Attending RailsConf and/or CabooseConf? Join FiveRuns to see Penn & Teller perform at the Rio on Tuesday night.
We’ve got transportation and 40 tickets to catch Penn & Teller at the Rio on Tuesday night. Want to join us? Drop your name in the… hat. Okay, it’s not a hat, but you get the idea.
Enter your name before 8am Tuesday morning; winners will be notified by 10am via email.
See you in Las Vegas!
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@juliegomoll – more of a tweak at those who ‘left behind’ long-form-blogs and now only do short-form-tweets
housekeeping on my blog. remember blogs? so last … decade? years?
not sleeping. the day is still running through my head.
Finding Paths Through the Worlds Photos (via webware.com) is a stunning example of stitching together collections of 2d photos and navigating them in 3d.I can’t help but be reminded of the scene from Blade Runner where the main character takes what appears to be a 2d photo, enhances and looks around a corner (or similar). I always thought that special effect failed – how would we ever pull that off… But, this demo is creeping up on that idea.Separately, because the demo stitches together lots of different photos from different sources, there are several examples of people quickly appearing & disappearing as the narrator navigates the 3d space. This is another example of an effect I’ve seen where you can visit a place and find traces of who was there before – there are some iPhone applications that let you do this with notes and photos. Are we assembling technology stacks to make our own pseudo-ghosts?
I had an interesting discussion with Kelly Looney today regarding positioning. Based on his experience, (as I interpret it )positioning starts with identifying and sharing a world-view and then describing what you do (of benefit), in the context of that world-view.
For me, it seems an interesting pattern to use to compose a simple pitch of an idea (e.g. for a startup). So, here’s some attempts to try that pattern out:
(worldview) Desktop apps and Web-based apps will co-exist for the foreseeable future. The web-based application market is strong + beyond conventional desktop browser access, access continues to improve (e.g. iPhone and other mobile web devices). At the same time, there is a resurgence in elegant desktop applications for the Mac – and their ease of use and aesthetics are unbeatable. Right now, it’s a frequent forced commitment to choose (for a particular function) between working on the desktop or in the clouds. The longer this goes on, the more important it will be to banish that artificial choice – and allow both transparently.
(benefit) We build productivity applications that transparently offer the best for your use regardless of whether your are on a Mac or via the web – we take care of making everything work together.
(worldview) There are often repeated patterns (e.g of activity, thought, etc.) that occur across many disciplines. Recognition and sharing of those patterns will have some unknown and unexpected benefits.
(benefit) We have developed an open community system where patterns are documented, explained, discussed, organized and connected to actual uses in the real world.
Nice.
There seems to be more and more instances of platforms appearing which raise the level at which people can create, manipulate and share rich content in a rich context.
Sophie appears to be another interesting entry, in addition to Croquet and the etoys work in Squeak.
I love the start-up environment – in part because of what happens when we ‘drink the kool-aid’, but at the same time I also value ‘fail-it-fast’ pragmatism.
I haven’t found an eloquent way to think about or express this conflict – until I randomly came across an interview with Scott Brave from Baynote Inc. on folksonomy.org (quoted below without permission):
On the topic of discussion we had last week Scott regarding how do entrepreneurs draw the line between the “never give up†philosophy and “cut your losses short†philosophy, can you share your insights?
I don’t think they are mutually exclusive, actually. You want both, but at different levels. If your high-level goal is to create a successful company or express a particular vision that excites you, then you should always keep a “never give up attitude†in working toward that goal. But at the level of implementation or tactics, you may find yourself taking the wrong approach at some point—that’s the time to “cut your losses short.†But you don’t give up on your high-level goal. You just find a new, better approach to achieve it.
It’s similar to the difference between the “just go for it†attitude and taking a “more considered†stance: also not mutually exclusive. You want the “just go for it†attitude at the level of your goals, but a more careful attitude toward the specific approach you take to achieve those goals. You don’t want to over think things either, though. You collect all of the information you can and analyze it carefully, but in the end you may just have to trust your gut.
Different levels: strategic versus tactical – that’s the missing piece!
Parsing it out according to these distinctions will improve my response to the chaotic enthusiasm that sometimes happens in start-ups. Channel the wild-eyed enthusiasm to the strategic level & use it to create the context for pragmatic/realistic execution. They both inform each other.
