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Archive for the ‘Raves’ Category

Netscape and Digg Kings of the Hill

Wikipedia statistics

WEB statistics/tracking services share some very encouraging figures which suggest that Netscape and Digg lead the pack of social-driven news sites. As I am active on both sites, I am more than pleased to see this. Some time this weekend I will have submitted my 10,000th story to Netscape.

Knowing that Netscape attracts roughly 5 million unique users per month, I am certain that my contributions have an impact. They primarily promote digital freedom — something which I passionately believe in and therefore perpetually promote.

Second Interview with Google

Googleplex in London
Image of Googleplex in London (from ZDNet gallery)

LAST night I had my 2nd interview with google (a *nix systems administration position). What is noteowrthy is that I did not apply for a job. I was contacted by Google owing to my involvement and work on the Web. I am patiently waiting to hear their decision (should take several days), but I am pessimistic. Some questions were really hard and I needed hints. These questions were less analytical than I had expected.

Raves Du Jour

My opinion has just appeared in a CRN article. To quote the relevant bit:

“I have a gripe with what you claim and suggest. Essentially you propose robbing users from choice and diversity. Monocolutre is what GNU/Linux is here to address/tackle. Isn’t that what SLED is for? Corporate uniformity?

Why eliminate all others as contenders? And why spread FUD about compiling packages when there are such huge Ubuntu repositories?”

I referred to the original article in a previous blog post — that which motivated me to address the author. It seems as though, exposure-wise, the sun has begun to shine my way. I received the following E-mail last week (anonymised; anon replaces names/titles).

Hey there Roy,

I bet you’re getting a lot of email these days, thanks to Jason Calacanis’s post. So I’ll be quick.

You probably know anon, thanks to his blog (#36 in the world or thereabouts), his anon venture, and his books like anonand anon. Well, he’s got a new book coming out in August–called anon–which covers anon‘s best blog posts and rants and remarkable ideas of the last decade.

I’ve got a limited number of early books on hand. Any interest in a free copy? No strings attached.

I was shocked to find myself in such honourable position. I hope it’s all sustainable.

Digg’s Effect on Search Engines

The Digg front page

I must admit that I have fallen in love with the ‘Digg (sub)culture’. And primarily owing to Digg (and its saturation of dynamically-generated pages), the number of hits for my surname is growing at a wild pace across search engines. It is approaching one million in Google (Interesting fact: if I received a penny for every hit that is added to Google, for example, I would be able to make ends meet). This wasn’t intended; rather it’s a side effect that I have just become aware of. I tend to have a consistent username, which is always available due to the small size of my family.

I suspect that, at the moment, Digg boasts over 10 million subscribed members who are largely interested in information technology. Many will be exposed to the virtues of GNU/Linux and Open Source, which seems encouraging to me. At the time of writing, 4 of my submissions appear in the front page, among 15 submissions in total. That’s almost a third of a front page, whose domains’ Alexa traffic rank is among the top 100 sites on the Web. What an overwhelming experience.

I Have Become a Top Digger

The Digg front page

I have just reached page one of Digg’s top users! This puts me at an excellent position in two separate Web sites: MATLAB Central and Digg, with 20th and 30th position, respectively.

With MATLAB I have been for 2 years, but with Digg this was achieved within just 2 months, which seems rather amazing to me. Two months to get there translates to more than one story at the front page, per day, on average. The pace on weekdays stands at approximately 3-4 front page (promoted) items per day, which makes my first rave seem almost insignificant and utterly irrelevant.

KDE Receives Praises for Innovative Features

KDE shadow

EVER wondered what a Windows XP clone that is based on Linux would look like? Just follow the link to find out. Apart from various Linux distributions that achieve Windows ‘lookalikiness’ out of the box, there are many extensions too. Regular and long-time Linux users , however, are rarely happy to discover some a new “Start” button for Ubuntu, for instance. And I speak from recent experiences and observations here.

On a related note, KDE is frequently said to imitate Microsoft Windows a little bit too much (design mistakes included). Nevertheless, definitely not in spite my opposition to this claim, I always say that KDE is user-friendly, intuitive, innovative, and comprehensive. It offers me plenty of function that is not available elsewhere. I have just spotted the following ‘fresh-out-of-the-oven’ blog post, which seems to concur with my opinion:

10 Things I Love About KDE

Oh, man, a top ten list. Am I already scraping the bottom of the barrel? Don’t worry, friends. I have several articles on the back burner, but various endeavors are preventing me from completing them. So let’s just run through my favorite desktop environment ever. In no particular order, here are ten things I love about KDE.

(The list in brevity):

1. KIOSlaves

2. Krusader

3. YaKuake

4. Respect

5. KMyMoney

6. KDevelop

7. The Simple Things

8. It’s About Choice Too

9. You Don’t Get Functionality Like This Just Anywhere, You Know

10. Outlook Killer? Okay!

My Third Digg Rave

WHAT a day over at Digg.com! 3 of my story submissions have reached the front page; and the day is not over, yet.

I have recently accumulated some friends in this social networking platform and, to be honest, this sometimes makes me feel like a groupie in a game which is not democratic. People who acquire friends are more likely to have their submissions rapidly popularised. We shall see if Digg version 3, which is due to be released this Monday, will somehow correct for this tendency by deterring excessive mutual ‘digging’.

All my stories, by the way, are posted in defence of GNU/Linux and/or Open Source software. I truthfully do this in the spirit of freedom and openness.

Related items:

Update (8:35 PM): It’s now 4 (stories in the front page), with the possibility of 5 by the end of the day!

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Original styles created by Ian Main (all acknowledgements) • PHP scripts and styles later modified by Roy Schestowitz • Help yourself to a GPL'd copy
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