February 2006 Archives

I am a huge Meebo fan, so I am excited by these new features as noted in the Library Stuff  weblog

"For those that use ,Meebo (and I know of many librarians that do), you'll notice something new when you access the site. First, they've implemented an account feature, which allows you to save your numerous IM acocunts and only have to log-in with one (Yay!). "

Also new:

"Included in this new system is a new dialog, indicated by the new “my meebo” icon in your buddylist. Click there to retrieve your individual IM accounts — you can add and remove as many as you’d like. For those power users who have 2 AIM, 2 Yahoo, and 3 MSN accounts, this is your lucky day!"

Antonin Scalia, the supreme court justice asserted this weekend that the U.S. Constitution was not a living document and should change as society changes.  He is an originalist; believing that the Constitution is not flexible.  In fact, he goes so far as to say that people who believe the Constitution would break if it didn't change along with society are "idiots,"

That’s the argument of flexibility and it goes something like this: The Constitution is over 200 years old and societies change. It has to change with society, like a living organism, or it will become brittle and break. But you would have to be an idiot to believe that. The Constitution is not a living organism, it is a legal document. It says something and doesn’t say other things.

I am surprised he did not take off his shoe and pound the table.  I seem to remember that it is very hard to change the constitution, so I wonder what his comments were about.  Congress and the the American people do not approach changing the Constituion lightly.  There is a process that protects us from idiots. However, I don't know how we are protected from the conservative Supreme Court Justices.

technorati tags: Constitution, Justice, Originalist Scalia

Microsoft Monitor Weblog provides interesting details on the Office Live beta which will launch on 15 February.  The author explains the features and functions and describes what he likes and dislikes about the offering. He is no longer under a non-disclosure agreement so the article is very specific about the features that we will see.

I heard about this site on NPR yesterday.  It is fabulous to hear all these artists again live. Check it out:  Wolfgang's Vault.  Alvin Lee, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Blue Cheer, Yardbirds, The Nice, Led Zepplin,The Fugs, The Mothers of Invention, Grateful Dead, wow!

technorati tags: music, 60's, Bill Graham, Psychedlics

I write about speed and going slow, a lot.  To often, we subsitute activity for thought.   Thoughtfulnes and deliberation create real insight.  In fact, carefully thinking and planning can speed execution.

technorati tags: design, speed, thoughtfulness, slow

Here is an example of Microsoft listening and making itself available to users, which I applaud.  This is from the IEBlog:

Members of the IE team will be traveling far and wide over the next month, attending conferences and speaking with you, our customers, about IE7.

Look for us at RSA next week and Blackhat Europe, South by Southwest, and Mix06 in March. We’re considering attending ETech, and we’re looking at other conferences through the rest of 2006, so hopefully we’ll get to your corner of the world.

I am sick of  Channel 9, Robert Scoble, and the  self-congratulatory Microsoft bloggers who mask their lack of solutions with betas and “naked conversations”. Yes, I do think that Microsoft needs to connect with its customers, but vacuous conversations among the "A" listers does not yield products that have value.  How hard is it to create a portal in which people can keep up with their RSS feeds? How hard is it to create a browser that has tabs, is secure, and performs well? How hard is it to create a webmail platform that connects to Outlook?  Does it take a visionary like Ray Ozzie to see that the read/write web is evolving quickly before everyone’s eyes? Why aren’t Microsoft’s customers even more demanding than they are?  Is it because we are so satisfied with the applications that have evolved over the years that we are willing to wait for Vista and the next version of Office?

I am impatient and I want Microsoft to deliver collaborative applications that work well in the business environment that we work in today.  I wish that Microsoft would not just sit on their hands, make videos and posture. Work hard and deliver better tools on our desktops and on the web. Listen and execute is all that I ask.