I learned that Newt Gingrich has a really cool Internet Strategist and is the only DC politician with an office in Silicon Valley that isn't just for fundraising (other than Congresspeople who are from SV). He showed me a bunch of interesting eGovernment stuff. Did you know there is no database anywhere of all elected officials? - Robert Scoble
I didn't know that. Do you know if there's a reason for not having it? Or has no one thought "Gosh, this is something that would be useful" yet? - Jordan Hofker
More importantly, there really isn't a real need for such a list. Things are so decentralized, it would be a massive undertaking to try to compile such a thing. Also, there isn't any reason that you would need to have a db of -every- elected official. There probably exist such things for certain levels and certain groups, but having one massive central db wouldn't make any sense - Jeremy Herbel
I learned that Obama leads McCain + Bob Barr in the Georgia poll by 1%. - Russellreno
David, last I heard, they were going for about $80 USD on eBay: which is just a crazy exchange rate. - Mark Trapp
Reminiscent of Nazi Germany - inflation was so rapid they had to stamp new values on already issued bills because they couldn't be used quickly enough. People carried around wheelbarrows of the stuff just to buy groceries... http://www.uncp.edu/home/rwb/i... - Jan Dawson
The real craziness is that a loaf of bread there costs over 5 USD - Jeremy Herbel
Yeah - it was all pretty expected and already announced stuff, nothing new. It was a totally fun event though - I'm very glad I went (although I want my Facebook shirt!) - Jesse Stay
It did? I looked into it when it first came out and thought it would have to be, but things checked out then. I never looked at it again after that. I guess I should have. - Jeremy Herbel
Not debating the quality of the 'art' in question at all, but I have a quick question regarding the comment by micker377: in what way is a video game simulating the attempted assassination of the President like "yelling 'FIRE' in a crowded theater"? - Derrick Burns
Would your outrage be as high if the "killers" were Army Green Berets going after a rouge president of another country? - Andy Green
Andy: Loving your own more than the others is basic of human experience. Not that you should not love everyone including those pesky rougue Presidents. Its just a matter of degree. - Robert
It really is too bad that the barriers to creation are such that independent game developers do not have the resources to develop games that advance the human condition. I can only hope that someday we'll have true art. There are way too many artists contributing to a 'game' that do not permit them to express themselves in a way that could promote awareness, connection, and ultimately change. Maybe we need to be more courageous? I don't know. Until then...it's paint by numbers for the man. - Ryan
From the point of view of the reader, full, but for the blogger it's better to do partial. - Mathew Ferguson via Alert Thingy
Full - preferable with socially stuff on them too - Phill Price
@mattf: it's not better for the blogger to do partial. People always unsubscribe from partial feeds. What's better, a reader for life, or a those 20 page views you get before they decide to unsubscribe? - engtech
Always full. Mathew I TOTALLY disagree. Have you tested this? My friends have and have found you to be wrong. - Robert Scoble
Engtech is right. A lot of bloggers have said they see an increase in traffic when they've switched to full. - Jeremy Herbel
Probably end up being a Google/Microsoft acquisition - Joe Dawson
Ontario Emperor sort of mentioned it, but isn't twitter the perfect acquisition for FriendFeed? Not that friendfeed has a true business model yet either. - Rob Diana
Rob, actually that thought HADN'T occurred to me. Are you envisioning the incorporation of Twitter into FriendFeed, or the maintenance of FriendFeed and Twitter as separate services? - Ontario Emperor
Dennis, that was a good compilation of thoughts from the technical perspective. - Ontario Emperor
Ontario Emperor, I was thinking the integration of twitter into friendfeed. It just makes too much sense not to. - Rob Diana
I don't see how Friend Feed would acquire Twitter. Friend Feed is like 4 employees or something? Twitter is much, much bigger. - engtech
@engtech: It's known as a 'reverse takeover'. - Andy C
engtech, size doesn't matter here, money does. Not sure if twitter has that many people either, but I am sure they are bigger. - Rob Diana
Hmm.. I think you could already replace Twitter with Friend Feed. Just share without including a link. So they'd be buying users/technical expertise. - engtech
twitter is fun, twitter replaces the Balkans of IM, if twitter goes away don't we has Ponce/Haiku to replace it? - Nathan Eckenrode
engtech, well the twitter IM like conversation is hard to get started in friendfeed. Share just doesn't feel the same. - Rob Diana
Yup, but that's a user interface thing. A day of work, assuming someone is goofing off on the internet the entire time they're doing it. :) The SMS mobile phone functionality of Twitter would be harder to duplicate, but I wouldn't be surprised if the FF guys weren't thinking of it already. - engtech
understood, but I thought we were talking about replacing twitter now :) Most of this stuff isn't that hard to do. Just hard to do well and scale. - Rob Diana
Yup. Scaling is hard. I've been amazed at FF's responsiveness, but I have no idea what's going on in the background. - engtech
"but I have no idea what's going on in the background" Intelligence? - Jeremy Herbel
@all - if Twitter doesn't get its shit together and soon,it's roadkill. Enterprisey types who do know what they're doing are building this inside other apps already. @Rob Diana - it is VERY hard to do after the fact. - Dennis Howlett via Alert Thingy
I'm a huge proponent of keeping things free. That said, why doesn't Twitter just charge $5 a month for people who twit more than X number of times/day?? I know, crazy! But seriously, if there was ever a service that could support such a model twitter is it -. - Will DeLuca
I'd pay $5 a month for twitter - BUT with the caveat they improve their uptime first. - Jason Kaneshiro
Do you mean TV shows, or actually sitting in front of the TV? - Jeremy Herbel
TV on the TV? Only sports and news. Also some local shows I like (I live in Argentina) TV shows and movies, on the PC. - Alejandro S.
all torrents -- use TV only for news, will probably cancel cable soon - Shey
I'm with @alejandroz on that one. I only watch sports and news on the TV. Shows are via torrent or Hulu. - Jeremy Herbel
TV shows yes (on the HTPC), but whats actually broadcasted here in germany? A world of no! - Gina Häußge
Once a week for the TV Show "Tatort", apart from that: Not a minute. - Jürgen Geuter
I watch TV shows on DVD or online. I use the TV as a monitor. Cancelled cable in favor of Apple TV, Netflix, Internet, and the local library. - Jason Kaneshiro
Don't really agree with this. Alert Thingy hasn't really expanded my FriendFeed usage. - Brandon Titus
I still can't use Alert Thingy as a viable alternative to having FriendFeed open in a browser. FF is far too robust, I think, to be limited to what AT offers (that might just be me, though). Whereas I use Twhirl almost exclusively for Twitter, I still keep FF up in a browser. As for AT causing any dent in Facebook usage, I wouldn't think that's widespread. I use FB and FF for two entirely different purposes, and while I might be alone on my desire to have FF in a browser, I don't think that's true here. - Jeremy Herbel
louis, i'm with you on this. unless the blog actually DOES offer some kind of boutique service, or merch or a comic or whatever, it's done for self interest and entertainment not for monie$ ...via AlertThingy - Snipergirl
The other thing is that how many of us in the tech world us actually click on the ads? - Andy Davies
You're right. I made $100 from Adsense after 12 months but I didn't deserve it so I gave it to charity. It was more of an experiment than a desire to get rich (which was just as well) - Andy C
I honestly believe I would have had more luck writing about my positive experiences with Bluehost, noting new BH features, writing hints, tips etc and referring new customers to BH using the affiliate program ($65 per individual referral). Might make for another interesting experiment one day. - Andy C
Most bloggers don't add any value with their blog..quite often it's vanity publishing - I've been guilty of all the above in the past. I still defend my right to do it though (even if I only made $100 in one year like someone above!) ...via AlertThingy - Pete Gilbert
My name's Colin and I ... have an Adsense unit. Most blogging definitely IS about vanity, who doesn't like a bit of recognition from their peers? I don't think I'm owed anything but a little bit of change every few months comes in handy. - Colin Walker
I'm considering putting maybe one or two small ad units on my blog once I get my own domain. Hopefully the ad(s) would make just enough to cover the cost of registering the domain name. Barring significant increases in traffic, they won't make much. - Voyagerfan5761
Can I get an Amen! I've never run any ads on any of my blogs, and have no interest in doing it. It's never been about the money, or even about the vanity, it's always been about creating a small group of peers to share information with. (The peer groups being different for the different blogs) The costs associated with doing it aren't a problem for me, I definitely don't feel like anyone owes me for those costs, they are just the costs of my hobby. - Mike McBride
I have a thing of ads on my site, but mostly as an experiment to see how many views they get as another statistic (because I love numbers). I actually have a number of posts on what to use to block ads on different browsers, and often tell people that if they're seeing ads on my site they're doing something wrong. - Jeremy Herbel
One of the pieces I was going to include, but forgot to, was the issue of blocking ads. I touched on that with my December article, but I think there is a trend of intentional ad avoidance and blocking, which is only going to make this process harder. - Louis Gray
There are sites that block the browsers like Firefox because of that. - Alejandro S.
@Alejandro, adblocking isn't limited to Firefox, though. I use IE7 for most of my browsing (I know, but I like it), and via IE7 Pro I can block ads just as easily as Firefox + Adblock Plus. - Jeremy Herbel
@Alejandro: I remember reading about those sites. There was a huge argument on one of them where it was noted that, if you use AdBlock, you wouldn't be clicking on ads anyway, so the webmaster/blogger isn't really losing any revenue. - Cyvros/fyc
@Andy C BlueHost is awful, Lunarpages FTW! :) @Louis Gray: nice to see the tables turned this weekend! ;) (i'm kidding, i'm kidding.) - Matt Shaulis
What? Where is the I Don't Like This button? Facebook deserves ads but bloggers don't? People shouldn't cover topics that have already been covered? Who cares how many different bloggers blog about the latest Microsoft acquisition? Just because someone at TechCrunch got up at 4am to read the press releases first doesn't mean they "own" a headline and no one else can jump in. Most bloggers won't get much if any ad revenue (very true) but "don't deserve" is way too harsh imho. - Greg K.
@Greg Knollenberg Note the author said "most". If you are dealing with 5 million bloggers, then "most" is no less than 2,500,001. In that case, I am inclined to not only agree with Louis but to say he took it easy on the blogosphere. There are way more than 5M bloggers, and WAAAAAY less than 2,499,999 that are worth a lick of revenue (ad or otherwise). I think what he has done is promote added value to the original voices by taking value away from the echo chamber. Kudos for honesty, as always, Louis. - Matt Shaulis
@Matt Wouldn't you tell a little lie for $65 ? Seriously though, I have been with BH for 18 months. Hardly a problem. Previously with Dreamhost (8 weeks) which rapidly turned into a nightmare. - Andy C
@matt Most of the world's bloggers aren't even trying to blog for money so it is pointless to say they don't deserve any. I think Louis has a great blog and great ideas - i just didn't care for this post particularly the part that says Facebook deserves ads more than blogs do. :-/ - Greg K.
@Andy lol @ "little lie". I've had my personal site on lunarpages for years and their service & support are 2nd to none. - Matt Shaulis
@Matt: A trusted recommendation for LunarPages is valuable. I think I looked at them prior to BH. Thanks. - Andy C
ustream works better in dark africa :-) ...via AlertThingy - Kim White
uStream may also be good for the IRC chat feature. I know IRC is already used for the TechGuy live show. ...via AlertThingy - Rolf Schewe
I find stickam to be more about video conversations around live content where as ustream is more on the pure video streaming side of things ...via twhirl - Dave Senior
Maybe you should have warned Comcast when you said you'd blog about it that you have more than five readers. - Jeremy Herbel
It shouldn't matter how many READERS Dave has - the comcast rep has to realise that he (the rep) has no idea of the other persons influence or reach. - martin english
@scoble thinks you blocked him. Have you? ...via AlertThingy - Jason
really like the FriendFeed support in Twhirl. Testing now. ...via twhirl - Jeff Turner
Loic Single timeline please. Major issue. Can't move windows if I have both FF and Twitter open at same time. Needed to shut down first to move them. :( ...via twhirl - Jay Gilmore
I appreciated the quick install. It is nice not to have to visit the site or RSS reader. Right on the desktop works well for me. ...via twhirl - Rich Palmer
Okay, I can't move them at all. I'd say the window start position is locked somehow. ...via twhirl - Jay Gilmore
In general I like it, some suggestions would be for single timeline, filtering duplicates within twhirl, and way to view all coments without having to load the browser ...via twhirl - Chris Lewis
Perhaps Twhirl could have an option to filter out the Tweets received through FriendFeed since I'm already getting the Tweets in Twhirl on my Twitter account. I do realize the irony in posting a FriendFeed comment on your tweet from Twhirl while asking for the option to remove Tweets from the feed. Also, a multi-line comment box would be helpful, but overall, great work! Thanks for the new features. ...via twhirl - Will Johnston
"and way to view all coments without having to load the browser" - Yes, this is the first thing I noticed I didn't like. - Jeremy Herbel
font rendering in AIR looks poor compareed to native OS X clients. AlertThingy just looks better, and easier to read. ...via AlertThingy - Panayotis Vryonis
I like what you've done here. Still doesn't feel quite right, but it's a great start. ...via twhirl - Bwana McCall
there appears to be problems with this version, I keep getting the same pop-ups ...via twhirl - Scott STEPHEN
scott, you get the popup again when the item is updated (e.g., new comment). this needs to be improved ...via twhirl - Marco Kaiser
if we can get all this in one Air window, I'd be 200% happier. This is a great start, though! ...via twhirl - Mike Lewis
just found a bug, if I am typing a comment and there is an update, comment box gets bugged ...via twhirl - Scott STEPHEN
I've had almost identical experience with AT&T ...via AlertThingy - Jeremy Herbel
To think, I was pondering switching from AT&T to Comcast. BTW, Dave what are you doing? Running a data center out of your home? ...via AlertThingy - Bill Rice
This handy commenting system has kept me here, so tweet might have sealed the deal *err sorry @Nicole I forgot the "snoozing" and "group clustering" in Version 5.0 *wink ...via AlertThingy - Stefan Asemota
I can't figure out why they didn't just go ahead and include support for reading your Twitter stream in this one. Great turnaroud time on adding Twitter support, though. ...via AlertThingy - Jeremy Herbel
I'm really enjoying this! ...via AlertThingy - Mike Lewis
I'd love it if links were clickable too ...via AlertThingy - Jeremy Herbel
I had both apps running (twhirl and alertthingy)...now just alertthingy, twhirl look out indeed... ...via AlertThingy - champhuet
The last thing I need is another thing to flood me with updates. If Alert Thingy or someone else doesn't create a great filtering engine soon, I'm going to go postal. ...via AlertThingy - Lisa Brewster
I like commenting in line, but I need to see my entire Tweet follow/follower list before I drop Twirl. Will run both for a while. ...via AlertThingy - James Urquhart
Alert Thingy is far more attractive than Twirl. Agree with others that being able to see entire Twitter stream would be nice. ...via AlertThingy - Neal Hohman
I don't really think it's a threat. I enjoy seeing my twitter feed on Twhirl and getting more periodic updates from Alert Thingy ...via AlertThingy - Teresa Valdez Klein
But don't we need to factor in all the screen space these app's take up? Window switching is becoming more and more challenging. ...via AlertThingy - ImJustCreative
Don't get me wrong, I love these Air app's, but asking them to display too much will make them pretty damn huge ...via AlertThingy - ImJustCreative
@ImJustCreative exactly. Between Twitterific, Alert Thingy, Adium, and chats I've lost a whole monitor. Hopefully Alert Thingy will eliminate the need to have Twitterific open soon. ...via AlertThingy - David Klein
adding more info you will ideally need more columns, rather than just straight down, otherwise way too unreadable ...via AlertThingy - ImJustCreative
Agreed, I may have to stop using Twhirl at this rate! ...via AlertThingy - Craig Dalton
poor loic...seemed like such a great little buy ...via AlertThingy - AJ Arora
Like I said before, I guess I don't need Twhirl anymore. ...via AlertThingy - Cesar H Castro Jr
over/under on days until alert thingy integrates twitter streams? i'll go for 3 ...via AlertThingy - Samuel Bostock
It'd be nice if AlertThingy had a "hide comments" link that would show up after you do a "show all comments", so you could compactify things again after you were done reading. For that matter, it'd be nice for the web interface to have that, too. :) ...via AlertThingy - felix
No matter how this plays out, the big winner here is AIR. Playing host to all the most popular desktop Web 2.0 service clients is an enviable position. ...via AlertThingy - Teresa Valdez Klein
@felix I have longed for that since day one. I figured it would eventually show up since it was such an obvious feature. - Jeremy Herbel
Not sure I'm ready to give up twirl yet. One thing re:AlertThingy; it's popped up the alert for this post about ten times as if it were a new post. Is that a bug? ...via AlertThingy - Jandy Stone
twhirl no worries until you can monitor and respond to twitter streams ...via AlertThingy - amarquart
@faithx5 just letting you know the entry has a new comment or like. ...via AlertThingy - Phil Ashman
@faithx5 everytime there's a new comment it pops up the original message and not the comment ...via AlertThingy - Hernan Garcia
@Phil & Hernan I wondered if that was what was happening. You should be able to turn that off, or have it show the comment instead. Thx for the replies. ...via AlertThingy - Jandy Stone
Like that you can finally change the horrible original theme ... ...via AlertThingy - Patrick Jordan
Someone who is subscribed to loads of people should work out what % of comments are coming from Alert Thingy these days. - Samuel Bostock
I guess this is what happens when I'm sick for a few weeks, I miss the new weird people. How did this Magibon manage to become so popular? Aside from the obvious creepy old guy factor, where's her appeal? At least someone like loneygirl talked and did stuff. It's amazing how easy it is now to become popular on YouTube. - Jeremy Herbel
"I'm not sure if a girl staring into her cam not saying anything and just waving for a minute would -ever- make sense" I think that was her point. I haven't watched those videos, though. - Alejandro S.
the youtube videos are well needed context. she did a great copy. the internet gets weirder everyday. - paulm
