Social software: love it or hate it, it’s here in abundance and isn’t going anywhere.

I personally love the direction web applications have taken in the last few years. I couldn’t have imagined ten years ago everything that’s available online these days. I’m a member of a few of these social websites, so I figured I’d share what I’ve tried.

Last.fm:

I’m way behind on this one, as I only just started to use it a couple of weeks ago. It keeps track of every song you play on your computer and MP3 player, displaying them in handy charts. It will also recommend users who have similar tastes to you, so you can pop over to their profile and see their playlists. It even provides samples of most music and will create a ‘radio’ out of your common artists.

It’s a great way to find new and interesting music, so I’m surprised it took me so long to sign up. The only problem I have right now is that my iPod Nano usually doesn’t update my recently played list, so those songs don’t get added to my play count, which is very frustrating. It does work occasionally, just to keep me hoping.

Twitter:

This site lets you broadcast messages to whoever has signed up to listen. The messages have a 140 character limit, so they need to be short and sweet. The neat bit is you can update and receive the messages via text message.

I haven’t decided if this is lame or not. I currently have the messages popping up in Digsby, my instant messaging client, and that’s working quite well. It can be nice to break up those long work days with random messages sometimes.

Pownce:

This is like Twitter, but you can broadcast files as well. I haven’t found much use for this. I get e-mailed right now if there’s any activity on there, but I don’t use it much at all. Apparently, Digsby will be adding support for it eventually, so I might look into it again when that happens.

Flickr:

Everybody loves Flickr. They’re the quintessential example of how to do things right. I bought a Pro account with them when I first signed up, and I haven’t regretted it since. I don’t take nearly enough photos these days, but hopefully that’ll change with the new camera.

Facebook:

Yes, Facebook. Pure evil on earth, yet impossible to break away from once you join.

LibraryThing:

I signed up for this a few days ago, and I’ve added about half of my books. I’m really not sure what this is all about yet, but I basically signed up for this because I enjoy lists. Give me a beer, something to snack on, and group of objects that need itemizing, and I’m your man.

Basically you list all of your books, and then other people list their books, and….I’m not really sure what happens then. I guess it’s just interesting to compare libraries with other people. It also gives you recommended books based on what’s in your library, which could be handy.

One neat feature is that they’re adding the libraries of famous readers. I apparently share six books with Ernest Hemingway.

The one thing that worries me about this site is its focus on the books you own rather than what you’ve read. I’m currently trying to wean myself off buying too many books, and this site probably won’t help with that, but I figured I’d sign up and see what all the fuss was about.

Feel free to add me as a contact on any of these or share any sites you’ve been enjoying.

I’m back from the conference. It was good, and I learned a lot. I knew more overall about the technologies going in this time, so I feel like I was able to get a little more out of the talks.

I won a 3rd generation iPod Nano door prize, which is pretty cool. I already have my own 8gb Nano though, so I’m not sure what I’ll do with this one. I’d like to find some cool use for it, but I might end up just keeping it as a backup or giving it away. The next draw was for an iPhone, so I unfortunately just missed out, but I also dodged the book draws, so I can’t complain. Nothing worse than winning the draw for a book when an iPhone is coming up next.

There was much drinking and a serious lack or sleep this weekend, so I’m still recovering. I have my first appointment for dental work tomorrow, which I’m dreading terribly. I get to find out, while in the chair, whether or not I need a root canal. It’s a surprise!

I’m off to Seattle this weekend for a Java conference, so you might not hear from me much for a few days.

We’re going to the No Fluff Just Stuff symposium. We went the last time it was held in Seattle, and it was fantastic. The hotel accidentally labeled the conference No Stuff Just Fluff that time, but it definitely had stuff. I really picked up a lot from it.

The focus is on learning. You don’t have to sign up for the individual sessions, so you decide what to view throughout the day instead of committing at the beginning, and no one tries to sell you anything or push their products. It’s set up in a way that allows you to get the most out of it.

The conference is right in Seattle this time, instead of being in Redmond, so we’ll have more to do at night. It should be a fun weekend.

The site design has changed. I’ve once again used a WordPress template, as I was too lazy to design my own. I get incredibly meticulous and obsessive with web design, and I just don’t have the time for that right now. Actually, I do have the time, just not the will.

WordPress themes are a joy to use. Adding, changing, and modifying themes is such a breeze. But while WordPress theme management might be designed brilliantly, the user uploaded themes aren’t always, and this one is a good example of that.

I didn’t notice until I just tried to edit the sidebar, but they used nested tables in the layout. I feel dirty all over for using this now. I feel like I’m harbouring a terrorist, clubbing seals to death, or buying a Paris Hilton CD. The design isn’t Widget Ready either, so editing the sidebar is a pain. I’ll start looking for another theme soon.

If you mosey over to the sidebar, you’ll find I’ve added contact information and links to my various profiles around this here Internet. Feel free to add me as a friend/contact/followee on any of those applications.

Lastly, I’ve started using Postalicious to post periodic shared links here. I initially set it up to post my shared links from Google Reader, but that wasn’t working how I wanted, so I switched to using del.icio.us. I’m going to try it out for a while, and see how it goes.

And yes, I realise that coffee cup has an eye. And yes, it is staring into your very soul.

Lifehack.org posted this the other day, and I thought a few of you might find it useful. It’s the Ultimate Writing Productivity Resource, and while calling it the ultimate resource is more than a stretch, there were a few interesting applications listed I hadn’t seen before.

The article consists of:

• 9 Free Apps Every Writer Should Consider
• 10 Online Apps and Services Every Writer Should Check Out
• 10 Sites Every Writer Should Bookmark (Besides Lifehack)
• 30 Lifehack Posts Every Writer Should Read
• 5 Online Communities Every Writer Should Join

I’m still going through the links, but I can definitely recommend the first two items: Q10, which I’ve written about previously, and Freemind.

I’ve spent the last thirty minutes trying to FTP to my site to upgrade my WordPress to 2.5, but my connection keeps getting dropped almost immediately after connecting. The closest I can get is through command line, but that also drops before I can do anything useful. The web interface, Plesk, only allows single file uploads, so that’s obviously not going to work either. It’s all rather frustrating.

This new version has built-in tag management, which is great. Ever since Flickr, I’ve been a huge fan of tags. It’s such a simple way to manage content. The new photo gallery tools are also interesting. I have very little storage with my hosting plan, so I just use Flickr for my photos, but it looks like a cool feature.

The most exciting part of this new version, however, is that they’ve finally stopped the visual editor from raping your HTML. This has haunted me in the past, so it great to see them address it. This, along with the new full screen editor, shows they’re trying to smooth out the writing process, which is something I’m glad they’re focusing on.

Here’s a preview of the new dashboard and photo management:

Tonight wasn’t a complete waste, though. I pulled out my new stock pot for the first time and made a huge batch of chili. After nine hours of what I can only imagine is some kind of black magic, my dinner was ready, and it was delicious. I used this recipe, and I’ll be making it again.

I stumbled upon this on YouTube just now and fell in love. It’s a demented short video from Looking For Group, a World of Warcraft based web comic, and it’s produced by Blind Ferret Entertainment. If The Little Mermaid was more like this, I think I would have enjoyed it a little more.

The first day of NaNoWriMo is finally here. I started writing after midnight, before I went to bed last night, and I’m just sitting down to continue now. I’m a little late getting home, as I went to the climbing gym tonight.

I’m using the free Q10 as my word processor for this month. It was recommended to me by Amanda (her fiance, actually), and it’s really working for me. It’s a very simplistic text editor that has a few handy features:

• No installation required. It’s run from a self-contained executable, so you can toss it on a memory stick with your novel and take it anywhere.
• Run at full screen, allowing you to focus on your writing free of distractions.
• Set a word count target. You can set it for your month or your day goal, and it will display the percentage completed at the bottom of the screen.
• Set a timer. This is one of my favourite features. Once the time is up, it will display how many words you wrote during that period. I plan to set it for 30 minute intervals, to remind myself to stop and stretch every now and then. Having a timer while you write tends to keep you moving at a fast pace.
• Auto-save the document at a customizable interval.
• No distracting red and blue lines under your mistakes that will awaken your inner editor.
• Display multiple word counts. I use one for overall word count and one for daily word count.
• Insert notes into the document. By started a line with “..”, it sets that line as a note. You can bring up the list of existing notes whenever you like. This will be really useful when you go back to edit next month. The notes do not count towards your word count.

Just thought I’d share this with you. I’m off to write now!