When Community Software Becomes Community Property
One of the most widely recognized social media applications in the world today is Facebook. People use it for everything from email to event planning to entertainment. You can manipulate your profile to display every detail of your life or nothing. You can build an online profile to represent yourself in any fashion you want to.
But being open to the community doesn’t make Facebook property of the community.
I do a lot of work with open source software. It’s “community owned” in the sense that the user community defines development directions, feature sets, and release dates. WordPress, for example, has evolved from merely being a blog engine to running enterprise-level content management systems because the community wanted it to. While Automattic technically publishes the software, the community owns it in every sense of the word. Read More…
Mindshare Strategy
Do As I Say …
… not as I do.
At least that’s the idea I got the other day from a fellow motorist while on my way home from a work project. Driving down the road, I watched as the driver of the Jetta in front of me rolled his window down and threw his trash on the curb. Ironically, [...]
UI Failures
Years ago, a friend introduced me to the concept of “phishing” – impersonating a legitimate business or authority on the Internet in attempts to steal personal information. At the time, were were trying to play a prank on a childhood friend, but I never quite realized just how wide-spread the phenomenon has become. Every few [...]
Competition
Every now and then, I come across a client who wants me to build them a fancy website or do something online at a reduced price. In a shrinking world, it’s easy for them to pit my bids against development firms in other parts of the world with lower costs of living. Once I was [...]
XML-RPC
Just to forewarn you, this might come across as a more technical post than I normally throw at you. Still, I did something exciting last night that I wanted to share and perhaps educate you about.
I built a custom XML-RPC server.
And with that statement I know I’ve already lost most of you. Rather than get [...]
Paperback vs. Siliconback
Some time ago I joined the debate over digital media readers. I will always argue that having both paperback books and ebooks available is the right way to go – we should never be forced to make a choice between new technology and nostalgic print. But the other day I saw an even more interesting [...]
