I like pretending I dislike Pitchfork as much as the next socially-awkward shoegazer, but I haven’t found a decent substitute. I think back nostalgicly on the early days of Pitchfork when record reviews could be as short as a single paragraph and ratings were based more on whether or not the reviewer had sex [...]

Union Square Ventures invested in Outside.in last week, but the lid finally came off the pot today. I’m really excited about this investment, but I certainly don’t want to sound like a broken record… my excitement is best reflected in the posts at USV and by Fred on his personal blog.
To keep things novel, [...]

A true story:
A very social college senior at Stanford was deciding what to give up for Lent. She thought long and hard about temptation and her self-discipline. She decided she was going to give up Facebook. Then, after some honest internal reflection, she realized that giving up Facebook would be too hard. [...]

Wow! Dramatic dating-site search decline reported by Markus Frind (CEO of PlentyofFish.com).
I have been tracking domain name searches on yahoo for the big paid dating sites. Domain name searches translates into word of mouth and signal trends in paid membership about 8+ months from now.
I’m comparing Jan 06 to Jan 07 [...]

I’m very excited about the lastest USV investment, AdaptiveBlue.
I am most excited about the product roadmap, and where AdaptiveBlue can take us all going forward.
However, I want to highlight the way in which I get the most utility out of AdaptiveBlue right now. The BlueMenu, a part of the right-click menu anywhere in [...]

I attended a meeting of the Social Media Club here in NYC for the first time last night. It was an interesting debate about how both we (the voters) and campaigns can use social media to engage in the 2008 elections that let me “get my geek on.”
A few interesting points that I recall [...]

A choice cartoon from the latest New Yorker:

Also, make sure to read the Susan Orlean piece on Origami. Who knew paper folding could be so interesting?

I love playing with systems that are supposed to “give you the answer.” Some examples to explain my fascination:

The old Ask.com
Financial portfolio balancing services
Babelfish

My favorite example is Microsoft Word’s AutoSummarize feature. When I put my resume in AutoSummarize and ask for a 2% summary I get:
9/01 – 6/05:Stanford University, Stanford, CA.
3/02 – 3/03: [...]

I started using OpenDNS today. I’m not sure if I like it or not…
Pros: It’s snappy. I feel like I notice a difference in the time it takes for sites to load. The DNS misspelling auto-correction feature works as advertised. I don’t think I need the anti-phishing technology because it’s now built [...]