What is web2.0?

I know this is one example of web2.0 technology, however what is the business model for making money with web2.0 technologies? I really don't know the answer? If I did then I wouldn't be working for my company, and would instead have opened my own to make the money.

I have been working on some ideas, but they are really just ways to increase the user interaction on a web site. For the ideas I am working on, this is really what I want. It is based on all user interaction and user contributed content. I am also hoping to use a mashup with a couple of other sites, but don't know if there are API's for those sites.

I am also looking into the Rails framework. More on this later as I figure out what I need to get everything to work together. Since the application involves a database to track the user data, it is a natural language to use.

Listening Library

I seem to be hooked.

Awhile ago I started checking out audio books from the library. You know those books on tape (or CD) or various stories. I seem to be hooked on them now. I have enjoyed listening to them during the short (15min) commute I have to work and when I need to wait for my daughter after her play practice in the evening.

It seems that my children and I have different tastes in stories :-) While we have all enjoyed the Harry Potter series and for the most part have also enjoyed tapes of the older original Hardy Boys mysteries, they don't like my taste in Science Fiction. I have a penchant for hard science fiction (science fiction with plausible precursers) with my favorite probably being stories related to time travel. Being an engineer I guess this is only normal (I love to consider the possibilities and probabilities of such fanciful devices).

Lately I have been listening to Carl Sagan's Contact. While you can definitely read his irreverence in the store line (I have read that the character Ellen follows his beliefs very closely), I still appreciate the science and the questions raised in the story. I have read the book earlier and love the movie adaptation (enough said), but the tapes are a bit hard to follow. The book has a number of vignettes and montages, along inclusions of related quotes at the start of each chapter, that make it difficult to follow if you are not listening carefully (or have already read the story). My kids just say its 'wierd' and hard to follow.

Chalk another one up to Dad's strange ideas.

Enjoy!

Disneyworld Vactaion from New Years

I have been meaning to write up some stuff about our vacation to Disneyworld over New Year's 2007.

We had a great time (why not) and the kids only wish they could go back tomorrow. I wouldn't mind, but my bank account will have to catch up for awhile. I really enjoy the Disney experience and they really make you feel like a king while you are there, but everything costs so much and the fast food in the Hotel's food court isn't really for those on a diet either.

We spend longer then we normally have in the past. In other times (well we have only gone to WDW twice in the past, while we are old hands at Disneyland) we have only had a few days to spend in the parks. Both times before we were only able to spend 4 days and that is really the absolute minimum depending on the time of year you go. The last time we went during spring break and the time before we really didn't have any planning and was difficult to figure where to go.

This time we knew we were going during the absolute worst time (crowds wise) and knew that we needed more time. So we decided to spend a full week, and later even added an extra day for travel. Since we live on the west coast (Oregon), and we have to drive for awhile to get to the airport anyway, the extra day was needed and mostly burned on airline flights and buses to the hotel. We left around 6:00am from Portland and ended in Orlando at 7:30pm. Long Day.

We had the best days in the parks though. This trip was the best for our family, and instead of having to wait for everyone else in the party, we were able to just take our time and enjoy everything. I might take some time later and write up a full trip report. This is useful for my typing skills too.




Enjoy

Conversion to Google...

Well,

As could be seen by the dates, I haven't posted for quite awhile (over a year). I thought it might be a good thing to look into it again so I went ahead and logged in again. I noticed that now blogger is integrated into google accounts. I needed to go back and look up my gmail information, but I went ahead and converted the account.