Disqus - Friends of thaumata

Re: More from the MT backlash backlash

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 14 May 2004 12:09:02 -0000

An excellent point about people who write for a living - I wonder why it is.

Re: I hates Lucas! I hates it forever!

Ian Betteridge — Tue, 17 May 2005 13:23:05 -0000

Brin's not the first SF author to have a pop at Lucas for the elitist, anti-democratic and authoritarian streak in Star Wars - Michael Moorcock wrote a great essay called "Starship Stormtroopers" after the release of the original film (do a google search for "MIchael Moorcock Starship Stormtroopers" if you fancy a read). As he put it: "This sort of implicit paternalism is seen in high relief in the currently popular Star Wars series which also presents a somewhat disturbing anti-rationalism in its quasi-religious 'Force' which unites the Jedi Knights... and upon whose power they can draw, like some holy brotherhood, some band of Knights Templar. Star Wars is a pure example of the genre (in that it is a compendium of other people's ideas) in its implicit structure -- quasi-children, fighting for a paternalistic authority, win through in the end and stand bashfully before the princess while medals are placed around their necks."

Re: ZDNet looks into Office suite performance

Ian Betteridge — Thu, 27 Oct 2005 12:07:13 -0000

"The guy made a benchmark based on a 200MB file."

Hey anon, have YOU read that article? To quote from it: "Here is a comparison of memory and CPU usage between Microsoft and OpenOffice.org office applications. This is with just the bare application and blank data file loaded."

With a blank document, OpenOffice takes up 10x as much CPU time and 3-6x as much memory. That's shockingly poor coding for something that's supposed to be an efficient alternative to MS Office.

Re: Scoble should be fired, author tells Microsoft

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 28 Oct 2005 06:57:28 -0000

I'll be happy when Robert eventually leaves Microsoft, so he can stop persuading me to reinstall MSN Desktop Search when Google Desktop is still so much better! I must have have swapped between the two a dozen times now... :)

Re: Guinness blog - not serving for the United States?

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 06:01:26 -0000

Check under "Jesusland" ;-)

Re: Overwhelmed with pitches, Dave, say it isn’t so!

Ian Betteridge — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 09:18:30 -0000

Robert, I think it sounds a little like you're trying to have your cake and eat it. Actually, that's a little strong: but you've spent many long hours talking UP the impact and influence of bloggers and blogging in general. You've contributed to the hype around blogging. Unfortunately for your inbox, there's a price that comes attached to that - you will gain the attention of people who want to reach your readers through you.

You're an opinion-former, Robert, whether you like it or not! :)

As for Dave's decision, I think it will make precisely zero difference to anyone outside his circle. Dave is no more responsible for the popularity of blogging than Gutenberg is responsible for the popularity of Vogue magazine. Dave made some tools that people have used to make great stuff, and that inspired other people to make better tools than his, but claiming that him deciding not to blog (and personally I'll believe it when I see it) will have some impact on the wider blogging space is silly.

Blogging grew beyond the point where Dave Winer could have an impact on it years ago. I suspect that 90% of the people who use LiveJournal or Blogger or TypePad barely know who he is, let alone care if he blogs.

Re: The new A list

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 17 Mar 2006 06:13:12 -0000

"No one called both sides and did some real reporting"

That's right, Robert. Why should they? There's no money in it.

The difference between "professional journalism" and "citizen journalism" comes down to money, because money makes it possible for someone to concentrate time and resources on a story. A professional journalist covering this would ring Dave, ring Rogers, do some digging, get to the bottom of it. Someone who doesn't have the time because they're not being paid to do it won't do it.

"One thing on this case: one guy called in the mob, the other guy didn’t. That says volumes to me."

That's actually a bit rich. There have been plenty of occasions in the past when Dave has "called in the mob" as you put it. And posting a threatening legal letter - which is what Rogers did - is pretty much standard practice on the internet these days.

At the end of the day, Robert, THIS is the wisdom of crowds that many folks, including you, have been talking about. Crowds become lynchmobs and witch hunts at the drop of a hat, and the internet amplifies that. Anyone who'd ever done researching into the psychology of crowd behaviour could have explained this - but instead, a band of techno-utopians somehow thought that crowds on the internet would act differently to other crowds.

The only time that crowds become wise is when they're mediated through money: Markets, not crowds, are never wrong.

Re: The new A list

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 17 Mar 2006 06:45:31 -0000

Incidentally, Robert, as you're his friend it might be worth reading Rogers' comment (http://www.cadenhead.org/wo... where he explains why he didn't sign the contract that Dave offered. If you could get that message through to Dave, it might help to clear up this mess.

Re: The irritant of the non-credible journalists

Ian Betteridge — Sun, 26 Mar 2006 18:41:50 -0000

Robert, I really think you need to take a step away from the keyboard, take a deep breath, and go spend some more time with your family. You're getting *way* overheated about this, and it doesn't sound like the Robert Scoble I respect and enjoy reading at the moment.

To elaborate, when you say: "Ricky: why, again, am I listening to someone who doesn’t even have the courage to sign his/her name on what he/she writes?"

Perhaps because Ricky is writing something pretty sensible when he says "It is NOT 'what you link to' that defines the service that you give to your readers. It is 'what you say about it'"

And when you say "anonymous people are not credible" you're falling into one of the oldest traps in the book. Stating that someone who chooses to keep their identity quiet is "not credible" *no matter what they say* is the exact equivalent of stating that nothing you say about Microsoft is credible because you happen to work there. The people who sneer "Yeah, Scoble, you can't trust him because he works for Microsoft" are making exactly the same call. They're judging you not on what you say, but on who you are.

Re: Scoble: poster child for not blogging

Ian Betteridge — Mon, 27 Mar 2006 11:57:25 -0000

To be honest, Robert, I wonder why you allow comments. You get a constant stream of "you work for liars!" type posts that add nothing to the conversation. You end up spending too much time answering comments, when perhaps a little more time thinking through your own posts (and being with your family!) would be of far more benefit to you. A less-stressed Scoble means better posts, and better posts mean happier readers.

As I've said a few times, to other people: a blog isn't a "free speech" zone for everyone. It's a "free speech" zone for the person who writes the blog. Everyone else can get their own blogs, if they want to comment. Tools like Technorati make it easy to follow the conversation, if that's what you want to do.

On the subject of Nick's post, I think his advice isn't that you should have "a PR machine" blogging - it's that, unless they have a really compelling reason, corporations shouldn't blog at all. I think he's wrong in that, because I think that the blog format is a great way of getting information across in a less formal manner. In particular, I think that some of the Microsoft blogs, like the one for the Live Messenger team, get across some great info in a concise and simple way. But that level of communications empowerment for employees won't work for everyone.

Re: Much ado about blogging (Scoble, you didn’t answer the question)

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 11:35:59 -0000

"blogging doubled sales at Stormhoek winery, according to its CEO"

I think this sentence, on its own, shows why, Werner was right to give you guys a rough ride and demand some real figures. The actual first line of the story you link to is this:

"South African producer Stormhoek has doubled sales of its wine with a campaign directed at the blogging community."

Can you see the difference? Stormhoek didn't double its sales through blogging: it increased them by marketing to bloggers. That's a very, very different claim. The only actual indication of how many bottles that were sold via blogging is the 100 bottles sent out via Hugh - of 100,000 sold. How many of those 100 bottles were turned into further sales? How many people who bought Stormhoek did so because they'd heard of it via a blog? And how much more significant was the fact that Sainsburys, Asda, Oddbins, Majestic, Waitrose and Somerfield - all major UK wine sellers - started stocking the brand?

That's what Werner means by a lack of hard figures. Now Amazon has a LOT of hard figures about its customers. It knows everything you've bought, and how many things (and what) you've bought after a recommendation. It knows who your friends are, because they bought you things from your wishlist. It knows what you sold through its marketplace, it knows if and what complaints you made. THOSE are hard facts, and from them Amazon can tell a much greater range of things about its customers than any amount of blogs would.

Re: Correcting the Record about Microsoft

Ian Betteridge — Sun, 11 Jun 2006 05:26:42 -0000

Congratulations Robert!

Re: Nielsen blows it on podcasting

Ian Betteridge — Thu, 13 Jul 2006 10:24:14 -0000

I have to agree with Weeksie. Why are you (and others) getting so het up about this? It's just a comparible figure, not comparing the two things. They're both just things people do on the internet.

And I thought you weren't linking to/reading Memeorandum-type sites? :)

Re: The advertising firewall

Ian Betteridge — Tue, 18 Jul 2006 06:32:24 -0000

"Audiences get turned off when they know that content isn’t actually coming from the heart but rather is coming from the deep wallets of a big company."

Actually, Robert, this isn't always true. There's a huge, thriving contract publishing business out there where entire magazines are created for companies - and consumers actually like them.

In the UK, for example, the highest circulating magazine is a contract publication - Sky's listings mag. Magazines for supermarkets like Sainsbury and Waitrose sell 300-400,000 copies, beating their "independent" rivals.

So I'd suggest you're wrong. It's not the source of the money that's paying for a publication - it's the quality of the product. If all a product is is hard sell, it turns people off. But not if it's done under contract, and done well.

Re: Huge Red Flag at Netscape

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 21 Jul 2006 08:57:17 -0000

Digg is "one of the most interesting cultural experiments occuring on the web right now"? I thought it was thousands of people bickering at each other and adding precisely zero insight or information to the stories it points at. But I guess YMMV.

Re: 100 people do most of the Digging

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 21 Jul 2006 09:29:50 -0000

"If you take away those 100 people another 100 would jump into their spots. Why? Cause our relationship is with Digg, not with those people."

But that assumes that those 100 new people can do exactly the same job as the 100 old people. If not, you're getting less value - and Netscape wins.

Re: Big conferences are dead…

Ian Betteridge — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 05:57:12 -0000

The key point is number 8: the high cost. Large-scale exhibitions only make sense if they're a true overview of the industry they're about, which means that small companies must be able to afford to exhibit. In the case of E3 (like Macworld NYC), that's no longer the case. When you're being charge $1000 for a week's worth of ropey WiFi connectivity to your iny booth, you need do a LOT of business on the back of it to make ROI. And if it's costing a tiny booth-company a lot, you can imagine how much it's costing a Sony, Adobe or Microsoft.

ROI on small events is both easier to manage and easier to measure.

Re: Big conferences are dead…

Ian Betteridge — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 05:58:23 -0000

OH, and there's just a natural business cycle at work here. The big events become too expensive (for customers and companies alike), people decamp to smaller, cheaper events. These become more popular, and grow larger... which makes them more expensive... and so on.

Re: Why did Boeing’s wifi service die?

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 18 Aug 2006 03:08:28 -0000

When airlines all start to offer mobile phone access on the plane, the first one to ban it and advertiser with "No phones... no WiFi... no worries. Get off the grid with SnookAir" will reap a whole lot of money.

Re: One thing about innovators…

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 25 Aug 2006 13:33:20 -0000

The problem that people have with Dave's latest "River of News" idea (it's not the first concept he's called "River of News" - he's also referred to a single-stream RSS aggregator by that name) is that it looks an awful like stuff that's been done before, and Dave hasn't explained it well. Doc's explaination of what it is and why it's important is much better.

But the problem that I have is that it's simply not a good way of browsing news web sites on a mobile device. What you get at the top of the page is the latest news, not the most important news - compare and contrast the BBC's mobile site and BBCRiver to see what the difference is. With a site like the BBC, which delivers hundreds of stories per day, the most important story is likely to be one, two, or three pages down - and as user interface design has shown again and again, the more you make people scroll, the more readers you're lose.

If you're checking news on a mobile device, you want to see the big story that happened a couple of hours ago at the top of the page - not the 10 minor stories that haved appeared since then and pushed it on to the second page on your Blackberry.

Re: Newsflash: 98% don’t use RSS

Ian Betteridge — Tue, 29 Aug 2006 06:21:30 -0000

The problem is that you don't know if RSS is on the 14th day or the 30th. The "all the cool kids" argument doesn't work - all the cool kids have been using Linux or Macs for years, and I don't see the market shares of those products growing fast.

RSS will grow, of course. Whether it will be a mass market product depends on the applications people build with it, not the technology itself. What you and others are forgetting is that RSS is an enabler, not a product.

Re: Best broadband service in the UK?

Ian Betteridge — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 10:10:08 -0000

I'd really back up Stuart's recommendation for Zen. I was with them for a year, and in that time I didn't have a second's downtime. These days, I'm with Be Unlimited, which is fast (24Mb) but has rotten customer service - not recommended unless speed is more important to you than reliability.

Re: Second Life sees inflation?

Ian Betteridge — Mon, 30 Oct 2006 06:01:18 -0000

" user created content equates to no content whatsoever."

If you think there's no content in Second Life, you're not looking properly. I spent last evening in SL attending a trivia quiz that used only user-created content, from questions through the big yellow buzzers that you pressed to buzz in. My partner spent yesterday evening playing a game that someone has created within Second Life that is one of the most brilliantly conceived trading card games I've ever seen. Every aspect of that, from the scripting that drives the cards through to the fantastic art work, was created by users.

I used to be a skeptic too. And then I saw what users could do when you give them the freedom to create what they want. It's not all good, but I've NEVER seen such a wealth of creativity, from fantastic clothing and avatar design through to wholly-created immersive experiences.

Eric is correct about inflation, but that's no surprise. You have an economy where money is constantly created (via buying L$ from the Lindens with real dollars) while there are few, transfers in the opposite direction (even the biggest operators take far, far less out). Increase in the money supply = inflation, which anyone with even the briefest aquaintency with economics knows.

The Lindens are trying to react by cutting the amount of money given to users as a stipend, but that's no good. They're also trying to squeeze the economy by taking more out in tier fees from island-owners, but that won't work either - island owners will just up their rental income, which means more people will buy more dollars to compensate. More money will flow into Linden coffers, but the L$ will continue to plummet.

Re: Google Reader, the next “Digg?”

Ian Betteridge — Wed, 27 Dec 2006 07:49:45 -0000

I started using Google Reader as an experiment a month or so ago, switching from Newsgator - and despite loving NewsGator's offline clients, I don't think I'll be going back. The interface is really nice, the starring and Sharing features are well thought-out, and it works with IE, Firefox AND Safari, which is a bonus.

I agree that they could build some very interesting social software stuff around the Sharing idea, too. At the moment, its almost hidden in the background - but it could easily go some interesting places in the future.

Re: Thresher wine discount version 2

Ian Betteridge — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 07:38:35 -0000

£15 million in sales, but how much in actual profits? I very much doubt that Thresher has a 40% profit margin on many of its wines.