The Big Klosowski

From Shine comes a great article on how NOT to use Twitter.  Here’s a two I thought were pretty apt.

DM People Who Just Start Following You With an Advertisement for Your Company

I can’t tell you how many messages I got from people after my following binge that said something like “Thanks for following me back! Want to make lots of money? Let me show you how http://spammy-scammy-stuff.com”.

SERIOUSLY? Is that the very first thing that comes out of your mouth at conferences or networking events? No? Then why the HECK would you do that on Twitter?!

People Who Just Tweet Out but Don’t Respond to Others

This annoyance is definitely a very fine line — I really don’t care if this is how you want to use Twitter – this is a free country (and a free Internet). And there are some people who I still follow who do this — but that’s because their tweets are either still valuable or interesting. I have to REALLY like you to follow you when you aren’t willing to engage in the conversation – but for the most part, it comes off as elitist to me and I don’t have time for that.

If you don’t get Twitter I understand, but then don’t use Twitter.  By the way, you can always find me on twitter at http://twitter.com/thebigklosowski – I won’t spam you, much!  :-)

TechRadar.com has another great article detailing the 10 features the iPhone needs to beat Android.

While I think features like “Shake to Shuffle” would be a pain (think about jogging), there are a few I particularly agree with.

Cut and Paste
Why, oh why has it taken Apple so long to add this? It’s frustrating that you can’t do it, and it’s so obvious how it would work on the multi-touch screen – just tap and hold, then drag your finger over a block of text to select it. That functionality is currently reserved for the magnifying glass, but that could easily be shifted to a double-tap.

A better camera with a flash
This is a no-brainer. The next iPhone will have to have a better camera, or we’re going to bin it without even opening the box (possibly). The current 2-megapixel effort just isn’t up to the job. Oh, and we also want a flash to brighten up those dull indoor shots, too.

Video recording
When your mate’s phone (that he got free) can record video you know it’s no longer a premium feature. Without the ability to record video iPhone owners are second-class citizens in the mobile phone world. Come on Apple, sort it out.

Picture messaging (MMS)
See above. Just because nobody in the US wants to send picture messages doesn’t mean everybody in Europe has suddenly changed the way they’ve been using mobile phones for years.

They also list “Stationary in Email”, but I’m most concerned with the ability to have HTML signatures that are per-account, like they are in Mail.app

Saturday, Pandora founder Tim Westergren issued a “call to arms” to its listeners. He pleaded with fans and supporters of the popular music-streaming service to urge their State Representative to vote for the Webcaster Settlement Act of 2008. This Act would give web radio broadcasters more time to negotiate outrageous royalty fees that have caused some to go out of business and put many more under the same pressure.

A sigh of relief has been heard across the web, as that bill has been passed in the House. This means that Pandora gets a brief reprieve.

The NAB dropped their efforts to eliminate the bill after a Saturday night meeting with Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.) that addressed some of the groups concerns. Additionally, the NAB has expressed that they will not oppose the bill when it moves to the Senate. When NAB’s efforts stopped, the bill was able to pass unanimously through the House according to CNET.

Hopefully, the flood of Pandora listeners that stepped to the plate through sites like SaveNetRadio.org helped Congress understand what was really at stake.

But there are rumors that NPR played a major role in saving internet radio by cutting some last minute deals with legislators to appease traditional broadcasters.

The Act will allow web radio broadcasters to negotiate with the music industry only while Congress is out of session. They have until February 15th to settle upon a new royalty rate. It looks like they are now closer than ever to reaching a rate that everyone can agree with it.

My fingers are crossed that Pandora has a long and healthy life!

Lifehacker has a great Faceoff Battle posted regarding the best distribution of Linux.

Their conclusions?

Fedora is for “Anyone who likes their Linux on a USB stick (with persistent data and setup), and anyone looking to try out a general purpose Linux distribution without having to monkey around with too many settings.”

OpenSUSE is for “Anyone keen on trying out virtualization tools—OpenSUSE has got a serious jones for VMware and similar tools—or any PowerPC users who don’t really dig Fedora. Also, given the roughly 22,000 packages in OpenSUSE, anyone missing a key piece of connectivity or functionality that just can’t be found elsewhere.”

Ubuntu is for “Newcomers to the Linux game, especially those looking to dual boot or replicate as many Windows apps in Linux as possible.”

Read the whole article here. It’s really a great article that weighs all of the pros and cons.

I prefer Ubuntu, but I guess that makes me a n00b?

Think I’m kidding this this headline? I’m not.

A recent Chicago Tribune article that outlines it all:

This is how: During a recent interview at a North Side bar, Michaud, a prominent lockpicking hobbyist (you read it right), cut the top and bottom off a can and carved a wavy M-shape out of the middle. He then folded and refolded it in such a way that it could be inserted between the lock and the shackle. A twist and voila! The lock popped open.
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Lock pickers, whose hobby is legal in all 50 states in case you were wondering, have a creed of sorts. It goes something like this: You can pick your own locks, you can pick your friends’ locks (with their permission), but you can’t pick anyone else’s locks.

To read the whole fascinating story visit Pick a lock. For fun. (It’s legal too).

Of course, guys have been using beer to pick locks for centuries, but that is another debate.

iPhone Atlas has posted screenshots of the new iPhone 2.2 features.

Looks like a redesign of Safari is in the works, along with a slew of new features.

While details regarding the newly released (for registered developers only) iPhone OS 2.2 are still trickling in, sources report that the MobileSafari interface has been tweaked. The new iteration of MobileSafari eschews the magnifying glass and refresh buttons at the top of the screen, instead displaying the URL bar and search fields side-by-side, much like the desktop version of Safari. Page refreshes are now accomplished via a tiny icon located inside the URL bar.

Wired.com is speculating that it will be bringing the Cut & Paste feature as well. We can only hope, that is the one feature that really limits the iPhone as smartphone in my opinion. I mean, really, no cut and paste after a year?

Read the whole story here.

ZDNet is reporting that the military is pushing a new open-source initiative to run intra-departmental computer systems. Sounds very interesting.

“The committee is concerned by the rising costs and decreasing security associated with software development for information technology systems. These rising costs are linked to the increasing complexity of software, which has also resulted in increasing numbers of system vulnerabilities that might be exploited by malicious hackers and potential adversaries. The committee encourages the department to rely more broadly on [open-source software] and establish it as a standard for intra-department software development.”

Is Linux going to war? Read the whole article here.

TechRadar.com has a great piece on the Top 15 things you should never do on Facebook. I happen to agree with most of them, while some are just filler.

Here’s a few I thought were spot on:

1. Use Facebook mail instead of proper email
Are you silly? When you Facebook mail me, I have to log into my real email to find that I then have to go and log into my Facebook account to read and reply to your message. If you’ve got my real email address, please use it.

7. Write on a wall instead of communicating privately
The driving force behind the success of Facebook is… vanity. People love the idea that others are watching what they’re doing. Tell me this: for what reason would you invite someone to a private party by writing on their wall, other than to show off to all the people on their friends list who you don’t want to come? It just makes you look like a tit, so don’t do it.

10. Upload drunken pictures the morning after
Have a little common sense. If you go out for a big one on a Wednesday night, posting humiliating, drunken photos of your friends on Thursday morning is a recipe for disaster. Because when I call in sick at 9am, the last thing I want my boss to say is: “I’ve seen the pictures of you crawling in the gutter last night. I’m not amused or impressed, now get to work!”

11. Joining ridiculous chain-mail groups
Why do people insist on joining groups such as “On the X of May, everyone has to panic buy carrots”? Come on people, how stupid are you? There’s one group on Facebook devoted to nullifying the vegetarian moral crusade, and it’s called: “For every animal you don’t eat, I’m going to eat three”. That’s a good group name. “I think Ryan Seacrest is the best presenter ever” is not.

If you haven’t read it yet, I suggest taking a look at my piece on social networking best-practices here – Want to be President? Better shut down your Blog, Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter accounts

You might not have noticed that my project Rootclip.com is hosting two contest voting periods this week. We encourage you to vote and comment on both to support aspiring filmmakers.

Rootclip has some incredible, fantastic, and awe-inspiring submissions in the final round of their film Chance Encounter. These films are all amazing in their own way, and we need everybody to help us pick the best one. Filmmakers in this competition are competing for the $2000 Grand Prize and ultimate bragging rights!

Click here to see the videos and vote for Chance Encounter’s final winner!

Also, Rootclip has gone to colllege and is hosting the University of Tennessee Knoxville 2008 Fall Film Project. These future filmmakers need you to weigh in with your opinion and votes. Please give them support and go check out their excellent films.

Click here to see the videos and vote for the UTK 2008 Fall Film Project’s Chapter 2 Winner!

If you are feeling left out by all this action, and now have the urge to get in on the filmmaking action, we have your fix. Rootclip.com’s newest competition, Doctor Frank is currently underway and taking submissions. The latest contest revolves around a mad scientis named Doctor Frank, his assistant Igor Johnson, and a rather ordinary switch that opens up endless possibilities.

Click here on more details regarding the new Rootclip.com contest – Doctor Frank!

Thanks everybody for your support of Rootclip.com, and good luck to everybody competing this weekend!

Rootclip.com was created to give filmmakers, writers, actors and anybody who just likes to watch movies the ability to collaborate on a video project. It’s a new approach to collaborative filmmaking. Rootclip team members create a short video clip or “Rootclip” to start the story. You watch the video, then shoot your own rendition of what should happen next in less than 2 minutes. Once you’ve created your video, upload it to Rootclip.com during the submission period and compete for votes against the videos from other users.

In what is surely a great move for the indie music artists everywhere, PurePlay music is teaming up with iTunes to get new, unsigned acts, some exposure.

Pure Play Music has reached a digital distribution deal designed to bring its catalogue of 1.5 million tracks from unsigned artists to iTunes, eMusic, Amazon and Napster. As part of the partnership, one of the four distribution channels, iTunes, will be giving Pure Play Music its own drop-down category on the front page of their Web site. Music enthusiasts can log onto iTunes, listen to the artist’s song, and, if they like it, click on a link that directs them to the artist’s personal profile page at Pure Play Music.
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Pure Play currently features and promotes over 6,000 acts from a total of 42 countries, all of whom have been vetted through the stringent Pure Play A&R selection and legal process.

As a long time indie music supporter, I’m pretty stoked about this. Currently I get most of my music from eMusic.com, which is a lot of indie bands that are just getting exposure or never made the really big deals. eMusic.com does have quite a selection of big names as well, but that’s really not what I’m out for. I like hearing that new, undiscovered talent, that often offers so much more.

Now, this would be really great news if iTunes finally went to a subscription based service!

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