Wednesday, December 30, 2009

DGDM: Digital Development Partners


Punch Pizza Web Coupon - Expires 12/19/08Image by The Punch Pizza via Flickr

Digital Development Partners, Inc. (OTCBB: DGDM) has a flagship company: YuDeal.com, in beta. What does YuDeal do?

You own a restaurant. You see half your tables are empty. YuDeal would allow you to reach by text message potential customers to whom you might offer 20% off should they drop by within two hours. This is real time, social networking, and advertising in one package. YuDeal is a game changing proposition. The coupon industry will not be the same ever again.

DGDM came into the YuDeal game early.

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123Print: Business Cards


Realize Business CardsImage by Thomas Rockstar via Flickr

If it is time for you get a new set of business cards, go to 123print.com. The site can be very helpful for your business card design.

Somethings don't go away, like business cards for example. The difference between making and not making a contact could be the difference between deal or no deal. Is your business card at hand?

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Has Your Debt Run Amok?


WASHINGTON - MARCH 26:  U.S. Secretary of the ...Image by Getty Images via Daylife
Don't get embarrassed if it has. Get help. Get your debt under control through consolidation services. Get help from those who are good at the fine art of debt negotiation. Sometimes debt consolidation can be a slippery slope that makes things worse for you. Don't fall into that trap.

But it can be done right. And it is also the right thing to do to repair your credit. Otherwise you keep working for money instead of making the money work for you.

These are hard times. Take the effort to make the right choices.

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Vegas Red: Online Casino


SAN FRANCISCO - DECEMBER 11:  Democratic presi...Image by Getty Images via Daylife
For the past decade and a half we have watched pretty much everything go online. Casinos have ended up there too. Expect that trend to only accentuate. You can look forward to richer media experiences. A parallel universe that comes to mind is gaming. Gambling is like gaming. Online gambling is a sport of sorts.

I am aware of of the social baggage tied to that word gambling. But there was gambling before the web came along. The big news is not that gambling has moved online. I think those who intend to play watchdog roles should focus primarily on making it a safe experience for those who are going to indulge in it anyway.
So I like sites that offer to be portals to online casinos. They do the vetting for you. They make sure the safety standards are met. And they work hard to inform you just as they intend to entertain.

And if you don't want to lose money, play it for free. There are those kinds as well. Some really smart people like Warren Buffett are into poker. Poker games are one of the staples at casinos. Online poker, how about it?

I hope the experience is safe, regulated and fun. And I am excited about the technological underpinnings of what the online casino experience might be in a few years, just like I would like to imagine what companies like Google might be doing in a few years.
A pachinko parlor in Tokyo, JapanImage via Wikipedia


News this morning is YouTube wants to get into gaming. You should be able to interact with your YouTube videos: that is the idea. The online casino experience could benefit from such advances.

And the free, no deposit online casinos naturally would have global appeal. Can come online, can play. It is all in the mind. Throw some music in there, will you?

I was past 20 when I landed in America. I don't follow baseball, or basketball or football. Give me my World Cup Soccer. There are many online casino games that run tournaments. Legions of fans follow them. The best online casino sites help fans follow the tournaments of interest.

Have fun. Be safe. Win if you can. Don't lose too much.

Go to Vegas. If you can't, go to Vegas Red.

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Tuesday, December 29, 2009

OnlineGambling.net


A pachinko parlor in Tokyo, JapanImage via Wikipedia
There are a ton of casinos online. If you are one of those who has to gamble, it is best to play safe. OnlineGambling.net is a portal. It is a leading resource for online gambling. It lists casinos that accept players from the US. The site also features "multi language casinos, no deposit casinos, free casino games."

The site offers reviews of casinos and rates them based on various variable. In the process the scam online casinos get weeded out. And that is good for you. Have fun. Play it safe. Be an informed player.

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Thursday, December 24, 2009

WildBlue Satellite Internet


The back panel of a satellite modem, with coax...Image via Wikipedia
The importance of broadband in this day and age can not be exaggerated. Broadband is as basic as electricity today, for work, for pleasure, for life activities. With the satellite option, the rural urban divide goes out the window. Wild Blue Internet is available anywhere in the continental US. The price is affordable.

Dial up just does not cut it these days. If you don't have broadband speed, you are missing out. On productivity, on pleasure. You need WildBlue Internet. WildBlue Satellite Internet fills in where cable internet is not an option.

Wildblue Satellite Internet might be the solution you are looking for.

Satellite Internet In CA


Sign up today.

USA Players Online


Casino Velden PanoramaImage by geek7 via Flickr

USA Players Welcome is an online gambling portal that welcomes players from all states in the US. If you are looking for a casino online, take a look at this one. You can find free casinos, you can find big bonus casinos. What is it that you are looking for? All the casinos listed at the portal have been reviewed and thoroughly tested. If you are going to gamble online anyways, play it safe. Don't go straight to a gambling site. Go there through a portal like this one. Playing it safe is the more fun way.

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Virgin Galactic

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

An Open Google

Google Public Policy Blog: The Meaning Of Open



A company that has become big needs a new ethos. Google as a company will stick around for a long, long time, but it is not at all a given that Google will continue to be on the bleeding edge. Will Google Wave end up being the last bleeding edge product Google gave to the world?

The advantage Google has is that search is at the core of the internet experience, and there Google is the one with the secret sauce. And this is the Internet century.
The Meaning Of Open  Complacency is the hallmark of any closed system. If you don't have to work that hard to keep your customers, you won't.........understanding the fast-moving system better than anyone else and using that knowledge to generate better, more innovative products ........ a fast innovator and a thought leader ........ Open systems have the potential to spawn industries. ......... win based on the merits of their products and not just the brilliance of their business tactics ........... open systems allow innovation at all levels — from the operating system to the application layer — not just at the top. ........ good business, since an open Internet creates a steady stream of innovations that attracts users and usage and grows the entire industry. .......... Reward = (Total value added to the industry) * (Our share of industry value) ........... grow the web for everyone ......... When railroad tracks were first being laid across the U.S. in the early 19th century, there were seven different standards for track width. The network didn't flourish and expand west until the different railway companies agreed upon a standard width of 4' 8.5". ............ about 681 million hosts on the Internet. .......... In the early 1900s, the U.S. automobile industry instituted a cross-licensing agreement whereby patents were shared openly and freely amongst manufacturers. Prior to this agreement, the owners of the patent for the two-cycle gasoline engine had effectively bottled up the industry. ........... we are the largest open source contributor in the world ....... when traders in the Mediterranean region circa 3000 BC invented seals (called bullae) to ensure that their shipments reached their destinations tamper-free, they transformed commerce from local to long distance. ........ Trust is the most important currency online ........ Think that your product's value is so obvious that it doesn't need explaining? There's a good chance you're wrong. ............. the Google Dashboard ........ If they use our products and store content with us, it's their content, not ours. ........ we need to do whatever we can to make leaving Google as easy as possible ....... we make numerous platforms - video, maps, mobile, PCs, voice, enterprise - better, more competitive, and more innovative. We are often attacked for being too big, but sometimes being bigger allows us to take on the impossible. .......... Open up as much as you can as often as you can, and if anyone questions whether this is a good approach, explain to them why it's not just a good approach, but the best approach. .......... the chaos of open benefits everyone ........ The future of government is transparency. The future of commerce is information symmetry. The future of culture is freedom. The future of science and medicine is collaboration. The future of entertainment is participation. Each of these futures depends on an open Internet.

Staying open is Google's best bet to stay on the cutting edge for as long as possible. This is an important document to have come out.

The Official Google Blog: From The Height Of This Place
the worst economic situation of our lifetimes...... Eric Schmidt has called these times 'uncharted waters': none of us has been here before. ........ the Internet, which is the most powerful and comprehensive information system ever invented. ........ from the most remote villages on the planet, you can reach as much information as is held in thousands of libraries .......... the secular shift of information, communications, and commerce to the Internet ......... over 1.4 billion people, nearly a quarter of the world's population, use the Internet, with more than 200 million new people coming online every year. ......... More than three billion people have mobile phones ......... search will remain the killer application ....... Our ongoing challenge is to create the perfect search engine ....... to actually make search smarter, our index and infrastructure need to grow at a pace FASTER than the web. ........... "Democracy of information alone can supply the vitalizing force to stir the peoples of the world into triumphant action." .......... 120K blogs are created daily — most of them with an audience of one. Over half of them are created by people under the age of nineteen. In the US, nearly 40 percent of Internet users upload videos ........... about one of every six minutes that people spend online is spent in a social network of some type. ........... the vast majority of stuff we find on the web is useless. The clamor of junk threatens to drown out voices of quality. ........... news has largely shifted from thoughtful to spontaneous ...... the best of both worlds: thoughtful and spontaneous, long form and short, of the ages and in the moment. ....... With facts, negotiations can become less about who yells louder ......... The Internet allows for deeper and more informed participation and representation than has ever been possible. .......... Oil fueled the Industrial Revolution, but data will fuel the next generation of growth. ......... making decisions based on facts, not opinions ......... Data is the sword of the 21st century, those who wield it well, the Samurai. ........ devices will proliferate in many directions, but all of them will converge on the cloud. That's where our stuff, not to mention civilization's knowledge, will live. ............ abundant APIs, open source software, and low-cost, pay-as-you-go application services like our own App Engine and Amazon's EC2. The components are abundant and available to anyone who can get online. ............. Cloud computing levels that playing field so that the small business has access to the same systems that large businesses do. Given that small businesses generate most of the jobs in the economy, this is no small trend. ............ The real potential of cloud computing lies not in taking stuff that used to live on PCs and putting it online, but in doing things online that were previously simply impossible. ........... Translation will get a tiny bit smarter with each iteration.
Google Docs And Mathematical Formula

News came out weeks and weeks ago that on Google Docs now you can insert mathematical formula. That is one of the first things I talked about when I launched this blog years ago. I am glad Google Docs is finally doing it.

Google Voice Acquisitions And Phone Number

Some recent Google Voice acquisitions beg the question, so will now Google Voice allow us to get our own Google Voice number? So you could use Google Voice without having another number at all?

Google: An IC Software Company?

I'd like to believe my fascination with the Google blogs is healthy. My startup's IC vision chimes in. I might be wanting to do the ISP and the hardware parts, but Google has already been doing the software part for the better part of a decade.

Marissa Mayer: An Omnivorous Google Is Coming   a tool built into the search engine which translated my search query into every language and then searched the entire world’s websites ...... the ‘omnivorous’ search engine –i.e. one which is able to take a user’s total context – where they are, what they were just reading, which direction their mobile phone is pointed and so on. .... An omniscient, omnivorous Google is coming and it knows what you want, even if you don't. 
Why Net Neutrality Is Important  an Internet that encourages innovation and startups is one that supports net neutrality — and unless such neutrality is enforced, capitalism on the Internet is in serious jeopardy. .....Service providers need to accept the fact that net neutrality is the only way that capitalism on the Internet will survive. 

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Saturday, December 19, 2009

Volcanic Eruption 4,000 Feet Below Sea Level



Captured by undersea robot.

"Since the water pressure at that depth suppresses the violence of the volcano's explosions, we could get the underwater robot within feet of the active eruption. On land, or even in shallow water, you could never hope to get this close and see such great detail."

Panic Attack: $300 To $30 Million



"Man makes YouTube video. Goes to Hollywood. Gets pots of money and a movie deal."

Friday, December 18, 2009

Whuffie: Vamsi Sistla

Earlier I was at the first ever Whuffie MeetUp in New York City. If you are like me, you are also new to the word and concept.

Several months back I met an Indian from Canada at the NY Tech MeetUp. We exchanged cards. Recently he emailed me and introduced to Vamsi Sistla over email. I was to meet Vamsi on Wednesday. But instead he invited me to come to his first ever Whuffie MeetUp. I am glad.


Whuffie is an interesting concept. Measuring it could be grand business. Whuffie is like search, news, email. It is a basic web concept. A company that could figure out a way to really, truly measure your whuffie could make big bucks.

Whuffie - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Whuffie is the ephemeral, reputation-based currency of Cory Doctorow's science fiction novel, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom. ... 
The Whuffie Bank - Reputation is Wealth
TC50: Meet The Whuffie, A New Currency That's Based On Your Online ...
Making Whuffie

Vamsi Sistla - LinkedIn 
Vamsi Sistla | Facebook
BABC 2007: Meet Vamsi Sislta

Vamsi Sistla On The Coming Convergence of IM and VoIP. Get Real ...



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Time, Facebook Connect, And Comments

Image representing Facebook Connect as depicte...Image via CrunchBase
I just noticed now I can sign in with Facebook Connect and leave comments at the bottom of Time articles. This is quite a moment. This must be a new thing because I don't see too many comments. I must be one of the early ones.

Time: Tiger Woods' Sponsors: Will Any Stick by Him?


Now I can leave comments at Time like I have been leaving at TechCrunch. Time has been saved. Time "gets" social media. The New York Times could learn from Time. Leave social networking to Facebook. You just use Facebook Connect.

People signing in with their Facebook comments are less likely to leave comments that might need to be moderated.

Sites and blogs where I can't sign in with Twitter, Facebook or Disqus, I don't even bothering leaving comments. That is extra true of Wordpress blogs. 

[WordPress #336657]: Not Being Able To Leave Comments

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Tiger

Friday, December 11, 2009

WildBlue Satellite Internet


The back panel of a satellite modem, with coax...Image via Wikipedia
The importance of broadband in this day and age can not be exaggerated. Broadband is as basic as electricity today, for work, for pleasure, for life activities. With the satellite option, the rural urban divide goes out the window. WildBlue Internet is available anywhere in the continental US. The price is affordable.

Dial up just does not cut it these days. If you don't have broadband speed, you are missing out. On productivity, on pleasure. You need WildBlue Internet. WildBlue Satellite Internet fills in where cable internet is not an option.

Wildblue Satellite Internet might be the solution you are looking for.
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Online Casino Bluebook


An ordinary MahjongImage via Wikipedia
Online Casino Bluebook is your free guide to online casinos. Right on the front page are the top 10 gambling sites as measured by "bonus size, payout percentage, customer service, game features, # of games, software graphics, and ease-of-use." You can go straight to one of them, or you can read detailed reviews of them and then proceed to visit their online destinations. Online gambling churns a lot of money. That attracts scamsters as much as legitimate players. It is best to play safe and go through a site like Online Casino Bluebook.

The site also takes you straight to some of the more popular games. One of them is baccarat. Another is the slots game.

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Thursday, December 10, 2009

Pete Cashmore







Gold Coins Gain

My Wild River Of Goldโ€ฆ!!!Image by Denis Collette...!!! via Flickr


Physical gold is back in vogue, thanks to the global economy being in bad shape. It is time to have gold IRA and gold 401k thoughts. If you want to know how to put gold in an IRA visit Gold Coins Gain.

401k gold, IRA gold is back in vogue for a reason. Don't get left out. Physical gold might be one way out of the ongoing economic turbulence.

What are your other options?

Ride out the storm the smart way.


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Dennis Crowley: I Underestimated Him

Image representing Dennis Crowley as depicted ...Image via CrunchBase
Dennis Crowley and his gang presented FourSquare at the New York Tech MeetUp many many months back. I was not that impressed. Actually the app felt cheesy to me. But now I can see why it is being touted as the next Twitter. I met Crowley at a recent New York Tech MeetUp and told him about my initial reaction and congratulated him on his recent buzz.

You have to notice Fred Wilson is an investor in both Twitter and FourSquare. That guy can sure see trends. He spots.(Fred Wilson) Google obviously was not able to see what Fred Wilson was able to.

Om Malik: Why I Love FourSquare

And it is not just Dennis, it is also Naveen. I talked to him after their first demo at the NYTM. 

People have asked this question: If Twitter came after Facebook, what will come after Twitter? There were comics who suggested we might end up with a service that allows for only 40 characters maybe.

Ends up it is not what you can say in 140 characters. Your current location is interesting enough information.




FourSquare

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2010 Trends: Pete Cashmore's Take

Ted Murphy & Pete CashmoreImage by tedmurphy via Flickr
"....the continued spread of social media, location sharing, and Internet TV...."

Social media has not seen its full manifestations. So yeah 2010 might be bigger for social media than 2009 has been. But it was 2009 when Twitter really took off as a buzz brand. Facebook keeps growing by leaps and bounds. Facebook has figured out something basic that Twitter has not, not yet. The everyperson gets Facebook. That everyperson does not get Twitter yet. It has been more of a tech elite application. Granted that covers most of those who shape thoughts, but I would not bet my business model just on that.

FourSquare is the next Twitter, if you believe the buzz. Location sharing is the web going a little bit 3D. That is very much up my alley. I have kept arguing Web 3.0 is not the semantic web, it is the 3D web.

Our broadband pipes are going to get bigger. We will consume more video format content online. Video in real time is TV, right?

Pete Cashmore's CNN Article: 10 Web Trends To Watch In 2010

2010 is looking really good for one giant: Google. Wave and Android will really take off. But this Cashmore article will be an interesting read a year from now. Future can not be predicted. That is inherent. Could we have foreseen Fall 2009 in Fall 2008? I doubt it.

"....location is not about any singular service; rather, it's a new layer of the Web...."

This comment is very insightful.

Matt Galligan, Pete Cashmore, Brian DeWittImage by *Samantha Murphy* via Flickr

"How many desktop applications do we really need"

Just one, the browser.

".....a converse trend in which task-specific devices gain popularity......"

It is because our tech realities are an ecosystem. There is room for the all-in-one and the one-in-one. And more.

Farmville has a message. It is a major business trend.

Privacy as a concept will get redefined. It will get new life.



What is most interesting to me about this article by Pete Cashmore is the interaction between old media - CNN - and new media - Mashable. I think CNN is more a brand name than an old media entity. They have the option to incorporate new media and social media into that brand. And they are doing it. Old brand names need not die, but they do need to face the new reality.


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Wednesday, December 09, 2009

Discovering Andrew Wong

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Droid Does



Mashable story: TIME Names Gadget of the Year: Droid

Verizon Droid competes with the iPhone and Amazon's Kindle faces competition in the Barnes Noble product. For now the newcomers seem to have the buzz. Mashable thinks iPhone is the superior phone. TechCrunch thinks it is Droid. My bias is for Droid. I have a feeling the iPhone is the Mac and the Droid is the PC, poised for a wider adoption. We will see. 

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Monday, December 07, 2009

Google Wave For The Masses

Image representing Google Wave as depicted in ...Image via CrunchBase
Mashable just broke story saying Google Wave has now a million members and many more invites are being sent out. I say about time. Google Wave is not a whole lot of fun if all or most of your friends are not on it.

So far I have used it with very few people, very few times, and all I have done is have instant messenger like short conversations. So far I have not used the multimedia features or the document collaboration features. Or how about publishing a wave as a blog post? I think I would like that greatly.

Google Wave needs to be scaled and fast. Go for the masses. It is gift giving time.

 I Now Have Google Wave
Anil Dash On Google Wave
Bill Gates, Chrome OS, Natal, Wave
Blog Carnival: Google Wave
Google Wave API Google Group: Got To Undo The Ban On Me
Google Wave Protest
Google Wave API Google Group: Stalinist Mindset
The Google Wave Developer Community Will Be Vibrant
Five Blind Men And Google Wave
A Little Trouble At The Google Wave API Google Group
Lessons From The Open Source Community For The Wave Community
Google Wave Developer Community: Asking For A Culture?
Google Wave: Organizations Will Go Topsy Turvy
Google Wave: Enormous Buzz
Possible Google Wave Applications And Innovations
Google Wave Architecture: Designed For Mass, Massive, Global Innovation
The Google Wave Architecture
Google Wave Ripples
Is Google Wave Social Enough To Challenge Facebook, Twitter?
Of Waves And Tsunamis
Google WaveImage via Wikipedia
Google Wave: Wave Of The Future?
Google Wave: If Email Were Invented Today

Google Wave Developer Blog

Google Wave API Articles: Extensions Debugging & Robot-to-Gadget Communication
You got questions? We've got answers!
Upcoming US Events with Google Wave Presentations
WaveSandbox.com: Federate This
Happy Hallo-Wave-een!
Google Wave is headed to Europe: Join us!
Google Wave at GTUG London: Monday, October 26
Google Wave Samples Gallery: Best Practices & New Features
What happened in the Wave sandbox
Google Wave in Internet Explorer
Google Wave Extension Updates
Google Wave API Hackathon & Federation Day: Videos Available Now!
Tweety Sample Improved with OAuth Support
Prototyping a Drupal Module for Google Wave
Google Wave Community Events
Google Wave Federation Protocol and Open Source Updates
Google Wave: Updates from today's hackathon
Google Wave Sandbox Update
Google Wave API Presentations: Now Online
Google Wave Hackathon and Federation Day: July 20, 21 in Mountain View
Share Your Work in the Wave Samples Gallery
TwilioBot: Bringing Phone Conversations into Waves
1 Wave Sandbox, 5 Hours, 17 Awesome Demos
The Making of the Sudoku Gadget
Google Wave API Office Hours
Google Wave team heads to Google Developer Days in Asia
Introducing the Google Wave APIs: what can you build?

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Finally Real Time Search From Google



Mashable Story: Real Time Search From Google
Read Write Web 
Tweets And Facebook Updates: The Mumbojumbo
Search: Pregnant Territory
Twitter Should Hand Over Search To Google
Search: The Human Vs. The Machine
Dynamic PageRank And Real Time Search
Microblogging Search: What Took Google So Long?
Real Time Search: Twitter Is Not Doing It
Google Analytics: SML Pro Blog Traffic Sources...

Search Come Full Circle: That Human Element

This is a moment I have been waiting for for a few months now. All tweets reside on Twitter's servers, and they still can not fathom all tweets. All Facebook updates reside on Facebook servers and Facebook still is not serving a search on Facebook updates, I thought. Let the king into the ring. Let Google do search.

Finally Google is doing it.

But this is only the first step. I don't want to be able to search the here and now. Actually the archives of tweets and Facebook updates are of greater interest to me. Help me see all sorts of patterns. Dig into the archives and display in many different ways.




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Saturday, December 05, 2009

The Pro-Blogger's Daily Routine

Cover of
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