Google Wave

What is Google Wave?

Google Wave is a 'next generation' email system. It takes cues from Gmail and builds a new model for conversation over the web. A simplistic way of looking at it is to say that it is a mash up of an email app, IM client, Wiki, blog, and photo sharing site. A more sophisticated way of seeing it is as email reimaged, or thinking about how one would build a communication system on the web starting from scratch.

Google Wave not only changes how we use email, but also how the nuts and bolts of it work. Resources (like images) are uploaded once and then shared where ever they need to be, in a document, a photo album, a blog, etc... And Wave will allow 'drag and drop' of images (and maybe other files?) into the browser directly from your desktop onto the web.

Instant Message or Email? Yes, both.

Currently, during an Instant Message conversation, each person waits while the other types. No more, as one person types, the other sees each word, indeed each letter, as they are typed. This instant and continual connection is what dissolves the line between what an email is and what an instant message is. Conversations can be conducted as they would in a current email environment, or can be treated like a chat session.

You say 'Conversation' I say 'Wave'

One of Gmail's innovations was the inventions of 'conversations'. In the 'old days', emails would be bounced back and forth between users and would whined up scattered across the inbox. But Gmail automatically consolidated all these emails into on expandable conversation. The new basic unit in Google Wave is simply called a Wave which is basically the same thing as a current Gmail conversation, but on steroids (legal ones of course). A Wave can be replied to like a conventional email, or the recipient can insert a reply anywhere in the original wave, so the reply has context. In addition, the recipient can edit the original email, treating it like a collaborative document.

This free wheeling editing capability could get confusing and downright dangerous if not for a basic feature built into the frame work of Google Wave: a timeline. This timeline can be used to 'roll back' the conversation within the wave to see who added or deleted what and when. It is a simple and intuitive method of tracking changes and makes this whole email thing much more elegant. You can seamlessly flow from a typical 'email' into a collaborative document to a chat and back again, the hole time being able to see exactly where the story started and how it grew.

Bona Fide

If it is not clear just how big of a step forward this is, know that Wave is from the same guys who did Google Maps. Google Maps completely revolutionized online maps. Every other mapping system has been chasing (copying) Google Maps for years. I expect the same will be true of Wave.

Mobile Integration

The developers of Google Wave have worked very hard to make all different kinds of communication seamless. Wave can be used like the email you know and love or like IM. But the developer's zeal for seamlessness did not stop there, they built the system from the ground up to work beautifully both on your desktop and on your mobile phone. There certainly is a difference between the mobile and desktop versions, but the parity between them far exceeds the differences.

For you, for me, it's free, it's Open Source.

Not only is the design and functionality of Wave extraordinary, but so is Google's approach to the platform, they are giving it away. Anyone can download and install Wave on their own server and run with it, no strings attached. The code is open and the dev team has made is easy to create 'extensions' that make Wave do what you want it to do. This is extremely powerful, what we have seen of Wave so far really is just the early iterations of the dev team, but Wave is more a frame work than a final product. I expect that Wave will evolve in many different ways in the coming years and that has the power to solidify it's continued success.

But when a developer takes Wave and makes it his own, that does not leave the developer on his own lonely product fork. Nope, Google Wave is designed to work with variants of itself. You can customize it and still have it play nice with someone else's customized Wave.

Plays nice with social networks

As I mentioned at the top, one of the core ideas is to create the content once and share it where every you want. That means plopping a Wave component down into your FaceBook page, should you be so inclined. Post a 'Wave' to blog? Sure thing, and it retains all its 'Wave like' properties. If you update the Wave, the Blog reflects that change as you change it.

Powerfully extensible

Google not only lets people mess with Wave, they want people to mess with Wave. The Wave dev team created a simple API for creating extensions. By doing this, they have invited a lot of people to the party. Think about how successful Firefox has become, in no small part because that is what they did. There are thousands of extensions for Firefox that let it do all kinds of things from grabbing video from YouTube to notifying you when you have a new email. Google is not staffed by dummies and they are not to proud to take a play out of the Firefox's playbook.

The Wave dev team has built a few of their own extensions to get the ball rolling. One of the most impressive is Rosie that instantly translates Waves into your language, letting you chat (in real time) with someone typing in a foreign language.

Other examples of Wave's extensions are:

• Integrated with Twitter
• Play Chess in real time in a Wave
• (the aforementioned) ability to automatically post a Wave to a blog

And in this corner, from Redmond, Washington...

Wave is in beta now, open only to a select group of developers. It is scheduled to be released at the end of the summer (2009). As it stands, one glaring omission from Wave is calendar functionality. I have little doubt that it will be added in at some point. Maybe it is such a large feature set that it was not ready for the preview. Or maybe that functionality will be added through an extension. Or maybe, just maybe Google did not want to scare Microsoft too much.

I can not know or speculate if Google intentionally targeted Microsoft's Exchange server (that runs most company's email systems) or if the threat that Wave posses to Exchange is just a byproduct of Google's desire to build the next generation internet communication platform. Either way, Wave certainly is the scariest thing to happen for Microsoft since Firefox. In fact, it is significantly scarier.

If Wave proves to be reliable and secure, Exchange will have a competitor like nothing it has seen before. IT departments around the world will have the option of a wildly powerful, extensible, and controllable communications platform in Wave. And it is free. Compared to a buggy, semi-secure, closed, and expensive alternative (Exchange).

Wave lacks two things that Exchange has; Exchange is the leader so it is what IT departments know, and Exchange has integration with Outlook's calendar features. Outlook lets a company know who is doing what, when, and where. It is a massively powerful tool. If and when Wave adds similar (or, based on what we have seen from Wave so far, superior) features, Microsoft will be in real danger of loosing it's grip on the business market and by extension, it's grip on the operating system market. Oh, did I not mention, because Wave is completely web based, it does not matter what operating system people are using to access it, it is all the same. Unless you are running Internet Explorer which was distinctly absent from the list of browsers that Wave will work in. But then, if you are still running Internet Explorer, you have bigger problems...

There is a lot of work still to do on Wave, and a lot of ground it has to cover before it can even be considered a threat to Microsoft. But, in my mind, it is the first real challenge that could be a serious threat to Microsoft as a whole.

And to be frank, Microsoft does not look to be in a position to deal with a serious competitor right now. They look better now than they have for years, they are set to release Windows 7 that may be their first operating system that does not suck since Windows 2000. They recently launched their new search engine, 'bing' that also does not suck. It may even be on par with Google. But, 'not sucking' is no way to compete with a serious threat. And when you release a new product, it can not be 'just as good as', it needs to be better, otherwise who cares?

Third Place

I was awarded third place in the photography catagory for Mega-Mum at this years Katonah art show.

Mega-Mum

Katonah Art Show

The Women's Civic Club of Katonah is holding the 2009 Annual Beaux Arts Exhibit at the Katonah Library. The show runs from May 18th through the 23rd. The reception will be on Saturday May 23rd, 2009 from 2pm until 4pm.

I have two photography works in the show:

Mega-Mum

Flower Kaleidoscope

Microsoft has dumb customers

Microsoft features 'real' people in their new ads who are looking for laptops and, surprise, they find that PCs running Windows are better for them than Macs.

The first 'shopper' up was the now infamous Lauren who says she is on a strict $1000 budget. Why such a strict budget Lauren? You are driving a VW Beetle that costs a good $10,000 more then a nice little Honda or Toyota. It's a vanity car. I don't know much about clothes, but yours look trendy and expensive. And, in the end, you are 'drawn' to one laptop because of its looks.

So, the idea that you are on a budget, or that you are too smart to get suckered into the Mac simply for its design is flat our ridiculous. In reality, 9 out of 10 Laurens wind up buying a Mac


Second 'shopper' up is Giampaolo. He says he is 'technically savvy'. He drives a Ford Probe, 'nuf said.

Also note that none of these shoppers seem to do any research until they hit the floor at their local Best Buy. That's just dumb.

I'm going on about this because it is really sad that Microsoft just can't figure out how to find an ad agency with a brain.

Oh, and I own a Mac (I got a good deal on it). And I run Windows on it. And I drive a Toyota Matrix. It's not pretty or hip (it is downright ugly) but it was cheap, reliable, and is like a mini truck when I put the rear seats down.

Circus

People are very upset about bonuses handed out to AIG execs. Granted, it is rather shameless for AIG to be continuing down the same seemingly greed driven path they have been on, but let's keep two things in mind. First, we don't know why the bonuses were given. There is a slight chance that these execs made some kind of herculean effort that minimized AIG's loses. Maybe without these people things would be a whole lot worse. I'm just saying it's possible. Second, it's only $165 million. That is just peanuts in the greater scheme of things. No, actually it's less then that, it's peanut shells.

Yes, it sickens me that a bunch of greedy bastards who screwed up royally are getting even more compensation for their irredeemable behavior, but this huge uproar over it is simply a side show we don't have time for. We and out leaders should be focusing on fixing the larger economic problems at hand. Spending this much time over how $165 was used is just stupid.

And, it's not AIG's fault, it was written into law. There was an amendment added that allowed any bonus stipulated before February 11, 2009 to be paid out. So can we really blame AIG for handing them out? Well, of course we can, but the bigger issue here is were did that amendment come from. There is a lot of finger pointing, but no one is fessing up.

This amendment is the much, much bigger breach of ethics then the bonuses themselves, because it is a grotesque use of political power. We need to stop talking about the bonuses and simply have the Senate setup an investigation into who added the amendment. It does not have to be a big show, put just enough people on it to get it sorted out. Once we know who did it, we know who will be resigning. Or, if they are too stupid and cowardly, who will be expelled from the Senate.

It is a bit ironic, but if the White House and Congress would spend even one percent of the time they have spent on this circus on each and every $165 million they spend, we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with.

AdSense Interest-Based Advertising

Over the coming months, Google will be rolling out a new feature to their AdSense system called "Interest-Based Advertising". If you are not familiar with AdSense, scroll down a little and a look in the right hand column. See the light blue box that says at the top, "Ads by Google"? That is AdSense. Ads in that box are automatically placed there by Google. Google scans the content of my site and figures out which ads match that content. I write about photography a lot, so most of the ads are photography related. I get a couple of pennies every time those ads are clicked.

With this new "Interest-Based Advertising" system, Google will change the way it determines which ads will appear. Ad selection will now be, at least in part, determined by a visitor's profile that has been built up over time. What that means is that Google will track your movements on the Internet and determine what you are interested in. Don't get paranoid, it can only track you on Google properties and sites with AdSense. Google requires all participating sites to disclose this in their Privacy Policy. If you look at a lot of photography related sites, Google will think you are a photographer and show you photography related ads. It will not matter too much which site you are on, if the site has AdSense, Google will populate that site with photography ads.

This is the logical path for Google to follow, but I'm not crazy about it and think that, to some extent, it is a bad idea. It too easily pigeon-holes a person into being one type of shopper, in essence, one type of person. Sure, I look at a lot of photography equipment, but what if I decide I want to start scuba diving? If I go to a scuba blog, will I still see ads for photography? Now, it's reasonable to assume that Google will eventually realize I am now a photographer and a scuba diver, but how long does that take?

This may water down the effectiveness of AdSense as there will always be a lag between what Google thinks my interests are and what my interest is at that moment. For instance, if I go to a blog about baby cribs to read up on those for the first time, AdSense may show me ads for photography, because that is what Google has determined my interest to be. Well, I'm not shopping for photo gear, I'm shopping for cribs. Eventually, Google will figure that out, but that is of no use to that first web site I went to. That web site owner won't get any of my clicks because they are not relevant to what I want right now. This, ironically, may hurt the most relevant web sites that show up at the very top of Google search results as you will look at those sites before Google has a chance to figure out that you are now looking for cribs.

Can I turn "Interest-Based Advertising" off?

Yes, Interest-Based Advertising can be turned off. Both as a web site owner and a surfer.

If you are a web site owner, you can go into your AdSense account and opt out of this new system in which case, ads will be served to your site they way they have been. Here is how you turn off Interest-Based Advertising. Though, Google is implying that you may not have access to the same pool of ads because some advertisers may opt to only put ads on sites that are using Interest-Based Advertising.

If you are browsing the Internet and you don't want Google to track your activity for use with this system, you can opt out of the tracking cookie here. If you want to take advantage of this new system, but want more control, you can set your preferences here.

So far, I have only talked about the potential doom and gloom of this new system, but it can be a good thing too. It will allow advertisers to target their audience much more precisely, and most importantly, on an ongoing basis. An advertiser could setup their ads to remember how you have interacted with them in the past. For instance, say I click on an AdSense ad for camera equipment on Amazon.com. Amazon has the power now to remember the information for the next AdSense delivered ad I see from them. Maybe I clicked on an add for a specific camera and bought it. Amazon has the ability to then tailor the next ad I see from them to maybe some lens or other accessory for that camera which they currently have on sale. The interaction possibilities are almost endless and may give the consumer more timely and relevant ads. That can be good for the consumer and the web site owner because it means I will be clicking on more of their ads and they get more of Google's pennies.

And, this being Google, they are smarter then I so it is likely that they are at least aware of these pitfalls and are working to minimize them, or make them go away entirely.

I've turned off the Interest-Based Advertising on this site for now, I don't want to be part of the 'beta' project. But I will be keeping an eye on the system and experimenting with it in the coming years to see if it becomes more of a helpful or harmful service.

Buttons = Good

The 2nd generation iPod Shuffle was one of the most beautifully designed mass manufactured products ever (IMHO). Granted, it had the dreaded click wheel, but its size, shape, and the fact that it was basically a clip with a music player built in made it one masterfully designed object. It bordered on being too small to be practical, but it was still large enough so that it was possible to find after you put it down.

Ever the optimist, I thought Apple would improve the Shuffle by keeping the shape, but replacing the click wheel with discrete buttons that would be easier to find and distinguish by touch. And maybe add a little screen?

Sadly, this was not to be, the new iPod shuffle eschews buttons to the point of sacrificing usability. It is also too small and nondescript. Put it down and I dare you to find it again.

The controls are on the headphones which ties the player to the headphones. Don't like the included headphones? Tough, get used to it. It's Apple's way or the highway.

Why even bother having the headphones plug in? you can not change them, so a more fully thought out design would simply integrate them with the player. There is simply no need to have them as a detachable part. It's an odd oversight for a company known for its design prowess.

Granted, most people will probably still be able to pick it up and just start using it, but there are several features that will be opaque to those who don't read the manual. But, for such a simple product, should there even be a manual?

These hidden features are all based on audio feedback feature of the new shuffle, it now talks to you. I hate the idea of my audio device talking to me, but no one will know they are there, so I guess that it's a wash.

But why build features into a product that people won't use, that people can't use because they don't know they are there.

The hardcore Apple consumers, not the fanboys, but the ones that buy a new iPod every year because they break, or loose, or just want to replace their old iPod don't read the manual. They just want to pick it up and use it, taking the cues on how to use the player from the player itself.

It's just bad design to obfuscate the functions of a product.

Edit: Almost as soon as I published this post, I realized that there are plenty of good reasons to obfuscate functions of a product, especially software. Many products (like Microsoft Word) have huge features sets that only a handful of people use. So obfusscating those features clear up the interface for the average user, but leave them there for the power user.

Now, the iPod Touch is incredible. And now that it works with the Kindle Bookstore, it's even more incredible. I had a chance to have a look at a the Kindle App for the iPhone and, though it was a little small, found it to be a cool and usable eBook reader. Granted, I'm still young enough to set the type to its smallest setting, that does make a big difference. If you can not read it at the smallest text size, it becomes very tedious to flip the page every two seconds. I wonder too if it will also cause excessive eye strain having to constantly go from line to line as you are forced to with such short lines of text.

Talk, Not Torture Wins the Day

"Similarly, it was a relationship-building approach that we used to persuade a detainee to give us information on the whereabouts of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former leader of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia — information that led to his being located and killed in 2006."

I wonder why no one at the Bush White House thought this was worth mentioning...

From, "Try a Little Tenderness".

Inexpensive Macro Photography

I am very much enthralled with the abstraction of macro photography (as seen in my photos) and I'm all about cheap. So, let me combine the two, here is a cheap way to shoot macro. The nice thing about this solution is that it will work on just about any camera, DSLRs as well as Point and Shoots.

Here it is, the Opteka 52mm 10x HD² Professional Macro Lens. This 'closeup filter' attaches to the front of a lens with a 58mm filter thread. Opteka sells this closeup filter in several different kits, each one containing a different 'step down filter adapter' that allows it to fit different lens filter sizes. 58mm is the size of many Canon lenses including the ubiquitous Canon EF-S 18-55mm IS. On this page, Amazon has a boatload of kits to fit just about any DSLR and many point and shoots.

Essentially, adding one of these to your lens is like putting a magnifying glass in front of your camera. The images below show how it compares to a true macro lens, the inimitable Nikon 60mm Micro. The first image is with the 60mm at full extension, at this 'zoom' the 60mm is a 1:1 ratio. That means that image is fully filling the sensor at a one to one scale. The next image is with the Opteka fit on the standard Nikon 18-55mm AF-S VR kit lens at 55mm and focused as close as possible. Following that, is a shot with the same lens, but without the 18-55mm so the impact of the closeup filter and be readily seen. The last image is with the Opteka attached to the wonderful Nikon 50mm f/1.8D AF-D.

Click on an image to see the larger, straight from the camera, image.

Nikon 60mm Micro

Opteka on the Nikon 18-55mm AF-S VR lens

Nikon 18-55mm AF-S VR lens without the Opteka

Opteka on the Nikon 50mm f1.8 AF-D

The Opteka brings the 18-55mm quite a bit closer, almost to 1:1. Same goes for the Opteka on the 50mm. The images a softer than the 60mm Macro, but for $30, it seems like a bargain to me. On these smaller lenses at longer focal lengths there is no noticeable vignetting, but there will be on fatter lenses. The 18-55mm will show vignetting as you zoom out, but it works best for macro shots at 55mm, so there is no reason to be zooming out.

The depth of field is noticeably more shallow in the image from the 60mm, this is because the closer you get, the shallower your depth of field becomes. All the images were shot at f14 so it is apparent that a lot of light is needed to make a macro shot work. Unless you want to exaggerate the shallow depth of field, in which case, attaching the Opteka to the 50mm f1.8 really makes things interesting. Even though the 60mm is rated as an f2.8, that is not fixed, the closer you focus, the more it stops down. It is only f2.8 at about 6 feet to infinity, then starts to stop down and ends at f5 at its closest (1:1) focus.

Now, if you put the Opteka on the 50mm f1.8, it does not stop down, it shoots at whatever aperture you want from 1.8 too 22.

OK, so what happens if the Opteka is attached to the 60mm? It does get in closer, but the trade-off of sharpness is, in my opinion, is not worth it. Without the opteka, the 60mm will frame the helmet from top to bottom with a little space, with the Opteka attached, most of the domed head would be cropped out. At that point, the depth of field gets so shallow that a great deal of light is needed to stop down all the way to the 60mm's minimum aperture, f57.

One last note, I've tested the Opteka with the 50mm f1.8 on a full frame FX camera (Nikon N75) and there is no noticeable vignetting there either.

Showing at 2009 KMAA exhibition "Seasonal Shift"

I had two photographs selected for the 2009 KMAA exhibition "Seasonal Shift". The show will be at Ridgefield Guild's Gallery Barn. Show details:

• March 15, 4-7 PM: Artists' Reception
• March 22: Gallery talk by the juror, Michael Blakeney
• March 29: Last day of exhibition . Artists pick up work 4-7 PM

Ridgefield Guild of Artists

Water / Light #4

Water / Light #3

A list of the participating artists

• Sally Aldrich : The Sky is Falling
  
• Frances B. Ashfoth : Spring Field
  
• Suzanne Ashley : Mill Street
  
• Lois M. Barker : The Awakening
  
• Deborah Beck : Morning Dew
  
• Richard Bennett : Yankee Nightgame & Baseball Grid
  
• Edward Burke : Early Spring
  
• Sarah Corbin : Oak Spring
  
• Ivy Dachman : Untitled43
  
• Hilda Green Demsky : South of the Wind
  
• Karen Williams Edelmann : The Earth. That is Sufficient
  
• Monique Ford : Tropic Improv
  
• Marcy B. Freedman : Ten Seconds (How Time Flies)
  
• Randy Frost : Metro North - Harlem Division
  
• James Fryer : Water-Light-3 & Water-Light-4
  
• Michele Gage : Untitled (Mianus River Gorge 4)
  
• Julia Goldberg : Lily Pond - Bronx Botanical Gardens
  
• Patricia A. Grabel : New England Winter
  
• H. Sitki Gulergun : Bullseye
  
• June Gumbel : The Orchard in the Spring
  
• Nils Hill:  WNY-1
  
• Bernie Kessler:  Constitution Marsh, Garrison & Rolling Meadows
  
• GG Kopilak : Tree Reflections
  
• Barbara Korman : Coming Alive
  
• Paul Krause : Crescent Pods
  
• Elaine Krause : Lotus Variation
  
• Martee Levi : Winter Thaw
  
• Annette Lieblein : Transitional II
  
• Belle Manes : The Woods are Lovely Dark and Deep…
  
• Ronald Meyerson : Illusion #12
  
• Bernie Mindich : Spring Forward
  
• Nancy Egol Nikkal : Winter Thaw 2
  
• Constance Old : Whiskmarks 0107212508
  
• Ethel Renek : Edge of the Woods
  
• Harriet Sadow:  Four Seasons & The Midnight Wind
  
• Renee Santhouse : March Wind on the Bay
  
• Barbara Browner Schiller : Joie de Vivre
  
• Wendy Shalen : Montalk Dawn
  
• Phyllis Sinrich : A New Day
  
• Arle Sklar-Weinstein : Message from Waccabuc
  
• Ron Topping : Four Seasons
  
• John Wagner : Mianus Summer
  
• Gabriella E. Wagner : Little Raincloud