The Brooks Review

Category: Links

  • Google Employee No. 59 on Google+, Privacy and Why He Left

    Former Google employee Douglas Edwards:
    >So, it’s not like your privacy’s being invaded – in fact I talk in the book about this moment I had with Sergey, where I was handling customer service and I said, we need to talk about the privacy issue around Gmail and he just stood right in front of me and he looked at me and he said, “There is no privacy issue.” Because in his mind, there was no privacy issue. The facts were that Google was not reading email, Google was not targeting email. So the facts said there was no privacy issue. He didn’t understand that people’s perception was reality. Reality was reality.

    Edwards left Google in 2005, yet I am not so sure Google’s mindset is any different today. The question is: is that good or bad?

  • Marked: MultiMarkdown Preview, Everywhere

    I haven’t had a ton of time to really dive into this app, but it is pretty nifty. Basically you get a live rendering of any text file that you are working on in Markdown, from any program. This is very cool and the fact that I can dump the TBR CSS into it makes it really neat, not to mention that you can export the HTML or as a PDF.

  • Google+ To Pass 10,000,000 Users Tomorrow

    That’s impressive growth, but not surprising given the widespread initial interest. That’s 5% of the user base Twitter has and 1.4% of Facebook’s — what’ll be more interesting is how long until, and if, they can pass 100 million users. That’s the point when they become a serious ‘player’.

    (Side note: This is not official data from Google, click through to see the calculations.)

  • Product Shots With an iPhone

    What a great setup for shooting products. Many will say: “But I have a dSLR and surely that can do that better.” That’s only partly true, you really need a light tent + macro lens + flashes to do “good” product photography on a dSLR. What makes the iPhone great for this is the Macro focus it has, my wife uses our Canon G9 for taking her photos, in a light tent, with some of my flashes.

    This is a great little setup for all the would be Etsy sellers and those occasional Craigslist/Ebayers.

  • Here’s to the Misfits, the Eccentrics

    Marco is spot on here arguing that you/we should own our identity. Your identity *is* your brand — ask any company if they would allow anyone else to control their brand, the answer will be a resounding ‘no’.

    Own your brand. Well said Marco.

  • DOJ: We Can Force You to Decrypt That Laptop

    And… I’m turning on FileVault.

  • Does LinkedIn Indicate a Social Networking Bubble?

    James B. Stewart:
    >But LinkedIn is too new to have reliable earnings, given its heavy capital investment. So let’s ignore earnings and focus on revenue, which will ultimately be the source of LinkedIn’s profits.

    Yeah, because that has *never* gotten investors into trouble before.

  • Preparing for John Siracusa’s Review of OS X Lion‬‏

    What an amazing way to start off the week.

  • Jesus Diaz Doesn’t Get It

    Jesus Diaz for the Giz:
    >Mac OS X Lion still works. It’s fast. It’s solid. Its shortcomings could be partially fixed. And I’m sure that many will learn these new user interfaces patches and live with them. Me? I’d rather wait for a more coherent operating system.

    He’s wrong, really wrong. I have my review 99% finished and it will be live the same day as Apple pushes out Lion. That said, there are a handful of new features in Lion that if they were the only *new* features would make the $29 easily worth it.

  • Solving the Scoble Problem in Social Networks

    Rocky Agrawal commenting on social networks:
    >Paradoxically, the extent to which the constraints of Twitter stifle conversation helped its growth. Because real conversation is hard using Twitter (vs. just tweeting out your own story) there isn’t the expectation that people will engage with you in it. Because tweets disappear as the firehose continues to gush, it’s easier to ignore them.

    And a bit later:

    >The current Google+ interface would be less appealing to celebrities, because the interface is designed to invite conversation and engagement.

    That seems to be the main problem that I have with Google+ ((And yes, I have now joined up on Google+ so that I can accurately comment on it.)) , I don’t like being forced — or feeling obligated — into responding to people. It gets me into trouble many places (Twitter, Email, voice mails), but at the end of the day I don’t have the time, care, or concern to give a proper response ((Anything less is not worth responding)) to everyone that pings me — it’s not something I say with pride and unfortunately is a ‘humble brag’, but I don’t know how else to explain it.

    I’ll have more thoughts on Google+ this week…

  • Dave Winer: Why Twitter May Have Trouble Monetizing

    Some great points in here and I feel like this statement:

    >Twitter was better when there were fewer people there.

    Is the most common complain I hear about Facebook from “original” users. He has some good points and this is well worth a read. (It’s short.)

  • The B&B Podcast – Episode 18: 36 Hours Without Internet

    >In this episode Shawn and Ben talk about life without Internet, purposefully not responding to Email, Google+, and the HP TouchPad’s future.

    Brought to you by: [Authentic Jobs](http://www.authenticjobs.com/?ref=fusiona)

  • Verbs App

    A big thanks to #include tech for sponsoring this weeks’ RSS feed to promote their excellent iPhone app: Verbs. With the launch of Verbs Pro (available through an in-app purchase) you can now stay connected to your IM accounts for up to 7 days.

    That’s a killer feature that I personally love — Verbs keeps me from using Twitter’s DMs as an IM platform, which is better for everyone. It really is a good app and if you are an IM fiend you should definitely check it out.

  • Dave Winer on ‘Corporations’

    Dave Winer has a great take on not just Google+, but social networks and companies in general. A lot of what he is saying resonates with me, at the end of the day I just want to own **my** data.

  • The HP TouchPad & Dropbox

    Shawn Blanc reviewing the HP TouchPad:
    >There is not a Dropbox app in the Catalog, but rather a system-level sign-in for Dropbox.

    Why is this the first I am hearing of this awesome feature? Shawn says that apps have native access to Dropbox once you make the link. This is amazing and very cool.

    Too bad the overall impression of the TouchPad is that it isn’t very good.

  • I’m Quitting Email

    MG Siegler:
    >For the rest of this month, I’m not going to respond to any emails. None.

    Who hasn’t wanted to do this? This blog generates about 75% of all emails that I get. At first I responded to 99% of all emails that I received and I did so with as much care as time allotted. Just over a month ago I was pretty fed up with responding to emails, so I stopped.

    I didn’t stop reading emails, I just stopped responding to 95% of them. I feel like a dick when I don’t respond, but I also know that by not responding I have more time for other things and I am happier because of it.

    I still read 70% of the email that I get, but I don’t feel guilty if I don’t read it. I do however read 100% of @replies that I get on Twitter — so you do have that option if you luck out getting in touch with me (well for as long as I remain on Twitter).

    Kudos to MG, I may not be far behind — I have long desired to make Twitter the only way you can “comment”.

  • Apple’s App Store Downloads Top 15 Billion

    Apple press release:
    >Apple has paid developers over $2.5 billion to date.

    Anybody know how much Google has paid out to developers?

  • What’s Yours Stays Yours

    Dropbox clarifies its new Terms of Service, re-writing the section that got many hot and bothered, here’s their explanation of the changes:
    >We’ve never been interested in rights broader than what we need to run Dropbox. We want to get this language right so that you’re comfortable using Dropbox with no reservations: what’s yours is yours.

    Bottom line: all that language before was lawyer speak that allowed Dropbox to implement features like sharing and galleries and hosting. The new language is dead simple.

  • The Doom of Publishing Circa 1982

    Robert Reinhold reporting for the New York Times on a National Science Foundation report from 1982, even then the coming technology was known to represent a massive change for publishers:

    >”Videotex systems create opportunities for individuals to exercise much greater choice over the information available to them,” the researchers wrote. “Individuals may be able to use videotex systems to create their own newspapers, design their own curricula, compile their own consumer guides.

    Fast forward almost 30 years and publishers are only just now realizing what was reported, by a newspaper no less.

  • Capture — the Quick Video Camera for iPhone

    This is a great little app that I have been beta testing for a while now. What I love about the app is how simple it is: tap the icon and the video starts recording the moment the app is launched. I don’t have kids, but I can only imagine this would quickly become a killer app if I did.

    Even without kids in my household this app gets plenty of use — I find that when I want to record something, the built in camera app is consistently too slow to make it worth my while.

    The app is $0.99 and available now — go get it.

    One last note: The app icon, it’s the best icon on my iPhone home screen.