…as the whole world fights for their URLs. Actually, Facebook’s holding up pretty damn well. So’s Twitter. It’s impressive.
It turned out Facebook.com/Stephanie was taken by a Facebook employee (just after I had checked yesterday). Not surprised - and no problem - I’m http://facebook.com/stephaniebergman.
I know, I’m a dork for caring. But I’m sure not the only one…
Tonight at 9pm PST (midnight EST), Facebook is going to open up vanity URL’s to everyone. Ya know, those pretty URL’s after your name, like that other social network has (ahem, myspace.com/StephaniePBergman or myspace.com/stephaniebambam). Despite everyone’s joking, this really is a big deal. Facebook has fought against this for a long time, really not wanting people to be identified as a URL, but rather, forcing them to use their real name everywhere.
I see this as something that kinda had to happen. No matter what Facebook wishes, I can’t tell someone my name and hope that they’ll find me. It just doesn’t work. They would need to go to Google, or wherever and search for me. Facebook has no guarantees that they’d be the first entry there. In fact, for me, they’re not. If I can tell someone facebook.com/stephaniebambam, there’s no question where they go to find me. But right now I’d never tell them to look on Facebook, not when I have pretty URL’s to hand out.
All that said, yes, the simplest solution is to buy a domain, which obviously, I have. A domain is the easiest way to go, and as many people have said, with domains being as cheap as they are, there really is no reason not to buy one. Buy a domain, redirect it to Facebook, and you’re done. Takes 10 minutes. Most people aren’t going to do that though. No matter HOW easy it is, “buy a domain” sounds very ominous to some people. They think they need technical knowledge, that it’s hard, and the domain companies out there don’t make it any easier. Look at GoDaddy.com, the UI’s a wreck, and definitely will make anyone think it’s really hard to do. It’s NOT.
Back to my original point. I will be online tonight to grab a URL from Facebook. I haven’t quite decided what I want yet, though. facebook.com/stephanie IS available, and I’d kinda like that for the novelty factor. However, that doesn’t help me with SEO, and unfortunately, I’m gonna have an SEO battle soon - there’s a tv reporter with my exact name out there. If she goes national, I’m out of google. So there’s facebook.com/stephaniebambam, or /stephaniebergman, but those are no fun .
I have no idea what I’m gonna do and I probably won’t until the exact moment I type the name in. But regardless, this will be a funny night. See you all on Facebook in a few hours!!
A Roomba is a little robot vacuum cleaner. Being a robot, it can go out, navigate your house/apartment to clean, and return to the charger base all on its own. I got one for a few reasons:
1) I needed a vacuum cleaner.
2) I didn’t need a crazy powerful vacuum cleaner.
3) I own a dust buster for the bad spots (like the litter box).
4) I hate cleaning.
5) It would be funny for the cats.
6) It was on sale ($68 during a woot-off)
7) It’s just cool. 
I’ve had the roomba for a couple of months now, and absolutely adore it. One of my cats loves it as well - I have to hide it from him or else he’d have it running 24/7. He thinks Robbie’s his buddy, and I suppose in a way, it is. The other cat is scared of it. But Harry will happily chase it across the room, try to ride it, and get very upset when it stops running.
The roomba cleans fairly well. I use what they call a “lightbox” to help the roomba navigate from one room to the other, in my case, cleaning the main room, my bedroom, and the bathroom. It kinda works. When the roomba’s really working well, it cleans for about 1 1/2 hrs, goes around my entire apartment, and returns itself to base. Most of the time, though, I find it stopped somewhere in the middle of my apartment, either because it needs to be cleaned or thinks it’s stuck because it’s hit an immovable cat. If it misses a spot there is a “spot mode” I can put it in to have it clean a particular area, but that’s rarely necessary since it cleans so often.
But even when Robbie ‘doesn’t work,’ or gets lost, or Harry stops it in its tracks - my apartment still gets vacuumed. How could I possibly complain about that??
If someone is considering buying a roomba, they need to be aware of, and consider these potential issues:
- It IS a vacuum cleaner, which some folks somehow forget. That means that it is not exactly silent when it runs. To me, the sound is fine. It does not wake me up at night unless it comes into my room, and I can easily watch television while it is running around me (which I never have been able to do with a “normal” vacuum). That said, it is much louder on wood than on carpet, so keep that in mind.
- It is not the greatest vacuum cleaner on earth. This is no Dyson. I think a dust buster (or some other thing for small areas) is pretty necessary if you’re gonna rely on this as your main vacuum.
- It needs to be cleaned often. It will stop running and tell you when it needs to be cleaned, but I tend to clean it every other day without prompting (and remember, I have two cats, so there is hair/litter/stray food to clean up) It’s easy to do and takes all of 5 minutes.
- It bumps into everything. This is by design, of course, a robot does not have eyes and relies on bumping things to tell it where to go. It doesn’t bump into things very hard, but can pick up speed when it moves, so it has its moments where it flies across my room into a wall. There is padding to prevent damage, and people do sometimes add extra stuff there, but I’m a little loathe to add anything else to the roomba since Harry would just rip it off anyway. I have yet to see it hit something hard enough to cause any damage, cats included. But, people who are obsessive about having perfect furniture may not like this.
- It is always out and visible. This is a big deal to some folks. You don’t want to store your roomba in a closet, that defeats the purpose. It needs to be docked somewhere that allows it to easily roam around the entire house, which means it’s going to be pretty visible wherever it is. I do hide mine at night sometimes (just stick it in a closet), but that’s because Harry will turn it on and I don’t want the noise.
- I already mentioned that mine rarely returns to its dock, I think that’s a fairly common problem. So be prepared to come home and discover your roomba is sitting in the middle of the room somewhere.
- Rooms absolutely have to be “pre-cleaned” before the roomba can go. Which, if you’re like me with cats that will set the roomba off at any time, means you need to be very careful about what’s on your floor. Just this morning I woke up to find my roomba stuck on a cat toy in the middle of my living room. The roomba can get over cords with no problem, but stringy things will get caught, and can cause damage.
- Performance may vary, depending on surface. The wood floor in the kitchen and tile in the bathroom clean easily. The carpet in the rest of my apartment cleans ok, but not perfectly. The roomba does detect what it thinks is a dirty area and will go over that spot more than usual, which helps. However, when the roomba goes off multiple times in a day (which the cats will do), the carpet looks AWESOME after its done. A lot of people use a roomba as a “between cleaning” thing, and still vacuum their place once a week.
- It won’t do stairs. It supposedly can detect a ledge and won’t fall down, but I dunno if I’d risk it.
I love my little Robbie. It is fantastic, ultimately does all its supposed to (which is clean), and provides hours of entertainment for my cats. It is very much not for everyone, for the reasons mentioned above. Anyone considering getting one should take all of those issues into account, and really think through if this is for them. But for me, it’s perfect.
As some folks who read this know, my mom is superintendent of a school and hospital in Westchester County, NY. This economy is hitting everyone hard, and the schools are some of the hardest hit.
This Wednesday, May 10, 15% of all sales at B&N made using this coupon will go directly to her school. This coupon can be printed and brought into stores, or the code can be used online.
So if you have some book or DVD you’ve been thinking about buying and putting off, go get it Wednesday! I think there’s a new James Patterson I haven’t read, a David Baldacci…I think I shall find enough stuff to get.
This is your excuse to spend money. “Yes, I’m buying stuff, but I’m helping make kids lives better!!” Take advantage of it, the kids of Blythedale will thank you. Forward this on to anyone you know, the more people who use it, the better!! My mother and I thank you.
The coupon is below, click through for the full size version.
A quick entry to say that yes, I know you’re getting an error when you leave a comment. The comment IS going through and will be posted, there’s just a problem with this theme returning you to the correct page after. So please, feel free to talk 
I need to spend some time tinkering with the design of this blog and fix things up, please just bear with me in the process.
Not so long ago, I wrote a blog entry listing my favorite iPhone apps, one of which was called White Noise. I specifically mentioned that part of the reason I loved the app was because of how simple it was. Well, it’s not so simple anymore, and I can’t fathom why.
Original White Noise iPhone application
The White Noise application’s functionality - only functionality - is to play one track, looped, for a certain period of time.
The original design of the WhiteNoise application seemed to understand that, and made the app as easy as possible to use. As you can see in the screenshot, everything you need from the app is right on the main screen. You select a sound there, set the volume, set the timer, and off you go. The application also remembered previous settings and allowed me to select which sounds went on my main screen, which I liked. I opened the app and it would be good to go. It was, very literally, the perfect application. All it did was what it was supposed to.
New White Noise iPhone Application
This is the new White Noise application. For some reason, all functionality has been yanked off of the main screen and put behind various buttons. It’s not clear which button should be clicked for what (there’s no such thing as hover help on an iphone), nor is there any good reason to have such a blank, empty main screen. It’s a waste of valuable real estate.
Want to choose a noise? Go to the “catalog” button at the bottom of the screen to choose one. The app no longer remembers my settings, so I need to do this every night or else I’ll be listening to “Amazon Jungle.” Dunno about you, but that’s not relaxing to me. One click went to at least four.
Want to set a timer? It’s under the “Timer” screen, but the lack of a “save” button on that screen messed me up more than once. One click is now at least three, more if you’re as confused as I am.
What’s under the “Controls” button? It’s an app that plays a sound on a timer. What kind of controls does it need?? Oh, do I want to exit the app when the timer’s done. Well, hopefully I’m asleep, so I truly don’t care.
So unfortunately, here we have one of the best examples I have ever seen of overdesign. There is no reason all the functionality for this app can’t still be on the main screen, other than it’s not pretty. But who cares about pretty when all the app does is play a sound?
K.I.S.S. is a rule of product development that will never get old. Keep It Simple, Stupid. You don’t turn something that could be done in one click into three unless you’re adding something damn important to the process. The app doesn’t do anything more than it did the day I downloaded it: play a sound on a timer.
Developers, product managers, UX/AI folks - I recommend you all check out the application. There’s a huge lesson to be learned from it. Never detract from your core functionality. Hunting around menus just pisses off users. If you can keep everything on one screen, do it!!
Normal folks who just want a sound - I recommend you stay away from this one. It’s simply not usable anymore.
If anyone has another white noise app to recommend, I’d love to hear it. I’m definitely in the market for a new one now.
One of my coworkers wrote this, and it’s too funny (and well-written) not to share. Anyone can propose pretty much anything in California, so here’s one for the next ballot.
It is basically a Proposition to redo the Proposition process, and creates the “Office of the Initiative Editor,” who will be responsible for proofreading Propositions, among other, very necessary things.
The underlined text below is what’s new, the rest is already in effect.
It’s not a short read, but it is fun. Thanks to Daniel for sharing this!!
Be it ordained by the people of the City and County of San Francisco:
Section 1. The Charter of the City and County of San Francisco is hereby amended by amending Section 14.101 and adding Section 14.105 to read as follows:
SEC. 14.101. INITIATIVES.
An initiative may be proposed by presenting to the Director of Elections a petition containing the initiative and signed by voters in a number equal to at least five percent of the votes cast for all candidates for mayor in the last preceding general municipal election for Mayor. Such initiative shall be submitted to the voters by the Director of Elections upon certification of the sufficiency of the petition’s signatures and approval by the Initiative Editor as specified by Section 14.105.
A vote on such initiative shall occur at the next general municipal or statewide election occurring at any time after 90 days from the date of the certificate of sufficiency executed by the Director of Elections and the date of certification of approval by the Initiative Editor (whichever is later), unless the Board of Supervisors directs that the initiative be voted upon at a special municipal election.
If the petition containing the initiative is signed by voters in a number equal to at least ten percent of the votes cast for all candidates for Mayor in the last preceding general municipal election for Mayor, is approved by the Initiative Editor, and contains a request that the initiative be submitted forthwith to voters at a special municipal election, the Director of Elections shall promptly call such a special municipal election on the initiative. Such election shall be held not less than 105 nor more than 120 days from the date of its calling unless it is within 105 days of a general municipal or statewide election, in which event the initiative shall be submitted at such general municipal or statewide election.
No initiative or declaration of policy approved by the voters shall be subject to veto, or to amendment or repeal except by the voters, unless such initiative or declaration of policy shall otherwise provide.
SEC 14.105. OFFICE OF THE INITIATIVE EDITOR.
(a) The Office of the Initiative Editor shall ensure that all initiatives submitted to voters by the people adhere to the following criteria:
1. The initiative is free of errors in spelling and grammar.
2. All provisions intended to be non-binding are clearly indicated as such, and all provisions not so indicated are enforceable by a court.
3. No provision clearly contradicts the law of the State of California or the law of the United States of America, nor does any provision clearly contradict the Charter of the City and County of San Francisco unless ordaining an amendment to the same.
(b) The Mayor shall appoint or reappoint an Initiative Editor, subject to confirmation by the Board of Supervisors, who shall perform and manage the functions of the Office of the Initiative Editor. The appointee shall be a member in good standing of the California Bar Association. The Initiative Editor shall have a term of office of two years, and may be removed by the Mayor subject to approval by the Board of Supervisors.
(c) Upon submission of an initiative to the Director of Elections, the Office of the Initiative Editor shall determine whether the initiative adheres to the criteria laid out in subsection (a) of this section, and, in consultation with the proponent, make the minimum set of changes to the language of the initative reasonably necessary to bring it into adherence. Upon determination that an initiative complies with the criteria of subsection (a), the Initiative Editor shall certify his or her approval of the initiative. The Initiative Editor shall not refuse to approve an initiative on any grounds other than those laid out in subsection (a), narrowly construed.
(d) The Office of the Initiative Editor shall consult with the proponent on matters of style, clarity, and good legislative practice, but the Initiative Editor shall not refuse to approve an initiative on such grounds.
(e) If after 60 days from an initiative’s submission to the Director of Elections the proponent and the Office of the Initiative Editor cannot reach an agreement on the language of the initiative, and the proponent petitions the Municipal Court for a writ of mandamus ordering that the Initiative Editor certify his or her approval of the initiative, then the court shall presume in the petitioner’s favor, and shall find otherwise only upon a standard of summary judgment.
(f) The Department of Elections shall provide sufficient staff and resources for the Office of the Initiative Editor to perform the functions defined in this Section.
(g) In the event that the position of Initiative Editor remains vacant for 30 days or more while an initiative is pending approval or certification thereof, approval shall be deemed certified.
Section 2. The Municipal Elections Code of the City and County of San Francisco is hereby amended by amending Section 820 and 840 to read as follows:
SEC. 820. INITIATIVE PETITION FEES.
At the time a proponent files a notice of intention to circulate an initiative petition, the proponent shall pay a petition filing fee of $200.00 $750.00 pursuant to Section 320 of this Code.
SEC. 840. SIGNATURES IN LIEU OF FEES.
Each signature submitted in lieu of a fee that is specified in this Article shall reduce the amount of the fee by $0.50, but in no case shall the petition filing fee specified by Section 820 be reduced to less than $250.00.
Section 3. Sections 820 and 840 of the Municipal Elections Code, as amended by Section 2 of this initiative, may be repealed or amended by the Board of Supervisors without a vote of the people.
If you managed to read through this whole thing, I’m totally impressed. Now, tell me, what do you think the chances are of us getting this onto the ballot?
I’m finding all this stuff about Sandra Cantu’s killer very sad, of course, but I’m also really fascinated by the fact that this is a woman.
One of my favorite classes in college was Criminology, and like oh so many college courses, we had a large term paper to do as a final project. We had to present an original concept, with research to back it up. I wrote my paper on female serial killers, with a theory that the only reason the statistics were so low on women and murder was because people didn’t look for them.
Where did that come from? Well, statistics for female serial killers dropped dramatically in the late 70’s - right at the exact same time the FBI began heavy profiling. The generic serial killer profile is a white male, 30-50, middle class, etc. Nearly every investigation into a serial killer at the FBI begins with that standard profile. Meaning…they don’t look for women.
I don’t have the paper anymore, so unfortunately, I can’t give sources for any data. I used a lot of FBI/CIA documents (publicly available stuff, obviously), books on profiling, and lots of articles/interviews of serial killers.
My paper caused quite an outrage in my class (me? causing trouble? never!). My professor thought my theory was “plausible, but could never be proved,” but over half the class insisted it was impossible. They didn’t have data, there is none, but “women don’t do things like that.”
But of course they do. We have multiple instances in our history of women being just as nasty and evil as men, and yet, we expect women to be “better.” I keep hearing the quote “why would one woman kill another woman’s child.” People don’t say “why would one man kill another man’s child.” Women kill their own children, they murder, they’ve even raped before…raped both boys and girls. And because we all think the way we do, it genuinely HURTS to find out a woman did something like this.
I’m as guilty of it as anyone. Intellectually - I know full well that women can be as evil as men, obviously, I was pushing the theory over ten years ago. Emotionally - I was as horrified as everyone else to find out that Sandra Cantu’s killer, and possible rapist, was a woman. There is an expectation that women should be better, which makes absolutely no logical sense.
I still feel the same as I did back when I wrote the paper. Profiling is really great, and very helpful in solving criminal investigations, but it is dangerous when an entire segment of society is excluded for no good reason. I believe the statistics are flawed, and that there really is a correlation between the rise in white male serial killers and FBI profiliers looking for them.
To get back to Sandra Cantu (which is what inspired this blabbering), police stumbled into Melissa Huckaby as a suspect. They knew of her and had interviewed her; she told police that the suitcase Sandra Cantu was found in had been “stolen from her driveway.” But she did not become the focus of an investigation until she had done two more interviews with conflicting information (if I remember right, it was a CNN interview that was the nail in her coffin). I can’t believe that had a man said he owned the suitcase the girl was found in that he wouldn’t have been - at the very least - dragged down to police headquarters.
With all that said, kudos to the Tracy police for figuring this out. Women slip under the radar in things like this, and even though it took CNN to help “break” this for them, at least they were open minded enough to consider the possibility. Women are fully capable of evil things, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s going to be watching the criminologists and psychologists that are bound to start coming out to talk about this topic.
Why is it that while we push for gender equality everywhere, we still dodge the possibility that women could be just as evil as men? Equality is equality, after all. Women killing people on the front lines of a war? Absolutely! Women killing people…for no reason? Absolutely not. How on earth does that make sense, and why do I feel that way? I dislike logic that comes from emotion. I want facts, figures, proof. The data says we’re just as bad. But I simply can’t believe it.
Can you?
I have written this post a number of times now, but never published it due to my own silliness. See, I’m always discovering new applications, that’s part of the fun of the iPhone, and I never really wanted to put my foot down and say “this is my top list.”
So, this is a list of the 5 iPhone apps I use most often, and can’t imagine my iPhone without them….as of right now.
1) White Noise - I’ve used this app every single night since I got it. It has a bunch of different “white noises” it plays, I think the one I use is technically called ‘brown noise,’ but I love it. I’ve used a white noise machine for years, but have always hated trying to wake up in the morning with the machine still going (and there are studies now saying that any noise - including white noise - effects sleep negatively). With the app, I can set a timer and it’ll turn itself off once I’m asleep. I also have chronic insomnia, so for me, anyway, it’s also useful to tell me if I’ve been awake in bed for far too long. If the noise turns off and I’m still awake, it’s time to get out of bed for half an hour (I think my wacky sleeping habits could probably be a post in and of itself, I know they’re weird).
2) Flashlight (link to itunes) - Really. All this does is make your iPhone light up like a flashlight. For me, it’s handy navigating my apartment in the dark so as to not wake up or step on the cats. If you’re uber l33t, you can find a version of Flashlight embedded within Tweetie. Which takes me to…
3) Tweetie - My favorite twitter client so far. There are many, and which one I like changes regularly, but as of right now, I prefer Tweetie. The fact that it has a flashlight is a silly cute thing too.
4) Evernote - I’ve always been one for simple note taking programs, my main requirement being that it needs to sync between my computer(s) and my phone without me plugging the iPhone into the computer (I rarely do that). I tried a bunch of apps, but Evernote is absolutely the best (toodledoo would be my #2). It does exactly what I want - lets me type something in as a note on my computer, then turn around and see it on my phone (or on another computer). It’s more powerful than that, it does audio, images, to do lists, but all I want are text notes. And it’s fully cross-platform, with apps for both Mac and PC. The PC app also contains a little screen clipper thing that works like Grab does on a mac, I likey.
5) Taxi Magic - this one probably isn’t all that helpful to everyone, but for me, I love. This uses GPS to find taxi companies near your location, and, if it can, will electronically order the cab for you. According to the cab drivers, the call shows up on their end just like a regular dispatch.
6) ZumoDrive - This was supposed to be a top 5 list, but had to include this. ZumoDrive lets you store files on a “z” drive (or just upload to their website), and access them from anywhere. Like Evernote, it is fully cross platform (Mac, PC, iPhone, Web), and syncs without any effort on my part. I use it for basic file storage, but one of the cooler things it will do is play mp3’s stored on ZumoDrive on your iphone…all streaming.
I’m still hunting for a great calendar app and a great poker or hearts game, but these apps have transformed my iPhone from being just a phone to being a real handheld computer. Applications are what the iPhone is all about. If you own an iPhone and haven’t played with any applications, you’re truly missing out.
There has been a lot of discussion around the blogosphere the past few days about Twitter’s Suggested Users feature and whether or not it’s fair, valuable, and so on. Jason Calacanis offered up $250,000 to be near the top of the list for two years, and stated he thought that price was a bargain. (Jason has also been pushing the value of Twitter followers for a long time now, but that’s a whole other story. For this, let’s assume there is some value to the number of followers you have.)
I gotta admit - I agree with folks on this - there is a problem here.
Twitter is like any other social network - it’s no fun unless you have friends to follow. It does make sense to create a list of people for new users to add and it avoids having to create a “Tom” (MySpace) type person who will give you something to do when you first join.
My problem is around the way the list has been implemented. I have multiple problems with it:
The list is truly akin to an advertisement, which, let me make clear, I have absolutely no problem with. When I was at MySpace, we created (and this still exists) an Editor’s Pick spot for applications that would receive the same sort of promotion as paid ads, but would be clearly designated as an editorial choice. Ads would be marked as ads, and anyone who wanted to be featured could ask to be listed (btw, if interested, head over to http://developer.myspace.com) more information about this program is here: In fact, everywhere I’ve worked in the last, oh, 10+ years, has a rule that ads must state they’re ads.
The Suggested User “ads,” while not being a result of money being paid (as far as we know), are clearly there because of….something. Is it knowing the right person at Twitter, is it having a certain number of followers, is it ‘quality’ of what the person says, is it some sort of evaluation of the person themselves, what? “Payments” do not always involve cash.
Suggesting users is a great idea. The problem is in the execution, and, really, all issues that are fairly easily fixed. It is to Twitter’s benefit in the long run to make sure their users are not all following the same 20 people, and to possibly create a revenue model that doesn’t exist right now.
If the list is editorial, it should be rotated, and be pulling from a larger segment of users than just the ones who are already popular. Twitter should also tell people what the requirements are to end up on that list. If the list is going to be the result of paid sponsorships, that’s fine as well, it should just be marked as such.
Until the issues with that list are fixed, if you want to find new people to follow, I recommend checking out the #followfriday hashtag over at twitter search. You’ll be exposed to a much larger and more diverse segment of the Twitterverse than you will on the Suggested Users page.
