Public Streams

I really think Google+ needs this enhancement to public sharing.

My first impressions upon joining G+ were good; finally a network that allowed a public forum but that wasn't as mindless, limited, or noisy as Twitter.  This was Quora with more social and more sharing.

But alas, I started following some popular public figures and was quickly disenchanted as they posted content completely unrelated to what I'd known them for, and in some worse cases, content that was overly personal or involved bathroom humor.

Basically, the public side of G+ could be a great mashup between Google Reader and Facebook.  I could log on, intuitively find people "blogging" (or rather posting publicly), and sign up to hear about their interest-related content.  Users would be given the chance to create "Public Streams" that could each be interest-specific.  I would be able to follow +Robert Scoble's tech stream, while not having to see all his photography-related posts.  I could still have the ability to circle Robert, and hence would be subscribing myself to all his public streams.  Note however that if Robert decides to only start sharing his content with private circles, I wouldn't be able to see the posts unless Robert had circled me.  Imagine the pureness of content I could achieve in my interest circles!  Here's a few mockups:

Selecting the "Public Streams" box would reveal a drop down of all the public streams that Leo posts to.  I would be able to hover over one and the list of my circles would pop up and I could add his public stream to the circle of my choosing.

Current sharing: when choosing with whom to share a post, I select a circle, all my circles, or simply make it "Public" which lets it loose on the internet as well as spamming all my circles, who may or may not be interested in public posts I'm sharing.  Posting something to public streams under the new system would not share it with my circles unless they had specifically followed those streams or had chosen to follow all of my public streams.

Under the new sharing system, as I post (or share things from around the web), I can choose to share the post with certain private circles, or one or more of my public streams.  This transforms public sharing into the fastest, simplest blogging platform on the internet; and even more, users are ensured, depending on the sharing integrity of the blogger, that they will see only relevant content!  Win-win!






My final step with this change would be to fully integrate blogspot (blogger) blogs into this system.  I know, I know: bold, brash, and maybe a little crazy.  But think about it: millions of mommy bloggers (of which there are not a few in my own extended family) being able to seamlessly switch over to G+ and even more, see increased engagement from their content.  How would the integration work?  First of all: as I logged in to G+ one day, it would pop up and ask me if I'd like to be able to post to my blog from G+.  Once I clicked yes, it would ask if I wanted to allow G+ users to follow/circle my blog from G+.  After clicking yes, the "Public Streams" box would show up on my profile for people to circle.  As well, when I go to share content from the sharing box on G+, it would give me the option to post to my public stream/blog.  I could also choose whether posts from G+ showed up on my blog on the blogging site.  If yes, then visiting my blog's url would show you blog posts plus G+ posts shared to it.  In blogger, I could choose to auto post to my G+ public stream, or keep it limited to my blog.  I think the take would be vast and would completely nail the public side of G+.

Next, I'll be posting about how the big goog could nail the private side of G+. Stay tuned.

Chip Conley: Measuring what makes life worthwhile | Video on TED.com

Chip Conley: Measuring what makes life worthwhile | Video on TED.com

Chrome Extensions

I don't have a ton of time tonight, but I wanted to post about Chrome Extensions.  Let me just say that I don't know how we browsed the internet before we had extensions.  Seriously!  I love the agility, speed, and convenience extensions offer.  Anyway, on to some screenshots:

So this is a screenshot of my new tab (when you push ctr+t or open a new tab); now, I'm not going to speak specifically to the webapps which are the pretty icons taking up the bulk of this page, but rather divert your attention up to the top right-hand corner of the page where all the little icons are just to the left of the tiny wrench (your chrome 'options' menu).  Those icons each represent a different extension I've installed.  Another screenshot:

This is a list of extensions I have installed (well, partial list).  You access this menu by right clicking any of your extensions and choosing "Manage Extensions".  In this tab, you can disable, uninstall, check out settings, or update your extensions.  On to my favorite extensions:

-Google voice.  Oh beautiful thing you are GV.  So if you'll notice in the screenshot above, I have one of my extensions, Google Voice, opened.  When I click on the little phone within the speech bubble, it brings up my google voice inbox, so I can quickly see recent texts as well as any missed calls to my phone.  I can also (as shown above) send a quick text to whoever I want (all synced with my google contacts info!).  Let me tell you how much I love this feature while in class!  The perfect solution to texting in class and......letting others know you're in class and can't talk of course! (*smirk)  Anyway, I love it and use it all the time.

-Another icon above is a little vice grip with a green box it's clamping down on.  This is my goog.le URL shortener extension which instantly transforms any URL of a page I'm on into a mini version that looks better on twitter/facebook/etc.  Love it.

-On the very far right is a blue icon with a 'd' in the middle.  This is actually my newest favorite extension as it allows me to put sticky notes on webpages (and they reload when you come back to the webpage!) as well as save notes from a webapp, and even entire webpages to 'Read Later'.  I'll post more on this in a later post when I discuss webapps.

-A few other extensions don't have icons up in the toolbar, but rather live in the background.  Ones that I have installed include: Google Dictionary (lives in my omnibox for easy defining of words), Google Translate (automatically detects websites not in English and offers to translate them for me), Highlight to Search (when you highlight something on a webpage, a little magnifying glass pops up and you can search the term in a new tab), PriceBlink (automatically recognizes when you're buying something on a page and checks a bunch of other sites to see if there are cheaper prices), Read Later Fast (by Diigo, save webpages to see later), RescueTime Productivity Meter (ha! this one is funny, it tracks your browsing data and gives you stats on how distracted you are), and RSS Subscription Extension (any page that has RSS, you can click this little guy and it adds it to your Google Reader RSS feed, nifty!).

Anyway, I love extensions, they rock.  More on the netbook coming soon......

-quinnj

Life in the Cloud(s)

And we're back!

So I thought I would just take a few minutes to talk a little more conceptual before I do some more hardware/practical blogging on the Cr-48.  But first a Dilbert cartoon:

Love it.  So anyway, what's the big deal about the cloud?  Well, the Cr-48 makes the cloud a pretty big deal.........I mean, seriously, it's like, almost all there is.  Yes I'm sure you've read an article or two about the hardware specs, so yes, it only has a 16 gig SS hard drive.  But even stuff you store locally is hard to access.

Anyway, the point is, this is a shift in mindset for chromebook users.  No longer do we deal with "Windows Explorer" and C:/drives, and F:/ drives, and D:/ drives, organizing folders within folders within folders within.........nope, you do all that in Google docs!  (Or some other web-based storage site, I like dropbox) (btw, did you notice the redesign to Google docs made in the last day or two?  Looks pretty slick!  Check out my screenshot below:

Looks like they redid the icons for the file structure on the left, redid how the file tags look on the documents and added a handy thumbnail view of the document to the right.  They also added a handy toolbar at the top to search for certain types of files, pics, video, docs, etc.  Anyway, sorry for the longest parentheses break ever!)

Again, this is a shift in mindset, but so far for me, a welcome one!  So I've been using the Cr-48 as my primary computer for school this semester and I'll have to say I love it.  I'll be posting soon about some of the specific webapps I'm using as well as how I use Google docs/Dropbox, but I've enjoyed knowing that all my school docs are in the cloud.  This comes in handy when I need to use a heavy-duty stats program on the school computer and with no thumb drives or having to email myself the needed documents, it's already there and ready to access.

It also means that I haven't lost work on a single document yet this semester.  No word crashes, powerpoint crashes, nada, ning, zilch.  Google docs saves pretty much every character, so I think it would actually require some maneuvering to lose your work on there.

I'll also comment later about moving other things to the cloud such as music, photos, and video, so stay tuned to hear how I'm trying to defy gravity.

But to conclude, if the number of spammy tweeters tells us anything about what a bunch of so called SEO experts think is the future, it's the cloud.  Having the ability to access your information non-hardware specific; whether that be a desktop, laptop, netbook, tablet, or phone.  Bring it on.

Let me know if you have requests of things you want to hear about the Cr-48.  I'll be trying to post as often as possible and I have an idea list of a dozen or so posts, but I'm definitely open to requests.  Ok, more tomorrow.

-quinnj

My New Cr-48 Google Chrome Netbook!

Cast your minds..........It's December 3rd, and you're feigning boredom in an attempt to continue procrastinating studying for finals.  The second you become direction-less, where do you turn?  Facebook, of course.  You log on for the bazillionth time that day to skim the 3-4 posts that have come up in your feed since you last checked.  "Pumpin' some sweet iron @Gold's", "Repost if you love ponies!", "Blah, blah, blah....".

But then something catches your eye, a familiar icon.

And then you remember your punk junior high cousin (who seems to be in some kind of competition to add every FB group ever created) had liked the Google Chrome page  last week.  Being a big Chrome browser fan, you figured this was one group you'd really like to join to stay abreast new Chrome updates.

Next to the icon, you see an invitation + link to take a quiz regarding your internet usage behavior, and as a grand prize for taking the quiz you could get...........a FREE Google Chrome Laptop sticker!  Hurray!  Wait....what?  What's a laptop sticker?  Is that like what apple cult members have all over their macbooks?  Oh well.....it's free right?  So you take the seemingly innocent quiz and enter your address info to get your sticker.

A week later, you see a post from TechCrunch in your Reader feed and see that Google's doing a new Chrome OS presentation and they're live-streaming!  You quickly push your homework aside and log on to catch the event.  It's mostly over, but you pick up from the beginning anyway and spend the next hour fantasizing about this new OS.  Then a line drops you back from the clouds, "Some of you may have seen a Facebook quiz we put up a few days ago on our Chrome FB page.  Those who took the quiz before December 3rd have automatically been added to the pilot program.  We're shipping netbooks immediately, so people should start receiving them in the next few days."  HOLD THE PHONE.....WHAT?!?  Seriously??  You break into a cold sweat thinking that you might actually be getting a netbook.  You race to your browsing history and start scrolling back to the day of December 3rd, praying you find the right FB link.  

And yes!  There it is!  At 5:46 PM on December 3rd, you took the quiz!  Will that count?  Do they have a 5 PM deadline cutoff?  Only time will tell........

Each day drags painfully on.  The mounting pressure of finals and final projects is feeling more and more like giving a sumo wrestler a ride on your shoulders.  One day passes, then two.  Still no netbook.  Day three arrives and classes again cause physical pain to rip through your soul.  On the drive home from campus in the late afternoon, depression and relief set in as you realize it's still/just one more week until Christmas break.  You start to pull into the driveway for your apartment complex when you see the Fedex guy just pulling out.

Wait!  Could it be??  You totally forgot that a netbook might be coming!  You quickly park and race up the stairs three at a time and as you turn the corner on your floor, what do you behold??

"There she is......Ms. America!!"  You breathlessly approach the door, and gently pinch your arm to make sure you're not dreaming.  Can this really be happening?  Yes, yes it can.

You rush inside and tear open the packaging and yes, there it is.  A new Chrome netbook, in all it's chromed glory (er, black matte glory....).  You pull it out.  Snap the battery in.  Open up the lid.  The power light automatically comes on and then the screen shows:

About 7 seconds later, it shows this

                                          

You enter your google username and password.  You snap a quick picture and then boom!  You're in a browser and a few seconds later, your bookmarks, extensions and browsing preferences are all loaded, identical to the browser you closed 30 minutes earlier in class.  Amazing.

So instead of you, replace that with me and you have my story in getting the Cr-48, Google's test-run netbook running the Chrome Operating System.  As part of this pilot program, I was sent this netbook and charger free and asked to use it as a primary computer.  I was also encouraged to report bugs or other thoughts about my experience.  This blog is a part of my attempt to share with the world my experience with the Cr-48 and my thoughts about Google's foray into operating systems.  I'm not a computer engineer by any means and I know practically nothing about Linux (what the Chrome OS is based on), but I do have a little programming experience and consider myself a fairly cutting-edge technology user.  I'm also a big Google fan.  So I hope you enjoy learning about my experience using the Cr-48.

-quinnj