A Week with Google Chrome

Posted on February 21, 2010 by Zach Ware

I’ve used Firefox for a long time primarily because, in my Windows days, I abhorred IE. It was too structured and tried to think too much for me. I wanted mah Internets and I wanted them now.

I’ve been a Mac for almost two years and have found Safari to be at once beautiful and frustrating. I don’t store my bookmarks in my browser and I really, really need Firebug.

So along came Chrome. Since it’s built on Webkit it’s bound to be fast and oh so pretty. Really, the Internet is just more beautiful in a Webkit browser.

For a while there was no official Mac version of Chrome so I started with Chromium (they are in a lot of ways interchangeable). I could stick with Chromium except for that little problem with mission-critical open source software, it’s buggy. I use a lot of community built software to get things done, but my browser needs to be officially supported, it’s far too important in my life to be buggy.

Inadvertently I started on a week-long trek to use Chrome as my primary browser. It’s been a long-time comin. Firefox has an incredible memory leak bug that goes back ages. On the 12th, I’d had enough. On an aluminum MacBook Pro these memory leaks cause the machine to transform into a stove top. I simply can’t deal with that hot of a computer.

The Setup

Chrome was on my machine for some time, but I hadn’t used it. There were a few core extension-type functions that were mission-critical such as 1Password integration and bookmark syncing. Other extensions of less importance to my daily life are Firebug, MeasureIt, User Agent Switcher and Delicious bookmarks. The latest builds of Chrome allow extensions so I was closer.

For the longest time I used 1Password to keep track and secure my various online identities (I haven’t personally known my Facebook password in over a year.) 1Password didn’t yet support Chrome. A bit of research let me to LastPass, I migrated and became cross-browser compatible.

As of today the only extensions I use in Chrome are LastPass and Read it Later. I had to update RescueTime with a new beta version to allow it to track activity via Chrome. That was an improvement considering the trouble I’ve had with Firefox and RescueTime of late.

Impressions and Problems

Chrome is fast and stable. As a user I appreciate (though had a hard time adjusting to) the merged address and search bar. Otherwise the browser is a joy to use as my standard browser. As Firefox matured it took ever longer to open. Once opened the memory leaks/burning laptop ensued. Chrome opens super fast and to-date the only memory hog issues I’ve had relate to Flash.

A new and nice feature is the Incognito Window. There are a variety of reasons why you don’t want cookies and history pressed to your logs of certain sites. I primarily use it for the one-off sites I visit occasionally that I don’t want clouding up my address bar (I rely on recently visited sites where most people rely on bookmarks.)

There are still a few core bugs that preclude me from making Chrome my only browser, particularly for web development:

  • Javascript Bookmark Problems: These are little bookmarklets used by Tumblr, WordPress and other sharing services that allow you to in some what post where you are online to another place. Mostly they are for sharing. In Chrome some work and some don’t. The ones that do (bit.ly) open a modal window where the ones that done (WordPress) force a popup. I’m thinking the problem could be more related to the bad popup support.
  • Pop-up Issues: Chrome for Mac blocks all pop-up windows, 100% of the time. There is no option to turn off the blocker and no notification when one is blocked. This is a fatal bug that needs to be corrected. Until it is, I keep Firefox handy for work in tools like PHPMyAdmin.
  • Flash Crashes: This may or may not be a Chrome bug. Flash video plays fine but I often receive a “script out of control” error caused by flash-based advertising. Chrome halts the script gracefully throwing a notification window instead of crashing. Like I said, this could be a performance issue with the resource-heavy, poorly built irresponsibly developed Flash. Who knows.
  • SSL problems: This one baffles me and only occurs in a few cases, such as with Chase.com. Chrome seems to have a problem pulling the stylesheet. Perhaps it is attempting to protect me from multiple domain calls when pulling a secure page, I’m not sure. But this is what my banking session looks like.
  • No decent Delicious sync: I created a mess for myself. In Firefox I use a Delicious Add-On as my primary bookmark source. I have my favorite tags in the bookmark bar and all is swell. Now I can’t get them out so my mission-critical bookmarks are stuck in Yahoo’s data silo (Plesk links, Dev site links). If there were an extension for this, it would only delay for me the awful task of getting my stuff out of Delicious.
  • Little Bugs: When I first switched Chrome crashed every time I accessed the WordPress editor. An update fixed that problem but there are still odd little javascript issues, such as the inability to bold text in WordPress’s TinyMCE editor. They aren’t huge problems but they force me to use Firefox (although my WordPress text is Textile by default.)

Summation

This has been a pleasant Internet week. I’ve had less trouble and less sweaty palms as a result of using Chrome. I’ll keep using it because it keeps getting better. Firefox is a standby because of Firebug and the aforementioned weaknesses. To borrow from Eston Bond, I’ll use Google Chrome as my default browser unless I’m developing. In a few months I bet that will change.

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In Re: @Jason is wrong about Facebook

Posted on February 10, 2010 by Zach Ware

Bold, sweeping statements irritate me. But I have to give Jason Calacanis some credit for knowing his stuff. In a post to his newsletter (titled “BREAKING: Google Buzz is brilliant, Facebook just lost half its value“) Jason says a few things that I think are the exact opposite of correct.

First the sweeping generalization:

Facebook is going to see their traffic get cut in half by Google Buzz.

He backs it up with a few thoughts:

3. Google has excellent privacy record and Facebook is a disaster.

Totally agreed.

Google Buzz puts relies and updates into your GMAIL as
threads–this is BRILLIANT and a HUGE advantage.

Completely disagree. The reliance on Gmail is a deal-breaker. For those 0utside of tech circles, a service based in Gmail means they have to switch email addresses. They will *not* do that. Sure we know better but they don’t.

This really is game over for Facebook because you know Microsoft and
Aol are going to copy Google Buzz as quick as they can.

This is precisely why Facebook still holds the cards. For now it is a neutral network not tied to any search engine or email service. I can be a part of Facebook without changing my email address (again, baseless fear but perception in middle America is reality.)

Buzz is a part of my life because Gmail has been a part of my life since it launched. Buzz has to have a business model as will the AOL and MSFT copies. If half of my network of friends uses Yahoo as a primary portal/email system then how do I interact with them and get the same interpersonal value as I get from the email agnostic Facebook (this may change soon)?

I think Jason is right. Buzz does shakeup the social space but it has a serious barrier to entry by tying the service to Gmail. I would actually be more inclined to call this a win if it *weren’t* so tied. Then at least I know my non-gmail/Google friends would be there to interact with me.

(Note: This is a hastily written post. Sorry for typos or factual errors.)

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Barriers, Open Data and Google Buzz

Posted on February 9, 2010 by Zach Ware

Google Buzz is billed as a challenge to Twitter, Facebook and more, so I expected a lot from today’s launch. I want to find a place for Buzz in my life but I’m not yet convinced that the barriers to sign-up coupled with the silo’d nature of today’s social web will let Buzz succeed.

As a platform Buzz mostly delivers on its promises but it’s not yet a social network. To be that it needs users. Here are some thoughts on that and a few lessons learned on launching a new product.

  • Google must execute open data. It’s one thing to read everything in one place but to be truly revolutionary, Buzz should allow me to engage all of my various networks in once place. If it doesn’t do that, it’s just another stream I have to manage. (More on that here.)
  • The API has to work. Open data is a two-way street. I need to engage my Buzz network from somewhere outside of Gmail. A mobile web app isn’t enough.
  • It does status updates, it does @ replies, it does geolocate information. But to look solely at the platform misses the point because it doesn’t have my stream of interesting people from Twitter (more on that later) and it doesn’t allow me to engage friends on other networks.

Lesson 1: Never launch a product without opening the entire platform to users.

Anyone can play around with Buzz on an Android or iPhone mobile device, but it’s core functionality is in the browser which is slow to rollout for everyone (10 hours later I still don’t have it).

The early adopters are a fickle bunch. When you show us something and say it’s live, it better be live (or it better not be.) Leaving us stuck in the middle is a mistake. We’ll find something else to do.

Lesson 2: Don’t position a social network as a part of an email address.

At its core Buzz is more than Gmail, but to reach a more diverse audience it needs to move beyond the Gmail shell. If you know anyone with a Prodigy or an AOL email address, you know that asking someone to change his email address is one of the toughest debates you’ll ever have.

I know Buzz is larger than Gmail but perception is reality. Hackers know they can sign-up for an email address and never use it. Most people don’t think that way. This decision will be Buzz’s single greatest limitation to growth.

Lesson 3: If you launch with a geek mentality, you’ll only get geeks as customers.

A janitor at Google is arguably more qualified to comment on Google’s business than I am. From the outside it seems that Google knows engineering and it knows how to make computers do awesome things.

Based on the product positioning of several recent launches (Wave, Nexus One) I question whether Google knows how to make people want things. The only company I know that’s mastered both is Apple.

Wrapup

Social networks need people to be useful. The Gmail attachment is a big barrier to gaining critical mass. I’m curious to see how that goes. Until then, I’ll wait for the other half of my Buzz experience to arrive.

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If Kids Ran The World

Posted on January 12, 2010 by Zach Ware

It’s not on message for me to depart from talking about tech and rant about TV but the travesty the NBC is committing right now begs a response. To start let me make it clear that while I think Conan is funnier than Jay Leno, I’m agnostic about The Tonight Show. I don’t watch it. No, my concern is with NBC’s behavior and what it says about how it runs its business.

Some months ago I ranted about NBC’s choice to play musical chairs with Kings, a modern-day David and Goliath drama that I felt was one of the best things to hit television waves in some years. Obviously millions of Americans disagreed with me electing instead to watch American Idol, Extreme Makeover:Home Edition, or pretty much anything else they could find that wasn’t Kings.

What’s a network to do when ratings go south? I can’t fault NBC for canceling it. But that’s not what they did. First they moved it to a new night, Sunday, looking to give it more steam. To review the logic, NBC felt that a show with low ratings would perform better if stacked against Extreme Makeover:Home Edition, Desperate Housewives and Fox’s Sunday Night lineup. They did it for one week then quickly gave up, moving it to Saturday to run it out. In one week.

Meanwhile I was telling everyone I know to watch Kings on Thursday, Sunday, I mean Saturday night. How is a show to grow if it moves days every week? Sure, ratings were low but shuffling a show twice in two weeks doesn’t help rescue it.

So here we are. NBC made a fear-based knee-jerk reaction in offering Leno a 10pm spot. They committed to a 52 week run with the new Leno/Conan schedule then caved 45 weeks early to pressure from local affiliates whose local news ratings are apparently suffering, not because local news programs are crap, but because people get their funny fix at 10 and head to bed.

Their solution, move Leno to 11:30 and The Tonight Show to midnight? It might make sense to shift in the long-run, but so soon, so quickly? After all, what are the affiliates going to do, change affiliation?

I don’t question NBC’s choice to cancel Kings or play musical chairs with Leno and Conan. I challenge NBC to give a plan a shot. It’s America, we overreact and scream but over time we adapt to change and start to love life again. It just takes time.

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Silicon Valley and The Consumer-Focused Web

Posted on January 10, 2010 by Zach Ware

Dave McClure wrote an interesting post today that touched on something I’ve been thinking about for a while. To begin I should point out I am not an investor nor am I a founder. I come to this article as an observer with concerns. Dave’s argument is that there are far too few investors with design/user-experience/marketing experience. I can only assume that to be true based on the state of technology today. Let me explain.

Building anything for consumers is a tricky endeavor and it takes time to get it right. Companies must have a firm grasp on what consumers want, develop solutions to meet those demands and be prepared to stick it out. In short, developing consumer technology is just as complicated as developing a consumer product. You can invest years in what you think people want only to find out that the demand has passed or your creation just didn’t hit the mark. (See Waterworld, Crystal Pepsi, New Coke.) The tech industry has yet to realize that it’s just another consumer products manufacturer.

What I observe in emerging tech today is a glaring lack of consumer-centric strategy. When Kevin Rose tells people to join Gowalla investors trip over themselves to back it and all of the early adopters rush to be a part of something new and shiny. What we forget is that middle America doesn’t watch Diggnation and they don’t understand why they should drop a slice of pizza at a venue or pickup a muscle car. They just want to know where they should eat tonight.

Continue reading →

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22 Minutes. 10,051 People.

Posted on December 28, 2009 by Zach Ware

The reach of the internet fascinates me. The speed of email, blogs, and websites is old news. Now communication tools like Twitter thrust words into light speed. A few years ago I could email everyone I know. Today I can send a Twitter update to a plethora people, some I know and most I don’t. Either way, I can influence others with very little effort. They, in turn, can influence those who follow them.

When I wake up in the morning I check my feed reader (Fever) and many others check The New York Times or whatever. The point is most of us don’t walk to our doorstep or to the local newsstand and buy a paper to find out what’s happening in the world 12 hours after it happened. Words come to us in real-time from the streams we choose to follow.

Saturday a perfect storm unfolded between AT&T, the people of New York, and everyone with an interest in either. It seemed like the perfect opportunity to observe the reach of words on the internet. That is to say how quickly words travel. Story here

The Consumerist, with roughly 8 million unique visitors/month, published a story. They tweeted it. Mashable also published a story and sent it out via Twitter to its 1,863,998 followers. Friends retweeted the retweets and so on. On Monday the NYTimes, WSJ, NPR, and countless others jumped in.

The story didn’t wait for editorial confirmation, the rolling of the printing press, or the spin of PR. The writer went to AT&T’s website and had a chat with a customer service agent who confirmed the story, telling her “New York is not ready for the iPhone” (see the chat.) That agent probably doesn’t have a job today.

At 7:47pm I searched Twitter for “New York iPhone”. Let’s examine the first eight results. Combined, those first eight random Twitter users have 10,051 followers. That’s 10,051 people who potentially saw that story in 22 minutes. There are thousands of tweets behind these eight all going into an untold number of users’ streams. Social influence aside, you can’t argue with the numbers.

This isn’t a story about the shoddy job that AT&T did managing its business and its image, but the ease with which a guy from Brooklyn made his experience into a national headline. A dialog between a customer service agent and a random customer can become national news, quickly.

Every person with a computer, a phone, or a camera is a member of the real-time media. Stories that influence people come in the form of bytes, Tweets, feeds, and webpages and they come instantly. The only middleman between a person’s fingers and the people she can influence is, well, AT&T.

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Lessons From 2009

Posted on December 27, 2009 by Zach Ware

This is the time of year when the torrent of “New You in the New Year” articles flood my feeds. Like the covers of Men’s Health they seem to repeat themselves. After all, we’ve had twelve months to forget all the things we were supposed to do last year.

During this long holiday weekend, with 2010 just around the corner, I thought it proper to look back on 2009, a significant year in my life, full of change, advancement and challenges. It was at once the best and hardest year of my life. It’s worth a bit of reflection.

2009 was a year of change and challenge. I moved to San Francisco, a city that looks beautiful from the outside but is much more complicated for those who live here. For a year I lived in a house I both hated and could barely afford, an overpriced Victorian on a very bad street. Thankfully that experience is behind me. New place, new me.

I would be doing a disservice if I didn’t speak to the importance of my friends. I’m not much of a co-dependent and I don’t accept help (or advice or criticism) very well. As I’ve grown, fallen, and overcome challenges my friends have proven irreplaceable. I am so very grateful for and humbled by their friendship.

It’s impossible to summarize the technical knowledge I’ve acquired this year so I won’t. Here are a few things I learned about myself and about life.

Deal With What’s Out There
There are few times in life when you are not in 100% control of your fate (exceptions include air travel.) You lose control when you leave others no choice but to act on your behalf. Dealing with uncomfortable challenges may seem difficult now but you can bet that they will worsen with every passing day.

I’ve had the opportunity to learn this lesson many times in my life, but never did. In 2009 I dealt with a financial situation that that started ten years ago. For ten years I’ve had the opportunity to take control of it and I chose not to. Alas, the shit hit the fan in 2009. I lost control and almost didn’t recover. Thanks to hard work and the support of many in my life, I made it through and learned my lesson.

American culture doesn’t reward assertive behavior but that doesn’t mean you can’t take control of your life. When confronting an uncomfortable situation, remember, the person at the other end of the table, phone, or email doesn’t control you. If you do the right thing, you will always win in the long run.

Accountability Is Infectious
I take pride in my accountability. I make decisions and take complete responsibility for them if something goes wrong…the buck always stops here. It’s a valuable trait in a world where so many people spend their time searching for someone to blame or making excuses. It can also be troublesome because when something goes wrong there’s no one else to blame.

Though like a virus, accountability is infectious. When those around you know that you will take responsibility for what you do, they spend less time trying to point fingers. Everyone is better off and groups work more efficiently. As a person I’m less interested in hearing why you did something wrong than I am in hearing what you’re going to do to fix it. As a professional, I don’t see the value of explanations. At the end of the day, something still went wrong and the smartest people are constantly trying to find ways to make the world better instead of focusing on who to blame for their woes. Don’t get caught up in the race to blame.

Understand Motivation
I make a lot of very quick decisions. Some are spawned by gut reactions others by sheer will. Rarely do I stop and take stock of why I want do do something. Even when I make an effort, I almost never admit my real motivations, they can be too uncomfortable to admit.

Here’s a recent frivolous example. I’ve been toying with moving my hosting services from Media Temple to Rackspace. No less than four times I’ve provisioned a clean server on The Rackspace Cloud, moved databases, done everything short of pulling the plug. My gut tells me I should do this but it doesn’t tell me why.

When I stop to consider my root motivations, the reason is clear…it’s new and shiny. I arrive at this conclusion via Toyota’s Five Whys Test. Understanding the root, I can weigh the advantages and make a better decision, which in this case means not moving my server. With reality in front of me, I abandon my frivolous pursuit of developer coolness and stay with what works.

Trust, But Question Your Gut
Outwardly I’m very self-assured but often I give detractors and naysayers more credit than I should. Instead of considering varying viewpoints and making a decision, all too often I allow the negative feedback to overpower my will.

Even our closest friends who want nothing but the best for us come to our lives with their own perspectives. Almost every time I’ve trusted me gut, life was better and most times I’ve allowed my gut to be overpowered, I’ve regretted it.

Your gut should be an excellent guide so long as you have honest conversations with yourself about your motivations.

You Can’t Know Everything
The saying goes, “Those who can’t do teach.” I don’t know if that’s true but I’ve learned this year to accept the opposite…those who do, can’t teach. For years I thought the world crazy because no one could learn what I was trying to tell them. This year I’ve realized the lowest common denominator in those situations was me. The buck stops here. I’m a bad teacher.

Part of growing up is admitting that you aren’t the solution to every problem the world has. As I continue to narrow my professional focus I must accept that when things aren’t going as I would like, close examination may prove that in fact I am the problem. This logic along with my focus on finding “the root” helps me lead more effectively.

How 2010 Will Be Better
As I grow older I grow more focused, not to be confused with more patient. This year I’ve had the opportunity to grow in ways I never thought possible and I’ve been the recipient of generosity I can never repay. I’ve also suffered through the consequences of decisions I’d convinced myself would never go awry. All of that, good and bad, is behind me.

All of these cautionary guides give me strength to grow in 2010. With a better personal foundation I intend to take a few more risks in 2010. As I examine the root of my motivations and the reality of what it will take to get there, I have 20/20 clarity of the things that could go wrong. It’s not that I’m more comfortable with risk, I’m just more comfortable taking risks because I know my motivations are just.

As a human I intend to balance the generosity scale that’s woefully out-of-balance. I’m not sure how to go about that but I’m going to try. Most of all I intend to live in the moment, see what’s in front of me, and listen. These are simple statements with far-reaching implications.

Happy 2010.

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Why the News Corp./Bing rumors are bad for all of us.

Posted on November 22, 2009 by Zach Ware

It started as a rumor, then confirmed, and is now a distinct possibility. News Corp. may be the first (or at least the largest) news producer to block Google in favor of an exclusive partnership with Bing.

From the FT (which I pay for):

Microsoft said that the plan “puts enormous value on content if search engines are prepared to pay us to index with them”.

Here’s why that’s the worst thing that could happen to the internet. Search is about finding information. Google, Bing, and Yahoo (now also powered by Bing) index the internet and try to match your search term with things people have created on the internet. The algorithm that determines what lies at the top of your search results is acutely democratic. It’s meant to highlight content that is relevant to your search, content marked by others as good, and not at all influenced by direct payments to the search engine from the publisher.

Along comes Microsoft with their third try (MSN, Live, now Bing) at search. In possibly teaming up with News Corp to be the ‘exclusive’ indexer of news from its properties, Bing will become a completely undemocratic search engine. This isn’t an example of the “what’s next” fear mongering. If News Corp and Microsoft reach a deal and News Corp blocks Google, the worst will have happened.

Search results will be weighted by a financial arrangement and no longer ranked by relevance to the user. The idea is counter to everything journalism is supposed to protect. Sure, Rupert, put your content behind a pay wall (Disclosure: I am a subscriber to the Wall Street Journal) I think we all agree that’s fair. But making search a game of who has the most money is evil.

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Brands, Blogs and Bad Consultants

Posted on November 21, 2009 by Zach Ware

I feel the need to write this post to counter the corporate blog snake oil salesmen out there. If it’s helpful, send it to your CEO.

Blogging is about content. Good content is favored by search engines. If you write good, relevant and useful content, search engines will give you weight and the traffic will come. That’s your formula for adding value to your website with a corporate blog.

The 800-pound gorilla in the blogging world is Wordpress. It’s a service and a platform, whichever you want it to be. You can host with Wordpress.com or host your own with Wordpress.org. Visually they are mostly the same and users won’t know the difference.

You can setup a corporate blog in minutes. The hard part is content. Your content should be relevant and helpful to your users. Your post’s title should be a well written, accurate reflection of the post’s content. Wordpress will automatically make the URL the same as the page title (if you check the right box). URL and page title are among the most influential facets to determining your search engine rank.

Don’t be fooled into wasting money with systems like Compendium Blogware that aim to “target keywords” and game the SEO system. Out of touch marketing consultants will read articles in banner publications like Internet Retailer and think that Compendium is tech gold. Truth is, it’s just a paid solution for something they don’t know how to do.

Write good content. That’s the only strategy that works.

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Non-Hacker Fear Mongers

Posted on November 2, 2009 by Zach Ware

I get heartburn when non-hackers explain technology. Tonight on Fresh Air Terry Gross interviewed Ken Auletta, author of the new book Googled: The End of the World As We Know It.

Fresh Air’s and NPR’s audience skew older. They are more educated than the general population but when it comes to technology, overall intelligence doesn’t a technologist make.

Auletta is a media critic and author of such objective titles as World War 3.0: Microsoft and Its Enemies, Three Blind Mice: How the TV Networks Lost Their Way, and Greed and Glory on Wall Street: The Fall of the House of Lehman. With that list we shouldn’t be surprised that the author’s perspective on Google leans a bit on the alarmist side.

The first half of the program focused on explaining what Google does, how Gmail works, and how GPS can be used to advertise to consumers. I take issue not with Google nor do I stake a claim on either side of the privacy debate. I take issue with programs like Fresh Air that introduce a topic like GPS-based advertising, cloud computing, or Google’s search algorithm using an old curmudgeon journalist and a (normally very intelligent) interviewer who prefaces questions saying “Google has had a lot of, like, advertising breakthroughs that have been very threatening to the broadcast and print media.”

When speaking of cloud computing, Auletta notes the pros of cost savings in server infrastructure then:

The minus is: do you trust Google? Do you want to store that information with a company? Will they guard your secrets, or will they share them with advertisers or with someone else?

That was it. Save a bit of money and hand you secrets over to the devil. He made no mention of productivity improvements, enhanced collaboration, or any of the other benefits of cloud computing. Why should he? Fear sells more books than information.

Thanks to this broadcast hour there is now one more CEO with a pronounced fear of remote servers, managed IT services, and cloud computing. That’s not what we need in today’s fast-changing technology environment. We need people on shows like Fresh Air who can discuss technology objectively and with knowledge. Not from the perspective of an media fearmonger with a book to sell.

(Quotes courtesy of NPR, available here.)

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    The views, words and opinions expressed in this space are those of Zach Ware and not those of my employer, any clients or any other entity dead or alive.