Google Reader Sharing

Just added a new widget to the blog - Shared Items from Google Reader. I never really understood the point of sharing items from my reader unless I actually went around telling people about it. Now there's a little box on my blog that shows the five most recent items, so that's pretty cool. I come across a lot of neat stuff in my reader and I always end up emailing it to people.

It reminds me of an interesting article I read a while ago (5 minutes on Google and I couldn't find it, oh well) that compared Twitter with email and instant messaging. The basic premise was that email was a fairly heavy medium. Most people feel compelled to respond to email (that isn't spam anyway) since the author obviously took time to write out his or her thoughts and send them to a specific person. But there's also some pressure to take time for composition, spelling checks, revisions, that sort of thing. Instant messaging holds a similar demand, but the response must be immediate. This can lead to potential miscommunication and/or frustration. Putting something on Twitter (or, to relate it to this post - a Reader Share box) doesn't ask for a reply, at least not nearly as much as other internet social media. Simply putting it out there is usually enough; if the audience decides to respond, that avenue is open, but it's not expected.

I'd actually like something like this for YouTube videos. I'm always sending links to those to people I know. Heck, there's probably something already out there that does it. If not, maybe I'll look into how difficult it would be to make something like that. Could be a fun project.

tl;dr - I probably think about social networking way too much to be healthy.

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Now playing: The White Stripes - Seven Nation Army
via FoxyTunes

Moving Back to Blogger

I'm temporarily moving back to hosting this blog on Blogspot. There were a few things I didn't like about hosting it on a separate server, mainly the fact that paging went away. I've also updated the template (using one of the provided layouts at the moment) and added a few neat widgets. You might notice the Twitter update at the top of the sidebar - I've finally broken down and started an account. We'll see how it goes.

As far as the future is concerned, I'm thinking about finally making my site. Right now I'm leaning towards Python and Django, but we'll see. Short-term, I want to create my own template or at least heavily edit an existing one. Also, I'm not sure if my feed has changed because of the switch; guess I'll find out after I post this.

In other news, I recently attended KaizenConf, which was awesome. I'll be either posting a recap here or on The Pirates' Code. Maybe both. To sum up in a word though: enlightening. And the number of people in attendance who owned iPhones was staggering. But seriously, it was the most amazing event I've ever been part of.

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Now playing: The Raconteurs - Five On the Five
via FoxyTunes

New Site Design!

I've updated the blog a bit, might have to refresh if you don't see any changes.

The picture is of a tree in my front yard, taken around noon. No Photoshop levels/color adjusting required; nature saw fit to provide me with all that.

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Now playing: Israel Kamakawiwo'ole - 'Ulili E
via FoxyTunes