Greg Cohn's (Other) Blog

"Second, even though we’ve been quiet about it, we have been working on new versions of..."

Fri, 24 May 2013 11:27:32 -0400

“Second, even though we’ve been quiet about it, we have been working on new versions of NetNewsWire for Mac, iPhone, and iPad. We have some great new features and a modern design that we can’t wait to show you.”

- The Return of NetNewsWire

Did anyone else see this? Back to 2005 — and happily!

"In the midst of the major press blitz surrounding its annual I/O Conference, Google dropped some..."

Fri, 24 May 2013 11:24:06 -0400

“In the midst of the major press blitz surrounding its annual I/O Conference, Google dropped some unfortunate news about its instant messaging plans. In several places around the web, the company is replacing the existing “Talk” platform with a new one called “Hangouts” that sharply diminishes support for the open messaging protocol known as XMPP (or sometimes informally Jabber), and also removes the option to disable the archiving of all chat communications. These changes represent a switch from open protocols to proprietary ones, and a clear step backward for many users.”

- Google Abandons Open Standards for Instant Messaging | Electronic Frontier Foundation

"According to a sales rep for a midwest data co-location and analytics startup who asked to remain..."

Thu, 23 May 2013 16:59:09 -0400

“According to a sales rep for a midwest data co-location and analytics startup who asked to remain anonymous, regional hospitals, insurers, and grocery retailers are already investigating ways to work together to translate consumer purchase data into health risk profiling insights.”

- You are your data: The scary future of the quantified self movement | PandoDaily

Flickr, Vimeo integration likely to bolster social ties in iOS 7 | 9to5Mac

Thu, 23 May 2013 11:39:29 -0400

Flickr, Vimeo integration likely to bolster social ties in iOS 7 | 9to5Mac:

Flickr 2.0 could be the camel’s nose of a revamped Yahoo! ID/login strategy. Discuss.

"Another unconventional tip Sperans offered was for VCs to show some love. Doing well in venture..."

Thu, 23 May 2013 00:42:23 -0400

“Another unconventional tip Sperans offered was for VCs to show some love. Doing well in venture requires a certain disposition toward the work, a high level of passion, and a love for ones’ partners and team members. Though he conceded love is not a word one hears much in the business context, Sperans says it is something that matters, is rare, and can’t be faked.”

- LPs to VCs: Cut Fund Size, Show Us the Money and Stop Lying | peHUBpeHUB

Force-feed. #justfuckingdisgusting

Thu, 23 May 2013 00:37:58 -0400

Force-feed. #justfuckingdisgusting

Congratulations LA tech community - LA has a new...

Wed, 22 May 2013 09:17:58 -0400

Congratulations LA tech community - LA has a new mayor, @ericgarcetti! I’m excited by what’s to come.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ln-garcetti-wins-race-for-mayor-20130522,0,6850215.story

"Looking back on Larry Page’s tenure as CEO, I don’t know if it’s a coincidence but it seems..."

Tue, 21 May 2013 17:11:53 -0400

“Looking back on Larry Page’s tenure as CEO, I don’t know if it’s a coincidence but it seems reasonable to believe that, unlike Eric Schmidt, Page does not believe in open standards or an open Internet. Google has, in just a few short months, dropped support for open standards en masse, including RSS, XMPP, iCal/CalDav, and Podcasts (Listen). Additionally, other services are being forcefully “integrated” into Google , which has no complete public API and no interoperability with other systems. Google, is, in other words, the new AOL: A silo separate from the open web, with very limited interoperability.”

- Leaving Google’s silo: Alternatives to Gmail, Talk, Calendar, and more | Ken Kinder

"Singhal said users who activate Hangouts on Gmail can continue to make calls by reverting their..."

Mon, 20 May 2013 17:40:23 -0400

“Singhal said users who activate Hangouts on Gmail can continue to make calls by reverting their accounts back to Google Talk instead. Of course, the downside to this is they will not be able to use the new Hangouts service, but Singhal said Google will soon make the ability to make outgoing calls available through Hangouts.”

- Google vows to support Voice within new Hangouts app - latimes.com

Usability FTW.

spiegelman: I recently saw Eric Garcetti bowl seven strikes in...

Mon, 20 May 2013 16:09:19 -0400

spiegelman:

I recently saw Eric Garcetti bowl seven strikes in a row. It was at a campaign event just before the primary election, at the Spare Room in the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. Eric’s technique is probably better suited to discus throwing. He hurls the ball with such force that by the time it makes contact with the ground it’s already halfway down the lane. The momentum of his own arm lifts both his feet off the ground, so that for a moment he bobs in the air like a buoy. I’m not sure the pins get knocked down so much as they dive out of the way of Eric’s throw in fear of obliteration. The frames that were not strikes were all spares, except for one, which was an eight.

If you want to know about Eric Garcetti’s actual achievements in office, about how, during his terms representing East Hollywood, Silver Lake, Echo Park and Atwater Village on the City Council, those neighborhoods transformed from gang-ridden cesspools into some of the most dynamic and desirable areas of Los Angeles, go ahead and Google that. I support Eric for that, and also for a handful of other small details you might think are unrelated to the skills you need as Mayor of Los Angeles, but which I think demonstrate something essential.

Here are some additional minor data points.

Eric Garcetti dances like a Jewish kid who grew up in the Valley —which is to say, really well. Jewish kids from the Valley are raised on hip hop. At some point everyone had a home video that taught you how to breakdance. You showed off for girls at bar mitzvahs by demonstrating the moves you spent months learning in secret. At some point Eric mastered the pop and lock. He will bust it out with little provocation. The professional dancing crew that inaugurated the South Los Angeles campaign office was genuinely impressed.

The first time I heard Eric Garcetti speak was at a fundraiser for his City Council reelection campaign in 2005. I remember it well because I embarrassed myself. Eric was talking to the room about the history of Spanish missions in California, and he asked “How many of you here have been to the mission of Los Angeles?” I was the only person to raise a hand. He looked me dead in the eye and said, “That was a trick question. There was no Los Angeles mission.” While I shrunk back cringing into the crowd he went on to explain why this was, and demonstrated what I would come to realize was an encyclopedic knowledge of the history of Los Angeles.

Before the Mayoral campaign, when he had a bit more free time, Eric Garcetti would never turn down a game of Lexulous, the Facebook equivalent of the Scrabble knock-off Words With Friends. He’s the only person I cannot beat at that game.

Steve Lopez, the usually cantankerous columnist for the Los Angeles times seems genuinely won over by Eric Garcetti, which is something, because Steve Lopez doesn’t ever seem to get won over by anything. Here’s one of his typically acerbic passages, from January: “Since my knee replacement surgery less than two weeks ago, I’ve been popping narcotic painkillers that come with long lists of potential side effects. Among them are vomiting, hallucinating and impaired thinking. It is perhaps that third one that made me feel compelled to write about the race for mayor of Los Angeles.”

But jump ahead to last week, when Lopez admitted that he is “humbled” by Eric Garcetti’s experiences. “He’s George Plimpton, Bono and Seinfeld’s Mr. Peterman all rolled into one,” wrote Lopez about Eric. “When he says: ‘And then there was the time I commandeered a snowmobile at the North Pole while on a climate-change fact-finding mission and located Salma Hayek’s lost purse in the frozen tundra,’ he’s not kidding.” You may detect a hint of sarcasm, but the fact that it’s only a hint is telling.

The title of Steve Lopez’s article is “You name it, Eric Garcetti has done it.” But that misses the point. From what I’ve seen, you name it, Eric Garcetti can do it. You might be tempted to dismiss him as one of those annoying guys who is good at everything, until you realize that he’s not good at everything, he’s only good at the things he loves —but he loves a lot of things. He loves service, he loves Los Angeles, he loves the pop and lock. And the thing about someone who has that kind of heart, who gives his all to the things he loves until he masters them, that sort of heart is infectious. It wins people over. Even curmudgeons like Steve Lopez.

The office of Mayor in Los Angeles is not like the office of Mayor in New York or Chicago. In eastern cities, the executive is invested with large amounts of unchecked authority. Eastern mayors, to some extent, rule by decree. Not so in Los Angeles, which spreads executive power over several independent bodies and offices. To be successful as mayor here, you have to exercise what they call “soft power,” which Wikipedia describes succinctly as “the ability to attract and co-opt rather than coerce.” The secret to soft power is winning people over. The secret to winning people over is to demonstrate a lot of heart.

There are specific reasons I’m in the tank for Eric Garcetti. I think he’s a leader. Not only do I think he’s the leader that Los Angeles needs, I think he’s the leader everyone needs. I want to see what he can do as Mayor. Please join me in voting for him tomorrow.

"They want everything; their ambition is boundless."

Wed, 15 May 2013 20:46:37 -0400

“They want everything; their ambition is boundless.”

- Daring Fireball

"Why go anonymous? As artists currently working in the industry we felt constricted by social, media..."

Wed, 15 May 2013 16:09:11 -0400

“Why go anonymous?
As artists currently working in the industry we felt constricted by social, media and political laws when experimenting with the music making process. We didn’t want to carry the baggage or expectations from our other projects. Preserving our anonymity allowed us more freedom as we were able to break from today’s paradigm without people expecting a certain sound or identity. Also, this cult of personality is too prevalent in today’s culture. We want to focus solely on the music and product. In an era where no one cares whether Big Brother is watching them, we prefer to remain hidden behind the music.”

- Exclusive Interview: Black Tooth | Death and Taxes

I was interested to know more about what they were up to, so I wrote back and asked. After a week of correspondence, I learned that they are organizing a program to intercept mobile application data, with specific interest in monitoring:

Tue, 14 May 2013 00:45:06 -0400

I was interested to know more about what they were up to, so I wrote back and asked. After a week of correspondence, I learned that they are organizing a program to intercept mobile application data, with specific interest in monitoring:
Mobile Twitter
Viber
Line
WhatsApp

"Hackers are the animals that can detect a storm coming or an earthquake. They just know, even though..."

Thu, 09 May 2013 02:48:10 -0400

“Hackers are the animals that can detect a storm coming or an earthquake. They just know, even though they don’t know why, and there are two big things hackers are excited about now and can’t articulate why–Bitcoin and 3D printing.”

- WSJ: Coinbase Nabs $5M in Biggest Funding for Bitcoin Startup (via seanbonner)

"We’ll look a lot more like China than America after this,” Mr. Gidari said."

Wed, 08 May 2013 21:19:21 -0400

““We’ll look a lot more like China than America after this,” Mr. Gidari said.”

- Obama May Back F.B.I. Plan to Wiretap Web Users - NYTimes.com

"Schmidt then explained that Roubini’s assessment of the future was not one he agreed with...."

Tue, 07 May 2013 12:35:15 -0400

“Schmidt then explained that Roubini’s assessment of the future was not one he agreed with. “I think you’re describing a world of tracking which I think is highly unlikely to occur, because people will be upset about it in the same way you are,” Schmidt said. “Governments won’t allow it, and it’ll be bad business. And ultimately, in a competitive market, companies want the consumers to be happy. So it’s true tracking in this context…you’re taking a much broader view of the word [‘tracking’] than any I would use. A situation where you go to people and say, ‘Oh, here’s our phone, and we’re going to track you to death,’ people are not going to buy that phone. It’s just a bad business model.””

- Google’s Eric Schmidt On Data Privacy: The Internet Needs A Delete Button | Fast Company | Business Innovation

Orly?

"Though Google finally launched its Gmail iOS app way back in November 2011, thus far links to the..."

Tue, 07 May 2013 12:26:48 -0400

“Though Google finally launched its Gmail iOS app way back in November 2011, thus far links to the likes of Google Maps have opened up in the browser, rather than the app. Now, with version 2.2.7182 (yup!), all links shared through the email client will open in their respective apps – this includes YouTube, Chrome and Google Maps.”

- Gmail for iOS now links directly to native YouTube, Google Maps and Chrome apps - The Next Web

Interesting move.

"Dr. Berg, who does salivary research at the University of Washington, said the new findings..."

Tue, 07 May 2013 08:00:06 -0400

“Dr. Berg, who does salivary research at the University of Washington, said the new findings underscore something he has been telling his patients for years, that “saliva is your friend.” It contains enzymes, proteins, electrolytes and other beneficial substances, some of which can perhaps be passed from parent to child.”

- Sucking Your Child’s Pacifier Clean May Have Benefits - NYTimes.com

"We determine the people you might enjoy following based on your recent visits to websites in the..."

Tue, 07 May 2013 01:21:49 -0400

“We determine the people you might enjoy following based on your recent visits to websites in the Twitter ecosystem (sites that have integrated Twitter buttons or widgets). Specifically, our feature works by suggesting people who are frequently followed by other Twitter users that visit the same websites.”

- Twitter Help Center | About tailored suggestions

I didn’t know about this, did you?

laughingsquid: Share Tonx With Mom

Sun, 05 May 2013 08:00:19 -0400

laughingsquid:

Share Tonx With Mom