I've finally gotten around to adding Rdio streaming music support to Fathom! This means everyone now hears at least samples of all the tracks, which already makes for decent music discovery. If you have an Rdio account, however, you'll hear full-length tracks, which is even better! You don't need to log in to Rdio on Fathom; as long as you're logged in on the Rdio site, it just works (thanks to the great Rdio API).

So what are you waiting for? Get hunting!

Labels: music

It seems like the music tech scene on the Internet is bursting with potential these days. Unfortunately, I've been so distracted with other projects that I haven't had a chance to do all the crazy cool things I want to with Fathom… I keep telling myself I'll get to it soon, but, well, so far that hasn't happened. There are sketches in my notebook, but not much else.

The good news is it hasn't stopped other folks from taking some of the same ideas and running with them. At least I get to see them in action, right?

For instance, I wanted to do a kind of group DJ/party/jukebox thing where everyone collaborates to make the mix we all listen to. Well, someone has made that:


I also wanted to make a service that would watch your social feeds for links to music recommendations and give you a “music inbox”. Yup, someone has made that, too:


Here's another one I at least got around to writing up (well, in terms of books): an easy way to share music recommendations without having to know what service your friends use for streaming. Sure enough, someone's made it:


Of course, they're not quite exactly what I would make, so maybe I'll still get around to playing with those ideas, but in the meantime, it's great to see all these explorations happening! I mean, if I'm not going to get around to it, someone should.

Labels: interchange, music, seeds

I've been syndicating my blog to Planet Mozilla for about a year now, and it's been great, as it's a community that shares a lot of my passions. I've been finding lately, however, that I've been subconsciously censoring myself, wanting to make sure my posts are at least somewhat relevant for that audience. Considering my extremely low blog output, anything that slows me down further probably isn't a good idea, so I've decided to switch to a tagged feed; only posts I specifically tag for Mozilla will show up on the Planet.

If you've been reading me through Planet and would like to continue following my (hopefully more frequent, but no promises) off-topic posts, you can do so with the RSS feed for my blog, or even (for more off-topic bits plus blog post notifications) my Twitter stream.

I haven't been actively working on Firefox for a while now, but I still consider Mozilla to be one of the best families I've been welcomed into. Cheers to all of you!

Labels: mozilla

I've been back in the freelancing world for a couple of years now, and still loving it. The only downside, really, is I need to force myself to get out of the house and socialize from time to time, lest I become a complete hermit.

Trying to explain to people why the freelance life makes me happy, I've realized there's actually a lot of history there. Not only have I spent most of my career working from home on freelance projects, but my parents worked from home the whole time I was growing up (my father still does). Early on I even rejected the daily grind of elementary school, opting for a self-made curriculum in the wild. Given that history, it's amazing I sat still in an office (at Microsoft no less!) for four years.

Of course I love the short commute, and having more time to spend with my family. It also seems like a really good use of my time: I'm able to devote myself to a project when they need me, but when the project is over, I move on to the next project for the next client, rather than having to contrive ways to fill my weekly time obligation for a single employer.

While there are many of us freelancers in the tech industry, it still seems to be more the exception than the rule. The film industry, on the other hand, is dominated by freelancers. Hundreds, even thousands, of people come together to work on a single film, and when it's done they all move on to other projects. Some of them may work for various production companies and service houses, but the dominant paradigm is that of the free agent.

I feel like this may be happening with the tech industry, and things like open source and github certainly lean in that direction. Of course some people prefer the comfort of employment. Ultimately, it's healthy for the ecosystem to support both modes.

Bug trackers are an essential part of software development; I'm not sure how we'd get anything done without them! Yet it seems much of the rest of the world hasn't tuned into their value. It's certainly not that there aren't things to fix in the real world! Perhaps it seems overly complicated. Yet people seem to be able to figure out how to use, say, Foursquare.

Working at Mozilla I was particularly taken by Bugzilla, and what a difference it makes. Not the software specifically, and certainly not the UI, which is in fact extremely complicated. The thing I was struck with is how anyone could come in and contribute, whether it be a bug report, a better set of reproduction steps, suggested strategies for fixing, actual patches, etc.

I want this for the whole world. I want to be able to file a bug report for a pothole, or a piece of bad legislature. I want to be able to file a feature request for a new park, or a light rail stop.

Once the report is filed, it needs to be easy to connect problems with people who have solutions, and it needs to be possible to take ownership of an issue. The bug report then becomes a record of the progress, the discussion, setbacks, etc. If you wonder why things are the way they are, you can read the paper trail.

In this way we create a marketplace of problems and solutions, and we make it easier to shed light on  what's needed to fix things. By opening it up to the world, we can encourage people to get involved and take action.

This seems like something that could be cobbled together with various tools that exist (you know, Ushahidi meets Get Satisfaction meets the Portland Reporter meets Bugzilla), but ultimately I don't think that would be good enough. For people to actually use it, it needs to be clear, clean, and easy, focused on this specific problem space. For that reason, I think it has to be built.

So, I'm going to get started on it… anyone want to help?

Labels: mozilla, seeds

Well, not exactly: Jim Jackson is writing the book and I'm doing all the JavaScript code examples. The book is called HTML5 for the .NET Developer; it's an introduction to all the hot new goodness in the JavaScript world, for folks who have been living a sheltered .NET existence. Each chapter we explain a different HTML5 technology and build a functional demo with it. I'm having a great time at it; each one's a little Out of the Box Week project.

I need your help, though. I like to think my code is pretty clear and clean, but we could all use more eyes on our work to keep us honest, right? If you're a JavaScript coder, I'd love it if you could take a look at the demos we've done so far and let me know what you think of the code:

Canvas: code, demo
History: code, demo
Geolocation: code, demo
Drag & Drop, Web Workers: code, demo

All comments – from fundamental flaws to superficial style nits – are appreciated!

Last year, none of my friends had startups. Now at least 5 do (forgive me if I forgot yours!). They're all in various stages of launch, some with great fanfare and others more quietly, but they're all cool projects, and I'm delighted to see them growing.


Aza Raskin's Massive Health is seeking to bring a design renaissance to the world of health, starting with an iPhone app that makes it fun to watch what you're eating (and what your friends are eating).


Gary Flake's Clipboard helps you collect all the bits and pieces scattered around the web, organize and share them.


Aseem Kishore's Thingdom invites you to connect and converse around the things in your life that you love.


Kai Gradert's Cheers seeks to brighten your life with praise for the wonderful people, places, and things in the world.


Robert Bailey's GAIN Fitness is a personal trainer in your pocket, ready at the drop of a hat.


Maybe my Fathom is a startup as well? Hard to say. At any rate, Happy Startup Season!

So, Daylight Saving Time is a bit silly:



… but I do like the idea of being more in touch with the seasons. Perhaps rather than adjusting the clock twice a year, how about something a little more gradual, a little more personal? Why not get up with the sun? More and more of us work in jobs where we can set our own schedule, so get an alarm (such as this one, though surely it could be improved upon) that you can set in relation to sunrise, and enjoy your journey through the seasons.

Actually, I think it'd be interesting to live for a while with a clock that told time all day in terms of distance from sunrise to sunset, rather than hours and minutes; what new habits and ideas would you gain from this perspective? What sorts of beautiful time displays could this inspire? I'll meet you at the pub at 1/8 'til sunset and we'll find out…

Labels: seeds

People may be frightened by change, but they also crave newness. At its worst, it can be a sickness, always bored with the old, driven to tear down the past. At its best, it can be healthy improvement, a source of joy and resilience.

I don't presume to have a bulletproof prescription for telling good novelty apart from bad, but it certainly seems like a worthwhile endeavor. At first blush it seems one indicator of good novelty is that it refines and embellishes upon existing structures, rather than seeking to destroy or replace them. I suppose the corollary would be that healthy structures are ones that are easily receptive to refinement (much as Stewart Brand said in How Buildings Learn).

There's been much talk of Steve Jobs lately, as he just passed away. People debate whether he was a visionary genius or just a huckster who repackaged other people's innovations. I suppose it won't get resolved anytime soon; that same debate has been going on for Thomas Edison for over a century. Anyway, I think Steve Jobs' genius was in the constant refinement… where others were happy to coast on the status quo, he always looked to make things better. In retrospect it looks like revolution, but along the way it was just steady evolution.

So maybe that's what I'm looking for as well… perhaps I'm not so much a revolutionary as an evolutionary.

Your 1st religion you can't see at all; it's like water to a fish. With nothing to compare it to, you don't even know it exists in any sort of meaningful way.

Your 2nd religion is the worst. You've suddenly seen the light — that everything you thought before was wrong — and you figure this time you've finally got it all figured out.

It's not until your 3rd religion that you start seeing the patterns between them. It's only then that you start to find the higher truths that transcend them. This is when your journey really begins.

Now, by religion, I'm not talking about God and church, per se, but any school of thought that large groups of people get passionate about. Furthermore, it's not enough for you to be simply exposed to it; you need to catch the passion as well. For example, a few of mine: JavaScript, new urbanism, Apple, Lego, programming on the right side of the brain, open source. I can talk to you with evangelical zeal about each of these (and many other) topics.

This devotion to an idea is one of the amazing things about being human, but you're not much good to the rest of us until you're on to your 3rd.