About a week ago, a New York Times article titled “Blogs Wane as the Young Drift to Sites Like Twitter” painted a bleak picture for blogging by making pronouncements like “blogs were once the outlet of choice for people who wanted to express themselves online.” The article then goes on to suggest that Twitter and Facebook are the culprits stealing blogs’ thunder.

While some prominent bloggers came to the defense and proved these pronouncements to be inaccurate or at least misleading, there were still some thoughts in this article that really resonated with me. For instance:

“Former bloggers said they were too busy to write lengthy posts and were uninspired by a lack of readers.”

Yup. That’s true for me. I haven’t blogged for six months before this post, and why? Well, it takes times and effort. And the payoff is unpredictable (I characterize “payoff” as discussion and readers). Most times hardly anyone comes to say anything. And other times, it’s a ghost town.

That is, unless you blog frequently enough (and are insightful frequently enough) that you have folks stopping by regularly. But the blog equivalent of “friending” or “following” is mostly dead (it’s called RSS). So you can’t count on people to stick around or come back unless you really stick with it and/or are consistently interesting.

Compare that now to Twitter or Facebook. Neither take much time nor effort, and it’s really not hard to say something that will get read and/or start a discussion. While in the blogging world, you might track visitors and traffic, in the Facebook/Twitter world, you don’t care about that (nor can you really figure it out). It’s been replaced by even better gratification in the form of “retweets” or “likes” plus replies/comments.

This probably comes across cynically, in the sense that I’m suggesting indirectly that blogging/Facebook/Twitter are all done primarily for self-gratification purposes. There’s probably a better way to say that, but connecting/interacting/sharing with others is something most humans enjoy immensely. And Facebook & Twitter make it so easy! Whereas blogging…

Perhaps the conversations don’t run as deep or the discussions aren’t as stimulating, but Twitter and Facebook have a certain “good enough” feel to them. Let me put it this way:

If I told you that you can get in really good shape by walking and that you’d notice results on day one, you’d totally do it, right? But then if I told you, you know what, you might be able to get into slightly better shape (than the first option) if you exercise regularly. But you won’t notice results for at least two months.

Which would you choose?

I think most would (and will continue) to choose walking if it means most of the payoff but none of the hassle / hard work. (Incidentally, I think we’d all love it if only short walks really did get us most of the payoff of regular, more intense exercise.)

By the way, I’m back and ready to blog more (well, at least, more than every six months).

Wow, some major love for Apple tonight coming from none other than Bill Maher:

“America needs to focus on getting Jobs, Steve Jobs… In 2001, Apple reinvented the record player, in 2007 the phone, and this year the computer. I say, for 2011, we let them take a crack at America.”

“Our infrastructure, our business model, our institutions, get rid of the stuff that’s not working, replace it with something that does. For example: Goodbye US Senate, Hello Genius Bar. So good luck, Steve, ’cause you’ll need it. Of course, I’m sure he’ll make us change the name.”

[Cut to image below]

But interestingly enough, in an earlier segment, he showed a screenshot of an Apple customer satisfaction survey and complained (generally, even if using Apple as an example on screen) that companies bug him too much with satisfaction surveys. So what should we make of this?

Probably not much other than Bill Maher seems to be fan enough to give Apple credit for the iPad already having reinvented the computer. Record player and phone, sure, I see that. But computer? I think Maher may have watched one too many Apple ads for the iPad. The jury’s still out on whether or not it deserves being placed alongside new record players and phones.

Of course, the extrapolation makes sense and isn’t necessarily a bad bet to be making. But let’s wait and see.

*Update* There’s a video of this here that starts right after Bill Maher complains about customer satisfaction surveys (last couple minutes is the main Apple part).

*Update 2* See below for embedded YouTube version of the entire segment.

Logan and I are at it again with another episode of our new podcast: Practically Ideal (get episode 2 here, right-click and select “Save Link As…”). This week we’re discussing progressivism (general Democrat views) vs. conservatism (general Republican views) and figuring out if/where we fit in.

We also talk about Google’s Thanksgiving present of turn-by-turn GPS directions available on all their phones as well Microsoft Bing’s latest and greatest features just released. And lastly, Logan and I discuss which movies we plan to see this holiday season. Enjoy, and thanks for listening!

*Update* Practically Ideal is now on iTunes.

My friend Logan Beaux decided to start a podcast (get it here) and invited me to be part of the project as a regular cohost. For whatever reason, I’ve never done the podcasting thing (till now). And lately I’ve been thinking that Twitter/Facebook has replaced my need to blog like I used to.

But now having participated in a podcast, I can say (perhaps naively) that I’ve been missing out on a decent form of expression. We’ve only recorded one show, but I’m already feeling pretty excited about doing this new thing more. New for me, that is, I think I’m only five years late to the party?

Anyway, the podcast is called Practically Ideal. Logan mentions you can tell it’s our first try (which may be true), but I have to give him props for some pretty good production value. While I think what he’s trying to accomplish is fairly ambitious, I’m glad he (we) is (are) doing it.

The format used includes a discussion on the latest in politics/economics, followed by a discussion on the latest in tech, and wraps up with a nice dose of pop culture. In this episode we discuss libertarianism, “climategate”, Windows 7, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, the Mad Men season finale, and other TV shows we’re watching. And we do this all in about 50 minutes.

The truth is, Logan and I are fairly interested in each of the broad subject categories but haven’t found a show/podcast that addresses them all together in a condensed package of sorts. So he decided it was a good time to start what we’ve never found. I wonder, though, if it’s too much for one show?

It’s really 3 or 4 mini-shows with the same personalities behind each segment. In fact, if technology would allow more easily, I wish there was an easy way to present the podcast with bookmarks of sorts so you could skip to only those topics that interested you. Then again, I think the show works best when all together. But of course I would say that…

Anyway, enough of my take. Give it a listen, and let me know what you think. You can download it here (Right-click and select “Save Link As…”), and we’ll soon have it as something you can subscribe to on iTunes.

*Update* Practically Ideal is now on iTunes.

So I’m walking back to the office (work for Microsoft in Bellevue, WA) after meeting my wife for a nice dinner out. And I’m wearing a black t-shirt that says “I’M A PC” in white letters across my chest. I’m half way through crossing the street and a guy runs up to me, whips his arms around, points his two index fingers an inch away from my chest, and then yells loudly: “I’m a Mac!”

I give him a shoulder shrug and say, “cool, dude” while the rest of the crosswalk traffic is trying to ignore what just happened. We then walk our separate ways. My first thought was: “how bizarre.” But then that thought was quickly followed by my second thought, which was: “how normal.”

Sure, this is ancedotal and an isolated story. But for being completely random, I can’t think of a better story that characterizes my experience with how Mac fans express themselves as compared to PC fans. Some fans feel the need to yell their stance to your face (read any Apple fanboy blogs lately?) while others feel more comfortable simply wearing a shirt.

Now I’m wondering if I still want to wear this shirt from time to time. I think so. I wouldn’t want to pass up another chance at a Mac fan proving my point.

*Disclaimer* I work for Microsoft but do own certain Apple products, just how most all of my “Mac” friends own Microsoft products. I personally think the tech world is a better place because of both companies. But that’s too long a message to shout to someone’s face.

Cross-posted to the Microsoft Learning blog.

The Microsoft Games for Windows team working with the SideWinder (gaming hardware) team put together a fun event a few days ago. Of course, I may be saying it was fun because I won third place in one tournament and first place in another.

Winnings included everything I needed for a lazy weekend: Fallout 3, 007: Quantum of Solace, SideWinder Mouse, SideWinder X6 Keyboard (won two!), and a LifeChat LX-3000 headset (see picture above or see an unboxing video here by a fellow winner).

Seriously, though, I want to thank those involved for putting this together. The more I work at Microsoft, the more I realize it’s a company full of some pretty cool people.

See below for my post-victory interview video. Incidentally, this is my first time posting a video of myself online. Given the context, it’s a little heavy on the “I’m a computer game nerd” content.

At first, I wasn’t sure if I wanted it to be the first impression of me for anyone who might come across it. But then, given all the hoopla around Susan Boyle, I decided I’d go with the “embrace yourself” mentality. This is me, no need to provide excuses or disclaimers (even if I just did).

Also, for you World of Warcraft players, I kid. Don’t take what I say about it too seriously. (I actually played it for a summer a few years back before giving it up for more gaming variety.) But for you coworkers I’m talking to near the end, take what I say very seriously (or just buy me lunch sometime).

Check out the email (below) I got from the Hotmail team. Much has changed in the last 10 years, but somehow I’ve managed to hang on to my original Hotmail email address. (I opened my account the end of 1998.)

Of course, the Hotmail team may or may not like the fact that I use this email address primarily as my spam location. Most everyone has an email address like this, right? I know I do, and I actually need it at this point. Anytime anyone who is not a real, distinct person wants my email (think of most forms/companies asking), this is the address they get.

This week I found myself in the frozen section browsing for ice cream. I’m not even sure how I ended up there and why ice cream, but my subconscious was apparently way ahead of me. Once my conscious kicked in, the comparing started.

There’s, of course, plenty to choose from if you’re in the mood for flavors that put the ice cream in the running for world record of highest calorie density food. My personal favorite in this category: Ben & Jerry’s Half Baked Fudge Brownie & Cookie Dough. So good!

But alas, I try to limit my intake of said category. So this week I was going for sweet tooth meets practical. And this category is all over the place. It simply depends on what your trade off threshold is. Do you want sugar free? How ’bout fat free? One third less calories? Half the sugar? Half the fat? Or some combination of the above?

The trick is to get something made where the taste sacrifice is minimized while the health advantage is maximized (or more accurately, the health disadvantage is minimized: it’s not like ice cream, no matter how sugar/fat-free is ever really considered a health food). But there’s no one right answer to this formula. In fact, the answer almost completely depends on the unique criteria of any given person, which brings me to my question of the day:

When will I be able to tweak my ice cream like my PC gaming graphics?

While some consider it a disadvantage to PC gaming (when compared to console gaming), I actually like being able to customize my settings to my exact criteria. I’m in full control. I make trade offs when selecting the hardware (decision based on price). And then once I install a game, I make trade offs based on what’s important to me: frame rate / resolution / detail level / anti-aliasing / isotropic filtering, etc. In the end, my gaming experience is custom tailored to my criteria (though arguably more expensive, just like custom-made ice cream would likely be more expensive than the pre-made alternatives).

But I’d be willing to pay (within reason) for custom made ice cream that fits my criteria more exactly. The difference, though, is that with computer games, you can change your settings as many times as you wish and preview the results. With ice cream, however, tweaking the taste-to-health meter and previewing it several times before placing an order… not very practical.

Or is it? I’d love it and would find it to be very practical (from the consumer perspective). How the process would work in reality, though, escapes me. Any ideas?

It’s been two months since my last post, and I’ve decided to get back into blogging. It feels like so many times in the past couple months something has happened, and I’ve thought to myself, “I should blog about that.”

Well, now I think I will. For those keeping score at home (that would be me), I’m hoping to get into a weekly rhythm.

On a more random note, what is the deal with the spelling of the word rhythm? Just now I couldn’t even spell it close enough to the real thing to get spell check to have an idea of what I was trying to say.

I’m currently in Bulgaria and recently went to a screening of the latest Indiana Jones movie. Since my wife and I decided to go to the movie with a group of friends on a Saturday night, we thought it best to buy the tickets in advance.

When we went to the box office to purchase our tickets, we were shown a screen that displayed the layout and available seats of that particular movie theater. We were then asked to pick the row and seat numbers we wanted. We were early enough to get seventh row center.

When I was a teenager, waiting in line for a movie or saving seats was as much a social event as it was a necessity. But nowadays, the “first come, first serve” method simply wastes my time, gets me crappy seats, or forces me to watch a popular movie later than its release weekend.

In the Bulgaria model, all seats were still priced equally. I can see how the economics of the situation would be problematic from the perspective of theaters maximizing their audiences and revenues. It’s human nature to assume that you won’t be the one to get the worst seat in the house for a sold out movie.

If you have a ticket, you have just as much of a chance at a good seat as anyone else. But if seats are assigned, and you understand that no good seats are available before you pay… well, you’d be more likely to change your plans (i.e., go to another movie, a later showing of the same movie, or do something else).

But then, why not price seats accordingly? If a theater knows it will be unlikely to sell out with this model, then it needs to make up for this. Certain seats should have a premium while others have a discount.

Perhaps I’m alone, but I’d definitely pay a couple bucks extra to pick good seats in advance. Time is money, as the saying goes. And I think I’m ready to be done with the extra time hassle anytime I want to see a new movie on a weekend.

What do you think? Is the current U.S. model fine as it is? Or would a change like this be an improvement?