PublicRadioFan.com: Need to add this one to my news page

The Doc Searls Weblog : Sunday, July 11, 2004

PublicRadioFan.com is a cool discovery. It tells you what's playing, right now, on a hundred or more public radio stations, along with what format they're using and other helpful information. Way too few use MP3 (the only popular format that doesn't require its owner's proprietary player), but among them are a still-impressive list: WFUV, KKJZ, WEMU, KRVS, WUNC, KCRW, KPUB, WNYC-AM and FM, KUOW, KUSC (to which I'm listening right now), KXPR, KRWG and NRK. The majority of stations and networks (CBC, BBC and NPR itself) require a Real or a Windows Media player.

Even among the MP3 streamers, the situation is far from perfect. For example, neither of WNYC's MP3 streams is working right now.

And too many sources, such as the BBC and WBGO, use a browser with a RealAudio plugin as the required receiver — a pretty clunky approach.

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I think the BBC also uses windows audio codecs. I'll add this to my news page.

Niacin and Alzheimer's?

BBC NEWS | Health | Vitamin may ward off Alzheimer'sThey found that those with the lowest food intake of niacin - around 12.6mg a day - were 80% more likely to be diagnosed with Alzheimer's than those with the highest intake - around 22.4mg a day.

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An 80% risk reduction is worth something, but this study looked like a fishing expedition. They may well have come across a chance and erroneous correlation. 22.4 mg of Niacin is a lot, I think the average multivitamin only has 15 mg.

MIT Technology Review Article on Flickr

MIT Technology Review Article on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

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Ok, so online photo sharing is hot. I was impressed with Picasa/Hello (just acquired by Google), this is another angle on the same story. Flickr is trying to merge photos with social networks. Not sure how they expect to make money. They do have ads.

I get the feeling not all the photos are wholesome and pure. One can mark photos as "likely to shock".

They do have private groups, so I can host the family pictures there. They may be too private however, I don't want to bother Grandma with a password. I'm ok with the feeble security of a privately held URL.

Somewhat like Picasa's Hello they support hosting a photo and simultaneously creating a blog entry with a lower res thumbnail. So you can use their blog, or you can use another blog (I have an unpublished blogger photoblog brewing). Somewhat like Picasa, but it's all web client so no platform issues. On the other hand one can't stage fifty photos for posting, the easiest interface is to mail one photo at a time (suited to phone based photoblogging). Maybe they'll extend their offering.

I'll read this MIT tech review and see what it says.

Hot area, but noone is yet following the grandma-friendly plans I posted on newsgroups and emailed to photo vendors a year ago ...

Update: I read the MIT article. It's really an iChat, text messaging, party animal, social networking kind of schtick. I can't see where they expect to make money (higher featured version costs money?) but I can't judge this market demo -- I'm way too old!

Not quite what I need ... but we'll see where it goes ...

Flicker: Doctorow (boing boing) likes it

Welcome to Flickr!

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I'm still not sure what it is. Some kind of photo sharing/community/blog service. The profile seemed to ask more personal questions than most (I entered "taken") -- makes me think it might be a dating service rather than a means to create a photo blog with limited distribution.

Given Doctorow's nature, it could be either of the above.

Bluetooth, thumb drives, RFID, watches and cyborgs

Air2Net Bluetooth CF/PC Card

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How do we end up traveling from the 20th century into the virtual age? Historians, if there are any, will look back at wrist watches with embedded bluetooth and flash memory, and they'll look at dogs tagged with RFID implants.

Then they'll look at feckless youngsters who implant RFID tags to weird out their parents. Whose younger siblings implant usb stores and bluetooth modules (Perhaps the power supply remains external? A good way to gross out parents would be to inject alcohol into a subdermal fuel cell bladder). And so it goes.

I do like the idea of a watch with USB storage 2-4GB (or, soon, a microdrive with 40GB), a thumprint reader, bluetooth and an embedded RFID tag (I'm too squeamish to put the RFID tag in my forearm). I think with a bit of cleverness the watch could look pretty conventional, and even less bulky than is the current fashion (the real problem is batteries -- we need a fuel cell battery than can be resupplied by an external device).

Anyone remember the Java ring of the 1990s?

One could do a LOT of things with this combo. Data would be stored on the USB store as an encrypted disk image. The RFID tag would respond to inquiries and trigger a biometric authentication request. Upon authentication a nearby computer would exchange keys with the Bluetooth adapter, then mount the disk image via the bluetooth interface. The disk image would contain one's roving profile, private keys, etc. (like the Java ring)

Nothing new here or technically challenging, just interesting to watch the pieces come together.

Pluck RSS Reader: Retrieve news from favorite sites

Pluck RSS ReaderAnother RSS reader, this one an IE plug-in. RSS seem clients now come in four flavors:

1. web service/asp: use browser to work with
2. email plug-in, esp. Outlook
3. browser plug-in, esp. IE/FireFox
4. standalone

I think the standalone are unlikely to go too far. I'd like to use a web service that had companion plug-ins for Outlook and FireFox, so they'd share a single OPML file.

Rocket RSS Reader

Rocket RSS Reader

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I followed this link via a Blooger Google ad. It looks interesting, especially since I've been disappointed with bloglines latest changes.

I do like having Google's ads next to my blog posting and my gmail. They're interesting and useful.