Twitter error page is appearing too often...

Mood: a bit annoyed... will try again... and again. Make that four times!

Twitter Spammers 2 Blame 4 Hickups

According to this interesting post on WebWare, hope for Twitter scalability problems to go away partly lies in putting roadblocks in place to avoid the impact of uber-popular Twitter users. Quote:

The outages and slow performance are due to "popular" members of Twitter with many followers who "tweet" a lot all at once, according to Twitter. Because of that, the company says will put some limits on what some users can do, but it should not be noticeable.

Sounds to me like the folks referred to are not TechCrunch or BBC News, but rather outright Twitter spammers that misuse the platform to inform "the world" of their posts about anything under the sun. Even the word "twam" is being used now to designate this behavior!

People who are new to Twitter and get "followed" fall prey of these individuals who are praying on newbies who choose to follow them (excited to have been followed by someone who appeared to care about what they had to share), to get their spam across in new ways beyond email. If you have ideas to reduce the spam on Twitter, let Twitter know.

Ning: Where People and Technology Make the Future of the Web a Reality Every Day

I like it when people do innovative things... but when those things come from a place that I respect and love as much as Ning, I like it more!

I just saw today the new Ning Jobs page... Not compelled enough to check it out? Take a moment and see for yourself. You may find yourself applying for a job in downtown Palo Alto before you know it.

Disclaimer: I worked at Ning and I can attest that every bit that these folks say is true.

My First Flickr Video: Word In Your Hand

After listening to a talk by Gail Williams today @ N2Y3 (she is a true legend and an honor to be able to meet in person), I decided to give a shot to videos on Flickr. My first video was the one we did for the "Word In Your Hand" project last year.

The interface to upload was the same one used to upload photos and the speed to upload was actually visibly faster than YouTube's. Here is the result.

Friendfeed vs. Pulse

A while back I wrote about Pulse, Plaxo's attempt at social networking through aggregating feeds that your connections add for public display (with their connections).

Yesterday, I was made aware of FriendFeed. I was wondering if anyone who reads my blog has taken a stab at it and would mind sharing how they see it being different than Pulse.

One thing is for sure (not that Plaxo's Pulse doesn't have smart people): FriendFeed's team sure has a lot of talent. Quite a number of former Googlers in it.

UPDATE: I decided to give FriendFeed a shot. The interface is quite clean, though I still can't figure out how it's different than Pulse. Here's my FriendFeed profile page.

¿Por Qué Chequearse el Azucar en la Sangre?

La gente de LifeScan nos permitio compartir el comercial del cual forme parte. Fue una experiencia muy interesante participar en esta filmacion, sin lugar a duda.

No busco con la colocacion del video promover OneTouch en particular. Si tienn diabetes, sea cual sea su marca de preferencia, POR FAVOR midanse el azucar en la sangre con regularidad, no menos de 4-5 veces al dia.

Why Twitter is Hurting

The past couple of days have not been particularly impressive in terms of performance for Twitter. I finally read on TechCrunch today about what may be going on.

Too bad... Twitter is an amazing resource. I don't loose my faith in them.

Stephen Colbert Gets Angry Too!

Stephen Colbert couldn't let Bill O'Reilly be the only anchor loosing it in front of the camera. Here is his segment getting upset at the words on the teleprompter he couldn't not repeat... :)

Books to Help You Start & Run a Nonprofit

I've compiled this list of books for people who are starting and running non-profits.

Hope they are as useful to you as they have been to us @ the Diabetes Hands Foundation.

New Hammock Album: Simply Glorious

I have yet to be disappointed with a release by Hammock. Casually finding out about them back in 2004, when they released Kenotic easily was one of the best things that happened to me that year, musically speaking. Since then, they've released a couple more EPs and another full length album, in 2006. All their albums have become standards in my collection where they top my Last.FM list of most played artists above The Beatles and many other legendary artists.

Their music simply transcends time and place. I can listen to their work over and over and never grow tired: rather, I feel empowered -it makes me feel great and want to jump up and live life at its fullest. That's Hammock in a nutshell for you... no language, just music to let you release.

In Maybe They Will Sing for Us Tomorrow, their 2008 release, besides counting on the most gorgeous album artwork to date they've gone further from their more dream pop sound of previous albums, coming closer to the music of Stars of The Lid and The Dead Texan: very quiet and soothing ambient loops that are bound to enchant you. They have earned my respect and admiration one more time. I recommend this album as my favorite to date in 2008.

Podcast About Interview with Diane Rehm

Here is the interview at The Diane Rehm show, this past Monday, May 12, 2008.

The show was about Social Networking and I had the opportunity to talk for a little under 4 minutes about TuDiabetes.com and EsTuDiabetes.com.


Find more videos like this on TuDiabetes.com

The Interview on NPR's Diane Rehm Show

Today was an incredible day. During the segment about "Social Networking" on the Diane Rehm Show (NPR), I was interviewed and had a chance to talk for almost 5 minutes!

It was truly great, not only because of the legend that Diane is (I still remember when I first heard her show, back in Phoenix), but because the other folks on the air were true luminaries:
-Gina Bianchini, co-founder of Ning
-Andy Carvin, senior product manager, NPR Community, NPR Digital Media;
-Josh Bernoff, vice president, principal analyst, Forrester Research; co-author of Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies

I was VERY nervous before but I think it turned out alright (I think). This was the take by OnlineInsider. You can listen to the entire show however, you will need to have Real Player or Windows Media Player installed to listen to it. The part where I spoke was minute 24:20 to minute 28:00. :)

I am awaiting for permission from the NPR producer that I talked with, so I can capture those 4 minutes during which I talked about TuDiabetes and EsTuDiabetes, to share with friends and family! :)

I am very grateful for this chance I got to talk to so many people: each week the Diane Rehm show gets more than 1.7 million listeners.

Happy Mothers Day!!

Find more videos like this on TuDiabetes.com


A big hug and our deepest admiration and love goes to all the mothers of TuDiabetes.com, EsTuDiabetes.com and the world.

Don't forget to tell your children to participate in the "Drawing Diabetes" contest. There's three more weeks to be a part of it.

Why Apple Stores Rock!

(Tip: it's not just that they all look extra-cool... though that helps!)

If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, you know I had a major hiccup with my Mac Book yesterday. Something happened during the most recent Software Update which I was unaware of until I shut down the computer (a couple of nights ago). When I went to turn it back on, it wouldn't go past the startup screen (we saw the Apple logo come up and then it showed the blue screen that follows... and then nothing else).

Lucky for us, I realized this was happening while we were at the Apple Store in Palo Alto. I spent a while looking at this and learning from a great guy called Tom, who used to be a SysAdmin in the Bay Area for over 20 years and now helps people in the Apple Store. :)

After we determined that it was beyond his ability, I made an appointment with the Genius Bar for later. Within 30 minutes (it took that long due to the diagnostic tool), we knew what was up and the solution: the OS had to be reinstalled. The genius helped me copy my whole user folder, to make sure all my data was saved and I came back for the machine and started the Leopard installation process at home.

Before I left the store, I got a new external drive, one that REALLY feels robust (on the outside it's just the same structure of a Mac Pro): a 500GB G-Drive, so we can use it as a drive for the foundation. Although I had my own personal drive I was using for Time Machine backups, I realized I should be ready with another drive that I can have set as a bootable drive, in the event something like this happens again.

I am now almost back to where things were (in terms of data and applications) before the issue. I am honestly not upset but thankful: the people at the Apple Store really were great, knowledgeable and patient.

Randy Pausch: The New Morrie

Years ago, I read "Tuesdays With Morrie" with tears in my eyes. To date it's the only book I've read more than twice in my life.

Today, there is a Morrie still among us. His name is Randy Pausch and if the fact that he made the TIME 100 list is not enough, I truly recommend you watch his Last Lecture:



I thought I should point out Professor Pausch is dying from pancreatic cancer. He gave this last lecture at Carnegie Mellon's McConomy Auditorium, Sept. 18, 2007. The name of the talk was "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams."

So what are you going to do to make your childhood dreams come true?

Dilbert Mashups Rock the Web!

The new look of Dilbert.com, along with some of the tools to engage new audiences it offers, is simply worth commenting.

Besides the bells and whistles below each day's strip, which let you vote on it, share it, email it, embed it, print it, add it to your RSS feeds and to your widgets, one of the brightest concepts the new site sports is the ability for readers to create mashups.

You heard it: Dilbert Mashups! The premise is simple: click on the strip if you have an idea that's funnier than Scott Adams' and other readers will vote on it if they agree you are as funny as you think. Simple. Brilliant!

Vote for my mashup of today's strip: I tried embedding it below, but I could see why the site is still in Beta. :)

Anyway... Dilbert has been one of my longtime favorites, so I am always happy to rediscover him whenever it's been a while since I last read his strips.


Thanks to ALD for letting us know about Dilbert 2.0.

Avance Associates Comes To a Stop

It's been crossing my mind for a while (since last year, I've had progressively less time to dedicate to it), but this past April 30, 2008 we made it a reality: Avance Associates, LLC ceased its operations.

We had started this consulting firm back in Jan. 2004 to assist clients with search engine marketing, translation and design services. We served customers such as AOL Latin America, MLB.com, dLife.com and Border Trade Alliance. But the dedication to the Diabetes Hands Foundation now demands that we focus on it full-time.

So, effective today, the home page of Avance Associates indicates this clearly.

5'nizza: Russian Bossanova, Rap, Reggae..

Thanks to my friend Mat, I found this jewel. They reminded me a LOT of Manu Chao:

Interesting Experiment in Synchronization

Synchronization of 5 coupled metronomes done in Lancaster University:

What's The Name of That Song?

How many times have you found yourself watching a movie, at a record store or simply passing by... and wondered who sings that beautiful song you just heard?

That happened to me (again) last night while watching a not-so-great chick flic ("23 Dresses"). There was a voice that my wife and I both were amazed by singing not unlike Ryan Adams, reminding of Thom Yorke and Cat Stevens in equal portions.

So this morning, I decided to give a shot to a service I learned about not too long ago: Songza. Songza lets you find and play back songs you have been humming for days. But you can do MUCH more with it:
-Share the song: send a link to friends with the song, so they can play it too; Twitter the song automatically within Songza; embed it or email it.
-Rate the song: thumbs up or thumbs down.
-Add to a playlist: you can play your favorite songs when you come back to the site.
-Firefox Plugin: if you are too lazy to surf to their site, you can be taken directly to the results page for that song that is driving you nuts, by typing it into the Firefox search plugin for Songza.
-Promote your band: it's a great new channel you can use to get the word about your music out there!

And all this happens legally too, in case you are wondering: royalties get paid when music gets played. How do these guys make money? I don't know, but I sure hope they last for a very long time, because I love it! :)

Ah! And about that artist? His name is Ray LaMontagne and the song that was haunting us last night is called "Be Here Now."

Why User Experience Rules!

As I was reading the "Ten principles that contribute to a Googley user experience", I thought I'd share a fantastic book that I read during the trip to Boston last week. It was the result of the effort of four members of the Adaptive Path crew in SF and it's titled "Subject To Change".

If you are into user experience design at all you MUST read this book. They do a phenomenal job at establishing a framework for the creation of products and services that are resilient in the midst of today's changing and uncertain world. Get a copy so you can see for yourself.

Still Selling Our House

If you know anyone interested in buying a beautiful house in Orlando, FL, please let me know.