Scoble, you're a maverick like me. I'll probably never get down to 50-150 follows... like you. It's all good. But still, gotta look for the value. - Chris Messina
Chris: on FriendFeed you can create a list of your high value people and that lets you stay subscribed to 1500, but put them into separate folders. I've found that to be VERY valuable. I have one folder of just my high value people with only 200 in there. So, I'm pretty close to doing what you recommend anyway. - Robert Scoble
And there are many more than 200 who would like to peek inside that folder. - Mark VandenBerg
Mark: I put my list on my blog and generally if you watch my "Liked" items you're seeing the high value bits that are coming through my feeds. - Robert Scoble
Mark, you just have to build up your Twitter tolerance. :) Here's a list of Robert's favorites... It's still a very long list, but a very valuable one!
http://scobleizer.com/2008/09/... - Daynah
depends on what you hope to get out of twitter. If you want something akin to Business Intelligence (in regards to idea generation), following a large number of people can be good imo. - Chuck Boyce
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Thganks Robert, Daynah and Chuck. I'll do a little more research! - Mark VandenBerg
I'm trying to write a Greasemonkey script to enable these kinds of lists for Twitter. I don't expect success, but it'll be an interesting exercise! - Chris Messina
Chris, if you really want lists for Twitter, you might want to check out TweetDeck. They have groups for Twitter users. - Rob Diana
18.4" screen??? Wow, guess you're not planning on actually carrying that thing around much? =) - saeba
But it's really going to be my wife's laptop. :( She needs to work from every corner of the house where the baby is. - Josh Haley
So buying a Sony laptop helps the US economy? Dell, HP or Apple are more likely to, right? :-) - Louis Gray
@saeba...It's not so much about hiking it around town or a school or anything, so we wanted a big screen. The 18.4 is really a extra wide 17". Kinda weird but cool. True 16:9 ratio for movies too :) - Josh Haley
I wouldn't mind doing my part and buying a Macbook Air!!! - Niall Connellan
Wow that's huge. It's nice it has Blu-Ray and a HDMI port. - Rodfather
Dangit LG! I guess we gotta take it back. I helped at least one American with a commission at Fry's. At least I think he was American. ;) - Josh Haley
We have no HDTV at this point, so it will have to play discs locally. Never touched a blu-ray disc before. - Josh Haley
Josh - Seriously doubt anyone knows who's making what where anymore (or to which country the money is actually flowing). The only thing I'd be sweating is those VAIO's are VERY proprietary. You're pretty much captive to Sony if anything goes wrong. Most others are staying closer to what hardware and software standards we do actually have. - Charlie Anzman
Like cars, even domestic PCs have most of their components made offshore. - Phil Wolff
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Charlie - thanks for the heads up. I chose to buy locally and have 14 days to return it if I don't like it. - Josh Haley
Agree with the local buy strongly. Hey, they're awesome boxes at current prices but pretty heavily locked down. - Charlie Anzman
I spent nearly $500 yesterday... but most of that will benefit the Canadian economy. Sorry. - Stewart Rogers
My wife bought a $300 easel for her painting yesterday. And we ate out for brunch and dinner. Just doing my part to keep myself deep in debt! - Robert Fischer
Or it could simply mean Valleywag and all the gossip is not as relevant as consumer centralized sites of the same group. - Consumerist, Lifehacker, and Gizmodo. :) - Mona N.
mona - it means valleywag isn't hitting digg every other minute - Allen Stern
I'm probably going to side with Mona on this one. I think Valleywag is tapping a niche that people just don't care about as much. - Shawn Farner
Disagree. But I think it's probably really hard to sell ads on a site that could be posting confidential emails from the advertising company at any moment. - Cyndy
Maybe they needed to throw parties or set up a conference - Jason Carreira
Jason, you are totally correct. If you throw enough parties, it doesn't matter how many writers you have. - Cyndy
It's probably because everything I've seen on Valleywag is pure shite...I mean, it's hard to believe I know, but Valleywag is even more of a douchebag blog than Techcrunch!...and that's saying a lot! - Sean McGee
Now Sean, that's where they have you fooled. There is a lot of crap on there. A lot. But in between are some really good stories that they sneak by people. - Cyndy
actaully owen is one of the best writers out there - forget about the stories of who is sleeping with whom, etc. and look at his main stories - they are typically very well done. - Allen Stern
I got almost the same traffic from when Valleywag linked to me as Techcrunch linked to me. Is Techcrunch next? - Jesse Stay
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well the Alaska one is super frozen! - Susan Beebe
If anyone can find the numbers on paid staffers of Obama's campaign vs. employees of the Alaska state gov't that would be much appreciated. - Jason Carreira
false choice, of course. if you want to compare resumes and accomplishments, look at their entire careers and what they stand for. - Phil Wolff
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I'm just tired of the executive experience bullshit. The rest of their careers is not even comparable. He's a Constitutional scholar, she's a PTA mom. - Jason Carreira
15k employees in the state of alaska. about the same as in a mid sized city in California. - Phil Wolff
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Are you MOCKING my motherhood, Jason? I know you din't. 'Cuz you betcha that fightin' the Stepford moms at school in my lipstick has me gunnin' fer the White House. - Cyndy
Cyndy LOL!! BTW, Alaska has a lower population than Memphis, TN - Susan Beebe
On CNN's "360" Obama "also countered critics who suggest that he has less executive experience in this situation compared to Alaskan Gov. Sarah Palin saying, "...my understanding is, is that Governor Sarah Palin's town of Wasilla has, I think, 50 employees. We have got 2,500 in this campaign. I think their budget is maybe $12 million a year. You know, we have a budget of about three times that just for the month..." - Erin Kotecki Vest
Susan, it has a lower population than Rochester metro. Duffy for Veep. LMAO. - Cyndy
and it should be noted I grew up looking at Canada. but I can one up Palin, I would actually VISIT the country I could see on a regular basis. - Erin Kotecki Vest
Good then, I'll sign you up for the HSA (our version of the PTA)... hahahahaha you walked into that one - Jason Carreira
Cyndy Duffy would kick her ass! ha, ha! - Susan Beebe
I don't buy the executive experience argument either Jason. After the past 8 years, and the 8 before it, I think it's clear that we need to get back to some modicum of intelligence in the White House. How much executive experience does McCain truly have? How much time does a Senator actually spend on administrative duties? - Joe the Plumber
experience ... can't get more than the bush administration .. rumsfeld, cheney, around for years ... and what good was it? - Gregory Lent
Gregory, that was executive experience within the executive branch of the government. Hmm, a lightbulb just went off. I wonder whether that's what the whole argument is about, executive vs. legislative? Even so, McCain has no more than Obama, so we can put that one to rest once and for all. - Joe the Plumber
management experience i think is what the subtext is - Gregory Lent
It's easy to see which campaigns are well managed and which aren't... Don't forget that McCain's campaign was basically bankrupt last November. Clinton's campaign had all the advantages with the whole Democratic machine, financers, etc. but they squandered it with infighting and horrible management. Obama has re-invented campaigning for the internet age and created an incredible 50-state grassroots political machine. - Jason Carreira
But McCain was a POW! That's also how he knows how to win a war! - Alex Scoble CISSP
I had that thought too, Jason -- when Palin made her stirring speech about how John McCain KNOWS HOW TO WIN A WAR, I thought, "Um, dude? The war McCain was in was one that we *lost.* The only one, iirc." I mean, all due respect to the enormous sacrifice he and the other vets made, but we didn't win that one. - Mitch Wagner
Great how to on using shortcuts effectively. I learned some new shortcuts after reading this. Esc goes to your most recent chat "mole" :) - Benjamin Golub
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I have to admit, I learned to use the keyboard shortcuts way before that slow mouse ever showed up, so I truly appreciate those shorcuts! thx! - Susan Beebe
Behind this link are 37 intense, disturbing, real images illustrating, in graphically engaging photography, the growing pandemic of extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis. I warn you, they aren't easy to see. But, hopefully, they move us all to help out. - Christopher Sacca
via Bookmarklet
XDR TB is a research focus of CEND, the Center for Emerging & Neglected Diseases at UC Berkeley, of which I am part (as a postdoc in Sjölander Lab). http://globalhealth.berkeley.e... - Ruchira S. Datta
The music is Iguazu by Gustavo Santaolalla...chilling (I think used in Deadwood too). - Jonathan Keller
@Jon, explain to me again why you no longer own a music store - Christopher Sacca
While I don't doubt something is up Bush's sleeve, I don't think either the US or the UN would approve of an unprovoked attack. Sure, Iran can shut down the Strait of Hormuz, but only for a few hours. - Joe the Plumber
An October surprise wuld be one less reason to vote for McCain. - Mike Reynolds
The only October surprise that could help McCain is the economy getting better. If Israel attacks Iran and price of oil skyrockets as a result? The election will be a HUGE landslide in the favor of Obama. - Alex Scoble CISSP
I remember reading about the possibility of a so-called "October Surprise" a couple months ago. Chilling to think about the outcome of a hastily orchestrated series of actions against Iran. Scary stuff indeed. - Brian Daniel Eisenberg
Another October Surprise scenario: 9/11 Part II on American soil followed by the imposition of martial law. Neoconservative and Christian Zionist sources (like Newsmax and Worldnetdaily) have been anticipating and predicting something like this for years -- the narrative is essential to achieving their political objectives. - Sean McBride
@sean exactly what I was going to mention - if one really wants to get paranoid, consider martial law in the US, and suspension of the election. The public outrage would be huge, but there are all kinds of troops and Blackwater trained folks ready to go... - Jason Kaneshiro
Digg started a witch hunt today.. tons of people got banned.. :( :( - embee
WHA???!!! that's aweful! Can you reach them via tech support and get a dialogue open? what can we do to help? - Susan Beebe
omg, i have a digg greasemonkey script turned on, digg friends easier - Sarah Perez
What's next? I bet I'll get kicked off of friendfeed for using scripts. - Alex Scoble CISSP
Using Scripts....isn't that why websites have APIs to begin with? So people can use scripts? - Sean McGee
I thought greasemonkey stuff was OK? I thought they were banning people who like had programs and stuff. I didn't know that my oh, say, 5 max. diggs per day were an issue. Wow. Is gmonkey bad? Dang, I don't even know what scripts i've collected over the ages. guess i had better check it out - Sarah Perez
No, they have APIs so they can brag about having an API. - Jordan Hofker
I gave up on digg a while ago - it just seemed to be giving me important news 2 days late. - Alexander Carlill
I guess Digg is important for some, but I find it quite useless. - Rah™
I've never used Digg in my entire life. I'd prefer to use a service that can't be gamed to easily. The beauty of FF is it shows me what I want but it's easy to hide what I don't want without affecting other users. - Martin Bryant
I'm starting to think that the 200m offer from Google last year was some kind of advertising stunt. - Mattb4rd
Cee Bee - digg is absolutely not irrelevant for sites that need Digg to remain in their positions. - Allen Stern
Stopped using digg on a regular basis once I joined FriendFeed - FF has better story links, and a better discourse. Sorry about the ban - digg seems to be getting deeper into the gutter every day. - Jennifer Dittrich
Apologies for the mid-spelt comment above. Can't wait til comments can be edited on FF for iPhone! - Martin Bryant
@Outsanity is that good or bad? I'm usually not bored during copulation. Just saying :) - Mattb4rd
Martin, methinks you 'mid-spelt' again there. ;-) - Kol Tregaskes
Sarah it's a failure of citizen journalism clearly ;-) - Duncan Riley
It's no big loss. The whole concept of Digg is stupid. - Baxter Tocher
Careful people...if we spread the word that Digg sucks, then we might get all those people who are complete fuc#ing morons and leave completely useless comments (like this one) to find their way over to FF and start bombing our posts with their negative and brainless criticism. - Joe Cook
Well, it is good for one thing, well, two: training stupidfilter and decoying all the marketing douchebags. IOW, Mr. Cook has a point. - Mr. Gunn
Hehehehehehehe ;-) Just to be different. :-) - Kol Tregaskes
where does mwahahahaha come in the scale? :) - alphaxion
:D love to write it that way, but because of the spell check I tended recently to reduce on the number of syllables. hahahaha is usually my level of laugh for the best outta those and hehehe in a more subtle way. - Zu aka ElijahBailey
I agree with most of those, except lol is usually between hah and haha and LOL is usually between haha and hahaha. And rofl is around hahaha and ROFL is usually around hahahaha.. but you gotta remember the original... hehe, which is around hah, but in more of a serious laugh. :D - Ken
I'm still waiting for someone to ask me what I think of the whole thing. - Daniel J. Pritchett
So, Robert, if not posted in a blog, a point of view doesn't exist/matter? What happened to original reporting or fact checking? - Chris Shipley
What I wrote is mostly my opinion and market feedback I am hearing. I didn't talk with either you or Mike because I don't think it would have added to what I was writing about. But I am interested in what calling you would have added to my article? - Robert Scoble
Robert, Chris might say something that informs your point of view, even slightly. That would make it worth the call, no? - Sam Whitmore
Sam: it probably would but this is a two-way conversation. Why does every blog post need to be a NYT article? Sometimes I just want to tell my readers what I think and I want to start a conversation. Not report on what everyone else's point of view is. - Robert Scoble
I don't think a blog is necessarily the same as a newspaper or magazine. While I think it's important to have a consistent standard of ethics - of fact-checking on stories, etc. - a blog is typically your personal point of view. It's more an op/ed and less a newspaper report. You don't have to proactively go after every possible point of view, or be objective or neutral, so long as people know this.. I think bloggers _are_ trusted more when they are honest, open, check their facts. - Justin Long
I think we have seen that social media, like FF, like Twitter, like Memeorandum and others are spectacular vehicles to create and support echo chamber thinking and echo chamber creation. Many bloggers do good work, but many do shoddy miserable work - and so far I don't see the bad ones punished by the readership. - Soulhuntre
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Soulhuntre: you are probably right but tonight I waited on the phone an hour to participate in a radio talk show. Here you can correct and be part of the story. - Robert Scoble
Daniel, what did you think of the whole thing? - todd
Chris: I just searched Google for your phone number. It can't be found. So, how are we supposed to call you? For the record, my phone number has always been on my blog. You can search Google for it and call me. It's +1-425-205-1921. That's one thing you can do to make it easier for journalists and bloggers to call you and get your point of view. - Robert Scoble
Chris, how many calls did you receive from so-called "true" journalists? When I read newspapers and other work from the "traditional" media, it often seems that the reporter simply regurgitates the press release. - Ontario Emperor
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I got the Rancilio Silvia (also recommended in the other thread). If you don't get a grinder, you'll have to practice a bit to find the best coffee though (I like Illy's expresso cans, they hold pretty long unopened, so you can order a pile from WholeLatteLove, they also have tons of machines :-)) - John Mueller
Facebook is still the most useful new web project for me. I keep up with all of my old friends and current friends there. It's only boring to people who like to be on the cutting edge of the web. - Andrew Burd
Holy Cow!! Congrats on reaching 100,000,000 Facebook users - that's simply awesome!! yeah!! very impressive milestone!! :) - Susan Beebe
From Boing Boing: "Extreme ironing might be the coolest sport that didn't make it into the Olympics this year. Started over a decade ago by UK knitwear factory worker Phil Shaw, it requires four simple criteria: a man, an iron, an ironing board, and a crazy natural environment that makes people think, holy crap I can't believe he's ironing on that thing! Shaw calls extreme ironing "the latest danger sport that combines the thrills of an extreme outdoor activity with the satisfaction of a well pressed shirt."" - Mark Trapp
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It's really interesting how the current UI, not having undergone any "Wow it's all different" iterations, is so similar yet different from where we started. - Kevin Fox
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It reminds me how much I dislike JPG for screenshots :) - Paul Buchheit
It took me a while to figure out what was going on here, until I realized you'd Bookmarket-ed a blog post from *2004*! That's ancient history, man! - Paul Wilcox
Great to see you had a Prius label in 2004 :) - Roshan Vyas
Archive is nice :D it is very interesting to see the evolution. Thanks Paul :) - Harun Baris Bulut
I love the fact the delete button wasn't introduced yet. I tell people about this and they don't believe me - Derek Coatney
not being able to delete was a bit strange, I remember. - Josh Haley
Delete was there from day one -- it was just in the "more actions..." menu. - Paul Buchheit
Is there any important feature in today's Gmail that hasn't been envisioned from the beginning? - Ionut
That's an interesting question. I guess it depends on your definition of "important" and "beginning". In the very beginning, the only definite vision was to make something "better". However, pretty much everything in there today had been prototyped or at least talked about well before launch (see the chat integration in http://www.techcrunch.com/wp-c... for example). As usual, coming up with the ideas is easy, but fitting them cleanly into the product is hard. - Paul Buchheit
