Hey all, just wanted to apologize for the delay in RIA Weekly 2. I’m editing it down and have been having some issues with first Soundbooth (a whole other post) and now Auadacity. I think we’ll have it finalized tonight so it will be up tomorrow. This episode was really cool so I’m bummed that I couldn’t edit it this week and get it out.

For those that didn’t see the inaugural post, I’m doing a rich Internet application-themed podcast with Michael Cote from RedMonk. Unfortunately I won’t be doing the Flex Show, but I think Jeff has an awesome co-host lined up so that’s still going to be a great podcast. With my travel schedule I wasn’t able to devote enough time to Jeff and the show to make it fair. The new podcast is a bit less work-intensive and Cote has a similar travel schedule to mine so we’re being pretty flexible about when/where we do the podcast. The first episode is over on Cote’s site.

[tags]RIA Weekly, Cote, Podcast[/tags]

Careful. If you read Techmeme or some of the major blogs you may get the impression that Facebook is out like mainframes. This whole Beacon thing has people in a tizzy. I think that Facebook actually ruined itself when it opened up to everyone. That meant that any tech blogger/industry pundit could join up. Eventually they freaked out because of this privacy issue or that invasive application. Guess what tech people, 99% of Facebook’s demographic doesn’t care.

I consider myself a “below average” Facebook user. That means I’m older than most of the people who actively use the site but I still use it a ton and consider myself close in mindset to the mainstream users. As I’ve said before I was actually a senior in college when Facebook came out, so I’ve been on the site since basically day 1. My privacy? I couldn’t care less. Even the Fortune blog acknowledges that many of the people are “unaware” of the “worsening situation”. You know what? We just don’t give a damn. Remember when everyone freaked out about the mini-feed? How many of those people quit the site? Zero? .001%? Now it’s one of the best features ever. I think to my generation privacy has a totally different meaning than it does to the various tech bloggers who look aghast at the way Facebook works. Me? I didn’t even really get what Beacon was until recently and when I found out I thought it was kind of cool because I could show my friends what I was up to. Privacy doesn’t exist to me. I’ve put way too much of myself online to care and I think people younger than I am are even more privacy-averse.

So for those of you who are worried and thinking about closing your Facebook account, do it. And stop messing with our Facebook.

[tags]Facebook, Privacy[/tags]

Sad, sad news today. Marc Orchant, a great blogger and someone who was very prominent in helping me with blogging and navigating the tech world, suffered a heart attack over the weekend. Most of the information is over at blognation USA, where Marc blogs. For those who don’t know Marc, he has been a huge supporter of RIAs in the technology industry at large. He was a bit of a mentor to me when he was doing his ZDNet blog and he recently took a position with Curl and is doing some really great things to get both their name out and to help evangelize RIAs in general. Marc is a first class human being and I was always amazed at his ability to help everyone and leave an impact. I’m going to be keeping his family in my prayers and hope he comes out okay. As Scoble says, the week has a different meaning. It’s a jarring bolt of reality to wake up Monday morning and see news like this. Get well Marc.

[tags]Marc Orchant, Personal[/tags]