For some reason, whenever I have visited Google today, it has bounced me straight to http://google.co.uk/ig – in other words, the Personalised Google page. This happens whether or not I am logged into my Google account.

Is Google starting to abandon it’s ‘classic’ homepage? Clicking the ‘Classic Home’ link now takes me to this URL.

Update: this explains it.

[tags]google, google personalised[/tags]

For some reasons Google Analytics isn’t working properly on hyprtext. The background for the graphs are there, but no data appears on them!

This worked perfectly in FF on XP. Is there some sort of issue with Ubuntu?

[tags]google analytics, firefox, ubuntu[/tags]

Word Count Journal might be a good option if you would like to start a blog, but aren’t sure how you will manage the words. A blogging NaNoWriMo, anyone?

Sometimes a little bit really does go a long way. In Word Count Journal, by gradually building up your writing stamina and discipline, you will see just how easy it is to get a whole lot done. By simply writing a set number of words each day, every day, you will write a whopping 66,795 words at the end of one calendar year. Little by little, through the power of series, the total of your written words will add up to more words than contained in the average novel.

Quite frankly, the thought of reading a blog where the words have to be dragged out of the author in this way fills me with horror, but I guess for someone who isn’t sure about dipping their toes into blogging waters, it might just help.

But then…a WordPress.com account is free. Go there instead.

Technorati Tags: word count journal, wordpress

Of course they didn’t. But for a little while, it looked like they might have done:

Apparently Qatar has a single ISP, Qtel, with a single IP address
shared by the entire country. Wikipedia has blocked that IP address for
anonymous edits, but is allowing users of that IP address with actual
Wikipedia accounts to continue to edit articles. There’s one problem,
though. You can’t create an account if you enter Wikipedia from that IP
address.

Jimmy Wales quickly responded on the wiki talk page for the IP address in question:

Iff [sic] you came here from a news headline saying that Wikipedia has banned all of Qatar, please pop right back over there and post in the comments that the story is not true. This IP number was temporarily blocked for less than 12 hours, and a block of an entire nation would go absolutely against Wikipedia policy. In the English Wikipedia, such an action would require approval of at a minimum the English Arbitration Committee and/or me personally, and would never ever be undertaken lightly, nor without extensive attempts at direct negotiation with the ISP and/or nation in question.

To any and all reporters, from Slashdot, TechCrunch, mainstream media, etc.: You may email me and ask me for my personal cellphone number, which I will answer 24 hours a day to confirm or disconfirm any such story of this type.
–Jimbo Wales

Fair play to Wales, he does his best to put things right (he commented on the TechCrunch thread pretty quickly).

Once again, this ruckus has brought up the issue of Wikipedia requiring people to log in to edit. Wales seems set against it, determined that Wikipedia remains open.

[tags]Wikipedia, Techcrunch, Jimmy Wales[/tags]

Stuff about microformats seem to be popping up all over the place at the moment. I first came across them in a post by Simon Dickson.

The latest piece appeared on the Read/WriteWeb blog, which in turn introduced me to a great series of posts by a Mozilla developer by the name of Alex Faaborg, in which he moots the notion that microformats might be an integral part of FireFox 3.

So what are microformats? Well, it’s all a part of the so-called ‘semantic web‘ – embedding the documents that make up the web with information that will allow computers to find stuff quicker and better. Here’s Wikipedia’s example:

For example, a computer might be instructed to list the prices of flat screen HDTVs larger than 40 inches with 1080p resolution at shops in the nearest town that are open until 8pm on Tuesday evenings. To do this today requires search engines that are individually tailored to every website being searched. A semantic web would provide a single standard for all websites to publish the relevant information.

Microformats, then are a way of embedding this metadata into html pages, or, in Faaborg’s words,

adding semantics to markup to take it from being machine readable to being machine understandable.

Sounds useful. But there’s more:

Much in the same way that operating systems currently associate particular file types with specific applications, future Web browsers are likely going to associate semantically marked up data you encounter on the Web with specific applications, either on your system or online. This means the contact information you see on a Web site will be associated with your favorite contacts application, events will be associated with your favorite calendar application, locations will be associated with your favorite mapping application, phone numbers will be associated with your favorite VOIP application, etc.

If FireFox could understand all this stuff – and if the microformats are being used – then all sorts of things are possible, allowing all your data to be tied to the services you use, and not shoe-horning you into using a suite of web apps because they all link up nicely. You can use Gmail for your email, Zoho for your word processing and Skype for your calls, and it will all be handled for you automatically.

Here’s a graphic example of how it looks, courtesy of Mozilla:

There’s a FireFox extension out there now for handling metadata, called Operator, so you can get in on the action straight away. Check out the microformats website for more information on what can be done right now with them. But the real benefits of this technology will come in the future, when all the information scattered across the web can be brought to order.

Technorati Tags: microformats

Quentin Stafford-Fraser (British web pioneer, who helped devise the first webcam) points to a frightening article by Peter Gutman about “Microsoft’s devotion to ‘content-protection'”. From Peter’s executive summary:

Windows Vista includes an extensive reworking of core OS elements in order to provide content protection for so-called “premium content”, typically HD data from Blu-Ray and HD-DVD sources. Providing this protection incurs considerable costs in terms of system performance, system stability, technical support overhead, and hardware and software cost. These issues affect not only users of Vista but the entire PC industry, since the effects of the protection measures extend to cover all hardware and software that will ever come into contact with Vista, even if it’s not used directly with Vista (for example hardware in a Macintosh computer or on a Linux server).

The ‘Executive Executive Summary makes things plain:

The Vista Content Protection specification could very well constitute the longest suicide note in history.

It’s very worthwhile reading. As Stafford-Fraser points out:

The good news is that you may be able to play Hollywood movies in high-definition on your Vista machine (as opposed to, say, on a dedicated DVD player). The bad news is that almost everything else about the PC platform will be made worse as a result.

John Naughton, author of the excellent A Brief History of the Future, has further comment:

The strange thing is that most of this DRM lunacy seems to have been created at the behest of the recording and movie industries. Microsoft is bigger than all of those companies combined…

Before Vista, I thought that anyone who willingly used a Microsoft
operating system was merely foolish; from now on, I think they will
have to be regarded as certifiable.

Like Chris Garrett, the spectre of Vista was what pushed me into switching to Ubuntu for my main OS – though my conversion was more successful than Chris’, who eventually went and bought a Mac.

The growth in number and sophistication of web services will further make the OS irrelevant. It’s perfectly possible to imagine a situation not too far in the future where all media, whether movies, music, tv, radio is all held online, accessible on demand. DRM won’t be an issue, because people can view the stuff they’ve paid for wherever they are. The sooner we get to that position, the better.

In the meantime, get yourself a quick, reliable and open operating system. And compared to Vista, Windows XP probably counts.

Technorati Tags: drm, vista, microsoft

Mike Arrington has opened up a storm of a debate over at TechCrunch, criticising the official Google blog for not allowing comments. He’s picking the issue up from a post by Zoli Erdos. He asks

Is a blog really a blog if there are no reader comments?

It’s an interesting question, but the answer is pretty obvious. Yes, of course it’s still a blog.

As Arrington notes, most definitions of a blog is a regularly updated website with content in reverse-chronological order. I reckon that’s about right.

Comments are nice, but not a requirement. John Naughton’s blog, for example, doesn’t have comments open, but that doesn’t make his site into something other than a blog. It’s not something I would personally do, but on a popular blog, the moderating of comments could turn into a serious business. If Google allowed comments on their blog, they’d probably have to employ someone full time just to deal with them.

And people can still comment on the articles, through their own blogs. Such comments will soon be found through Technorati, or Google’s own blog search.

Technorati Tags: google, blogs, techcrunch, zoli erdos

Just had the chance to get some new photos up on my Flickr account.

Here’s a view of the flooding we had in Llansantffraid earlier this month:

This is St. Bridget’s church in the village (Llansantffraid means ‘Church of St. Bridget’), where Jnr Briggs performed spectacularly as Joseph in the crib service on Christmas Eve:

And finally, here’s a shot of the lower part of the immense Pistyll Rhaeadr:

Hugh McCleod:

I am no longer interested in being a “professional blogger”, whatever that means. I like blogs, blogging and bloggers, but I think we’re in “post-revolution” times now. The train has already left the station. If you managed to get a seat on it, great. If not, it’s not that big a deal, either. There are plenty of other good ways of expressing yourself. Succeeding at that is far more important than what precise method you use.

Technorati Tags: hugh mcleod, blogging

I’ve been using Peformancing for FireFox, shortly to be rebranded as ScribeFire, for my last few posts on hyprtext, and my initial impressions are pretty good. It certainly fills the gap left when my switch to Ubuntu meant I could no longer use my beloved BlogJet.

It works, as I am sure most people know, as an extension to FireFox, that allows you to create blog posts by either clicking the little icon at the bottom right of the browser window, or by using the right-click context menu’s ‘Blog This’ option, which will insert a link to the current site into the editor, along with any text you have selected. Nice.

The Good

• Setting up blog accounts is very easy, and most settings are automatically detected
• FTP settings are easy to complete, making the posting of images very simple
• All the little extras are there when making your post: technorati tagging, automatically adding a post to your del.icio.us bookmarks, trackbacks, etc
• All the standard formatting is there, and it works very well, unlike quite a few rich text editors I could mention…
• You can save draft posts as ‘notes’ and finish them off later

The Bad

• Deleting notes doesn’t seem to require a clarification. I lost the first draft of this post that way.
• I can’t edit the way some automatic content appears. For example, in my Technorati tags, I’d like the “Technorati Tags: ” bit to appear in bold.
• The way line breaks are handled is a bit different to others – and the HTML view doesn’t insert <p> tags so it’s a bit tricky to know exactly what’s happening there

The Ugly

• I can’t add alternate text to images, or text links. This is very bad for accessibility.

In conclusion, I like PfF/ScribeFire and I’ll be using it as my blog editor from now on. Most of my ‘Bads’ were pretty pernickety, but those alternate text issues need sorting out quickly.

Technorati Tags: performancing for firefox, scribefire, review, blog editor

It looks like there will soon be a new contender in the hosted blog platform sphere. Blogsmith, the engine which was designed to run Weblogs Inc, Jason Calacanis‘ early blog network which was subsequently bought up by AOL.

WordPress seems to be the market leading platform at the moment, certainly among hardcore bloggers. It will be interesting to see whether Blogsmith’s imminent arrival will affect that service at all – especially in terms of the release of the awaited 2.1 release.

Blogsmith.com currently forwards to Brian Alvey’s blog. I’ll keep an eye on it, as it’s likely to change soon.

Technorati Tags: blogsmith, weblogs inc, calacanis, wordpress

Here’s the pathetic list of books I managed to read this year. Excuses: new job, wedding, house move.

11. The Prone Gunman – Jean-Patrick Manchette
10. He Died With His Eyes Open – Derek Raymond
9. The Damned United – David Peace
8. Four Stories – Alan Bennett
7. The Complete Talking Heads – Alan Bennett
6. Writing Home – Alan Bennett
5. Revolutionary Road – Richard Yates
4. Port Mungo – Patrick O’Brian
3. Newton (Brief Lives) – Peter Ackroyd
-. Virtual Light – William Gibson (abandoned)
2. The Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro (carried forward from 2005)
1. The Consolations of Philosophy – Alain de Botton (carried forward from 2005)

I want to watch this video in FireFox on Ubuntu. Anyone know how I can?

Technorati Tags: scobleshow, sam sethi, quicktime, ubuntu

There has been much discussion of late about Google’s antics in providing ‘tips’ at the top of searches. For example, try running a search on the word ‘blogging‘. What’s that, just under the sponsored links? A tip telling us to give Blogger a go! Not WordPress.com, or LiveJournal, or TypePad, but Blogger, Google’s own blogging platform. Hmmm.

There have been loads of posts about this issue, but more attention was gathered when Blake Ross, FireFox founder and all-round good guy, blogged about it:

Google is now displaying “tips” that point searchers to Google Calendar, Blogger and Picasa for any search phrase that includes “calendar” (e.g. Yahoo calendar), “blog” and “photo sharing,” respectively. This is clearly bad for competitors, and it’s also a bad sign for Google. But I generally support anything that benefits users, even if it’s controversial. I believe, for instance, that shipping Internet Explorer with Windows was a good move. So why are tips bad for users?
…
I care that Google is doing it because the company’s integrity over the years has impressed me and earned my loyalty.

Dave Winer, who was at the very least heavily involved in the development and propogation of RSS and related technologies, makes a further point:

I stopped believing in Google fairplay when they added a Blog-This feature to their toolbar, and didn’t use open APIs so users could post with any blogging tool, not just Google’s. To be clear, I wouldn’t have objected if they had set the default to work with their tool, as long as users could change a preference to use it with other tools.

Absolutely right – the ‘Blog-This’ function on the Google Toolbar was enough to make me remove it in annoyance. Why add a feature if it turns users away? A similar example is the fact that Picasa will only upload photos to Google’s piss-poor web albums, and not other sites like Flickr or PhotoBucket.

So why are people pissed off with Google? After all, they are a corporate company – and a damn big one. Surely they can do whatever they like in the interests of themselves? That’s what business is about, right? It’s like the decision to collude with the Chinese government in the censorship of search results. Whatever helps Google get ahead in its chosen markets is ok.

But as Ross points out, Google was meant to be different. That mantra of ‘Don’t be evil’ meant something to a lot of people and played a part in the huge and rapid growth of the company. Google were seen as the good guys, and continue to position themselves in that way in their competition with Microsoft. But the tides appear to be turning in popular opinion.

Matt Cutts – who plays a similar role for Google that Scoble did for Microsoft when he worked there – has responded to the barrage of criticism the search giant has received on this issue, and generally, he’s in agreement with the criticisms. He notes several searches where unwanted and irrelevant tips have appeared, and concludes that,

In each of the previous cases, I was not in the market for a blog or calendar or photo sharing service. Furthermore, the triggers appear to match on substrings: if I type in “blogoscoped”, I’m looking for Philipp, not to create a blog. The poor targeting alone is enough reason to turn off these tips (if I had my way).

He also agrees that it is reasonable for users to expect more of Google:

…it’s a fact that people expect more from Google than other companies. People compare other search engines to Google, but people compare Google to perfection. We have such passionate users that they’ll complain loudly if they think Google is ever straying from the right path. If you’re a Googler, it may feel frustrating. Instead, I’d choose to be grateful, because that passionate feedback keeps our heads on straight. When our users yell at Google, they care and want us to do the right thing (for their idea of what the right thing is). What other company gets that kind of feedback? Besides, if Yahoo or Microsoft jumped off a building, would you jump off too? 🙂 So yes, if the decision were up to me, I’d remove these tips or scale them way back by making sure that they are very relevant and targeted.

Let’s hope that whoever is in charge of the introduction of these tips into Google’s results soon sees the light and gets rid of them. They aren’t tips, they are advertisements.

Technorati Tags: google, blake ross, matt cutts, dave winer

I wrote a couple of days ago about the purchase of Performancing Metrics by PayPerPost. The Performancing blog editor and advertising partnership programme were to be continued by the same team under different banners.

Well, the blog editor is now going to be called ScribeFire, which is a nice enough name. You can still download the editor (which is a FireFox plugin) from the Mozilla site, under its previous banner.

Since my switch to Ubuntu, I’m on the lookout for a new editor. I didn’t get on with PfF the first time round – it kept asking me to put my password in all the time which got annoying. I might give it another go now.

[tags]performancing for firefox, scribefire, blog editors[/tags]