Google+

Google launches all out social networking assault with Google (video)
source: Engadget

Ok, I watched the 7 videos about Google+ on the engadget article above. Here is a snapshot of my thoughts:

Overall, I'm not opposed to a Google run social network. I generally like Google stuff, and for the most part, I have no love of Facebook.

Circles - Nice UI, but still in the video, this feels like how an engineer views relationships. And since Circles seems largely designed to control who sees what you share, the sheer number of circles seems like overkill. I'm sure there are some people that will just go nuts with this and create 100 different groups of their friends, but I'd have to think most people are going to have maybe 4? Work, Friends 1, Friends 2, and Family? I mean how much are people sharing that they need to subdivide down their content beyond that? And since circles aren't going to overlap perfectly, you can run into some thorny issues at the 2nd and 3rd degree levels as people slowly figure out what groups you've put them in. to me, categorizing your friends is probably something best left in Jr. High.

Also people like Anthony Weiner are going to get themselves in so much trouble with circles when they post the wrong thing to the wrong group.

The dude in the video that isn't sure he can "take on another friend". Dude, if your contemplating it that deeply, it's probably not a friend, it's probably just an aquaintence... And if you're getting that stressed about it, maybe social media isn't for you.

The hangout video chat looks interesting. I could see myself using this for meetings. I think just being a geek, I'd like to try and play some sort of group game over it, once. This could have possibilities though. A workable, Personal Chat Roulette of people you know, hopefully without the penises.

What's up with that dancing couple? And dude, those are some skinny jeans, still I'm sure that dance is something they can treasure forever.

Instant Upload. Picture and video sharing, that's cool. Document sharing too? that could be interesting if combined with Google Docs. That could make the wiki dream a reality. (there was nothing in the video that i saw about docs, but I can dream)

Sparks. Basically looks like a very sharable Google Search crossed with Google Reader Recommended Items. Not really revolutionary, but looks convenient and useful.

Explore Settings. uhg, brain hurts, so many privacy settings, so complicated. The ability to view your profile as how one of your friends would see it is nice if you're crazy mad into drawing circles around everyone I suppose.

Mobile. Mobile app and the android integration looks promising. Being that i just got an Android phone and being that millions of people have and will be buying android phones, this looks to be Google's best vector of attack to actually get people to start using this stuff.

Looking forward to giving this a look see, but I don't see it taking on Facebook quite yet. Gotta give it up to Google though, they just keep trying this social thing over and over and over again...

829/365 - JAFAX
source: Jennifer\'s 365 Project

Jennifer has a short little recap of Saturday: Jafax and Adam and Comfort being over. Plus she's got this great pic of Leki laying on his back in my lap.

Leki is a lazy figher he'll lay on in my lap on is back, all 4 paws in the air and fight my hands, but he'll make pretty much no attempt at all to escape.

Archos unveils bare-bones Arnova 7 Android tablet, priced at $99
source: Engadget

Really interesting price point. At $99, these devices become impulse buys.

Archos has the retail presence to at least get these into Kmart and Sears (is Archos at Walmart?)

Above spec makes a fine enough ereader, portable video unit, and with a little light tweaking can read comics as well.

I watched this All Things D interview with Marc Andresen this morning. A member of the audience asked him what he thinks about connected TVs. Andresen seemed excited by the space. Even told the story of a friends small child who walked up to the TV, swiped it, and said the TV was broke.

I watched that above 1 hour video, streamed full screen from the internet on my iPad 2.

I've been sick today. Making some wonderful hacking noises, got that all over achy body feeling, mild headache in the back of my head-- A pretty typical 1 to 3 day summer cold. Any way I stayed home from work, and not once have I turned on our rather nice, respectable sized TV.

Not because, like the little girl in the story says that it's broke because you can't swipe on it, but because it's broke because it doesn't have the content I want. The video's, articles and podcasts that I want aren't on the TV, they're on the internet.

Granted we have an iMac hooked to the TV, so in theory I could get most of that content on the TV too, but I don't read articles by sitting 8 feet from the screen, I don't twitter sitting 8 feet from a screen, I don't check facebook sitting 8 foot from a screen, and I don't want to Google things sitting 8 feet from a screen.

It's nice to watch video on a big screen that's 8 foot away, but you can watch video on a 10 inch screen that's 16 inches away too. And then you can switch easily between all those activities listed above.

So I'm not sure about the connected TV. I think it will happen, but it might just be that instead of sitting around a single screen, 8 feet away, in the future we'll all hold our own screens, and maybe, if I want to watch or see the same thing that someone else in the same room with me is watching, they'll be an app for that. Maybe we'll be able to share the same experience on several tiny screens instead of just one big one.

Maybe the TV isn't broke because you can't swipe it, maybe it's broke because it's not personal and versatile enough, maybe the future of the living room is already here on the edges, in the form of tablets, and maybe instead of finding ways to replicate them on TVs, maybe we should be working even harder to make our personal screens, the tablets, share their current experience with each other.

Or maybe I'm rambling incoherently from the cold medication. What do you think?

Green Lantern Movie

I went with friends and saw the Green Lantern movie yesterday. I was cautiously excited about this film. After the first few trailers I started avoiding the advertising because I didn't want to spoil every scene, so for the most part I got to see the movie without too much pre-movie over hype.

From the start of the film I was not disappointed. The opening set piece with Abin Sur was great. The movie takes some liberties with various events, but it gets the core corps concepts and characters spot on and it lays out a rich superhero sci-fi universe that is as much as a fanboy could ask of a translation of this material.

Story-wise the outer space stuff works really really well, the Earth stuff less so, for the most part the failings of the Earth side of the story are pretty standard tendencies of the modern genre movie to overly tie the character's histories and origins to each other and to make the lead actress someone who saves the hero even if such actions are so implausible and forced as to jar you out of the story.

And on the topic of Carol Ferris, While Blake Lively is attractive, she doesn't pull off Carol's needed competency and intelligence and while admittedly, she isn't given very deep material to work with, she doesn't even meet up to the quality of acting you'd typically see from any given Smallville guest star actress. The bad acting makes the constant saving of hal by her even less plausible.

That set aside, when it comes to the GL stuff, the constructs are fantastic in both light and sound. The flying animation are superb and as if out of a dream. And the costume that admittedly looks lort of meh in stills, comes alive on screen with it's pulsing and rthyming green charges of energy.

[spoilers ahead]

There are numerous comic touches I enjoyed: Giving Carol the call sign Sapphire, having Green Lantern and Carol at the fancy dress party (a staple of the 60s for some reason). Hal's call sign "Highball", the locker room, Hal arguing with the Guardians, Kilowog's repetitious use of the word "Poozer". the essence of hector's jealousy of Hal. The fact that we got an onscreen Tomar Re at all. Much less such a great portrayal. Hal's giant fist constructs. Lots of great stuff in there for the GL fan.

I even like how the Krona story got merged with the Parallax story, it's a much tighter story than it was in the comics.

All in all I really enjoyed the film, and very likely will try to see it in the Theater again, perhaps in 3D even.

The frog looked around.

It was getting hot.

He looked at the room. It couldn't be the room, it's the same room he had been in for some time.

But it was getting hot.

He looked at the clock. It couldn't be the clock, the room was always more or less the same temperature day or night for a good while now.

But it was getting hot.

He looked at the pool of water. It was the same pool of water, it was the same water he'd been in for the last good while. it couldn't be the water.

But it was getting hot.

The frog listened. There was more noise than usual, and people running here and there. But how could that be anything? People running can't make it hot can they?

It *was* getting hot.

Every now and then one of the people running here and there would run by, and bump the, the, the... hmm what did they call it? the 'stove'? Yes, they would bump the 'stove', and it would get a little more hot.

It was getting so very hot.

"It's the people!" the frog exclaimed, "it's the people that are making it hot!"

It was getting so very hot now.

From the corner of the room up on the sil, there came a "Tsk, Tsk" from the cat.

"Who, who is that, Why do you tsk, tsk me Mr. Cat? Is it not the people that are making it hot?" said the Frog.

"I suppose, I suppose they are indeed making it hot Mr Frog.", replied the Cat.

"The why do you tsk, tsk me Mr. Cat? It is the people's fault, they bump the, the stove and they are making it hot!"

"I suppose, I suppose that, that is true Mr. Frog", came the cheshire's reply.

"Then again, why do you tsk tsk me if you do not disagree with my exclaim that the people are to blame!"

"tsk, tsk, Mr. Frog. While it's true that the people are the ones bumping the stove and making it hot..." answered the cat.

"Yes, yes I am not wrong!" said the Frog.

"... I tsk, tsk you because you have not jumped out of the pot." came the cat's sly reply.

The frog looked around at his pool of water, it was in a good rolling bubble and boil now, he was beginning to cook. Like the word "stove" he did not know, he wondered, what is this word: "Pot?"

"tsk, tsk" said the cat perched on his window sil, "They only know the world pool, they don't know the word pot."