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Jun 9, 2009
Live at WWDC, Apple has announced the new iPhone 3G S along with the new iPhone OS3.0. This is finally enough to make the move from the Blackberry!
Wordpress Scalability #8211; Wordcamp Toronto 2009
May 10, 2009
Thanks to everyone who attended my talk this morning at Wordcamp Toronto! Here are the slides, although they are light on textual content. I #8217;ve added some scalability resources and links for more information below.
Not many sites need an infrastructure like this, but it #8217;s important to have a roadmap in mind and stay one step ahead of your growth.
Read the rest of this entry raquo;
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5 free tools for collaboration with remote teams
Apr 11, 2009
Technology has made it easier than ever to telecommute or work with remote teams. At b5media, we have people working from around the world, and have tried and used dozens of tools to make that work go smoother.
Everyday, there are new tools that show promise, but many are tried once and forgotten about. Some are clunky or get in the way of collaboration. Others are a solution in need of a problem. Here are some of the best ones that have gone past the trial, and turned into must-have tools that we use every day.
Skype
www.skype.com
Cost: free
Skype is best known as a telephone replacement. Sure, being able to make free skype calls anywhere in the world is nice, but that isn #8217;t the real killer app from a collaboration perspective. The best kept secret about Skype is its use in Instant Messaging. Just like Messenger, AIM, or Google Talk, you can create a text chat bewteen people. You can even create a group chat within your team. The one feature you won #8217;t find elsewhere though, is the ability to bookmark these conversations. This means that if someone is offline, when they return they will see the entire conversation they have missed and are able to catch up. With a team spread over multiple timezones, this is really useful, and you never have to worry about being left out of the conversation because you happen to be offline at the time.
Tokbox
www.tokbox.com
Cost: free
Video conference calls add that human touch to a remote team. If everyone has a webcam installed, Tokbox is a really elegant interface to show a #8220;Brady Bunch #8221; style display of your team during a meeting. We #8217;ve used it with up to 6 people, but in theory, you could have many more. With folks scattered around the continent, being able to talk with them face-to-face makes a big difference! We don #8217;t use this for every call, but from time to time it #8217;s really nice to remind us all that we #8217;re all people working as a team.
Teamspeak
www.teamspeak.com
Cost: free
Skype is great for a short, purpose driven call, but Teamspeak turns voice chat into more of a virtual office. It is client/server software, which means you need hosting, but most Internet companies already have access to servers with extra capacity. Load up the server and you can now have a #8220;push-to-talk #8221; style conversation with your whole team. Have the team hanging out in a Teamspeak channel, and hitting a button is the virtual equivalent to poking your head over the cubicle wall for a quick question. It allows those quick, informal, water-cooler conversations to happen despite the distance. Since it #8217;s a push-to-talk setup, you won #8217;t be burning up bandwidth having a skype call active all day with mostly silence.
Yugma
www.yugma.com
Cost: free
There are many desktop-sharing applications out there, but the good ones like WebEx or GoToMeeting cost a lot of money. Yugma is a free solution with all the features of the commercial solutions, including multiple viewers, and both Windows and Mac compatibility. A software download is only needed for the host, not for clients. Desktop sharing is useful for everything from viewing a powerpoint presentation to having several people doing a code review. One person hosts the meeting, and shares his screen, and everyone else can see, in real-time, what is on that screen. Combined with Teamspeak or a Skype call, and you can really see what we #8217;re talking about.
Google docs
http://docs.google.com/
Cost: free
Google Docs are a great, free way of maintaining your documents or spreadsheets without using Microsoft Office, however there is also a huge advantage to having documents existing online in the cloud instead of within an application on one computer. Collaboration with Google Docs, specifically Google Spreadsheets, is as easy as inviting others to the document. If two (or 5.. or 50) people open a spreadsheet at the same time, they can all edit individual cells and others will see their changes immediately. If your team needs a common checklist, or you need to get information from many people, this is the easiest and most real-time way of setting this up. Google Documents can also have multiple people editing, but the experience isn #8217;t as slick as the cell-locking based system in Spreadsheets.
These are the five that we use and have stuck with over time. There are many others that we have tried, and haven #8217;t found as useful, but other organizations may. Which tools do you use within your work environment?
4 Comments
Apr 3, 2009
Off topic, but big news! I am pleased to announce the birth of our second son, Samuel Wynne Taiabjee! For more details and pictures, visit our family blog.
Mar 31, 2009
Some changes today at b5media. Check out our CEO #8217;s message about it on his blog, and a note from one of our investors.
Feb 10, 2009
Wordpress MU 2.7 just released! Get it here!
Canadian Politicians on Twitter
Feb 1, 2009
It seems that @BarackObama stopped using Twitter as of his inauguration, but really, he only has 2 tweets since the election back in November.  (Yes, I know he has taken over the @TheWhiteHouse account, but even that only has a couple of tweets since he has taken the reigns)
I #8217;d love to say that Canadian politicians are making better use of the platform, but sadly, while many of the prominent ones have an account on Twitter, few are using them effectively.  It #8217;s still pretty cool for a casual tweet from your Prime Minister, #8220;Called Mexican President Calderon today #8221;
Regardless, here are some of the big ones in the Twitterverse.
Federal Party Leaders:
@PMHarper #8211; Prime Minister Stephen Harper
@JackLayton #8211; NDP Leader Jack Layton
@M_Ignatieff #8211; Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff
@gillesduceppe #8211; Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe
@elizabethmay #8211; Green Party Leader Elizabeth May
Other Notable Federal Politicians and Groups:
@BobRaeMP #8211; Bob Rae
@LiberalTour #8211; Liberal Party
Canadian Premiers:
@g_campbell #8211; BC Premier Gordon Campbell
@EdStelmach #8211; Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach
Provincial Representatives:
@TimHudak #8211; Tim Hudak (Ontario) [HT: Joseph Lavoie]
Other Local Politicians:
@MayorMiller #8211; Toronto Mayor David Miller
@MayorGregor #8211; Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson
Let me know if I #8217;m missing anyone in the comments below, and I #8217;ll add them to the list!
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Toolbox #8211; Twitter Apps
Jan 30, 2009
Twitter has become my primary way of getting news these days. News sites require you to go and look for information. With twitter, if the news is important, it will find me.
But what makes twitter so powerful is the cottage industry of tools that have popped up using the API to make your Tweeting life easier. There is much debate about the best tools to use, but here #8217;s my 5 tools I can #8217;t live without.
1. TwhirlTwhirl is a desktop client built on the Adobe Air platform so that you can tweet and monitor your friends tweets. Some would argue that Tweetdeck is better if you follow alot of people, but Twhirl gets my vote.
2. TwitterberryViewing and sending tweets on the Blackberry allows you to take Twitter on the road. You could just go to twitter.com in your browser, but loading up Twitterberry makes life so much easier!
3. Twitterific for iPhone Iconfactory has released their Mac-based Twitterific for the iPhone, and, of course, it also works on the iPod Touch. Definately the prettiest way to keep up with your tweets.
4. TwitterfeedTwitterfeed monitors the RSS feed for your blog (or whatever) and posts to your twitter account every time there is a new post.
5. TweetlaterCool Twitter toolset which allows you to schedule items to tweet at a scheduled time, as well as other cool tools, like autofollowing, or sending follow thank-you DMs.
What #8217;s in your toolbox?
2 Comments
Dec 22, 2008
Great article in today #8217;s Toronto Star about b5media: Blog network b5media has Write stuff to attract advertisers
That was built with Wordpress?
Nov 4, 2008
Yesterday, we at b5media launched the third of our unique look at the blogs within our channels. Splendicity is a new portal which pulls content from over 70 Beauty amp; Style blogs within the network, and pulls it all into a customized Wordpress instance. This follows on the launch of Bizzia last week to highlight our Business content, and Starked which highlights our Entertainment and Music blogs. Yes, it #8217;s been a busy month on the team!
Adding in some custom plugins built by Mike Schinkel, and a slick theme created by Todd Henwood and Bill Erickson, we #8217;ve created a really cool site with all of the features you would expect from a mainstream site. The best part about it, is that it #8217;s all built on top of a Wordpress base. Taking advantage of the ability to extend the Wordpress code using plugins and custom themes, we #8217;ve created the ability for the editors to pull the best content from the blogs within those channels and present it in a way that can drive traffic and create a more mainstream audience.
That is the next great frontier for Wordpress. In the coming weeks, Wordpress 2.7 will be released which is a huge refinement of an already robust product. With this release, Wordpress graduates from the realm of the geeky blogger, into a mainstream content tool.
When sites like these portals, or mainstream news and magazine sites like my last project, Green Living Online, have the tools the Wordpress provides, anything is possible! When I look back on some of the large media sites I have built in the past (like TSN and DiscoveryChannel), there aren #8217;t many (any?) features needed that couldn #8217;t be provided within Wordpress.
I #8217;m not suggesting that the folks at CTV should be rebuilding their tools from scratch, but for people out there looking to create competing products, you #8217;d be hard-pressed to find a tool that provides all of the functionality, and the support community that is found here.
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About Joetek
My name is Joe Taiabjee, and I am a web technology professional specializing in high-traffic, scalable web infrastructures. I am currently working as the Director of Technology at b5media Inc.
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@brianlayman Hadn't heard that... definately good timing! [#]
mdash; 12h ago via Twitter
RT @mashable: Skype Files to Go Public - http://mash.to/2mUSZ [#]
mdash; 13h ago via Twitter
Awesome official statement on ShoutOut from Twitter! Well done! http://bit.ly/djjmY1 (via @technosailor) [#]
mdash; August 5th via Twitter
Cool new feature! Drag and drop Gmail attachments to your desktop! http://bit.ly/aID8jT [#]
mdash; August 5th via Twitter
@LaneAndrew I'm sure... somewhere... #crickets [#]
mdash; August 4th via Twitter
@maxchirkov Perhaps. I think the value of #Wave was adding your own tools on top of it. Developer takeup wasn't strong enough. [#]
mdash; August 4th via Twitter
Thanks for the RT's! @maxchirkov @LaneAndrew @bbbbrandy @gastonfig @BoltClock @josemv @Antipimp @sgordon70 @Wedding_crasher @liannestewart [#]
mdash; August 4th via Twitter
@LaneAndrew Thanks Andrew. Interesting that Google took the time to post about it. They could have just let it languished [#]
mdash; August 4th via Twitter
@maxchirkov Yeah, I'm not sure if it was ahead of its time, or just a solution to a non-existent problem. [#]
mdash; August 4th via Twitter
RIP Google Wave. We barely knew ye. http://bit.ly/bg3ixC [#]
mdash; August 4th via Twitter
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Wordpress Scalability #8211; Wordcamp Toronto 2009
5 free tools for collaboration with remote teams
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Changes at b5
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