May 16, 2008
I just spoke at the Social Rockstar Workshop at Busboys & Poets in Washington, D.C. about Social Media & Blogging. It was a great conversation and thank you to everyone that attended. I have uploaded to docstoc the online document sharing site for anyone that would like to take a look at the presentation.
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May 2, 2008
I am terrible at pronunciations. Forvo is an online resource that might be able to help by leveraging the wisdom of the crowds to collect and offer audio pronunciations of words. Currently, they offer 14,653 words 13,131 pronunciations in 182 languages.
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April 14, 2008
Childhood obesity is a serious medical condition that affects children above the normal weight for his or her age and height. Most computer games, mobile devices and other online activities these days contribute to a sedentary lifestyle. How can kids keep on top of the obesity? GoTrybe, a Tennessee based startup, offers a interactive online approach aimed at attacking the problem. GoTrybe is an interactive community for kids based on health and wellness.
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January 19, 2008
Somewhat Frank Weekly Video: This week I got a chance to sit down with AOL's Kevin Lawver who is very well respected at AOL and in the web development community. He has worked at AOL for 13 years and worked on everything from AOL search to conceptualizing and developing Ficlets.
We sat down and discussed a new book Adapting to Web Standards : CSS and Ajax for Big Sites which he helped Christopher Schmitt, Robert Cherny, Meryl K. Evans, Mark Trammell and Kimberly Blessing author. The book is devoted to helping experienced developers to better understand the changing web standards landscape and somewhat frankly, adapt. Kevin wrote chapter 7 which focuses on AOL's move into the online space with the relaunch the new AOL.com in 2005. The chapter discusses managing "corporate swirl" and "combating the waterfall" methodology. It even explains how web development is an art and craft (not witchcraft though).
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December 20, 2007
Are you particularly good at something and want to tell the world just how to do it? Or do you work at a company looking to setup some free online courses but don't know where to start? If so, you might want to check out Neulio. Neulio, an Orlando, Florida based startup, recently launched to offer a free platform for anyone looking to create an online course to educate via distance learning.
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October 19, 2007
A common theme I have run into in life and in conversations with friends and colleagues recently is something I will refer to as "lifestyle management." We work hard but strive for the short work weeks with more free time to enjoy life. Finding the ability to do everything you want to in your 24 hour, 7 day week can be a struggle. As Web productivity tools have risen, many of us still try to do MORE with the time we have freed up from leveraging these tools. Email, Instant Messenger and everyone and their bothers mobile device usage has caused us to look for more instantaneous actions and reactions. How can you get everything done? An intriguing approach that I have recently seen on the rise is the usage of a personal assistant. This article will look at a few of the current online personal assistant options.
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September 1, 2007
Strumming a six-string can be a very relaxing exercise but it is not something you can do well overnight. It takes time to practice and perfect it. Read/Write Web recently posted an article listing a number web 2.0 sites and services for musicians. I recently found one that was not mentioned but is worth mentioning called JustinGuitar.com.
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July 19, 2007
Ujogo, a Silicon Valley-based startup, just launched into public beta poised to create a more competitive and satisfying free online poker site than its competitors. Targeting the estimated 30 million free online poker players, Ujogo will cater to all demographics, including the 40 plus percent of woman playing online these...
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May 12, 2007
I usually like to switch up the video sources I referred to on the weekly video post but I could not resist pointing out another solid video created by GOOD Magazine. GOOD contributor Max Joseph has created this video which takes a look at the porn industry on the web. Apparently, there are some online sites that offer pornography? :)
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April 21, 2007
A few months ago, I highlighted an inventive web 2.0 video titled, "Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us" by Kansas State University anthropology professor Michael Welsh. The brief article I wrote ended up on the Digg homepage which ultimately lead to its mainstream discovery - at last count...
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March 30, 2007
We all have questions at one time or another and there are number of question and answer sites like Yedda, Yahoo Answers and Askville that facilitate a simple transaction between a user, who asks a question, and the web community, who attempts to provide an answer. Jabbits offers this same...
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March 23, 2007
Twitter has been the talk of the blogosphere and tech community for the last few weeks. Twitter has taken a simple idea and technology to create an easy to use and somewhat addictive product thus turning it into a growing phenomenon. I finally gave in and reviewed Twitter two weeks...
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March 21, 2007
I have reviewed a number of education 2.0 products like Chalksite, GradeFix, Mindpicnic and Quizlet on Somewhat Frank in the past. I truly believe the trend towards online education is going to continue to grow and the number of tools will continue to multiply. ProProfs, an online resource site for...
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March 2, 2007
18Seconds.org is campaign Yahoo recently launched in conjunction with Lawrence Bender, Oscar-winning producer of the documentary "An Inconvenient Truth," devoted to informing the world about the energy savings associated with switching from a normal light bulb to a compact fluorescent lamp. The campaign is based on the idea that is...
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February 28, 2007
The term "unconference" first surfaced in the late 1990's but has recently become more popular among geeks as a result of events like BloggerCon among others. According to Wikipedia an unconference is defined as: "A conference where the content of the sessions is driven and created by the participants, generally...
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February 27, 2007
OpenCongress, a political information mashup, is a great resource for anyone strongly interested in politics on Capitol Hill. By cataloging information (and there is a lot information) in an easy to navigate format, users have access to voting records, and statements by Senators and Members, including the always interesting breakdown...
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February 6, 2007
Gradefix is an online tool that aims to help students with getting better grades by auto-generating an appropriate study schedule based on a student's availability. A student simply enters all of their homework, readings, quizzes or exams and Gradefix does the rest. Gradefix uses a set of patented algorithms to...
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February 3, 2007
What is web 2.0? Time Magazine recently tagged it "You 2.0" with its mirrored magazine cover naming "You" the person of the year. However, the question has been pondered and explained in a number of video attempts including one by TechCrunch's Michael Arrington which I highlighted previously on Somewhat Frank....
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January 25, 2007
Empressr offers the unique ability to create, share and store Flash-based slide presentations online with ease. Empressr aims to impress by offering the ability to incorporate rich media features, like streaming video and animation into an online presentation. Empressr has incorporated an easy to understand set of steps to help...
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January 23, 2007
Who would have thought that a history buff and a techie would EVER have anything in common? Turns out, they do – and it’s on the techie’s turf. A historian’s dream, Footnote brings the Smithsonian’s National Archives – thanks to a partnership with the museum – and much more right...
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January 8, 2007
Remember having vocabulary lists in elementary school and your parents drilling you every day for the big end-of-the-week quiz? And then middle school – as if English wasn’t bad enough - enter vocabulary in another language altogether. Thankfully, it’s been a long time since I’ve had to brave those terrors....
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January 7, 2007
It is time to start planning which conferences are going to attend in 2007. To make it easier I have compiled a list of some of the best web 2.0, technology, design, marketing and innovation conferences and events scheduled in 2007. This is meant to be a working list, so...
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December 28, 2006
There are a number of Q & A web sites, like Yahoo Answers, Yedda and Grupthink among others, that have recently emerged to embrace a large number of users looking to get their questions answered. VideoJug takes a slightly different approach to helping people to find answers online. VideoJug is...
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December 18, 2006
A few month's ago a friend of mine took on a new online search marketing job which called for extensive keyword purchasing experience. She asked me for the best search engine marketing resources and I pointed to a number of search marketing sites, podcasts and resources. Unfortunately, I did not...
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November 25, 2006
The web 2.0 movement has shown that it is a great time to start an online business with limited funding. As a number of startups have emerged some have received funding while a large number of others that have turned to 'bootstrapping' to keep their startup dreams alive. Bootstrapping in...
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October 27, 2006
Joseph Morgenstan once said, "Children are gleeful barbarians." So how do parents handle "gleeful barbarians?" Parenting is not an easy task but parents are no longer alone. With the web 2.0 movement there have been a number of parenting sites that have been introduced to help unite parents to do...
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October 6, 2006
Innovation has become an extremely hot word in the last few years as companies work to push the envelope on the products and services. On Wednesday (October 4, 2006), I had the opportunity to listen to a brown bag discussion presented at the AOL Mountain View Headquarters. The event titled...
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August 13, 2006
Are you interested in finding out more about Ruby on Rails? If so, I would recommend checking out this recent list of the top 13 Ruby on Rails presentations pulled together by TechKnow Zenze. For a more comprehensive and live web resource I would also check out this post on...
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August 13, 2006
The release of AOL search data last week was an admitted mistake by AOL which prompted them to apologize and express anger for its release. With the NY Times identifying the first person, AOL searcher 4417749, based on her search query data AOL representatives once again apologized. I like the...
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August 1, 2006
This is the question that, usability guru, Jakob Nielsen tried to answer in his most recent article. While Jakob admitted that the answer to was not clear he did give a few points which make it a bit more clear: Optimize for 1024x768, which is currently the most widely used...
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July 27, 2006
Steve Rubel recently posted an interesting piece about the sea of emails, instant messages and bookmarks that are circulated behind the scenes by bloggers, reports and companies calling it the "Blogosphere Underground." The underground conversations are ongoing and sometimes can be overwhelming. Any blogger should be able to relate. The...
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July 26, 2006
A new browser study performed by University of Hamburg researchers found a shift in how we interact with the Web - moving from static hypertext information to dynamic interactive services. The report examining navigation by tracking page reloads, web site viewing patterns and screen size dimensions. According to the report:...
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July 16, 2006
Reflecting the increasing omnipresence of technology in our society, a recent Chicago Tribune article reported on Illinois’ first public virtual elementary school, which is preparing to open for the upcoming academic year. The Chicago Virtual Charter School tailors an individualized curriculum depending on a student’s particular aptitude – an arguably...
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July 3, 2006
Mindpicnic, is a fairly complex online learning or e-learning web site which empowers its users to both create and learn from user-generated online courses. In taking a brief Mindpicnic tour you learn how the site works and can either sign up for courses or start your own course. In signing...
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June 27, 2006
With the two posts today, numbers 567 and 568 respectively, the Somewhat Frank blog has turned one year 0ld - and what a year it has been. It has been a wonderful adventure through the blogosphere which started with a simple business trip to attend a (pre-Katrina) New Orleans conference....
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June 21, 2006
It’s the first day of summer and I have just arrived in sunny San Francisco where I will be attending Supernova 2006 at the Palace Hotel. The conference is hosted by Kevin Werbach and produced in partnership with The Wharton School of Business. The conference has an all-star cast of...
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May 20, 2006
I just participated in the first waxxi Interactive Podcast event with Robert Scoble and Shel Israel authors of the book Naked Conversations and it was an amazing experience. Waxxi's interactive podcast enabled me to connect with Robert, Shel and everyone else on the call making it a very rich conversation....
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May 19, 2006
A few blogging tips and resources and how to's on getting started in the blogosphere posted on SOMEWHAT FRANK.
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May 9, 2006
ResourceShelf Real-Time is a new ResourceShelf feature which provide links to web, software, mobile and other application that "offer real-time or near real-time" data and information. ResourceShelf, a site powered by librarians including search engine legend Gary Price, has been aggregating at least one piece of information a day for...
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May 4, 2006
Waxxi, a web 2.0 startup focusing on offering interactive podcasts and creating a global online community, has scheduled a kickoff event aimed at bringing large scale interactivity to podcasts. The event will feature Robert Scoble and Shel Israel authors of Naked Conversations and will take place on May 20, 2006....
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May 1, 2006
David Sifry, CEO and founder of blog search engine Technorati, has released a second part to his recent yet reoccurring State of the Blogosphere report focusing on the various languages of the blogosphere. Apparently, English is no longer the primarily language of the blogosphere as David Sifry states: "Something that...
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April 29, 2006
Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson, co-founders of 37signals (the hot web software development company), spoke last night (April 28, 2006) to a group of about thirty at a free event at DePaul University CTI. The event was put on by e, DePaul CTI's High Tech Entrepreneurship Club. Jason and...
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April 11, 2006
Big In Japan, the company behind PodServe, has posted the ten most popular PodServe podcasts. I am always in search of new sources of information so I appreciate the post. I may have to add these three to iTunes: Naked Conversations Discussion Daily Tech Show Big in Japan Podcast If...
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April 3, 2006
Are you interested in finding out the latest Ruby on Rails news? If so, you might want to check out Rails-a-Rama! since it aggregates Ruby on Rails links, discussions and blog posts. I think it could be a handy online resource however I wonder why it does not offered an...
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March 31, 2006
I wrote a guest post that just was published on TechCrunch, the weblog tracking Web 2.0, titled The State of Online Feed Readers. I analyzed the leading web-based feed readers and a few up and coming readers and compared them. Thank you Mike Arrington for the opportunity. It was my...
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March 20, 2006
DropSend offers an easy to use solution for anyone who is looking to send large files over the Internet. DropSend allows you the ability to move files up to 1 GB and store these large files online. This could be useful in sending music, video and other file types that...
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March 13, 2006
Google has shown us satellite imagery from Earth and even the Moon, but now it appears Google is offering maps of other planets, in this case Mars. Visit Google Mars and you will see a colorful crater filled surface (as shown below). Googling Google details the mapping features of Google...
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March 13, 2006
The Technology Evangelist team continued to hunt innovators as they swung into Chicago about a month ago to meet-up with for Episode 2 of online video series called The Innovators. You may recall Episode 1 which I highlighted recently which included the interview with Derek Franklin. Episode 2 features me...
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March 5, 2006
Seth Godin, author of The Big Moo, Purple Cow and All Marketers Are Liars among others, recently spoke at Google. Google is now presenting a video of his speech on Google Video as part of the Google Author Series. You can view it by clicking this link. I truly enjoy...