Check out Matt Asay on the CNET Blog Network
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Blog: The Open Road looks at emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities.
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Weâve talked about popcorn here on Dinerâs Journal before, but today brings some actual popcorn news. For more on that, and a way to avoid becoming a news story yourself, Iâd like to present Mark Bittman, who writes the Minimalist column for the Times. I think the guyâs got a future in blogging. Take it [...].
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You may have seen it, but now it's time to CNET.
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Gabe: I mentioned the Nerdcore Rising documentary a few weeks ago and I know a lot of you were interested in it. Well the girls doing it have decided to help build interest in the film by highlighting one of the many nerds they met on their journey each week. They call it the Nerd of the Week and the first Nerd is actually PAX. I'll go ahead and plug the Youtube version in right here so you all can check it out. I think they did a fucking incredible job cutting this together.
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Why do we persist in looking at the Web through a browser, asks CNET Blog Network contributor Matt Asay.
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The folks over at php|architect have posted their latest podcast today - the Newscast for June 28th, 2007 - hosted by Sean Coates and Paul Reinheimer.   Among the topics mentioned on this week's show are:   php|works the PHP plush elephant Circular references talk about Ohloh and the loss of Bertrand Gugger.   You can grab this latest show directly [mp3] or subscribe to their feed to get this and future episodes.
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David Sklar points out some of the new base sites that are being offered on the PHP-based mashup site, Ning.    It's been a lot of hard work, so I'm quite excited that we've just released three great new Ning sites: Ning Videos, Ning Photos, and Ning Group.   Plus, all three sites have the juicy bits that every site on the Ning platform gets -- things such as cloneability, complete customization, and built-in REST APIs. I've been watching the feeds for clones of photos and videos -- I suppose seeing who's cloned sites you care about is the Web 2.0 version of ego surfing.    He also talks about some of the features of the Ning Photo cloneable site like the slideshow and, in Ning Video, the embeddable player. The Ning Group application also has parsing abilities to help with sharing documents/music/photos/etc with anyone.
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By Naitove, Matt  I admit it: I like trade shows, especially big ones like NPE. Where else do you get to see so much new stuff from so many companies, countries, continents in one place? The opportunity to stumble onto some fascinating invention from a firm you never heard of is ...
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I've been saying this ever since I started blogging.  When you have a product to announce, start a blog (if you don't already have one) and announce it. Before there were blogs, I wished Infoworld or PC Week would give space to the lead developer of the product, whether he or she is a marketer or technical, even the CEO if they wouldn't assign a former reporter or ad guy to write it, and tell us what you meant when you designed this product. Who were you thinking of and what would they do with it. And where does it go? What does 2.0 look like if it's 1.0 or 3.0 if it's 2.0.  I like it when people like Zuckerberg, Andreessen or Canter write a blog post that tells you without pulling any punches what the intent of the product is, in their own words. I'd like to hear what they said to the team that worked on it. I'd like to use my imagination. That's why I don't like Steve Jobs' keynotes, he's telling you what Eddie Haskell would say about the product to Mrs. Cleaver. You never get the intent when it's filtered by the press. And many of the people that call themselves bloggers, love them and bless them, aren't anything like bloggers, and they're everything like the bored hired writers that used to work at CNET and Fortune. In fact, many of them are exactly like them (because they are them).  We live in the age of DIY, that means if you have something to say, just say it. PS: Here's a picture of three child actors from Leave It To Beaver, taken when they're in their fifties. From left to right, Eddie Haskell, Beaver and Wally. Time Waits for No One.
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Over the last week, I've been writing about the disconnect between flow and rank. Paradoxically, sites that are ranked high don't always deliver a lot of hits when they link to you. On the flipside, there are some sites that are rarely on Top 100 lists, or talked about very much, that deliver substantial flow. Two of them stand out, one a veteran site, and the other a relative newcomer. 1. Daring Fireball is a thoughtful blog written by John Gruber that focuses on the Macintosh. Since I've returned to the Mac in 2005, and have been writing more about Mac issues, I've started getting links from this site, and when I do, they usually send between 1000 and 2000 readers my way. And they're generally interesting people with useful information and ideas. I follow Gruber on Twitter and have learned that he is a Phillies fan and therefore disappointed this year. His posts are interesting there too, and irreverent, which I like of course.  2. A Digg-like memetracker, news.ycombinator.com is in the same league as TechMeme, about 1000 hits for a highly ranked piece. I don't know much about the site, I'm not a regular reader, and I don't know much about the people who visit from this site.
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Jeff Jarvis, whose mind occupies the intersection of mainstream media and the blogging world, perhaps more than any other person, is having a conference in mid-October in NYC to bring together people from both worlds to present constructive ideas for working with each other. Me, my feet are firmly planted in the blogging world, but I've spent a lifetime reading and watching MSM, starting with the NY Times at the kitchen table with my parents and brother, when growing up. Some of my fondest memories as a child were our discussions of the days events, and the Times was our common structure. Everyone in our family read the newspaper, often from cover to cover.  As Jarvis councils us, never mind the mistakes, what can we do to make things work better? And I have a couple of proposals in that direction that I will try to present at the October 11 conference. In all cases, they involve the MSM opening up more to include not only the ideas of blogging, but also the bodies of the bloggers.  1. I've said it many times before, it's worth raising again. Any newspaper or radio or TV station with a good reputation in its community could embrace the fresh ideas of the bloggers in their community by offering free blogs to members of the community, who may be new to blogging. I suggested this to the Times in 2001 -- when a person is quoted in a Times article, a few days after the piece runs, contact them, and ask if they'd like to have a NY Times hosted blog. There would be no control over what appeared on the blog. It would have a nytimes.com domain (something like bullmancuso.nytimes.com). Build an aggregator, something very much like Twitter (which is after all, a river of news, not exactly a new idea, heh) that shows all the new posts from members of the community. Encourage (but don't require) your editorial people to read the blog posts. Let whatever happens happen.  2. Here's a new idea that I haven't proposed before. Open your newsroom to bloggers. Set aside a half-dozen desks for people who blog in your community, people you've gotten to know, and provide them with wifi, a water cooler, your coffee (no matter how bad it is) and chance to work alongside your editorial people and (very important) with each other. It's an incredible thing when bloggers get together in a physical space, the sparks can really fly. Now imagine what could happen if those sparks got flying between the remaining editorial people in a professional news organization and the bloggers. I believe the secret of scaling the news is right there, you just have to open the door and see what comes in.
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The Zend Developer Zone has posted their latest episode of the PHP Abstract podcast hosted by Cal Evans himself covering ways you can attract quality talent to your organization.   Along the way I've picked up a few truths, mainly stolen from people like Joel Spolsky. Some of these ideas can be found in an article I wrote a while ago titled "Nerd Herding", a link to which can be found in the show notes. Recently, I've had many people ask me variations of the same question, "How do I find talented programmers?" So today, I'm going to share with you some of the things I've learned.   The latest show is available for direct download or, as always, you can subscribe to their feed to get this and lots of other great shows.
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Blog: Taking a look at a new entrant into the online music scene.
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The last podcast of the year, for sure, it's a tutorial on the meaning of the at-sign in Twitter for Dave Sifry. Maybe I got it wrong? If so, post a comment here.
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Match your gadgets with the right software to really feel the burn. By Mathew Honan from Wired magazine.
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Blog: What challenges does the CEO of an open source company face? Matt Asay finds out.
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Matt Harding tours the world and incites wanderlust in YouTube fans. He visited San Francisco this week as he prepares a sequel to his beloved travel video, 'Where The Hell is Matt?'