Weblogs on The West Wing

The latest episode of The West Wing features weblogs breaking a news story before the mainstream press. It’s a cute episode in which weblogs pick up a story of a White House staffer test driving a huge SUV right into a brand new Toyota Prius hybrid.

 

My Brush With Micro-Celebrity

The crowning moment of my recent Firefox local media blitz was an interview on Canada Now, the local CBC Television evening news. Local anchor, Bruce Rainnie (brother of Matt Rainnie, who conducted my recent radio interview – thus confirming all assumptions that everyone on Prince Edward Island is related), came by our silverorange offices to conduct the interview.

Here are some assorted thoughts on the experience:

  • I prefer radio over television. The visual aspect of television might add a lot to some stories, but it really just seemed to detract from this one (especially since my ugly mug was the primary visual)
  • I am not, as was mentioned in the piece, the “head man”, at silverorange. We didn’t discuss my role at silverorange, so it was likely an honest mistake. I probably exuded too much confidence.
  • Television is all a big lie. Ok, this isn’t a big surprise, but this was my first real exposure to the fabrication that is television. Since there was only one camera man, the interview was filmed with me in front of the camera, and the interviewer behind it. Then, after the interview is over, we trade places, mix up the background props a bit so it’s not too obvious, and the interviewer “re-asks” (apparently an industry term) the questions for the camera. That said, it still fooled me when I watched it.
  • TV requires visuals. We didn’t have many, but was kind of cool to see my Linux desktop on TV.
  • The camera (and its operator) prefer LCD screens over CRT screens, as they avoid the dreaded flicker effect on camera.
  • No matter how comfortable you are with your appearance, watching yourself on television will make you self-conscious.
  • They did a good job. It’s easy to mix up a technology story when dealing with a general audience. Bruce Rainnie did a good job of setting up the questions.
  • Fame, no matter how small in scale, is a cruel mistress.
 

SpreadFirefox.com Likes Me

Slice illustration

Being as humble as I am, it can be difficult for me when I’m showered with praise. However, it does soften the humility blow when the praise is written cleverly and with wit. Such is the case in my selection as Volunteer of the Week at SpreadFirefox.com.

SpreadFirefox.com, is a community site focused on promoting the Firefox browser through a variety of campaigns. They’ve been tracking the progress as 2 million copies of Firefox Preview Release 1 have been downloaded in the last 10 days.

The best part (after, of course, the illustration of myself in the style of the Slice of the Month) is being referred to as the “Martha Stewart of Web Browsers”.

Thanks!

 

Firefox on Local CBC Radio

CBC Radio’s head geek, Tod Maffin, did a great piece about Firefox for CBC Radio today. I was invited into the local evening CBC Radio show, Mainstreet with Matt Rainnie to talk about the local connection we have to Firefox.

Today, Mainstreet played Todd’s piece and followed up with my interview. Listen to the two pieces together (6.4MB MP3 – 16 minutes).

I’m reluctantly becoming a local media representative for all things Firefox. I’m talking to the evening TV news tomorrow afternoon. It’s not a full-page spread in the New Zealand Herald, but it’ll do.

 

New Mozilla.org Design is Live!

It’s up! The new design for Mozilla.org by Daniel Burka, myself, and the others here at silverorange, working with the brilliant and patient people at the Mozilla Foundation has just gone live.

Here’s the CVS checkin:

dbaron%dbaron.org – 2004-08-31 14:31
Landing BETA_20040721_BRANCH: new template, homepage, and product page design by Steven Garrity and Daniel Burka from silverorange, and required tools changes by Myk Melez.

Be sure to refresh! Thanks to all involved (especially bart, dbaron, and myk).

Of course, there is still lots to do to improve the site, and we’ll keep working on it – but for now, it feels good to be live.

 

Mozilla Foundation Looking for Quality Design Help

The Mozilla team is looking for some help with some design work. The work would involve a variety of design tasks for the web and for print. For example, banner ads, small HTML page designs, print ad layout/design, etc.

What we’d like to do is assemble a loose team of people to whom we can throw out a quick piece of work and have someone who’s able speak-up and take on each piece of work.

Here are some of the conditions:

  • It’s all volunteer – no cash, sorry.
  • Be prepared to work within an existing defined (if still evolving) visual style – we’re not looking for people to put their personal stamp on any given piece of work.
  • Accept direction and vetoes – you will be given direction and iterations may be required.
  • Timelines are tight and notice is short.
  • We’re looking for experienced designers with demonstrated abilities.

If that doesn’t sound too terrible and you are an experienced designer, please send a brief introduction, overview of your interest, information on your availability, and a selection of portfolio URLs to: blake at cs dot stanford
dot edu
and bart at decrem dot com.

We’ll be choosing a small team from those interested to help us out. Thanks!

 

Notes from my first Linux conference

My Badge from DDC 2004

I was at the Desktop Developers’ Conference in Ottawa this week. The DDC was for developers working on Linux on the desktop and it started off a week in Ottawa that also includes the Linux Kernel Summit and the Ottawa Linux Symposium (neither of which I stuck around for – both being way over my head).

Here are some observations from the conference:

  • T-Shirts and golf-shirts with project/company logos are the war-paint. Despite having a lot of these shirts myself, I resisted wearing any of them to the conference.
  • Where the ladies at? (about 75 people and no women)
  • Even though everyone has a cell phone and a laptop with IM on WiFi, there are almost no annoying phone/IM sound interruptions
  • There is a constant, but not distracting, pitter-patter of laptop keyboards
  • There was lots of debate and productive discussion – people were getting work done
  • People seem to like Canada
  • Lots of people knew of Prince Edward Island, and think of it as a idyllic vacation destination (true for a few months of the year)
  • Traveling is much better when you have friends to drive your around, feed you, etc.

For those interested in the details and contents of the conference, here are some details other attendees have posted:

I’m on my way to the airport to catch a flight back home in a few minutes.