donloeb.com

ok…listen carefully…errr…anyone want to translate?

[note: if you’re using an rss reader and don’t see the videos below, please go to my blog]

ok, i haven’t written about google products and don’t really plan to…but, i have to point out a couple of new features in google earth and maps. why? because they’re so freakin’ cool…

first off, when i was 17, i wrote a program (on a mac…in basic…ughh) that showed the winter sky from northern california. you could walk toward the horizon and the view would change, etc…and, i also simulated retrograde motion. i had a planet move across the sky while at the same time i showed a bird’s eye view of the solar system in another window so that folks could see why this happens. yeah, i was an astronomy geek…

when i used our new google sky service yesterday, it brought me back 20 (or so) years. words won’t do it justice…just go play around with it. of course, make sure you turn on a bunch of the data layers re planets, etc. and, just to whet your appetite -> here’s a screenshot of orion and then a closeup of the orion nebula (thanks to the hubble telescope).

lastly, just because i love embeds, here’s where i eat lunch most days :)

monday’s links:

- facebook email…should spur adoption…this is a big big deal,

- hp is building a pretty cool system to print docs anywhere in the world from your mobile phone,

- gmail adoption in schools,

- wsj piece on business blogging, and

- skrenta on mahalo and SEO. i need to get my hands on that ppt…

happy friday….

- why journalists should blog…and, scott karp’s new social network / news aggregation company targeted at journalists and consumers - very interesting…

- david berlind’s take on twitter…i agree…

- new local page from topix? looks like a real newspaper…and, nice article about charlie from google…sign me up…

- facebook monetization and metrics from seth goldstein, etc.

- CDN pricing…a nice detailed view into that world…

today’s links:

- cage-free egg shortage!

- newspapers are screwed…or no, they’re not? plus, media tribes from jeff jarvis…

- great facebook newsweek profile and new facebook ad network from videoegg

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since the times published an article today on books & cell phones, i can now talk about my obsession publicly…phew :)

i’ve been reading books (yes, real books) on my cell phone for the past year or so. when a friend first suggested i try this, i thought he was nuts. but, here’s why it’s great (despite the rather lousy user experience):

1) you always have a book, wherever you are -> train, plane, car, doctor’s office, boring meeting, etc. :)
2) no one knows you’re reading a book…or what you’re reading,
3) you can easily carry multiple books (i tend to read two or three books at once anyways), and my favorite…

4) when your spouse goes to sleep, you can still read :)

here’s the money quote from the times:

Mr. Biba loves the flexibility, and even takes his cellphone to bed with him. “If I’m reading in bed and I don’t want to wake up my wife, I can use my phone and read in total darkness,” he said.

my only complaints -> it’s hard / impossible to share books and they’re too expensive.

my tools -> blackberry curve and mobipocket reader (from amazon). when i had a nokia smartphone, i used the ereader app…

today’s links:

- social to do lists from dabble. they’ve “outsourced” social networking to facebook. but, how many apps focused on to do lists do we need?

- union square ventures on hiring a vp of enginerring / CTO. great great advice.

- wine marketing via blogs. nice web2 strategy from stormhoek.

- how to read a chapter a day via email or rss…

starting right now, i’m going to attempt to post daily. to accomplish this, i’ll use my gbus time to crank out a post of some sort. like today, it will often just include a few links, etc. essentially, this will replace much of my delicious usage (but not greader sharing)…

so, here it goes:

1) saw this on TV last night. while it’s not surprising, it’s pretty scary. the mcd brand is simply that strong. sounds like the golden arches could really help us with the kids + broccoli problem :)

2) interesting doc on iraq…odd that i hadn’t yet heard about it….also, he’s a first time filmmaker…

3) ahh…ibm to the rescue. here’s their take on media’s mean streets :) (via hooman)

i read this article on silicon valley millionaires on sat. (via the web)…errr…no comment. well, the accompanying video explains some of it…but, it doesn’t make up for the rest of the article…

as an aside -> i need to find a way to start blogging regularly again…i might just resort to shorter posts like this one.

first off, congratulations to jz, arun, traci, jon, steve, and everyone else…i’m terribly impressed with our team - they pushed this out in record time…

so, what exactly are self-serve feed-powered ads? well, this new service enables publishers to create “live” ad units - i.,e take a custom background image or standard banner and then use feed content to automatically update the ad creative. we’re essentially allowing publishers (of all shapes and sizes) to use the existing headline animator service to develop and then traffic dynamic ad units…

why is this significant? two reasons…(1) it’s super easy for any of our 500k or so publishers to produce compelling creative that doesn’t need to be changed (the ad updates when the feed changes), and (2) these ads are “useful” and fit the feed-reading experience (note: these are not contextually targeted ads). for example, if i’m reading valleywag (yeah, i’ll admit it), i’ll start to see feed-based ads from other publishers (big and small). since i’ll be in “reading mode,” these ads should act as content discovery units…i can then click to preview the content, and if i like what i see, go to the site or subscribe to the feed (of course)…

here are a few examples…

btw, these ads can also be published to web pages and virally spread (see the “grab this” links)…and, we track these headline animators (err…widgets) across the web…

lastly, here’s an older post i wrote on feed-powered ads…