Avenue A | Razorfish is one of the most successful on line advertising agencies.  AARF has done leading edge work for many of the most respected brands including Mercedes, JC Penney and Kraft.  They are in the thick of the Internet revolution as broadcast advertising dollars move dramatically to on-line in search of customers.  Agencies live in the space between Advertisers, Publishers, and Consumers.  It is a rapidly evolving field as the rich interactivity of the Web enables advertisers and consumers to meet and have a conversation about products and services.  AARF brings together professionals in marketing strategy, creative user experience design, and Internet technology to deliver world-class web-based experiences.

Everyone has a theory as to why we are in Iraq.  Certainly Bush’s recent comments in his Mideast visit lends credence to “oil” as one of the top 3 reasons.  But another reason, I am convinced, is for target practice.  We have a high tech military that uses highly sophisticated equipment.  Anyone who has designed and delivered anything high tech knows that you can’t count on it until it has been field tested.  Hardware or software will have “bugs” (defects) until it is used in real life.  Moreover, anyone who has performed anything (musical or sports) knows that you don’t get better by reading books, but only by doing it, practicing it over and over.

Combine these two points and it’s rather obvious that our very expensive, high tech military is only worth the time and money if it can be battle tested.  That’s the only way the equipment can be perfected and the skills to use it can be developed and sharpened.  Without an occasional war, our military capability would hardly be sustainable, much less improve.  A military is only as effective as the experiences of the highly trained and equipped men and women.  They have to serve active duty to learn and be at the top of their game, especially due to the sophisticated systems involved.

And in an Internet world, where there is no barrier to knowledge, our only competitive advantage is EXPERIENCE not knowledge.  Another competitive advantage comes from our military being composed of SYSTEMS not individual warriors.  By system I mean what is being referred to in the article below about the use of close coordination between air and ground, between men and machines.  Drones, laser-guided missiles, night vision, communications gear, etc.  It is a deadly and unstoppable war machine—if you have the skills to operate it.  And the only place you can acquire these skills is on a BATTLEFIELD.

And that is why I think we are in Iraq—to build military muscle.  Field test the gear and battle test the men and women of the military.

U.S. airstrikes intensify in Iraq

Thanks to my brother in law, Raj, and the recommendation of a friend, Jim, who also visits Ottawa for the holidays, I am now the proud owner of a Garmin Global Positioning System (GPS) Receiver. For some reason, I always assumed they were:

• expensive to acquire (based on options at the car dealership)
• entailed subscription fees (?)
• difficult to use (squinting at friend's mobile phones rigged to GPS)

As it turns out, the technology has really matured:

• cheap: $250
• no on-going fees
• easy and fun to use

The model I chose is the Garmin Nuvi 250 which has a detailed database for all of North America including points of interest, restaurants, etc.

We've been using it for a couple of days and I highly recommend this for anyone. Goodbye paper maps!

You can even use it as a photo viewer using the SD memory card slot. What's nice is that even though it recommends a route to your destination, it quickly adjusts when you are "off course" or allows you to insert a "via point" to take you to an intermediate destination first. Most important though is the touchscreen interface and logical menus that allow you to set your destination very quickly.

In an article by Randall Stross, the New York Times reports:

The superabundance of content in the Internet's ecosystem is best explained by its organizing principle of "network neutrality." The phrase refers to the way the Internet welcomes everyone who wishes to post content. Consumers, in turn, enjoy limitless choices. Rather than having network operators select content providers on our behalf - the philosophy of the local cable company - the Internet allows all of us to act as our own network programmers, serving a demographic of just one person.

Today, the network carrier has a minor, entirely neutral role in this system - providing the pipe for the bits that move the last miles to the home. It has no say about where those bits happened to have originated. Any proposed change in its role should be examined carefully, especially if the change entails expanding the carrier's power to pick and choose where bits come from - a power that has the potential to abrogate network neutrality.

Woe to us all if the Internet's content is limited by the companies who also handle the plumbing. "The Future of Ideas," by Lawrence Lessig (Random House, 2001), shows how innovation and creativity associated with the Internet are the byproducts of its openness, its role as a commons that is accessible, by design, to all. Professor Lessig, who teaches law at Stanford, said last week that even now, broadband carriers have failed to demonstrate their commitment to the principle of network neutrality. "They've fought it at each stage," he said, "and they have never embraced the principle."

The largest Internet companies are the ones that could easily afford whatever terms the carriers demand for exclusive deals that would lock out smaller rivals and new entrants. But they have not done special deals with the carriers and instead have joined together to try to persuade Congress to protect the principle of network neutrality and prevent the Bells from striking exclusive deals with anyone. Last November, Amazon, eBay, Microsoft and Google, among others, formally registered their concern with a House committee that is revising the basic telecommunications law; they noted that a draft version of the bill failed to make network neutrality a matter of policy without exception. Whether the committee has responded positively to the suggestions from the Internet players should be known soon.

Update:  NY Times article

Machinima.com: What Is Machinima?

Introducing the revolutionary real-time unreality that is Machinima: shooting film in virtual reality.

An artform come out of nowhere. Films that use computer game technology and look like "Toy Story". Zero-budget film-makers making films that would stretch the biggest of Hollywood studios.

That's Machinima.

In short, a film made using Machinima (Ma-sheen-EH-ma) is a film made with computer-generated graphics, similar to those you can see on the television or on film in titles like "Antz" and "Toy Story". However, unlike those features, Machinima uses graphical techniques originally developed for computer games to generate its visuals, meaning that a film-maker with a home PC can create feature-length epics that would require millions of dollars to make using traditional CGI (Computer Ganerated Imagery) techniques, thanks to the fact that the Machinima film-maker can make his or her film in real time, rather than painstakingly animating frame by frame.

And once the film is made, rather than languishing on a video or in a can, Machinima productions can be dsitributed over the internet, being split down into their component parts and "rendered" in real-time on a viewer's computer, allowing them to be reproduced exactly as the film-makers saw them.

Machinima as an artform is still in its infancy, with only a small number of devotees. However, we at Machinima.com believe it will revolutionise film. For the first time, anyone can become a film-maker: able to create any film and any scene they can imagine.

MIT Center for Information Systems Research

Firms with superior IT governance have more than 25% higher profit than firms with poor governance given the same strategic objectives. These top performers have custom-designed IT governance for their strategies. Just as corporate governance aims to ensure quality decisions about all corporate assets, IT governance links IT decisions with company objectives and monitors performance and accountability.

Peter Weill

Learn how to select & use video equipment to produce & edit video productions

Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution
by Howard Rheingold
website

Smart mobs emerge when communication and computing technologies amplify human talents for cooperation. The impacts of smart mob technology already appear to be both beneficial and destructive, used by some of its earliest adopters to support democracy and by others to coordinate terrorist attacks.

The people who make up smart mobs cooperate in ways never before possible because they carry devices that possess both communication and computing capabilities. Their mobile devices connect them with other information devices in the environment as well as with other people's telephones. Dirt-cheap microprocessors embedded in everything from box tops to shoes are beginning to permeate furniture, buildings, neighborhoods, products with invisible intercommunicating smartifacts. When they connect the tangible objects and places of our daily lives with the Internet, handheld communication media mutate into wearable remote control devices for the physical world.

A blog entry about Smart Mobs

Paul Resnik, researcher

The Wired 40
They're masters of technology and innovation. They're global thinkers driven by strategic vision. They're nimbler than Martha Stewart's PR team.

1. Apple Computer, 2. Google, 3. Samsung Electronics, 4. Amazon.com, 5. Yahoo!
6. Electronic Arts, 7. Genentech, 8. Toyota, 9. Infosys Technologies, 10. eBay
11. SAP, 12. Pixar, 13. Cisco, 14. IBM, 15. Netflix
16. Dell, 17. General Electric, 18. Medtronic, 19. Intel, 20. Salesforce.com
21. Vodafone, 22. Flextronics, 23. EMC, 24. Nvidia, 25. Jetblue
26. FedEx, 27. Monsanto, 28. Microsoft, 29. Nokia, 30. Costco
31. Comcast, 32. Pfizer, 33. Li &Fung, 34. Taiwan Semiconductor, 35. Gen-probe
36. Citigroup, 37. L-3 Communications, 38. Ameritrade, 39. Exelon, 40. BP

Open Media Network

Open Media Network (OMN) was founded by Internet pioneer and Netscape veteran Mike Homer and includes Marc Andreessen as an advisor and board member.  The service offers users a broad selection of free public programs with a simple TV-style program guide and automatic background deliveries of favorite scheduled programming.  Content producers can easily add their programming to the network, with unlimited free delivery of their shows and with digital rights protection.  Through the service, consumers can view the content on multiple devices, including PCs and iPods today and televisions and cell phones by this summer.

Wired News: Gore's TV Seeks Northern Insights

Short-form content -- be it viewer-submitted videos, independent film or computer animation -- is nearly ready for prime time, according to analysts.

Wired: The Vee Pee's New Tee Vee | CNET: Gore's network to launch with Google

Former Vice President Al Gore unveiled a new interactive cable TV channel for the internet generation Monday that blends the immediacy of video blogging with the voyeurism of reality TV.

Current TV, formerly known as IndTV, will be launched Aug. 1 and will aim to combine the interactivity of the internet with the couch-potato pleasures of TV.

The new channel will air short-form (15-second to 5-minute) news, arts and entertainment videos for 18- to 35-year-olds.

There's plenty to watch on TV, but as a viewer, you don't have much chance to influence or contribute to what you see. This medium - the most powerful, riveting one we have - is still a narrow vision of reality rolled out in predictable 30-minute chunks. It's still a fortress of an old-school, one-way world.

We want to bust it open.

We're rethinking the way TV is produced, programmed, and presented, so it actually makes sense to an audience that's accustomed to choice, control, and collaboration in everything else they do.

So, we're creating a network in short form. Whenever you tune in to Current, you'll see something amusing, inspiring or interesting. And then, three minutes later, you'll see something new. It'll be a video iPod stocked with a stream of short segments and set to shuffle.

Wired News: Rockers Flex BitTorrent's Muscle

"No matter where you stand on issues of copyright, a network like BitTorrent is really for exactly this kind of thing -- when you have content that you want to freely distribute."

Technology News Article | Reuters.com

If you think video games are engrossing now, just wait: PlayStation maker Sony Corp. has been granted a patent for beaming sensory information directly into the brain.
The technique could one day be used to create videogames in which you can smell, taste, and touch, or to help people who are blind or deaf.

The U.S. patent, granted to Sony researcher Thomas Dawson, describes a technique for aiming ultrasonic pulses at specific areas of the brain to induce "sensory experiences" such as smells, sounds and images.

Here’s another story of “one guy” operating out of the mythical garage, i.e. today that means a blog site.  Now he’s one of the hotspots of the online media world…

PaidContent.org

"He is a genius," proclaims Henry Copeland, founder of Blogads, a company that sells Web log advertising. "Everybody knows about Rafat Ali and bangs on his door to advertise with him." The fact of the matter is that in the broadband Internet world, Ali can stand alongside a Time Warner or a News Corp. and feel his power. His is an achievement that could not have been possible before the advent of inexpensive Web logging software in 2001.

Now, on the connection between media, technology, and finance, the topics paidContent covers every hour of every day, the self-effacing Ali is both a news breaker and a trusted source. Industry players around the globe regard him as a veritable new-age magnate. Ali, for his part, is modest about his rise, as befits his upbringing in a small university town in India.

America Online says incorporating more video content and related advertising is job No. 1, and key to its Web at-large strategy.

A media report by Avenue A/Razorfish earlier this year expects that 2005 will be a landmark year for advertisers' use of online video. Still, video advertising represented just $121 million of the $9.5 billion spent by advertisers on all online media, according to JupiterResearch. The research outfit projects that overall spending on online advertising will swell from $6.6 billion in 2003 to $16.1 billion in 2009, with video growing exponentially.

More…

The Rise of the Consumer-Generated Media Machine

A new citizen-centric media, a sort of me-to-you "minimedia," will soon rule. That's the vision of the youthful brigade driving this movement. And for now, the wind is definitely at their back.

The unspoken secret of the blogosphere is that it's not yet as large as the recent hype would suggest. The power lies in its interconnectedness, the fluid linking from one node to another. Nevertheless, there are only about 5 million active sites, total, and most of those have but a handful of regular readers. According to Anil Dash, a vice president of Six Apart, the company that created the blogosphere's most widely used software, "The majority of bloggers are writing for only five to 10 friends. Fewer than 100 blogs have 100,000 readers. Maybe 50."