Busy as a Bee!

Just a quick note to let everyone know that I started a new gig today as company cofounder and;

Chief Marketing Officer / VP Business Development
Swarmteams

“Swarmteams™ is a unified global messaging platform that integrates internet and mobile phone communications to enhance the performance of teams, groups and social networks through intelligent sharing of information among member devices — regardless of their location.”

We're essentially a mobile social networking technology platform but with a serious twist – "Multichannel, 2-Way, Mobile Group Messaging that bridges Mobile Devices with the Web/internet" (check out the TechBriefing/Demo links below)...

but more importantly – we enable our clients and business partners to engage, support and monetize their most important user communities (24x7) via integrated 2-way messaging across mobile phones, instant messaging, email, web and RSS – in a way that unifies, promotes and measures modern electronic "engagement marketing" activities.

Our unique approach is based on research into the field of biology and the effective forms of team communications and collaboration found in nature. Ken Thompson, my new boss, is a software engineer and researcher and has spent the past 10 years engaged in coaching teams, networks, communities and groups to work more effectively together. His contribution in developing the “Bioteaming Manifesto” centered on research into how biological groups and teams (e.g. ants, bees, geese, penguins and dolphins) effectively communicate and collaborate to achieve their goals.

Swarmteams consists of a small group of wonderful people located in N. Ireland and now Toronto and I'm exceptionally proud to be working with such a talented team!

That said, I'm off to workbzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!

Check out the Online TECH BRIEF/Demo videos I created for:
Enterprise/Corporate Messaging and
Mobile/Web Media: Owners and Distributors
(including Wireless Carriers and MVNO's)

Multichannel Mobile Group Messaging:

Unique Differentiation:



Link to my new Hive!
Link to "Bioteaming" concepts.

History of the PC in TV Commercials

Here's a great article from PCWorld that covers the history of the personal computer from the perspective of TV ads that ran throughout the years. Featured are Atari, Commodore, Coleco, Tandy, Apple, IBM, Packard Bell, Microsoft and others. The Ad above is a favorite of mine -- even thought it never mentions computers :-) Link via BoingBoing.

Lawyers... start your engines!

With the dust settling on Google's acquisition of YouTube (in an all stock transaction last week) the boundaries of both business models and copyright law seem likely to get "reset" as massive media conglomerates (and the mandarins who run them) try to make sense out the emerging internet media landscape.
This ought to be fun to watch...
Link to VentureBeat.

UPDATE: here's a Prof. Michael Geist article from The Toronto Star (10/16/06) on why YouTube won't be the next Napster.

UPDATE: GigaOm reports "and so it begins" by Universal, but the suits are against relatively small companies. "Got Precedent"?

"GooTube" a done deal!

Google to acquire YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock.
Link to Yahoo! Finance (via Paul Kedrosky)

Surviving Midair Collision

This is an amazing, harrowing and ultimately tragic story about surviving a midair collision -- which ultimately claimed 155 lives of the not so lucky.
Link to report of the crash in Brasil.
Link to NY Times with an excellent video piece.
UPDATE: an interesting post from Philip Greenspun at Harvard.

When will the peanuts start to float?

Richard Branson's SpaceShipTwo interior designs...
Link to BoingBoing

Human Cell Animation

Well, if any of you out there know a better way to exchange long protein strings, I'd sure like to see it ;-)
Link to animation video.
Link to BoingBoing post.

Clinton on Fox News

Via the "Lost Remote" blog:
"President Bill Clinton’s interview on Fox News Sunday is spreading like wildfire around the internet. (If you haven’t seen it yet, Clinton became upset when asked about bin Laden. “So you did Fox’s bidding on this show,” he told host Chris Wallace. “You did your nice little conservative hit job on me.”) Clearly, this is a viral video if there ever was one, yet the relaunched FoxNews.com dropped the ball. Yes, it’s displaying the story and video prominently. But there’s no way to email, link or embed the video. So what did Drudge and a fair share of blogs do? Linked YouTube’s clips of the interview, not FoxNews.com. So far, the first YouTube clip of the bunch as been viewed 988,000 times. A couple others are in the 200,000 range and counting. (And this is as of Sunday night.) You can bet FoxNews.com’s clip of the video isn’t even close. And they can’t blame YouTube — just themselves for the lost opportunity."
Link to video.

UPDATE: Like I didn't see this one coming ;-)

Adobe Updater Updater Updater

Gotta love this Adobe dialogue box :-)
Link via BoingBoing.

Steve Jobs goes "Boom"

Via Wired "Cult of Mac" and "All ABout Steve"

Voting Machines

Yeah, but what do those Princeton guys know about computers? ;-)
Way to Go Professor Ed!
(via Kevin Burton's FeedBlog)
UPDATE: Prof. Felton responds to Diebold's response here.
UPDATE: Rolling Stone has a related article here (via Engadget).

"White and Nerdy"

Here's a little Wierd Al diddy that attempts to answer the musical question:
"Kirk or Picard" ;-)
(via Merlin @ 43Folders)

Excerpt:
First in my class here at MIT
Got skills, I’m a champion at D&D
MC Escher - that’s my favorite MC
Keep your 40, I’ll just have an Earl Grey tea
My rims never spin, to the contrary
You’ll find that they’re quite stationary
All of my action figures are cherry
Steven Hawking’s in my library

Link to full lyrics here.

Gordon Lightfoot

If you don't know Bob Lefsetz of "The Leftsetz Letter: First in Music Analysis" you should. It's a great blog and here's one of his Podcasts featuring the music of Gordon Lightfoot (with some interesting back stories) but hey, even before hearing it knew that the rights to "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" are almost impossible to secure because Lightfoot donated all royalties to the surviving families of the Fitzgerald crew...
Link to the Lefsetz Letter blog.
Link to MP3 Podcast file (explicit language).

Tubesock

Download YouTube videos to your iPod. Way cool.

Link

Pinot

I watched "Sideways" again last night. What a brilliant film and screenplay, especially with lines like this, where Miles uses metaphor to subconciously describe himself to Mia:

"Pinot is thin skinned, temperamental, ripens early, not a survivor, you know... like a cabernet, which can grow anywhere and thrive even when it's neglected. No, pinot needs constant care and attention. In fact it can only grow in these really specific tucked away corners of the world and only the most patient and nurturing of growers can do it really... only someone who really takes the time to understand Pinot's potential can then coax it into it's fullest expression... and then it's flavors are the most haunting and brilliant and thrilling and subtle and ancient on the planet."

Awesome.

Marketing Terror / Managing Attention

A long and interesting hypothesis by Keith Olberman of MSNBC news via Kevin Burton's FeedBlog. Link to video.

Watching Lebanon

An interesting New Yorker article (and worthwhile read) by Seymour Hersh. Link

The London Plot

Here are a couple of interesting pieces on the foiled London bomb plot.
Both touch on the issue of "emotionally potent oversimplifications" and the effect they have on us all.
Personally, I subscribe to the concept of not being afraid.
Link to an interesting video piece by Ze Frank (adult language).
Link to a NY Times OpEd piece.
(via Dave Winer)

Got Art?

I just caught this browsing YouTube:
A girl takes a picture of herself every day for three years.

With the internet increasing in power and scope as a distribution platform, will user generated content like this lead to a kind of renaissance in art and communications?
You be the judge.

Ontar-i-ar-i-ario!

Here's some pretty cool vintage content (photos and videos) from the Government of Ontario, Ministry of Industry and Tourism's web page.

I'm pretty sure I sang this song more than once on the way to the cottage when I was a kid ;-)

Link to video. Link to main page (via Cory at BoingBoing).