The plug-ins allow you to create relationships between the blogs — for linking friends, messaging between one another, creating groups and, of course, collecting your photos into albums that can be shared. BuddyPress isn’t out of development yet, but it’s worth watching if you’re interested in a WordPress-based social networking solution…which could be interesting if you’re using WordPress for a CMS platform or for a groups site already via bbPress forum software.

It’s fun watching WordPress grow like this. For the past six months or more I’ve explored the possibilities with social networks; a white-label social network is tough to come by; that fact that one may soon be built on such a robust platform is an exciting testament to the power of open source.

It’s almost bad enough that it might be worth parting with if something better comes along.

Of course, I probably wouldn’t gripe as much if AT&T’s network didn’t suck so bad in my neighborhood. The fact that 50-75% of the time I can’t use my phone as a phone probably makes me more willing to criticize other features that I could live without. (But, frankly, even when the AT&T signal is good, I still seem to get a lot of drop-out from the iPhone>)

Still, beyond signal and service there are some flaws Apple needs to address. Arguing from the specific to the theoretical, those include:
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We did have fun on that show, despite the fact that — to this day — Dave suspects that I “never really liked” him. Well…I’ll leave the answer to that question to your imagination.

Let’s just say the pay was good.

(Oh, and gas was only like 8 cents a gallon at the time, so I was more than happy to commute up to Denver from Colorado Springs for a two-hour radio show once a week. In a Jeep Cherokee. Can you imagine?)

Dave focuses on old clips of “Dank Showcase, Cyberspy” because, well, he wrote them. (So, BIG surprise there.)

Truth told, though, Dank Showcase was the best part of the show…that single experience has caused me to occasionally yearn to do a little “real” radio theatre at some point in my life. The fact that no one would listen it — just as they did then — is somewhat beside the point.

But he captured the high points — the megadingos, the callers, the silly stuff we would do. Almost makes me want to do it again.

Hmmm.

Whatdaya say, Dave? We could use uStream or similar to put together a show like TuesdayNightTech, but not so…juvenile. Heck…using Skype or something we could take callers. (Do you still know anything about computers? I might have to brush up a bit on PCs. Yuck.)

Maybe you could get us a sponsor from up there in the techie Northwest? If we got enough of a following, we could write books together again. Maybe they’d even put us on ZDNet. TechTV. TechTV G4. PBS!

Dave?

No?

You never liked me, did you, Dave?

I was surfing Ning sites and came across this guy’s profile page and pic. If I’d have been drinking Coke, it would have come out my nose. (I love that he’s shooting from a little Heineken mini-keg.) He’s a member of Bobalicious in Canada, which is apparently a social network supporting an online online magazine up there.

I didn’t get too deep into social networking in HTDE/Web 2.0 Blog in part because services like Ning weren’t quite in full swing. But the truth is, as these services mature, Ning-like social networks offer a great way to mash up a blog and a forum to get a community of folks focused on getting to know one another better and having a little fun.

You need to have some momentum in terms of readership (three nerdy guys hanging out on a Ning is just about as exciting as three nerdy guys hanging out at one of their mother’s house without a Ning site) and it REALLY helps to have a reason to bring folks together, whether it’s regional or topical. (And if you can get people together IRL based on their social networking, all the better.)

But, that said, Ning is cool, and it can be “blogging” if you want — you can set up a Ning so that it’s very much like your personal blog (or a group blog) except you surround yourself with pictures, events and blog entries by others as well.

Anyway, if you’re reading the book and want to see if thing’s have gotten any further toward the “next big thing,” check out Ning and see if maybe it qualifies.

Do yourself a favor: don’t judge this book by its (awful) cover. I’ve had this book by my side every step of the way while setting up my very first blog, and I have to say it has been a huge help. Stauffer’s style is direct and engaging, not cutesy. He tells you what you need to know to get started, without a lot of fluff.

I wanted to write a review here because I think this books deserves a big audience, and because the Amazon listing tells you little about what’s covered.

Bob then goes on to talk about the different topics in the book.

Actually, he brings up one problem I’ve had with Amazon on past projects — the book descriptions often come from very early entries in whatever cataloguing systems are used for book orders and sales. So, many times the descriptions of the books just aren’t as accurate by the time they’re written; this book, for instance, moved away from some programming coverage in part because the “rise of widgets” took place as I was writing. It took a long time to get the description changed to reflect the new outline.

First, I can totally see why Apple has announced a push strategy that goes along with the Me.com announcement — having to wait for your e-mail to download very much blows when you’re used to just looking down and seeing e-mail on your Blackberry instantly. I’m excited about the Me.com upgrade, since I already pay an arm-and-a-leg for my less-than-useful Mac.com account, but ONLY if the service will transparently allow me to send e-mail from my other accounts — I need it to work like Gmail in the respect that it seems that e-mail is coming from my jacksonfreepress.com account even if I’m using Apple Mail. If not, then it’s straight-up no dice on Me.com, because I can’t answer my work mail using an @me.com address.

Second, my main complaint about the iPhone might just be the carrier — AT&T is simply not as good as Alltel, my previous carrier, in this area. I’ve gone back to the days of hunting around in the room for a signal — something that I haven’t had to think about for years using my Alltel phones, whether regular clamshells or Blackberrys. Ms. D’s Treo is the same way — signal problems are very rare.

Since I’ve gone to the slick, swanky iPhone, I’ve had a LOT of trouble making actual phone calls. In my house, the signal only works well closer to a front window; in our office suite, I’ve found a better signal in the sales cubicles than in my own office. That just ain’t right.

Solution? I’m concerned that I’ll need to quickly make the decision to move to something else — back to Alltel, ideally, with, perhaps a Treo 755p. That’s not my greatest desire, since I like synching contacts and addresses with my iPhone — as a diehard Mac user, even in business, the iPhone excels on that front. Or, I could sit around and wait for AT&T to improve in my area, or I can hold on and hope that the 3G iPhone is better on actually being a phone.

We shall see!

I, personally, am watching this whole iPhone thing closely…although I swore months ago I wouldn’t go in for an iPhone, I ended up buying one one eBay somewhat accidentally (long story, but a I got a great price), but I haven’t yet activated it. Not sure what I was waiting for…but I’m getting closer.

Word of native iChat clients is helping me make that decision; I’m not a huge iChat user, but being able to bring up folks back in the office using iChat has proven very handy when I’ve had the capability in the past. (It was a feature that I found compelling about the T-Mobile SideKick, for instance.) I may be an iPhone user yet…

Watch the guided tour and then sit back and realize something. You page through films, choose one to rent, then you rent it. Then you watch it. On your TV. That’s it. It works.

That, my friends, is a killer app.

Oh, plus, you can buy TV shows, play podcasts, play your music collection, buy more music…Apple TV just became the heart of your media center. (If you could rip movies to MPEG-4 from DVD that would take this thing even further. The drag-able movies from new DVDs will be the next best thing.) Apple TV can replace your music channels on digital cable or satellite — in fact, it can replace your CD player or iPod dock device altogether. Internet radio. It’s all there.

Once I’m allowed to buy an HDTV (ahem…Ms. D?) this will revolutionize how *I* watch TV. I imagine others will agree.

Now if only they would make it so that you can purchase football and baseball games without the damn commercials…