Social Media — What is it Good For?

I took a three month break from blogging and social media sites so that I could focus 100% on a critical project at work. Strangely enough I didn’t miss the flow of information; I was still able to find interesting links for coffee break time by browing Hackers News. Here’s a break down of my experience from leaving for so long and rejoining it.

Blog

Blog traffic went down -26% (vs -12% for the previous period).

Feed subscriptions up 9% (vs 12% for the previous period).

My blog email address is inundated with press releases and the very occassional question about an old post or tool.

My blog comments are a horrible nightmare of spam that I still have yet to wade through. WordPress has an annoying bug that when you click “Mark As Spam” it always returns you to the start. There’s been 20 pages of comments. It’s likely that most are spam.

It makes me wonder how much time a day I was spending on blog maintenance. The time sink in blogging isn’t writing posts; it’s all the related activities.

News

Surprisingly, I didn’t miss out on much by not having my lips attached to the news firehouse. Some crazy PM is trying to put me in jail with a new Canadian copyright bill that someone needs to question him about how it benefits his constituents. The iPhone is finally available in Canada, and the data plan is almost-but-not-quite liveable. Facebook has a redesign in the works. Xbox has some cool ideas for release next fall.

I’m sure there were plenty of things happening that I could have gotten worked up about, but nothing happened that directly affects my life that I would have found out about on the Internet.

LinkedIn

I’ve had a strict policy of only using LinkedIn for people I’ve actually worked/went to university with, and it’s been a good tool for contacting ex-coworkers years later about new job opportunities. Spam free.

Facebook

I try to keep Facebook to “real life people only”, and that works well for me. I only use it for group emails, and for photo sharing. Spam free once you get rid of those people who invite you to use applications.

Google Reader

I’m oversubscribed still. When you check your RSS feeds once a month, it becomes much more about the people who consistently keep you thinking or providing good information. Of course, information is only useful if it has impact on your life.

We, the information overloaded, collect new information but I wonder how much of it is retained and has lasting impacting on our lives?

Twitter

I didn’t feel any pain of Twitter downtime because I didn’t log into it. I need to cull my friendslist to make it more useful. But I found Kathy Sierra on twitter and if that’s the real thing then it’s a good sign for twitter having the potential for making me think vs phasing it completely out of my life because of the constant self-promotion.

I still like twitter for chatting with other bloggers that I respect.

Friend Feed

Still not sure if I like rooms or not. The Friend Feed hacking community is kicking even harder lately with a ton of new greasemonkey scripts thanks to Hao Chen. It looks like Lou Cypher is getting involved in Friend Feed as well which means even more cool little hacks.

Nothing new has been happening with ffapps or friendfeedwatch though.

Delicious

It might be time for me to abandon delicious for something new to use for bookmarking. The future does not look peachy for delicious with Josh leaving Yahoo. Maybe it’s time to look at Google Reader shares as an alternative.

Last.FM

I’m still using it, still finding great music because of it. I do like The Filter for making lastfm-esque playlists of my own music collection.

Real Life

I’ve been enjoying the summer and having more time for family, friends and non-Internet hobbies like reading, movies, and games. I really appreciate the knowledge I’ve built up with the programming I’ve done. I plan to continue that in that direction: releasing useful free software and delving into creating my own web apps. I want to spend less time participating and more time creating.

Weekend Reader – blogging, twitter, marketing, funny, lifehacks

This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. You can follow this list of links as I post them on Friend Feed or on Twitter. Or you can get the weekly update by subscribing to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.

• [BLOGGING] Its about respect, winextra.com
  • When do you link to someone? When you’re talking about them and want to discuss their viewpoint.
• [BLOGGING] Ten FriendFeed Visitors Beats 1,000 StumbleUpons Any Day, bhc3.wordpress.com
  • Why Friend Feed is a better source of traffic than Digg and StumbleUpon
• [CODE] Business of Software Forum FAQ, discuss.joelonsoftware.com
  • Good info for MicroISV developers.
• [CODE] Why I’m a better software developer than you, ytechie.com
  • Hey, that describes me to a tee. :)
• [CULTURE] Shift Happens, slideshare.net
  • Excellent slide show showing how the world is changing and the new culture that is emerging.
• [FACEBOOK] FaceBook In Reality, youtube.com, via:codinghorror.com
  • Funny video from BBC comedy group
• [GOOGLE] Share anything. Anytime. Anywhere., googlereader.blogspot.com
  • Google Reader Shares might have just become the delicious killer for me.
• [ITUNES] harmony, thirteen23.com, via:lifehacker.com
  • Automatic cover art downloader for Windows
• [LIFEHACKS] Life Hack Misnomer, thegrowinglife.com
  • From the article: ” Repurposing your shoe holder to organize your gadgets isn’t hacking life, it’s hacking a shoe holder. Likewise, utilities used to synchronize files don’t upgrade your life, they upgrade your computer.”
• [MARKETING] 5 Great Examples of Guerilla Marketing Gone Wrong, weburbanist.com
  • Except, has the guerrilla marketing gone wrong if people are still talking about it?
• [PRODUCTIVITY] The Joy of Freeing Up Mental RAM, caffeinatedcoder.com
  • Intro to Getting To Done
• [SOCIALMEDIA] Are we building Universities or Amphitheaters?, weblog.raganwald.com
  • Because getting your attention is more valuable than giving your life value.
• [SOFTWARE] MoMB | The Museum of Modern Betas, momb.socio-kybernetics.net
  • Looking for new stuff to try out? This has a comprehensive list of betas that are available.
• [STARTUPS] From Messes To Successes, avc.blogs.com
  • Applies very well to the perception people have of Twitter
• [STARTUPS] The Coolest Business Plan Ever, ricksegal.typepad.com
  • Microsoft Office metadata strikes again
• [TECH] What’s Mainstream Technology? Ask Joe Average, The Spouse, Grandma, and Dave Letterman, webomatica.com
  • How to figure out if tech is mainstream.
• [TWITTER] Using Twitter to track your FedEx, UPS or DHL Shipments, technofriends.in
  • Neat trick, twitter @trackthis supports FedEx, UPS, USPS, DHL tracking codes to send you direct messages whenever your packages change languages.
• [TWITTER] Who Should I Follow? | Twitter Friend Recommendations, whoshouldifollow.com
  • REALLY excellent tool for suggesting people to follow
• [WEB2.0] Web 2.point.Mac: Developing software on Apple computers, compsci.ca
  • Many of the web2.0 companies out there are using Macs as a developer platform.
• [WORDPRESS] 13 of the best WordPress plugins, davidairey.com
  • Plugins for Self-hosted

Weekend Reader – twitter, blogging, usability, webdesign, bsg

This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. You can follow this list of links as I post them on Friend Feed or on Twitter. Or you can get the weekly update by subscribing to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.

• [BLOGGING] 10 things you MUST know before you register a domain name with anyone, domainwarning.com
  • Tips for picking out where to host your domain names.
• [BLOGGING] Google Analytics for Blogs, googlesystem.blogspot.com
  • Google Analytics will report daily readers, incoming links, popular posts, comments added.
• [BLOGGING] Warning Labels for Bloggers, geekculture.com
  • hahah… so on point.
• [CODE] The Perfect Job Interview Question, noop.nl
  • How to interview programmers: “what do you not like about other people’s code?”
• [CREATIVITY] 17 Obscure Creativity-Sparking Websites, lifedev.net
  • List of interesting websites that stand out from the crowd.
• [CULTURE] Gin, Television, and Social Surplus, herecomeseverybody.org
  • From the article: ” However lousy it is to sit in your basement and pretend to be an elf, I can tell you from personal experience it’s worse to sit in your basement and try to figure if Ginger or Mary Ann is cuter.”
• [FRIENDFEED] Proposal to Clean Up the FriendFeed Clutter, bhc3.wordpress.com
  • Some great ideas on making FriendFeed more useful.
• [GAMERS] Grand Theft Auto IV Activity Book For Kids, the-minusworld.com
  • And they thought Mass Effect was bad…
• [GEEK] Battlestar Galactica Backstory in 8 Minutes, io9.com
  • Spoilers, of course.
• [JAVASCRIPT] Guarding in JavaScript, thoughtworker.in, via:lazycoder.com
  • Very brief look at using && and || to simplify your code.
• [LIFEHACKS] 5 Productivity Nutjobs Explained, thegrowinglife.com, via:doshdosh.com
  • This made me laugh. :)
• [LINUX] The Great Ubuntu-Girlfriend Experiment, contentconsumer.wordpress.com
  • How hard is it to switch from Windows to Linux?
• [MEDIA] The Wire as Simpson Characters, periscopestudio.com, via:kottke.org
  • artist renditions of scenes from the Wire as Simpsons characters
• [PERL] Ten things I hate about Perl, pozorvlak.livejournal.com
  • I absolutely hate Perl’s OO, all the referencing, and the ugliness of embedded POD. It’s hard to go back to Perl 5 after Ruby.
• [STARTUPS] Why I love working with family people, 37signals.com
  • If people have the constraint of “having a life outside of work” it makes it harder to hide poor management.
• [TWITTER] The Twitter Blacklist, twitterblacklist.com
  • Tool with API for identifying Twitter spammers. It works by analyzing the ratio of followers to friends with some manual intervention.
• [TWITTER] Twitter Less, Blog More!, dailyblogtips.com
  • From the article: ” Why? Because your blog is your property. It should be the single most important location for you on the Internet. It should be the place where people go to when they think about you. Your blog, not Twitter”
• [TWITTER] TwitterSnooze! v0.13, twittersnooze.com
  • Stop following someone for a few days.
• [WEBDESIGN] Five More Principles Of Effective Web Design, smashingmagazine.com
• [WEBDESIGN] Khoi Vinh, nytimes.com
  • Interview with one of my favorite web designers.

Delicious Links – 20 links – google, blogging, wordpress, twitter, lifehacks

This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. You can follow this list of links as I post them on Friend Feed or on Twitter. Or you can get the weekly update by subscribing to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.

• [BLOGGING] 6 Ways That Bloggers are Like Rappers, copyblogger.com
  • Are you down with the B.L.O.G.? Yeah, you know me!
  • (blogging, 31 saves, 29 inbound links, 7 diggs)
• [BLOGGING] How to Target the Right Social Media Sites, problogger.net
  • Howto guide for bloggers on using sites like Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon to generate traffic.
  • (socialmedia, blogging, 44 saves, 7 inbound links, 15 diggs)
• [BLOGGING] the thorny issue of blog comment ownership, nbrightside.com
  • Who owns a comment?
  • (blogging, comments)
• [CODE] Google REST Search API, blogoscoped.com
  • This could be useful for web apps.
  • (google, rest, 19 saves, 7 inbound links)
• [CODE] We need a Wikipedia for data, bret.appspot.com
  • Where is the open source database for map info, whitepages, movie times, music info, etc.
  • (data, opensource, innovation, 222 saves, 79 inbound links)
• [FIREFOX] Why downloading Firefox is like getting into college, sethgodin.typepad.com, via:avc.blogs.com
  • From the article: ” In the lingo of Nancy Reagan, Firefox is a gateway drug.”
  • (firefox, marketing, 71 saves, 62 inbound links, 20 diggs)
• [GEEK] My Cat Bubba Posts Videos and Twitters using an EeePC and Ubuntu, fsckin.com, via:webomatica.com
  • It’s a pretty static video of the cat eating, but nice hack.
  • (cats, 3 saves, 2 inbound links, 33 diggs)
• [LIFEHACKS] From 10000 to 0 Emails in an Inbox in 24 Hours, problogger.net
  • Switching to Gmail to become more productive with email.
  • (lifehacks, workhacks, gmail, email, 22 saves, 14 inbound links, 5 diggs)
• [LIFEHACKS] Just say NO to crap!, squawkfox.com, via:skelliewag.org
  • The ultimate decluttering tip is not to consume.
  • (lifehacks, declutter, 2 saves, 11 inbound links)
• [STARTUPS] We Need A New Path To Liquidity, avc.blogs.com
  • From the article: ” what happens when a company gets purchased: The service languishes. The team leaves. It stops getting better. And often gets worse.”
  • (web2.0, business, vc, 116 saves, 99 inbound links)
• [STARTUPS] What the New York Times “death by blogging” story got right., calacanis.com
  • From the article: ” In some ways I think I’ve realized that life is just a big video game and if one game doesn’t work out you put another quarter in and try again.”
  • (startup, entrepreneurship, blogging, 17 saves, 18 inbound links)
• [TWITTER] Improving Twitter, kungfugrippe.com
  • Merlin Mann’s ideas for how to improve twitter. He’s one of my favorite people to follow on Twitter
  • (twitter, 26 saves, 18 inbound links)
• [TWITTER] Twubble, crazybob.org
  • Twitter friend of a friend finder.
  • (twitter, tools, mashup, 513 saves, 100 inbound links, 6 diggs)
• [WEB2.0] AppEngine World: your one-stop resource for Google App Engine, appengineworld.com, via:marshallk.com
  • AppEngine news aggregator. I wish I had an AppEngine account :(
  • (appengine, google, 5 saves, 3 inbound links)
• [WEB2.0] Google App Engine, code.google.com
  • Google releases blogspot for web applications.
  • (google, python, hosting, 2148 saves, 100 inbound links, 26 diggs)
• [WEB2.0] Mulling On Google App Engine, al3x.net
  • Alex Payne (of Twitter)’s thoughts on the new appengine
  • (google, hosting, web2.0, 4 saves, 3 inbound links)
• [WORDPRESS] Coming Soon: My Personal WordPress Theme Starting Point, themeshaper.com
  • Ian is releasing his Sandbox-plus-plus theme with some stuff from BluePrint CSS. I’ve been waiting 9 months for this. :)
  • (wordpress, themes, 3 saves, 2 inbound links)
• [WORDPRESS] The Great WordPress Attack, psionmark.com
  • If you aren’t running WP 2.5, your site is probably hacked.
  • (wordpress, 5 saves, 6 inbound links, 5 diggs)
• [WORKHACKS] The Case Against Overtime, caffeinatedcoder.com
  • Compelling arguments as to why you shouldn’t work overtime as a programmer.
  • (career, balance, programming, 6 saves, 3 inbound links, 4 diggs)
• [WPDESIGN] Raising Personal Standard for Paid WordPress Themes, wpdesigner.com
  • What a WordPress theme should include.
  • (wordpress, themes, 6 saves, 10 inbound links)

Crunching the Friend Feed Stats to Find the Most Popular Web Apps

One of the nicest things about the Internet is that if you sit on your ass for long enough, someone will code up whatever little side project you’re thinking about starting. In my case, I was interested in finding out general statistics about Friend Feed as a tape measure of how popular certain social bookmarking sites are. Enter Friend Feed Stats. Thank you, lazyweb.

What Is the Most Popular Web Service?

Delicious Links – 20 links – tools, gamers, workhacks, code, links

This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together for my blog on Internet Duct Tape.

Subscribe to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.

• [BITTORRENT] Dutch University Uses BitTorrent to Update Workstations, torrentfreak.com, via:l33t.reddit.com
  • Pretty cool. Then when from 20 servers and 4 days to update clients to 2 servers and 4 hours to update clients.
  • (bittorrent, 15 saves, 22 inbound links, diggs)
• [BLOGGING] 17 Tips For Getting Bloggers To Write About You, informationweek.com, via:doshdosh.com
  • This should be titled “WELCOME TO THE INTERNETS”. Mandatory reading for understanding linking. It gets bonus points because the article doesn’t follow its own rules.
  • (blogging, tips, Linkbait, links, 54 inbound links)
• [CODE] insomnia and productivity, sob.apotheon.org
  • hack mode
  • (code, programming, 2 saves, 3 inbound links)
• [FRIENDFEED] Elite Bloggers Joining FriendFeed In Droves, louisgray.com
  • List of tech bloggers who are on friendfeed
  • (friendfeed, blogging, lifestreaming, 15 saves, 50 inbound links, 2 diggs)
• [GAMERS] Animal Crossing Is Tragic, animalcrossingtragedy.ytmnd.com
  • Sad little tale of a gamer who shared Animal Crossing with his/her dying mother.
  • (animalcrossing, gamers, 15 saves, diggs)
• [GAMERS] The Co-op Gaming Bill of Rights, ozymandias.com
  • Co-op gaming can be a ghetto on a lot of platforms. I’d love for more games to adopt these.
  • (gamers, xbox360, 2 saves, 12 inbound links, 4 diggs)
• [GAMERS] Warlords Online, warlords-online.com, via:lazycoder.com
  • Online MPORG based on Puzzle Quest
  • (gamers, puzzlequest, 15 saves, 2 inbound links)
• [LINKS] Ten Sites for Finding Wonderful Things, readwriteweb.com, via:twitter.com
  • Some suggestions for ‘best of the weird web’
  • (links, fun, 15 saves, 20 inbound links, 649 diggs)
• [OPENID] Zero Sign On – 1 better or Infinitely better than Single Sign On?, drnicwilliams.com
  • How to use OpenID certificates so that you NEVER have to log in to any site that supports OpenID.
  • (openid, authentication, certificates, firefox, 15 saves, 47 inbound links, 7 diggs)
• [TECH] The real reason I left my career in tech, backinskinnyjeans.com
  • What women have to deal with being in the hightech workplace
  • (tech, women, 8 saves, 10 inbound links, 34 diggs)
• [TWITTER] 17 Ways to Visualize the Twitter Universe, flowingdata.com
  • Some cool examples of visualizing data
  • (twitter, visualization, tools, 15 saves, 94 inbound links, 12 diggs)
• [TWITTER] Need help managing your Twitter Karma?, dossy.org, via:experiencecurve.com
  • Something I’ve been complaining about. A better Twitter followers manager. Needs more info about the followees though.
  • (twitter, mashup, 15 saves, 10 inbound links, 185 diggs)
• [WEBDESIGN] 20 Websites That Made Me A Better Web Developer, sixrevisions.com, via:news.ycombinator.com
  • List of webdesign related websites. Most are familiar.
  • (webdesign, development, design, 15 saves, 65 inbound links, 3621 diggs)
• [WEBDESIGN] Administrative Debris, tomayko.com
  • Content is everything… then why do we display so much stuff that isn’t content?
  • (design, tufte, usability, 15 saves, 8 inbound links)
• [WEBDESIGN] IE App Compat VHD, microsoft.com
  • Virtual machine images of different versions of Internet Explorer so that you can test a website on multiple versions of the same web browser.
  • (windows, virtualization, testing, 3 saves, 100 inbound links)
• [WEBHACKS] Down for everyone or just me?, downforeveryoneorjustme.com
  • Find out if a website is unreachable for the entire net or just your machine
  • (tools, internet, network, 15 saves, 100 inbound links, 8 diggs)
• [WEBSAVVY] the Awesome Highlighter – be nice, highlight, awesomehighlighter.com
  • note to my parents: please use this all the time so I have some clue why you sent me that web page in an email.
  • (tools, highlighter, web2.0, sharing, 15 saves, 100 inbound links, 29 diggs)
• [WORKHACKS] 10 Ways to Improve Your Programming Productivity, matthewpaulmoore.com, via:news.ycombinator.com
  • Good advice, even if none of is groundbreaking.
  • (advice, workhacks, code, programming, 15 saves, 28 inbound links, 5 diggs)
• [WORKHACKS] 9 Simple Strategies to Getting Things Done At Work, lyved.com
  • Tricks for being more productive in the office
  • (productivity, lifehacks, workhacks, 15 saves, 12 inbound links, 679 diggs)
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This Week at Internet Duct Tape

Internet Duct Tape is my blog where I talk about software, technology, blogging and other geeky subjects.

•   Delicious Links – 17 links – programming, stumbleupon, blogging, windows, copyright

   

This Week at Internet Duct Tape

Internet Duct Tape is my blog where I talk about software, technology, blogging and other geeky subjects.

•   [DELICIOUS/STUMBLEUPON] Delicious Stumbles v2.0
  StumbleUpon upgraded their interface last nice so that means you get a new version of Delicious Stumbles.

This Week at Internet Duct Tape

Internet Duct Tape is my blog where I talk about software, technology, blogging and other geeky subjects.

• Installing ruby-prof as a plugin on Rails 1.2
• rails/mysql: Load your production database on to your development server
• How not to replace WEBrick with Thin

Tags: blogging, code, design, gamers, links, programming, tools, twitter, workhacks

Delicious Links – 20 links – geek, twitter, sleephacks, design, programming

This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together for my blog on Internet Duct Tape.

Subscribe to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.

• [CODE] The Years of Experience Myth, codinghorror.com
  • It’s more important to hire smart people who get things done than masters of the domain
  • (programming, career, development, 177 saves, 53 inbound links, 51 diggs)
• [COMMUNITY] 4 Reasons You Should Encourage, Foster and Harness Dissent on Your Blog, problogger.net
  • Reasons against censoring dissenters
  • (blogging, community, 14 saves, 21 inbound links, 73 diggs)
• [COPYRIGHT] The Pirates Can’t Be Stopped, portfolio.com, via:techcrunch.com
  • An interview with the kid who hacked Media Defender copyright police.
  • (hacking, piracy, filesharing, p2p, 47 saves, 57 inbound links)
• [GEEK] 10 Breeds of PC User Identified and Explained, anywired.com
  • This was great. I’m a bit of 5, 7, and 9 with maybe a dash of 10.
  • (geek, computer, funny, 12 saves, 11 inbound links, 21 diggs)
• [GEEK] George Lucas Will Sell Your Dreams For Candy, io9.com
  • Star Wars merchandising that never was. High quality artwork.
  • (geek, starwars, 6 saves, 2 inbound links, 4 diggs)
• [GOOGLE] How 404 pages work in Google Toolbar Beta 5, mattcutts.com
  • The new Google Toolbar won’t display your custom 404 page if it’s less than 512 bytes long.
  • (google, 404, toolbar, 16 saves, 94 inbound links, 2 diggs)
• [HIRING] The Naive Approach to Hiring People, weblog.raganwald.com
  • Really excellent read by raganwald on why interviewing candidates is a Bayesian filtering problem instead of a if-then problem.
  • (hiring, career, programming, 75 saves, 14 inbound links)
• [JAVASCRIPT] XPath Overnight, ejohn.org, via:lazycoder.com
  • XPath is taking over DOM traversal in javascript libraries.
  • (javascript, 17 saves, 14 inbound links)
• [LIFEHACKS] I Was Programmed by Tetris to be a Better Person, io9.com
  • The 7 habits of highly effective form tetris players
  • (gamers, lifehacks, 12 saves, 9 inbound links, 11 diggs)
• [MOVIES] Netflix on the PS3 or Xbox 360 Could Be a Killer App, parislemon.com
  • Much agreement that this is too good to be true. If this happened it would kill the movie industry overnight.
  • (movies, 2 inbound links)
• [PIPES] Our one year anniversary, blog.pipes.yahoo.com
  • Yahoo Pipes is one year old. They have a list of tutorials
  • (pipes, 5 saves, 2 inbound links)
• [PIRACY] Internet users could be banned over illegal downloads, technology.timesonline.co.uk, via:l33t.reddit.com
  • The UK is setting up a “three strikes” rule where pirates could be banned from having internet access.
  • (copyright, piracy, filesharing, 28 saves, 100 inbound links, 22 diggs)
• [SLEEPHACKS] Ask YC : How many hours do you sleep in average ?, news.ycombinator.com
  • Good discussion about sleeping
  • (sleephacks, 5 saves)
• [SLEEPHACKS] Relax Like A Pro: 5 Steps to Hacking Your Sleep, fourhourworkweek.com
  • Some things I haven’t heard before
  • (lifehacks, sleephacks, 423 saves, 51 inbound links, 164 diggs)
• [SOCIALSOFTWARE] The Complexity of the Web 2.0 World, hq.andrewshuttleworth.com, via:l33t.reddit.com
  • A crazy look at what ubiquitous computing really means.
  • (web2.0, socialnetworking, visualization, 48 saves, 29 inbound links)
• [TWITTER] Dear LazyWeb, dearlazy.com, via:blog.twitter.com
  • A questions and answers interface using Twitter as the backbone
  • (twitter, web2.0, 10 saves, 4 inbound links)
• [TWITTER] Twitter-proxy: Any Interest?, assetbar.wordpress.com, via:l33t.reddit.com
  • A look at why Twitter has such scaling issues.
  • (twitter, architecture, performance, 36 saves, 10 inbound links, 3 diggs)
• [URLS] I CAN HAZ dot COM, icanhaz.com, via:lifehacker.com
  • new url shortner
  • (lolcats, tinyurl, tools, 61 saves)
• [WEBDESIGN] 10 Principles Of Effective Web Design, smashingmagazine.com
  • Well researched look at what makes for effective web design
  • (webdesign, design, usability, 2079 saves, 99 inbound links, 1709 diggs)
• [WEBDESIGN] Interface Screencast #1: The WordPress Dashboard, binarybonsai.com, via:wank.wordpress.com
  • Screencast of the (old) WordPress dashboard, and why it sucks. A little on the long side at 30min
  • (wordpress, design, interface, 4 saves, 4 inbound links)
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This Week at Internet Duct Tape

Internet Duct Tape is my blog where I talk about software, technology, blogging and other geeky subjects.

• Digest for December 2007 and January 2008
• Book Review: Halting State by Charles Stross
  • If you’re a programmer/gamer geek and looking for a gripping book that you won’t be able to put down then look no further than Halting State.
• The Canary in the Coal Mine of Open Source Code Re-use
  • Don’t reinvent the wheel. It’s one of those things that’s much easier to say then it is to do, particularly when it comes to programming. Programmers suffer from a horrible mental disease called Not Invented Here Syndrome (it’s in the DSM — check if you don’t believe me). We…
• Book Review: Everyware by Adam Greenfield
  • Adam Greenfield is a designer and one of the guys behind Boxes and Arrows. He’s also the guy who coined the term “moblogging” for blogging from your cellphone. He’s got a knack for inventing terms because “everyware” is such a simpler name than unicomp or “ubiquitous…
• Delicious Links – 20 links – programming, community, development, twitter, lisp
  • programming, community, development, twitter, lisp

This Week at IDT Labs

IDT Labs is where I announce new software I’m working on.

• [GREASEMONKEY] The Pirate Bay + Rotten Tomatoes = Crazy Delicious
  This script will create links to Rotten Tomatoes while browsing the Pirate Bay.

Tags: career, design, filesharing, geek, lifehacks, piracy, programming, sleephacks, twitter, web2.0

Delicious Links – 20 links – programming, community, development, twitter, lisp

This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together for my blog on Internet Duct Tape.

Subscribe to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.

• [BLOGGING] Absolute Guide to Losing Readers, raproject.com
  • Things not to do
  • (blogging, community, 3 saves, 39 inbound links)
• [CODE] David Heinemeier Hansson step aside, Paul Graham is next to be voted off the island, weblog.raganwald.com
  • The backlash against the new Arc LISP dialect
  • (rubyonrails, arc, lisp, pg, 17 saves, 4 inbound links)
• [CODE] Let The System Design Itself, gilesbowkett.blogspot.com
  • From the article: ” 1) runs all the tests, 2) contains no duplication, 3) expresses every idea you want to express, 4) minimal number of classes and methods. When you work with these rules, you pay attention only to micro-design matters.”
  • (programming, development, 7 saves, 3 inbound links)
• [CODE] The Programmer’s Food Pyramid, osteele.com, via:labnotes.org
  • Good point. Instead of writing about code, we should be reading code or writing code.
  • (programming, software, code, 59 saves, 16 inbound links, diggs)
• [CODE] can lisp do what perl does easily?, groups.google.no, via:programming.reddit.com
  • Ouch. Stinging roast of Perl.
  • (perl, rant, lisp, 13 saves, 2 inbound links)
• [COPYRIGHT] Better Than Free, kk.org, via:blogs.chron.com
  • From the article: ” The internet is a copy machine.”
  • (business, economics, free, marketing, 1146 saves, 100 inbound links, 30 diggs)
• [DESIGN] 8 Web Design Mistakes That Developers Make, wakeuplater.com, via:news.ycombinator.com
  • What programmers get wrong when they try their hand at web design. I found myself nodding my head.
  • (webdesign, typography, advice, 1307 saves, 94 inbound links, 2429 diggs)
• [DESIGN] DOs and DON’Ts – Colour, inspirationbit.com
  • advice on choosing colours
  • (color, design, webdev, 25 saves, 38 inbound links, 17 diggs)
• [GAMERS] The Mass Effect, nytimes.com
  • From the article: ” –Before the show I had asked somebody about what they had heard, and they had said it’s like pornography,– she added. –But it’s not like pornography. I’ve seen episodes of ‘Lost’ that are more sexually explicit.–“
  • (games, amazon, community, 56 inbound links)
• [GEEK] 10 Breeds of PC User Identified and Explained, anywired.com
  • This was great. I’m a bit of 5, 7, and 9 with maybe a dash of 10.
  • (geek, computer, funny, 6 saves, 7 inbound links, 14 diggs)
• [LIFEHACKS] Applying Unix Philosophy to Personal Productivity, lifehacker.com
  • A decent read if only because it’s a good refresher on unix philosophy
  • (productivity, gtd, unix, programming, lifehacks, 269 saves, 29 inbound links, 149 diggs)
• [PHOTOS] 5 Image Resizing Tools to Die For, friedbeef.com
  • Includes the resizer tool for GIMP/web that lets you resize only the non-important parts of images. Coolest resizer ever.
  • (photography, photoshop, gimp, resolutions, 11 saves, 5 inbound links)
• [RSS] Rating Burner, ratingburner.com, via:louisgray.com
  • What are the most popular blogs?
  • (feedburner, ranking, rss, 83 saves, 68 inbound links, 64 diggs)
• [RUBY] reddit for ruby hackers, reddit.com
  • Reddit has a spot just for ruby posts
  • (ruby, reddit, rails, 87 saves, 13 inbound links)
• [SOCIALSOFTWARE] Nofollow Killed Google Social Graph API 3 Years Ago, andybeard.eu
  • A look at the Google social tools
  • (google, socialsoftware, 4 saves, 26 inbound links, 1 diggs)
• [SOFTWARE] Best Software Tools for the Family Tech Support Guy, killertechtips.com
  • Useful tools for debugging Windows PCs
  • (freeware, tools, software, 33 saves, diggs)
• [TWITTER] Power Twitter by 30 Boxes, 30boxes.com, via:hmmcast.com
  • Firefox extension for adding new features to Twitter
  • (twitter, firefox, extensions, 96 saves, 79 inbound links, 3 diggs)
• [TWITTER] When Seth Godin isn’t Seth Godin, problogger.net
  • Interesting look at branding on social media sites. Someone can pretend to be you with negative consequences
  • (twitter, 12 saves, 47 inbound links, 5 diggs)
• [WEBDEV] Web Developer’s Field Guide – Your Ultimate Resource, webdevelopersfieldguide.com, via:news.ycombinator.com
  • Ok. That’s a ridiculous list of links. Everything you need to know if you’re doing anything on the web.
  • (development, webdesign, reference, resources, 1816 saves, 96 inbound links, 4 diggs)
• [WORKHACKS] Firing on All Cylinders: Productivity Tips for the Knowledge Worker, baron.vc
  • It’s isn’t about getting more done, it’s about distancing yourself from the work so that when it’s time to work you are prepared for it
  • (tips, work, workhacks, 2 saves)
• Powered by Delicious Links Pro

This Week at Internet Duct Tape

Internet Duct Tape is my blog where I talk about software, technology, blogging and other geeky subjects.

• V-Day Alert
  • This is your friendly neighbourhood geek reminder that Valentine’s Day is only a week away and that now is the time to make restaurant reservations and/or go gift shopping.
• How to Install the Exception Notifier Plugin with Ruby on Rails
  • Exception Notifier is a Rails plugin that will email you when an error occurs in your Rails application with full debugging information. It’s as useful as you can imagine, and running it is the difference between happy users and grumpy users who don’t use your web app because every second…
• Delicious Links – 20 links – blogging, programming, ruby, photography, copyright
  • blogging, copyright, lifehacks, photography, productivity, programming, ruby, rubyonrails

Tags: community, development, lisp, programming, software, twitter, webdesign

Blog Tip: Creating a Blog Maintenance Start Page with Netvibes

In Blogger GTD, Leo mentioned that it was a good idea to have one inbox for all your blogging related notifications. I hate cluttering in my inbox, but I do agree that it makes sense to have a single point of reference rather to spend 5 minutes checking some information in one place and then spend 5 minutes checking information in another place. As Skelliewag says, those 5 minutes add up over the course of a day and by the end of it you’ve wasted an hour.

Directing everything to my inbox would never work for me, but it is possible to have a single start page for all your blog maintenance activities using Netvibes. If you aren’t familiar with Netvibes it is a combination of an RSS feed aggregator and a widget platform. It is analogous to iGoogle (but works better). In simple terms Netvibes lets you put lots of information in one place and look at information from several web pages on a single page.

If you’ve never tried it out before then please visit http://netvibes.com — they let you play around with a default page even if you don’t have an account.

This is what I put on my blog maintenance start page. Replace internetducttape.com or engtech.wordpress.com with your blog URL.

Column 1: Comment Administration and Social Site Monitoring

The first column is for things that I want to respond quickly to — comments and checking to see if my site is submitted to Digg or Reddit.

Box #1: Comments RSS feed: http://internetducttape.com/comments/feed

Or you could use my WordPress Comment Extractor / WordPress Trackback Extractor to get only the comments or only the trackbacks.

Box #2: Shortcuts to WordPress administration activities using the Netvibes Bookmarks widget.

Bookmarks: http://www.netvibes.com/subscribe.php?module=Bookmarks

I add the following bookmarks:

• Moderate Comments: https://engtech.wordpress.com/wp-admin/edit-comments.php
  (also see WordPress Comment Ninja)
• Moderate Akismet Spam: https://engtech.wordpress.com/wp-admin/edit-comments.php?page=akismet-admin
  (also see Akismet Auntie Spam)
• Manage Posts: https://engtech.wordpress.com/wp-admin/edit.php
• Manage Pages: https://engtech.wordpress.com/wp-admin/edit-pages.php
• Layout Sidebar Widgets: https://engtech.wordpress.com/wp-admin/widgets.php
• Layout Edit CSS: https://engtech.wordpress.com/wp-admin/themes.php?page=editcss

Box #3: Social Site Submission Watchdog is a custom Yahoo Pipe I created.

Click on this link then

• change your blog URL
• click on Run Pipe
• copy the RSS link to Netvibes

Column 2: Blog Stats

It’s a bad idea to check your blog stats multiple times a day, but is it so bad if you’re also checking blog comments, emails and instant messages at the same time?

Box #1: This will only work for WordPress.com bloggers, which is too bad because it’s a great way to check stats at a glance.

WordPress.com Mobile Widget: http://gamespotting.net/wordpressnetvibes.html

Box #2: Technorati Rank from RSS. Another custom Yahoo Pipe. This one is a little more complicated to install because you’ll need your Technorati API key.

Click on this link then

• change your blog URL
• find your Technorati API key and cut-and-paste it
• click on Run Pipe
• copy the RSS link to Netvibes

Box #3: Filtered Blog Reactions from Technorati. This is another custom Yahoo Pipe. It shows the blog URL as the title and links to the front page instead of directly to the post.

Click on this link then

• change your blog URL
• click on Run Pipe
• copy the RSS link to Netvibes

You could use this RSS feed instead: http://feeds.technorati.com/search/internetducttape.com

Column 3: Direct Communication

I use the second tab as a way to keep a quick check on how I stay in contact with other bloggers — through Gmail and Twitter.

Box #1: Gmail: http://www.netvibes.com/subscribe.php?module=Gmail

I use a dedicated Gmail account for blogging — I don’t receive any personal or work related email with that account.

Box #2: Twitter Replies RSS feed: http://twitter.com/statuses/replies.rss

This shows some of the power of Netvibes — you can view password protected RSS feeds.

Box #3: Twitter: http://www.netvibes.com/subscribe.php?module=Twitter

Create Your Own Blog Maintenance Start Page

This gives you a few ideas of how I use the service, but the possibilities are endless.

For instance there is a Facebook widget: http://www.netvibes.com/subscribe.php?module=Facebook

Not to mention several widgets that let you directly embed a web page. Using those generic modules you can embed Google Reader into Netvibes and other crazy stuff like that.

What are you going to put on your blog maintenance start page?