Tiny Twitter: it’s good. portable. Twitter.

From Tiny Twitter –

Tiny Twitter is just what you are looking for and it will work on ANY Java enabled device (that’s a bunch & includes the CrackBerry) and ANY Windows Mobile Pocket PC or Smartphone (they’re pretty cool).

If you like Twitter, but wish there was an app out there to allow you to tweet from you cell, look no further.  Web Worker Daily comes through again, and shows us just the ticket:

“On my Windows Mobile phone the interface is crisp and clean and Twhirl like.  I can see and browse through my timeline and tweet, reply or direct message easily. Options let me choose how often it checks for updates which is great with the ever changing API limits that Twitter seems to be imposing.”

What’s not to love?

Slippery Slopes

A lot of people have told me washing their car makes it rain. If that were true, it seems like it would rain more. What are they trying to hide?

Slippery Slopes #3: one from he who has no equal

An important perspective from Jack Handy:

If you’re a cowboy and you’re dragging a guy behind your horse, I bet it would really make you mad if you looked back and the guy was reading a magazine.

Slippery Slopes #2: Integrity

You can always spot the people with integrity; they admit they love Barry Manilow (… or Tron).

Slippery Slopes: the first

I have always wondered…

Why is it that we never see any really good goth golfers?

[It is my intention that "Slippery Slopes" posts will be a (near) daily event.  The name was selected in honor of one of the crappiest arguments of all time (because in my opinion it concedes the opposition's point, yet persists with the claim that the opposing view would have horrible effects, when taken to its extreme).  It is my hope that Slippery Slopes -- at least once in a while -- makes your thought process step back and gather itself to take another run at a concept.]

Flag Day coming — reason to look back

Words have power.

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

Now it’s ours … a republic, if we can keep it.

Fathers Day Gifts

Just a reminder: If you are planning to mail Dad something this year, better get it in the mail soon! (Like right now.) And if your father is a man of discerning taste, why not give the classic!

iPhone WWDC Keynote video

Mahalo and Calacanis have done it again.  Here’s the caffeinated version of SteveNote:

Jott Feeds comment + true Lifehacker feedback = innovation

So, you know (thanks to Lifehacker) that Jott will read your feeds to you. Suppose yours truly left a comment on Lifehacker regarding another potential use:

If I’m not mistaken, can’t one get a feed of his gmail inbox? If it’s not too cumbersome, I could see listening to email during morning commute.

But wait! It’s not that simple (read: it does not work). What to do?

Leaping tall buildings in a single bound, LH’s own Kevin Purdy comes through with a way:

You’ve always been able to email yourself with a phone call through voice-to-text service Jott, but with the introduction of Jott Feeds, Gmail (and Google Apps) users can now have a summary of their messages read to them by phone. The secret sauce lies in Gmail’s RSS feeds and a go-between web site that handles password requirements. I’ll show you how …

You know what Wayne and Garth would say, no?

Lifehacker, “we’re not worthy!”

Adobe, Erik Larson, a Real Answer, Please.

After License to Display Your Online Files … Beware, Adobe’s Erik Larson assured he’s “checking with lawyers” and will be “looking into it”.  See for yourself in the comments to that post.  I’m feeling less and less assured that anyone’s actually checking with anyone.

All I can say for sure is that “Adobe Systems” has visited the site every few hours the last few days.  No additional comment — only views.  Perhaps those are the people Erik Larson is checking with? Wanna know what I think: someone’s looking over their shoulder every now and then, just to make sure this one blows over.

First ever Quick Poll:  Do you think we’ll actually hear anything meaningful back from Mr. Larson?  As a matter of fact, if you don’t think so, take a minute to write your best PR-speak follow-up line we might expect to get back from he and Adobe on the topic.  Example: We at adobe enjoy such a great trust relationship with our customers, that most of them will use acrobat with the current terms of service and simply trust us to do the right thing.  : )

(What I wish readers could see, but Erik could not see, is that I’m guessing Erik will write something very thoughtful and take the edge off this issue even before my readers get online to comment tomorrow morning.  Shhhh…)

YouMail Public Beta

I’ve been using YouMail for a year, but this is certainly a nice improvement on an already great service.  From the folks at PinStack.com: 

“Our new visual voicemail service represents one more free and useful feature in our powerful and unique product offering.” said Alex Quilici, CEO of YouMail. At a glance I can see all of my voicemails and choose which to play and in what order. For people who get a lot of voicemails per day, this provides an organized way to determine priority. In a world where we seem to find bite-size messages in SMS or Twitter form preferable, many people find this approach better than spending time listening to and often forgetting an audio message.”

From YouMail,

With YouMail Mobile’s “click to play” beta feature you’ll save time and avoid having to make another call to listen to your messages. Plus, you can go directly to any of your messages without listening to the prior messages. It’s voicemail at-a-glance!

• Instead of calling your voicemail box to retrieve messages, simply click the message you want to hear for instant playback
• Instantly see who called, message length, city/state, date/time
• Includes auto-transcriptions of messages
• Works on Blackberry, Treo, iPhone and Windows Mobile

Sign me up!  Oh wait…

Acrobat.com Erik Larson interviewed by Scoble

(This is of special personal interest since this morning, prior to the interview Erik Larson was commenting (below) on my post regarding concerns with Acrobat’s service agreement terms.)

Unsealed First Amended Complaint vs. Yahoo

For your reading enjoyment, see:
Yahoo Amended Complaint - Free Document Templates

Jott Reads Feeds

So you know Jott will transcribe your 30-second voice blurb, and send it as a text, email or RTM, but now it will also read feeds to you! What’s not to love? Thanks (once again) to Lifehacker:

Voice-to-text service Jott has up and reversed their game a bit with their latest service offering—having custom-picked feeds read back to you, over your phone connection. If you’re already a Jott member, you should see a feed notice when you log in starting today, where you can choose highlighted feeds (including Lifehacker) or give Jott your custom feeds. Call into Jott, say “Jott feeds” when asked “Who do you want to Jott?” and you’re on your way. …

It’s Jott, and it’s nifty. What kind of use might you make of it?

License to display your online files … BEWARE

Adobe Air Acrobat.com. It seems like a great new pdf-conversion, file sharing, screen-sharing, collaboration, video-conferencing tool. Caveat: remember my post only a couples weeks ago regarding how ADrive (online file service) apparently reserves the right to share your metadata with its partners?

Say hello to the new adobe air acrobat.com services agreement, paragraph 5.1 regarding “Your Content”:

…By maintaining your Content on the Services, you grant to Adobe a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual, royalty-free and fully paid license under all intellectual property rights to copy, distribute, transmit, publicly display, publicly perform, transmit, and reformat your Content solely to deliver the Services to you. Adobe shall make commercially reasonable efforts to block the uploading of Content to the Services that contains viruses detected by using industry standard virus detection software.

(Attorneys, especially) Yes, that was the hair on the back of your neck standing up. If a file service of any type reserves the right to “copy, distribute, transmit, publicly display” your communications or work-product, please re-consider. As always, a little due diligence goes a long way; read the services agreement.

*Update: see Erik Larson’s (from Adobe) comments (below) in response to this post (thank you Erik), as well as his interview by Scoble, later the same day:  http://tinyurl.com/67otq8