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My Blogging Hiatus Ends Today

As you know I’ve been in a career shift recently and have not been posting. The dust is settling and I’ll be back bringing you information and commentary about emerging technology and social media. Please check back soon.

As you know I’ve been in a career shift recently and have not been posting. The dust is settling and I’ll be back bringing you information and commentary about emerging technology and social media. Please check back soon.

Mobile Virtual World Unveils in Japan

Recently launched in Japan, a new virtual world called Chipuya Town allows users to take their gaming on-the-go through the use of any Flash-enabled cell phone. Although it’s somewhat similar to popular virtual fictional world Second Life, it differs in that users create avatars which they use to walk around and interact with a virtual [...]

A Bad Case of Seesmic Fever

I’ve been pretending since the private beta launch of Seesmic in October that I wasn’t dying for a private beta invitation to test the service. Well, I can no longer mask my obvious envy for those who’ve been granted access. If you haven’t heard (and you will) about Seesmic, it’s a new startup by Loic [...]

I’ve been pretending since the private beta launch of Seesmic in October that I wasn’t dying for a private beta invitation to test the service. Well, I can no longer mask my obvious envy for those who’ve been granted access. If you haven’t heard (and you will) about Seesmic, it’s a new startup by Loic Le Meur, a well known European entrepreneur that recently relocated to San Francisco. It can best be described as Twitter video. The larger vision is for it to become an online video/television service where people interact around professional and user generated content. I’m very much into video. In my early career I was a TV journalist. In my current career I am in the planning stages of launching my own web video show. Seesmic would be the perfect outlet. Seems like I’ll have to wait like the rest of you (more than 5,000 on the list). For now, I’ll just admit my jealously every time I receive a link to a Seesmic video posted by one of my friends who snagged one of the first 300 invitations.

Nissan’s Magical Electric Paint Changes Colors on the Fly

While this post may not fall into the interactive space, it is about putting the customer in control and is just flat out COOL!You’ve probably been there. You get all excited about buying a car and then a short while after making the purchase, you regret the color choice. Sure, you still love your sleek [...]

While this post may not fall into the interactive space, it is about putting the customer in control and is just flat out COOL!You’ve probably been there. You get all excited about buying a car and then a short while after making the purchase, you regret the color choice. Sure, you still love your sleek black Nissan 350Z, but then you see a gorgeous blue number fly by and wish you went with that paint job instead. Soon, you may not have to choose.

Nissan is working on some sort of self-healing paint system that can actually change color based on your mood. Just flip the switch on the dash and your Sentra goes from white to red to black to whatever other color you want. It’s not a whole new paint job; the actual paint itself is changing color. This is achieved because the paint is a polymer-based substance with tiny iron oxide particles. You can manipulate these particles with an electric current and based on the distance between the particles, we perceive a different color.

You’ve got to wonder about insurance issues, though, because while the “default” color is white, what would it read on your registration papers? What about a high-speed chase where the car keeps changing color?

Original article/post found at http://www.mobilemag.com/content/100/354/C13813/.

Go Wild With New York Zoo Animals

The New York Zoos and Aquarium has developed a Web site that allows visitors to transform themselves into an animal, or combination of animals, of their choice. I made myself a gaz-dog-bush-fro-con-at-horse, going a bit over the top. The site also educates as the user creates, by offering up facts about each animal that you [...]

The New York Zoos and Aquarium has developed a Web site that allows visitors to transform themselves into an animal, or combination of animals, of their choice. I made myself a gaz-dog-bush-fro-con-at-horse, going a bit over the top. The site also educates as the user creates, by offering up facts about each animal that you add to your Avatar creation. The final product can be emailed to a friend and printed out.

Wear Your Website – Scan Tshirts With Mobiles

If you have a company website, this is the ultimate marketing tool—if you don’t mind total strangers scanning you with their camera phones. When a cell phone scans an “Extended Identity” T-shirts, it will visit the coordinating website. The shirts feature a datamatrix barcode, known as a “tag”. Using a mobile phone camera, a person [...]

Interesting Cool News of the Day Read

A pair of former Modem Media guys are introducing lemonade.com, which lets people put kiosks of their favorite products on Facebook or MySpace and make money on the clickthroughs, reports Bob Tedeschi in The New York Times (9/10/07). Tim Smith and Thomas R. Zawacki admit that nobody’s going to get rich on this (well, except [...]

A pair of former Modem Media guys are introducing lemonade.com, which lets people put kiosks of their favorite products on Facebook or MySpace and make money on the clickthroughs, reports Bob Tedeschi in The New York Times (9/10/07). Tim Smith and Thomas R. Zawacki admit that nobody’s going to get rich on this (well, except hopefully the two of them!), but they believe that the opportunity to make a little bit of pocket change is a good fit for a certain demographic.

“If you talk to 13- to 25-year-olds and tell them they can make $15 to $30 a month doing this, that’s wonderful news for them,” says Thomas.The way it works is, you register at lemonade.com and create your kiosk “by browsing product categories or searching among the roughly two million items on the site.” Once you’ve made your selections, you click and drag your choices into a “lemonade stand,” that “displays a slide show of those goods, along with product headings and item descriptions.” Then you just type in your Facebook or MySpace address and your “lemonade stand” is up and running in a matter of minutes. You get paid just for clicks, but you also earn a commission if somebody actually buys something.

Gene Alvarez, a Gartner consultant, thinks it’s a good idea: “Word-of-mouth referrals tend to close more deals, and when you’re on my Facebook page and I’m selling something, you’ve gotten to know me. You don’t think of me as a dark, evil corporation.” Adrienne Durkin, who beta-tested the service, observes that people like to see what other people are buying, and besides, it takes “something that’s been a way to waste time, and actually turns it into a way to make money.” And Hilary Bowers of Yoox sees a really nifty research tool: “We’ll be able to see this audience … what they like and recommend … that’s an intimate perspective on our catalog and how this demographic reacts to it,” she says.

Adobe wants to push Flash onto wireless devices

“Adobe, the company credited with transforming the Web from a dull to a dynamic environment, is pushing to do the same thing for mobile phones. The San Jose company wants to become a major player in the wireless market by making it easier to use graphics and interactive gadgets, as well as watch Internet videos, [...]

“Adobe, the company credited with transforming the Web from a dull to a dynamic environment, is pushing to do the same thing for mobile phones.

The San Jose company wants to become a major player in the wireless market by making it easier to use graphics and interactive gadgets, as well as watch Internet videos, on the small screen.”

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Attending Gnomedex from my office in Birmingham.

A short post about Gnomedex, the Blogosphere’s Conference, going on this weekend in Seattle. I’ve been able to attend many of the sessions from my office here in Birmingham, Alabama. The sessions are being streamed live on the Web at http://chris.pirillo.com/live/  The video is a bit choppy but I’ve been mostly pleased. Streaming video of a [...]

A short post about Gnomedex, the Blogosphere’s Conference, going on this weekend in Seattle. I’ve been able to attend many of the sessions from my office here in Birmingham, Alabama. The sessions are being streamed live on the Web at http://chris.pirillo.com/live/  The video is a bit choppy but I’ve been mostly pleased. Streaming video of a live event is not a big deal these days. What makes this special is that there is a chat room attached to the stream where any of the 300+ viewers can comment on the live presenter. Some conversations are valuable, some are irreverent (get the old fart off the stage), some lead to other information sources. The thread in the chat room is being projected on the screen for the live audience to see. While this is going on, I know several people that are in the room and they are giving live updates from Twitter (www.twitter.com).  So I am able to ask them questions via Twitter and have the presenter answer my question 2000 miles away. This totally closes the communication loop, in real time. That’s what’s so great about the way the Web is evolving: you can have a meaningful conversation with anyone, anywhere, any time.  http://www.gnomedex.com/2007/

Zappos Campaign Is Great Targeting and Timing

Online footwear retailer Zappos.com has introduced a campaign that places ads in the airport security bins. What better way to reach a consumer than when they’ve just removed their shoes and placed them in the bin. The creative really pays off the medium with headlines such as “Getting shoes through security isn’t always fast. Buying [...]

Online footwear retailer Zappos.com has introduced a campaign that places ads in the airport security bins. What better way to reach a consumer than when they’ve just removed their shoes and placed them in the bin. The creative really pays off the medium with headlines such as “Getting shoes through security isn’t always fast. Buying them is.” and “Great shoes. No line.” It’s the perfect time to remind each person that they’ve been meaning to take time to buy a new pair. The ads will run for three months at checkpoints within the Reno-Tahoe and Chattanooga, Tenn. airports — among the few currently participating in the bin ad program.