A 2011 study by telecommunications giant Ericsson found that 35% of iPhone and Android users check their email or Facebook account before getting out of bed in the morning. Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Internet
Alone Together
We are lonely but fearful of intimacy. Constant connectivity offers the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship. We can’t get enough of each other if we can have each other at a distance and in amounts we can control. — Sherry Turkle Read more →
Things Which Matter Most
Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least. — Goethe You’ve got to keep your priorities in order . . . We’re developing an on-site conference registration system . . . the topic generating the most email bandwidth yesterday was the ability to retry a declined credit card if the on-site Internet connection is down. Declining a credit card when the Internet is down is an unusual scenario that may never occur. We’re not even far enough along in development to be able to say for sure that we can accept a credit card when the Internet is up, but by golly, we’ll be able to decline one when it’s down. My head is spinning . . . Thus spoke The Programmer. Read more →
The Cloud
Thomas Jefferson on Weinergate
Rep. Weiner of New York — one of the 13 original colonies — has been sending photos of his penis to women in Texas, Washington and other points west. When I was president, Texas and Washington weren’t even part of the country, and if I wanted to show a woman my dick, she had to be right there in the room with me.1 And still there are some misfits who insist that there is no such thing as progress. Yes, I could have made a sketch and sent it through the mail but that could take weeks. Read more →
Everything Must Be Replaced
Uh oh, it looks like the wireless connection here at EppsNet headquarters just went down . . . “NOTHING MAKES ME ANGRIER THAN AN UNRELIABLE NETWORK CONNECTION!” my son yells. “WE NEED A NEW ROUTER! WE NEED A NEW MODEM! WE NEED A NEW SERVICE PROVIDER! WE NEED NEW COMPUTERS!” “We don’t need new computers,” his mom says. “YES WE DO!” Read more →
Penis.com
My wife got some promotional pens delivered to the house today from pens.com. Did you ever notice how pens.com looks a lot like penis.com? I wonder if anyone owns the penis.com domain name? Hang on a sec . . . OK, penis.com is taken — but penis.edu is still available! University of Penis! Read more →
Perspective
If you do stuff online, people are tracking it and putting it into a database and trying to sell you stuff based on that. There’s not much you can do about it except not be online. And it’s not all that bad, really, to get ads for diapers when you’re having a baby, or ads for cars when you are looking to buy a car. Life will go on. — TechCrunch Read more →
A Day in the Internet
Created by Online Education Read more →
Twitter: 2010-09-17
RT @SteveMartinToGo: OMG. President Lincoln has been shot! Wait, whoa, my internet connection is SUH-LOW. # Read more →
How Much Information Do You Really Need?
On the web there’s a certain kind of encouragement to never ask yourself how much information you really need. But when I get to the point where I’m seeking advice twelve hours a day on how to take a nap or what kind of notebook to buy, I’m so far off the idea of lifehacks that it’s indistinguishable from where we started. There’s very little advice right now to tell people that the only thing to do is action, and everything else is horseshit. — Merlin Mann Read more →
Twitter: 2010-08-26
RT @eddiepepitone: Prophets of doom make 13 dollars an hour, life coaches 35 an hour. So who’s full of shit now? # RT @thesulk: “Who’s that actor?” “I don’t know, and I may never know.” (Watching TV Before the Internet) # RT @capricecrane: “Heidi Montag Wants Huge Breast Implants OUT.” She’s getting good at cutting giant boobs out of her life. # Related Articles Heidi Montag Regrets Breast Implants (mtv.com) Read more →
10 Reasons to Stop Apologizing for Your Online Life
Via Harvard Business Review Read more →
April Fools
Every month, I present web site metrics to our Web Steering committee. Since this month’s meeting fell on April 1, I took the opportunity to mock up and present a set of fake charts showing all of our key metrics falling off a cliff. LOL! OK I know what you’re thinking — not as funny as cling wrap on a toilet seat. You’re right but chart pranks are more cerebral . . . Read more →
There is No Such Thing as Information Overload
Looking over my notes from an Edward Tufte course . . . There is no such thing as information overload, just bad design. Example: Google News presents hundreds of links on a single page and no one complains about information overload. Example: The financial section of the newspaper presents thousands of numbers and no one complains about information overload. Read more →
Twitter: 2009-10-29
RT @tweetmeme Google Maps Navigation Launch Aftermath: Yes, This Will Be Huge http://bit.ly/4D6qtj # Google Envisions 10 Million Servers http://bit.ly/13sPox # Read more →
I’m Killing It on Amazon
I’m explaining to my wife how being an Amazon.com associate works . . . “If I mention a book on my web site, I link it to the book’s page on Amazon. Then if someone clicks through on the link and buys something, I get a small commission.” She loves money-making enterprises. “How much do you make?” she asks excitedly. “It’s around four percent, which usually amounts to around 5 or 10 bucks a year.” “Oh,” she says, rapidly losing interest. “But look,” I say, showing her my online associate report. “Last month, someone clicked through on one of my links and while they were on Amazon, they bought a very expensive camera lens and I got the commission on it: 18 dollars and 48 cents! We could dine out on burritos and beer with that kind of money!” “That’s wonderful!” she says. “Can you print that out so I… Read more →
Twitter: 2009-05-17
RT @andrewgrose: 11 Obscure Google Tricks You Didn’t Know Existed http://www.gilsmethod.com/11obscuregoogletricks # Read more →
A Handful of Editors
It used to be that a handful of editors could decide what was news–and what was not. They acted as sort of demigods. If they ran a story, it became news. If they ignored an event, it never happened. Today, editors are losing this power. The Internet, for example, provides access to thousands of new sources that cover things an editor might ignore. And if you aren’t satisfied with that, you can start up your own blog, and cover and comment on the news yourself. Journalists like to think of themselves as watchdogs, but they haven’t always responded well when the public calls them to account. A recent American study reported that many editors and reporters simply do not trust their readers to make good decisions. Let’s be clear about what this means. This is a polite way of saying that these editors and reporters think their readers are… Read more →
T.J. Simers Must Die
I thought sports columnists were appointed for life, like Supreme Court justices, no matter how irrelevant they become, and yet I see that the Los Angeles Times has just dumped J.A. Adande. Well, by golly, that’s a good start! I can’t think of a single print columnist, at the Times or elsewhere, who’s remotely relevant anymore. There are dozens of sports websites (not that one — start at Deadspin and follow the links) with at least an order of magnitude more energy, insight and wit than you’ll find in your local print rag, which is why newspapers are going the way of the 8-track tape, the buggy whip and whale oil. The next in line to go at the Times should be fatuous blowhard T.J. Simers. Simers positions himself as a pot-stirring wiseass, and the line on him seems to be that if people don’t like him, he must be… Read more →