Blogs
Tags > web
Four short links: 18 November 2009
By Nat TorkingtonNovember 18, 2009
Memento: Time Travel for the Web -- clever versioning hack that uses HTTP's content negotiation to negotiate about the date! Ordnance Survey Maps to Go Online -- The prime minister said that by April he hoped a consultation would be completed on the free provision of Ordnance Survey maps down to a scale of 1:10,000, (not the scale of...
Three Paradoxes of the Internet Age - Part Three
By Joshua-Michele RossNovember 7, 2009
The myth of personal empowerment takes root amidst a massive loss of personal control. Social technologies are cloaked in a rhetoric of liberation (customers are in control, the internet fosters democracy, social technologies propagate truth etc.) that tend to obscure the fact that never before have we handed so much personal information over in exchange for so little in...
Announcing O'Reilly Answers - Clever Hacks. Creative Ideas. Innovative Solutions.
By Allen NorenNovember 4, 2009
We're launching the beta of O'Reilly Answers, and I'm inviting you to be part of it. In brief, O'Reilly Answers is a community site for sharing knowledge, asking questions, and providing answers that brings together our customers, authors, editors, conference speakers, and Foo (Friends of O'Reilly). O'Reilly is at the center of an amazing exchange of knowledge sharing and idea generation, and we want you to join us in changing the world by spreading the knowledge of innovators.
Three Paradoxes of the Internet Age - Part One
By Joshua-Michele RossNovember 4, 2009
In the circles that I travel the Internet is often breathlessly embraced as the herald of all things good; the bringer of increased choice, personal empowerment, social harmony...and the list goes on. And yet, as with any powerful technology, the truth of its consequences eludes such a singular and happy narrative. Here is the first of three paradoxes of the...
Four short links: 29 October 2009
By Nat TorkingtonOctober 29, 2009
Julie Learns to Program -- blog from our own Julie Steele as she learns her first programming language. The point is: it’s in me. I wasn’t sure that is was, and now I know—it is. And what, exactly, is “it”? It is the bug. It is the combination of native curiosity and stubbornness that made me play around with...
John Hagel on The Social Web
By Joshua-Michele RossOctober 24, 2009
I am releasing my conversation with John Hagel in three segments. In the first segment we discussed the real-time web. Here we discuss the move from the information web to the Social Web. John makes the point that the rise of the Social Web feels “a bit like Back to the Future” for people who have a long history with...
Four short links: 14 October 2009
By Nat TorkingtonOctober 14, 2009
10Gui Video -- demo of a new take on multitouch, a tablet and new GUI conventions. (via titine on Twitter) Behind the Scenes at WhatDoTheyKnow -- numbers and stories from the MySociety project, which provides a public place for Official Information Act requests and responses. The fact information is subject to copyright and restrictions on re-use does not exempt...
Four short links: 7 October 2009
By Nat TorkingtonOctober 7, 2009
Followup to jwz's Palm App Store Fiasco -- redux: still nothing concrete from Palm, but they're saying they'll create a second-rate app store into which open source apps will go (along with apps that Palm hasn't reviewed). Schmidt on YouTube -- the interesting bit for me was Every minute, more than 10 hours of video is uploaded to the...
A Classic from the Archive: Tim O'Reilly interviewed in 1994
By Andrew SavikasOctober 5, 2009
Unfortunately I don't remember who pointed me to this (it was a few months ago via Twitter I think), but I came across it while cleaning off my Mac...
Four short links: 29 September 2009
By Nat TorkingtonSeptember 29, 2009
Bletchley Park May Have a Future -- the UK birthplace of modern computing, where Alan Turing worked during WW II breaking German codes, is dilapidated and in need of major repair. They appear to have a supporter in the UK National Lottery, who have given them a grant to begin work and prepare for further grants. It should be...
Four short links: 28 September 2009
By Nat TorkingtonSeptember 28, 2009
Sci Blogs -- aggregated and hosted blogs from New Zealand scientists and researchers. A planet aggregator has become a key part of building a community, even outside programming. Super Better, or How To Turn Recovery Into a Game -- Jane McGonigal had a concussion, and created a game to keep her doing things that aided her recovery. Interesting discussion...
RSS never blocks you or goes down: why social networks need to be decentralized
By Andy OramSeptember 13, 2009
We may have been willing to build our virtual houses on shaky foundations might when they were temporary beach huts; but now we need to examine the ground on which many are proposing to build our virtual shopping malls and even our virtual federal offices. The next generation of social networking increasingly appears to require a decentralized, peer-to-peer infrastructure.
Four short links: 4 September 2009
By Nat TorkingtonSeptember 3, 2009
Flood Maps -- what the world will look like when the oceans rise. Interactive, so you can dial up your preferred level of environmental horror. (via Hans Nowak) Citability -- making government accessible, reliable, and transparent with advanced permalinks, as Government websites are ever changing and cannot be cited. Content changes without notice or accountability. Bootstrapping EC2 Images as...
Time-Lapse Movie with iPhone Soundtrack
By David BattinoAugust 24, 2009
Former O'Reilly web producer Justin Watt just made a surprisingly cool video by combining still photos with a soundtrack made in Looptastic, a $5 iPhone app. Here's how he did it.
Four short links: 17 August 2009
By Nat TorkingtonAugust 16, 2009
How Twitter Works in Theory (Kevin Marks) -- very nice summary about the conceptual properties of Twitter that let it work. Both Google and Twitter have little boxes for you to type into, but on Google you're looking for information, and expecting a machine response, whereas on Twitter you're declaring an emotion and expecting a human response. This is...
Web Video Hack: Many Movies, One Player
By David BattinoAugust 13, 2009
Here's a super-easy way to play multiple movies in the same area on a webpage. No JavaScript required, and it works on iPhone too.
Four short links: 13 August 2009
By Nat TorkingtonAugust 12, 2009
Under the Hood of App Inventor for Android -- regular readers know I'm a big fan of visual programming language Scratch, and apparently Google are too. They've got twelve university classes testing App Inventor for Android, a visual connect-the-bits programming environment for Android. University classes probably because one of the co-creators is Hal Abelson, coauthor of the definitive programming...
Four short links: 11 August 2009
By Nat TorkingtonAugust 10, 2009
The Slowing Growth of Wikipedia and More Details of Changing Editor Resistance -- researchers at PARC analysed Wikipedia and found the number of new articles and number of new editors have flattened off, and more edits from first-time contributors are being reverted. This is a writeup in their blog, with the numbers and charts. It's interesting that coverage in...
Four short links: 10 August 2009
By Nat TorkingtonAugust 10, 2009
The Propaganda Newspapers -- London councils increasingly providing their own newspapers, masquerading as mass-market popular appeal newspapers but without anything critical of the council that produces it. This is an evolutionary dead-end for reinventing newspapers, and is why the non-profit/trust structure works so well. Time for Computer Science to Grow Up -- publish in journals so conferences can be...
Four short links: 3 August 2009
By Nat TorkingtonAugust 3, 2009
Enabling Massively Parallel Mathematics Collaboration -- Jon Udell writes about Mike Adams whose WordPress plugin to grok LaTeX formatting of math has enabled a new scale of mathematics collaboration. 2845 Ways to Spin The Risk -- introduction to the ways in which our perception of risk (and numbers in general) can be distorted by how it is presented. (via...
Four short links: 21 July 2009
By Nat TorkingtonJuly 20, 2009
On Data Reconciliation Strategies and Their Impact on the Web of Data -- For years, I’ve been a fairly vocal advocate for the elegance and scalability of a-posteriori reconciliation via equivalence mappings as a superior mechanism (scale-wise) to a-priori reconciliation efforts… but this started to change very rapidly once I started working for Metaweb and saw first hand how...
Relational databases as reality sandwiches: thoughts about C.J. Date's "SQL and Relational Theory"
By Andy OramJuly 15, 2009
I recently returned to SQL and Relational Theory: How to Write Accurate SQL Code by C.J. Date, a leading researcher in the field of relational databases, as I learned more about some of the alternative forms of data storage that are becoming popular for Web-based or text-heavy repositories.
In Defense of Social Media (At Least Some Of It)
By Joshua-Michele RossJuly 2, 2009
Scott Berkun just posted a great rant titled, Calling Bullshit on Social Media. I suggest everyone read it. Berkun raises good points - and I agree the hype around social media warrants taking a critical look. Despite being in general agreement, there are a few areas I can't abide, starting with this statement: social media is a stupid term. Is...
Four short links: 1 July 2009
By Nat TorkingtonJuly 1, 2009
The Onyas -- New Zealand web design awards launch, from the people behind Webstock and Full Code Press. The name comes from "good on ya", the highest praise that traditionally taciturn New Zealanders are allowed by law to give. The Year of Business Metrics: Don't make your users run away! -- wrapup of the Velocity conference. AOL: Users who...
Four short links: 18 June 2009
By Nat TorkingtonJune 18, 2009
Harvard Study Finds Weaker Copyright Protection Has Benefited Society (Michael Geist) -- Given the increase in artistic production along with the greater public access conclude that "weaker copyright protection, it seems, has benefited society." This is consistent with the authors' view that weaker copyright is "uambiguously desirable if it does not lessen the incentives of artists and entertainment companies...
Four short links: 17 June 2009
By Nat TorkingtonJune 17, 2009
NY Times Mines Its Data To Identify Words That Readers Find Abstruse -- the feature that lets you highlight a word on a NY Times web page and get more information about it is something that irritates me. I'm fascinated by the analysis of their data: boggling that sumptuary is less perplexing than solipsistic. Louche (#3 on the list)...
Four short links: 8 June 2009
By Nat TorkingtonJune 8, 2009
How to Project on 3D Geometry -- the fine art (and math) of distorting an image so that it looks undistorted when projected onto a non-flat 3D surface. Confused? See the images below. (via straup on Delicious) ZinePal -- Create your own printable magazine from any online content. (via warrenellis on Delicious) What The Government Doesn't Understand About The...
Four short links: 5 June 2009
By Nat TorkingtonJune 6, 2009
Visual Programming Environments for Kids -- detailed writeup of the research and coding done by Shone Sadler to build a visual programming environment for robots, so simple that kids can use it. (via steveweiss on Twitter) The Nation's CTO Lays Out His Priorities -- it's still not entirely clear how the CTO and CIO's roles differ, as both are...
Four short links: 3 June 2009
By Nat TorkingtonJune 3, 2009
Tinychat -- very simple web-based take on videochat. Pro members get higher resolution, more rooms, and privacy. (I like the "free = public, charge for private" business model) One Click Orgs -- One Click Orgs is building a website where groups can quickly create a legal structure and get a simple system for group decisions. We think social enterprises,...
Four short links: 29 May 2009
By Nat TorkingtonMay 28, 2009
Freedom for OS X -- Mac app that disables networking for up to eight hours so you can get work done without Internet distractions. Technology workarounds for meatware bugs. (via Joshua-Michèle Ross). iPhone Casts a Giant Shadow on the Web -- 43% of mobile web traffic is from iPhone users, as measured by "the world's largest purveyor of ads...
Four short links: 27 May 2009
By Nat TorkingtonMay 27, 2009
uzbl -- lightweight WebKit-based web browser controlled with vim-like keystrokes, controllable through a FIFO for scripting, and all the "features" (bookmarking, history, changing URL) happen through external scripts. For the hardcore. (via joshua on delicious) A Conversation With Eric Rodenbeck About Usefully Cool Design and Engineering (Jon Udell) -- if we could only distil Stamen down to their barest...
Four short links: 25 May 2009
By Nat TorkingtonMay 25, 2009
China is Logging On -- blogging 5x more popular in China than in USA, email 1/3 again as popular in USA as China. These figures are per-capita of Internet users, and make eye-opening reading. (via Glynn Moody) The Economics of Google (Wired) -- the money graf is Google even uses auctions for internal operations, like allocating servers among its...
Four short links: 22 May 2009
By Nat TorkingtonMay 22, 2009
Hiding Dirty Deeds: "Encrypted" Client-Side Code -- obfuscated Javascript from a Facebook phishing site, deconstructed and reconstructed, parsed and glossed for understanding. It reminds me of the best obfuscated Perl: Latin, string substitution, runtime and compile-time semantics ... a work of evil art. (via waxy) Kickstarter -- artistic commercial version of PledgeBank. You say "I want to do [X]...
Social Science Moves from Academia to the Corporation
By Joshua-Michele RossMay 21, 2009
This is the latest of a series of posts addressing questions regarding social technologies. These topics will be opened to live discussion in an upcoming webcast on May 27 with a special guest to be announced. In order to control a thing you must first classify that thing -- and we are seeing a massive classification of social behavior. While that classification falls under the guise of making life easier (targeted ads, locating a nearby pizza joint using your mobile), history tells us that we should be leery of the motives driving the masters of our social data (see Captivity of the Commons). Social sciences (behavioral psychology, sociology, organizational development), whose historical lack of data and scientific method left them open to ridicule from the “hard” sciences, finally have enough volume of data and analytics and processing power (see Big Data) to make “social” much more scientific.
The Digital Panopticon
By Joshua-Michele RossMay 20, 2009
This post is part three of a series raising questions about the mass adoption of social technologies;. Here are links to part one and two. These posts will be opened to live discussion in an upcoming webcast on May 27. (special guest to be announced shortly) In 1785 utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham proposed architectural plans for the Panopticon, a prison...
Captivity of the Commons
By Joshua-Michele RossMay 19, 2009
This post is part two of the series, “The Question Concerning Social Technology”. Part one is here. These posts will be opened to live discussion in an upcoming webcast on May 27. In January 2002 DARPA launched the Information Awareness Office. The mission was to, “ imagine, develop, apply, integrate, demonstrate and transition information technologies, components and prototype, closed-loop, information...
The Question Concerning Social Technology
By Joshua-Michele RossMay 18, 2009
I am an evangelist of social media and an active participant: on Linked In (business), MySpace (music) and Facebook (increasingly my online identity), I blog on several sites and I am a daily user of Twitter. I also make my living speaking to companies about the value and operating principles of these more open, participatory technologies. I have read the...
Four short links: 15 May 2009
By Nat TorkingtonMay 15, 2009
Whither Sockets? -- ACM Queue article on how sockets as a model for network programming have become an obstacle to where networking is going. All of these calls have one thing in common: the calling program must repeatedly ask for data to be delivered. In the world of client/server computing these constant requests make perfect sense, because the server...
Velocity 2009 - Big Ideas (early registration deadline)
May 8, 2009
(tag cloud created from Velocity session & speaker information using wordle.net) My favorite interview question to ask candidates is: "What happens when you type www.(amazon|google|yahoo).com in your browser and press return?" While the actual process of serving and rendering a page takes seconds to complete, describing it in real detail can take an hour. A good answer spans every part...
How Big Data Impacts Analytics
By Ben LoricaApril 28, 2009
Research for our just published report on Big Data management technologies, included conversations with teams who are at the forefront of analyzing massive data sets. We were particularly impressed with the work being produced by Linkedin's analytics team. [We have more details on Linkedin's analytics team, in an article in the upcoming issue of Release 2.0.] At the second Social...
What the Sun/Oracle Combination Means for Java and Open Source
By Timothy M. O'BrienApril 22, 2009
What does the Oracle/Sun merger mean for Java? There's been a lot of speculation and a fair amount of apocalyptic, "sky is falling" Twitter activity, but does anyone really know what Ellison has in store for Java?
3D Web Plugins - The Next Trend?
By Andrew TriceApril 22, 2009
Both Adobe and Microsoft have demonstrated the capabilities and importance of player-based runtimes within the browser -- There is no question about it. There are numerous things that you can do within the player based runtime that allow for an enhanced experience, and amazing graphical capabilities. Now, it appears that more and more 3D browser plugins are popping up.
Four short links: 31 Mar 2009
By Nat TorkingtonMarch 31, 2009
Web traffic, web design, hacker spaces, and feature spaces: iPhone and Android Make Up 50% of Google's SmartPhone Traffic Worldwide -- Matt Gross found this interesting tidbit in a TechCrunchIT story. Refining Data Tables -- Luke Wroblewski gives some seriously good tips for designing usable tables in web pages. After forms, data tables are likely the next most ubiquitous interface...
Are we losing the Declarative Web?
By Philip FennellMarch 31, 2009
I saw something the other day that I was both intrigued and bothered by in equal measure. 'Mozilla and the Khronos Group Announce Initiative to Bring Accelerated 3D to the Web'. Apparently, the working group will look at exposing OpenGL capabilities within ECMAScript. The intriguing part is that, as a fan of 3D Computer Graphics and Animation this has got to be a good sign, especially if it is exposed in this way; but the bothersome bit is how people will end up using it because it has been exposed in this way. The crux of the problem for me is the question, JavaScript - what's it good for? Absolutely...
The Future of the Web: I Disagree
By Yakov FainMarch 25, 2009
Tim Bray, a Distinguished Engineer and Director of Web Technologies at Sun Microsystems has been interviewed by InfoQ about the future of the Web. With all my respect to Sun’s engineers, I have to disagree with some of the statements...
SpatialKey - Amazing Geo-Spatial Visualization
By David TuckerMarch 24, 2009
Today, SpatialKey announced a private beta. The SpatialKey team has been hard at work since InsideRIA first announced the technical preview on August 9th. This new version includes many new features and some advanced visualizations. This release demonstrates why SpatialKey is one of the most exciting RIA's I have seen recently.
Radar Roundup: Sensors
By Dylan FieldMarch 16, 2009
In his "Web Meets World" talk at the Web 2.0 Expo in New York last September, Tim O'Reilly described where he saw the web heading. "The next stage of Web 2.0 is going to be driven by sensors," he said. "We are moving out of the world in which people typing on keyboards are going to be driving collective intelligence applications." Like all transitions, the incorporation of data from the physical web onto existing platforms is gradual. We are just beginning to see applications surface and the best is still ahead of us. Below are a few observations, predictions and implementations of this emerging trend.
Four short links: 13 Mar 2009
By Nat TorkingtonMarch 13, 2009
Museums, Labs, Businesses, and Hash--all in today's four short links: Shelley Bernstein Talks About the Brooklyn Museum at the National Library of New Zealand (Paul Reynolds) -- I've written about Shelley's work before. Brooklyn [Museum] is not about using social media as just another marketing and visitor experience tool-set. Rather, as Bernstein said last night, Brooklyn Museum itself is now...
"Right Here Now" services: weaving a real-time web around status
By Mark SigalMarch 11, 2009
The "status update" has become the ultimate social gesture (ala Twitter tweets). Now, imagine Status and Location as application ingredients that can be combined together to create new application compounds using social ingredients, like People, Places, Localities, Times, Topics and Events. The composite that results is what I call "Right Here Now" services, and the focus of this post.
Microsoft and Science Commons Team Up To Add Semantic Content to Online Science
By James TurnerMarch 11, 2009
John Wilbanks, VP of Science for Creative Commons, gave O'Reilly Media an exclusive sneak preview of a joint announcement that they will be making with Microsoft later today at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference. According to John, who talked to us shortly after getting off a plane from Brazil, Microsoft will be releasing, under an open source license, Word plugins that will allow scientists to mark up their papers with scientific entities directly.
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