Who uses AOL anymore anyway? 
I am getting seriously annoyed with Facebook. Can you please make privacy easy and simple. I don't want to have to opt out of everything. I don't want to have to update my privacy settings after every new story about some exploit or problem.
It should be everything is
1. Everyone
2. Friends
3. Customize
If you want option #3 knock yourself out. I don't want to have to deal with it.
I tried to get a PDF onto my iPhone once back in the day. It was super hard. Eventually I just emailed it to myself. 
Now with iBooks I tried again and it was super easy. Here are the steps.
1. Drag the file into iTunes.
2. ummmm, your done. There are no more steps.
Thanks Apple for making it easy to something that needed to be easy from the start.
It was an amazing movie. Great ending, great action, great plot, great acting. I loved it.
I especially liked the creating part. So cool.
Bourne mixed with the Matrix.
If you haven't seen this yet... watch it.
It's been featured on the Huffington Post, Fast Company, CBS News, among others. Almost a million views in a couple of days.
Love it.
I liked it. It follows the classic storyline.
Boy has problems. Boy finds mentor.
Mentor is unwilling. Boy finds love.
Boy gets more problems. Mentor trains boy.
Boy wins back love. Boy beats enemies down.
Jaden Smith is a good kid actor, and Jackie Chan is himself.
I kind of missed hearing the classic lines in English. Somehow "Sweep the leg." in Chinese wasn't as sinister.
But I liked it. I might even take a nephew to see it in theaters. Definitely Redbox it.
From Love it. Go USA!
I don't know what these guys knees are going to look like in 20 years, but this is sick.
Quite possibly one of the worst movies I have ever seen.
It looked quite "fake". I'm sure it would have been more impressive in 3D but a movie should have to rely on gimmicks.
The plot was convoluted and dry. I never felt bad for Alice. I wanted to slap her a few times. No character drew me in. The White Queen (Anne Hathaway) was dreadful. I felt at times that what happened above ground was more interesting than Wonderland.
I wouldn't even spend a dollar on it from Redbox.
I signed up for Quora and connected my Twitter account and found this.
Awesome. I love it when companies take the initiative and do things for you.
via youtube.com
I love this. Great ad, great fun. I want one of these at my school.
I use the http://tippingbucket.org/ to contribute a couple dollars to various causes that I want to support. I just got this email updating me on the various projects. Great accountability and reporting. Check out the TippingBucket.
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Boise State adds some great competition to the Mountain West Conference. BYU, Boise State, TCU, Utah. That is some football power. Here is the official release.
BYU Athletic Communications
In response to the Mountain West Conference announcement to add Boise State as a member institution beginning in 2011, Brigham Young University has released the following statements from University President Dr. Cecil O. Samuelson and Director of Athletics Tom Holmoe. BYU President Cecil O. Samuelson BYU is pleased to welcome Boise State University into the Mountain West Conference. Boise State has achieved success academically and athletically. This addition will make the conference stronger and more competitive, as exemplified by Boise State’s recent football success. This certainly strengthens the Mountain West Conference’s standing as one of the top athletic conferences. BYU Director of Athletics Tom Holmoe I have a great deal of respect for Boise State University and what they have accomplished in a relatively short period of time since becoming a Division I program. They have risen to the upper echelon of college football in recent years and will add to the growing strength of the Mountain West Conference. We warmly welcome athletic director Gene Bleymaier and the Boise State athletic department to the Mountain West.
MOUNTAIN WEST CONFERENCE RELEASE Mountain West Conference Adds Boise State University COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (June 11, 2010) – The Mountain West Conference announced today that Boise State University has accepted an invitation to join the MWC as its 10th member institution, effective July 1, 2011. "We are pleased and excited to welcome Boise State University to the Mountain West Conference,” said Commissioner Craig Thompson. “Since our inception just 11 short years ago, the Mountain West has experienced tremendous success, and the addition of Boise State will further enhance that strength. The MWC continues to strategize regarding potential membership scenarios and bringing Boise State into the Conference is an important part of that evolution.”
“The invitation to join the Mountain West Conference reflects the excellence that Boise State University has demonstrated academically and athletically,” said Boise State President Robert Kustra. “It will be a privilege to compete and partner with such a successful group of member institutions. This move is in the best interests of Boise State’s future, and the university is excited to be part of one of the nation’s most outstanding conferences.” The Mountain West Conference was founded with eight members in 1998. Boise State is the second institution to join the Mountain West since that time; TCU became a member in 2005.
I decided to take a customer satisfaction survey. I almost didn't make it through it.
It wasn't fun and it wasn't easy. There has got to be a better way.
I am an official river guide. Trained and licensed. So if you are in Moab, call me up and I will take you on the river.
My company site is WesternRiver.com
Sad - but I like how they handled it.
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I've been on the river for 7 days out of 9. Pictures and videos coming soon. Until then, I like these videos.
I put info that I want up on my profile. I "fan" pages that I want. My profile is MINE. So stop trying to force me to use your new system of linking pages and junk. I want a couple of lines of text. This is what I like. This is how I like it.
Usually I accept changes to Facebook as "progress" but you are starting to annoy me. When I get annoyed I stop using things. Of course you don't care, I am one person in, what is it now 500 million?
So just chill Facebook. Stop trying to suck me in deeper and deeper. I want my old profile back.
This post is about thanks and 2 serious questions.
I couldn't believe it when I realized I have been writing this blog for over a year now. I went through and read all my posts since the beginning. Thank you. Thanks for reading, for commenting, and for being a part of my life. I would be lying if I said I didn't get excited when Google Analytics tells me that lots of people are reading stuff that I wrote.
This movie sums up how I feel sometimes.
But I have 2 serious questions.
1. Why do you read my blog?
2. Should I split personal and business stuff into 2 different blogs?
Do you like reading about movie trailers and user interface stuff on the same blog? Do my pictures and movie reviews and teacher improvement posts clash?
Please give a comment and tell me what you think.
Thanks. Here's to another year.
-Joshua
Spring has come. So have finals. Not good for both to arrive together. I should be in the library but I'm going running.
On my way home from school, I passed by the new South End Market. I stopped by and was impressed. A good (albeit small) selection of produce, a Subway, a frozen yogurt shop that has literally, 27 different flavors. I like it.
Update - We got some ice cream Friday night and the place was packed! We sampled just about every flavor. Delicious.
I don't know if I will get one, but my fellow students sure rack em up!
I love this. I love simplicity and clarity. The world needs this.
I don't particularly like the infographic. I don't think it adds much. But the stats and info is interesting. 
Buy a bottle of water for $1.35. Drink it. Fill it up every day for 10 years 5 months and 21 days and you will have spent $1.35 for water. 
via youtube.com
If you haven't tried out Google Docs yet for all your school and doc sharing needs, now is the time. I use Google Docs just about every day.
The silence is total until they realize it's an April Fools Joke.
So I got to try out the iPad. It is fun to use. I lived the book feel and just the fact that it is a huge iPhone. I had no trouble typing on it. I am used to the virtual keyboard from the iPhone but I found it quite natural to type with all my fingers not just the thumbs. Yes - want one and am probably going to buy one. No - it is not just a huge iPod touch. The iPad fits somewhere between a laptop and an iPhone.
Josh
Make sure you watch this in 720hd. Just sayin.
So I was skeptical of the first Step Up. It was ok. I was skeptical of the 2nd Step Up. It was ok. I was skeptical of the 3rd Step Up. And it looks crazy. While the dancing improved dramatically from the first to the second movies, the 3rd looks like its bringing the house. The trailer had the water dancing, tron like neon suits, dust dancing, formal, street, whatever. I just hope they don't ruin it with cheesy special effects. I am beginning to trust Jon Chu, a little as a director. After what he has done with the LXD, I hope Step Up: 3D is a good movie.
A cool new company starts. Great. Gets some good press. Great. Shows all the big name logos of people who covered them on their homepage. Great. Fails to link the image to the review. Not great.
Please link these. I want to read your reviews. I want to learn more. Just link them!
If you don't have time for 20 slides, skip to the end. The last 3 slides pretty much sums it up.
Basically by rewarding people, non financially for behaviors we want, (donating to a cause, sharing info with someone) it helps make it fun and increase conversion and retention.
Something to use with helpcapeverde.org/?
Makes me love my iPhone even more.Of course the skeptic in me pointed out that it was a very specific example. What else are you going to call a taxadermy company. And introducing it, you show a giant bear? Ad agencies want the client to like their work. They are already trying to do what the client wants. It was "relatively easy" then to get the ad guys to do what he wanted. But still kind of cool.
I recently tried out an iTunes cleaning app called TidySong.
I was quite excited for it. Until it didn't work. 
There are a couple different options, from adding album art, or fixing metadata. But every time I tried to do one of those options I would get this message.
Ok cool. I'll fix 100 songs and see if I like it. But when I could click on anything the app would go dead.
Ummmm ok?
Tip - Your app demo should make me want to buy it. It should make my life easier. Rainbows and butterflies should start flowing out of my computer because of your app. It shouldn't be endlessly annoying.
So goodbye TidySong. It looked like such a promising relationship.
Finally. After going 17 years without a first round NCAA victory, my Cougars put away Florida. Amazing Game. Jimmer had 37 points and Loyd Jr. had an amazing 26. The last picture is a blurry shot of the Varsity Theater filled with screaming fans. Such a fun game to watch. Now we just have to beat Kansas St.
In general everything should be as easy as possible on the internet. Since programmers and designers can control just about everything on a page, they should make it simple and easy.
So when I see a difficult sign up page, I get depressed. I have abandoned signing up for plenty of services, just because their sign up page was so hard.
For example this one.
It is a simple newsletter type thing. Why should I have to pick a NSA quality password?
Remember, if you design on the internet... Make it easy.
It may be noted that I am not quite the typical iPhone or Mac users. I download just about any App that looks interesting. But this is getting ridiculous. I can not go a day, without getting prompted to update or download an update. So I decided to track which apps and when I was prompted to update.
The stats are this. One month. 39 updates. Over 1 a day.
I don't know what the solution is but something has to happen.
I propose an integrated platform for all updates. I can then once a month view all the apps (iPhone and Mac included) that need updating and can approve all at once any and all updates.
For the curious here are the apps and days.
Jul 16 skitch Foxmarks for safari
Jul 17 iPhone
Jul 19 tweetdeck
Jul 21 safari and Java for mac os
Jul 22 - for iPhone
Animoto
Evermore
Shazam
Aroundme
Facebook
Taptap2
Enigmo
Midomi
Things
June 29 - TweetDeck
June 30 skype
topple
loopt
remote
July 3 backgrounds
Goodfood
July 4th adobe indesign cs4
July 5th dictionary
Evermore
Lose it
Requall
Tap tap 2.6
Things
July 6 istat pro
July 9th tweetdeck
July 10th rescue time
July 12 tweetdeck ihandy level
July 17th evermore
Mormon channel
Tunepad
Banner
Breakdancing, popping and locking, krumping, and sooooo classy. Amazing.
Kind of excited about this.
It's funny because I saw Tron back in the day and it was "the first computer graphics" movie.
I like look and feel of the site, kind of retro and understated.
Terminator Salvation could have been a good movie. But it was not.
In fact, there were so many plot holes and logical jumps that I had a hard time even enjoying it.
Sure there were lots of explosions and gun shots, and giant robots. But these things do not a good movie make.
I would like to just ask the writer a couple of questions.
1. How come the robots don't listen in to the Resistance broadcasting exactly when and where they will attack?
2. Why don't the robots just look for fires? They have thermal sensors, and last time I checked robots don't need fires.
3. Why isn't anyone curious? I mean if I was the only human alive in the whole city and some guy shows up, shouldn't you ask him "Where are you from?" "How do you think you became half machine?" "What are you trying to do?"
In the end I think Terminator Salvation is a Redboxer. Get it from RedBox, but only when everything else is checked out.
Entrepreneurial ideas can strike anytime, anywhere. For Picnik founders Mike Harrington and Darrin Massena -- who announced the sale of their online photo editing startup to Google on Monday -- that moment hit on Saturday, Dec. 10, 2005 at 10:56 p.m. That's when Massena sent an email to Harrington with the subject line: "Internet Photo Editing."
What follows in that email is a truly amazing exploration of the entrepreneurs' mindsets at the moment of conception, a rare glimpse at the birth of one of Seattle's most successful Internet startups. What's also fascinating about the email, which we've received permission to re-publish, is how closely Picnik actually followed the six-point plan laid out by Massena and Harrington.
"This could be really BIG ($-wise)," wrote Massena in one section of the email. "Our timing is right. We%u2019re at the intersection of demand (mass use of online photos) and capability (Flash 8 supports the first level of functionality we need)."
Here's the full email thread, which first appeared on the blog of Monica Harrington (the wife of Picnik co-founder Mike Harrington and a frequent TechFlash guest columnist).
From: Darrin Massena
Sent: Saturday, December 10, 2005 10:56 PM
To: Harrington, Mike; Massena, Darrin
Subject: Internet Photo Editing
OK, OK, this is it man. Our long term business goal: OWN THE INTERNET PHOTO EDITING MARKET. I think we can do this.
THE MARKET
What is the internet photo editing market? Any site/service that people upload images to. Any site that hosts photos. Photo storage/sharing/management sites (Flickr et al), social networks, blogs, personal web sites, personal gallery sites, forums and groups for starters. More and more people are uploading unedited photos from their camera phones directly to the internet. Wifi-enabled cameras also allow direct-to-service uploads. New sites and services that make use of photos are popping up all over the place. Photos are becoming an internet data type as common as text.
THE PROBLEM
There is no ability to manipulate photos once they are online. People have to download them, bring them into a photo editor (which they must buy/maintain/upgrade), and somehow upload them again. That sucks. Especially for little tweaks like to sharpen an image, or crop it, or to zoom in on part of it. The overhead is so high that most people just don%u2019t bother even though they know the photos they%u2019re printing/sharing could look better and wish they did. To some degree this must be hindering photo sharing sites, amongst others, because their user satisfaction levels aren%u2019t as high as they could be.
OUR SOLUTION
A wholly-online photo editor, provided in (at least) two forms. Standalone, as an online application we provide direct to end-users. And integrated, as a seamless part of any site whose users benefit from being able to manipulate images. Our standalone photo editing service is so complete and powerful that people will pay to use it. They%u2019ll prefer it over the offline tools they have today. The integrated service will work so seamlessly and be integrated so easily that any photo-using site/service will be happy to pay for the value it adds to their site/service; they%u2019ll attract additional users who will spend more time on the site and be happier with their results.
THE COMPETITION
Established companies with photo editing products. Established companies have to overcome two major hurdles to address this market (in addition to realizing it is a market!). First they must write an online photo editing application. There will be no quick ports of existing applications; most code will have to be from scratch. Second, they must implement their code to work as a seamlessly integrated service in a 3rd party site. Not only is this more work, but it is a new mindset for the established players. Their present mindset is more about how they can create a vertically integrated application and service of their own, not how can they add value to a 3rd party.
Upstarts like ourselves, possibly as outgrowths of photo sharing sites. Competition against an independent startup comes down to our ability to execute on our standalone and integrated services as well as our marketing of them. As far as I can see nobody has any kind of lead on us so it is a good bet we will be first and even if we are not first we will be best!
Each photo sharing site that develops an adequate photo editing solution in-house might mean one less customer for our integrated service but a) our standalone service might still make customers out of some of their customers due to its superior interface and capabilities, and b) if even one major photo sharing site adds significant editing capability (presumably proprietary) they%u2019ll fuel their competitor%u2019s desire for our integrated service.
GETTING THERE
There are many avenues we can take. Here%u2019s one possibility that appeals to me.
1. create v1 of the standalone service w/ a minimal devil-horn level of features (i.e. not a serious photo editing tool)
2. launch it using the viral marketing strategy (%u201CMake funny pictures of your friends!%u201D). Build an audience, build credibility.
3. start implementing more serious photo editing features and the ability for the photo editor to be seamlessly integrated into 3rd party sites
4. send our biz-dev folks out to make deals with sites that can be satisfied with basic set of photo editing features
5. launch our v2 standalone service when we have a credible set of photo editing features
6. add features and customers forever and rake in the dough
THOUGHTS
This could be really BIG ($-wise). Our timing is right. We%u2019re at the intersection of demand (mass use of online photos) and capability (Flash 8 supports the first level of functionality we need). Flash 8.5/9 will take us to the next level. If Canvas becomes widespread and is hardware accelerated we can move to that. If WPF becomes widespread we can move to that and boost our functionality/performance even further.
One thing I like about this is the RAD Games Tools-like approach of providing a service for other sites. This is an angle not every Flash bitmap-editing tool author will consider or be able to execute on. In addition to the revenue stream we will be building relationships that will make us harder to displace.
Another service we can provide to 3rd parties: photo processing (both user-directed and automated). Shaula mentioned a service she%u2019s used that provides photos of race participants after a race like the Seattle Marathon. They take pictures of everyone during the race. You pick your photo from their site then they send you prints in the sizes you%u2019ve chosen. They also allow you to choose whether the race%u2019s logo will be printed on the photo. Problem is, they don%u2019t preview what the result will look like with the logo overlaid nor do they let you choose its positioning or which race logo to use. Such a site could insert our service after the photos have been selected and pass us the various logo options. We%u2019d take over and let the user choose/place/size the logo, maybe add a caption, crop the photo, zoom in on a particular group of runners, draw an arrow pointing themselves out in a crowd, etc. We%u2019d pass the composited result back to the host site and they%u2019d take it from there. This is one small usage but I suspect if we look we can find a lot of opportunities like this.
I specifically didn%u2019t mention above the potential inherent in allowing people to %u2018upgrade%u2019 their images to include animation, sound, and interactive elements (e.g. hover your mouse over each person in a photo to see their name) because I don%u2019t think it is necessary to add these abilities to make serious headway toward owning this market. They would be really cool though and might break us through into something completely new.
From: Massena, Darrin
Sent: Sat 12/10/2005 8:47 AM
To: Harrington, Mike
Subject: Picnik
What do you think of Picnik as a code name? I really like it. Maybe even as a product name? Picnik.com is for sale. After sleeping on it I think it is really important to get and use the product's domain name. Flickr.com is just so much a better handle than somecompany.com/flickr. Especially for a first product, why confuse things by emphasizing your company over your product?
From: Harrington, Mike
Sent: Saturday, December 10, 2005 9:42 AM
To: Massena, Darrin
Subject: RE: Picnik
awesome. get it!
via techflash.com
Love seeing the creation of ideas that went places.
Have you ever heard of Rube Goldberg? How about the Incredible Machine? How about Ok Go?
Well take them all and put them in a blender and you get this amazing video.
Stunning. I love the idea and the execution.
How to get over your fears. 5 Steps.
1. Define your nightmare, the absolute worst that could happen if you did what you are considering.
2. What steps could you take to repair the damage or get things heading up?
3. What are you putting off out of fear?
4. What is it costing you - financially, emotionally, and physically - postponing action?
5. What are you waiting for?
Get out there and do it. Make that sales call, apologize, sign up for the race, go talk to that cute girl in the library. If you are worried and or fearful, go through the 5 steps and then just do it.
On page 283 of The World Is Flat something just jumped out at me. 
If the President of the United States wanted something to really inspire America, similar to JFKs moon shot, we should declare a program to make America energy independent in 10 years. The benefits would be huge.
1. We get engineers. Lots of scientists. Kids in school can see a large exciting goal (windmills! solar panels!) that uses math and science.
2. Our global popularity rises. Europe likes less global warming right?
3. Problems with Iran, Russia, Venszuela, and Saudi Arabia will dry up. Not completely, but a huge portion of their incoming cash will, helping to solve some of the problems with these states.
As quoted in the book, "This is not just a win-win," said Michael Mandelbaum. "This is a win-win-win-win-win."
America's New Moon-shot: Energy Independence in 10 years.
Recently I have read 2 great books. The first is The World is Flat.
This book is awesome. It talks about fundamental things that are changing business and life on this planet.
The second is Made to Stick.
Another incredible book. It talks about why certain ideas "stick" or are adopted while millions of others fall away.
The third, which I am currently still reading is The Design of Business.
Fascinating look at business as it takes a crazy idea, figures out how to replicate it, and then use it.
These are three of the great books I have read in the past year.
Joshua Dance Likes World
About
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I love life, Macs, the outdoors, design, and chocolate chip cookies. The soft chewy kind.
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