skrapnel

Many cultures look to nature to predict the future.  Perhaps these soothsayers might interpret this article from last October as an omen foreshadowing the latest victim of Facebook’s increasing expansion.

Check it out:

The photo [right], believed to have been taken earlier this week, shows the spider clenching its legs around a lifeless bird trapped in a web at a property near Atherton, west of Cairns.

via Giant spider snapped eating bird in backyard near Cairns | Environment | News.com.au.

Looks like President Obama can add one more first under his belt: first president to use email while in office.  This will help him break through the White House Bubble and not rely so much on the insulation of the staff around him.

This is why I like the man:

“It’s not just the flow of information,” Obama said in a recent interview with CNBC. “I mean, I can get somebody to print out clips for me, and I can read newspapers. What it has to do with is having mechanisms where you are interacting with people who are outside of the White House in a meaningful way. And I’ve got to look for every opportunity to do that–ways that aren’t scripted, ways that aren’t controlled, ways where, you know, people aren’t just complimenting you or standing up when you enter into a room, ways of staying grounded.”

via First e-mailing prez: Obama keeps his BlackBerry | Politics and Law – CNET News.

We knew it would have to come eventually.  I wonder if his staff will get to use Facebook?  Or is that a barrier for a future president to knock down?

Read more about the compromise made with the White House Counsel at CNET

This whole argument over whether Obama should have a blackberry–or even email–is pointless.   When I worked for Unisys in the first few years of the Bush administration, the Defense Department and Homeland Security were both using Blackberries.  If all the advisers are, shouldn’t the guy who is leading them?

I understand the security argument, but not sure I understand how any sort of business–including that of government–can be efficient with just paper and oral-based communications.  Thank God we have an incoming president who understands what those of us who’ve worked in any business over the last 15 years know: Emails aren’t private.

Check this Obama quote from an interview with CNN’s John King:

“Now, my working assumption, and this is not new, is that everything I write on e-mail could end up being on CNN. So I make sure that — to think before I press ‘send.’”

Prez Bush the 2nd had to give up email when he entered office.  I’ll let you decided why.

The real question is: Do you think Obama is savvy enough to switch the Gov’s email to Gmail?

I love my iPhone, but I hate how you can’t use the touchscreen while wearing gloves.  Good thing Apple just patented a glove that works with the iPhone. Check out this patent drawing:

Not too shabby looking. When I first saw the patent, I shudder at having to buy one more Apple product. So I did a little searching and found a few gloves already in the wild to help iPhone users get through the next few months of winter. Check it:

Tavo Glove looks nice, but I’m not a fan of fleece.

Then there is the Freehands.  For me, the whole point of getting special gloves is to AVOID having to expose flesh to cold.

The Northface ETip glove looks cool. Kinda reminds me of Tron.

Overall, my favorite has to be the iPhone glove from DOTS.  They look like the gloves I already wear, but with those cool tips at the end.

Which do you prefer? Know of any others? Let us know in the comments.

In his post “Who Needs Another Social Network?” on the New York Times Bits blog, Miguel Helft analyzes Yahoo’s new tactic of turning into a social site, and he gets it wrong. Yahoo has always had the foundations for a social network; most of its properties have very energetic communities. Its problem, however, has been trying to figure out how to link all of these properties to create a complete set of offerings for its users. It’s not too dissimilar to the problems we are facing on the whole for the Internet.

At this point in time, Web 2.0 has created disconnected portals in which we store our content: Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, personal blogs, etc. The next step in the Internet’s development will be aggregating and sorting the content we produce into one centralized location. With that in mind, I feel like Yahoo is making a good first step.

By finally trying to link all of its properties, Yahoo is working towards solving a problem that is becoming increasingly more pervasive: too much content. The next step in the evolution of the web will be aggregating and sorting web content so we can find what we want where we want. This quote sums it up:

“We are not trying to be another social network,” said Yahoo president Susan Decker on Tuesday, during the company’s earnings conference call. “Rather, by linking users’ favorite destinations and content, with their friends’ families and communities, we can deliver better relevance on a scale that no one else has achieved.” Two days later, the company’s new chief technology officer, Ari Balogh, speaking at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco, elaborated a bit on the idea. “We don’t think of social as a destination,” Mr. Balogh said. “We think of social as a dimension.”

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.