Saudi Arabia awaits new ruler

What is the state of oil prices in financial markets ?
I've looked for it after reading BBC report for the health condition of Saudi King Fahd.
Latest news are telling that markets aren't jitter about possible Saudi Arabia power swap.
US summer season drives prices up, according to agency news reports.

Some say the rush on oil is over and one should stay away from oil investing.
For commodity markets, there's apparently an opportunity for sugar and cotton in the following years.

Podcasting your blog content

These two software pieces translate blog/news content into ready podcasting files : Talkr and Speakwire to remember as a solution text-to-podcast.
Does someone has experience using it ?

Odeo will try

Article to read about simplifying podcasting. Time for Odeo.
It needs to be really simple.

Podcasting and individualism

Thinking today about podcasting and audioblogging. Then mix up radio. Internet and radio are different. Let's see, one has a mp3 player. It's a deep individualism ( only you can hear files , not other around you) , It's a democratic process by nature ( you don't force people to listen what you're listening and likes ) .
Even when there is proliferation of mp3 players, how do you set up mass audience for podcasting ( from the view of producer ) ?
You don't.
The answer should be ''Long tail'' approach.

Audio homework

Integrating podcasting concept into education is a brave and inovative act. Canadian professor might be one of the first who will ask the students to make another audio files as a education task. Bring your MP3 player and learn. Wooh.

Via I Love Radio. Org

Personalized Google, again

The Google Lab shows how personalized page should look like. To me, it looks very poor. Like they are trying to bridge time-to-market with services that Yahoo and MSN already done.

Soic, your mail was blocked

My friend Soic from Zagreb read my blog about month ago and send me an email . I replied but seems the message wasn't delivered to him because of some strange server issues at his part of the chanel.
So, Mr. Soic, if you are reading these lines, drop me another mail to make it work better this time.
Hope to hear soon !

Hedge funds on german

I had noticed over at del.icio.us nice link that points to coverage in today's german newspaper Die Welt dedicated to hedge funds. These are heavy weight ( and heavy unregulated ) financial entities that are moving every day a lot of money in the capital markets all over the world.

One identity, one person, all the web

Another distributed identity system called OpenID. It should be something decentralised. I didn't play much, but I'm posting this as a reminder to try it in the future and look how it works.

I am annoyed lately by the constant need for logging when using various services on the web. Would be nice that web could have more simple and secure systems for identity and authorisation. It seems to be utopia for some time, or I 've missed something ?

To be ''Seamless'' in digital world

What they were talking about ?
Chief technology officers of Microsoft, Sony and Yahoo gathered for an evening in Sillicon Valey to discuss technology development of the coming years.

Groupware for small teams

What to choose when looking for open source groupware app ?
The place I am currently looking is OpenSource CMS site with demo showcase of every app.

I need small, flexibel, modular and useful app for managing small teams over the web. Groupware app will be web based workplace, central point of interaction between team members.

It's only one small piece in the puzzle of so called ''virtual company''. If possible, why not.
After then, I'll be looking for outsourced solution for accounting and finance reporting.
After that...who knows.

Ontology hype

Is it the same mistake done few years ago comparing current onotology hype to DMOZ projects and other directory mantra.
Sorting relevant internet content into structured logic is a bit avanturistic, IMHO.
I liked this part:

One reason Google was adopted so quickly when it came along is that Google understood there is no shelf, and that there is no file system. Google can decide what goes with what after hearing from the user, rather than trying to predict in advance what it is you need to know.

Shirky posted long article about something very simple and clear to me.
The main principle for the state of the web is people's need for , what I call, ''private web for all '' .
My private web, my private context and information and resources that I need in a given time. That's it.

Erogs

According to some japanese bloggers, there's new craze about so called ''erogs'' in Japan.

Chinese way

Google heads for China. Why so late? Apparently, they got operational license and opened some job positions. Reuters has a story too.

Open source license: KPL

Another open source license is considered in India. Cnet reports.

"Let me tell you my dream: Today, India is a net taker in the open-source community. In four years, I want the world to recognize India as a net giver, and that is entirely possible" he said.

Google browser is in the lab

Google is testing Google Browser.
It seems they are testing this product as some word could be heard around in the blog space.

Norway hates oil

Interesting economic agenda, taxing on cars in Norway. Suppose they are country with chaotic living distances, it comes as surprise to me. It's very rare among oil exporting countries.

These policies have resulted in one of the lowest car-ownership rates in Europe and fuel-efficient Volkswagens and Peugeots far outnumber big sport utility vehicles on its roads.

Asterisk GUI

Asterisk is great IP solution but it doesn have simple user interface. Therefore, numerouse companies are building user interface managers for handling complex Asterisk PBX solution.
Here are some of these companies>
IPSwitchboard
Third Lane Tech
Bicom Systems
Coalescent
Switchvox

.travel domain in an industry directory

I am starting to ask myself following question: How latest introduction of .travel domain names will erode Google's ( and web advertising industry in general ) industry of paying contextual ads ?

You ask why ? Very simple.

I happened to discover following sentences on the official web page operated by ICANN's accredited company Tralliance Corporation ( who will be contracted for selling those .travel domains ):
It's about targeted search engine ( Global industry search engine ):

Is the .travel Directory a search engine?
It is more than a search engine. A search engine is as valuable as the data that is available to it. The prevalent consumer search engines are reliant solely on web site data, which is incomplete, changeable and chaotic. The .travel Directory will have data detailing all products and services that are being offered and such data will be provided by the travel businesses themselves. This data will be accessible through a custom-made taxonomy or controlled vocabulary, developed specifically for travel Industry. Tralliance's extensive industry data and indexing technology will enable sophisticated search capabilities to deliver very specific information to each query.

The selling of .travel domains hasn't started yet. It begins around early June. But what's interesting to me in the whole story is a goal of the .travel directory that will be very targeted, operated on non-commercial terms.
The importance of travel industry all around the world is tremendouse and will be interesting to see how the ''attention'' competion will start. How those brands will be satisfied with the service of such a neutral search engine ?
But, look at that what Tralliance Corp will do with its directory for travel industry:

Consumers will not pay for access to your directory information, nor will Tralliance charge industry members for order of placements in the list of responses from a search query.

What ? Business Week cited in their article some older data ( but it shows some indications ) :

The travel industry is one of the largest buyers of advertising on Google, which reportedly pulled in gross revenues in 2003 of close to $1 billion -- mostly from online advertising sales.

Significant or insignificant for targeted advertising in the long run ? I think there will be present need for the sponsored search and visibility on general search engines because that's where the action is ( an ordinary consumer ).

Open source

Finally someone said something like this: Open source is just another licensing model.