A little logo redux
By Huw Leslie | January 28, 2007
I just found this redux of a whole load of corporate logos in the Web 2.0 style:
Its odd when you think about it that such an important sector within the American economy has carved out such a different branding style. I do like some of the above logos more than the originals, particularly BMW.
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Dick Cheney munching…
By Huw Leslie | January 27, 2007
during the State of the Union, presumably as a mark of respect to his boss!
Oh dear! Now we know why Iraq happened:
Bush: So, Dick, do you think we need to invade?
Cheney: [eating, not paying attention] What’s that? [seeks to cover up his lack of attention] Oh, yes, definitely. Totally agree.
oops.
via cvp
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Snow
By Huw Leslie | January 25, 2007
We had what has to be the most pathetic layer of snow ever today and yesterday - it had thawed out almost completely by lunchtime on both days.
All down to global warming, I guess.
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Upgraded to Wordpress 2.1 RC
By Huw Leslie | January 19, 2007
I’ve installed the recently released RC of WP 2.1 on here today, mainly out of excitement for the Auto Save feature - something that I really felt was needed for Wordpress (I’ve lost far too many posts!).
They’ve updated the admin interface somewhat, and I’m hoping that they’ve improved the visual text editor to fix some of its bugs. We shall see.
I’m a little bit bemused as to what the ‘upload manager’ is, above and beyond that in 2.0x. Hence the picture accompanying this post, to see if I can find out.
Details of what is contained in the release are here.
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Dawkins, Archbishop of the Church of Athiesm gives a sermon
By Huw Leslie | December 16, 2006
I’ve just finished watching a video of Richard Dawkins posted by Dawkins himself on YouTube. Amusing that he is starting to use new media to spread propaganda of his false philosophy.
What no-one mentioned explicitly in the programme but that I wanted to hear was the point that Richard Dawkins, always critical of faith, is just as faithful as a Christian. There is no proven explanation as to the beginning of this universe. No-one knows for sure whether the cosmos was created by God or in the absence of a God. Yet Dawkins is adamant that any explanation involving a God is invalid and false, and that science provides the only possible answer. There is a gap in our knowledge, and religious people fill it with God, Dawkins with science. Both approaches rely on faith, rather than the firm evidence Dawkins loves so much.
Having removed the argument that a leap of faith can never be justified (since that is required if we are to explain the universe), we can then argue for the existence of God based on logical arguments (my favourite being the first and second of Aquinas’ five, although they need some altering to work). Thus, from the balance of probability, the existence of God can be proved.
I think I might start putting my philosophical ideas down here. After all, if Dawkins can use YouTube, I can use WordPress!
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First post on Digital-lifestyles.info
By Huw Leslie | December 11, 2006
A little while ago Simon Perry asked me to write for Digital-Lifestyles.info, as he’d seen that I had favourited it in Technorati and liked Gizbuzz. It’s a fairly big news source - it’s listed in Google News, and Alexa shows that it’s not suffering in terms of traffic.
My first post there has just gone live:
YourMinis review : Ajax Homepages explained
I’m going to be writing a series on Ajax homepages for them. Hopefully the start of something good!
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Zoho knows how to evangelise
By Huw Leslie | December 7, 2006
Scoble reports that there’s a conference on tech evangelism going on at the moment. As I understand it, evangelism involves building one’s brand through conversations with the tech community, talking about why you are better and taking feedback. Think Channel9.
In my opinion, tech companies (and much of this would apply to other companies as well) need look no further than Zoho for their tips on building interest and brand value for their product in the age of new media. Zoho first got in contact with me when I wrote on Gizbuzz on the launch of Writely that ‘Writely is certainly better than Zoho Writer’. One of the Zoho team, Arvind, got in touch to ask why. I was really impressed - I’d written about countless companies on Gizbuzz before, often negatively, yet none of them had bothered to get in touch. I wrote quite a long email back. What impressed me even more was that Zoho took some of the feedback on board, with the result that much of the criticism contained in that document no longer stands.
About a month after that, I got in touch with Arvind again about doing an interview with someone from Zoho. I hadn’t interviewed anyone for Gizbuzz before, and it was the first Gizbuzz podcast. It’s not uncommon for a company you email about an interview to completely ignore your request (bigger companies, unsurprisingly, are worst about this). This was even more likely given the fact that I had no track record and no audience, as this was the first ever. Zoho did put up someone for interview, however, and it was certainly one of the best I’ve done. And the Gizbuzz podcast now has a fairly substantial audience, with a lot of traffic from our latest podcast being sent back to the Zoho interview. The second second benefit Zoho has got from being helpful.
Since then Zoho has always kept in touch with me, telling me when they have released something which they think I might be interested in. Having built the solid foundations of a relationship with Gizbuzz, I am far more likely to cover Zoho because I find them interesting and use many of their products.
The latest stroke of genius from Zoho, which prompted this post, was the post on their corporate blog about coverage of their latest update. They posted quotes from many blogs, including Gizbuzz, who had covered them, obviously all positive. This post was then used by Read/WriteWeb’s Richard Macmanus (I suspect) find what other bloggers had been saying. Thus by this summary post from Zoho they influenced the blogging conversation by ensuring that the positive reviews were picked up by the A-list blogs where it really matters.
So what have Zoho got from me as a result of being friendly, savvy and ‘keeping me in the loop’? Quite extensive feedback, on a number of their products. Significant coverage of those products, often positive. More positive coverage on A-list blogs, despite my distinct B-list status. I would say that was worth it!
A note to Zoho - make sure you hold on to your evangelism team!
Topics: Blogging, Gizbuzz, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
So why not Vox?
By Huw Leslie | December 5, 2006
This is a personal blog, yet I have gone down the route of installing Wordpress, a theme and getting it all set up as I like it, rather than choose Vox. I reviewed Vox on Gizbuzz a little while ago, and really liked it. If you don’t know, Vox is the latest personal blogging app from Six Apart, which really emphasises social networking features. You set permissions on your posts to say who within your network is allowed to read them, or you can make them public.
If you look at FCOL, you will see that I have most of the features that Vox would provide me with, but with the noticable absence of social networking. It’s not that I don’t think that social networking is a good idea - it is, and Vox does it very well. The problem arises out of the fact that I don’t know anyone who uses Vox. If I did, I would probably be using it. This highlights a major problem for aspiring new social networks. I will only use a social network if my friends are on it, but I’m not prepared to send out the spammy emails required to get the three or so that would actually respond.
If I can’t have the social networking features, I may as well not use Vox, and therein lies the problem. Vox need to get me to use it because it is the best platform even without social networking features, so that eventually people see that I am on Vox and follow (I’m being optimistic about my ability to act as a social leader here!). And right now, for people like me that can set up Wordpress but don’t have any friends on Vox, Wordpress remains the best option.
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Why Britain needs nukes
By Huw Leslie | December 4, 2006
OK, whilst I’m still fired up about this whole personal blogging thing, here’s my take on the story of the day:
Tony Blair has announced that he wants the UK to renew it’s nuclear deterrent. Currently we have four Vangard-class submarines which carry the Trident missiles. The missiles themselves are fine for the moment; it’s the submarines which need replacing.
People seem to confuse themselves between two entirely separate issues related to this topic; having the nuclear deterrent and using it. It is absolutely essential we maintain the nuclear deterrent because it puts us in a much stronger position in terms of international diplomacy (we get to be a member of the ‘nuclear club’) and it is a good disincentive to other countries looking to destroy Britain in a war to attack us using nuclear weapons if that country knows that we have the ability to fight back. The problem with states such as Iran and North Korea having nuclear weapons is that they are not stable democracies. Britain has had serious parliamentary government since the Glorious Revolution at the end of the seventeenth century, with ever increasing involvment of the people as respect for lower classes increased. Iran has had several revolutions as late as the 20th century, and North Korea is a dictorship, led by a mad, meglomaniac despot. Therefore, if I were Prime Minister, I would ensure that we had nuclear weapons in a usable state at all times.
I would not necessarily press the button. The circumstances under which I would use nuclear weapons would be severely limited. I like Aquinas and Augustine’s ideas about Just War. There are various tests which proposed millitary action must pass if it is to be morally acceptable. The principle centres around the concept of the lesser of two evils. Essentially, I would only press the button if it prevented or stopped a greater evil. I can’t think there are many circumstances in which that would apply.
We still need the nukes though!
Topics: Politics, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
Blogs as tools for procrastination
By Huw Leslie | December 4, 2006
I am procrastinating right now. I have two essays I should be writing, and I don’t want to write either of them. So I’m blogging.
I have always used blogs as a way of work posponement. I set up Gizbuzz on Blogger partly to avoid revising for my GCSE mocks. When it came around to the real GCSEs, not only did I move Gizbuzz to Wordpress, but I installed Ubuntu Linux on an old laptop, attached it to my network, got LAMP working, set up port forwarding and a static IP address and put Gizbuzz on that.
I’m not sure what it is about blogging which makes it so perfect for procrastination. I suspect that it is something to do with the combination of the technical challenge of setting the blog up in the first place, combined with the escapism of entering the virtual world of the internet, which seems at times strangely disjointed with the world in which most of us live, most of the time. Thus it takes up time, it is interesting and, most importantly, it is utterly irrelevant to the task in hand.
I really need to get on now.
Update: Have now done both essays, 48hrs later. Wow, that was effective procrastination!
Topics: Blogging, Me, Uncategorized | No Comments »