Extraface

1. Merlin Mann pointed me to a DJ by the name of Girl Talk who makes fun, frenetic, sample-fueled tracks. I read Merlin’s tweets and was intrigued, so this morning I investigated and am enjoying listening to what’s available on Hype Machine. Wikipedia helped too. Girl Talk is in the process of releasing a new album and on the site you can decide whether you want just the mp3’s, high quality FLAC’s, or the CD once it starts shipping, and you name your own price for each or all. It provides guidelines so that if you want to be fair, you can.

2. Yesterday, I very much enjoyed Dallmayr Sonnenblumen Honig honey from Munich, on a Grands biscuit with some butter.

3. Just a few minutes ago, Gregg shared with me this video interview that Mark at Boingboing.tv did with Kyle Glanville, U.S. Barista Champion and one of the baristas that spends time behind the counter at Gregg’s local Intelligentsia coffee. I expected it to be all magic and mumbo jumbo, but Kyle shows off his deep organic understanding and encyclopedic knowledge of all aspects of what goes in to a proper espresso. As I said to Gregg, it’s refreshing to be reminded that there are still specialties and specialists who own a particular subject area, that some things will never be “just look it up on the web” easy.

4. Earlier this morning I enjoyed reading Tony Pierce’s How To Blog from 2004, for the first time. I don’t agree with all of it, and it doesn’t reflect how I blog, but I’m glad that Tony does what he does how he does and that he is so helpful in getting others to do the same in their own way.

5. Jason Santa Maria’s article, A New Day, inspired me to think about my blog a little differently today.

6. I’m not sure about numbering the items and the italicizing key passages. Just giving it a try.

I’ve returned from the Germany trip. While I work on catching up and getting my legs back under me, please enjoy this brief glimpse of a flea market we checked out in Bad Durkheim. Overall, the merchandise was strikingly similar to what you’d find in the states, but the food was a welcome change(and since it was Spargel season it was not without the ubiquitous Spargel booth) and we did find some fun and interesting displays.

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

This screen:

…told me Zappos has made improvements to the way they use Facebook’s Beacon blabbermouth marketing program. Since it asked me clearly and nicely if I’d like to share word of my purchase with my Facebook network, and thoroughly explained the options and implications, I allowed it. It’s a nice evolution from the earlier, creepier days of Beacon.

This screen:

…told me that the site I’ve used for at least eight years to check domain name registrations, Thebigwhois.com, either forgot to renew their own domain or decided to close up shop for some reason. I liked them because they were simple, and they weren’t attached to a big domain registrar so they didn’t have an obvious vested interest in my data.

This screen:

…along with this screen:

…pulled me out of the suspension of disbelief on an otherwise well-executed fictional online extension of ABC’s Lost. I wish there was some cleverer way the ABC lawyers could have integrated a Terms of Service and copyright notice without having to make reference to the parent companies.

• The Perfect Gift For Your Manager - Who wouldn’t appreciate a box of good managering feelings to commemorate an employee, project, or division well managed? [via Fox]

• Dramatic Snack - Never has eating a potato chip been such an act of defiance.

• Walk It Out With Fosse:
  

  [via Tom Biro]

  Update: Kristen’s grandfather shows us how he Walks It Out.
  

Last Friday I was invited to attend and photograph the WebChallenge ‘08 awards. The Technology Association of Georgia, SAP, Appcelerator, and entrepreneur Wayt King hosted the competition wherein small teams of high school students are tasked with putting together the best Facebook application. Josh Mangel and Avi Zolty of The Weber School and Alan Barber and Brent O’Neill of North Gwinnett High School took home first and second place, respectively, in both Best Concept and Best Implementation. Josh and Avi’s app is called I Recommend It and Alan and Brent’s is Remember When. The “Most Viral” competition was split four ways between those participants and these two teams: Christopher King, Joseph Hughes, Stark Riedesel, and George Ursu at the Academy of Computing and Information Technology, and Josh Patton, Josh Halliday, Josh Kilcoyne, and Ben Crete at Horizon Christian Academy(War Games). I hope to see some of these budding developers at upcoming events like BarCamp Atlanta ‘08.

Here’s a collection of photos from WebChallenge:

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

Building a Facebook app is no small task, and I’m very impressed with what these students were able to accomplish. Having anything “go viral” is an exciting outcome but not a very predictable or plannable one. None of these apps truly “went viral” in some sense and I think that’s a useful lesson both for the organizers and for the participants. Just ask any number of web application developers, content producers, advertising and marketing agencies, and global brands that have labored under the misconception that somehow with the right magic idea, the right formula, the right partners, strategic advertising purchases and some special SEO blend they could “just make it go viral” in the larger sense. One suggestion I have for next year — perhaps the awards could focus more narrowly on rewarding specific attributes that would help guide young developers in a strong direction for the next steps in their careers, like good problem area definition, smallest codebase, most benefit to the casual end-user, and simplicity of application design.