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April 2006

April 30, 2006

Anyone have a clue what is going on?

I've been getting a steady stream of really oddball email from this blog's contact form. They look like this:

Nice hack on Shoutwire!  I like how you stole my article submission link to a news story and re-directed it to your bullshit blog. 

If you want to express an opposing viewpoint on Shoutwire, please do so.  Don't fuck with my submissions.

sdkid

Shoutwire is some sort of digg clone that doesn't even have comments, it just has a frame around other sites and you vote on links and I can't tell if this person thinks I run it or thinks I hijacked it.


why are you jacking pages?

Another one, and when I replied to this one asking them to explain, I got nothing in return. This is the weirdest one of all:

Why do I get your site when I am trying to  get the Fox47News web site?

It must be a default browser thing, sorta like when you type in http into firefox and you end up at microsoft?

And another:

it bites the way your site hijacks links

I wish someone would write me back on this that doesn't think I am stealing something. A few months ago someone said an old article on Wired News redirected to this blog, but perhaps it was just a bad HTML link. I'd sure love to get to the bottom of this and figure out what combination of exact browser version plus links ends up with people on this site. If anyone has any ideas, do tell in the comments here because I can't figure it out and no one will email back to explain.

update: the person that sent the first feedback wrote me back and posted it to shoutwire's site here. On my mac with firefox, I don't get redirected here, but if anyone clicks on this link and ends up here, do leave a comment telling me what browser/OS you are running? Thanks.

another update: So here is the offending page. Click on the blue title and you'll end up here, but the crazy thing is that in the middle, the word "nothing" is google searched, and since I'm apparently the first result, people get redirected here.

So I think the issue is that whatever content management system foxnews.com is running, somewhere, somehow, instead of responding to browsers with a real 404, the phrase "nothing" is being returned on their app server, so browsers like firefox are guessing on it by running a Google "I'm feeling lucky" search for the phrase, ending up here. Hopefully someone at foxnews.com notices and fixes this soon.


conclusion: As Phil figured out, javascript on foxnews.com checks to see if it is being presented within HTML frames on another server, and if so, it redirects to http://nothing/. Firefox by default does a Google "I'm Feeling Lucky" search for any word you put in your address bar, and I am apparently the first result for "nothing" on google, so you end up here. I would direct folks to a page explaining this but there is no referrer sent from the I'm Feeling Lucky search. I guess those of you looking for foxnews.com, don't use whatever site tried to load foxnews within a frameset, as they are just putting a frame around other sites. Just go to foxnews.com yourself.

Posted at 12:00 AM in internet |

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April 29, 2006

Buzzplant: none more crass

Lately I've been getting a steady stream of unsolicited bad marketing and PR mail. People promoting products are stooping to new lows in order to try and get legitimate weblogs to promote their clients for them. It's fake viral buzz hidden behind whatever legitimacy a participating website can offer. I've seen the quality and cluefullness of these PR pitches go way down, but tonight, one PR agency's pitch trumps them all.

I give you the flight 93 PR blast.

Now if you haven't heard, there's a movie about the hijacked plane on 9/11 that crashed in the Pennsylvania countryside, enroute to the Capitol. Personally, I have a hard time reliving that day and I can't even watch the trailer. I don't know how anyone can watch a film like that or how anyone can have any respect for a movie studio trying to make a buck off this nation's tragedy five years ago.

So their PR agency is giving away free tickets if you plaster banner ads on your blog to promote a movie reliving our terror so Universal Studios can make more money from ticket sales. What kills me is the line about:

Due to the nature of the subject matter of the film, we request that the giveaways be done in a very respectful, thoughtful manner.

...sort of like how this unsolicited PR pitch was sent to me oh so respectfully (I can even unsubscribe from future pitches! thanks!).

Bloggers will also love their idea to exploit your readers into writing some of that highly prized User Generated Content about that emotional day:

One idea is to ask visitors to your site to share their own memories of 9/11

...again, so a movie studio can make more money from this exploitation flick.

I hope the folks at buzzplanet do a great job getting more tickets sold for flight 93 and I can't wait to see flight 93 banners all over the blogosphere. I hope it makes Universal Studios a lot of money in the process, because there is no better way to come to terms with terror than to go watch a movie about it.

Posted at 12:00 AM in weblogs |

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April 28, 2006

links for 2006-04-28

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April 27, 2006

SketchUp FREE!

Sketchup is one of the coolest apps to come out in the past few years. It always reminded me of the OOP program from Microserfs.

Basically it's an easy to use, rapid 3D program that lets you sketch out ideas much like you would on a piece of paper. I used it to mock up my garden in about 30 minutes and my friend Michael did his entire house. The one downside to it was that until now it was really expensive, like around $500 per license. When Google announced they bought the app earlier this year, my one wish was that it would someday be free and it looks like that day has come. Sweet, though the free version is Windows only at the moment, which is odd since the app works great on OSX and I assume it's coming very soon for the mac.

Posted at 12:00 AM in internet |

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links for 2006-04-27

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April 26, 2006

links for 2006-04-26

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April 24, 2006

links for 2006-04-24

  • a javascript demo of how to properly handle tab key presses within a textarea (I wish all blog software supported this)

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April 23, 2006

links for 2006-04-23

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April 22, 2006

links for 2006-04-22

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April 21, 2006

links for 2006-04-21

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April 20, 2006

links for 2006-04-20

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April 19, 2006

links for 2006-04-19

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April 16, 2006

It had such promise

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links for 2006-04-16

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April 15, 2006

links for 2006-04-15

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April 14, 2006

Back behind the lens

I've been neglecting my once-ambitious photo site for the past year. I used to think it was because Fiona was taking up all my free time, but I realized it was more the tools I was using and the restraints I imposed on myself. I've continued to take a lot of photographs in the past year, but I've been short on free time to process them or think of things to say about them. I realized the confined template and complicated workflow was keeping me from uploading photos to the site.

So I started from scratch with blank HTML page, and made sure it was flexible for any size photo and any amount of text while always keeping the back/next nav in the same exact place so you can click your mouse and page through dozens quickly.

Ultimately, I'd like to script something that lets me upload an image to flickr, pull it down along with the title and description into my photoblog, and have each entry link back to flickr to handle comments. Eventually, it'd be nice if I could just select a good photo in iPhoto, export to flickr and hit a single button to do the rest of interaction with my photoblog, but until then I'm still uploading them one at a time to my blog, only now the site can showcase shots of any shape or size.

Posted at 12:00 AM in photos |

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April 13, 2006

Reader politics quiz

Question: Name a controversy in politics in the last five years where the outrage of Democrats affected real change. My hypothesis: the only Republicans I've seen removed from positions did so only after independent courts or Republicans themselves agreed with Democrats and allowed it to happen (like Trent Lott).

I've been suffering from outrage fatigue for years now and every week it seems like some flaggrant lawbreaking on the part of the President or his party is going to have consequences, but it never does. Nothing ever seems to come out of anything except some quips on the Daily Show.

Dear readers, I ask you for some success stories. What change have the Democrats actually acheived on their own in the past five years?

Posted at 12:00 AM in politics | | Comments (11)

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links for 2006-04-13

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April 12, 2006

links for 2006-04-12

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April 11, 2006

links for 2006-04-11

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TurboText Adventure

I realized when I was finishing up my taxes last week that TurboTax is basically boiled down complicated tax forms into a text adventure. They ask you hundreds of questions, you fill in some numbers, and you're done.

I've been using TurboTax online for six years now and I typically work on my taxes in fits and starts. I'll kick it off in January by importing last year's info. In February I'll feed in all my 1099s and W2s to see how awful my tax hit could be. March is mostly totalling up expenses and tracking down receipts. By April, I'm scraping together all the money I owe.

Since I revisit my return a lot, I'm having to jump around in the application and there often isn't a direct easy way to get to precisely the form you want. I've started to almost memorize the game paths.

Thoughts that crossed my mind when I finished my return recently:

I have a home office deduction to total up -- I need to enter the Schedule C castle and answer 8 questions correctly to get to the part where I can save money.
Remember: to get past the Big Boss near the end, you have to answer 'no' to every audit alert you see. Yes, even the big red flashing ones.
When you first buy a house in the game, they send you into this level that goes on and on, with one brutal question after another, but don't fret, because at the end you get a bunch of bonus money.
I should write up a complete walkthrough to solve Tax Return 2006 in as few moves as possible.

Posted at 12:00 AM in foofery |

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April 09, 2006

links for 2006-04-09

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April 07, 2006

links for 2006-04-07

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April 06, 2006

links for 2006-04-06

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April 05, 2006

When friends and contacts are neither.

I noticed something weird in how I use Flickr today and wondered if maybe there is a disconnect between social software systems and utility in web applications. I know flickr has continually moved away from the social software label, but their application still has firm roots in such a system.

I started using flickr back when it was a flash-enhanced backchannel chat at etech many moons ago, and when it was finally released to the world, it was built off the previous web trend of social software [1]. You used to have 5 or 6 different levels of contacts with various rights attributed to your images, but thankfully they simplified the process into basically "contacts" and "friends/family" (friends and family can be separate, but they're basically equal).

So the odd thing is that I've been adding really good photographers as "friends" even though I've never met them. Real-life friends I've shared many beers with have been demoted to "contacts". Half my contacts list contains people I've never had any contact with whatsoever aside from looking at a photo of theirs on flickr.

When I first joined flickr, I did the natural thing and connected to everyone I knew online as contacts with people I met and hung out with in real life as friends. But flickr isn't just a social software app and is a great utility, and the one page I hit on flickr.com many times a day is the "Photos from your contacts" page. What I quickly found is that while I love seeing my friends take photos of the beach, and their family, and meals they eat, eventually the feed was getting clogged with one friend's fascination with a subject, or another friend's attempt to upload thousands of photos at once.

I realized mapping my personal relationships of "contact" (acquaintances) and "friend" clashed with the actual utility of Flickr. With almost 300 contacts, I've taken to keeping my favorite photographers as friends, and viewing photos from "friends and family only" and switching that back to "photos from all contacts" occasionally when I have nothing to do and time to kill. A bunch of pro photobloggers I've never even emailed are on my friends list, while people I have attended many parties with and enjoy talking to are demoted to contacts. At this point, the word "contact" lacks meaning and I can't think of a new term they should swap it out with.

This presents weird social problems. I worry when I set a stranger as the elevated "friend" level and they get the email from flickr describing it -- it feels like a social faux pas that I've overstepped my bounds [2]. Similarly, I don't have the heart to completely delist anyone from the lowest contact level, especially those I've talked with at many parties, on the off chance they notice.

Maybe it's my early adopter status and adding so many friends as contacts early on when the application was just getting going, but I've noticed the leftover social software components don't really mesh with how I use the app anymore. Flickr is a really useful, fun way to share photos with friends -- it is software and it is social in nature, but the old conventions of social software don't really apply.

I'm curious what comes next -- what terms should we use to describe social and utilitarian connections in the latest web applications?

 


[1]. It's weird how the best example of web 2.0 technology was born during the 2003 social software boom that has since passed. Is the next king of web development trends going to spring from all this web 2.0 hullabuloo by learning from current mistakes and conventions and outlive this era?

[2]. For the ancient-in-web-years reading this, you probably remember a time when Carl Steadman added you as a life partner on sixdegrees.com

Posted at 12:00 AM in web development | | Comments (15)

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April 04, 2006

links for 2006-04-04

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Hi, I'm Matt Haughey and this is my blog. I created MetaFilter, co-created Fuelly, started many other sites. I also ride and race bikes. I am battling a benign brain tumor currently but I'm winning. Some kind strangers wrote some nice things about my life at Wikipedia. You can always contact me via email at matt@haughey.com or give me a ring at (503) 465-4522.
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