Christine

Open Source Dynamics Discussion

Last night, I moderated a panel entitled "Open Source: Ready for Prime Time?" that was sponsored by TechCoire amidst the dark hills of Sacramento. These intrepid panelists joined me in the (very) long afternoon drive from the Bay Area:

Venture Chicks at the NVCA

Environment: The 2006 NVCA Annual Conference in San Francisco, sponsored by the National Venture Capital Association.

The Googlized Future, Through the Eyes of Eric Schmidt

Eric Schmidt of Google won over the crowd at the NVCA (National Venture Capital Association) 2006 Annual Meeting with his first comment onstage: "Everything that has happened in my career, has happened because of venture capital."

Eco-Friendly Computing Through Greasy Vegetable Juice and Aggressive Recycling

The Alameda County Computer Resource Center (ACCRC) showed how eco-friendly computing is done at this weekend's Maker Faire. Longtime volunteer Alex Handy shared some fascinating info about the hidden value in computer scrap, and the veggie-grease generator gathered plenty of foot traffic. See the video:

Urban Camouflage for Parking Scofflaws

This is somewhat afield of a typical Christine.net post, but this exhibit from the Maker Faire was just too funny to not share. And it is a best practice, of a sort...how to fly under the radar of the meter maid.

See the 360-degree view of urban camouflage

Lighting My Hair on Fire with a Flaming Sunflower

We met one of the Flaming Lotus Girls - makers of cool fiery objects both large and small - at this weekend's Maker Faire. Pouneh let us light things on fire (almost including my hair), and told us a little bit about this art.

See the fire flower video (1:50)

Robots and Jigsaw Racers at the Maker's Faire

There was an entire Maker's Faire pavilion dedicated to the robotic arts: whether making sophisticated, two-legged archetypes or bulky, jet-powered battlebots, these makers are pretty hard-core. My good friend Sue and I checked out a few after hanging out by the Crucible's fire truck, and threw in some cool disc drive art for good measure. (Sue and I took some glassmaking courses at Public Glass last year, and plan to learn more fiery arts at the Crucible.)

Christine and Sue check out the robots

Crafts and Quirks at the Maker's Faire

Since life is about more than technology, we made sure to check out some of the highly skilled craftmakers at the Maker's Faire. Here's a few videos of the people that we met on Day One, along with some of the more "interesting" sights.

• Reflections on Day One of the Maker's Faire (2:02)
• Succumbing to Peer Pressure Near the Cool Army Truck (0:47)
• Bizarre Costumed Dancing Interlude (0:27)
• Glassblowing from a Trailer Furnace with Doug Brown of colquhoun glass works (1:01)
  

Dale Dougherty Shares the Joy of Making

This weekend marked the inaugural Maker's Faire from O'Reilly Media's MAKE. The Maker's Faire is a wonderland of creativity for the builder within all of us. Dale Dougherty, MAKE publisher, shared his inspirational perspective on "Makers," and why bringing together the Faire community is so vital. I think Dale's happy mug is on the Wikipedia entry for "infectious enthusiasm."

Interview with Dale Dougherty at the Maker's Faire (6:02, 28MB)

LED Breadboarding with Bunnie Huang

The mysteries of the breadboard were revealed today at the Maker's Faire by Bunnie Huang, who also happens to write articles for MAKE. Bunnie's workbench was tucked in next to the Make Play workshop, where visitors to the Faire rolled up their sleeves and let out their inner Maker.

See the video for Bunnie's quick tutorial, and two budding Maker interviews.

Am I Blacklisted by Google?

And if I am, who else is? It's amazing how much we take for granted that our search results are accurate and unfiltered. If search mechanics and result filtering (or censorship, perhaps) interest you, then read on...

Collective Wisdom on the Backfence-Bayosphere Acquisition

There's been a lot of interesting press today about the acquisition of Bayosphere by Backfence. (Disclosure note: Omidyar Network is a co-investor in both firms, and I serve on the board of Backfence.) It's been amazing to watch the landscape for participatory media evolve, and I've enjoyed the ground-floor access to communities trying out different models for interaction. Citizen's media, bottom-up content, user-generated content, participatory media...whatever you choose to label it, it's exciting and transformative.

E-Mail Face-Off: AOL, Goodmail, and GetActive vs. the EFF

Amidst all of the conversations on Net Neutrality, a related issue has gone unremarked: the variable pricing of e-mail communications. There are a number of solutions being tested that address  the deterioration of trust around e-mail communications. One of the more controversial is AOL's new Certified Mail system:

MD Robotics: From Space Stations to 3D Scene Modeling

space station
Originally uploaded by spacejockeys.

Stirr: New New Networking

april pics 023
Originally uploaded by philosophygeek.

General good guy Dan Arkind of the Indico Group invited me to a new networking event called Stirr last night. The frantic buzz was ominously reminiscent of you-know-when, but the waves of positive energy were still a treat.

Slingbox Setup, Round One

Jeff Pulver took the excitingly generous step of giving away Slingboxes at VON this year. And so, for the very first time in 16 years of tech conferences, I actually ran around to all of the booths on the exhibit hall bingo card and collected the necessary stamps.