The Gang talks with a data scientist (and accomplished applications developer) living here in the Twin Cities, Jamie Ostheimer. He is working with a string of startups and is deeply embedded within the world of data. Osterheimer has a PhD in Astronomy, a discipline all about the data (and no, not Commander Data from Star Trek Next Generation). Rather his focus is about the core data sets that power all of our analysis, driving insights and enabling us to gain new meanings from it.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson
Music: bluessmyth & the song “Down on My Luck” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Minneapolis startup TST Media acquires Wisconsin Sports Network site (Pioneer Press)
• Facebook’s $5 Billion IPO: The Next Google? Or The Next Groupon? 
• Zuckerberg Controlling 57% of Facebook Seen as Risk to Investors
• Facebook’s Ad Business Is a $3 Billion Mystery
• In China, Human Costs Are Built Into an iPad; Foxconn; Major Customers
• Was Google’s Disastrous January A Passing Storm Or Sign Of Things To Come?
• Employers added 243,000 jobs in January, pushing unemployment rate down to 8.3 percent 
• Jamie Ostheimer links: What Is a Data Scientist? (the diagram we discuss); Forbes article 

Upcoming Events:

• February 10-11: Startup Weekend Twin Cities III, U of M Carlson
• February 23rd: WordPressMSP at The Nerdery
• February 23rd: How to Leverage Digital Media to Raise Capital (a DealPen event at CoCo. Promo code for free ticket: dealpenfriend)
• February 24-25: MinneWIC (Women in Computing)
• March 16-17: Mobile March (Mobile 3D) (Call for speakers)
• April 7th: MinneBar, Best Buy headquarters
• June 5-8: eyeo Festival, Walker Art Center

Minnov8 Gang 155 – It’s the Data is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: Ruddin & their song “Cover the Distance” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

Carrier IQ scandal:

• Researcher’s Video Shows Secret Software on Millions of Phones Logging Everything
• Phone ‘Rootkit’ Maker Carrier IQ May Have Violated Wiretap Law In Millions Of Cases
• Carrier IQ references discovered in Apple’s iOS
• Apple: We Stopped Supporting Carrier IQ With iOS 5
• Senator Al Franken Demands Carrier IQ Explain Mobile Tracking

Black Friday/Cyber Monday sales strong:

• The Kindle Fire Is Beating The iPad At Best Buy
• Amazon, Best Buy, Walmart Lead Online Sales
• Target November sales miss analysts’ expectations
• Friday’s Deals May Not Be the Best

Guest: Don Ball:

• Google Chairman Praises Mpls Entrepreneurship at CoCo 
• Where Don Ball is speaking on Dec 8th
• Important New Research to be Unveiled at GigaOM Net:Work 
• Net:Work agenda (Don Ball’s panel at 2:50 pm)

Other: Julian Assange: iPhone, Blackberry and Gmail users are ‘screwed’ – video

Upcoming Events

• Friday, December 9th: Gadgets and Gifts from Geeks to Grandmas
• Wednesday, December 7th: MOJO Mixer 2 – Speed Mentoring for Startups
• Thursday, December 15th: 1st Annual Minnesota Tech Holiday Bash
• December 10th – 13th: TIES 2011 EduTech Conference

Direct link to the show

Minnov8 Gang 147 – Wanna Buy Some Wheat? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins, and Phil Wilson

Discussed during the show:

• MN-Based Cloud Startup enStratus Secures Series A VC Investment
• MHTA Tekne Awards (MHTA site; BizJournal article)
• Returns aren’t in on Best Buy’s VC venture
• Google’s new GoMo – Google Creates “GoMo” Portal To Help You Mobilize
• New in Google Reader: a fresh design, and Google+ sharing  and Reader redesign: Terrible decision, or worst decision?
• Google Releases Gmail for iOS…then pulls it
• HTML5 and a great site with demos called,”HTML ROCKS”
• Square’s Card Case iOS App Adds Support For Hands-Free Payments, Twitter Integration For Merchants
• Groupon IPO 
• Mary Meeker’s State of the Internet
• Kidblog; Minnov8 Gang podcast with the co-founder; Graeme’s video with key folks about hitting 1M users

Upcoming Events:

• Friday, November 4th (weekly): Frontend Masters Workshop Series
• November 8-10: Defrag (Denver & MN startups going include: Zingstring, AsystMe, TST Media, KidBlog, FanChatter… enStratus is a sponsor)
• November 8-10: JAMF Software National User Conference 2011 @Guthrie Theater
• Wednesday, November 9th: Hacks/Hackers Twin Cities – “Newsrooms, Open Source, and the Maker Culture”
• Saturday, November 12th: ProductCamp Minnesota 3
• Saturday, November 12th: Code Slingers Challenge 
• Tuesday, November 15th: Mobile Twin Cities

Minnov8 Gang 144 – Smartphones & SmartScooters? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Ben Theis, Google

Our guest this week is Ben Theis, Field Marketing Lead for Google in Minnesota (and part of a team of five). He talks about what he’s doing here, initiatives that Google has underway in Minnesota, and some very interesting factoids about the lack of online presence with small businesses.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson (Graeme Thickins is off).
Music: “Full Circle” by Clintone via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Minnesota Emerging Software Advisory (MESA)
• Facebook F8: One graph to rule them all
• Best Buy in serious trouble? (be sure to read the comments); Best Buy CMO Barry Judges’ response; Best Buy’s Cowboom 
• Google Claims $1B of Economic Impact in MN in ’10; Google Adwords Express; Google Adwords 
• Multiple iPhones in October? Al Gore says so 
• HP Names Meg Whitman President and Chief Executive Officer
• English Books for Thai School – Can You Help? 

Minnov8 Gang 138 – Fate…or Plus? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

We’re pleased to have Julio Ojeda Zapata on this week as our guest host. He’d been on an adventure to California speaking at Google as an author (of his “iPad Means Business” book), being briefed as press by Apple on behalf of his tech column at the St. Paul Pioneer Press, and visiting the new TWiT studio in Petaluma, CA. Besides seeing the new studio, Julio was in the audience for the iPad Today show and was also on as a guest for the this Tech News Today episode.

We also discuss the amazing patent wars going on with seemingly Apple and Microsoft on one side and Google on the other. It’s shaping up to be one incredible battle and we discuss it at length.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins & Phil Wilson.
Music: “Meltdown Man” by Derek K. Miller via Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• The Nerdery
• Google, Microsoft Patent Spat Heats Up
• Google Fires Back At Microsoft, Both Companies Are Looking Lame Right Now
• Adobe Edge
• The new TWiT Studio (watch the video here for ribbon-cutting & tour)
• Dan Benjamin and 5by5 Studios

Upcoming Events:

• Sunday, August 22nd at Noon: MinneBar-B-Cue

Minnov8 Gang 134 – GooglyAppSoft is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott & Phil Wilson (Graeme Thickins is off this week).
Music: “Running from the Law” by Mean Gene Kelton & the DieHards via Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• NASA on the tech made possible due to our space program
• Apple blows out quarter; New Macs (Air; Mini); Mac OS X Lion; Lion Downloads Top One Million in First Day; Apple to buy Hulu?; Disappearing $69 iPad 2 triggers buyer outrage at Sears; Tablet PCs Threaten PC Dominance
• Google blows out quarter; Brand pages on Google+; Vic Gundotra On How Google+ Handled Brands: “It Was Probably A Mistake”
• Microsoft Beats Expectations but Microsoft Posts a 30% Increase in Profit, but Sales of Windows Are Weak; Mary-Jo Foley: Microsoft worldwide tablet operating-system share at 5 percent; Anybody Who Thinks Microsoft Is Going Out Of Business Is Nuts — Here’s Why
• UPCOMING EVENTS: WordPressMSP on July 28th on Gravity Forms; CoCoMSP Kickoff Party on Saturday, July 30th (note slow link…be patient)

Minnov8 Gang 132 – Hot Enough for ‘Ya? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins & Phil Wilson.
Music: “Blue n Boogie” by Norman Hedman’s Tropique via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Can Google+ Sustain Growth Beyond Early Adopters?
• Google blows out their quarter
• Amazon tablet (NYTimes article)
• TMobile Announces Twin Cities 4G
• Phil is at Conclave Learning Conference for radio folks. Saturday is the RAIN summit
• Steve’s post on the Google Chrome extension security problem
• UPCOMING EVENTS:
• July 28th, 6:30pm-9pm at The Nerdery: WordPressMSP Meetup on Gravity Forms
• Saturday, July 30th, 7-11pm: CoCoMSP/Project Skyway Launch Party 

Minnov8 Gang Podcast 131 – Deals Baby! is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins, Phil Wilson, & Julio Ojeda Zapata
Music: “Just Got to Boogie” by Matt Thorpe via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Google+; Cosmic Panda
• Google+ to Brands: Not So Fast
• Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, and his first reaction to Google+
• Facebook, Skype and Microsoft’s Savvy Investment
• Apple 15 Billion App Store Downloads
• Apple Supply Chain Advantage
• About the Baby Boomer generation
• Google Makes Facebook Look Socially Awkward 
• Wifi Storage for Tablets and other devices
• UPCOMING EVENTS:
• Hacked! – Why You Should Care about Privacy in Social Media
• WordPressMSP July 28th meeting on Gravity Forms

Minnov8 Gang Podcast 130 – Tablets, Schmablets is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

• Apple sells 1 million iPads in 28 days. Took iPhone 74 days. Plus, Minnesota-based analyst Gene Munster of Piper Jaffray estimated that Apple sold about 300,000 units over the weekend, similar to the 300,000 Apple sold the first day of sales April 3. He said the 3G unit was sold out in 49 of 50 stores he checked, suggesting that long term, 3G units will make up about 40 percent of all sales while Wi-Fi units will make up the remaining 60 percent. In related news, is the iPhone code ban facing antitrust inquiry? and Apple Policy Said to Prompt U.S. Allegation by Adobe

• HTC’s Incredible Android Smartphone Hits the Market

• Twitter Launches Embeddable Tweets and PCMag’s Lance Unaloff thinks Twitter is the new CNN

• Governor Pawlenty says Minnesota needs to be more competitive. Healthy state economies will play a critical role in future job creation, but Minnesota does not rank among the nation’s top 10 “growth performers,” according to a U.S. Chamber of Commerce study rolled out Monday by Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

• KeyOn Announces Acquisition of Network Assets in Iowa and Minnesota. KeyOn is one of the largest providers of wireless broadband, satellite and voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) services in the United States, primarily targeting underserved markets with populations generally less than 50,000. (Good thing for rural Minnesota?)

• Google Acquires 3D desktop company Bump Technologies

• Microsoft’s IE Sinks While Google Chrome’s Market Share Triples

• Seven things you need to stop doing on Facebook and tech pundit Leo Laporte mentioned on TWiG 39 that he’s going to delete his Facebook profile over the incomprehensible social graph moves — and Leo’s inability to understand their impact on privacy settings (which he explains as, “If I can’t understand them…how can the average person!“) — made by Facebook at F8, their developer conference.

• Bill Gates says that Microsoft has some tablet projects in the works.

Newsbytes for Tuesday, May 4, 2010 is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Here we go, then — five experienced Minnesota mobile app developers tell me, straight up, what’s up with iPad as relates to them.  And, after that,  I include some great insights from a couple of them about iPhone OS 4 — coming this summer for the iPhone, and soon after for the iPad. (Bring it on, Uncle Stevie!)

Joe Sriver, Founder, DoApp Inc. Joe, will your company be developing iPad apps?

“Yes, we do have plans for the iPad, first for our real estate product, then our other products. No ‘made for iPad’ apps are in the store from DoApp on day one, though.  But I did preorder an iPad for the team.”  In a story our friend Julio Ojeda-Zapata wrote in the PioneerPress on April 2, we learned that DoApp was frantically at work on the iPad version of it’s “Home Kenex” app, which is for home buyers and real estate agents.  Maps can be positioned alongside lists or photos of homes to make navigation easier and more intuitive than the cramped iPhone screen allows, said the story, facilitating better house comparisons.  iPad becomes “a coffee table-type of thing, with people in their agents’ offices cruising for properties on the device,” said the story, quoting DoApp’s Wade Beavers.  GPS capability will be added in an upcoming version of the iPad, so home buyers or agents will be able to pull up listings in their vicinity and “drive effortlessly towards them using satellite navigation.”

Bill Heyman, Founder and Lead Developer, CodeMorphic. Bill, what apps are you doing for iPad?  Redoing any of your existing ones?

“No existing apps.  What we’re doing are new ones for various clients.  Unfortunately, I’m not at liberty to say what they are.  I’m also working on a new game app I’m publishing myself, but I’m not ready to submit it yet. I’ll let you know when it’s getting close.”

I assume you now have an iPad in your possession? “Yes, I had one delivered to me while on vacation in Arizona this week.”

What are you finding in regard to how well your iPhone apps work on iPad? “They seem to work fine.
”

What about landscape mode?  Are you concerned that apps should work either way on iPad? “Apple has basically told developers that they MUST support rotation in their iPad apps.  Unfortunately, it can be a major PITA to support it well, but developers are going to have to bite the bullet now.
”

Any other comment? “I think iBooks is the killer feature of the iPad.  There’s been talk about the iPad developer gold rush, but no discussion about the author and independent content provider gold rush.  It’s going to happen — and I think it could be every bit as exciting as some of the apps.”

Matt Bauer, Founder, PedalBrain. Does the iPad fit in at all regarding your app? “Yes, it does — from a coaching or team director standpoint, to track athletes.”

I guess iPad isn’t too “mobile” as relates cycling, huh? “It will be a new application than what we have.  Likely a different app that we will charge for — probably like $20 or so.  I really see iPad apps being sold for quite a bit more than for the iPhone.  It won’t be till late summer we will think of doing an app.”

Your current app, of course, would work on the iPad, right? “App, yes — but hardware, no.  Apple hasn’t given the okay for iPad accessories from third parties yet.  Once they do, our hardware accessory will work.”

Terry Anderson, Founder, Handcast Media Labs. What’s up with you and iPad? “We also got our first iPad on Saturday.  We’re within a few days of having our next release of the SparkRadio app, which will work on either iPhone or iPad.  In the future, we will optimize a version for iPad that takes advantage of the increased screen real estate in a cool way, but that’s further out (maybe 45-60 days).  The visualizer screens on the iPad are stunning in full screen mode.”

Did I hear you dropped your price for SparkRadio on the iPhone from $5.99 to $1.99? “The price drop is temporary and is part of our experimenting with promotional tactics and pricing to see the effect on demand.

“Ultimately, we’re likely to end up with this scenario:  A free version called Spark Radio Lite that will be full featured, but will only stream 200 selected stations (maybe two weeks away)
…  A full version that will sell for between $5 and $6 (ultimately 30,000 stations) – so the price drop is temporary…  And note that both versions will support iPhone and iPad equally –  the software will detect the device and will load the appropriate interface… And we may come up with an enhanced iPad version, which could be sold as a separate product, but that’s down the road and still undecided.  Now that I see SparkRadio on the iPad, I can imagine a scenario where the iPad is docked in a stereo (many companies make them for iPhone and I assume we’ll see them shortly for iPad), and Spark is streaming audio and providing a pretty cool lightshow.  We think this will be a great way to expose the product and the graphics to a larger audience.  Very excited.”

Bekki Freeman, Developer, TinyMission. Please tell us about your firm’s experience, what kinds of apps you do, and what types of clients you work with.

“Tiny Mission started as an iPhone app development company.  Because of the high demand for applications, and especially integration between web apps and mobile apps, we’ve expanded to other mobile platforms, including iPad, and are eager to integrate these with enterprise systems.  Two of our clients are On Impact Productions and Fraser.  We work with both small and medium-sized companies, writing apps to enable their corporate and customer visions.”

How many apps have you published, and in what categories, for iPhone and other platforms? “Tiny Mission has published one iPhone application for On Impact Productions, and is preparing to submit a second for them this month, in addition to a BlackBerry and Android application.  We are submitting two iPhone applications for Fraser this spring, and are part way through development on an enterprise application that will be centered around the iPad.”

What are your plans for iPad apps, and what do you see as being different or challenging compared to iPhone? “We are very excited for the iPad because of the endless possibilities for very feature-rich applications.  The iPhone has been great for enterprise, but it is just too small to do complex business tasks.  We plan to bring web apps, smart phones, and the iPad together to fully integrate our clients’ business applications.  Our vision is for our clients to answer all of their customers’ questions and needs without ever going to a desk.”

——-

So, enter the Apple sneak-peek media event yesterday. CEO Steve Jobs outlined what’s coming in the next version of the iPhone operating system, called OS 4.  He highlighted seven new features:
•    Multitasking
•    Folders to organize apps
•    A unified inbox
•    iBooks is coming to the iPhone
•    More features for the enterprise
•    A social network for gaming
•    Mobile advertising with iAds

I asked Bill Heyman of CodeMorphic, What’s your reaction to the iPhone OS 4 sneak-peek announcement yesterday? “Multitasking is a great feature, of course, but still keeps the iPhone OS in control — to prevent bad apps from monopolizing the feature. It’s probably not enough for real-time, time-critical apps for the iPhone, but it’s a step in the right direction. Apple’s drawn a line in the sand for how apps are developed — Adobe Flash, Corona, and other platforms appear to be screwed, as they’re currently architected.  Basically, Apple wants native apps to use native code (Objective-C, C++, C, JavaScript).  So, for these other development platforms to survive, they’re going to have to ultimately be code generators for code types that Apple approves. I suspect Apple is following up the release of the iPad with the new iPhone OS to maintain momentum and to blunt criticisms of the iPad (and iPhone) as new Android-based tablets and phones start to appear in the next few months.”

I also asked Bekki of TinyMission, What are your impressions of iPhone OS 4? “Obviously, multitasking is huge.  We’ll be able to offer our clients’ users so many more options for delivering functionality, such as location-based notifications. Local notifications will give many of our small business clients the ability to offer reminders and user-specific content without having to manage external servers and user databases.  We believe our clients will really benefit from the new enterprise features.  The agility and flexibility of wireless enterprise app distribution and the improved data encryption are very exciting.  By breaking down barriers to enterprise deployment, Apple is opening up a whole new market segment with opportunities for companies like Tiny Mission to expand into.”

Finally, I wanted to ask Joe Sriver of DoApp about the *other* announcement that came out at Apple’s media event yesterday — that being their “iAd” platform — in light of DoApp having its own such platform, called “Adagogo.”  Joe, what’s your reaction to Apple’s “iAd” announcement?

“iAd sounds like a good product.  I haven’t delved too deeply into it.  It’s another network that we will look at adding to our Mobile Local News platform.   I guess I don’t see it as a big competitor to Adagogo, since Adagogo is built into our products by default.   It will become more of a competitor if we release an Adagogo API for developers to add Adagogo ads into their apps.  Obviously, it’s a potentially big threat for Google and Admob — or both together if that deal ever goes through.  Google has the resources to compete, so I’m not going too worried about them!”  Nice touch, Joe — spoken as a loyal former employee of Google…

Minnesota iPhone App Developers Talk iPad and OS 4 is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

You may not know it but the clock is clicking down to Google’s deadline, March 26th, for nominations of cities interested in being their laboratory for an “ultra high-speed fiber network”. In fact, that clock can be found at the top of the page at GoogleTwinPorts.com, just one of the assets in Duluth’s well choreographed campaign to become a high-fiber community.

According to Google, the city chosen will be built out with a fiber network that will deliver “Internet speeds more than 100 times faster than what most Americans have access to today, over 1 gigabit per second” at a “competitive price”. And it will provide that network to anywhere from 50,000 to 500,000 people in the chosen community. It’s all part of their plan “to experiment with new ways to help make Internet access better, and faster for everyone”.

Oh sure, there have been more than a few cities that have made very public pushes to be chosen for this slice of web-surfing nirvana, but none have done it with quite as much panache as our own Duluth.

They have dedicated a website, Facebook page, Twitter page, and YouTube Channel to the cause. There’s a Fiber Business Idea award being offered, web badges, a coloring contest, a pledge to sign, Google Fest on March 20^th and there’s even a movie in the offing. (No details on the plot…hopefully a romantic comedy…there aren’t enough of those, ya know.)

Then there’s the celebrities…Hey Topeka, Kansas we’ll see your Mayor renaming the city to Google, KS for a month and raise you a State Senator.

The most recent addition of voices to the campaign is Minnesota State Senator Al Franken.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2i_piWVXuc

The fact is that Mr. Franken, back in his days working with Tom Davis, was the “Duluth Answer Man” in a series of commercials for the city. Here’s a little known fact: Franken filmed these commercials just two years ago. Boy those Senate bids can age a guy. (OK, not a fact. He actually filmed them in the 80’s). In the video he even credits Google with freeing him from his duties as the Answer Man so that he could join the Senate.

Details of when Google will announce which city will be the recipient of all this fiber are still a bit sketchy. Their website only goes as far as saying “We plan to announce a target community or target communities this year.” When would the network be up and running once a community…no…once Duluth is chosen? Google gives no time frame.

Needless to say, though vague,  the Google initiative is an exciting one. Hopefully, like the FCC Broadband Plan, it will yield a low cost way to bring a bigger pipe to all of the US…not just one city. Our collective digital future, with all its applications, opportunities and business ventures, really depends on it.

In the meantime, a city on the shores of Lake Superior can dream, as well as showcase it’s innovative community…and have a lot fun doing it.

Google’s High-Fiber City: Why Not Duluth? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

In the movie The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Humphrey Bogart’s character Dobbs, and two other gringos, embark in to Mexico to find gold in the Sierra Madres, an area in great flux and riddled with banditos, but policed by the Federales. In one of the signature lines in the movie the banditos, trying to convince Dobbs and his cronies that they’re Federales, say, “Badges? We ain’t got no badges! We don’t need no badges! I don’t have to show you any stinking badges!“ (usually misquoted as “We don’t need no stinkin’ badges!“). There are several moral and philosophical questions in the movie and Dobbs dies, the banditos are killed by the Federales, the gold is lost and thus the analogy might as clear as mud: chasing opportunities won’t be easy but they’re out there; barriers and obstacles (and bandits) stand in your way; but we thought exploring opportunistic thoughts in this podcast was worthwhile.

Special Guest: For part of the podcast, Meg Canada joins us to talk about libraries, the iPad and more. Meg is a senior librarian for Web Services and Training at Hennepin County Library and currently coordinates public training and  social media efforts for the library. She volunteers helping with the Unsummit, recently presented at MinneWebCon, and is a regular contributor to Social Media Breakfast.

This Week’s Show Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Opening & closing music is “Santa Maria” by Will Kriski from Music Alley, purveyor of podsafe tunes.

Discussed during the show:

+ Past Events: CloudCampMSP (see Minnov8′s coverage here); IgniteMPLS; Social Media Breakfast;

+ Upcoming Events: Mobile March; MIMA; DEMO; SxSWi; MinneWebCon

+ Mobile: MixMobi; WordPress mobile plugins (Mobile Edition; WPTouch); Square (mobile commerce)

+ Devices: Apple iPad; Microsoft Courier; Dell Slate

+ Other: Google pagerank to require speedier websites?; Hacker News.

Minnov8 Gang 69: “We don’t need no stinkin’ badges!” is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

This Week’s Show Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson (Graeme is off this week)
Music by Mean Gene Kelton and the Diehards and the tune is “Running from the Law”. From the podsafe music network Music Alley.

+ Google Buzz
+ Greg Litman (WCCO News & Sports producer) post on Arik Hanson’s blog
+ Juicy Lucy controversy
+ Phil’s video interview with Chris Brogan: “Catching Up With Chris”
+ Garrick Van Buren‘s Cullect.com
+ Steve’s post about Where are you paying attention?
+ Sarah Lacy controversy at SXSW & Danah Boyd’s Web 2.0 Expo speech and Twitter debacle
+ Craig Neal from Heartland Circle and his Art of Convening
+ Steve’s post about MSNBC’s awesome Super Tuesday primary coverage
+ The perfect valentine for social media folks to their sweetie: a “broquet” (a bacon bouquet)
+ What’s up with St. Valentine and how did we get to the point of giving cards, flowers and chocolate? (bonus link: History of Valentine’s Day)

Minnov8 Gang 67: Is Google Buzz a Taser or Cupid’s Arrow? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Here’s an excerpt:

“After a big public announcement of the sort Apple had this week for the iPad, CEO Steve Jobs often takes time in the day or two afterwards to have a Town Hall at One Infinite Loop, making himself available for questions from employees bold enough to stand up and take one right between the eyes.

This time, the big topics included Google and Adobe — no surprises there… And the absence of Adobe Flash support on the iPhone for three years and counting, and now on the iPad, is either celebrated by users as a poke in the eye of one of the web’s most dextrous tools, or the most over-rated and overused crutch for decent design.

Jobs, characteristically, did not mince words as he spoke to the assembled, according to a person who was there who could not be named because this person is not authorized by Apple to speak with the press.

On Google: We did not enter the search business, Jobs said. They entered the phone business. Make no mistake they want to kill the iPhone. We won’t let them, he says. Someone else asks something on a different topic, but there’s no getting Jobs off this rant. I want to go back to that other question first and say one more thing, he says. This don’t be evil mantra: “It’s bullshit.” Audience roars.

About Adobe: They are lazy, Jobs says. They have all this potential to do interesting things but they just refuse to do it. They don’t do anything with the approaches that Apple is taking, like Carbon. Apple does not support Flash because it is so buggy, he says. Whenever a Mac crashes more often than not it’s because of Flash. No one will be using Flash, he says. The world is moving to HTML5.”

I decided to ask three local observers with a special perspective on Apple for their reaction. Two of them are former Apple employees, the other a 26-year user of both Apple and Adobe technologies.

First, I asked Curtis Juliber, a 16-year Apple business development exec, about what it was like on the inside, and also his take on the latest flap.

“I’ve been in employee meetings in Cupertino. Yes, Steve can be very forthright on a variety of topics. People did get up and ask questions. Usually, they were pretty well thought-out in advance — because, if Steve thought something was bullsh*t, he didn’t hesitate to say so.

“Apple has been pushing HTML5 for several years now. I remember hearing it discussed at WWDC (Worldwide Developer Conference) several years ago. But the market has been slow to adopt it. Whether or not Flash will be killed by the time it *is* adopted is still up in the air, in my opinion. The longer a technology is in the marketplace the harder it is to go away.”

What about Google getting into the phone business?

“I do see Google wanting to be in this market in a big way. Phone ads, and whatever patents they may own on the work they did, will generate great revenue streams.”

Next up, I just had to ask my Minnov8 colleague, Steve Borsch, about his take on the latest developments. Steve was a sales exec for Apple for several years in the 1990s.

“I was never actually in an Apple employee meeting with Jobs. [Steve was based here in the Midwest for Apple.]  My only personal contact was at a Macworld, where we had a partner who’d created a Mac-based digital sign that we thought we had management approval to have in the booth.  He walked in, saw the huge digital sign right on the end where the crowd walked in, and said to his underlings, ‘Get that out of here, NOW!’ We were all taken aback at the time, but on further reflection realized that, once again, he was right. The sign detracted from the message of the booth and was inappropriate.”

I asked Steve for his quick reaction about the Flash issue touched on in the WIRED post.

“At our company, we have several machine ‘footprints’ of Adobe stuff, and we invest several thousand dollars per year on their software. I find PDF, InDesign, and other apps mission-critical and invaluable for our business.  While Flash is ubiquitous, it is a resource hog, is mostly proprietary, and I would rather vote for an open web standard — that is, HTML 5 — versus continuing down the path with Flash.

“Case in point with it is the difficulty — and lack of tools from Adobe — to create Flash-based *anything*! I’ve been puzzled for years why they haven’t come out with tools that enable normal humans — meaning designers, not coders — to create and deliver Flash output.  And, no — Flex isn’t it, and the output in InDesign is a joke.”

(For some additional perspective on the Apple/Flash/Adobe situation, check out these recent posts:  Daring Fireball: Apple/Adobe/Flash and Scobleizer: Can Flash Be Saved?)

Finally, I asked Randy Geise for his perspective — and he offered up a lot. Randy is an accomplished graphic designer who began using Apple and Adobe technologies in 1984. He tells the story of calling for Postcsript support in those early days, and having the founder of Adobe himself (John Warnock) get on the phone with him.

“Flash has always been a big resource hog — worse on Mac — but Adobe didn’t really worry about it, as we’d been in a GHz race in the PC industry.  Everything was getting faster, so why worry about putting resources into making Flash (or any Adobe products) more efficient, when the horsepower kept going up?  And all that browser-crashing going on is mainly on the Mac, and what kind of share does it have?  Adobe sat on their laurels – as Jobs has said – got lazy.

“Then two things happened: the Mac share started climbing, and all that crashing — and the fact that Adobe wasn’t using any of the great native, core OSX tech in their Mac apps — pissed Jobs off. Then the mobile web took off with the iPhone — the first phone with a really capable browser — and Adobe didn’t have an efficient version of Flash to go with it.  They still don’t.  Mobile is huge, the iPhone is huge.  The iPad will be huge.  HTML5 is finally coming onboard.  You have the H.264 standard for video.  Everything is changing, there’s less need for Flash (or will be), and Adobe has missed the boat.  They blew it, they were arrogant and lazy.  They used to be able to claim a 99% plugin penetration — the plugin was everywhere.  One could feel fairly confident using some Flash on a site — it would play. Now, you can’t be confident, and the penetration rate of Flash is going down with every iPhone, iPodTouch, and soon iPad sold. A crack has developed, and it’s growing.

“Some say Google will save Flash when they put it on Android.  It won’t — the ubiquity is gone. It’s not safe to use Flash, it’s not everywhere.

“For all those Flash games out there, some say Adobe is about to introduce a version that allows you to develop in Flash and compile it to native apps on various mobile platforms, and that this will save the Flash developers.  May help some for certain things, but it doesn’t really create a true native app using native controls/features.  It’s kind of like Java — write once, debug everywhere, and still a slow runtime.  And the Flash games will still have to compete with all those native games already on the iPhone and other platforms. Good luck.

“Adobe and Flash aren’t going to go ‘poof’ overnight, but I think the writing is on the wall: the Flash era is over.”

I asked Randy if he thought there was any possibility that Apple or Google would support Flash.

“Neither will. They’re both moving a breakneck speed and don’t want to have to slow down and wait for an update to Flash. They’d be hamstrung by any third party. And Adobe doesn’t have a good track record for quickly getting new stuff out — no 64-bit versions for either Windows or OSX, for example. Both Google and Apple are into efficient code. Adobe hasn’t been.  OSX-SnowLeopard for example was all about rewriting for efficiency.  Neither company wants or needs the bloat that is Adobe.  Both Google and Apple need the web to run on open standards.  We’ve just barely gotten out of the era where IE was holding us back on all things new.  Google and Apple are not going to let Adobe/Flash become the new IE.

“Since Android is open, and Google doesn’t really control what apps gets installed, Adobe could make Flash available but installed by the user. That depends, however, on if the Android web browser allows plugins.  And there’s the wild card of Google partners adding it — so it could be somewhat the ‘wild west’ on the Android side.  But Flash won’t be ubiquitous, so one won’t be able to count on it. And that is the death sentence.”

(Randy added that, for those who want to read more, there was a lot of Flash discussion going on today in the comments on this Robert Scoble post: Google Will Save Flash, a Developer Who Uses It Says.)

So, will Apple win?  Is Adobe and its Flash flagship doomed?  And, furthermore….is Google evil?

Minnesota Apple Watchers React to Steve Jobs’ Rant is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Discussed during the show notes:

+ The Pushbutton Web, a concept article by Anil Dash about a ”publish once, distribute everywhere” model:

• Steve Borsch talked about this at his SMBMSP #16 preso at Deluxe)
• Services: Posterous, PixelPipe
• WordPress plugins & themes like tWPter — along with hemes appearing like P2 that turns your WordPress blog into a Twitter-like tool
• Announcement by Typepad that they’re enabling microblogging
• PubSubHubBub at Google
• Google Insights, Trends & Alerts

+ Upcoming Microsoft retail stores and that they’re hiring for them. Also, the Gizmodo ‘leak’ of a presentation/plan done for Microsoft on the store concept

+ Google Voice, Apple & AT&T controversy with the Federal Communications Commission asking for clarification on Apple disallowing Google Voice in the iPhone App Store. Apple’s, Google’s and AT&T’s respective responses.

+ MIMA Summit; and the Social Media Breakfast (SMBMSP) next week at the State Fair.

Minnov8 Gang Podcast #48: Pushbuttons & Voice is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

This Week’s Show Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.

Discussed during the show:

+ Twitter down (and Dragnet’s “Blue Boy” LSD episode); FanChatter; Blog comment addition vendors: Echo and BackType (and BackType Connect for WordPress); Minnesota startups BusinessCard2 and Extendr as well as Retaggr

+ Federal Trade Commission (FTC) looking in to Google’s Eric Schmidt on Apple’s board (now potentially a moot point)

+ Pending Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proceedings regarding wireless open access and handset exclusivity are in motion, and as part of this the FCC requested more information from the Google Voice app rejection by Apple (good overview of the controversy–and Apple’s overall app rejection policy–in this BusinessWeek article)

• FCC’s letter to Apple
• FCC’s letter to AT&T
• FCC’s letter to Google

+ HTML 5 and the open source video codec rejection; Google acquiring On2 and conjecture it was a strategic move to open source On2′s codec, move away from Flash (and minimize the possibility Adobe could make it a ubiquitous application platform as well as continuing to extend its reach as one for video) and not require licensing H.264

+ The MiFi device and the Wired article referred to by Tim; Comcast getting in to wireless broadband

+ “Social Media on a Stick“: Social Media Breakfast, Minneapolis/St. Paul (SMBMSP) is meeting at the State Fair

+ Blogwell is next week! This is positioned as a must-attend event for anyone interested in corporate social media use

+ Evocam: Steve’s geek fun this weekend.

Minnov8 Gang #46: Addicted to Twitter, Chatter about FanChatter & More is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

This Week’s Show Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson. (Note: I apologize for the unfortunate ‘clicks’ heard in Lisa’s audio which were indeterminate)

Discussed During the Show Notes:

+ The music was provided by the Podsafe Music Network, the song is PJ style Blues by artist AjT, a 39 year old french geek and Apple lover.

+ Crunchpad and Mike Arrington on Charlie Rose

+ Twitter 101 and how Ashton Kutcher has come out about the fact that “Twitter Will Change Media”

+ Best Buy:

• Twelpforce: the Twitter account and a Techcrunch article
• The Twitter fight between Doug Beacham & Best Buy CMO, Barry Judge (and social media thought leader, Chris Brogan, has his own take on it here)
• Best Buy Social Media Director job that was crowdsourced and an update #2 on it here

+ The iPod as a multi-function device (can tie Touch to local app devs)

+  BlogWell on August 13th at General Mills (get Minnov8 discount code in this post)

+ Our guest, Lisa Foote, sent over these links for our show notes:

• Citation on “app stores not the future” (Financial Times report on MobileBeat, July 17)
• More on Nokia and QT
• Rhodes
• Android’s growth

+ Finally, as a special tribute to Phil Wilson’s curious and instant recognition that the bumper music for this week’s show was, in fact, very “Cialis commercial-like,” I offer up this Cialis spoof video starring the actor Cuba Gooding, Jr. (possibly NSFW) in honor of Mr. Wilson.

Minnov8 Gang #43: Tech Stuff & Mobile Trends is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

The available session videos and slides from each track are listed on this page and they’ll be updating this session list with all the sessions for Google I/O so check back frequently.

The categories are:

• AJAX + Data APIs
• Social
• App Engine
• Enterprise
• Google Web Toolkit
• Tech Talks
• Wave
• Mobile
• Client

Google I/O Conference Videos & Presentations is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

CodeWeavers says it is offering its version as a proof-of-concept “so Mac and Linux users can try firsthand the power and flexibility of the new Chromium open source browser.”  CrossOver Chromium also showcases the power of Wine, which allows CodeWeavers to rapidly migrate technology from Windows to alternate platforms. (Here’s more about The Wine Project.)

“We did this to prove a point,” said Jeremy White, CodeWeavers CEO, in the press release. “The message is very simply this: if you are a Windows software vendor, and you want to get your product into new markets, you should pay attention to Wine. Wine is a very powerful tool for bringing your product to new audiences in the Mac and Linux spaces. And in many cases Wine is faster and more economical than doing a native port.”

You have to love White’s latest blog post, Fire Drills and Proving a Point, which tells the story of how they pulled off their Chrome version.  An excerpt: “So in a CodeWeavers management meeting one day, we were looking for a way to show off Wine’s new maturity, particularly for porting applications.  What we needed was a freely redistributable application; one that didn’t exist on Mac or Linux, but one that was readily understandable….And then a little bird flew in the Window and chirped ‘Chromium’, and we knew we had it.”

CodeWeavers is no upstart. Founded in 1996, it brings expanded market opportunities for Windows software developers by making it easier, faster, and more painless to port Windows software to Linux. The firm is recognized as a leader in open-source Windows porting technology, and maintains development offices in Minnesota, the UK, and elsewhere around the world.

This announcement is just another example of the creativity and expertise in Minnesota’s developer community. Congratulations to CodeWeavers! I can hardy wait to hear how hard their site will get hit today with Mac and Linux users all trying to download the browser at the same time. Glad I got in early and got mine!  It will also be interesting to watch for Google’s reaction. I gathered that a Mac version was still quite a ways off, and here CodeWeavers does it in a week…   :-)

MN’s Own CodeWeavers Releases ‘CrossOver’ Version of Chrome Browser for Mac and Linux is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.