Fractals of Change

Nice Review

Steve Rucinski, executive producer of Small Business Trends Radio posted a very nice review of the podcast edition of my novel hackoff.com: an historic murder mystery set in the Internet bubble and rubble.

“This novel turned podcast takes you through the fun, games and hysteria of the turn of the century Internet bubble and blowup.

“With all the best features of a true mystery novel, sexually charged players and of course technology, this novel set to podcast will pull you in and not let go.

“The sound is great, the narration and character play terrific. Before you know it hours will have passed while you listen to the story…”

[music to an author’s ears]

He also writes:

“Pluses: I love this whole idea of a relevant fictional story set in recent times, revolving around technology in both print and podcasted format (complete with stock charts). The site is great, the graphics are effective and the visitor choice is maximized. You can even bookmark your place if you stop part of the way through the story. I even learned a new term ‘Blooks’ blogs as books or books as blogs, whichever you prefer.

“Minuses: Occasionally the sound is a little echoey but I can find no other fault with this great and creative podcast.

Recommendation: If you like great stories you need to try out the Hackoff.com Podcast.”

The hackoff.com podcast is free and you can subscribe to it by email or RSS or get it from iTunes. You can also read the online edition free. However, if you prefer to pay for books [nb. not a bad thing], you can buy the handsome hardcover from Amazon [great holiday gift] or download to the new Kindle you just got.

Podcast on Mac OS Competing with Vista

Phil Leigh interviewed me on my assertion that Apple ought to take advantage of the Vista and Office 2007 introductions to try to unseat Microsoft's domination of the desktop OS market and should aggressively support running Mac OS on commodity PCs.

The podcast of the interview is at http://www.insidedigitalmedia.com/downloads/apple_vs_vista.mp3

Previous related posts:

Apple’s Golden Opportunity – Readers Respond

Apple’s Golden Opportunity

Podcast with Dan Bricklin and John Sviokla

Dan Bricklin posted the podcast of the discussion between himself, John Sviokla, and me.  It was fun to do and I hope it'll be fun to listen to.  Dan and John got me to tell some stories I haven't told before about how big companies get convinced to do new things (or don't!).

We talked about what might break the stultifying grip network operators have on mobile phone innovation - at least in the US.  Dan's invention of VisiCalc broke the grip that mainframe programmers like me had on the development of new applications a generation and a half ago.

Dan's post about the podcast is here.

The podcast itself is here.

Podcast with Dan Bricklin

Dan Bricklin (one of my heroes as the inventor of VisiCalc) has invited me to join him and John Sviokla on a podcast to discuss the concept of Open Cellphone. I’m looking forward to doing this both because it’s with Dan and because I do believe that innovation on cellphones is being stifled by a variety of factors as I blogged previously.

Dan and John already began this discussion last week and you can find that podcast by linking through http://podcast.diamondcluster.com/.

The podcast is now available here..

Podcasts on PulverRadio

A surprising number of you are apparently listening to podcasts of this blog produced with PulverRadio.  I’m about to resume podcasting with PulverRadio after a short hiatus caused by technical problems.  New podcasts should be available soon.

Meanwhile, it is now easier to find both new and old podcasts of Fractals of Change.  If you use your browser to read the blog, you will find a list of current podcasts on top of the right hand column (sorry Google, you got pushed down the page).  You will also find an XML subscribe button for podcasts just a little way down the left hand column if you want to subscribe to an XML feed and be notified or get an authomatic download to your MP3 player for each new podcast.

If you never see the blog itself because you use an RSS reader, you can get a feed of the podcasts separate from the blog feed you are reading now.  http://feeds.feedburner.com/VonRadio-TomEvslin is the link for that.

New Podcasts

My post on a nerd turned ceo hiring the first employees is available as a podcast here.  Forgive the oxymoron but my post on the power of silence is also a podcast.

Nerd CEO Podcast

My first post of advice to fellow nerd CEOs is now available as a podcast courtesy of VonRadio.

Entrepreneur Test Podcast

My post with a test for entrepreneuritis is now available as a podcast.

Decompiling Programmer-Speak Now in Podcast

My post on decompiling programmer-speak is now available as a podcast courtesy of Von Radio.

New Podcast

Last week's post on whether Internet Bubble Two is going to be better than Internet Bubble One is now also available as a podcast from Von Radio. 

Now Available on Podcast

When I was young(er) man, I was concerned with propagating my genes.  Now the carriers of those genes have all left home.  As an old(er) man, I find myself propagating my memes.  Today the Internet is the primary place where live ideas (and some brain dead ones) meet, greet, and breed.

This blog, Fractals of Change, is one part of my meme propagation.  It’s fun to watch subscription numbers grow.  It’s exciting to be linked to by people I respect and by absolute strangers.  It’s challenging to be corrected and criticized in near real time.  And it’s a joy to write in a multi-dimensional medium which includes hyperlinks, pictures and graphics.

The novel whose first draft I’ve just completed is another outlet for memes.  Won’t reveal much about that except that it is an historic murder mystery set in the late great Internet bubble.  The book will be available both online and in printed form.  The Internet version will inevitably be richer in some ways than the paper version and will certainly offer more opportunities for reader interaction.  On the other hand, traditional books are still better suited than computers for the three b’s of recreational reading – bed, bathroom, and beach.

Publishing a book is a little like starting a business.  First you have to get the URL (we’ve done that).  You need a team of people with various skills like editing, layout, etc.  You need a target market (since you read my blog, you’re part of that).  You need to think about marketing, distribution, production etc. etc.  And you need to think about all those things not only as they’ve been done historically but how they now SHOULD be done on the Internet.  As in almost everything I’ve done over the last twenty-seven years (genes AND memes), my partner in this venture is my wife Mary so the book is bound to be well-marketed.  It’s my skill as an observer, novelist, and mystery writer that remains to be beta-tested.

Now I’m trying podcasting of my blog.  VON radio is my host and the first installment is available for download to iPod, computer or whatever.  For the first installment, I recorded my first post, the one you may or may not have read about why we need bubbles.  You can use any feed-aggregation or podcasting service to subscribe to a feed of all podcasts on VON radio with this XML file.  Soon you will be able to subscribe to individual contributors.

By the way, if you’re not a downloader of podcasts but do want to listen to me or anything else in podcast format, just click on the URL and it’ll play in Windows Media Player, RealPlayer or whatever you use for listening to audio files in MP3 format.  Don’t even worry if you don’t know what MP3 is; just click and the right thing is likely to happen.

The initial plan is to do two podcasts a week of the posts that seem to make the most sense as audio.  Don’t know whether podcasting is a way to reach a new audience or another way to reach those already reading Fractals of Change.  I’m dependent on your feedback to tell me this and to let me know whether there ought to be more, less, or different podcasts and/or blogs.