Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Farewell, Snip.it (& thanks!)

Fullscreen capture 1232013 73725 AM

So, Snip.it was bought by Yahoo and is being shut down. They've put together a "Hall of Fame" of contributors and I was named as one of the top contributors in the "Politics & World" category...

From an email I received from their Content Director:

I want to personally thank you for all your amazing contributions to the product, both in your snips and in your feedback to us. I’ve been continually impressed by all the interesting, unique content you’ve unearthed, as well as your thoughtful commentary on it. The quality of your contributions made the site an absolute joy to browse. 

To honor all of your support and contributions, we’ve included you in our Snip.it Hall of Fame, a place to celebrate our top snippers. We’ve included your Twitter handle, so people can continue to follow your insights.

https://snip.it/awards

We've also created a Snip.it Hall of Fame, where we’re honoring some of the top contributors to the Snip.it community. We’ve included their Twitter handles so you can continue to stay connected and follow their insights.

I joined Snip.it while it was still in beta and have posted to it more days than not since then.  They’ve been cool, it’s a great service, and their staff has been very supportive.  From nearly the beginning, they featured my content, which I was pretty proud of, and I seem to have attracted quite a few followers there.

Supposedly, they will be reinventing themselves with Yahoo.  I hope so.  They were a great service.

https://snip.it/

We are thrilled at the opportunity to bring Snip.it's vision to a larger scale at Yahoo!. While we can't share the specifics of what we'll be building, we are excited about the opportunity to take social news to new, exciting heights at Yahoo!. The Yahoo! team is passionate about inspiring and entertaining the world’s daily habits, and certainly sharing news and information is something we all do every day. The vision and energy at the company is contagious, and we’re so excited to be part of all that is to come.

So now, I just need to figure out what to do with the links I’ve saved there.  There are a couple ways to download them for future use, and I’ll be taking a look at how to get these back out there, when I have a little time…

I just deleted the Snip It button from my browser.  That makes me sad. 

Unfortunately, in life, with both the good and the bad, “This, too, shall pass…”

My Collections: HTML Links

Snip.it: All My Base Belong To You - HTML Links
Snip.it: Democracy In Distress - HTML Links
Snip.it: Favorites
Snip.it: Retrovirus Lab - HTML Links
Snip.it: Rubble - HTML Links
Snip.it: Suburban Eschatology Part Two - HTML Links

Yahoo Is In Talks To Buy A Site We Actually Use, Snip.It

Snip.It is a social site that resembles a mash up of Pinterest's collections and Instapaper's ability to save links for consumption later.

Read more:
http://www.businessinsider.com/yahoo-acquires-snipit-2013-1#ixzz2IoskdMnR

Yahoo Poised to Acquire Content Curation Site Snip.it - Liz Gannes - News - AllThingsD:

Snip.it was founded by Ramy Adeeb, who was formerly a principal at Khosla Ventures, and has funding from Khosla, True Ventures, Charles River Ventures and SV Angel.

Yahoo is paying “mid teens” of millions of dollars for the company, according to a source.



Kara Swisher yesterday described Yahoo’s new approach to content:

While one might argue that Google is already the Google of content, the plan is to make Yahoo more relevant by tailoring it to the individual and make the site a “trusted destination to get them to where they want to go and keep going back.”

Thus, the thinking goes, while Google is the place people come to search for links, Yahoo then becomes the place users come to find content. That means more partnership deals from third-party sources, with an additional social component layer and synced across a number of devices and platforms, especially video.

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Sunday, December 9, 2012

One Day On Earth: 12.12.12… So it begins

312755_3876785042879_505673581_nFullscreen capture 1292012 14207 PM.bmp   Fullscreen capture 1292012 12843 PM.bmp   Winner-180x180

Pretty much the same post I threw up in late October about NaNoWriMo 2012. 

Between working on this project and finishing the NaNoWriMo novel (I did get over 50,000 words in during November to “win” the event), I won’t be posting much on the blogs until 2013.

I wanted to do something quick and easy for One Day since the more complex idea a friend and I had will be impossible, since I am in Sacramento and not Portland, but things happen and after doing some planning and discovering that there is a theme for this years event, my idea for this year will be pretty complicated to edit.

Of course, I won’t be filming until Wednesday 12.12.12, but before then there is some prep work, and after there is going to be a whole bunch of editing.  And a whole bunch of writing on the novel.  And a whole bunch of major life stuff.

So the blogs will remain on hold for the time being.

Yes, this is being reposted everywhere…

One Day on Earth - Film on 12.12.12 from One Day on Earth on Vimeo.

One Day On Earth - 11-11-11 - Gresham and Portland, Oregon (720p) from A. F. Litt on Vimeo.

http://www.onedayonearth.org

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Saturday, October 27, 2012

Fun with PTC Sites: PTC Sense

2012-10-27. 01.

Another road leading to broken promises and false hope?  This is actually the same people who ran the last one I posted about, Fine PTC

PTC Sense (ptcsense.com) - Is it a Scam? | Not Recommended:

Connected to other scams - This site is being ran by the same people who owned DingoBux, PTC Wallet, RichPTC, and other scams. Most likely the one behind GPT Network, Michael Pratt. Also ValueBux traffic is being redirected to PTCSense. Valuebux is another GPTNetwork site that ended up scamming a lot of people.

Since this is the same people, Michael Pratt and GPT Network, the information on the last post is valid for this one.  Again, it’s probably all about the money.  Same unrealistic promises made with PTC Sense as was made with Fine PTC.

All My Base Belong to You...: Fun with PTC Sites: fineptc.com:

"Well looks like their other sites have scammed as much as they could. So they open up another site with a fresh name hoping to do the same. Lets hope people are doing their research before they start upgrading and wasting their time on this site."

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Friday, October 26, 2012

Fun with PTC Sites: fineptc.com

2012-10-26. 1.

Just checking this out...  An unfortunate potential new series of posts here…

advice for fineptc.com | Scam check for fineptc.com is fineptc.com safe?:

How did fineptc.com get a Trust Score of 0% ?

  • The owner of the website is using a service to hide their identity
  • This website has been reported as being untrustworthy
  • This website/business has been given a low reliability rating by other websites

fineptc.com | WOT Reputation Scorecard | WOT (Web of Trust):

Scam, site registered to the same people who ran other scam ptcs. DingoBux, BriteBux, to just name a few. Don't fall for the high rates and promises.

Fineptc and how I got scammed by it:

The worse part of my entire experience with the company is that they even told me that I will receive my payment after 60 business days, making that over two months of waiting. Waiting that long means that I won’t even be able to file a dispute with my PayPal accounts.

PTC Investigations: Fine PTC (fineptc.com) - Is it a Scam? | Not Recommended:

Well looks like their other sites have scammed as much as they could. So they open up another site with a fresh name hoping to do the same. Lets hope people are doing their research before they start upgrading and wasting their time on this site.

60 Business Days!! - Are you kidding?!! That is business days we are talking about here. That is about 3 months worth of wating. Guess how long before your time is up to file a dispute for paypal? Or even better, how about Payza (formerly known as AlertPay)? Last I checked, 45 for paypal, and only 30 days for Payza (formerly known as AlertPay). Starting to get the picture?

So you wait and wait for your payment. Then after you have waited 60 business days and you realize you were scammed and have no way of getting your money back.

Does fine ptc paid to anyone:

Best answer: Never

Fine ptc is true or fake??? - Yahoo! Answers India:

no no no. Fine PTC is an infamous scam site. DO NOT invest or do business with them...they will never pay you. PTC sites have to offer you like .01 or .02 per click to even have a chance at being legit....$10 is out of the question!

Is fine PTC Scam Pls Tell Me Guys - eMoneySpace:

with $10 Per  Click  and $10,000 cashout do you really need to ask if the site is a scam

FinePtc Review - Legit or Scam?:

The flashy layout was honestly what motivated me into joining this PTC site. If something seems a little too good to be true, it usually is. This site was a scam. I managed to reach the minimum payout, but it's been two months and no cash has been received. I recommend you stay far, far away from this one.

How does one earn $10 for each click when 1000 link credits are selling for $5? Be realistic and do the math. This site is only beneficial to the owner/admin of the site and not the clickers. They only want the money and do not care about members getting paid or not. I was a member there and feel that it was a waste of my time to click there because lets face it, the site is not going to pay you $10,000 when you reach payout.

I would not recommend to a friend.

Fine ptc is true or fraud:

The bad news is that most PTC sites fold up in just a few short months. They are complete scams. They will try to get people to buy as many referrals as possible and then when they have raked in a lot of money they will close the website instead of paying their customers. Some PTC sites like Bux.to have waiting lists of up to a year. Which means that when you request payment, you wil be waiting a very long time. A PTC site will start going down hill when it says it has to delay payments. This means they are broke and they will try to delay paying as long as possible and try to get more people to sign up and buy referrals. I would not trust ANY PTC site that takes longer than 30 days to pay you.

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

NaNoWriMo…. So it begins

Generic-180x180

Decided to throw this up everywhere tonight….

Pretty much starting in on NaNoWriMo this week. Not with the actual writing, but with character outlines, plot development, outlining, and a smidgen of research. More than anything, preseason training for writing a novel in one month.

Won't be around here much until December (except for when my laptop seizes up and I am spending time on the desktop waiting for spinning circles and endless hourglasses to work themselves out).

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Thursday, September 27, 2012

MySpace refuses to crawl off and die

2012-09-27. 1.

Been awhile.  Here is something, er, new?  Yes, a post about MySpace.  See, I am hip to what the kids are all into these days…

Myspace Wants to Be Pintumblfacergramify | Motherboard:

If MySpace’s fresh promo video is any indication, I think the veteran social network is finally sick of 187th place on the Internet. Now the site – preparing for a relaunch “very soon” – is offering something I don’t think many other networks have planned or thought of. Myspace is placing itself – and quite relentlessly so – in the center of the social networking panopticon, and it’s just so crazy, I’d sit in on this hand if I could.

The new Myspace from Myspace on Vimeo.

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Sunday, May 20, 2012

It’s Spooky in the Future! Fun with Obsolete Technology

Bumming around on YouTube watching tech geeks’ fathers fail on Windows 8, I noticed these…

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Gear: RIP frankenPC II - 2011-2012 & some thoughts on Windows 8 Consumer Preview

FrankenPC II  - 2011-2012.  May 17, 2012.

Well, it didn’t die so much as I chose to go in a different direction.  A while back I installed Windows 8 Consumer Preview (yes, the beta)…  It was interesting, but I was never able to get the sound running. 

Fullscreen capture 5202012 110232 AM

Long story short, yep…

Played the driver game, did everything suggested, and still no sound… 

This wasn’t a big deal, I could use my laptops for anything I needed sound for, except for editing videos.  The editing program I am stuck dealing with lives on frankenPC II and is non-transferable, but the hardware was so old that it had a hard time working with 1080 HD video anyway…

So, I already was planning on getting some Adobe software to edit on my newest computer and to call it good. 

Before installing 8, I also reorganized a lot of my files, backed everything up, and started using my Toshiba laptop as my primary computer. 

By this point, all I was really using frankenPC II for was using Windows Live Synch to automatically back up the photo files off of the Toshiba. 

Now, from the beginning, there was something a little off with frankenPC II.  Even XP was crashing a lot on this beast, so, of course, it only took a month or two before Windows 8 just got tired and didn’t want to play anymore.

If 8 had an easily accessible way to boot in Safe Mode, I probably could have fixed the problem, if it was a software issue, but I couldn’t keep it up and running long enough to navigate to the buried menus where they keep this option in 8. 

However, considering XP’s troubles, I think the motherboard was just reaching the end of its life. 

Decision time.  I spend an entire day, most likely, rolling back to Windows XP or I could just stick with my two laptop solution (applications on the newer Toshiba, email and music on an old Inspiron 9100) and move on…

Rebuilt external hard drive.  May 17, 2012.Considering that the backed up picture files were stored on a second hard drive and the fact that retiring frankenPC II would free up a lot of real estate on my desk, I chose retirement.

Fortunately, dealing with another recent issue, I had some hardware laying around to turn the internal HD into an external, plus I pulled a bunch of hardware and memory out of frankenPC II to soup up the tower in the living room, and this is a win, win, win situation.

So, the end result.  I have a lot more room on my desk.  I have to manually back up my picture files from time to time.  I have an ancient laptop as my permanent desktop PC (and a lot more room on my desk).  I am not bouncing between three different PCs running three different operating systems.  I need to invest in some new editing software, which I was planning on doing already. 

And, best of all, I am happier and less frustrated with my computer situation than I have been for a long time.

Some thoughts on Windows 8 Consumer Preview

As for Windows 8?  It was all right.  Mostly Window 7 with the Metro interface slapped on top.  A quick internet search will lead you to a lot of comments about the new operating system, and I think they are pretty fair and valid.Old Brick.  Inspiron 9100.  May 17, 2012.

In short, bright back the Start button for the Desktop.  Allow a choice between opening in the Metro mode or the Desktop mode (right now, it always opens to the metro screen).  Obviously, bring back the old F8 screens, with all of those start up options accessible immediately…

Oh, and work out that damn sound issue.  It looks like I wasn’t the only one struck deaf by my upgrade.

I can see where touchscreens are going to be playing a huge role in the future, and where touchscreens, for many people in many PC configurations may abandon their mice in the future.  However, I cannot see entirely abandoning my mouse ever.  There will always be, for as far into the future as I can see, times when I will want a mouse.Toshiba.  May 19, 2012.

Also, I can also see a future where I may have my screens mounted in places where it is inconvenient not to have a mouse or some similar input device.  When TVs are fully replaced by/merged with computers (5 to 10 years?), like hell I am getting up and walking across the room to interface with a menu!

In these case, I don’t know if I will want the Metro screen or the Desktop, probably depends on what I would be doing, but since we are not at this point yet, we need the choice.

Other than these small issues, when the time comes and I need to either purchase a new OS or a new PC, I see no problem picking up the latest version available.  7 if it is sooner, 8 if it is later. 

If if is 7, I’ll probably just stick with it and not bother upgrading for a while.  But I really see no real need, at this point, to avoid it like many people did with Vista.

Some Links

The State of Windows 8: Cheap Upgrades, Better Apps [RUMORS]:

Microsoft reporter Mary Jo Foley first reported that the company intends to provide cheap upgrades for new Windows customers over the summer. According to “contacts,” after the Release Preview arrives, customers who buy Windows 7 or a Windows 7 PC will be able to upgrade to Windows 8 when it’s released in the fall for just $14.99 — a pricerevealed to Windows Supersite by “sources.”

The best part of the deal is that those customers will be able to upgrade to Windows 8 Pro, the “higher-end” version of the software that’s a step above the basic edition. (for more on how Microsoft intends to market Windows 8, see this summary).

Living With Windows 8 Consumer Preview:

Microsoft has said that Windows 8 aims to be a "no compromise" operating system, focused on "and" instead of "or"—not a touch screen or a mouse and keyboard, but both together. It sounds great, but as I use it, I'm not quite convinced.

It's certainly improved since the developer preview. You can now use it successfully on a desktop or notebook, but I'm not sure why a typical desktop or notebook user with Windows 7 would upgrade to Windows 8.

Overall, I've gotten used to running Windows 8, and while a lot of it is neat, I'm still a bit skeptical.

In short, it almost feels like two operating systems in one: Metro, which works quite well on touch screens and tablets but feels awkward in the desktop mode; and the classic Windows UI with a Metro Start screen for desktop users, where the new UI seems unnecessary at least for now. It makes a lot of sense on a tablet with an optional keyboard, or with a hybrid or convertible notebook/tablet, but those seem to be relatively small parts of the market.

I think there are a number of things Microsoft could do to make Windows 8 more appropriate for desktop users. I'm not expecting it, but it would be nice to see an option for desktop users to return to the classic Start menu, and even launch Metro apps from there. For laptop users, it would be good to be able to use a touch pad for the kind of gestures you would use on a touch screen (a similar feature is in Mac OSX Lion). And for desktop users, I would be interested in an option to run Metro apps within windows, so you could have a number visible at the same time, particularly for large or multi-monitor setups.

As it is, Microsoft is right in saying there is "no compromise" to utility. You do get both sets of features, but simplicity of operation is compromised, I fear that will make a lot of desktop users in particular rather unhappy.

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Saturday, May 12, 2012

An interesting conversation about social media

Pepsi Digital Exec: Google 'Messed Up' With Google+, Instagram Is 'Phenomenal':

Was Instagram worth $1 billion? Will Google+ ever compete or beat Facebook?

Shiv Singh, global head of digital for PepsiCo Beverages and author of Social Media Marketing for Dummies, shared his thoughts on those trendy questions and more during his recent visit to Mashable to unveil Pepsi’s new celebrity-infused “Live for Now” global ad campaign and “Pulse” digital dashboard.

In a 10-minute interview with Mashable‘s editor-in-chief Lance Ulanoff, Singh commented about the launch ofGoogle+, Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram, avoiding digital marketing mistakes, establishing a brand voice and creating a Twitter list for “regular people.”

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