Mike Nicholson

Egh.. There's so much fud about Yahoo all over the net these past few days. That whole self righteous stance that Google has taken with respect to its query data that was requested by the government rubs me the wrong way.

As many of you know, I recently began work at Yahoo. I don't have access to any confidential information about this topic, nor would I blog about it if I did, but I did read plenty of blogs and articles about this story. Even though everyone is freaking out about privacy, and Google is touting its lack of evilness, it doesn't seem to be about that at all.

It seems that the US Government requested at random list of queries and a random list of website URLs… nothing more, and nothing about user identities. This data was requested for some important operation. I may be naive, but considering that the US Government is appointed by and represents the American people, is it possible that they could be correct in their pursuit of this information? Could they possibly be trying to service us or protect us in some way?

In addition to the 1984 paranoia about the big brother (that we all voted for in some way), there is concern about the data retention by the search engine companies. Based on these stories, it appears that search engines retain at least a log of queries and a log of URLs in their index. This should be no shock to anyone. When you're out surfing any site, all sites do record everything that they possibly can. They then use this to improve marketing, monetization, and user experience. Any website that does not do this has already failed. If you're paranoid about your searches being tallied, just visit http://www.scroogle.org.

Posted by at 4:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Hey All,

It's been an interesting month. I've been to five metropolitan areas in the past two months and I've worked ~6 days in the past month. I still do have a job, it's just a lot less demanding than my last one.

I spent about 90 min of this work day sipping expensive wine (cakebread) while my CEO tried to tell jokes. (many were pretty good actually).

Before that I spent a weekend on a great ski trip in Tahoe / Reno. We enjoyed the finest Mafia games as well as the most angry neighbor possible. He was very angry that we desired to shut our car doors after arriving at home. The slope conditions were incredible. I've never seen snow and wind like that before. I yodeled while I snowboarded so that those around me could tell where I was in the 2' visibility.

Even before this I spent the better part of a week in Palm Springs, CA at the Yahoo sales conference. The resort we stayed at had 38 pools and 42 hot tubs. The free presidential suite we received complimentary had a private pool and hot tub, but no on used them. We were too focused on the incredible flow of beer and wine. It was a good sales meeting. I actually learned a lot between the drinking and hangovers.

Even then before this I spent a good few days in LA. There I enjoyed the new CA Adventure theme park and gained a degree in crowd watching at Disneyland on the busiest day of the year.

Yet before this I had a great trip to Vegas where craps treated me poorly but roulette was my friend. I basked in the wonder of the $1.50 half pound hot dog and soda from the Golden Spike casino. This was the same casino that promised 'purified air'.

It's been a good couple months. I've worked a little and partied pretty hard. I'm still catching up on sleep and my apartment has never looked worse.

Posted by at 7:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

eStarling Wi-Fi Gmail / Flickr Enabled LCD Frame

What a neat idea. I can upload my pictures to Flickr, configure an RSS feed to work the way I want, and then my pictures will automatically appear on the picture frame at my desk without me doing anything else.

Too bad it has that wide frame and high price tag.

Posted by at 4:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)