the j. botter weblog

Dear Robert,

After being a subscriber to your feed for nearly two years, I made the decision to unsubscribe this weekend. I’d already stopped following you on Twitter about a month ago, because instead of using it to describe what you’re doing, you were using it to blog. I’d log in to my account in the morning to see what my friends were up to, and I’d have three pages of posts just from you. Instead of using Twitter for what it is (describing what you’re up to) or even just posting random pieces of information, you were typing 1,000 words and splitting it up between posts. That was annoying, especially when I had text messaging turned on, because I’d get 15 text messages from you within ten minutes.

As for unsubscribing from your blog…well, it’s all about Facebook. I may be in the minority, but it seems like you’re constantly harping on Facebook for not giving you the ability to add more than 5,000 friends. Every day, you’ve got at least one post complaining about Facebook capping your friend limit. That’s fine. It’s your blog, and you can write and publish whatever you wish. As a reader, however, it becomes grating to read post after post, day after day where you have some form of comment about Facebook and the inhumane 5,000 friend limit that they have imposed upon you.

Why do you need over 5,000 Facebook friends, Robert? I understand that Facebook is an awesome social tool, quite probably the best ever created (outside of the computer and the internet, of course), but do you really have 5,000 people that you could call a contact, or even 5,000 people that you might want to contact at some point during the course of your life?

I know you have thousands of people subscribe to your blog; why not just post relevant information there instead of relying on Facebook? If we’re going by the Dave Winer definition, then Facebook is nothing more than an address book; do you really need an address book with 5,000 names stuffed into it? I’m not being a jerk — I’m really asking you what in the world you’d need more than 5,000 Facebook contacts for, just as I would ask anyone why they need that many MySpace friends. There’s no possible way you personally know more than 1,000 of these people, and even that is pushing the limits.

The bad part of all of this? I’ve really enjoyed reading your blog. You’re consistently in my top five subscriptions in Google Reader, and I never would have switched to Google Reader if it wasn’t for you extolling its virtues. I just can’t handle the Facebook posts anymore, man, and I’m positive I’m not alone.

Sincerely,

A reader

Tomorrow is our last scheduled day of writing for the new Favorites record. The past two months have been devoted almost exclusively to writing new material, and we have a ton of it. I’ll be talking more about this as we move forward with production of the album, but I will tell you that I’m tremendously excited about seeing what form these songs will take when we’re doing tracking them.

A few random notes to close out the day:

– Robert is going to be doing a live broadcast from the Web 2.0 Expo on Monday that you’ll be able to take part in. Chris Pirillo actually did this last night and I caught the tail end of it and it was pretty cool in concept, so Scoble’s Monday show should be pretty interesting. I expect hundreds of video podcasts to begin using this technology within the next two weeks, mostly because it allows the audience to take part in real time and interact with the hosts of the show, which means we’re drawing ever closer to web-related shows matching regular television, not in terms of quality but in terms of what you’re able to do using the technology you’re given.

– In case you haven’t heard, Google has purchased the internet.

– I have nothing (positive) to say about the Don Imus thing. The guy is a buffoon, a fool, and anyone who thinks he shouldn’t have been kicked out the door by CBS for his insulting comments is in his league as far as human qualities go. I’ve never been a fan of “shock jocks”; I can’t stand Howard Stern. I’ve always been a big fan of Jim Rome, which I guess is the sports world equivalent to a shock jock, except there’s one huge difference between Rome and Stern and his ilk: Rome is actually a decent human being and doesn’t even come close to the proverbial “line”, whereas Stern and Imus will happily jump over it if it’ll bring them more degenerate listeners.

That’s all for now. Hope everyone is in the midst of a good weekend. I’m still trying to recover from jet lag, so I’m off to sleep.

I gotta admit it: I completely bought Robert’s story about Apple collaborating with Google and Amazon on a new “iReader”.

I mean, I bought it BIG TIME. I read the first few paragraphs and then stopped so I could excitedly tell the rest of the guys in the band, who happened to be at my apartment for songwriting sessions. I started reading it to them, telling them all the features and whatnot, and then got to the end of the story where it was revealed that it’s all an April Fools Day prank and felt completely foolish for allowing myself to be suckered like that. Again.

Bravo, Robert. Bravo. You got me to whole-heartedly buy into the post.

By the way, Robert: I’ll be in San Francisco for the first time in ten years next weekend. What’s fun to do around town?

I didn’t fall for Gmail Paper, but it’s pretty funny nonetheless.

Kevin Smith is looking a lot skinnier these days, and he’s doing the same thing that Jason, myself and a ton of others are doing: this new movement called “fatblogging” (kudos to Jason for the name).

When I joined Lifetime Fitness on December 28, I was 226 pounds, the heaviest I’ve ever been in my entire life. I was in the Army, of course, but hadn’t done any kind of physical training since last summer, and as a result was pretty much as out of shape as I was before going to basic training. That’s bad.

I had surgery to have my wisdom teeth removed last week, and when I weighed myself at the end of last week, I was at 205.3. I was estatic, but I didn’t take into consideration that a lot of that weight I had dropped was probably water weight; I wasn’t really allowed to drink anything for a few days after the surgery, and I’ve been drinking water like crazy as of late to make up for it.

I didn’t make it to the gym yesterday, but I did get a Polar heart monitor. I’d heard so many good things about it that I needed to at least give it a shot, so I got the cheapest version they have. I wore it to the gym today, and let me tell you something: the difference that heart monitor makes in my workout is absurdly amazing. I was able to set my threshold heart rate (what I wanted as my target and what I didn’t want to drop below), and for 20 minutes of elliptical training and 30 minutes of basketball, I was able to keep my heart rate right around my premium anabolic rate of 152 . The crazy thing is that it takes a lot less work to keep 152 than I had previously thought, so I wasn’t burning myself out as quickly, and as a result I was able to go hard for an hour without feeling like I needed to just lay down and die. I also learned that basketball is absolutely great cardio; it’s fascinating to see what your heart rate is like during various activities.

Jason, Wil, Robert, and anyone else who’s doing this: get yourself a Polar monitor. Don’t skimp and get the $5 one that doesn’t work. Get yourself a Polar and just watch what kind of difference it makes in your workout. If you’re doing cardio you’ll see an immediate difference, as you’re able to control your workout to stay in your optimum zone, and if you’re weight training, you’ll be amazed to see just how high your heartrate is while hitting the weights.

Anyway, with all that aside, I weighed in at 213.3 today. That’s still 13 pounds less than what I weighed when I started, and I haven’t really had an optimal workout until today. And there’s also the fact that my diet, while better than it used to be, still isn’t perfect. I’m working on it. I had a post-workout Buffalo Chicken Quesadilla (from Lifetime, completely healthy) and I’ll probably try to have a chicken breast, rice and a ton of water for dinner tonight.

You can watch my Traineo profile for more information about my “lifestyle change” (it’s not a diet or a workout, it’s a lifestyle change).

I know most of my readers are tech-savvy, but I also know of a few personal friends who aren’t web-savvy but love technology, so this post is geared mostly towards them.

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Matt and the gang just unveiled a new design for WordPress.com, and it’s hot. It totally turns the WordPress.com service from a mere blog host to a true social networking tool; the main page now features a “blog of the minute” (which is, not surprisingly, Robert Scoble), a list of the current hottest tags on the service and more.

StumbleUpon is already insanely addicting, and now they’ve added a new twist to the proceedings: StumbleVideo. They basically take the StumbleUpon framework and apply it to video, but instead of using a browser extension (as with the regular service), you stay in a web browser the whole time as it brings you cool videos from YouTube and other services. It learns your habits and tendencies, figures out what you enjoy watching, and then brings you videos that it thinks you’ll enjoy.

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Hugh says that Microsoft has lost a big asset in Robert Scoble, who left the company to join startup Podtech.net.

To me it says, Microsoft finally has reached the crossroads indicated in the cartoon above, and have opted to take the non-Cluetrain route. They opted to take that route because they have run out of ideas. They're at a time in their corporate life when they need a big idea. And you what? They. Simply. Don't. Have. One.

That's a bit harsh.

Yes, Scoble was a big asset to Microsoft because he's been able to add a human face to the company over the past few years that just didn't exist. But really, unless you're a Techmeme reader and participate actively in the blogging/tech community, the chances are pretty great that you don't know who Robert Scoble is. I know that I'm the only person in my entire family who would know who Robert Scoble is, and you know what?  The rest of my family still thinks Microsoft is evil.  They used to think Bill Gates was the devil, but now that he's been deemed one of the most charitable people on earth, he's suddenly a benevolent, giving billionaire.

It's good that Robert has been able to help the tech community see past the hard edges of Microsoft, and I hope someone steps up to fill Robert's shoes. Microsoft needs that human face within the tech community. But saying that they're headed down the path of evil just because they didn't pony up enough cash to keep Robert on board is a bit of a stretch.

Bill Gates is retiring from Microsoft in 2008.

You know, I actually like seeing the new rep Microsoft is getting lately.  A large majority of the good publicity they're recieving is due to Robert Scoble, the man who announced to the world last weekend that he was leaving Microsoft for a position with PodTech.  Microsoft has always had this reputation as the big Evil Empire, but now that Google seems intent on taking that throne (and quickly, I might add), Microsoft is starting to be seen as the underdog.  I have no idea how a company that has jillions of dollars in marketshare could be feasibly called an underdog, but Scoble was able to add a human face to the company that didn't really exist before.  

Bill Gates might be the richest dude in the world, but the fact that he's retiring from Microsoft at a pretty early age to focus on his charity work (in which he's invested half of his fortune) is highly commendable.