Disqus - Latest Comments for perilla

Re: Facebook: The Most Searched for Term on the Web?

perilla — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 05:31:41 -0000

Also consider that the term "Facebook" is not searched alone.."facebook games," "dan brown on facebook" etc., i.e. people look for stuff on facebook and that might be why it gets all the convergence of different queries otherwise not that much related to facebook itself..

especially the gaming part is a big deal..

Re: Oil and La Frontera

perilla — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 07:28:00 -0000

Brazil is surely big and influential enough to be able to swing geopolitical trends of the continent one way or another.

But slowing down the extraction will still exhaust their resources, only a little bit later..the solution is not in graduality but in a paradigm shift which is needed and will not happen soon...alternative, renewable energy resources is what we have to focus on more and less on the 20century relic nonrenewable fossil fuels..

Re: YOU, the U.S. Taxpayer, Can't Handle the Truth: Wrong.

perilla — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 03:38:48 -0000

Adding a new dimension, private sector, which according to the article is purportedly logical, and yes, the level of complexity is becoming getting even higher, instead of lowering and becoming more transparent.

Let's see how Geithner will be able to sell this new, "cute-looking" plan to the Congress and to the public.

Re: Web 2.0 turns us all into Yogis

perilla — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 03:53:03 -0000

Very very nice, Gregory!! Good to see you life :)

I would however like to point out that the final result of what you say is absolutely right but the route undertaken to "broadband-ness" differs widely for yogis and for those on inet. Also, the fruits reaped while undertaking this route and change in thinking and seeing differ immensely.

It is like, to give an analogy, seeing Jesus Christ live his life and trying to imitate him by taking the appearances side of his life as a guide. This would perhaps bring some parallels but the essence will remain quite different unless a personal experience is felt..which can and might happen.

:)

Cheers,
H.

Re: The Virtue of Selfishness, the Value of Selflessness

perilla — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 09:36:06 -0000

Very interesting point of view.

You are right. The basic concepts of marketing and branding currently in use have been around for some time. All that new technologies, internet and web20 added was an edge in speed/accessibility of sharing/delivery of information and style/interface of the message/idea. However, in its essence, marketing and branding campaigns are not all that different from the olden times, the end of 19th century, when as a result of mass production on industrial scale, the need arose to differentiate and identify products/services with similar offerings - the origins of marketing and branding.

The new realities of 21st century where the entire world shrank and became not merely connected but interconnected and interdependent brought an entire paradigm shift in mentalities, expectations and aspirations of humans.

It is time that perhaps, as you suggest, product/service identity/message/information be based more widely on the values that the modern world (ideally) is promoting and aspiring to achieve - values such as integrity, trust and selflessness as well as passion, compassion being few of those.

H.

Re: Getting A Piece Of My Action

perilla — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 05:55:33 -0000

I agree with Jay.

The entire issue of retail-level investors (not angel investors) investing in private companies/startups could be subdivided into three stages:

1. money transfer from individual/retail investors
2. management of collected sums/fund
3. investment of the fund money into companies

Parts 1. and 2. were superbly executed during the Obama campaign (for example see http://bit.ly/kwQ0). The collection part worked just fine. The channeling part of collected donations/sums was subsequently EFFICIENTLY spent/invested. Same principle, i think, only details are different.

The main difference will come here in part 3. Regulatory part comes in here.

Btu as said above, there is a huge market need and the market is familiar with individual financing/loans/lending/donations systems through kiva, zopa and election campaigns. Perhaps something can be done in terms of introducing some kind of legal/regulatory framework for such an idea to be implemented.

Re: Great Presentation From Saul Klein

perilla — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 07:53:13 -0000

A nice presentation, but i thought the imagery part was sometimes more distracting than helping to visualize!

A wealth of data, especially the supplements were quite informative (did not know Germany was num1 European Internet country - contrary to most Internet-ized Scandinavs like Sweden)!

Re: A Voice Of Reason

perilla — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 05:21:42 -0000

There is no such thing as wrong, not in the context you mention at least. Bush has done what his predecessors have been doing since 1970s. Nixon, Reagan, Clinton, Bush Sr. had all ardently pursued and keenly acted on core precepts of Milton Friedman's legacy - the shock doctrine. Think invasions and subsequent economic "robbery" of Central and Latin American countries such as Nicaragua and Guatemala.

Also think policies implemented by IMF and World Bank - neocon cronies - for Asian countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand in the second half of 1990s.

What Bush did? He went along. He twisted and warped the entire Republican ideology into something completely unrecognizable and alien to what it must have been originally. Why Bush Jr. has one of the lowest approval rankings? Because America happened to have 9/11, Katrina, Iraq, Afghanistan and the current credit crunch during his stance and because he handled all those with less determination, less intention and less knowledge than those who came before him. In other words, he attracted spotlight because of unhappy match of grave events and his inability to act upon them accordingly.

That is all.

Re: With a focus on financial news, Tip’d is a timely Digg clone

perilla — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 10:14:42 -0000

Just replied on FF about this.

It is not that all those people willing and interested to get deeper financial insides were in dire need of a separate Digg-like social outlet dedicated to financial matters. This is not true. Digg, as any popular and therefore horizontal news aggregator, could offer no better because of its lack of specialization.

Tip'd might achieve a status of a more channeled financial information but the sources are the same and majority of tip'd audience will come from Digg or alike anyway - thus decreasing a possibility of drastic change of contents of Tip'd.

Lastly, monetization might turn out to be problematic due to relatively small number of those who are using social media and are at the same time financially-curious.

Re: The Post American World

perilla — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 06:15:21 -0000

According to Plato any state undergoes the following stages - 1. Timocracy, 2. Oligarchy, 3. Democracy, 4. Tyranny. This view was elaborated based on what was back then one of cradles of civilization and considering that Plato himself was witnessing Athens turning from totalitarian to democratic rule - the development he came to hate and which conditioned him for his "Republic."

Democracy in my view is not what all the world is moving towards. Admittedly, most of the Western cultures tend to get more and more democratic, but we must not forget that governance must be aligned with culture and tradition of a society. How society is governed must stem from the society's cultural and demographic aspects - at least in the modern world. One cannot readily - America is vocally but unsuccessfully trying to do that - introduce democracy in the Arab world for their mentality is quite different.

One size fits all is not a solution and democracy is conceived in the eyes of the modern world as such, which IMO is wrong.

Re: Great Advice From Brad Feld

perilla — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 16:20:47 -0000

"Confused things/times kindle mind for great inventions" - Leonardo Da Vinci

Entrepreneurs who keep on going and innovating notwithstanding what happens around them are going to carry on with their initiatives with eventual profitable.

Re: The Hunt For Nonexistent Experts on Social Networks

perilla — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 16:57:13 -0000

People look for experts in different domains for two main reasons 1) overwhelming amount so info on all subjects made available by open-source, internet and other means makes nearly everyone able to express their opinions and claim a knowledge thus need to find someone with a tag "expert" who knows better than the rest 2) advent of al kinds non-trivial subjects, events and developments (financial crash in America being a good example) necessitates explanations and advice thus making people turn to "experts" in field for such information.

Steven, I will somewhat differ from your point of view that experts have better to do than use social media (if i understood correct). Michael Nielson from FF posted few links for blogs of respected (Noble prize) scientists. There are quite few respected economics professors whose feeds I follow as well. Most of them blog though, not much FF nor twitter. But that is because there is no dedicated audience or unclaimed demand for any such expertise on FF.

Re: Fred Wilson Dot VC

perilla — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 05:33:15 -0000

Palin does not even represent Republican point of view.

The lack of acknowledgment for all the progress made by humans for the last two centuries coupled with her strong faith in God and her proposed (and tried out) methodologies seems to suggest that what McCain got is not a staunch, relatively young and attractive modern woman, but an individual for whom the proper time to exist would seem like 12th century Europe.

Palin is a haunting ghost from a distant past, a reminder of once ignorant human species that walked this planet.

Re: Can You Build An Enterprise Only Web App?

perilla — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 08:29:30 -0000

Nigel has provided a very good example!

I also wanted to add that the so-called criticism that Yammer is not innovative, etc is irrelevant and doesnt make sense. Social media gurus, tech-savvy audiences and rest of tech and web2.0 enthusiasts who have been at roots of such critique are simply too much used to stylish and cool-looking online applications and gadgets, which bring little more than aesthetic pleasure from usage. Yes, there all kinds of Twitter clones, social activity aggregators or even virtual world creators. How many of those however were driven by need or necessity to feel a gap in real world? Very few.

Most of those products are just a result of playing around and imagining all kinds of software.

I do of course understand the Blue Ocean Strategy effect and how that creates markets which do not yet exist, and with markets it creates also demand. But even this principle is not going to explain away most of what is becoming fashionable trends in web2.0 and gadget developments.

Social media, IMHO, needs to be more aligned with realities of the world and have less penchant for looks and more inclined to see ultimate utility of things created. For the moment, this is not the case, hence the outcry at TC50 for one of few really good startups with a working, needed (and stylish) product targeting especially the corporate world.

Re: Fred Wilson Dot VC

perilla — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 12:56:38 -0000

In certain cases, digital life represents a fast-forwarded, stricture-free, info-packed framework without a real life contact. Some people do really know each other well in many aspects, which would otherwise be impossible to achieve in real life as a result of contatc online communication and information exchange. Digital world squizes the signal out of the noise, liberating it from social, demographic and ethnical constrains. The real life contact and flow turns out to be more like an audio tape whereas the digital life and communications thereof represent a MP3 of the same life with better signal-to-noise ratio and an enhanced Kb rate.

Re: Polisigh - Political Humor On Twitter

perilla — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 11:53:30 -0000

Fred!

Good idea!

Being a big fan of the Onion news, I wonder if you are going to have similar appraoch.

Cheers,
Hayk

Re: rizzn's personal blog

perilla — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 07:53:55 -0000

I found FF2 freezes when I use wireless and when that wireless for whatever reason gets little bit slow. it makes my FF2 freeze and sometimes crash.

Also, I don't like FF3 for its much disruptive name/url suggestions and its heavy initial load. After initially loading, it works fine though.

Strangely, I find OperaTor - the cross of Opera and FF made anonymous - to be more reliable and not crashing easily.

Re: Social software diet challenge!

perilla — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 10:54:35 -0000

Loic,

Being in Egypt (experiencing Ramadan during the period of September-October 2007), I started taking a diet since March this year. My diet includes basically eating only once per day, in the evening in between 6pm and 9pm, and drinking carbon-dioxide-free drinks few times a day, semi-Ramadan of sorts. I am not Muslim but this experience of Ramadan taught me the discipline necessary to stick to a diet.

So, no fast food, no heavy meat stuff.

I have not only lost quite some weight (180 cm, 69 kg before - 180cm, 63kg currently) but my thinking and self-feeling became significantly better. I am more lucid and intellectually more capable.

This year, I am going to do Ramadan as well, like nearly everyone in my company. My motivations however are not religious or social but rather health-driven !

Re: Black Swan Quote Of The Day

perilla — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 10:13:56 -0000

Fred,

Black Swan and Fooled by Randomness (considered as one of top 100 smartest books ever by FT) are both worthy of being table books for businessmen and politicians alike.

Taleb is a big fan and follower of Karl Popper, one of the mot profound thinkers of the 21st century. The idea of Black Swan is coming from Popper, who is most notorious for his critique of "principle of induction" !

Anyhow, not to get too redundant and overlapping with other commenters, this is an excellent book and after reading and re-reading it few times, it makes me smile every time I see a business person or a politician making "projections" and "future plans" in a serious and self-righteous manner.

It also makes me smile the kind of reactions I get once reminding those people that most of breakthroughs in science and technology happened by mere happenstance, error or unexpected turn of events, i.e. in any possible manner but by projection or careful planning.

Cheers,
Hayk

P.S. I really enjoy your blog!

Re: On Which Side Will Intellectual Property Laws Fall?

perilla — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 10:29:29 -0000

Gregory,

An important reason for IP laws and IPRs is to not protect for sake of protection but to recognize, be aware and give credit to the person whose intellectual work resulted in a such and such "property."

The idea of IP s exactly the same as normal property. How would one feel if one couldnt build a home and lciam its ownership? This is how we felt back in communistic times.

Not to have IP laws and regulations is therefore equivalent to defining virtual communist on the Internet.

I believe however I do udnerstand the reason you raise this point. Majority of IP current laws have been conceived before the advent of digital age and Internet and thus do not address or consider well or at all current realities. For this, I also think that IPs must consider current realities and especially open source products and innovation steming from it.

However, entire or even partial abolishment of IP laws will lead to online chaos. Notice, I didnt mention nor implied any commercial concerns, which are outstanding for many businesses.

Re: This is a test of the YouTube monetization system…this is only a test.

perilla — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 16:10:49 -0000

hmm.. i get the impression suddenly all attractive social entertainment startups decided to go dollars.. Twitter decided to just "SMS-unsubscribe" all its users outside US, Canada and India in its bid to cut costs. Brightkite, the next day, announced it is adding the SMS service. Facebook is thinking how to go significantly beyond its deal with Microsoft in order to increase its revenues.

and now Youtube, a "tiny" part of the huge Gooogle-plex is being put to test for its capacity to monetize. Only premium service can compel a user to pay a fee. Youtube so far is niether taken very serisouly by businesses (VIMEO is preferred) nor is it considered the best of quality available, notwithstanding to mention all lawsuits it pursues..

I dont therefore see whether it will be tempting enough for advertisers to deal with Youtube or for mobile users to pay a premium.

Re: New Seesmic Features: Search and Improved Threaded Player

perilla — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 09:50:46 -0000

Loic, this is really cool!

I havent tried the new one yet, but wanted to shoot few question before I forget.

When clicking on one of search results do they play 5/10 secs before the search word is displayed or do they play from the beginning of the video (bookmarking system can come in handy here)?

Is the search list according to some ranking system or chronologically (switching to some ranking or other system of display?)

Also, is the embedding part of Seesmic videos done as for example popurls is doing for Youtube (user can choose to watch in a tiny window on the site itself or to click and watch it on Seesmic site)?

Is there (or going to be) a Dial2Do (http://www.dial2do.com) kind of functionality such as hearing a video (on sites which do not support embedding Seesmic or for those on a lower range of internet connectivity)?

Lastly, what about talking to Netvibes (fellow Tariq Krim?!) for having a Seesmic widget on Netvibes (their widgets and network of partners seem to be pretty universal - a potential asset for growth for Seemis, perhaps)?

Anywhow, great job!!!

H.

Re: Twitter kills SMS service in some countries over costs. Will someone kill SMS already?

perilla — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 05:09:35 -0000

I totally agree with you on the future scenario. SMS was, by the time of its inception, a major innovation, a breakthrough, with just as prohibitive a cost and low awareness among mainstream as perhaps Twitter is today. So the future scenario of having a Twitter-like application fully replacing SMS is of course not a question. Question is when this will happen, and that will largely depend on the pace with which online communication will become mainstream and widely recognized as standard.

Re: Twitter kills SMS service in some countries over costs. Will someone kill SMS already?

perilla — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 04:55:14 -0000

Twitter is not mainstream. It can't thus kill SMS. Only in societies/nations where it gets mainstream, and by that I mean everyone from children to old people using it for daily communication (just like it is with SMS all over the world - in some places in Africa this is the only way to communicate), will the position of SMS be challenged, and even then all advantages of Twitter(or any other such contender) must be obvious to those using SMS so that a shift can happen.

To be able to benefit fully from all Twitter offers, one must possess a rather above-average mobile phone, yet another obstacle for mainstream usage until current gadgety mobile become cheap enough.

And of course operators won't kill SMS service which is a major cash flow income for many.

All in all, Twitter is so far a niche appealing to tech audience and in my opinion far from challenging SMS especially in developing parts of the world.

Re: Twitter limiting followers to 2000 (Scripting News)

perilla — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 06:14:35 -0000

Perhaps this limit is put to have some quality control? upper limit in number of what one can follow will compel to pick and choose whom to follow. This is good because I don't think our attention span or time can anyway allow following even 2000 or even 1000 people closely or even at all.

Many boast of following every important (what they dub important) people on twitter. Following for sake of following and show. This will be cut short as well. Good riddance.

Ultimately, this is good for long-term. Quality among followers will get better because they will have to make a conscious choice of whom to follow not to exceed the number 2000.

Perhaps also there is also a glimmer of business model? Wanna follow more, pay money?