Links for March 16th through March 17th

A little something extra…

I’m on vacation this week and next. Spending a lot of time just hanging out, catching up on news reading during that time.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about what I’m thinking of as “the return of the consumer”: with Facebook, Google, &co., targeting works better than direct mail, TV, and everything. It’s a dream world for businesses that want to create, profile, reach, and sell to consumers, a word we’ve been trying to use the Internet to escape from, but which the Internet is now perfect for. Ironic, or whatever, like the GPL: it turns out the be a really good license for commercial open source companies.

Here’s the first page of of some notes I took late last night:

See the rest of my current notes in the photo set.

The Links

• Why Iraq war films fail
• Re-Educating Austin | The Texas Tribune
  Aside from the content, the form of this news coverage is good: local politics and news, taking advantage of the web as a delivery medium – lengthy interview excerpts not limited by column inches and audio chunks interspersed through-out.
• Austin start-up selling Myspace data
• Cash gap grows between tech giants, rivals
• SEC Didn't Act on Lehman Brothers's `Problematic' Liquidity, Examiner Says
  Liking the emerging narrative here: it was all just lieing and cheating – “They were saying they didn’t have a problem,” said Peter Sorrentino, who helps oversee $13.8 billion at Huntington Asset Advisors in Cincinnati. “Well, they did. It just wasn’t being disclosed.”
• IBM Extends Development and Test to Their Cloud
  A very pragmatic, useful now cloud offering – no Cloud Fear for dev/test!
• In praise of sexual expression | Susie Bright
• GreatDismal: Michael Mann told me that people experience movies *backward*, as they leave the theater; the climax/ending is really the beginning.
• Ad Literacy
  I'd like to be in the "please don't show me ads" bucket – "The platform allows anyone with a Facebook account and PayPay/credit card/… to create a targeted advertising campaign in a few minutes, with Facebook approval to run the ad appearing within an hour. You can target the advertisement by many criteria including location, age, gender, sexual preference, company, school,… and can fine-tune the campaign once it starts – for example I managed to push a narrowly targeted ad in front of a Facebook-using colleague based on little bit of knowledge of her background."
• Facebook’s Ad Platform: The Mainstreamification Of Online Advertising? – PSFK
  Check it: advertisers are realizing they're getting Craigslisted. If you can micro-target your ads, they (probably) don't need to be very good. Or, more likely: they need to be good in a new and different way, which means disruption for the "old timers" who can't (or won't) figure it out.
• Congee Morning – Ruth Reichl
  "Sun pouring through the window. Lone boat on the river. Woke up to the scent of the chicken stock I made last night while we were sleeping through the Oscars. What I want is a walk along the river in the early morning wind, and a comforting bowl of congee when I return. There is nothing easier to make than the classic Chinese breakfast."
• Jay Rayner – the happy eater
  "Eating is not something you need insurance for. So denying yourself an edible pleasure just because you couldn't safely remove someone's appendix in the room in which it was prepared, seems just plain foolish, not to mention self-defeating."
• Facebook says it's ready to hire in Austin
• Android Has Enough Class for Opera
• Google's New Android Advocate Comes Out Swinging
• What does it actually mean?
  Nice how seriously this piece takes on the question: does spilling blood on your enemies door help over-throw them?
• OpenLogic pushes open-source scan service for M&As – BusinessWeek
• SpeedMenu Launches | AustinStartup
• Ford To Create App Store For Cars
• Wired’s Chris Anderson On Publishing For The iPad
  "It’s thinner than a laptop. It’s lighter than a laptop. It’s got longer battery life than a laptop. But most importantly, this is a personal device. And it’s – in the same way that your phone is something that you bring into your life rather than change your life for it, a tablet is something that you lean back, you cradle."
• Cultivated Play: Farmville

Disclosure: see the RedMonk client list for clients mentioned.