wikipedia watch

First google-watch now wikipedia watch (oh, there is also a yahoo-watch)

In the wake of Joi's discussion at seminar 2 weeks ago, I thought it might be relevant to post a link to the wikipedia-watch site here, if for no other reason than it gives sort of an alternative take on wikipedia, one that is more critical, based on his version of the history of the Wikipedia Foundation and Jimmy Wales at Bomis.com, and one that comes from a potentially interesting angle in the relationship between info-generating sites like wikipedia and income-generating services like google ads.

Before people start immediately reacting negatively to this criticism and other crap, it's important to note that the article does not second what is typically the main, and I would argue, ignorant, criticism of wikipedia that since it's contributers are not professional journalists, the legitimacy and value of the information is dilluted (see joi's reaction to these accusations here). Wikipedia-watch is much more about the beginnings of wikipedia and it's tendency to be scraped by other internet bots to generate google ad revenue. clearly, it's very important to make a distinction between the legitimacy of the content on wikipedia -- the articles -- and the potential abuses that come with having a stake in a vast and potentially lucrative amount of information content on the internet.

Wikipedia watch, google watch and yahoo watch have all been created (or the domains at least registered) to Daniel Brandt. The dude is definitely a far lefty, and personally I think some of his stuff tends to slip nicely into a conspiracy theory thing, but I think it's relevant to take a look at some of his accusations more closely -- at the very least they provide for good reading.

The examples that Brandt cites of wikipedia power abuses are exclusively personal, and therefore have to be taken with a grain of salt... many have suggested his troubles with google also originate from a personal spat. (google-watch-watch.org).

My take is that Mr. Brandt probably is probably trying to stick it to wikipedia for personal reasons. The idea of Wikipedia is a wondeful idea, open democracy, etc. I love it, and believe it works on a content level. However, I do think that even open Content systems like wikipedia still have much about them that is closed - further scrutiny of the power stuctures of these open content systems is not necessarily a bad idea.

metacritic

discovered this site metacritic a couple months ago, and have been pretty addicted to it since... this may be an old thing, but I think it's probably the best place to go if you want to browse current media offerings. Granted, it doesn't do any recommendation stuff like amazon, or doesn't value-rank the sites from which it culls it's rankings, but I really like the design of what they do have. Basically, it takes reviews of movies, tv shows, dvd releases, music, and games, and aggregates them into an overall composite score. Shadow of the colussus gets like, a 93 composite score, while the new TV show freddie gets a 33. Anyway, the design is great, allowing you to sort games by system and score, others just by score I think... but it's a nice way to quickly get info about what the critical mass is for a given piece of media (ouch, that pun hurt). Very simple.

showdown

so, this isn't really related to interactive crap, but:

So I was headed to work today, then I realized that there were a bunch of guys from the santa monica swat team on the roof of my building with large automatic weapons. They were there because this guy who had been involved in a chase had been up on the roof since like, 5am, and was threatening to jump.

Link

wifi bedouin on gizmodo

wifi bedouin on gizmodo - right on!

vipod has 44.1 stereo record. word.

thank goodness the new ipod can record (prolly compressed) 44.1 stereo audio... I realize that every other mp3 player on the market already had this functionality, and that I can use by 3G ipod running iPod Linux to record -- but good to have it finally implemented as a feature anyway.

link

del.ic.ious vodcasts

so this is cool, subscribing to del.ic.ious video in the new iPOd (which I fucking ordered yesterday, man -- you got a problem?)

apple wins again, proving that having a easy distribution system will trump everything. sony blows it again, even though they are first in the space. poor sony.

kellee posted a good comment on the vblogging seminar about content -- she's right... video on the iPod is not just about watching Lost on the train, or in your car while driving on the freeway or whatever - how we make videos is also due for an upgrade.

link

vg map

nice! eyebeam just released vgmap, a way to lay vector graphics onto google maps! finally, an alternative to the ugliness that is the google maps overlay. although it is yet to be seen what kind of cool stuff can be done, I'd imagine that it extends what you are capable of doing with the gmap overlay classes.

BrightCove

Jeremy Allaire, the guy who did a lot of work with Flash and ColdFusion, has a startup called BrightCove that is featured in today's NYT.

As Om Malik writes:

As Allaire explains it, Bright Cove will be quite different from [other DVR stuff]. Instead of developing a hardware platform, the company will base everything it does on open standards, and will essentially be a software platform that will run on any kind of device - Microsoft Media Centers to TiVo to connected DVD players. In other words, he is gunning for a market that is the super nova of consumer-acquired devices.

Potentially cool in the context of seminar last night, Allaire also notes:

this is really a platform for the little guy. Someone who is interested in video blogging, short form film and other downloadable forms of video. “For live broadcasts, cable and service providers there is no substitute, and it is not feasible,” he says, “Network PVR and connected DVD players and other devices that are connected to open Internet will be able to use this to deliver content.” It is through this consumer electronics proxy, the video content will be delivered to the only screen that matters for video: the television.

sounds pretty cool -- anyone else have any info on this stuff>? Was this mentioned by K.Cheese and I just spaced it?

CabBoots

from the wonderful regine (who also has a new blog!)

CabBoots, the navigation shoes. An interesting approach to navigation systems.

Conventional navigation systems communicate with the user in an audio or visual way. CabBoots tries to guide the wearer by sending tactile clues to the feet.

The project was inspired by countryside trails which usually have a concave shape. The foot walking near the edge of the trail preceives the angle of the concavity and the walker redirects his/her path intuitively - so s/he can walk along a trail blindly...

Electromechanic parts in the sole of the CabBoots shoes are able to modify the angle of the shoe artificially. Virtual paths can thus be communicated to the shoe.