Talk about localisation

A9.com Yellow Pages has a nifty new feature. It shows you photos of the street where a particular business is located and lets you "look" for the business you are interested in.

This is a good feature that won't have a huge impact on its own but it shows that the people at A9 are finding clever ways of taking on bigger rivals.

Plus it's great for when I miss Fillmore Street to much. Now I can visit it when ever I want ;)

Now all we need to do is wait for a new breed of sites which are all about spotting yourself, friends, celebrities etc on the 20 million images A9 has posted.

Related: SiliconBeat on how A9 made it on to The OC.

Feedster's job feeds

SiliconBeat note that Feedster have launched a job listings search tool that allows users to search all job related RSS feeds.

My own quick test shows that many of the results are either outdated, with links leading to "job posting expired" pages, or simply showing very old results, in some cases several months old.

When the kinks have been worked out this service will position Feedster nicely for "when companies begin broadcasting their job openings to the entire Internet with (free) RSS feeds on their Web sites, in addition to posting (paid) listings at large, centralized sites such as Monster.com and CareerBuilder.com"

First Knowledge Advantage

Today I posted a piece on the Orvet Digital site about First Knowledge Advantage.

"In short, this means the benefits gained from the point that you first heard of something new and acquired knowledge about it to form an opinion. Regardless of how little you found out, or indeed how fleetingly you might have brought this knowledge in to your organization, it represents your first step towards creating a First Knowledge Advantage for your company on a specific topic."

Feedback is as always appreciated!

More mini

Om Malik sees the same potential for the Mac mini as I do. He also thinks of the latest Mac as a "home media server". PVRblog has several posts on turning the mini in to a home theater system.

It's pretty clear that the Mac mini has us all excited. Very excited.

New Orvet Digital site

It's Friday 3:23 am and the new site for Orvet Digital has just gone live.

Let me know what you think.

Mac mini on the road

So Mac mini doesn't come with a keyboard, monitor or mouse? That's good news. Most of us have those anyway, and for the mobile workers among us who travel between offices (home and work, within a corporation etc.) the mini is potentially the Mac OS alternative to OQO. The latter has a built in keyboard and screen but most users still plug external ditos in to it. We can do the same type of office swapping with a laptop, true, but size and weight are a factor here. The mini has the potential to fill a gap in the Mac line up among converts and "switchers" alike.

My October 16, 2004 post on OQO

Macfeber offers best coverage of MWSF

Before we all start commenting on the new awesome Mac mini, iPod shuffle etc, let's applaud Roger at Swedish Mac site Macfeber.

I'm not sure what source/s he used to file regular updates on Steve Jobs' keynote speach at MWSF, but he did a great job. One of the main difference's was that all posts on Macfeber were well written, without typos and contained all the available relevant info. When Steve Jobs mentioned a new product, Macfeber would list the name of the product and a note - "more info to follow shortly". Minutes later there would be a short but fact filled text covering all the basics.

More etsbalished Mac sites, and other blogs, had a hard time either keeping up, or simply getting the linguistic or factual basics right. Well done Roger!

Desktop engine

Yahoo!'s desktop search beta became available for download today. It's powered by X1, and depending on how similar to the original X1 app it is, Yahoo! has the potential to out perform the offerings from MSN, Google etc.

My January 5 post on Slate's review of desktop search tools
My December 10, 2004 post on Yahoo! and X1

Boingo goes Mac

This one might get lost among all the Mac announcements this week but it's a big one for Mac based mobile workers.

Boingo has finally released a Mac version of its hotspot software. It allows users to sign in to approx 12 000 Wi-Fi hot spots with a single user name and password.

I've waited for this since 2002, can't wait tro try it out.

Power up at Starbucks

I love this story! We've all had to scramble for power outlets at coffe shops and airports over the years. The NYT has a fun piece on it today. My favorite place to plug in (log on, work, drink coffe etc) is Starbuck's on University Ave in Palo Alto. There's a double power outlet at every table. Bliss.

49ers clean up

The 49ers have cleaned house within the last 45 minutes, coach Erickson and GM Donahue are out.

Slate searches

Slate reviews desktop search apps (and no, MSN doesn't come out on top, but neither does Google). In my book X1 is still the quality option.

My December 10, 2004 post on the X1 and Yahoo! partnership

Healthy USB drives

There are many clever uses for USB drives, including the Migo USB or sticking a personalized version of John Haller's tweaked Firefox on it for easy use on any computer.

CNET News write about MedicAlert's plan to sell USB devices to patients for storing health data etc.

"Updates to the health records stored on the device can be made by a patient and other people authorized by the person to do so, such as a physicians or pharmacists."

The real key to its potential success might be the online backup of the information, and a dedicated support department, i.e. MedicAlert's emergency response center.

Test post

I am doing 43 things.