Austin Blogging, Podcasting – blogging, twitter, podcasting, music, tv, radio, sports
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TedXatx “rejects” party Ted X Austin (plus reviews)
Feb 21st
TedXATX was the hashtag. The event was a “tedxatx rejects” party following TedXAustin held Saturday, Feb 20, 2010 at Conjunctured Coworking Space in East Austin, Texas. Some of the people seen in the video include
Sunni Brown who was a major force behind TedX Austin seen chatting with Charles Knickerbocker, Jon Lebkowski organizer of the monster Plutopia event at SXSW and his coworker Maggie Duval, Dusty Regan (who gave the Austin Blogger a heads up via the #tedxatx twitter stream), David Walker, Sherry Lowry, Kristin Moses, webjournalist Mike Melansun of ReadWriteWeb, Cesar Torres, SparkNight’s Shelly Leonard who can plan your “surprise date from start to finish”, Challenge Games Christian Primozich, Paul Terry Walhus (who shot this video) of Texas Coworking and many more.
If you spot someone we’ve missed be sure to jot something in the comments on this blog post.
Video by Paul Terry Walhus of Texas Coworking and AustinBlogger.
Here are some recaps and reviews of the TedXATX event by some of the attendees/viewers:
Austin life coach urges women to take a ‘do-over’ – Austin American-Statesman
Jan 31st
 Austin American-Statesman | Austin life coach urges women to take a 'do-over' Austin American-Statesman How Women Are Reinventing Their Lives," with a pair of events in Austin this month (see info box). "I think of a do-over as an intentional reinvention by ... |
Colonels come up short in overtime against Austin College 66-62 – Centre Athletics
Jan 31st
Colonels come up short in overtime against Austin College 66-62 Centre Athletics Austin started the game by scoring the first four points and they would hold onto the lead for the remainder of the first half. ... Centre women's basketball beats Austin College 84-67 |
Scott scores 18, Williams has 17 to lead Stephen F. Austin to 70-55 victory … – Los Angeles Times
Jan 31st
Scott scores 18, Williams has 17 to lead Stephen F. Austin to 70-55 victory ... Los Angeles Times (AP) — Jereal Scott scored 18 points to lead Stephen F. Austin to a 70-55 victory over McNeese State on Sunday. Eddie Williams added 17 points for the ... |
Social Media Breakfast Videos
Aug 31st
New Videos from austinblogger
- AustinBlogger.com – Social Media Breakfast -6
- AustinBlogger.com – Social Media Breakfast -5
- AustinBlogger.com – Social Media Breakfast -4
- AustinBlogger.com – Social Media Breakfast -3
- AustinBlogger.com – Social Media Breakfast -2
- AustinBlogger.com – Social Media Breakfast -1
Austin Texas folks SXSW panel proposals
Aug 30th
- Paul Terry Walhus – Devices for Real World Social Networking
- Henrick Johanssen – B2B Social Commerce Success Stories
- Alex Jones – Managing Antisocial Behavior in Online Social Communities
- Matt Chasen – Unsexy and Profitable: Making $$ Without Hype
- Thom Singer – Networking at a Multi-Day Conference
- Nik Daftary – Making Dollars and Sense out of the Semantic Web
- Juan Sequeda – What the Hell is the Semantic Web?
- Kevin Koym – Growing Your Startup in a “Down” Economy
- Lani Rosales – Austin as a Technology Center
- Yvonne Tocquigny – Best Practices for Building a Data Driven Marketing Organization
- Dusty Reagan – Tips and Tricks for Developing Killer Twitter Apps
- Troy Lanier – Are Web Video Analytics Critically Dampening Content Length
- Matt Cohen – Newspapers vs. Content Aggregators – Fight Night!
- Aruni Gunasagarem – Online/Offline Networking in the Social Media Age
- Peter Kim – Sponsored Conversations: Good Strategy or Spam?
- Jeff Beckham – Citizen Journalism: Writing the News with a Million Reporters
- Jeff Beckham – Freelance Isn’t Free: The Twisted Economics of Writing Today
If I missed you, it wasn’t intentional! Add your panel in the comments if you’re from Austin, Texas
Longhorns Fan Day – football and volleyball
Aug 22nd
The UT football team and UT Women’s volleyball team showed up for “fan appreciation day” at the University of Texas Greogory Gym, on Sat, Aug 22, 2009. AustinBlogger Paul Terry Walhus meets up with Mack Brown and talks to some nice fans from Waco while waiting in line with 2,000 plus other fans. Part 5 of a 5 part video.
Paul Terry Walhus meets Mack Brown, UT football coach
door64.com party at Austin 360 Condos
Aug 21st
Door64 had a party at Austin 360 Condos on Thursday, August 20. It was packed. It was a $10 cover and 2 drink tickets in a gorgeous setting on the 9th floor where the pool and observation deck are located. Since it was a hot, steamy Austin night and there was a “no drinks” sign at the entrance to the pool, most people crowded into the long, narrow inside space where it was cool. It’s quite the luxury condo, with a mini movie theater at one end of the space and a bar at the other end. Matt Genovese, how did you swing such a cool venue? By the way, you don’t need pronounce the e at the end of Matt’s last name.
We weren’t able to interview much because of the noise level, so it’s mostly just pictures of people at the event. Maybe you can spot yourself if you were there. It was a great networking event, I ran in to Heather Havenwood, who did my SXSW interviews, and Meg Strout who was acompanied by a power auto seller Aaron Smith with Motorphilia, and Conversion Scientist Brian Massey to name a few.  I told Meg to check out Aardvark, because she asked me what was hot right now and I just had a foray in to this new “ask your social network” app yesterday.Â
You can also see this video on Metacafe, Blip.tv and Veoh and I encourage you to rate it up and review it if you like it. And if you’re in the video, drop me a note and I’ll include you in the blog post, (note at how many minutes in to the video you appear).
Watch Door64.com – Austin, TX (austinblogger.com video) in News Online | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com
Conjunctured First Anniversary Party Video
Aug 16th
Conjunctured Co-Working, 1309 E 7th Street, Austin, TX celebrated their first anniversary with a party on Saturday, August 14, 2009. This is the video taken by @springnet at the party, it’s about 38 minutes long and their are shorter versions available on youtube, metacafe, etc.
You can also see this full video on MySpace, Metacafe, Blip.tv and Veoh
Or you can see shorter episodes at YouTube, Yahoo, MySpace, Metacafe, DailyMotion, Blip.tv and Veoh
drupal group in Austin
Jun 23rd
- Location
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Guadalupe and Dean Keeton
Austin, TX 78705How to find us
“Go to corner of Guadalupe and Dean Keeton & look for ACT Lab”
- Who’s coming?
-
19 Yes /Â 5 Maybe
Who’s organizing?
Lauren
Elegant Functionality Requires More Than Hacking Bluemarine
One of the greatest benefits of a Content Management System like Drupal, is the ability to separate the visual presentation (Theme) layer from the site logic. This is accomplished by placing your theme files in site/all/themes. The rest is up to your abilities to write & edit PHP template files, use hooks, and customize CSS for use in customizing the presentation of your site. The callbacks may seem a bit labyrinthine, but by making a sub-theme you can get well on your way.
Sound tough? It is not.
Come out next Month to learn how to get started! Lauren N. Roth will be giving short presentation to get you going and recommends bringing a Localhost installation on your own computer. Even if you are an experienced Drupal developer, write modules, and have been pimping out sites for years, let’s get together, discuss best practices and demystify the design process. If you write modules, some themer needs to handle your output after they enable your module, so it would be fantastic to build a little elegance into the module itself!
Come out, ask questions, share your experiences and help others make some amazing Drupal sites!
In the meantime, go to
Watch Great Tutorials:
Learn By The Drop
Listen to Lullabot Podcasts:
Like this one Overriding Theme Functions
Download the Toolbox:
Ultimate Drupal Toolbox
Read the Drupal.org Theming Guide:
Theming Guide
Check Out These Books:
Pro Drupal Development – Chapter 8Â The Theme System
Learning Drupal 6 Module Development – Chapter 3Â The Theme System
Using Drupal – Chapter 11Â Theming Your Site
See you then!
So what’s the deal with Drupal? (panels and party)
May 16th
via Lyn Bender and Facebook:
an evening of Drinks and Drupal
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Global
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| Date: |
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
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| Time: |
6:30pm – 10:30pm
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| Location: |
Union Park Austin
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| Street: |
612 W Sixth St. Austin, Texas 78701
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| City/Town: |
Austin, TX
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| Email: |
Description
Ever since GeekAustin announced the “Introduction to Drupal” workshop, we’ve been getting emails asking: “So what’s the big deal with Drupal?” Sounds like an excuse for a party? Yes!
We’ll have drinks out front and panels in back. We’ll be bringing in local experts to discuss and debate topics such as: “Why should I use Drupal instead of Wordpress?”, “Isn’t theming hard with Drupal?”, and “Why would the city use Plone instead of Drupal?”. Ok, well maybe not the last panel.
This should be fun. Hope you can make it.
-Lynn
The Drupal Texas LinkedIn group:
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=1812268
The Austin Drupal Users facebook group:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=92094071680
worldwide water twestival – Dr Faye interview
Feb 6th
More discussion with Dr DD Faye about the twestival.com on Feb 12 in Austin and around the world. One in six people worldwide lack adequate drinking water – 1.1 billion people – and twestival.com and Dr Faye are both part of the solution to providing clean drinking water to the world’s population.
Water Shortage Worldwide – twestival.com and Dr Faye from Paul Walhus on Vimeo.
Yelp party at Copa Jan 9
Jan 6th
yelp.com is hosting an open party with free drinks, food, and swag. The free drinks are Treaty Oak rum and vodka
RSVP to austin@yelp.com.
Features:Â pinata, cigar rolling, and salsa lessons.
8-11pm, Friday Jan. 9
Free day of dance in Austin and then, Carnaval
Jan 4th
Jan 31 Sat 10:00 AM – After you’ve spent 9 hours practicing dance you’ll be ready for Carnaval the same night. Why not? Dance all day. Dance all night.
Location Austin Uptown Dance
8868 Research Blvd. #706
Austin, TX 78741
(512) 459-5678
(RSVP deadline: January 31, 2009 9:00 AM)
Who’s organizing? Clarke R
From Austin Uptown Dance’s site:
Dance all day, and no pay!
Bring your friends and tell everyone to join us for a Free Day of Dance! 9 hours and 20 classes of dancing from beginner to advanced. Shout it out in the streets!
10:00am Two Step 1, Two Step 2
11:00am Jitterbug Swing 1, Two Step 3
12:00pm Cha Cha 1, Cha Cha 2
1:00pm Jitterbug Swing 2, Salsa 2
2:00pm Salsa 1, Salsa 3
3:00pm West Coast Swing 1, West Coast Swing 3
4:00pm Night Club 1, West Coast Swing 2
5:00pm Tango 1, Tango 2
6:00pm Waltz 1, Quickstep 1
River of Austin pictures
Dec 19th
My cool app for today has to be “flickriver”; it’s well named as it delivers a river of pictures that just keep on going from flickr.
I used their embed badge to create a river of Austin images. It’s fairly awesome.
TechCrunch Austin interviews – Thom Singer
Sep 27th
Kimberlie Dykeman interviews Thom Singer at the Austin TechCrunch party, produced by austinlifestyles.com Paul Terry Walhus. Thom has written three books: “Some Assembly Required: How to Make, Grow and Keep Your Business Relationships”, “The ABC’s of Networking”, and “Some Assembly Required: A Networking Guide for Women”… which are available at Amazon.com. The books are full of tips to assist business professionals find unique ways to stand out from their competition and to build a network of contacts that will lead to more business.
Thom did a great rundown of the TechCrunch party on his blog.
TechCrunch Austin party interview – iKnowWare.com
Sep 27th
Kimberlie Dykeman interviews Mark Spilitro, CEO of iKnowWare.com which helps connect you to your business resources anytime, anywhere. Paul Terry Walhus produced this for AustinLifestyles.com. You can get a secure web based view of your business in your language on your mobile device.
TechCrunch.com party at Pangea rocks Austin tech scene
Sep 26th
TechCrunch rocked the high style Pangea Lounge in Austin’s trendy 4th Street District on Sept 25, 2008 with a roomful of startups, entrepreneurs and VCs. Kimberlie Dykeman did about 20 interviews, and these are a few of the first to be released. More will be released later.
Interviewees included Troy from PeoplePad.com, Brad from DadLabs.com, Dewey from Mingll.com, Mark Spilotro with iknoware.com, Erick Schonfeld and Heather Harde with TechCrunch.com, Randy Cohen with ticketcity.com, Joshua Baer with otherinbox.com, Jay Hallberg with SpiceWorks.com, Samantha Nebrick with YellowPages.com, Dee Dee Dial with BazaarVoice.com and more.
The video is also appearing at these video sites: MySpace, Metacafe, Blip.tv, Stupid Videos and Sclipo. On itunes, subscribe to austinblogger to get the video on your Apple TV, ipod, or Itunes player.
Here’s the DadLabs video from the TechCrunch party:
And here’s our video which is on austinblogger on itunes:
OneWebDay Austin – Austin Time Exchange
Sep 23rd
Austin Time Exchange & github
http://austinblogger.com/blog/ video – Open source currency – Solving social problems with Intentional Economics Tom Brown is a co-worker who has deployed OpenID on multiple high profile nonprofit websites. HeresTomWithTheWeather is contributing Ruby on Rails code to projects hosted on github. Tom is the co-founder of SuperBorrowNet. Rich Vazquez is a board member of the Austin Time Exchange Network, longtime editor of LasCulturas.com and currently works in software security and web programming.
OneWebDay Austin – Andrew Donoho
Sep 23rd
Andrew Donoho, Web Theorist with IBM’s Emerging Internet Technology Team, has a long history working with both web standards and implementations. He was an early participant in crafting XHTML v1.0 and v1.1 and SVG v1.0. He has been creating and pushing implementations of the bi-directional web since 1999 and is extending that idea to building a Co-Web with a scalable UI for the last 18 months. He is trained in experimental physics with a degree from the University of Texas at Austin. He still lives in Austin with his wife.
Bill Leake at OneWebDay Austin
Sep 23rd
Bill Leake has been involved in driving provable revenues through internet marketing techniques since the early 1990s when, as part of the management team at Power Computing, he built the first company to sell $1 million of product over the internet. Bill has guided Apogee Search from inception to its current position as the largest search engine marketing firm in the Southwest, and one of the 20 largest in North America.
Bill gave this talk to the OneWebDay crowd at Cafe Caffeine on Monday Sept 22, 2008 and has some interesting asides on the economy and the political scene.
Jon Lebkowsky at OneWebDay Austin
Sep 23rd
Jon Lebkowsky takes us on a trip down Internet memory lane and recalls how a couple of guys from the Farm in Tennessee (fig and tex) – who I know well – landed at Stewart Brands Whole Earth Catalog in Sausalito and started the WELL (Whole Earth ‘Lectronic Link) which turned out to be a seminal incubating ground for many of the ideas of the modern day Internet. He also traces the beginnings of blogging with BoingBoing and fringeware in Austin, Texas. It’s a fascinating story about the beginnings and evolution of blogging and social networking. This event was a special jelly coworking event at Cafe Caffeine in Austin, Texas on Monday, September 22, 2008. Maggie Duval was a chief instigator of this event (http://livelyhoods.com)
David Armistead at OneWebDay Austin
Sep 23rd
The Internet as key enabling technology for the emergence of the new global sustainability economy
David’s Bio: David Armistead has been involved in business and organization development, strategic planning, and future studies projects since the early 1980s, and has worked directly with major culture leaders, multinational firms and state and federal government, and also high tech manufacturing and small business.
CJ Romberger talks at OneWebDayAustin
Sep 23rd
The Web – Returning to Its Roots: It isn’t Just for Marketing Anymore
CJ’s Bio: CJ Romberger founded Wildwood Interactive, a premier web development firm, in 2000. Her experience includes systems analysis, website and database development, computer programming and training, quality assurance, and product and application development. She’s worked at companies like Fisher-Rosemont, BMC Software, and Human Code, and has led development teams for large eCommerce sites like RX.com and Leapfrog.com. CJ graduated with a 4.0 GPA from Texas State University and holds a BBA in Computer Information Systems. She writes a column called “Gadget Girl” for Austin Woman Magazine and in her spare time plays music in her recording studio and plays with new technology.
Video by Paul Terry Walhus of austinblogger.com
springnet gets 5 seconds on CNN
Sep 21st
Paul Terry Walhus, the AustinBlogger, got 5 seconds of fame on CNN by having his twitter post put up on the CNN big screen. His twitter name is springnet. He asked about the effect of the new economic package on the mortgage holder with a high interest rate. The answer? We’ll get back to you.
OneWebDay and iphone/itouch video podcast
Sep 18th
Bob Nagy and Paul Terry Walhus talk about iphone and itouch apps. Bob loads up his newly acquired itouch with some apps.
And this comes by way of Jon Lebkowsky and Jelly Austin
Celebrate OneWebDay – The Earth Day for the Internet
Activities all day long! Uber-Jelly Jam Barcampian Melange
http://wiki.workatjelly.com/One+Web+Day+Uber+Jelly+at+Cafe+Caffeine+-+Monday,+Sept+22nd
The idea behind OneWebDay is to encourage people to think of themselves as responsible for the internet, and to take good and visible actions on Sept. 22 that (1) celebrate the positive impact of the internet on the world and (2) shed light on the problems of access and information flow.
OneWebDay is a global, decentralized event. We’re encouraging people around the world to meet up on Sept. 22 to talk about the threats to the net and how the web could change lives around the world in the future.
Our Austin event features a day-long extended uber-Jelly, featured speakers and interviews about how the Web has changed lives. In addition to our speakers (list developing) we’ll be asking attendees:
- how the web has changed your life
- how you’d like the web to change the world in the future
- your favorite online event ever
- something you’ve done online with other people in other countries
and posting our clips on YouTube, Blip.tv and dotSub.com as part of a global video mashup.
Casey Mckinnon, Veronica Belmont, Leah Culver rock sxsw
Sep 12th
The hottest women in tech perform as a rock band at SXSW 2008.
Players are Veronica Belmont of Tekzilla, Bonny Pierzina, Leah Culver of Pownce, and Casey Mckinnon of Galacticast.
AustinCast named “one of 13 Important Austin Technology blogs” by Mashable
Sep 12th
“Laid backâ€. That’s how Mashable top dog Pete Cashmore described Austin, Texas in an interview with AustinLifestyles at the Summermash party at Buffalo Billiards in the heart of Austin’s 6th Street live music district. Mark “Rizzn†Hopkins of Mashable described Austin as “comfortable and intimate, you had no problems striking up a conversation.â€Â
Mashable put together a list of Austin’s most important technology blogs and AustinCast.com – sister site of AustinLifestyles.com – wound up on that list in some pretty great company.
Here’s the list with a few excerpts from the blog entry at Mashable:
- Austin 3.0 – A website designed to give the “younger Austin Geek a place to see what is going on in Austin.â€
- Austin Startup – Austin Startup is simply a news site that chronicles the goings ons and creation of new tech sector business in the Austin area.
- AustinCast – This site is a frequently updated hub for video and audio interviews of local area movers and shakers in the technology scene. He’s published over 100 video interviews with the likes of Veronica Belmont, Pete Cashmore, Zadi Diaz, Cali Lewis, Lindsay Campbell, and Leah Culver as well as a number of local heroes to the Austin scene.
- Austin360 – This is the official New Media offering from Austin’s reigning Old Media institution, the Austin-American Statesman.
- GeekAustin – Probably one of Austin’s oldest tech blogs, LinearB’ and Orion have been chronicling the gaming, business and tech communities of Austin since 2000.
- Michelle’s Blog - . . . she’s a very active leader and figurehead to the new, young Austin Tech community, and has her hands in just about everything. Her personal blog reflects all the myriad of ventures she’s involved in there.
- Josh Dilworth – Josh is over at PR group Porter Novelli, based in their Austin office. Amongst all his many work related projects like SXSW, he has quite visible presence amongst those in the online Semantic and AI community as well as an avid participant in a number of widely used social media tools. I was recently a guest on a podcast of his, Falken’s Maze.
- John Erik Metcalf - John Erik Metcalf is a major figure in the Austin scene as well, as he’s a co-founder in one of the town’s two co-working spaces: Conjunctured
- Social Media Club Austin – The site describes itself as “part think tank, part curiosity, all new media†and is a repository for all that is going on in the “business networking event†scene for the Austin area.
- Some Assembly Required – a self-described “business development and networking blog†authored by Thom Singer.
- The Jeff Beckham Weblog – Jeff is an Austin area blogger who focuses his posts on the evolution of media, specifically in relationship to how the Internet is forcing transformation on not just media industries but “the word itself.â€
- Door64 Blog – The blog for Door64, the forum and community portal for the Austin-area tech community.
If you an Austin area blogger and want to be added to the OPML file email Mark at Mashable to be included in the next version of the list.
Download Now! (OPML) (import this into your favorite feed reader)
Â
Austincast Hope Show (Sherry) sandwich
Jul 21st
This is the interview within an interview… inside the interview I did with ijustine is this interview done by Sherry Smith of the Hope Show. A veritable AustinCast – Hope Show – Austincast sandwich.
sxsw interview 11 – Lindsay Campbell – moblogic.tv
Jul 21st
Lindsay Campbell did hundreds of episodes of the insanely popular Wallstrip and is now doing something totally new and different, a show about news and politics. We luckily catch her in an interview on day 1 of SXSW. There will be blog is Lindsay’s clip from sxsw which includes two cuts of austincasts Paul Terry Walhus talking about Matt Mullenwegg and “wholesome, family podcasts”. “MobLogic shamelessly pimps fellow bloggers in a pathetically transparent attempt to promote itself” it says on moblogic.tv’s episode page. 
pingback austincast.com/blog bastropbuilder.com/blog compuslides.com/blog gameslides.com/blog magickpapers.com/blog shopslides.com/blog touroftexas.com/blog spring.net/blog socobuzz.com/blog web2.0slides.com/blog webgirlvillage.com/blog wholetech.com/blog wmeyers.com/blog workontheweb.com/blog
Norris Church Mailer, Norman Mailers wife talks days before he dies
Jul 18th
Norman Mailer’s wife speaks at the Texas Book Festival just a few days before his death. His sixth and last wife, married in 1980, was Norris Church (née Barbara Davis), a former model turned writer. They had one son together, John Buffalo Mailer, and Mailer informally adopted Matthew Norris, her son by her first husband, Larry Norris.
Norris Church Mailer is the author of a previous novel, Windchill Summer. She was raised in Arkansas and now lives on Cape Cod. Her husband of thirty-one years, Norman Mailer, died just days after this talk.
Social Network reviews – beginning of a spring.net series
Jul 1st
Starting today, I’m going to start a series of reviews, accompanied by screencasts, of reviews of social networks, social bookmarking services and social media sites on the Spring. You can see my initial list there which I’ll be modifying as this series goes along.
Listal is a social networking site where you can find people who share your tastes in movies, books, music or games. Lists and collections are shared via a simple url like (in my case) http://springnet.listal.com and they give you widgets to plug in to your blog or website.
The site stands out for it’s tight integration of tagging, friends, finding others, forums and messaging. The “explore” feature is hot, it lets you scan through reviews of movies, tv shows, books, games, dvds, and music.
sxsw del.icio.us network starting, join up!
Mar 23rd
Were you at SXSW and want to keep the experience going and stay in touch with others you met there? Here’s how! I put out a tweet to request that anyone in our “network” who has a del.icio.us account and is willing to share their del.icio.us “name,” to please send it my way and I will compile the list. This way, we can add each other to our del.icio.us networks. One of the drawbacks of all these social networking sites, is the separate interfaces, usernames and such. We are all hoping for the ultimate Mashup of social networking one day.
I’m very excited to get this ball rolling and even more excited to explore all the great bookmarks that our friends who are hot on sxsw are sharing. If you would like to be included, just post a comment here with your del.icio.us “name” and I will add you to our network or send a direct message to http://twitter.com/sxswtwit . Then, just follow these easy steps:
- Go to del.icio.us (sign up for an account if you don’t have one already)
- Click on Your Network (top left)
- On the right-hand side, in the text box, type in sxswtwit
- Click ADD
- Now sxswtwit will appear in your network beneath in blue
- Click on sxswtwit
- You are now in sxswtwit’s bookmarks, but there are none… BUT WAIT
- In the gray box at the top, it reads:
All sxswtwit’s items (0)
sxswtwit is in your network, view sxswtwit’s network - Click on VIEW sxswtwit’s network
That’s where the magic happens. There you see all the bookmarks shared by everyone in the network, which can be a little messy OR you can look over at the right. There you can click on each member’s name and look at his/her individual bookmarks. You can even add each member to your own del.icio.us network. As more members join this sxswtwit del.icio.us network, you’ll see them added.
Right now, the only member is http://del.icio.us/springnet (me) but that will hopefully change soon. Join now!
Great idea you say? Well, all the credit goes to GeekyMomma who thought it up for her edtech network and the above is practically word for word from her blog post.
Add your name to the comments below and you’ll be good to go or just send a direct message to http://twitter.com/sxswtwit
sxsw video Zadi Diaz on drums at Cedar Street Courtyard
Mar 21st
One of the brightest stars in tech podcasting, Zadi Diaz plays drums in a rock band competition at SXSW at the Cedar Street Courtyard on 4th Street in Austin, Texas.She was on the panel at SXSW called “Quit your day job and vblog” Watch Zadi Diaz play drums at Cedar Street Courtyard in Austin here. Speakers on Zadi’s SXSW panel: Lindsay Campbell (wallstrip.com and http://moblogic.tv), Zadi Diaz (epicfu.com), Lisa Donovan (youtube.com/lisanova), Bre Pettis (imakethings.com), Tim Shey (nextnewnetworks.com)
pingbacks austincast.com/blog bastropbuilder.com/blog compuslides.com/blog gameslides.com/blog magickpapers.com/blog shopslides.com/blog touroftexas.com/blog spring.net/blog socobuzz.com/blog web2.0slides.com/blog webgirlvillage.com/blog wholetech.com/blog wmeyers.com/blog
open door64 and what do you find?
Feb 5th
The hottest tech site in Austin right now is
It’s up to the second with information on events and stimulating forums.
Some guy named Matt does it.
I’m on it.
new streaming lifecast on justin.tv/austintexas
Sep 24th
Watch austintexas live video and chat on Justin.tv
We’re live streaming with a show on justin.tv/austintexas now.
We’re working with Redbud Sports in Austin, Texas and the plans are to bring you many athletes and sports events around Austin. Also, you can see our feed at austincast.com
post twitter, jaiku, tumblr, pownce at the same time
Aug 12th
Are you overwhelmed with your miniblogs, presence sites, and social networking sites. Here’s how to just make one entry and post it to all them. Thanks to frantic industries for providing 90% of the following instructions and the graphics.
You only have to post to Pownce. If you need a Pownce invite I have a few left. To find your Pownce RSS feed go to the following URL:
http://www.pownce.com/feeds/public/springnet/
Of course you won’t be springnet but someone else.
Next, register with Twitterfeed. If you don’t have an OpenID you can get one over at MyOpenID – you’re going to need it sooner or later anyway. Create a new feed in Twitterfeed and add the Pownce feed to it; make sure to uncheck the “Include description” checkbox, and set the update interval to 30 minutes.
However, Pownce and Twitter aren’t enough for me; I want to add Tumblr and Jaiku into the mix. The problem with Tumblr is that it won’t recognize the Pownce feed. No worries, though, go to the Twitter feed you’ve forwarded your Pownce feed to, click the RSS icon and add that feed to Tumblr (as text).
Finally, open up your Jaiku profile, click on Feeds (Edit) and add an RSS feed. You can use the Pownce feed or the Twitter feed – they both work pretty much the same.
That’s it – by posting on Pownce you now automatically update all four services at the same time. Now, if only someone would create a Miranda Pownce plugin…
Btw, my Pownce/Twitter/Jaiku/Tumblr stream is a lightweight combination of some posts from springnet and some of my personal thoughts. If you’d like to follow any of them, here are the links: Pownce, Twitter, Jaiku and Tumblr.
John Edwards lands at Austin liberal oasis
Jun 12th
Democratic Presidential candidate John Edwards rolled in to Scholz Garden, in the shadow of the State Capital, on a hot, blistering 90 plus degree day in downtown Austin, Texas. Youthful looking, expressive, he gave a clean, crisp speech opposing the war and full of ideals about ending hunger and illiteracy around the world. He’s determined to bring America back. And he mentioned that Bush was the only world leader not to commit to cutting back on global warming at last weeks European summit.
Edwards said, “Here’s an idea. Suppose instead of America spending $500 billion in Iraq, America led an international effort to make primary school education available to 100 million children in the world who have no education whatsoever.” [Applause]
Scholz Garden is a populist playground, a favorite place for liberal politicians like Hightower, like it says in this Austin Chronicle article:
“That’s how Billy Lee Brammer sets the scene in The Gay Place, his true-fiction account of Texas politics and the boozy courtin’ and lawmakin’ that went on under the trees at Scholz Garten (now casually renamed “Garden”) in the Fifties. It was the one place in town where an under-21 Eddie Wilson could score a beer without getting hassled. Scholz was destined for the ever-after indeed. The German-owned gathering place on San Jacinto was the watering hole of choice for every liberal politician, writer, musician, and artist in town.”
I had the chicken fried chicken with a potato double play: German potatoes and fries. I got close enough to Edwards to get some real good snapshots which you can see here (feel free to reproduce on your blog or website with attribution):
http://austincast.com/album/edwards (click “slide show” to see them all quickly). While you view them you might want to play the “rough transcription” of the speech done by News 8 Austin.
Wordpress Bloggers first Austin meetup
Apr 24th
The Gingerman was the site for the first Austin Wordpress meetup. About a dozen folks showed up including a local member of the Wordpress team who passed out cool t shirts.
I wasn’t able to stay long so I’m hoping to pick up the details of the last part of the meeting off others blogs.
Lorin Rivers has done a masterful job of stretching wordpress to it’s limit with his current project. He extended the mysql back end of wordpress to do a much better job at handling large numbers of users, making it more suitable to host a large community. Keep at it Lorin, you can go places with this if you open source it.
Andy Skelton, one of the folks at the meetup said on his blog today: “Don’t ask me why I didn’t do it first. Paul Menard is doing a fine job starting an Austin WordPress Meetup. He listed it on Upcoming and Meetup and the crowds are growing.”
Here are some cell phone pictures I took of the Wordpress meetup at the Gingerman showing the attendees and lots of beer glasses.
NYT: Many Tweets, One Loud Voice
Apr 22nd
A New York Times article mentions me.
One of the best-loved twitterers, Paul Terry Walhus, a gray-haired blogger from Austin, Tex., has 9,177 friends and 1,851 followers, according to the tracking site Twitterholic. (my name was mispelled in the article)
The article goes on to say:
At least one politician has tuned into the service. John Edwards, who has 2,001 followers and 2,082 friends, recently twittered that his presidential campaign would be “carbon neutral.”
After Robert Scoble, who writes a popular technology blog called Scobleizer and who himself has 2,985 followers and 3,045 friends, challenged this ambitious vow on Twitter, Mr. Edwards twittered back that he would, as president, offset his campaign’s carbon emissions by financing alternative energy research.
And they quote Bruce Sterling’s characteristically biting comment:
Bruce Sterling, the science fiction writer and journalist, who used Twitter at South by Southwest, wrote to me, “Using Twitter for literate communication is about as likely as firing up a CB radio and hearing some guy recite ‘The Iliad.’ ”
The articles author Jason Pontin is the editor in chief and publisher of Technology Review, a magazine and Web site owned by M.I.T. E-mail: pontin@nytimes.com
“most popular person on twitter” – Slate
Apr 11th
Holy cow! I just got this “direct [twitter] message”: jeffb @springnet: You get a shout-out in this Slate story: http://www.slate.com/id/2163861?nav=tap3 Austin, TX
“According to tracking site Twitterholic, the top 10 twitterers have thousands of people following them—a literal cult of personality. Paul Terry Walhus, a gray-haired Austin coffee-shop blogger who has 8,789 friends and 1,722 followers, is currently the most popular person on the site. His latest tweet: “5:33 am cst L:78704 starting work week … full plate today … toast, mango yogurt and coffee w half and half.”
I’m floored! Thanks for the shout out Slate! What can I say? I guess I’m going to have to dig deep and come up with some incredible blog entries now.
Out of the closet – twitter
Mar 31st
picture above from the Statesman article referenced below.
I’m out. Of the closet. OK. I’m a twitter user.
Omar Gallaga, Statesman blogger/writer and Rodolfo Gonzalez, photographer, caught up with me on South Congress last week and outed me as a twitter user in a story on twitter. Here I am posing for a picture above at Jo’s Coffee. He calls me “amiable”. Nice. He says my hair is “unruly under the hat”. I should have pushed harder for that haircut from Dorothy last week, darn.
Gallaga mentions Robert Scoble’s use of twitter at SXSW and it was Scoble on twitter that got me an invite to the Salt Lick for a super barbecue beerfest at SXSW. It was actually Coté that turned me on to twitter about 2 weeks ago.
Gallaga really hits it on the mark when he talks about how twitter is a “springboard to new creations”. Today twittervision, which is a mashup of google maps and twitter, introduced “personal twittervision” which lets you post comments while viewing every comment posted on twitter worldwide.
TwitThis for your blog
Mar 25th
What is TwitThis?
Click “TwitThis” to try it out and tell your friends about us on Twitter!
TwitThis is an easy way for people to send Twitter messages about your blog post or website. When visitors to your website click on the TwitThis button or link, it takes the URL of the webpage and creates a shorter URL using TinyURL. Then visitors can send this shortened URL and a description of the web page to all of their friends on Twitter.
So I think I’ll install this on this blog and my other blogs:
and
I’ll let you know how hard or easy this was. I run on Wordpress.
Given the powerful reach of the internet should political campaigns be required to disclose youtube negative ads? – Pat Buchanon
“let it rest” – Eleanor Clift
“the internet is being transformed into a toilet” – McLaughlin
twitter is exploding like a supernova!
Mar 22nd
My twitter site has exploded with followers. Over 400.
But twitter itself has exploded like a supernova overnight, going from 600 tracked on twitterholic to 13,000 last night. I’d guess it’s over 15,000 as of this red hot second. I talked with the twitterholic folks and they agreed with me that it’s like dealing with a runaway train. The site itself it under a crushing bandwidth load.
Twitter is great. It’s sms messaging and web messaging all rolled in to one package and it operates like a miniblog. It let’s you know what everyone is doing quickly.
Finally, the promise of real social networking is at hand. The last few days have been changing days in the life of the net.
I’ll have a lot more to say about twitter.
Here’s a blog past from my twitter friend Alex Nesbitt “buena vista” that’s typical of the kind of enthusiam and fervor there is for twitter. Direct quote follows.
1. It’s meant I’ve kept in touch a little more with one of my dear friends I was neglecting. In fact I’ve even seen him more partly because we’re both twittering. Here’s a couple of random examples…
“Dana Power, a computer programmer from Raleigh, N.C., says her brother who lives in Texas introduced her to Twitter so they can stay in touch: ‘I hardly ever corresponded with him, but with Twitter, I can see what he is doing at a given point in his life,’ she says. ‘It makes me feel more connected to him somehow.’”
Leisa tells a nice story about Twitter helped her get to SXSW.
2. I’ve loved watching the community create it’s own ‘rules of engagement’ and I’ve been facinated by all the blog posts I’ve read on this phenomenon; Like David Armano’s at Logic + Emotion. There are thousands more…
3. It’s a cross between IM and a mini blog – you can access it from both PC and mobile terminals so it’s easy and accessible.
4. I control it. I can twitter as often as I like. I can choose who sees me and who I see. Ican be public or secret. I’m a Twit!
5. It’s a growing ecology. Expect mash-ups with google earth and flickr soon. There’s already Twitterholic.com – expect ‘Twitterholics-anonymous.com’!
Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention twittervision which is really blowing the lid off everything. It’s television for the twitter age, on a google world map it shows you every tweet from every twitterer in real time. All twits, all the time. Mind boggling, the whole twitter phenomenon.
twitter twittering sxsw on techmeme
Mar 11th
Pete Cashmore / Mashable!:
The Evolution of Blogging, Cat Version — So blogging has evolved once more, and the talk of the town – or at least the talk of Austin, Texas during the SXSW Conference – is Twitter, that increasingly popular text messaging/blogging service from the makers of Odeo.
Discussion: Search Marketing Gurus, Mark Evans and Life On the Wicked Stage
Discussion:
Warner Crocker / Life On the Wicked Stage: Sunday Morning Reading
RELATED:
Bren / Slacker Manager:
The Several Habits of Wildly Successful Twitter Users — Twitter is a deceptively simple utility. That said, Twitter isn’t for everyone. In fact it’s probably not even for half of everyone. But for those that have the patience to find their personal sweet spot, Twitter can be quite good indeed.
Discussion: One By One Media and digg
Discussion:
Tris Hussey / One By One Media: Twitter is the new Flickr
Chris Brogan / lifehack.org:
5 Ways to Use Twitter for Good — I’m a big fan of Twitter, and have been using it heavily since the outset. For those of you not yet using it, Twitter is a communications gateway that asks the question: “What are you doing now?” Users can answer and hear their friends’ answers via SMS, via IM, or on a webpage.
Discussion: Texas Startup Blog, MYBLOG by Ouriel, Web Strategy and digg
Discussion:
Alexander Muse / Texas Startup Blog: Flickr is my Twitter — Everyone is talking about Twitter at SXSW.
Jeremiah Owyang / Web Strategy: Twitter, a useful Communication Tool of SXSW
Ross Mayfield / Ross Mayfield’s Weblog:
Twitter Tips the Tuna — On Wednesday, Twitter tipped the tuna. By that I mean it started peaking. Adoption amongst the people I know seemed to double immediately, an apparent tipping point. It hasn’t jumped the shark, and probably won’t until Steven Colbert covers this messaging of the mundane.
Discussion: Guardian Unlimited, Message, NevilleHobson.com, Complete Tosh,, J. LeRoy’s Evolving Web, Dan Blank and Rex Hammock’s weblog
Discussion:
Jack Schofield / Guardian Unlimited: Twitter crowd goes bananas at SXSW
Stowe Boyd / Message: Ross Mayfield On Twitter
Neil McIntosh / Complete Tosh,: Twitter crosses the tuna chasm
J. LeRoy / J. LeRoy’s Evolving Web: Why Do I Twitter?
Acarvin / Andy Carvin’s Waste of Bandwidth:Can Twitter Save Lives?
Discussion: Technology for the Nonprofit …
SXSW Baby!
Mar 10th
Yahoo! BarTab: Monday, March 12, 6:30–9:30 pm at Light Bar. The big ‘hoo! and what seems like every little company they ever acquired are throwing a bash at the fresh newish club at Congress and Fourth, featuring an open bar, munchies and music by The Little Ones. “After we reach capacity,” they say, “admittance will be determined by Feats of Strength.” We’re pretty sure that’s the name of Andy Baio’s band. Why you’ll wanna go: Ask anyone who was at last year’s Yahoo! party that busted the seams of Iron Cactus. This’ll be the talk of Tuesday. Also, if you’ve written something that uses tags, you might leave with a check.
from SXSW Baby!.
SXSW day parties
Mar 4th
Do you want the inside track on parties at SXSW. “Corky” has the scoop in the following link followed by a brief blurb:
“
WED: Day | Night THU: Day | Night FRI: Day | Night SAT: Day | Night
It used to be the mantra of the first morning at South by Southwest: “Where are all the cool parties?” Everybody would hit town knowing of one or two soirees where the free booze flowed and the gratis chow was spread out on tables, but they’d have to ask around to get a more complete picture.
Nowadays, the party scene is revealed more than a month before the first Shiner Bock is cracked — and then overrated — by an out-of-towner. Internet sites such as showlistaustin.com, donewaiting.com and austinist.com collect party info and spread the news, giving readers weeks to get in good with the party hosts, to get that all-important invite.
Here are some of the things we’ve culled from those sites and brooklynvegan.com. Many are free and open to the public:
More SXSW
“
Twitter Support
Feb 25th
Twitter, says the official website is a “ Whole World in Your Hands”
What is twitter?
“Twitter is a community of friends and strangers from around the world sending updates about moments in their lives. Friends near or far can use Twitter to remain somewhat close while far away. Curious people can make friends. Bloggers can use it as a mini-blogging tool. Developers can use the API to make Twitter tools of their own.”
Ok… so how does it work?
“You can send updates in three ways: send a text message from your mobile phone, type a message from the Twitter site, or instant message from Jabber or Gmail chat. (support for AIM and other chat services coming soon!) Start by texting the word help to 40404 if you’re in the United States. For international folks, we have different numbers. Write us and we’ll give you yours.”
I heard about twitter from Cote on his drunkandretired podcast.
You can see the twitter plugin on the lower right column of the austincast blog.
Friday morning at Jo’s
Feb 23rd
It’s Friday morning at Jo’s and there are a couple of dozen folks enjoying the chill air. Tom, with the green bandana, is sweeping up aound the place and extolling the virtues of the new espresso machine, the La Marzocco. We’ll have the scoop on this in an upcoming blog episode. It’s a nice view from the Jo’s front deck of Amy’s Ice Cream, Zen restaurant, and the Hotel San Jose. Tom cranks up the ipod and the music resumes.
We found 63 photos on flickr matching the search phrase Jo’s Coffee.
Jo’s has a MySpace page at myspace.com/joshotcoffee and soon there will be a guide to MySpace on Jo’s blog. What would you like to see on Jo’s blog, send us an article or post something in our comments.
Jo’s South is XL cover story!
Feb 22nd
Austin American Statesman writer Shermakaye Bass has written up a “day in the life” of Jo’s South called:
People-watching on SoCo
“Shermakaye Bass scopes out the social landscape at Jo’s on South Congress for a glimpse of the famous and soon-to-be famous. MORE”
“Any given day is a funky parade at Jo’s Hot Coffee on South Congress Avenue. Its location at the foot of the “SoCo strip” and its layout — open shed seating, walkup-window, tables — make Jo’s perfect for marathon people watching.
It’s one of those places where, throughout the day, life’s rich pageant unfurls, jogging past in sweats, ambling up with dogs, strolling through with babies, buzzing by on scooters, dashing up and away in suits. Musicians and filmmakers chat with geeks and fashionistas; well-heeled tourists sidle up to local characters. Stars of the big and small screen (hello, “Friday Night Lights”) hang out — and sometimes try to hide — here. “
Downtown Jo’s Music | February 13 – 18
Feb 14th
Tues February 13 at 8 pm
Blackwater Gospel
Amy Cook 9 pm
Thurs February 15 at 12:30 pm
Alice Spencer
and her Monkey Butlers
Sun February 18 at 12:30 pm
Andrew Nafziger Trio
Jo’s Downtown
242 W 2nd Street
Austin, Texas
512.469.9003
Screenburn mixer at Jo’s Feb 22
Feb 14th
SXSW, Austin Community College (ACC), and the Digital Media Council present “Get into the Game”, an industry seminar and mixer on Thursday, February 22 from 7–9 pm at Jo’s Coffee, 242 West Second Street Austin, Texas.
Mix it up with gaming industry mavens as they share their insights in to how to launch a gaming industry career.
Rodney Gibbs, from Amaze Entertainment, will give a presentation along with other gaming industry wonks.
And you can register to win a free 2007 sxsw interactive pass and attend this major blog/media fest in March.
Downtown Jo’s has a state of the art video projector for events like these and encourages meetups and special interest groups to use their facility.
Al Gore on the Grammys
Feb 11th
In a postscript to my armchair blow by blow of the grammys. Al Gore was a presenter for the best rock album of the year. Stadium Arcardium beat out Neil Young.
It would have been the redeeming moment of the night had Gore given the grammy to Neil Young.
Don Henley gave a shout out to the Dixie Chicks. “nice going!”
Grammys 49
Feb 11th
This years love fest of pop culture had the usual ups and downs, highs and lows. I watching this years show from my palatial estate in Cedar Creek on TiVo.
Here are some impressions I jotted down on my craplet sitting in the rocking chair.
The Police are back and they belted out Roxanne, then it was mostly downhill except for the Dixie Chicks and the “who died last year segment”.
The once shameful Chicks have gone from being scorned as unpatriot to singing their anti-war song in prime time on the big show.
What’s with Justin Timberlake and the “Blair Witch” camera that he did a youtube video with during his performance of “What Goes Around Comes Around”? Nice nose.
Dylan edged out Neil Young for best solo performance in the night’s most tragic snub.
Shakira shook those hips.
“Gnarls Barkley” dresses as an airline pilot during his rendition of “Crazy”
Ludacris gives special thanks to Oprah and Bill O’Reilly?
Natalie Maines quotes the Simpsons bully upon winning best country album “ha ha!” Maines, “a lot of people just turned their tvs off right now. Continuing in the tradition of blurting out whatever’s on her mind, good for her! Good for Austin!
I didn’t like seeing Ray Benson take a back seat to Carrie Underwood in the Bob Wills. One blogger said she should get the award for “pretend artist doing something classic to try and prove you’re legit . . . this would be a great time for Jesus to take the wheel and steer her out of here.”
Ornette Coleman is still living.
And finally there was James Brown dancing in the folks who died last year montage.
Austin International Rescheduled
Feb 10th
Organizers and city officials to bring the cycling event to Austin in 2008
(Lebanon, NJ) January 19, 2007 — g4 Productions, with the support of the city of Austin, has announced that the Austin International cycling event originally slated for this June will be rescheduled for June 2008.
“We have formed some fantastic partnerships in the Austin community and we will continue to work closely with the city, the Austin Sports Commission, our media partners and the Austin cycling community to make the 2008 race one of the best one day races in America,” said Robin Morton, partner, g4 Productions.
Official race website http://www.g4events.com/
SXSW in high def
Feb 10th
For all you South by Southwest (SXSW) fans out there, DirecTV just did a deal to bring the music-design-tech event to TV, airing live March 15-17th. Press release…
PRESS RELEASE — For two decades, the SXSW music
festival in Austin, Texas has been the industry’s best kept secret for
breaking new acts such as Franz Ferdinand, Kaiser Chiefs and James Blunt.
That’s all about to change as DIRECTV, the nation’s leading satellite
television service provider, teams up with music/entertainment guru Blaze
TV to bring the nation’s biggest music showcase to national television for
the first time in DIRECTV Presents SXSW Live. Exclusively on DIRECTV’s
Channel 101 (The 101), the special will be broadcast live March 15-17 and
feature unprecedented access with upfront performances and
behind-the-scenes footage from the three day musical extravaganza.
Birth of Coffee book signing
Feb 9th
The Birth of Coffee – presentation and book singing to benefit Friends of the Austin Public Library
Date and Time: Wednesday February 21 – 7PM
Location: 800 Guadalupe – Austin Public Library- Austin History Center
Information: Seating is limited so please call 974-7400
For more information on our project please see www.birthofcoffee.com
Thanks
Daniel Lorenzetti & Linda Rice Lorenzetti
The Birth Of Coffee Project
512 585-0011
Jo’s Coffee South tour w Lisa and Tom
Feb 7th
Lisa and Tom take us on a video podcast walk through of Jo’s Coffee South.
Jo’s Coffee Video Podcast Windows Media Version – download now
Jo’s Coffee Video Podcast Mac Quicktime Version – download now (ipod ready)
Tom, Jo’s Assistant Manager and fixit guy, shows us the equipment and processes that keep Jo’s running. He talks about the history of the place and gives us a tour around the outside.
Lisa demos one of her favorite drinks. We also encounter Fritz, the Motorblade poster guy and one of the regulars who talks about the NASA astronaut space love triangle. It’s a fascinating look at the inner workings of South Congress epicenter of activity.
Rose Makes a Mocha
Feb 6th
Rose of Jo’s Coffee South, Austin, TX shows us how the pros make a mocha. It’s on an early Tuesday morning in Austin and it’s just before the big crowd shows up at Jo’s.
Makin’ Mocha – the Ipod Version
Makin’ Mocha with Rose – for Windows Media player
A Café Mocha is a variant of a cafe latte. Like a latte it is typically one third espresso and two thirds steamed milk, but a shot of chocolate is added. Typically the chocolate is in the form of an Italian syrup, although less sophisticated vending systems use instant chocolate powder. Whipped cream, dustings of cocoa and marshmallows may also be added on top for flavour and decoration.
This being an American invention, it is mostly unknown in Italy and other continental European countries. Mocha was originally a particular variety of coffee from Mocha, Yemen, made without cocoa, but which tasted as if it had cocoa in it, and modern usage usually refers to an imitation of it using other coffee varieties and cocoa.
A variant is white café mocha, instead made with a shot of white chocolate.
A term moccaccino is used in some regions of Europe and the Middle East to describe Café Latte with cocoa or chocolate.
Carnaval Brasileiro Austin 2007
Feb 5th
OK. It’s here. This year’s two hour Carnaval video. Be the first to see it before it shows up on google video or youtube.
Yeah baby, take me there!
The Carnival 2007 Video!
The following is an excerpt from what has to be the best Carnaval “fan site” we have seen, produced with much love by Dana…lots of great photos and personal stories…to see the whole thing, click here. But this sums up what this thing is all about. We couldn’t have said it better.
“I heard a lot of stuff from folks this year about Carnaval and their reasons for not going, and it seemed to have a common theme of “fear of debauchery” or like this was some sort of giant ORGY or something where everyone is doing body shots and rolling about on the floor in a drunken or drug-filled haze. NOTHING COULD BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH…I want to go on record saying that Carnaval is
1. some of the safest, best fun I have all year
2. one of the HEALTHIEST things I do for myself all year
3. an opportunity to dance and laugh with some of the nicest total strangers I could ever hope to meet
4. one of the biggest creative outlets I have on ALL KINDS of levels.So, basically, if you’re not going to Carnaval, I sure don’t know why. If you’re afraid to go alone, find a friend to go with. Heck, Mac showed up as a surprise totally by himself. Sondra, Lane and I gave him some beads and later he was spotted in a conga line, having a great time. You don’t need a costume, you don’t need to drink, you only need to come with an open mind and happy feet and a willingness to let your spirit soar for a few hours. You only have from 9pm until 2am, when they turn the lights on, so it’s this brief trip into another world. I guarantee you’ll leave there with a happy heart and enough stored up mojo to get you through another month or so of winter – maybe until the bluebonnets perk up. Personally, Carnaval juice carries me through all kinds of rough times all year long. I think I speak for my “posse” when I say they feel the same way.” This comes from Dana’s website linked above.
Goodbye Milly Ivins
Feb 3rd
In Loving Memory of Molly Ivins, 1944-2007
Syndicated political columnist Molly Ivins died of breast cancer Wednesday evening at her home in Austin. She was 62 years old, and had much, much more to give this world.
She remained cheerful despite Texas politics. She emphasized the more hilarious aspects of both state and national government, and consequently never had to write fiction. She said, “Good thing we’ve still got politics—finest form of free entertainment ever invented.”
from the Texas Observer obituary
Lance Armstrong visits fans before final Tour de France
Jan 28th
Video by Paul Walhus
Lance does a question and answer session with Austin Texas fans before heading off to the final bike race of his career, a bid to win his 7th Tour de France in a row. The setting was Lance’s new health club.
Leighton Hodges Halloween party video
Jan 28th
Every Halloween Leighton Hodges hosts the ultimate Halloween party. Video by yours truly. – ptw
Vote in the Chronicles “Best Austin Music Poll”
Jan 25th
Austin Chronicle Music Poll 2006-2007 opens today
“After 26 years, you know the drill,” says the Chronicle. “This is your chance to duct-tape the critics’ mouths shut and speak up about Austin music. Not sure who to vote for? Turn on the radio, drop into the local record store, or head to the clubs tonight. Your favorite band is probably playing.” And give some consideration to our Austin favorite singer/songwriter Amy Cook.
Vote Here! Entries must be received by Wednesday, January 31, 2007.
Amy Cook Music Video featured on famecast
Jan 24th
Amy Cook’s new album, which will be officially released on February 16th, is featured on the Famecast “Show the World Your Talent” website. User comments on Famecast included “dreamy and beautiful”, “breathtaking video”, fabulous photography work, “marfa-lous song and video” and “good luck with the contest” Amy currently has 23 votes and, if you’re a fan, you may want to go there and cast your vote for Amy.
View the Contest Stage for the Artist, Amy Cook, on FameCast.com:
famecast.com/contest/stage50.php?stage_id=1&artist_id=1159
Before you vote, you’ll need to register as a “Famecast Fanatic”
http://famecast.com/registerfan.php
When you register there’s an option to “invite your friends”.
Jo’s Coffee rolls out blog at joscoffee.com/blog
Jan 7th
Jo’s Coffee has a new blog (4 days old) and they’re getting ready to host a series of great films, geek user group meetings, music events and other smokin’ events. They’ve equipped their coffeehouse with a high definition video / svga projector and surround sound system.
Jo’s Downtown will be rolling out it’s first film event Monday night, January 8th. Jo’s Downtown is located at 242 West Second Street, within a stone’s throw of the new rusty City Hall. Parking is free and plentiful in the City Hall garage. This the Future Film Forum Film Cluster’s first showing at Jo’s Coffee on the new high definition video system. The Future Forum Film Cluster meets the first Monday of the month to watch and discuss a film. Films they have watched and discussed in the past include: Last Days of the San Jose, Born Into Brothels, Crash, Jarhead, Goodnight and Goodluck, and others. For more information, to suggest a film, or to be added to the Film Cluster list, please email Taline at Taline@austin.rr.com Shown in picture below:
shown below: Dan Rather, Laureate Ahmed Zewail, Turk Pipkin and Laureate Steve Weinberg
Here’s a snippet from the Austin Chronicle on the film that will be shown. You can get the rest of the review at Austin Chronicle Screens.
If all you want is spin, you can get it six ways from Sunday on any subject, any day of the week. Op-ed columnists, administration apologists, bloggers, PR flacks, chat-show talking heads – they’re part of the army of agenda-pushers out there generating more spin than a platoon of whirling dervishes. But where can you go to hear straight talk on the state of the world today and, perhaps more significantly, the world our children will inherit?
As Austin writer/actor/filmmaker Turk Pipkin was pondering that question a few years back, he happened upon his then-preteen daughter Katie having a conversation with Steven Weinberg, the Nobel Prize-winning theoretical physicist. “She was probably about 10 years old at the time,” he recalls. “They met at a party and started talking about Texas fossils, and Katie was able to date these fossils, and they started talking about geology.”
From that discussion came the spark for Nobelity (www.nobelitythemovie.com, www.nobelity.org), Pipkin’s documentary featuring conversations with nine Nobel laureates about what’s in store for our planet over the next 50 years. The title, he says, springs from the idea that “they’re like our intellectual nobility.”
If you’d like to learn more about The Nobelity Project and its educational web-site, or would like to support The Nobelity Project’s non-profit work to bring clean drinking water to the children of St. Joseph’s Mahiga Primary School in Kenya, visit Turk Pipkin’s www.nobelity.org It didn’t hit my top ten list for last year solely because it was a work in progress and Turk had more work to do upon it, but it was slight. The fact is – it is absolutely brilliant. Listening to these minds share their insight upon the problems facing everyone upon every bit of this planet and how to solve them is essentially just stunning. This is one of the absolute most important films of this year or any year. – Harry Knowles, AintItCool.com “This film could have a huge impact on the world.” – Ann Richards Technorati Profile
Team Hotel San Jose’s Chris Brewer video podcast
Dec 21st
Watch the video podcast at http://touroftexas.com/podcasts/sjhcycle.mpg 
Chris Brewer, Discovery Channel “primary journalist”, does a video podcast on the outlook for this year’s Tour de France, the Discovery team with Ivan Basso, the Flying Forehead, and his Team Hotel San Jose. Barry Lee and Todd Reid head up Team San Jose. Today is Barry’s 42nd birthday and the team is showning pedaling off to South Austin for a 3 hour ride. “The Discovery team is looking great with Ivan Basso, says Chris. Lance is riding with the team and grooming Basso as his successor. We takea look at the Madone 5.9 SL with the Powercontrol V with “more information than a man needs to know”. We also talk with several other Team San Jose members, which numbers over 300 members. The interview takes place in front of Downtown Jo’s, which is the site of tonight’s moveon.org event and showing of “An Inconvenient Truth”. from http://teamhotelsanjose.com
Team Hotel San Jose is a new kind of racing team and sports club, led by athletes who are dedicated to serving the community by working with disadvantaged and at-risk youth, developing the skills of beginning and intermediate cyclists, and cultivating the most incredible regional racing team you’ve ever seen. The core team members are a motivated group of professional and ex-professional cyclists, cycling enthusiasts, and triathletes, who ride with respect for all, regardless of experience. We welcome road cyclists and mountain bikers, runners and multi-sport athletes, men and women, and girls and boys.
birthdayparty
Dec 11th
Jan and Neil Cronk put on a birthday party for about half a dozen folks, me included, at their home in North Austin. Neil is a talented painter whose work appears at many restaurants and galleries around town. Here’s today’s video podcast of that event. Shown below is the paiting of Neil’s that hangs in our living room in Cedar Creek.
the rise of “net nightclubs”
Dec 1st
Net Coffeeshops & Net nightclub entrepreneurs
The Alamo Draft House is a movie theater that has food. I recenlty posted on Mark Cuban’s blog about how they “get it.” Read what “clever monkey” says about how the Alamo “gets it”. because he says it better than I did on my Cuban post. By the way, I didn’t win his suggestion contest and how he could attract more customers to his digital movie chain.
Perhaps some of the coffee houses around town will start showing movies, documentaries and net flicks (youtube?) and turn in to mini Alamos? That would be fair play, for the foodies to start attracting some of the movie crowd and filling up their slow times with more customers. The first coffee house in town to start showing videos, movies, docs, etc. will attract a whole new following.
And there’s more to what the Alamo does, quoting from clever monkey: “The venue often offers more than just a movie for your admission price; when we went to see The Hustler the evening’s program included a 20-minute book reading from a local author who’d written a book on pool halls and 1960’s bachelor culture. We hadn’t really been expecting this facet to the event, but there were other patrons who’d clearly known that this was part of the whole deal and had bought a signed copy of the book before being seated.”
Where will the first “net nightclub” appear in Austin. It’s happening in the Bay area. So we’re on “net nightclub watch” to see where it will pop up first. The following is excerpted from the ValleyWag blog. and it’s about how the dot com bazillionaires are pumping up the “net nightclub” scene.
Jonathan Abrams, founder of Slide, is far from the only web entrepreneur to dabble in nightlife. One cynical take: They’re just trying to buy glamourous lives; too bad their clubs are in the SF area. But we’re inclined to be more generous. As sidelines go, a nightclub investment is at least less pretentious than developing a taste for fine wine. The roster of Silicon Valley nightlife investors, with the customer ratings for their venues, after the jump. 
Jamie Zawinski, a programmer who worked on early versions of Netscape’s Navigator browser, owns DNA Lounge. The DNA Lounge webcasts shows and events live from their venue in San Francisco, CA.
http://www.dnalounge.com/. They webcast everything: you can listen to the last two weeks of their shows in their webcast archive.
Jonathan Abrams, as one was reminded in his recent television appearance, is behind Slide Lounge, the downtown club, about as fabulous a venue as San Francisco is capable of supporting. Friendster founder Abrams, who famously turned down an offer from Google, is also an investor in Mamacita. http://slidesf.com is their site (Flash alert); see if you can get past their splash screen (I couldn’t)
Trevor Traina, socialite son of the Napa winery owner, co-founded Compare.net, an early comparison shopping site. He’s now more often in the society than the business pages. With Gavin Newsom, he’s an investor in Matrix. In the nightlife business, he’s overshadowed by his brother, Todd, who is a partner of Ashton Kutcher and Wilmer Valderrama in various L.A. restaurants.
Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal, the online payment service, and an investor in other ventures such as Facebook, is one of the backers of Frisson — an upscale restaurant-bar with a co-ed bathroom.
Ken Howery and Luke Nosek, two partners of Thiel in the former PayPal founder’s venture capital fund, are said to be investing in a Manhattan nightclub.
Doug Dalton, one of the founders of BranchIt Corporation, is behind Anu and Swig.
Thanksgiving podcast
Nov 28th
Our houseguests for the last week have been Bob Nagy and Karen Holcomb from Hot Springs, Arkansas and we have had many nights of music and storytelling and this is a podcast of one of those nights. It begins, appropriately, with Bob’s rendition of “Moscow Nights” on his new violin-like instrument.
The Longhorns lost their second game in a row this weekend to the Aggies, so their potential national title has crumbled in to an invite to one of the lesser bowls, maybe they’ll play Arkansas.
Texas Book Festival podcast and videos
Nov 14th
In the coming weeks I’m going to be recapping my experiences at the Texas Book Festival. If you want a sneak preview, here are all my podcasts from that event. A note of warning, I haven’t compressed the videos yet and haven’t added intros to the podcasts. So they’re pretty raw. But I’m guessing you’ll still have fun listening and watching these. The numbers are the sizes in kilobytes (kb.)
podcasts:
Barak Obama podcast 4,629,699 Senator Obama discusses his book The Audacity of Hope Oct 28, 2006 10 – 11:30 am
Chinese economy podcast 742,784 In China’s Shadow: The Crisis of American Entrepreneurship with Reed Hundt Oct 28, 2006 11 – 11:45 am
Evan Smith award podcast 3,092,257 Bookend Award Ceremony honoring Louis Sachar & Texas Monthly Magazine Oct 28, 2006 10 – 11:30 am
John Burnett NPR podcast 2,551,240 Uncivilized Beasts & Shameless Hellions: Travels with an NPR Correspondent Oct 29, 2006 3 – 4 pm
Matthew Dowd – the lesser known Architect podcast 7,473,022 Raging Moderates: Political Complexity in America with Rod Dreher, Matthew J. Dowd, and Ronald B. Rapoport Oct 29, 2006
Maureen Dowd podcast 9,067,400 State of the Union: Politics in America Matthew J. Dowd, Maureen Dowd, Nicholas Lemann, Victor Navansky Oct 28, 2006 3:30 – 4:30 pm
Maureen Dowd and Gore Vidal podcast 1,643,213 Gore Vidal in Conversation with Maureen Dowd, Moderator: Evan Smith of the Texas Monthly. Oct 29 2 – 3 pm at the Paramount Theater on Congress Ave in Austin, TX
Texas Beat generation podcast 1,894,607 The Ransom Center & TBF present: The Beats. Rob Johnson, Bill Morgan. Moderator: Lee Moore
Texas Book Fair podcast 2,029,474
Texas Monthly 1 podcast 10,772,897
Texas Monthly 2 podcast 10,763,075
Texas Monthly 4 podcast 2,036,137
The Architect Karl Rove podcast 5,686,857 Advice and Consent: Presidential Advisors Sidney Blumenthal, Clark Kent Ervin, Bill Minutaglio, James Moore, Wayne Slater (Bush’s Brain) Moderator: Paul Stekler. Oct 28, 2006 3:30 – 4 pm
waiting in line for Barak tickets podcast 8,259,485
video podcasts:
Barak crowd 1 video 209,698,816
Barak crowd 2 video 111,747,072
Barak crowd 3 video 8,026,112
Barak crowd 4 video 25,217,024
Barak crowd 5 video 9,746,432
Barak crowd 6 video 80,220,160
Barak crowd 7 video 27,512,832
Barak crowd 8 video 26,361,856
Barak crowd 9 video 12,605,440
Barak Obama intro video 245,194,752
Barak Obama speaks video 12,611,584
CSPAN video 64,761,856 – Paul Terry Walhus gets interviewed by CSPANN.
Matthew Dowd video 94,126,080
Texas Book Awards video 50,999,296
Texas Book Awards crowd video 10,323,968
Texas Book Awards crowd video 19,486,720
Texas Book Awards crowd video 25,800,704
Texas Book Awards crowd video 5,736,448
Texas Book Awards crowd video 29,224,960
Texas Monthly Awards video 144,375,808
The Beats in South Texas
Nov 12th
Podcast about The Ransom Center & Texas Book Festival Present: The Beats, Sun. 1:30-2:30, Capitol Extension Room E2.016:
Rob Johnson, author of The Lost Years of William S. Burroughs: Beats in South Texas and Bill Morgan, author of I Celebrate Myself: The Somewhat Private Life of Allen Ginsberg discuss beat identity and explore new facets to these authors’ lives that they’ve uncovered during their research.
This 15 minute podcast excerpt covers the most interesting parts of the panel. The Texas Book Festival is a great event that is held every September in Austin, Texas.
Jim Ellinger podcasts from AMARC in Amman Jordan
Nov 12th
Jim Ellinger podcast from Amman, Jordan AMARC conference
November 11 – 17 2006
AMARC 9, the 9th World Conference and General Assembly of AMARC, will take place in Amman, Jordan from the 11 to the 17 of November 2006.
The Internet Jordanian pioneer and FM broadcaster Ammannet ( http://www.ammannet.net ) will host the conference in partnership with media and journalists groups from Jordan and Palestine.
AMARC 9 will bring together up to 300 or 400 community broadcasters from more than 110 countries and all regions of the world.
The ninth gathering of community radio broadcasters will take a week and consist first of all in a world conference that will allow participants to analyze and explore the challenges facing community radios. For more information on the going process kindly visit: http://www.evaluation.amarc.org
Voting and associate members of AMARC will then meet for the 9th AMARC World General Assembly to receive the reports of the International Board, to define the Amman Declaration of Community Radio Broadcasters, to adopt the strategic plan 2006-2010, to elect the new international board of Directors and adopt resolutions to tackle the challenges facing the community radio movement.
Viva Les Amis
Oct 11th
Continuing with a series I started yesterday as foreplay to SXSW in March, there’s another KLRU special on the nostalgic drag hangout and restaurant, Les Amis. I spent a lot of time there. OK. Call me a slacker. One of my exes worked there. I was there for the last day celebration. Les Amis was part of the axis of slackerville, consisting also of the Kenny and Joni’s Omlettry and the Magnolia Cafe.
Here’s from the KLRU site cited above.
If LizLambert’s snappy hotel do-over and its resulting documentary film confirms that not all of old Austin should be considered sacred ground, then Nancy Higgins’ elegiac, heartfelt Viva Les Amis is the flipside of that particularly well-thumbed coinage.
Using footage filmed at and interviews with former employees, regulars, and assorted hangers-on of the late, lamented Les Amis Cafe (now, cruel irony, a Starbucks), Higgins’ film both mourns the passing of the UT area’s artistic and intellectual (and drunken) nexus and celebrates the plainly odd notion that a Parisian-style sidewalk cafe-cum-lifestyle could blossom so deep in the heart of Texas in the first place.
As for this third season of SXSW Presents, festival producer Matt Dentler notes, “The big difference is that we are expanding the episodes to include not just the films themselves but related conversations and panels with the filmakers and figures in the local film and arts community who will be hanging out, talking, and just kind of sharing their thoughts on the films.
The idea of this whole show in the first place was to try and bottle what an experience at a film festival – particularly South by Southwest – would be like. But on your television.”
Times for episode premieres are 9pm, unless otherwise noted. In January, BBQ: A Texas Love Story, Pedal, and two shorts programs will air, but dates and times are TBD.