Both show me tired, a little puffy, sadly (in retrospect) unshaven, bad hair (I’d confused the conditioner which said something like Apres Shampoo in french on it as being shampoo) but jeez Brian Solis takes a good pic.
Original source links via the pics themselves
I was in a cab yesterday and the driver had the radio tuned into what I believe was Ernie Sigley’s afternoon show, and they were talking job cuts at Fairfax. The discussion was not about how these job cuts are directly related to the downturn in print advertising caused by online alternatives, no, according to the clowns on the radio, it was the beginning of a new recession where unemployment will go through the roof. It’s a sign of the times they claimed, a weakening economy, the first of massive job cuts to come.
I wonder what it’s like to live in a state of pure ignorance, a delusional state that ignores reality instead of looking at the real reasons. I know that not everyone is so stupid in the Australian media as to not understand the changing marketplace, and talkback radio isn’t always a platform for highlighting the most intelligent debate, but still, it doesn’t bide well for large chunks of the mainstream media when they simply can’t see the change not only coming, but happening all around them.
I’ve already been accused of drinking the kool aid this week at Gnomedex, and there might just be an ounce of truth in that, but I really don’t care. In the last year and a half I’ve attended what many would consider to be among the biggest tech events on the planet (having done both a Steve Jobs keynote and a Steve Ballmer monkey dance among others) but in terms of substance, Gnomedex is the best so far.
It’s not as shiny as other events, nor does it have A-list speakers, but it’s the substance that counts. Where in the world could I get 30 minutes with the guy running Icanhascheezeburger, and finish the day with the Dancing Guy giving a dance with most of the crowd on stage. Speakers aside, it’s the mix of people that count. I shouldn’t say this, but unlike your typical Valley event where everyone wants to be your friend because they have something to sell, here people don’t have a hidden agenda (on the most part) so you see the real, non-shallow side.
I’ve met up with some really great people. I started the week with Christian Anderson from Jobster. Relatively unknown, but proof positive that PR isn’t evil. I caught up with the Grooveshark team, including the extremely talented SB Spalding. I finally met Drew Olanoff, who is perhaps one of the most energetic, genuine and awesome guys I’ve ever had the privilege to spend time with. I’ve shared a drink or two with Brian Eisenberg, a guy I only knew from Twitter but has turned out to be great company. Brian Solis, the champion of PR 2.0 has a great taste in champagne, and deserves his status as one of the leading PR guys in the Valley. Eric Rice, who sometimes scares me, but is intensely intelligent, and always adds something unique to the mix. I even caught up with Jeremy Wright, my former business partner, who was last seen having a serious drink at tonights (Fridays) party, and adding to the record of strangest things that can happen, we may even renew a business relationship in the future. Of course I can’t forget the world famous Liz Strauss. I remember she came into b5media years ago (I presume she’s no longer there, but I have no idea, we were just hosting her blog) and I can remember saying that I just didn’t get anything she did, but I knew she was the best at it. Years and wisdom have improved my understand of her appeal, and she’s as good in person as she presents herself online.
I’ve missed a pile of people on that list, so my apologies upfront, because there are way too many people to mention. A shout out to Chris Pirillo is due and just, because not only has he delivered the event, he somehow manages to be a nice guy despite the glare and attention he is constantly under. It could of course be a very good act, but even his employees sing his praises, and I’ve not once noted any insincerity yet, and I’d consider myself a reasonable judge on such matters.
What I really love about this event is that most people I’ve met do what they do because they love it. Sure, some make a lot of money along the way, but there’s a genuine passion here that isn’t focused on a Google buyout or their next $10 million round. For me today, it supports the notion that doing what I do for the love of doing it, not just the money, or even for money alone, is not a lost cause. Indeed, it will help drive me to continue doing what I’m doing. An echo chamber of sorts perhaps, but sometimes you have to fly half way across the world to drink that koolaid to keep yourself going. I can only hope that in 12 months I’m in the financial situation to afford another trip back.
I did my first radio interview yesterday in probably 9 months. Moving from country WA to Melbourne has meant that I’ve become a small fish in a big pond as opposed to a small fish in a small pond.
The audio isn’t great, probably my VOIP connection, but I was called by ABC Melbourne today to let me know that the interview was being distributed nationwide on the ABC Local network. No other stations may play it, but apparently ABC HQ selects a best of from around the network and distributes it daily for stations to use. They also asked permission for my contact details to go out with that in case stations wanted a local interview. We’ll see I guess. Still, it was a nice chat and the interviewer was sympathetic to what I had to say as opposed to badgering.
Link here, unfortunately I cant embed it.
Google Australia has launched Google Street View locally (via Simon Goudie). Privacy issues perhaps, but letter boxes have all been blurred out. Here’s our house in Google Street View:
Here’s a close up of the letter box
Interestingly, they’ve really gone all out in the coverage of Street View. My old house complete with sales sign (so it would have to have been in December/ January), notably in Australind, Western Australia. You can’t really get more regional than Australind
note though that although they have the house, the satelitte images are still woefully old for that part of the world
I don’t know why I still care. I guess that some small part of me still believes that perhaps Gabe is interested in impartial news and tracking the big stories as opposed to just TechCrunch. However tonight (my time) proves once again how Techmeme is failing the tech community.
As I write this, at 9pm AEST, or 4am PDT Saturday, the biggest story by far in the tech and blogging community is Site Meter enabled sites blocking Internet Explorer users. I don’t use Site Meter, but many do, including the Gawker Media blogs. The Inquisitr had it first and others followed. Here’s the state of play as I write this. Note that both Wired and Mashable have the story, and Mashable links to The Inquisitr.
Google Blog search has even more blogs
And yet Techmeme has nothing. If it isn’t on TechCrunch, it isn’t news. And you can include Mashable and Wired in the not counting list
a close up of the most recent stories
I know, false hope.
The following is reprinted from today’s subscriber edition of Crikey. They didn’t attribute a source, and I haven’t asked for permission to reprint it, so apologies on any copyright issues up front. I’ll pull it if asked, but I’m sure Crikey wouldn’t ask such a thing, and this is a story that needs to be spread far and wide. The problem with Zimbabwe today is that not enough people really know the daily realities the Mugabe regime has imposed on a country that was once the bread basket of Africa.
From someone in Zimbabwe
Dear Friends,
We have survived the worst week yet — no water since 12th of this month & still no water, power came on briefly on Sunday and then again yesterday morning, after being off for seven days. Associated with power-out is the lack of telephone. Now also total lack of food and money.
We are allowed to draw only 100 billion dollars per day from our bank accounts. This is currently worth less than 20 UK pence or 40 US cents or two South African Rand. It is a criminally cruel policy which is causing extreme suffering and costing huge unnecessary transport costs to get to the bank daily & then stand in the queue for hours.
This daily maximum withdrawal is not enough to buy even a single bread roll which this week cost 140 billion dollars. On Saturday 1kg of potatoes was 110 billion, 1kg of oranges 500 billion, so one cannot buy anything for the daily drawn-sum and then by the next day everything has again increased beyond one’s purse.
Supermarkets are empty. Vegetables available only from street vendors. Our telephone calls are 2.2 billion dollars per unit. We are desperate for relief. On Friday 25th exchange rate was 850 billion dollars to the US. Inflation was 150 quintillion percent (that is 150 plus 18 0’s ). We try to keep each other going but it is extremely difficult. It is incomprehensible that the world will not come to our aid.
The bank employees are helping themselves to client’s money and all municipal and state services have collapsed. There is no justice to be found anywhere.
My farming friends who had their larger farm expropriated now do not have enough grazing for their dairy herd. They were told to reduce their herd, but the shortage of milk is already so critical that most children never see milk. We are told that we are lucky to have enough water to drink!
These farmers are daily threatened by a police chief who wants to move into their remaining small farm. He has brought a contingent of police to squat on the farm to make sure that they do not remove anything from the farm. They are in terror for their lives and those of their workers but trying to hang on. There is no recourse to justice or help from any quarter. Common human decency has left us. These farmers supply me with two litres of milk and six eggs and sometimes vegetables each week. Without this food I would have nothing.
Last week we ran out of bread, having rationed ourselves to one thin slice per day to make it go further. The bread which we brought back from Johannesburg in April lasted us four months.
The sun still shines & birds are chirping in the garden & spring is coming. The warmer weather helps our mood.
Love to all …
A short note of apology to anyone who sent me an email in the last 24 hours and had a bounced response. I’m still here, unfortunately my MediaTemple set up suffered some email fail. I still don’t know what it is, and after spending hours doing everything from trace routes, deleting and recreating the inbox, and reading up on every possible reason, I rebooted the dedicated virtual server…and it started to work again… I think.
At this stage I’m not sure if I’ve lost all email to duncan @ nichenet.com.au, or only some of it, as I’m now seeing 12 hour old emails in my inbox, so at least some are slowly coming through, and new emails are getting straight through, creating this very odd picture (right).
Contacts made via the form on The Inquisitr go to the entire team, so if you submitted something that way, one of us would have read it.
Hopefully now returning to normal programming.
I went down the street today (Burke Road, Camberwell, VIC) for some lunch with the family and some time in Borders, and I kept seeing the above poster. Someone had come along and plastered it at the various places posters are frequently posted (construction site boarding mostly). But that’s it: An Apple and Pirates cross bones, the Apple Pirate poster with nothing more than the picture above. Does anyone know what it is suppose to mean? a statement about the iPhone perhaps (I’m presuming the timing isn’t a coincidence, and they weren’t posted last week).