My Personal Infocloud
So
It was recently reported that Google cedes Chilean village to Argentina where a mis-drawn country border is the culprit. One of many such mishaps in my experience.
Closer to home, my wife was trying to get directions to a roller rink were one of my daughter's friends was having a birthday party. When the in-vehicle navigation system failed to find the destination, she called me on her mobile. I plugged the info into Google Maps, only for Google to display three different destinations all with the exact same address. None of which, by the way, was the actual venue. Curiously, if you searched on the actual address that it returned, a more forthright response of “We were not able to locate the address” was given.
Granted, there has been some growth in that area and Google might not have caught up with the change. It would also be nice if they had a link on the page that would let you indicate that the directions are bogus and even offer a correction. While I could see that such a feature could be abused (a competitor could modify an address to point to it rather than the actual business) it would certainly go a long way toward fixing misdirected directions.
Newness doesn't explain all of the anomalies. The in-vehicle navigation system claims that there is no such place as the Cincinnati Zoo (established in 1875 and the second oldest zoo in the country) but thoughtfully directs us to 'the nearest zoo' in circileville, west virginia. Google gets the location of the Cincy Zoo horribly wrong as well — 'A' is actually the entry gate to the zoo (though curiously listed as “Cincinnati Zoo Academy High School”) and “C” is clearly no where near the actual zoo location. Room for improvement, indeed.
Technorati Tags: google, maps, gps, navigation, suckage, cincinnati
So
Spain's Solar Power generation tower is an amazing piece of engineering that can generate 11 Megawatts of power without emitting any greenhouse gas. Apparently it is quite a thing to see as well.
Technorati Tags: spain, solarpower, alternateenergy
So
This came up in the Olympus E-Systems Community on Flickr in a somewhat tongue-in-cheek discussion on “How to Dramatically Improve Your Photography With Ease”. It is so spot on that I had to repost it here:
I've done the Flickr circle of life myself (like I think you've done), the 12 step process so to speak...
1. join Flickr
2. take pictures & post
3. hope to get feedback
4. get feed back
5. give feedback
6. make Explore for the first time
7. join some “theme groups”
8. strive to get on Explore so more
9. become disillusioned with all the steps above
10. become jaded
11. stop giving a sh!7 what others say.
12. start taking photos for *you*
I have seen a number of people who seemed to really enjoy photography then jump on the Flickr treadmill and become absolutely obsessed. It's as if photography becomes hard work and they think that the only 'good' photos are staged black and white shots with lots of photoshopped blurs and streaks in them. Basically, rather than doing something creative they wind up copying what is supposed to be 'fine art photography' which personally I find to be stilted, self-referential, overly nostalgic and ultimately monotonous.
Granted, my photos aren't going to win any awards any time soon, but then again, I am at step 12. I enjoy photography, it hasn't become my new identity.
Technorati Tags: flickr, photography, ideas
So
It's like 'take you camera to work day' (assuming you have a job outside the house and work on Saturdays). It's 24 Hours of Flickr. Basically, document your day in photos on May 5th, 2007 and then post the best shot to the pool of the same name on Flickr.
What happens around the world in one day? In a word – life. Here on Flickr, photographers are sharing what they see: snapping daily moments, recording history, telling stories, capturing beauty.
To celebrate this global community, we invite you to join us in “24 Hours of Flickr” – a day-long global photo project. On May 5, 2007, grab your camera and whatever else you need, and chronicle your day in pictures. The group's photos will be featured at Flickr events around the world this summer and in a companion book, which will contain a selection of photographs chosen from the group (more about this soon!).
It's interesting that they intend to publish a companion book of shots — so this may be your chance for fame and fortune (if thats your thing).
Technorati Tags: flickr, photography, 24hoursofflickr, community
So
I think the outcome of this would have been very different if this happened somewhere in the US like New York City or Los Angeles.
So
Wired has a longish story about how the CIA used a made-up science fiction movie to smuggle six Americans out of Iran. Strange, but true (I presume).
So
Not sure I completely buy the premise of this post: 'Is iPhone Anticipation slowing Cingular Smartphone Sales?'. Sounds like the Osborne Effect, applied to mobile phones. While I am confident that there is a lot of interest in the coming iPhone — I, for one, would have bought a Nokia N75 last Friday (though I prefer the N73) if Cingular was able to keep it up on their site for more than a few hours before pulling it for some undisclosed reason.
The iPhone is slick looking, but how well does it work as a phone? And when will the closed nature of the iPhone be addressed? Nokia has always delivered a solid product that never loses site of the fact that it is a phone first.
I look forward to moving my existing apps on my aging but still functional Nokia 6620 over to an N-series phone once they become available. The extensibility of the Symbian platform used by Nokia is a big plus for me and one that Apple is going to need to match if they want my business.
Technorati Tags: nokia, nseries, apple, iphone, cingular, n75
So
As a long time user of tinyurl — a web-based tool that lets you smash down those long, ugly, line-wrapping URLs that some sites generate into something much smaller and more manageable, I was curious when I saw a new offering called dwarfURL.
It looks like dwarfURL is the same idea, but adds the ability to track the number of times that the dwarfed link has been clicked on. If you are into stats on your shared links, this might be of interest.
So
The Guardian has an interesting followup on the whole 'mobile phones are killing all the bees' meme. Basically, the researcher from the original report claims 'we never said any of that'. The first clue should have been that the research was not done on cellphones and towers but cordless phones used in the home where there is (or should be) a decidedly smaller bee population than in the wild.
Shocked. Shocked I am that the press would sensationalize something to make a profit.
Technorati Tags: press, suckage, bees, cellphones