Category: General

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SoundBlox, Remix Culture and the Digital Life

SoundBlox, Remix Culture and the Digital Life

The Laszlo SoundBlox, an open source MP3 blog widget, has quietly gathered an enthusiastic following around the world since its initial release in December 2003. Just this morning, I received a note of thanks from Patxi Trapero from the Basque region of Spain, who informed us of his wonderful use of the SoundBlox, complete with a mix of acoustic music, beautiful photographs and endearing personal videos.

Patxi’s SoundBlox is another example of the human impulse driving what some call the digital life and others dub the remix culture. I find this impulse supremely humanistic and hope-inspiring. Thanks Patxi, for sharing your life, and for having the patience required to program the SoundBlox XML file! The SoundBlox of today requires substantial technical prowess to customize. In the years ahead, Laszlo Systems hopes to make this kind of digital life activity far more accessible to the world-at-large.

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The Boom is Back: Web 2.0 2006


Conversation with Terry Semel
Originally uploaded by lyndon.

Technologists, investors and journalists have packed the Argent Hotel today for Web 2.0, including many gilded as well as scarred veterans of the first Web boom. The Web 2.0 Conference, now in its 2nd year, feels much like the Demo conferences of the late 1990’s – meaning, John Battelle‘s hand-crafted industry gathering has quickly established itself as a preeminent gathering and oracle of the information technology sector.

My modest contribution to the event coverage takes the form of a photostream, mostly capturing a defacto reunion with numerous colleagues from the once-mighty ExciteAtHome.

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Mobile Media and Blogging


SF BridgeToBridge 12K, Oct 2, 2005
Originally uploaded by lyndon.

On this morning’s BridgeToBridge 12K race in San Francisco, I finally internalized the reality that everyone with a modern cell phone is a potential reporter of events in the world, complete with still photos, video and sound. Are you curious about my morning today? Probably not, but that is beside the point. The amazing thing is that I could report on it with minute detail even while on a rigorous run.

A commentator this morning on public radio station KNPR observed that all of us spend increasing portions of our lives consuming media. I would add that going forward, more of that will be the personal media of our family, friends and colleagues rather than the professional or mass media of prior decades. In this way, with the help of the latest generation of Web applications, the world potentially grows more intimate for each of us.

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On the genesis of OpenLaszlo

Scott Mace met David Temkin and I at OSCON to conduct a short podcast interview. The result is now available on the IT Conversations site. It’s part of an intriguing podcast series called “Opening Move with Scott Mace”

A descriptive synopsis from the IT Conversations web site:

“Before AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) had a name, there was Laszlo Systems, a software tools developer using AJAX-like methods along with Macromedia’s Flash Player to deliver richer Web experiences. In this conversation with Laszlo founder/CTO David Temkin, learn why he chose the Flash Player as a platform and why Laszlo went open source choosing IBM’s Common Public License. What is planned for Laszlo Mail and Laszlo Calendar and how he plans to leverage rich client environments other than Flash Player.”

It’s a nuanced ramble on the genesis, status and future of OpenLaszlo. Ideal iPod listening for the home commute :-).

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Pandora: a new service with UI powered by OpenLaszlo


Pandora music discovery
Originally uploaded by lyndon.

Tom Conrad and I first met at Rob Scoble’s Geek Dinner in December 2004, where Tom introduced me to the interesting work of the Music Genome Project, and I in turn introduced him to OpenLaszlo. Now, 8 months later, the result of our chance encounter is Pandora, a new “music discovery” service that combines a Music Genome recommendation engine with an OpenLaszlo-powered user interface. Tom has received enthusiastic early feedback on this excellent example of where the Web is headed. My only ‘special request’ to Tom is to add more world music to the service, especially from Latin America and Africa. But according to the Pandora FAQ, some of this is already on the way… awesome!

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Convergence is a ‘background assumption’ at Supercomm 2005


Chicago Night View
Originally uploaded by lyndon.

Spent last week at the SuperComm show in Chicago. Besides getting reacquainted with Chicago’s majestic downtown, I got a first-hand glimpse of the current state of the Telecommunications sector. Here, telecom engineers told me their networks would be all IP-based within the next 5 years. So ‘convergence’ is now a background assumption, and all services will be IP applications.

The original architects of the Internet predicted communications services would converge onto a common network infrastructure, and make integrated applications possible.

The above seems abundantly clear to the exhibitors and attendees of SuperComm 2005. This bodes well for the near future of communications services.

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Bloggers and the propagation of knowledge

Bloggers and the propagation of knowledge

Last week, while entertaining good friend Masha Solorzano visiting from Toronto, I suggested attending a Chaat Cafe Geek Dinner organized by Robert Scoble and Marc Canter, to provide her with a taste of the unique culture which has produced the recent revolution in online communications. Masha’s presence has been documented for eternity thanks to the presence-of-mind of Robert Scoble and his TabletPC. Now she wishes she had a blog like many others at the dinner table:

Robert Scoble | Steve Gillmor | Steve Sloan | Dori Smith | Farida Paramita | Michael Eakes | Dan Gould | Christopher Carfi | Masha Solorzano | Scott Rafer | Dan Farber | Lisa Canter | Marc Canter | Mimi Canter | Lucy Canter | Lyndon Wong | Ron Lichty | Tom Conrad | Marc Novakowski | Pierre Wolff | Nadeem Bitar | Kaliya Hamlin | Brian Hamlin | Ian Jones | Nicole Lee | Kevin Marks | Thomas Hawk | Neal Drumm | Tony Chang | Zack Rosen | Kieran Lal | Jasmeet Singh | Jason DeFillippo | Ian Kallen | Kevin Burton | Brad Neuberg | Renee Blodgett | Jeff Minard | Om Malik | June Parina | David Sifry | Jonas M Luster | Micah Alpern | eleanor kruszewski | Jim Grisanzio | Tantek Celik | Rebecca Eisenberg | Curtis Smolar | Russell Beattie

Over the past couple of years, I’ve gradually internalized the benefits of blogs combined with search engines, and I have been astounded at how effective these new Web-based tools are at propagating ideas. The Internet communications revolution continues to play out all around us, and we are all so very fortunate to have “a seat at the table”.

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Information Technologist as Merchandiser

Information Technologist as Merchandiser

Oliver Steele’s remarks about “The Apple Boutique”

Colleague Oliver Steele made some interesting observations about his recent decision to switch to an Apple laptop computer. Rather than lamenting the loss of broad choices he enjoyed with his previous Wintel laptop, he felt relieved.

Oddly, given his computer science prowess, Oliver enjoyed deferring decisions on hardware and software to Apple. He ascribed his relief to confidence in Apple’s good judgement. To Oliver, Apple as an IT vendor appeared analogous to a builder with good architects, a retailer with good merchandisers, or a newspaper with good editors.

If the proliferation of computer hardware, software and services proved overwhelming to the likes of a ‘smart m.f.’ like Oliver, imagine how all this has impacted the lay public. Perhaps this explains why some believe the I.T. sector has reached a phase where the market needs are more about improved services than about increased product innovation. From consumers to companies, the buyers of information technology may want less rather than more. If Oliver’s sentiments are shared by others, some vendors could actually improve profit margins by demonstrating that “less is more”.