“Yes!,” you pant with anticipation?

Well, then this is your chance: I’m selling off a heapin’ helping of awesome furniture at a steep discount, as I prep for a move to SOMA. Here’s some links.

Incredible SteelCase Executive desk
Beautiful dark-wood dining table and fancy chairs
Awesome Bar / Storage Hutch
Sweet sweet silver tree/candle holder (over 6 feet tall)
Adorable matched set of wood dinner chairs
Custom-built Bar-height desk (genuine franken-kea furniture)

I’d bet we’ll also talk about media companies and people doing things right, and how to train for whats next.

I’ll be joining Jay Rosen of NYU, Vadim Lavrusik of Mashable, Jenna Wortham of the NYT tech section and Laurie Segall, a reporter at CNN. A pretty decent cast of characters for this subject, actually.

Why should you believe us? I’m not certain you should, but here are the perspectives you will get:

Jay Rosen is a professor of journalism at NYU. He recently started an experimental program there called Studio 20, where he is attempting to cross pollinate journalists with developers. Jury is still out on his strategy, but it is an incredible effort. He’s also one of twitter’s loudest pundits about journalism.

Vadim Lavrusik is Mashable’scommunity manager, and also has excellent journalism chops. He and I represent the “recently exited j-school and entered the workforce” crowd. This is Mashable’s party, so he’ll be moderating.

Jenna Wortham is one of the New York-based technology reporters at the NYT. She focuses a lot on consumer tech and apps, as well as start ups. She’s in her twenties, sassy, and something of a taste-maker, with a great deal of social-media relevance. I’m hoping she focuses on what skills and tech she brings to covering her beat, and how the demands of her current gig differ from her past life at Wired.

Laurie Segall is an unknown for me. She seems to be young, and her coverage of “Money and Technology” tells me she is dispatched to cover things that call for a young/female/techish voice. I’ll be listening closely to what she has to say, as I don’t know her well.

Me. I’ll be winging it, as usual. I recently graduated from Stanford’s journalism masters program, and did a stint at The New York Times before taking a permenant position at D: all things Digital. My title is Associate Editor, but that means I have developed and am implementing out social media and metrics strategy, as well as working on new multimedia products. I also cover early stage start-ups and emerging technologies in the weekly “Early Adopter” column.

I also consult and teach at Stanford in their journalism program. I focus mostly on digital journalism, practical techniques and tools, and distribution platforms. I also consult heavily on the Stanford’s flagship media program, Digital Media Entrepreneurship, which is 50% class, 50% incubator, with a side of VC, Angel and media execs. Its full of students and professionals from the journalism program, the graduate school of business, the CS department and some Silicon Valley orgs that lend a specific hand when needed.

As for topics to be covered, the materials are vague, but I’d imagine thats because Vadim and co are figuring out what we are going to be talking about. I’ll update this post if I hear more on that. If you have thoughts, feel free to tweet at me (@withdrake).

I’ve posted the official promo language below, along with where you can go to get tickets.

Oh yeah, and the whole thing benefits the Y, so buy two. And rumor has it there may be an open bar.

200 Hudson Street | www.92YTribeca.org | 212.601.1000
MASHABLE’S NEXTUP NYC
Tue, Feb 8, 6:30 pm, $15

Mashable’s fifth NextUp NYC focuses on the skills that news organizations will demand and the tools journalists will need to be successful as they redefine the way they report, produce and distribute their content. The night will consist of networking and a conversation and Q & A with Vadim Lavrusik, Community Manager & Social Media Strategist at Mashable; Jay Rosen, a journalism professor at New York University and blogger at PressThink.org; Jenna Wortham, Technology Reporter for The New York Times; Drake Martinet, Associate Editor of D: All Things Digital/The Wall Street Journal Digital; and Laurie Segall, Money & Technology Reporter at CNN. Part of Social Media Week New York.

About 92YTribeca
92YTribeca is 92nd Street Y’s downtown arts and culture venue in New York City. Opened in October 2008, 92YTribeca presents music, comedy, film, theater, talks, classes, family events, and Jewish community and holiday programs in a versatile, street-level, modern space at 200 Hudson Street. In addition to the mainstage and screening room, the venue houses an art gallery, lounge, bar, café, seminar and meeting rooms, and free Wi-Fi around the space. With programs developed by a professional curatorial team in partnership with staff, local artists and arts organizations, new-media companies, fellow presenters, and community and cause-based organizations, 92YTribeca aims to engage a diverse community of young people from around the New York area with smart, relevant programming that encourages participation and conversation. For more information, visit www.92YTribeca.org.

For background, she was looking for something for her husband, who is in his late twenties or early thirties, active and business-minded, though not “techie.”

Below is the email I sent to her. I figured it might be useful for someone besides her, so here it is.

Editor’s Note: I’m employed as a technology journalist, but this post is an answer to a family member’s question, and is full of opinion and advice about the situation and the people in it. If you think it represents an endorsement of any particular product, then you either aren’t reading very carefully, or should go soak your head.

________________________________________________________

Jordan,

There’s pretty much no incentive, these days, to get a desktop (unless you need a computer at very low cost, or you need a SUPER high performance machine, like something they edited the Avatar movie on). Other then that, laptops are just as capable, can be used just like desktops, and have the added bonus of being portable when needed. Thats my take.

There are many great PCs out there, and I used them up until about 2 years ago when I bought my first mac. I have bought another mac since then. The switch was easier than expected becasue I spend so much of my computer time inside a web browser.

I’d say this. He should avoid things labeled “netbooks.” They are great as a secondary, ultra-portable computer, but lack certain features that he will miss, and most cant support being connected to a nice external screen.

He should look for a laptop with at least 4GB of RAM and over 250GB Hard Drive. The processor isn’t as important, but all the modern laptops will have a processor that will do the job. Just dont get one with an “Atom” processor from Intel. Its not a bad processor, but it is designed to work on small computers and netbooks, not an everyday machine, so it will seem slow.

Think of it this way… If the computer is a brain, the processor is how fast it thinks, the RAM is how many things it can think about at once, and the hard drive is how much it can remember, long term.

The other issue is size (always is). How big a laptop is he comfortable carrying. I use a 15inch Macbook Pro. I dont like carrying anything bigger than that, but thats just me.

Also, as for the screen, If I were in the market, even if I got a mac, I wouldn’t buy a mac screen unless I was really wooed by how pretty they are (which I nearly am). Reason being, there are TONS of awesome screens out there (as good as the mac) for half the money. I use a pretty gigantic widescreen from HP as a second screen (I use them with my laptop open so I can put stuff on both screens). Its a beautiful, glossy screen and with the money I saved I bought an iPad, an apple mouse and some speakers. Literally, thats how much I saved.

So, if I were making recommendations, I’d suggest one of the less expensive MacBookPro models, or a nice, similarly capable (and less expensive) laptop from a company like Lenovo, HP or Sony. All make good products.

As a bonus. I’ve attached a photo of my workspace, to give you a sense of how I set it all up and work every day with the laptop and external screen. Feet in the picture are an added bonus.

They do classic Italian style crust and baking (brick oven and all) but fold in some of the fresh, local ingredients that have made the Berkeley food scene so famous.

I didn’t catch it in the video, but they are also mixing some seriously excellent original cocktails.

Almost Famous: Chris Messina from E. Drake Martinet on Vimeo.

A minute with Chris Messina of Google. We talk Buzz, Facebook and the future of openness at Google.

In a feature of “Almost Famous” we’ve dubbed “Need to Know,” All Things Digital talks with top players inside tech companies–much as we talk to emerging and innovative entrepreneurs–who are perhaps not as prominent as their influence suggests, but who should be.

Warning: Sordid details ahead.

This week: We took a trip to a little company called Google (GOOG) to talk with Chris Messina, Google’s open Web advocate. Openness? Google? We couldn’t pass this up.

Who: Chris Messina

What: Open Web advocate

Why: Chris has been in early on all kinds of pioneering open Web projects. He helped run Spread Firefox–Mozilla’s community marketing effort–co-founded the BarCamp user-generated un-conferences, and single-handedly invented the Twitter hashtag: #. No joke. He just made the move to the search giant.

Where: Factory Joe (blog); @chrismessina (Twitter); Googleplex (analog place)

Who Else: Open standards are Messina’s forte, but he’s been preaching the gospel of openness to many Google teams.

Five Stats You Won’t Find in His Facebook Profile:

Worst Job: You know, I’ve led a pretty padded life, but I guess my worst one was when I was a janitor in a print shop while living in Switzerland. I was living in an attic in this tiny town to attend this Swiss design school–which I didn’t like at all–and this is how I made my meager living while there.

Has a Geek Crush on: I first started learning Web design by reading Jeffrey Zeldman’s book. There are lots, though. More related to the stuff I’m doing now, I think John Panzer is a big unsung hero, he’s the one pushing the Salmon stuff (Google’s open comment project) forward.

Gadget of the Moment: I still love my first-generation Apple (AAPL) iPhone. It doesn’t have 3G and it’s slow as molasses, but I really like the form factor, the metallic finish, everything. It also allows you to take screenshots, which is the one thing really missing from Android.

Biggest Difference Being at Google: Even more email, if you can believe it.

Design Geekiness: My favorite font ever is Pennsylvania by Christian Schwartz. I also like Bello, Flama and Tungsten.

Bio in 140 Characters

Born an New Hampshire, he trained as a communication designer at Carnegie Mellon. He left for California and has been into the open Web ever since.

The Five Questions

What does being an open Web advocate at Google mean? Does it feel like you are working for “The Man”?

Generally what I’m doing here is a lot like what I used to do, actually. I have contact with a lot of different developer teams, and I talk to them about how they can use open standards in their work. Right now though, mostly I’m working on Google Buzz, doing developer relations and helping design the Buzz APIs. We’re trying to create these technologies based on stuff from the grassroots communities where these things already exist, as opposed to inventing our own standards. We document everything on the Google code site and then we just talk about it. It’s a little bit of an evangelism role, in the sense that we have to go out and be a part of the community and be a router for information back into Google.

Big companies seem to have their own agendas and needs to be met, and what I’m realizing now is that a lot of times, they also don’t have time or a way to go out and find the places where these needs are and these tools are already being developed. There are a lot of people who are really hungry for this information, but maybe just didn’t know where to go.

So how do you see Google Buzz as a part of the social Web landscape, now that you’ve been on the inside?

We approached it from a “pieces that are loosely joined” perspective so that we can spit out smaller communities that are self-sufficient, rather than one big monolithic project like Facebook Connect. We built Buzz so that Google can be one place that hosts the underlying technologies, but the capabilities can be spread and used by anyone who wants that social functionality.

The goal is to create a much larger social Web that is dispersed, as opposed to another monolithic silo that sort of sucks in a lot of activity and doesn’t let anything out. Facebook is just the most recent silo, there have been lots in the past. AOL (AOL). Prodigy. A lot of times they don’t mean to be that, but it just happens.

How do you see the competing philosophies of openness and proprietary technology and information at play on the social Web?

I think the way that I look at it is that facilitating choice is actually a good way to ensure you remain competitive. Also, right now, the social Web is in such infancy that competing on what is available now seems so premature. I’d rather see us spend the next five or 10 years building out the social Web so that we have good standards for identity, good standards for authentication and open ways to bring your friends with you to any site on the Web.

Because we’ve never had this social data before, there’s this mentality that it’s solid gold, and we should be hoarding it keeping it from everyone and only letting out little bits. In reality, I think markets work best when there is a flow of data. If I can’t take my data out of one network and move it into another, like I can move credit card balances from one to the other, then I think we are inhibiting the types of things we should be building, which will be much richer.

I already sign into 10 Google products a day with the same account. Is my Google account going to become more like Facebook Connect?

Well, the technology is there, but it’s more a question of motivation. It’s actually a problem I’ve been working on for the last two or three years. The first question is, how do you provide choice to people when they want to log in (what do you ask for)? The other question is, why would they use any one service or other, given the choice?

Facebook has solved that problem by just eliminating the choice. You just choose Facebook Connect, click a button, and it will be fine. And it works pretty well.

A barrier for us is that our tools are built on standards like openID and OAuth that were designed by people who cared a lot more about privacy. As a result of that, a technology based on openID doesn’t automatically come with all the social data that make modern applications work. We are actually working with Facebook on this problem, because it turns out the hardest thing to figure out is just what to put on the user interface–how do you quickly ask people what they’d like to share? We want to avoid making Web sites look like the side of a Nascar.

Google’s push into mobile is based on open standards. How do you see that proliferating?

You know, even the iPhone is actually just a platform that interacts with a bunch of open standards and accepted systems. It relies on 3G, sends email, SMS, takes pictures that are compressed and connects to other devices via Bluetooth–they are all open standards and protocols that have enabled these great tools. I think people are going to want more. I’m intrigued by Android, and it, plus the devices it runs on, are really getting there.

My co-teachers and I spent hours refining our scenario. We sought to bring immediacy and reality, so we chose a real disaster with a relevant time frame.

I spent several months living in Chile in 2004, and then again for a short time in 2008, and was more than happy to lend my knowledge of the geography and infrastructure there to make our game as accurate a model of reality as we could create.

The Disaster

Santiago wasn’t as hard hit as Concepcion, for instance. Lota, a small town on a hill near the epicenter, was nearly obliterated, but was, in our game, nearly impossible to contact. Damage to the coastal city of Valparaiso was severe, but as the Chilean Navy is based there, we concluded that it would be realistic that their infrastructure was in use to quickly respond to the crisis.

The Players

The co-teachers and I split up the class of 16 or so into four distinct groups. there were four journalists who were based in New York who had each been assigned to cover a particular city and it’s state of damage after the quake.

Another four class members were assigned to each play a victim on the quake, each living in one of the locales. There were aid workers, an aid worker dispatcher, and three government information officers.

The Restrictions

Journalists were each given the contact of the aid worker dispatcher, who in turn had contact info for the individual aid workers. Aid workers each had the contact info of a single victim, who was the source of the direct quote the journalists were seeking. The trick was that based on where the aid workers were stationed, and where the victims had lived, the means of communication were limited. Some could be reached by any means possible save face-to-face contact (we put aid workers and victims in a physically separate location from the journalists to simulate them being in different countries). Some victims could only be reached by phone, some only by email, and then only once or twice. In the hardest hit areas, we forced the victims to only speak with their journalists via the phone, and then once the call had ended, we informed the journalist that because of communication difficulties (that we couldn’t simulate in real time)  she had to drop out half of her questions and answers because of the poor quality of the phone connection she had just “experienced”.

Some victims could only be contacted of via Twitter.

In Real Time- a live streamed video of what ensued

The Aftermath

The lesson was a success, mostly. the journalist players spontaneously formed a press pool of sorts because they were running into great sources from other areas before they found theirs (as the teaching team had designed).  We had stories that included the correct details in some cases, and omissions in others. In one particularly telling example, a very complete story was written that quoted a victim from a hard hit area and incorrectly placed them in a less-affected city, causing a predictable distortion in the news presented. The facts were right, bu the information networks we generally rely on to verify sources’ stories were not there.

There was one snafu, however, and it is the reason for this post.

The Moral Dillemma

One particularly thoughtful participant in our game, who was playing the part of the aid worker dispatcher, was asked to use a specific twitter hashtag to update the journalists with fake casualty reports that were streaming in from out fake aid workers. She realized immediately, that out perfect little laboratory experiment had a serious flaw. We were asking people to tweet about our simulation, which bore the names of places in a currently emerging disaster zone. We were tweeting out casualty reports, reporter’s questions, victims statuses and all manner of info generated by a group of twenty-somethings secure int he ivory tower.

The objections fell into two categories. First, was that our game was callus, and would appear vile and insensitive to those who were actively dealing with life and death in the quake zone.

The second objection, and the one that rang with more immidiacy to me was that we were polluting the stream of REAL tweets coming out of Chile’s disaster zones with our false information. Worse, we hadn’t even considered that.

I take responsibility for the oversight. Most of the issues here could have been resolved by simply changing the name and locale of the disaster. We got very lucky in that most of our tweeters got all their hashtags right and also misspelled the names of the places they were supposed to be tweeting from. Damadge was minimal.

That’s not the point though. What is more interesting is that we, tech-savvy aspiring journalists, didn’t see the gaping hole in our closed system. We saw twitter as a flexible tool to be used for education, in this instance, and assumed that because it was flexible and we gave it context, that was all that mattered. What we forgot was that no one outside our carefully constructed bubble had that context and would interpret what we tweeted in the way that made most sense to them.

History of the Internet from Melih Bilgil on Vimeo.

“History of the Internet” is an animated documentary explaining the inventions from time-sharing to filesharing, from Arpanet to Internet.
The history is told using the PICOL icons on www.picol.org. You can already download a pre-release of all picol icons on http://blog.picol.org/downloads/icons/

You can see the credits and more information on this movie on

http://www.lonja.de/motion/mo_history_internet.html

Apparently, for many, whatever comes to mind is masturbating while wearing a cat suit.

The Nutshell: You head over to chatroulette.com, hit start, and your webcam and microphone are activated. You are immediately connected to another live human being, selected at random from the users online at the time. If a person doesn’t look interesting for whatever reason, you just hit next and you are shuffled over to the next random person. At the moment of this sentence being written (mid-day on a Friday) there are over 20,000 users online. Sounds Harmless, right?

My experience with it is reflected in the recent New York mag article by Sam Anderson. Chatroulette is just a novel interface for the sort of “break piggy’s glasses” internet depression that already is pervasive in online games and discussion threads.

While this service is sure to birth blog posts, Youtube mashups and maybe a meme or two, what I’m really interested in watching is what sorts of communities come to use it. I mean, sure, there will be some curious pre-teens on there—the same crowd that contributes the especially inane commentary over at 4chan /b/, but what about th groups that like to interact but would prefer to remain anonymous. Furries anyone?