http://www.yi-tan.com Yi-Tan means conversations about change. Every Monday at 10:30am Pacific, Jerry and Pip host a discussion about a timely tech topic, from open source and wikis to neuroceuticals and the Long Tail. en-us Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike Tue, 14 Nov 2006 07:29:14 GMT sanford@rawlingsatlantic.com 1 Technology http://www.rawlingsatlantic.com/yi-tan/images/jerry.jpg http://www.yi-tan.com A weekly podcast of the Yi-Tan Tech Community conference call Yi-Tan means conversations about change. Every Monday at 10:30am Pacific, Jerry and Pip host a discussion about a timely tech topic, from open source and wikis to neuroceuticals and the Long Tail. Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn no Yi-Tan jerry@sociate.com http://feeds.feedburner.com/Yi-TanTechCall Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn By making motion, position and acceleration available to game design, Nintendo's Wii promises to change the gaming landscape in beneficial ways. The old race is for more polygons, greater realism and more plot twists. The new game is for verisimilitude in participation. Would you rather play golf with a mouse, or golf with a club? Even better, Wii's price point is easy: would you like Wii with that? It's a whole new game now. Mon, 13 Nov 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall109 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn What technologies do you find fun? We started with TV-enhancing goodies like DVRs and Slingbox, then headed to mobile apps with GPS and mapping. With a few wistful glances at old fun technologies, we generalized some principles (multiple contexts, creative expression), and headed toward Flickr and social tagging. The best of these offer spiritual refreshment, says Al Chang. Amen! What apps and gadgets have brought you joy? Why? Mon, 06 Nov 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, technology, fun http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall108 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn As Linux makes inroads into corporate IT, more companies are willing to pay for enterprise-grade support. Though Red Hat hasn't been that clever at taking advantage of business opportunities, it is still in the drivers' seat in the new Oracle deal, and it has many software components that are not part of its open offer. Value there. Is this really an Oracle bid against Microsoft? Likely. Who can make less on service? Mon, 30 Oct 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Oracle, Red Hat, Linux, open source http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall107 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Cranium, Cirque de Soleil and others innovate by pushing the edge between brilliance and nuttiness. Polly LaBarre, co-author of Mavericks at Work, talks about strategic advocacy, power shifts and disruptive points of view. In the new business models, the power to persuade is worth more than the power of position as a gatekeeper or exclusive content holder. Onward, mavericks! Does innovation take intellectual humility? Bah! Mon, 23 Oct 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Polly LaBarre, mavericks, business models, innovation http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall106 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Tellme's CEO Mike McCue joins us to describe the future of a voice platform. Accompanied by an accidental Vivaldi soundtrack (someone's hold music), he talked about the ways functionality might grow in his application space. The goal: Just say it to get it. Mon, 16 Oct 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Mike McCue, Tellme, voice response, customer service http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall105 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Around Labor Day, some 40,000 people came together in the middle of an inhospitable desert to create a temporary city -- in which you can't buy or sell anything. Learning how gift economies work and what fuels generalized reciprocity could have huge lessons for the commercial economy. We're already seeing some of it in "crowdsourcing" and the "architecture of participation". That's just the start. What's life like in a post-scarcity world? Mon, 09 Oct 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Burning Man, scarcity, abundance, value http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall104 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Microsoft and Google are building data centers large enough to hold just about everything. Who can follow? Has Google established enough beneficial feedback that it is impossible to catch? Yahoo's ad weakness seems to be just Yahoo's, not generalized. Is the old model out of runway? Will it be killed by the low natural costs of most services? What wins: Walled gardens, open commons or something in between? Mon, 02 Oct 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Yahoo, AOL, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, eBay, commerce, competition http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall103 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn TBD TBD Mon, 25 Sep 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, interactive TV, iTV http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall102 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn You can buy real estate in Second Life, as well as dance moves for your avatar, nice outfits and much much more. While we're busy palavering about the potential long-term social impacts, clever folks are busy experimenting in SL, and some are making money. At roughly 300 Linden Dollars to a real Buck, SL is minting money. Strange new worlds -- and real money -- online Mon, 18 Sep 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Second Life, Robin Harper, Linden Dollars, virtual worlds http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall101 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn After Esme Vos reported that muni wireless remains a US phenomenon, we focused mostly on civil discourse in the large, catalyzed at first by Howard Greenstein's question, "Are we really safer?" We avoided that topic, skirting it instead to wonder whether real dialogue was scalable, or whether it inevitably degrades into duologues: two concurrent but disconnected monologues. We aspired, though, to thoughtfulness in the large. Looking ahead to better civil discourse Mon, 11 Sep 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, anniversary, discourse, online http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall100 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Although companies are still running "perkshops," many are learning that they need to nurture the informal networks and workshops in which their employees actually learn stuff. These guerilla learning strategies can be as simple as a gumball machine to lure passers-by into conversations, a map instead of a white paper or dumping cubicles in favor of sofas and more convivial furniture. Pair programming, a practice spreading from software development to many other fields, also helps. No more "perkshops," teach one another! Mon, 28 Aug 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Jay Cross, informal learning, education, Loretta Donovan, trust http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall99 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Formal learning is like a bus on a route: it follows its sequence of stops, with little chance for variability. Informal learning is more like a bike ride: you can stop for detours, to help others and more. It's not a matter of either/or, but rather both/and. The question is how corporations go about incorporating and nurturing the informal side. Creating a culture of trust seems to be a major element. Building cultures of trust Mon, 21 Aug 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Jay Cross, informal learning, education, trust http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall98 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Mary Hodder took us quickly in a great direction by describing how people are now making their own ads and how-to videos, then asking whether the ad model is being flipped on its head now. We also spent time talking about the other end of the spectrum: why do movies get so close to pissing us off with high prices and ever-increasing ads? Why cross the Irritation Threshhold? In between, Jesse Engle described his company's interactive product placements. Are we flipping the ad model? Mon, 14 Aug 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Mary Hodder, UGM, user-generated media, advertising, internet http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall97 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Over light (accidental) hold music, our four guests described audio, gaming, grassroots and streaming forms of advertisement, naming just about every medium imaginable. Big companies can play in all these, but a crisis is brewing for smaller ones, who see their market dissolving away. Customers are hit over the head with messages with increasing frequency as marketers' frequency measures drop. Not a fun game, but a growing one, to serve the long tail. To avoid crossing the irritation threshhold, connect! Mon, 07 Aug 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Darren Herman, Barry Morris, Sammy Haroon, Tremor, Mark Ramsey, advertising, internet, gaming, radio http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall96 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn The players in net neutrality keep jockeying for position. Carriers want their investments paid for. Citizens want the Net to stay Net-like, not head toward cable TV. And legislation keeps coming up. Another chapter in net neutrality Mon, 26 Jun 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, net neutrality, legislation http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall91 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Bob Frankston and Bruce Kushnick have different, radical and interesting perspectives on net neutrality. Frankston's frustration is how we buy into the givens of our situation, instead of thinking more broadly. There is no scarcity problem. Bruce believes we've paid for the infrastructure a few times over already, with tax breaks, overcharges and the odd fraud. Looking for infrastrucure from the edge Mon, 19 Jun 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Dave Burstein, Bob Frankston, net neutrality, legislation http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall90 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn In Google's various database and search enhancements, Al Chang sees smart ways the company is motivating data owners to dump their data into Google's engine in structured ways, rather than waiting for Google to crawl and infer it. Google Base and Google Coop are smart experiments that may reveal new usage patterns and new ways for the company to increase revenues. Google's building all sorts of incentive for you to add your data, nicely Mon, 12 Jun 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Al Chang, Google http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall89 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Nathan Brookwood of Insight64.com keeps a close eye on computer makers, and he sees a rebirth at Sun. Solaris, now open source, has the widest distribution of enterprise-class Unixes. The hard part for Sun will be preserving margins in the middle-ground server business, where price competition is fierce. These days, power and heat constraints are trumping Megahertz, which could benefit Sun, too. Maybe Sun has reinvented itself, after all Mon, 05 Jun 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Nathan Brookwood, Sun http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall88 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Working on his book Everything Is Miscellaneous, Cluetrain co-author David Weinberger is investigating how we "lump and split" things. This quest has taken him into the nature of knowledge, authority, topics, expertise and the institutions that manage all this, and insights about how useful messy data can be. Is Google the ultimate organizer? Why tag links for others in del.icio.us? Do explicit metadata standards actually scale? Going meta on metadata Tue, 30 May 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, David Weinberger, structure, metadata http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall87 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Our guest couldn't make the call (first time in 86 calls!), so after a little chaos we tucked into Dell's new use of AMD chips, Johnson & Johnson's not participating in TV's "upfront" market this year, the need for more metadata interoperability, and the popularity of YouTube. Various topics, various ideas Mon, 22 May 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall86 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Added excitement on this call, as we used a shared workspace tool called Vyew during the call, which began with the dire note that by the time people find Dave Gray's company XPlane for help, they're often in dire straits. "Cartoon maps" often end up helping conversations coalesce. Humor helps, too. This visual communications skill isn't specialized and shouldn't be outsourced: we'll all be doing more of it over time. How do shared images help us work together? Mon, 15 May 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, visualization, Dave Gray, Xplane, collaboration, PowerPoint http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall85 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Why all the Microsoft announcements this week? Did they all converge on when Vista was due out? Are they compensating for the earnings drain from investing in major Web-service-hosting infrastructure? And will anyone else follow Google and Microsoft into that space? On the communications front, Skypecast is interesting, but we would love to see more attention paid to improving conversations, whatever form that takes. Are Microsoft and Google the only two in the race for scale? Mon, 08 May 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, tech news, Skypecasts, Warner Music, EMI, collaboration, scale http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall84 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Will we look back on Web 2.0 the way we look back on WAP? Probably not, because the benefits of 2.0 architectures have already affected the software and services market, as they have blurred the line between application developers and users. HousingMaps.com is a few hundred lines of code. What if you took it further? What might be next? Web 2.0 is a stop on the way to what? Mon, 01 May 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Jason Fried, 37signals, design, simplicity, less is more http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall83 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn In five years, the investment climate for solar cells has gone from zero to sixty. Nanosolar makes nano-thin photovoltaic films that are of average efficiency but radically lower cost. It's preparing for volume now and has a few advantages over its competitors. Nanosolar promises a order-of-magnitude cost improvement Tue, 25 Apr 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Martin Roscheisen, Nanosolar, solar, energy, alternative energy, clean energy, sustainability http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall82 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Web 2.0 architectures have helped release the collective intelligence of peer production on the Net, as seen in mashups and other creative offers. But 2.0 isn't just about tools and services, it also involves a cultural shift -- a need to let go of the reins a bit by management. And this may be the hardest thing to get used to. What do new Net app architectures let us do? Help us learn? Mon, 24 Apr 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Web 2.0, Howard Greenstein, Greg Elin, architectures, AJAX, applications http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall81 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With Judith Meskill and Debi Jones, we started with what MySpace has done right, such as keeping the service from looking too professional and having a hands-off approach. But we gradually built more and more evidence that MySpace may be destroying the communities that it needs to keep. Can it survive if it's uncool? Is MySpace killing the goose that lays the golden eggs? Mon, 17 Apr 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, MySpace, Judith Meskill, Debi Jones, Murdoch http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall80 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Although Boot Camp won't run the Mac OS and Windows concurrently (yet), it seems to open some opportunities that Apple won't pursue aggressively, but should help it nonetheless. Now the Mac isn't merely different, it's special. Hardest hit may be Sony's Vaio line, which charges a premium for style and media integration. Microsoft should do ok, since it will sell additional licenses of Windows. Does the OS really matter any more? Will we have more hardware innovation now? We'll see. In search of design simplicity Mon, 10 Apr 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Boot Camp, Apple, virtualization, PCs, Virtual PC, Parallels http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall79 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn You can now make search engines and webmail systems your cellphone's home page. That's a step up. Location awareness isn't here yet, partly because cell carriers want to sell us location info and because other geotagging isn't ready yet, but things are getting handier when you're out and about. If this continues, will mobile search grow bigger than desktop search within five years? What applications will lead? Who will improve the UI? Where to eat? What's playing over there? Mon, 03 Apr 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, search, cellphone, PDA, wireless, location, LBS http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall78 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With visual language experts such as Bob Horn and Dave Gray, we explore examples of effective visualization, from the GUI and Web browser to things like Stella, the American Profile Poster and the art on the walls at Hagia Sophia. Often it's process, not merely drawings, that make shared visuals effective. And disciplines sometimes develop their own visual languages, such as Feynman Diagrams in physics or Senge's Causal Loop Diagrams. We're at a fascinating integrative moment right now, after years of dominance by text alone. Where are the tools we might use to draw with one another? Mon, 27 Mar 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, visualization, Bob Horn, Dave Gray, Nicole Lazzaro, mapping, design, shared meaning http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall77 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With Dave Burstein and Esme Vos, we compare European carrier dynamics (telco, cellular and cable) with the US. The US comes up a bit short. In the US, incumbents have largely neutralized new entrants. Across Europe, new entrants are winning and rates are very competitive. How much of this is government policy, how much initial conditions, how much incumbent advantage? Sharp differences in the US and European markets Mon, 20 Mar 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Jcable TV, telcos, phone companies, regulation, competition http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall76 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With flat-panel expert Barry Young, we address the different flat-panel markets, emerging device uses and the industry dynamics. Plenty of consolidation going on across the industry. New technologies like Thick Film Electrolumniescence, Electrophoretic and OLED are on the way. No signs of slowness in this industry. Faster, lighter, cheaper -- and you can see yourself! Mon, 13 Mar 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Jason Fried, OLED, flat panel, displays, Barry Young http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall75 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With Martin Geddes and David Isenberg, we talk about the threats the Net faces from companies whose business models the Net disrupts. Unfortunately, there is little agreement about what the problem is or how to solve it among people who care about this issue. Companies should be able to price discriminate, but at the cost of breaking down the Net's openness? How can we reset expectations so everyone benefits? Preserving the Net we know Mon, 06 Mar 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, net neutrality, competition, cable TV, telephone, cellular, access, non-discrimination http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall74 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With Timothy Prickett-Morgan and Carl Johnson, we talk about measures shifting from raw MIPS or FLOPs to performance per watt and side-effects such as heat dissipation. The A/C costs money, too! There is still room for CPU makers to grow. The question is, how will Intel respond to AMD's so-far successful incursions? Is AMD taking the high-end market? Mon, 27 Feb 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, AMD, Intel, semiconductors, servers, Opteron, Itanium http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall73 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With Al Chang, we discuss the major ecosystem that has emerged around selling and moving attention around the Net. The costs of parking domains and even hosting services are so low now, that if you can clear $4 a year for each visitor, you can offer them a service of value. Search engine optimizers, sweepstakes runners (see Blingo) and others are quickly setting up profitable shops. Your eyeballs are worth bucks (ew!) Tue, 21 Feb 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Al Chang, eyeballs, internet advertising, pay for performance, clicks http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall72 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With Howard Greenstein and Steve Crandall, we describe the morass that is our remote-control basket. Who can set these things up? Why aren't these things designed for Users? Worse, digital rights management is likely to complicate the problem. Alternative UIs are far from the market, such as speech recognition. One woman knew what to do on Valentine's Day, because she realized she hadn't yet taught her boyfriend to use her remotes. What price love? Um, which button mutes the TV these days? Mon, 13 Feb 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Howard Greenstein, Steve Crandall, remote controls, universal, user interface, design http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall71 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Backpack, Basecamp and other Web 2.0-ish apps attract users because, as Jason Fried puts it, his company tries to build "half a product, not a half-assed product." They key is avoiding overdesign. In doing so, Fried and his team throw away many user requests, focusing on those that recur. Basecamp, for example, has no GANTT charts but instead focuses on the communication side of project management. By keeping costs low and not worrying about submarkets they don't intend to serve, Fried and his colleagues can afford to build what works for them and let it find its natural markets. In search of design simplicity Mon, 30 Jan 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Jason Fried, 37signals, design, simplicity, less is more http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall69 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn The 10 rules that Kevin Kelly wrote about back in 1998 not only hold up well, they seem to have become more important. From "embrace the swarm" to "opportunities before efficiencies," you see the trends in the Wikipedia, Web 2.0 architectures and the low, low cost of some recent startups. Mary Hodder reports from an "Economics of Open Content" conference at MIT that even TV people are starting to get it (though many freak out). In the end, as Howard says, it's all flux. That prescient Kevin Kelly! Mon, 23 Jan 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Kevin Kelly, New Rules, New Economy, economics http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall68 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Emotions play a crucial role in our engagement with games. The electronic games market is still in the early rock band phase: developers are still playing the same three chords over and over, louder. With game design expert Nicole Lazzaro, we learned how we're slowly deepening our understanding of the emotional sequences that lead to deep involvement, from gratitude-generosity-elevation to curiosity-exploration-surprise-insight. These insights translate also into product design, branding and other domains. From fiero and naches to Schadenfreude Mon, 16 Jan 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Nicole Lazzaro, online games, video games, consoles, emotions, fun http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall67 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Blogging is now a worldwide phenomenon, prodding governments and affecting news organizations everywhere. Linking those bloggers and giving them some visibility strengthens the blogosphere and hopefully society as a whole, and that's what Ethan and Rebecca's Global Voices initiative is doing. We talk about balance and objectivity (goal: diverse and transparent), English as the main language and more. Global bloggers linking arms Mon, 09 Jan 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Global Voices, Ethan Zuckerman, Rebecca MacKinnon, development, blogging, bloggers, international http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall66 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With great hardware design, integrated software design and crisp, helpful stores, Apple has hit a sweet spot that nobody else in the computer and consumer electronics markets is serving. Apple store sales are amazing, and there's plenty of room to grow. Who is Apple's Avis? Is anyone catching up? Is that an iPod in your pocket? Tue, 03 Jan 2006 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Apple, Apple stores, iPod, consumer electronics http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall65 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Of the companies building WiFi networks such as Boingo, The Cloud and Cometa, most are building their own infrastructure or linking together smaller networks' own physical networks. FON asks individuals to add their own WiFi connections to its network, either openly or for pay. With FON's founder, we discuss "foneros," phone-company relations, muni wireless possibilities and the nascent trend of businesses built atop the commons. You gonna be a fonero? Mon, 12 Dec 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall63 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Who will produce the most effective enhancements to our transportation systems: automakers, governments or the unruly masses? Right now, GM, BMW and others are exploring in-car intelligence, while cities are helping buses extend green lights and citizens see what traffic is like with services and sites such as 511.org. Fears of Big Brother are one outcome. If we opened up the infrastructure, smaller innovators could help us test new solutions. There's plenty of low-hanging fruit in this market, but my fear is that automating driving will have negative effects, not positive ones. Google for Hans Monderman to see an alternative. I'm sorry Dave; I can't do that. Mon, 05 Dec 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, intelligent transportation systems, smart cars, smart highways, Jim Benson, cars, traffic 511 http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall62 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Energy, social ventures and disaster preparedness all came up in our call, but the resonant themes were the key role of social dynamics and the increasing decentralization going on everywhere, at every level. Microfinance works in part due to social forces. Other social forces helped coalesce grassroots relief efforts after the year's major disasters, sometimes showing how ineffectual governments can be. The fun and memorable idea in this call is that we're moving to a new, networked formulation of value. In brief: social dynamics and decentralization Mon, 28 Nov 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall61 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn If you don't have operators on duty to take your call, if you don't print on paper and move it around and if you keep costs really low, it turns out you can produce some pretty sophisticated things at very low cost. Think Craigslist and classifieds, Wikipedia and encyclopedias, BitTorrent and traditional entertainment channels. Who is safe from this trend? Who benefits? Is this a recipe for disaster, as money drains out of industries, obsoleting job functions faster than new jobs emerge? As barriers fall... Mon, 21 Nov 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, natural cost, Craigslist, Google http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall60 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With China on its way to 400 million cellphones and the rest of the world afire with mobiles and texting, maybe PCs and laptops won't be so dominant, after all. Trip Hawkins describes smart cellphones as terminals for personal social computing (not authoring), which may be a good starting description, especially as the "chunk size" of what we deal with online goes from large documents to smaller items such as blog posts and emails (or "snack videos"). Windows Mobile is gaining control of the mobile OS market and carriers will keep trying to retain their control. The next decade promises to be frothy, indeed. Is that a PDA in your pocket? Mon, 14 Nov 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, cellphones, GSM, PDAs, Windows Mobile, pocket PCs, Al Chang http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall59 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn With Windows Vista due in the next year, what's to love? The primary beneficiaries seem to be media conglomerates, because Vista bakes strong DRM deep into the hardware and software. Crashing less and being less vulnerable to intrusion is good, and should save companies money, but it's not a positive benefit. The implicit assumption seems to be that the most important thing that PCs can carry is "produced" media. But as data and applications move off the PC, does the OS matter any more? Notably, nobody offered any positive love for Vista during the call. Do operating systems matter any more? Mon, 07 Nov 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Microsoft, Windows, Longhorn, Vista, operating systems, web 2.0 http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall58 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Is Google close to tapping out the adworthy markets and overloading its visitors with ads, or is it just uncovering a new market dynamic, in which Google can build things that others consider their key assets -- say a global wireless communication network -- as a by-product of collecting better data for serving relevant ads? With Om Malik, we played out the current trends to the point of postulating "Google Cranium," with functions we'll leave as an exercise to the listener. Your core is someone else's context Mon, 31 Oct 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, core, context, Om Malik, Google, advertising, AdSense, Overture, Microsoft, Yahoo, relevance http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall57 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn There are many reasons why major IM players such as AOL might want to avoid opening up their systems, from security concerns to the belief that maybe they'll end up dominating the market. But many hope that the recent moves by MSN and Yahoo to link their systems heralds broader interoperability. It's like early ATMs when other banks followed Citibank's lead. But where's the value in IM? What's unique to any of the offers? Will we ever have IMteroperability? Mon, 24 Oct 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Coburn, Michalski, Yi-Tan, open source, openness, industry structure, peer production http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall56 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Openness is transforming industries. VoIP nixes long-distance revenues, but creates opportunities for global service. Craigslist kicks classifieds around, but increases local commerce. Open content helps those who can't pay for content get access and bootstrap themselves. In this call we talk about how to frame a peer-produced study that can model these and other trends. What happens when barriers fall? Mon, 17 Oct 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Coburn, Michalski, open source, openness, industry structure, peer production, Yi-Tan http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall55 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Since Yakima County, WA, started a wireless network for public safety four years ago, many US municipalities have started to build their own networks. These efforts are local; generalizing from them is iffy. One of the growing issues is jurisdiction. Will the profusion of local initiatives tilt the balance of power away from the incumbent carriers, who are well connected at the state level and have lawyers at the ready, or will the FCC take action that closes down local jurisdiction over wireless infrastructure? Managing the "middle mile" Tue, 11 Oct 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, muni wireless, municipal broadband, Dewayne Hendricks, Bob Frankston http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall54 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Municipal wireless access is coming to a boil. The technology, legal and governmental issues are complicated enough, yet how all of these are framed is also crucial, as VisiCalc inventor Bob Frankston points out early in this call. Framed as municipal services, muni networks may sound competitive with incumbent phone companies and cable TV providers. Framed as utility cabling and connectivity, they are more like water and sewage pipes. One (fiber) ring to rule them all? Mon, 03 Oct 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, muni wireless, municipal broadband, Esme Vos, Dewayne Hendricks, Jim Baller, Bob Frankston, framing metaphors http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall53 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Skype watcher Stuart Henshall brings us many good reasons why Skype + eBay is an interesting proposition, from markets that have more conversations to security, scalability, trust and smaller things like Caller ID. What will this do to voice-response systems and CRM? Hopefully, improve them a lot. Is this the new platform for commerce? Mon, 26 Sep 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Skype, eBay, communications, acquisition, eCommerce, Stuart Henshall http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall52 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Sascha Meinrath reports on his many bumps against FEMA in trying to help bring technology support to Katrina victims. As we hear other interesting updates about data entry and virtual call centers, an idea forms: Is is possible to create an on-demand virtual call routing capability over the Net? Barriers, updates and a project idea Mon, 19 Sep 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Katrina relief, hurricane, project backpack http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall51 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn From 9/11 to Katrina, people have been using the Internet to coordinate rescue and relief operations, creating everything from missing persons sites to housing offers, volunteer matching and on-the-spot PCs with Net access. What are we learning in this process? What does it say about large institutions? Pulling together on the Net Mon, 12 Sep 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Katrina relief, hurricane http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall50 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn "Web 2.0" services and applications are light, easily mixed, collaborative and tightly focused on useful tasks. Ajax is one of their enabling technologies. In this call, we discuss where these traits are taking applications and what we might expect next. How will the Web 2.0 change things? Mon, 05 Sep 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Adaptive Path, Janice Fraser, Peter Merholz, Ajax, JavaScript, Web 2.0, platform http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall49 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn What would a productivity and collaboration platform look like if we stepped away from Outlook, the Office suite and other things we use today? If we looked at the gestures we use to remember, create and collaborate? And is Google building something like this? Building a more effective work platform Mon, 29 Aug 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Google, Linkido, Microsoft Office, aikido, gestures, personal productivity, groupware, social software http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall48 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Mary Hodder has been urging search engines and blog-search sites such as Technorati to rethink the way they track blogs. By tracking measures that reflect conversation and relationships, search sites will reflect what goes on in the blogosphere better than the blunt measure they typically use now: inbound links. Keeping better track of the Live Web Mon, 22 Aug 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Mary Hodder, Live web, Live links http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall47 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn From one perspective, mommyblogs are the modern family album. They chronicle, day to day, events and insights to treasure (or bemoan) years later. From another, they're just a tiny niche in the blogosphere. But the authenticity and passion that mommybloggers (and daddybloggers) usually bring to their posts may herald a more connected and credible citizen, customer and collaborator. It's not a niche, it's a life! Mon, 15 Aug 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Elisa Camahort, Lisa Stone, Jory Des Jardins, Nancy White, blogging women, BlogHer conference, Jenn Satterwhite, Mindy Roberts, mommyblogging, mommybloggers, mothers http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall46 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Ten days after BlogHer, four of its instigators lead a discussion about what made the conference special, from the way they organized it (what's a do-ocracy?) to the dynamics of respect and openness that contrasted with the usual one-upmanship of tech conferences. BlogHer Afterthoughts Mon, 8 Aug 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Elisa Camahort, Lisa Stone, Jory Des Jardins, Nancy White, blogging women, BlogHer conference http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall45 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn IDEO's CTO Rickson Sun joins us to discuss how observation, carefully done, leads to innovation. We all share insights about what works: focus groups, storytelling, no storytelling and a mix-and-match approach, using what fits the situation. Perhaps most effective: experiences (vs. logic). In the worst case: fear. Lessons from Human Centered Design Mon, 1 Aug 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Human Centered Design, design, HCD, Rickson Sun, IDEO, observation http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall44 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn From Make magazine to amateur astronomy, DIY is everywhere. The sharing that fuels it is old: it's called "elmering" in amateur radio. But the feeling of power it offers is spreading to domains you'd never expect, and feeding back into traditional disciplines. DIY Everything Mon, 18 Jul 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, DIY, do it yourself, lead users, power, innovation, openness http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall42 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn How do today's kids use online games? What do they like about them? Why and when do they switch? We talked about these and other behaviors associated with virtual game environments, going all the way to games that help adults learn new skills. When virtuality intersects reality Tue, 05 Jul 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Tyler, Omar Abdelwahed, online games http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall41 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Generational change appears to be happening more quickly than usual. If you're over 20 or so, chances are you both love and dread your email, but you use it a lot. Not so for the next generations. They're living a real-time life, from IM to online games. Our guest 15-year-old takes us on a guided tour. Subtitle: Email? It's so 20th Century! DIY Everything Mon, 27 Jun 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, Tyler, instant messaging, IM, online games, sociology http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall40 Jerry Michalski and Pip Coburn Services such as delicious and Flickr have caught fire in the techie community, partly because of their tagging features, which allow all participants to add descriptive metadata to bookmarks or photos. These tags are then elegant ways to navigate through otherwise uncharted territories. You are here. Mon, 20 Jun 2005 18:31:34 GMT no Michalski, Coburn, Yi-Tan, tags, tagging, delicious, flickr, sharing, folksonomies http://www.podcasting.land-com.net/Yi-TanCall39