertising would have on my content and my readership.  Would it add or detract from my legitimacy, credibility, and authority?  Would it drive or diminish traffic?  And how well does advertising mesh with my own personal ethics?

AND he should be fired for this nonsense :

America's fabric is pulling apart like a cheap sweater.

What would sew us back together?

Another 9/11 attack.

[…]

Is there any doubt they are planning to hit us again?

If it is to be, then let it be. It will take another attack on the homeland to quell the chattering of chipmunks and to restore America's righteous rage and singular purpose to prevail.

The unity brought by such an attack sadly won't last forever.

The first 9/11 proved that. *

E-mail stubyko@phillynews.com or call 215-854-5977. For recent columns:

http://go.philly.com/byko.

This last 6-years has been a slow-motion train wreck.  OBL is still on the loose.  The Anthrax attackers are still on the loose.  We're stuck in a quagmire in a war of choice in Iraq, losing a winnable war in Afghanistan, and then contemplating opening a third front of the Great War on Terror in Iran (and Pakistan).

I'm tired of staring into the abyss.  In addition to the 3000 lives lost on 9/11 and the near 5000 (3600 military deaths, and an estimated 1000 contractor deaths) in Iraq and Afghanistan, we can chalk up threats to free speech, habeas corpus, our own privacy, and any semblance for advocacy for the middle class in Washington.  We are distracted from true threats like class inequality, our aging infrastructure, precarious financial environment, and global warming with bright and shiny objects like Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan, and divisive social wedge issues like abortion, gay marriage, and evolution.

Although Bykofsky takes the easy way out and (correctly) states that another 9/11 would finally unite us, he's correct, but I hope he's thinking of the wrong outcome.  He thinks that another 9/11 would would cause us to put aside our partisan differences to get "it" done - I'm assuming by "it" he means the War on Islamofacism.  But there's danger in these thoughts.  With the right proudly proclaiming that we are safer BECAUSE there have been no new attacks, another 9/11 might have the complete opposite consequences - reinforces the disgust and despair many of us are feeling towards our media and political institutions.

The next-9/11 will preceed one of two outcomes - either the police state, or the beginning of the American Renaissance, where we cast of the dead weight and corrupt institutions of the past and become the America we thought, hoped, and dreamed we were.

Should Bykofsky get fired?  Should free speech have consequences?  Vote here. 

There seemed to be a point at BlogPhiladelphia where everyone seemed to be grasping for what should be the obvious - what is the business model?  How do I make money?  How do I convince my boss that we should be blogging? What is blogging worth?  Typically, the value of a web site was dependent on it's number of PageViews, at least as far as advertising was concerned.  All of that is about to change.

One of the subjects briefly mentioned at this month's BlogPhiladelphia unconference was the death of the PageView (wiki) as the prime page metric for internet sites.  As explained by Mel "Toxic" Taylor, the metric, which is based on the amount of times a page is viewed, is being replaced by another existing metric, the time-spent-on-site, a move initiated by A.C. Nielsen - an Old Media company. This presents a challenge to scores of existing internet properties as well as new opportunities for sites that are still in the planning stages.  Simply put, this recalculation changes everything, and throws the most prominent business model, that of pay-per-click advertising into doubt.  At the same time, the move to mobile platforms, geolocation, the presence of AJAX and client-side refreshes versus server-side reloads, social networking, widgetized (syndicated) content, and the increasing utilization of RSS makes the PageView largely obsolete, as detailed by Evan Williams (aka evhead). For scores more on the topic, see this del.icio.us search for "PageViews".

It's humorous that this conversation occurs as Time Magazine contemplates pulling the plug on "Business 2.0" and as Businessweek showcases the LOLCATS meme (as in ICANHASCHEEZEBURGER), as well as a slideshow on what other bloggers make (which I first saw this morning on Mashable).  As Joe Sweeney joked at BlogPhilly, "What is it with these cats and the internet?"

There will be changes based on this refocus, some bad, some good, with the changes on balance being mostly neutral.  As Jakob Nielsen (no relation, I think) said, bloggers should write articles, not blog posts.  If the goal was to deliver timely and relavent content, to deliver increased page views, than yes, shorter posts would be appropriate.  However, if the goal is to engage the reader and get them to spend more time on your site, spend more money (if you sell goods or services), or to build relationships of trust, then longer articles would be ideal, buttressed by social networks and embedded media.

A renewed focus on writing and editing, a sharpening of writing skills, and the cultivation of an audience have always been the goals of many bloggers.  But now, the business environment has changed, de-emphasizing SEO, ad placement, text ads, pop-ups and -unders, embedded ads and towards the amount of attention someone pays to your site.  A cynic might say that Old Media is trying to drive a stake through the heart of the new media, as the core competencies of blogs, such as external links and blogrolls, will all be disincentives to the generation of revenue.  This may be another artifact of Western Societies post-Enlightenment obsession with Reductionism and Time-Studies, the trying to make Old-World measurements work with New Media properties.

Although this change will most seriously impact the phenomenom-based sites where short bursts of traffic generate the revenue, the big sites have certainly taken notice and are looking at ways to make their sites properties and destinations as opposed to landing pages from search hits. 

For example, Facebook has replaced a 3-page process for befriending with an AJAX process where everything is done sans page reload.

One of the benefactors of the change to time-spent-on-site will be social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook, the resurgence of the internet portal (like Yahoo), and embedded/streaming media portals such as YouTube.  Any sites that are dependent on sticky relationships with viewers are "teh win", including flash games, audio, video, feed readers, and the like.  Site valuations are also very-much in jeopardy - analysts and VCs take the pulse of a site, and assign the valuation based on PageViews…what happens now?  Does the "worth" of the property decline preciptously?  Even Google's own model, the search engine, will be in jeopardy.  Does this maybe even show promise of a revenue model for Second Life and in-game advertising?

For sites still in the planning stages, building-in code, processes, and layouts that maximize time-spent-on-site will be essential.  This might include sidebar territory typically reserved for advertising being repurposed for the highlighting of popular content, recent content, tags, or recent comments, taking advantage of the F-shaped eye-tracking patterns inherent to web usage.  Although a morally gray are, SEO-folk may want to move away from pagination as we know it (with each page view resulting in a higher total view count) towards content being displayed, scrolled, and refreshed inside of an AJAX (or Flash) window.  Any changes that are made need to focus on one thing - the changing of your site from a destination to a property.  It also places a premium on the relationship between writer and reader, creator and consumer, and the connections between the two and the attendant ad hoc networks that can develop based on those interactions.  Once again, the value is in the network.

I really need to get a laptop

Scanned Notes from Day 1 of BlogPhiladelphia