Microsoft Officially Launches Silverlight

Microsoft has also announced that a number of content providers will be providing Silverlight enabled content online, including Entertainment Tonight, HSN and World Wrestling Entertainment.

What this TechCrunch article doesn’t mention is that Microsoft has paid these companies, or has paid for the deveopment of some of these video players. I know this because the company I work for, Schematic, is in the process of developing some RIAs using Silverlight.
The second thing I’d like to point out is that so far, as of today, I have yet to see any ‘rich internet applications’ built with the Silverlight technology. I have seen a bunch of mediocre video players.
Silverlight is going to try to go head to head with Adobe Flash. If you’d like to see what real rich applications look like on the web, go browse through the featured sites on theFWA.
See the official Silverlight website

There’s been some good ha-ha’s this last month:
iTunes Store To Stop Selling NBC Television Shows – hahaha!
so NBC responds:
NBC ‘DISAPPOINTED’ IN NOT NEGOTIATING NEW ITUNES PACT – hahaha!
and NBC reacts:
After ditching Apple, NBC opts for flex pricing and more DRM with Amazon – HAHAHA! Stop, NBC, you’re killing me!
And on the Sony front:
Sony pulls the plug on Connect, refocuses on PlayStation – Now this is sad. I was really digging that Sony ATRAC music format. Wait, no I wasn’t, and I also wasn’t digging the mini disc format.

Number 1: This image is an example of outstanding art direction.
Number 2: This image echoes the opinion of a lot of people.
It’s funny, because the image doesn’t quite sync up with the point of the article. The point of the article is about how Microsoft is entering the realm of ‘cloud computing’. This refers to services like Google Docs – applications available over the internet, not locked down in your operating system. The article goes on to explain how MS is going to give Google a run for their money by offering similar online tools.
I didn’t read the image that way. I read it as Google shedding light on an otherwise cloudly, gloomy Microsoft-filled world. Whether he intended it or not, the art director of this image has put MS in a bad light (no pun intended).
Great design starts conversation, and I’m sure I’d hear a dozen different interpretations of this image …and that’s a good thing.
Simple, direct and elegant. Great job James C. Best Jr., whoever you are.

I have a word to all you staffing and recruiting agencies out there. I’m going to say this once and that’s it, so listen:
When you sit down to interview me, do not ask me if I have any friends looking for work. Don’t talk to me about how much commission I get per person I find for you.
The focus of my interview is me. I am looking for work, not my friends. Make me feel special (even though I might not be). Stroke my ego for the 15 minutes I’m talking with you. I’m not just a number went I sit down with you, I am your golden ticket. I am your moneymaker.
I promise you, that if you do indeed find me work, I will refer people to you, otherwise, why would I send anyone your way?
Who am I talking about? TTS Personnel, Inc., Gainor, Update Graphics, Artisan Talent, Aquent, Janou Pakter, Randstad … all you clowns, learn some manners.

It’s absurd to think that the iPhone would stay ‘locked’ with AT&T service.
If we’ve learned anything from copy-protecting on music and DVD’s, its that technology wants to be free. It’s an inherent part of the medium.
If something can be encrypted, then it can be decrypted. Knowledge is always flowing 2 directions (or more).
Apple knew this with iTunes and they knew it just as well with iPhone. Lock-in schemes like this were insisted upon by Apple’s partners – not by Apple itself. Apple could give 2 shits if their music has DRM encoded on it, or if their phones only work on AT&T’s networks.
The mobile phone industry in the United States is absurd and their business models have to be taken down and Apple has made the first moves in making this a reality by working the iPhone into their iTunes ecosystem.
This is echoed in this statement by RIM’s CEO (via MacNN):
“It’s a dangerous strategy. It’s a tremendous amount of control,” he says. “And the more control of the platform that goes out of the carrier, the more they shift into a commodity pipe.”
I want to see Blackberry and Palm step up to the plate and offer up some serious competition to the iPhone. In order to do this, though, they have to heed to design. They have to build an experience and not worry so much about features.

I logged into my LinkedIn account this morning and had this invitation.
I laughed and thought LinkedIn was getting funny with their tone of voice.
Then I realized that abbreviating doesn’t work with peoples’ names – especially on buttons. See below.

It’s the same reason a 1963 Ferrari 250 GTL / Lusso is still an amazing piece of machinery.
For people who appreciate true design, waiting for the next version of whatever product you want isn’t an issue.
Quality is quality. No matter how old it is.

Dear Palm: It’s time for an intervention – my sentiments exactly. I love my Treo. I also love my Nintendo – but that doesn’t mean it can compete with a PS3.
Migrating from AS2 to AS3 – a great breakdown of the differences in syntax between AS2 & AS3. After reading this entry, it’s not as bad as I thought but I still have a A LOT of catching up to do.
On a contrary note, here’s a great post by Joshua Davis on using Actionscript 1.0. Yes, I said Actionscript 1.0!

Copan in bag, originally uploaded by combustionchamber.

In the grand George Carlinian tradition of Things That Are Pissing me Off:
I live in New York City.
My friend lives in Boston, Massachusetts.
My friend wants me to come and visit him, so as we’re talking on the phone he says, “Hey, you really have to come down and visit one of these days…”
Has this happened to you?
Why don’t people understand their locations in relation to other places?

By the way my site was down this week, you would have thought I was hosting it in my backyard on a 10-year-old Windows 3.x machine, mounted on cinder blocks and piping through a 28.8 modem.
Unfortunately, I’m actually paying for hosting my site as well as some clients.
I apologize for the downtime.
I should have new hosting by next month.

Maurice Saatchi, executive director of M&C Saatchi has had a revelation on saving advertising (He doesn’t say that in the article but someone is going to have to show companies ‘the way’ and why not Saatchi). Why is advertising dying? Oh this stupid thing we have called technology. Yeah, technology is making things difficult for the Saachi brains. His solution? See below:

What I am describing here is a new business model for marketing, appropriate to the digital age. In this model, companies compete for global ownership of one word in the public mind.

Woah.

For example, the word “search” is now owned by Google. For 20 years, “favourite” was owned by British Airways. Sony used to own “innovation”, but that word has probably now been taken by Apple. Royal Bank of Scotland, in its US marketing, will soon own “action”. The same applies to political parties or countries – Britain’s Labour party won three elections with the word “new”. America’s one-word equity is “freedom”.

More woah. Innovation has ‘probably’ been taken by Apple? I never knew Sony had it? It must be great to be at the top of the company and can afford to just make shit up.
Oh and Maurice has made a really nasty, bloated Flash site for his new paradigm. Ooof that is nasty! Why not carry over the simplicity of one word equity and make a simple, clear site?
Truly Amazing. Great rhetoric there, mister Saachi guy.

From the set, 8.15 – 8.16.2007

Dreamhost down again
Yesterday all tubes were full
Please don’t bust my balls