We had two-way cable before most people (back in 95/96). In 2001, we moved a mere two miles and were kicked back to one-way cable, which means uploads at 56k modem speeds. To a software/web developer, particularly one developing photo software, this is something akin to the sixth level of hell. Every CVS commit in the last four years has been a "let's go to lunch" event. Last week, I saw one of the most wonderful sites in recent memory: Such a small thing to most, but what a difference! I'm two-way at last....

I'm reading Fritjof Capra again, returning to my Daoist roots. In college I studied cognitive science in conjunction with mystic philosophy. Our tendency to divide the perceived world into individual and separate things and to experience ourselves as isolated egos in this world is seen as an illusion which comes from our measuring and categorizing mentality. It is called avidya ... and is seen as the state of a disturbed mind which has to be overcome. - Capra Categorizing mentality! And here I just spent two years making a product that explicitly tags everything in life. I can just see...

Today starts the task of revisiting products and websites in the same space as Tidepool and Storymill. We did some extensive competitive analysis a year ago during the initial design phase, but we've taken a blank page approach since then, not wanting to get into a feature war mindset as we finished things up. Now it's time to revisit iPhoto and Picasa and Flickr and Webshots and Photoshop Album and the rest, then boil it all down to a new website that compares everything with a feature grid, some reviews, and lots of discussion forums. The trick is to do...