I was traveling on the 401 on Friday February 15th, 2008 and I stopped at the Mallorytown S. service centre. I happened to find a ring near the Tim Hortons lineup. I'm hoping to reunite the ring with it's owner.

If you lost a ring and can describe it in specific detail, I would be willing to send it back to you.

Am I crazy posting this? It's a bit of an experiment in conscience I guess. How many messages will I get? Send a note to "onecog2many @ gmail.com".

My web host is going to move this site to another physical location. They're not just picking up the box and putting it in another room. They're going to slurp all the files and data down a big pipe to another state and drop it on a new machine. Cross your fingers that by this time tomorrow I'll still be able to do anything.

Update: The Register picked up on the fiasco caused by the extended downtime...
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/11/05/navisite_outage/

WorkHappy.net is an entrepreneurial blog with a track record for good (if infrequent) posts and reviews. Carson McComas is known to post the occasional inspiring quote as well, and this one got me thinking...

"If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea."

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

That one speaks to me... instead of lining up tasks and barking orders, a good entrepreneur (or a any manager in general) should make a priority of inspiring their partners, investors, co-workers or even customers. Keep the goals clear and let people figure out their own best way to achieve them. It's very "Cluetrainesque" for someone who passed on in 1944.

For more details on Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, see the Wikipedia and WikiQuote pages.

Captain Cam, a children's entertainer that my kids have seen at a few events, must have a lot of time on his hands. He answers kids' questions on his video blog and he's getting pretty good at it.

Here's a recent entry where he answers a question about math:

Watching Captain Cam in person is fantabulous! The kids really like his magic tricks, songs and general craziness.

Here are some more links to help you find out more about this crime fighting super hero:
Captain Cam on mySpace
Home page

Gah! Spammers are going to be the death of me.

For quite some time my blog here has been running spam free, but for one reason or another it has been a target for the last few weeks and I've been the victim of comment spam. I thought I could get away without doing it, but as a result I've turned off the ability to post comments without approval.

For my little site this won't be much of a problem, but I imagine that approving each and every comment on a site with a high volume of readers and commenters would be a nightmare. A site administrator enables comments on their site in order to promote conversations, but the spammers make it near impossible to leave the system unattended and open.

I know that sites like Slashdot have an incredible volume of comments on every post, but they also have a large user base and moderators that help push off-topic talk to one side. Since it's just me and my site here, I'll live with the fact that I'm being a little "controlling" and comment approval is now required.

Update 2006/11/30 - It seems that even the comment approval feature doesn't stop the automated comment spam robots. I've spent the better part of the month removing daily spam comments from the approval queue... the attempts still keep coming in even though they never make it to public view on the site. So to keep my sanity I've had to implement some other methods that should make it harder for the computers to add spam, and easier for real people to add valuable comments.

BarCamp? What's that? No... you won't be learning how to make martinis. Check out the site. Participate. From the sidebar on the site:

BarCamp is an ad-hoc gathering born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos, and interaction from attendees.

The first meeting is Friday Sept. 29th, 2006 at UW, but it's not an event specific to the University.

Christine at the WPLINFOSTUFF blog (a fine blog for the Waterloo Public Library) recently posted about a pilot project to promote the the new Government of Ontario website called ServiceOntario. On the (English) homepage of the ServiceOntario site, you find:

The Ontario government is now making it easy for you to access the information, services and resources you need, when and how you need them. Whether you’re getting married, starting a business or want to learn more about your workplace or industry, it’s all here.

Part of the WPL promotion is a scavenger hunt to see who can find certain details on the ServiceOntario site. Check it out... you could win one of three iPod nanos! The scavenger hunt deadline is Saturday, October 7, 2006.

I loved Tim Bray's reaction to the recent launch of Yahoo!'s "The 9", the recently launched 5-day-a-week video run down of "interesting" things on the Internet hosted by a bouncy Maria Sansone. He likened it to the Apocalypse and asked, "Surely the Internet must have an "Off" switch somewhere?" If "The 9", then what should we call the "Amazon Fishbowl"? The worlds first Internet infomercial? Bill Maher returns to some witty banter, interviewing celebrities and plugging products for purchase on Amazon. From a techie side of things, I like how they have put this one together. You can skip ahead to the part of the 30 minute show that you want to see... complete with shrinking/growing video as it is playing and a scene list that looks pretty slick.

I just finished reading Eric Giguere's book "Make Easy Money with Google: Using the AdSense Advertising Program". According to the introduction, the book is somewhat of a departure in writing style when compared with author's previous books which were technical in nature. This book reads like a narrative from the perspective of someone having conversations with non-techies interested in setting up web sites with Google ads to earn some extra cash.

The book is clear and well written, outlining the basics of the AdSense system such as how ads are tailored for each web page and how to go about setting up your own web site. Eric, a Waterloo-local author, has done a great job with this book. I especially applaud his advice not to "game the system" and to honour copyrights on the Internet.

Even if you are not interested in using Google AdSense or other ads on your web site, Make Easy Money with Google is good primer to understand what happens when you click those ads.

There are several web sites out there that claim to help you stay in touch with your social network. LinkedIn is one such site, useful for sending "pings" to former co-workers... I've dabbled with this one a bit. There's other sites that I haven't tried, like Orkut, Friendster, and MySpace. Each of these seem to focus on the personal/friendship/dating side of your social network. But is there a site that can help manage your social network from a business slant?

For instance, Tim Bray notes writes about "Real Social Networks" that lists how his family's social and business contacts are intermixed. I'm guessing the more you deal with local small businesses (as opposed to large corporations), the more this mixing will happen. Tim ends his post with the question, "Why do we need computers to help us with this?"

My first off-the-top-of-my-head answer would be, "Computers make remembering and sharing our network much easier." The last time I paid someone to do some major work on our house was about five years ago. Just now I remember the guy's name was "Dennis" and that he did a fine job reproducing 10 inch baseboards in maple, but I had to go digging through my address book to find his last name and company name. And guess what else I came across there? I had added a note to the contact information that mentioned Dennis had been recommended by a plumber I had work on our tub that was leaking into a wall.

Now, maybe my memory is less retentive than your average geek's noggin, but I need a computer to help me remember my business network, and I'd appreciate a way to make it easier to share my recommendations. Is anyone thinking what I'm thinking? Microformats? Web services?

Update 2006/07/08: And now Robert Scoble is opting out of the on-line social networking scene. He writes:

Why do I need a social network? I hate LinkedIn, for instance. I get emails sent to me through five people. If you don’t know how to look me up on Google/MSN/Yahoo and email me directly why, exactly, would I answer your emails there?

Tod Maffin reports that CBC Radio is now making some of their programming available as podcasts... audio programs that you can subscribe to and listen to on your computer or portable audio player. I'll be glad to get the best of Ideas, Quirks & Quarks, DNTO, The Current and other great programs.

I saw this posted on the Flickr Blog. The AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario) will be "... launching an exhibition created entirely by the public." It looks like they will be using Flickr for the photo submissions. From the AGO blog post, "Portraits submitted to this Flickr group may be included in a computer kiosk slideshow presentation coinciding with the In Your Face exhibit at the AGO this summer starting July 1."

It sounds like a great idea. The AGO post mentions that submissions may be shown on a kiosk. I think they should put them on a wall with a projector or maybe a few dozen flat panels arranged on a wall.

Awhile back I decided to write a book on nurturing your customer community. It's a good idea, and I've actually made some good progress. Then I stumbled on a link off Steve Garfield's Squidoo page on video blogs. Steve pointed to a lawyer's site that had a downloadable flyer listing a photographer's rights (useful if you're getting hassled when snapping photos or shooting some video footage).

This got me thinking. Small business owners (especially the successful ones) are busy, busy people. They're often too busy to even consider setting up a website or doing any web surfing. So, how would such a business person have time to read a lengthy book on something they don't have time to do anyway? What's needed is a short run-down that makes a compelling case as to why they should invest some time into using the Internet to promote their business.

So, the book idea has morphed into a flyer or brochure-sized publication. Now don't think I'm taking the easy way out. Someone confided in me recently noting something similar to the fact that it's often easier to write ten thousand words than one thousand. I'm guessing that this won't be much easier, but I think it will be even more valuable.

What do you think? Drop me a comment.

2006/04/10 Update: I've started a page to track my progress, where I'll post the content as it evolves. Check it out here.

Awhile back I posted that I was considering writing a book on small business use of the Internet. Well... I've actually put fingers to keyboard and got a start. So far, I have the outline and the basic premise of the book written up (suitable for an "about this book" cover line). Here's what I've got so far, comments anyone? Would you read/recommend such a book to anyone you know?

Nurturing Your Customer Community
The Small Business Owner's Practical Guide to the Social Internet

About this book
If you operate your own business, you already know that successfully attracting and keeping customers is essential to your survival. But did you know that satisfied customers, properly cared for, can become a powerful force in helping your business to grow? The Internet is changing the way consumers research competing products, locate vendors, suppliers and services, and share both positive and negative business experiences. This book offers tips and strategies for helping you, the small business owner, harness the connectivity and interactivity that the Internet provides today while keeping an eye on future developments. You will learn how to "tune in" to network conversations regarding your business, how to identify and distribute information that customers will find beneficial, and how to foster strong relationships with key customers. The goal is to build up your customer base into a thriving community of advocates, ready and willing to tell the world about your business.

Some would say Seth Godin is a visionary. He's written several books on product marketing, knowing your customers and bootstrapping a business. Today marks the public beta of his latest project Squidoo, a wiki-like web site that is attempting to bring a human-focused organization to the problem of finding useful things on the Internet. The web site allows easy creation of a "lens", or a topic-centric page that is a pointer to other resources on the Internet. To keep the project going, ads are placed along side the lens with part of the ad revenue going to Squidoo, and part going to the "lenscrafter".

The system is currently seeded with data from the DMOZ project, with many, many lenses currently unclaimed. If Squidoo is well-received, watch for a land-rush to claim lenses.

My first lens is one on robotics. You can create a lens on any topic, provided it doesn't fall outside the terms of use. We'll have to see how all of these lenses shape the "visionary" title of Mr. Godin.

A recent blog posting on my site here has garnered over 100 search engine hits in the past few days for the terms "perth" and "meteor". I'm guessing from the number of Google.com.au referrers that it there must have been some good meteor viewing going on near Perth Australia recently. There's also a number of hits coming from Google.com.uk, so I'm not really sure where the heavenly commotion is coming from. Anyone have a clue?

Update - Later that same day: This story has rocketed the original posting to the most popular on my blog! Not too surprising since readership is pretty low anyway, but impressive nonetheless. Check out this news story for more details (and video footage) on what happened in Australia. You could also try this news story that mentions a system that could have been used to track the meteor's projectory in hopes of finding the meteorite.

After writing about Lulu.com in a recent column, I figured I should see how hard it would be to use and give it a try. My first salvo into the world of self publishing and print-on-demand is a calendar. Now I'm not much of artistic photographer (at least yet) so I thought I would go looking for some photos that would be good to use. Where do you find photos on the Internet? Flickr is one place. I wanted to do this legally, so I looked for photos licensed under a suitable Creative Commons license that would allow me to make money with the author's permission. Flickr helps with this task. I chose the "Attribution License" and after much (I mean a whole lot of) browsing and searching, I found the photos of Todd Klassy. I absolutely loved his photos on the spot. Even though I didn't have to ask (due to the licensing he assigned), I sent Todd a note through Flickr to ask permission if I could use some of his photos, and he permitted it.

Next came the real work. Todd has over 350 photos to choose from. A couple nights work and I had about 26 of my favourites picked out, then I worked that down to an easy dozen for the calendar. Lulu has some specific guidelines about the size and resolution of images, so I spent an hour resizing and tailoring the images. Then almost another hour to figure out the Lulu interface and that I didn't really want captions or a title on the front.

Steve Fentriss, a 19-year-old drummer from Ann Arbor, Michigan has made his singing debut with the song "I Love Public Radio". It's a jazzy song that encourages donating to your local public radio station... worth the listen. I really liked it.

I'm glad we have the CBC up north here and I'm glad the labour dispute is over (it's good to hear the "regulars" back on the air). Even though we don't have to make donations to keep the CBC running, there are other ways we can contribute like sending your comments their way or pitching a show. Thanks to Tod Maffin at his I Love Radio blog for the pointer to the song. Keep up the great work Tod and Steve!

Seth Godin is an interesting guy. I've got to read some of his books some day, since I haven't actually read any. I've read a couple of his ebooks though, and his latest "Everyone is an Expert" is worth the read. It's a slant on where the much-hyped "Web 2.0" might be taking us, written in plain language and is readable and understandable. Here's some snippets:

I BELIEVE THAT WHEN YOU GO ONLINE, you don’t search. You don’t even find. Instead, you are
usually on a quest to make sense.

We need a nowblog. A place where a stranger can go to get insight and meaning—and then leave that site and go
somewhere else.

A nowblog is a place, the best place to start. I call this place a lens.

Seth's idea of a "lens" is a single page view on the world as seen by one person. It is merely a director of information, not a source of information itself. It is a way to help others meaning of a topic that you feel strongly about. Of course people have been building "home pages" that act like Seth's lens idea for a decade using simple HTML on their web sites. What's new is that Seth will be offering a standard, easy and free way to do it with his latest project called "Squidoo". I like the idea of the standardized look between different people's lenses, and the free site to build them will encourage people to try it, even if just for the ability to increase your web site's or blog's ranking on search sites.

We're lucky to live in an age and country where we have the opportunity and resources to be able to sit back and contemplate what we want to do with our lives, and not have to worry about where our next meal comes from or where we're going to sleep. It's almost criminal that we have this luxury when you consider the people on the planet that don't have clean water or a phone with a 911 service connected to the other end.

But we do live in a fortunate place and time, and I do believe that it is a useful exercise to spend some time and look over where you are taking your life. I've watched televison and read a lot of blog postings and books that encourage you to "do what you love" or to "find your passion". But what if you don't know what your passion is? How can you figure out what you love to do?