I am having a long weekend of insomnia. No beauty sleep for me...

 

 

I can imagine the following dialogue between candidates #5 and #6:

(#6) - Darling, you're amazing.

(#5) - Thank you, you look nice too.

(#6) - I mean you look perfect. Are you perfect?

(#5) - No dear, but almost. All I lack is a self-criticism.

 

 

One of my former managers decided to create his own travel site. No one understood what was the point. After all Expedia et al do a good job covering properties, Fromers et al covering destinations and sites like Tripadvisor covering user generated content. But he dragged one of our best developers with him and I was expecting at least something reasonable.

 

Well, I am surprised. The site is Oyster.com and the proposal is honest to the bone and very useful. It is a mix of Consumer Reports ethics with Travel Channel journalistic personality. And they really like to take pictures - undoctored, unstaged pictures. And at least one reporter that "steals" shampoo bottles.

 

The nature of their approach makes coverage difficult, and information freshness will be challenging, but they already have information about complicated citites - Miami and New York for example. In my experience getting a decent hotel in Miami is not easy and most big sites absolutely suck at it. I had a horrible experience with the recommended hotel from my favorite booking site (to remain nameless since they found alternative accomodations with some nudging).

 

Check it out while it is fresh: Oyster.com.

 

Updates have been spotty lately and this post is no exception. It is very difficult to have something decided, change it, change it back, then end up with something completely different. A lot of people are disappointed with this one.

 

When I was a kid my mother told me ladybugs bring luck, but only if they land on you on their own. I need to find the Colorado city they taped this: http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2009/07/11/vanderveen.ladybug.infestation.kusa

 

 

Today, my Brazilian friends, is my personal January 9th, 1822.

 

I hope this is not a mistake, but I'll definitively not look back.

 

I work at Microsoft and I designed and tested quite a lot of code over the last 9 years. I worked on a new file system and synchronization platform at some point. A modern operating system is a wonder of engineering, regardless of the defects it brings. It has more moving parts than anything else I've heard of.

 

I was planning to write a diatribe about the new operating system Google is launching (the Chrome OS), but then I read the Fake Steve Jobs post on the subject. I laughed for 30 minutes. Then driving home I laughed again thinking about it. I think it sums it up perfectly, check it out: http://fakesteve.blogspot.com/2009/07/lets-all-take-deep-breath-and-get-some.html.

 

I think Google has been trying to shoot themselves on the foot lately - they might succeed with this one.