Archive for July, 2007

The City of Blue Lake has finally launched its new web site. Congratulations! It’s good to see the village making a place on the web. The site is broken in to three main areas: One for the city government; one for the general community; and one for Blue Lake businesses. This seems like a nice, high level structure for a site that wants to provide a platform that encompasses as many aspects of the town as possible. The information in each area is basic, but a good start. I assume this will expand over time, perhaps add some more interactive or dynamic features. I noted in the article in the Times-Standard that release of the site was delayed while the site developer waited for the content to be delivered. I can sympathize with that. Sometimes gathering content is the most difficult part of site development.

The design is pretty basic as well. It looks like the designer used a plain 3 column layout template and applied it to some kind of content management system. I’m sure this will make keeping the site updated easier for city staff.

But there are some strange attributes to the system. For one, if you go to the web site’s home page, the URL changes from a simple http://bluelake.ca.gov to http://bluelake.ca.gov/index.php?module=pagesetter&func=viewpub&tid=2&pid=4. Ugh. Kind of hard to share that with anyone unless you convert it to something reasonable at tinyurl.com. A better system would be able to convert those gnarly URLs into something more friendly.

Page titles (the line that appears at the very top of the browser window that is supposed to identify the contents of the page being viewed) don’t change from page to page. This makes it hard to bookmark different pages without doing extra work to identify the page in your list. It’s also a major error in terms of search engine indexing. Google and other search engines really like unique, accurate titles for each page.

Finally, I when I added the site to HumGuide, I couldn’t find a way to email anyone to let them know. There’s no email address or contact form that I could find. Very strange.

In spite of these criticisms, I am really glad to see Blue Lake stepping out on the web.

For a tech guy it pains me to keep railing against tech gadgets that should make our life better. But computer based voting machines are the exception. Ever since the various systems were introduced, computer experts have clearly pointed out their inadequate security. Already, many elections that have relied on these machines have been called in to question.  And now, comes “shocking” news that many of the machines already in place throughout California have serious security holes.

As I have said before, this is a case of politicians making decisions about technology without really understanding it. Kind of like our Congress claiming peer-to-peer networks threaten national security.

Anyway, it’s interesting that the SFGate article doesn’t mention Humboldt County. But the voting machines used here were part of the study. The full report on the independent sutdy can be found here.

Already the study  has fueled some action in Congress which has crafted a bi-partisan bill banning paperless voting machines. However, as the NY Times points out, even it  the bill get through the House, chances are it will die in the Senate.

The initial report generated by the Governor’s Broadband Task Force has finally been released. What’s odd about the article is there is no reference on where to get the report. But I’ve got yer report right here (PDF 23 pgs., app 1 MB). If you’ll recall our own Peter Pennekamp and Rollin Richmond are among the 21 members of the task force and charged with representing all of rural California.

The report makes several recommendations and lays out specific actions the state can take to improve telecommunications. Some of the actions have fairly tight time frames. It will be interesting to see what actions are really taken and how soon.

Several well known and very popular web sites went down today due to a power outage at a major data center in San Francisco. The web sites taken off line include Netflix, Craigslist, Technorati and several others. Interestingly, the home page of the data center, 365 Main says “…featuring 24/7/365 power, cooling, connectivity and security capabilities to ensure mission-critical operations and business continuity for tenants.”

This incident points up a couple things. Even major tech companies are vulnerable to service failures and the greatest connections to the Internet mean nothing if you don’t have power. Failsafe electrical power sources are critical. So, as we move forward on getting a second fiber line built (ironically, probably strung along PG&E towers) we should start looking at the power infrastructure just as critically. California already has a fragile power grid. And Humboldt County’s power can be blown down by a little high wind. Our Economic Deveolpment folks might want to put some focus on this issue.

Update:  This SFGate article has more information on the power failure. Apparenlty it was initially at PG&E power outage. But the data center failed to have it’s back up power kick in for over 45 minutes. Some servers then took as much s 11 hourse to get back up and running.

OpenLeft.com is having Senator Dick Durbin blogging live starting at 4 PM PT today. Might be wrth participating. That is if you have broadband access to begin with.

Update: Here’s the actual discussion thread.

Over in Myrtletown, Marshall Sparks has upgraded his free Wi-Fi hot spot to cover more area. He claims it’s the “largest residential internet wireless hotspot” in Humboldt C0unty. That may be. I’m not sure what all the qualifiers mean. But I am happy there is more Wi-Fi access. It’s really wonderful that grassroots efforts like this are emerging. It’s baffling why city and county governments are not doing much of anything to spread low cost telecommunications. It’s been over a year since the City of Eureka called some of us in to a meeting to say they were working on a plan to come up with a plan to install a wireless network in the city. On the other hand some grassroots efforts haven’t done well either. I have a router that’s been sitting in my office for about a year that was supposed to be part of an Old Town Wi-Fi network that some folks were trying to pull together. It’s still just sitting there, serving nothing.

So congratulations Marshall in getting this done!

Is there something going on in the local web development scene? Or maybe it’s a meme out there in the larger web dev world that a couple local companies have coincidentally picked up on and are using as a marketing angle. The meme in question is this: Some web development companies have been claiming their creations (web sites created for their clients for example) belong to them and not to the client. Precision Intermedia has been running ads in the paper and the Eureka Chamber of Commerce newsletter about this. And Jill St. Claire of JSC Markting had an article in the Eureka Reporter today covering this issue.

Are there really a bunch of web developers out there that make this claim? Are there really that many web site “owners” who have fallen prey to this ploy? It’s hard for me to imagine. However, I have run in to one such incident recently, where the client actually had to pay the web developer to gain ownership of their own site before they could hand it over to us to work on. But that was a new one on me. I have seen this be the case many times though regarding domain names and have written my own article that addresses this issuee.

Perhaps the local web development market has not evolved very far where people still don’t think that web sites are crucial business tools and should therefore be treated as any vital asset, protected by a written agreement that spells out these ownership issues clearly. Perhaps since we’ve always operated this way, I am naive about the practices of other developers.

Or, maybe it’s a straw man conjured up to create a sense of anxiety among web site clients. But it’s odd that they both have hit upon the same topic.

According to this Wired blog, a reprieve has been granted to webcasters who would have had to start paying a huge increase in royalty fees for music they play. ,Soundexchange the entity charged with collecting the fees has agreed not to enforce the new rates while negotiations continue. Just yesterday I spoke with Ken Conlin who programs Humboldt 101 which plays easy listening music.  He had no idea how the new fees would affect his station. He was hoping Live365 which powers his music would figure out something. Apparently they did. Or at least they and Pandora and many other groups and individuals have put enough pressure on Soundexchange and Congress to force the issue in to continued negotiations. Great news! But certainly not the end to the threat.

Over at Myrtletown.net, ‘Darsh’ has compiled a list of over 90 blogs based in Humboldt County complete with his personal views on many them. He rightly points out that I don’t link to other HC blogs. It’s not that I’m self-centered, so much as I’m lazy. I can’t keep up with them all, can’t read them all, so I haven’t picked a few favorites to highlight. I much prefer to just link to this list and let y’all browse fro yourself. It’s a great resource, so thanks for putting all the time in to this.

I hope that headline doesn’t get me on a terrorist watch list. Actually, maybe I do. 15 minutes of fame!

Anyway, the John Edwards campaign is promising to visit the community that offers the most demands for his presence. Eureka is currently number 2, but waaay behind Columbus, Kentucky. Whatya say, gang? Spread the word and see if we can catch up.  Even if you don’t support John Edwards, wouldn’t it be an interesting event?  The ‘contest’ ends July 18 and noon PT.

I’m on a little vacation. So, I shouldn’t be blogging, I know. But this is sort of a hobby. Or maybe a curse. Or an obsesseion. Whatever. I am in no man’s land as far as a broadband connection. I haven’t been without broadband since Northcoast Internet started offering PerkiNet. Anyone remember that? You dialed in to the ISP through a standard modem and you got downloads over cable, but your upstream went through the standard phone line. It was weird and awkward, but at the time, the only broadband available on the North Coast. I was one of the first to try it and it was a revelation! Now my cable and DSL connections drive me crazy with the often slow and erratic data delivery.

But I am in Trinity County where broadband, if available, comes at precious price. The cabin we’ve rented at least has dial up. It works OK as long as all your doing is surfing the web. But if you’re like me and have multiple tabs running in your browser, email and an RSS reader going in the background and then you start doing real things like downloading files, well then you might as well call it an evening and wait for the data to finish by the morning.

All this to say that in many areas of rural America, including large areas of Humboldt, Del Norte, Trinity and Mendocino counties, this is the reality. Fine, you say. If people want to live in the boonies they have to live with the inconveniences.

But poor Internet connections are not just inconveniences. They are roadblocks to information, to medical care, to economic betterment. The world is moving online. And those who cannot get decent access to the world will be left further behind. Is that the world we wish to build?

Decent access to information should be available to everyone. Just as decent access to water, sewer and power has become an acceptable standard. And not just because of me on a vacation. For the people who live here year around. Which, might include me. If the access was decent…

I’ve been watching the Live Earth Concerts off and on today. It’s pretty well done. You can switch from one location to another and the streaming video is crisp and smooth, at least over my Suddenlink connection. It’s worth checking out if you’ve got some time this lovely Saturday. And then join in the effort to save the planet while you’re at it. It would be a Humboldt thing to do.

Ars Technica has a good analysis of the current status of “Net Neutrality” issues. This paragraph offers a good summary of the what’s at stake, particularly for small businesses and end users:

Network neutrality can be defined in several ways, several of which may in fact be bad for end users. But when companies start talking about “charging Internet firms to use our pipes” and letting “the market sort it all out,” consumers and small business owners get nervous when they have limited ISPs to choose from. Will my webmail run more slowly if Google doesn’t “pay up”? Will the flash videos on my small business web site load so slowly that people won’t make use of them unless I cough up (a second time) for bandwidth? Will I have to pay for better speeds on every major US network? What about internationally? Will my own Internet access be free if you’re now charging the websites on the other end of the network?

The essay makes it clear that the current political climate in the U.S. still favors the telecommunications industry over the end user.

The problem most people have with potential legislation to protect Net Neutrality is the general ignorance of the legislators. The fear is that any new law will be more harmful than the ill it tries to cure. But I think a Net Neutrality law could be written quite simply: Thou shall not favor one bit over another for profit. Done.

We recently launched a couple new sites I’d like to mention:

The first is a small site promoting a couple of unique coastal parcels just north of Trinidad. They aren’t for sale, yet, but they should become available soon. Pretty spectacular land. If you know anyone with lots of cash. Maybe an Internet mogul who wants to relocate or build a vacation home, pass it along.

The other is a new site for Danco Group which is in the news today over the Board of Supervisors approval of a new affordable housing development in Myrtletown. On this one we worked with a designer from San Francisco who has been handling Danco’s marketing pieces. We implemented the design and built some clever tools for the front end as well as building some unique modules for our new Content Management System.

The goal was to consolidate the various Danco companies in to a single unified site. The overall affect is one of simplicity. But the there are some neat features, and the structure has the ability to grow over time. All their sites/domains have not been brought in to this fold, yet. But that will happen over time.