Managing the privacy settings on Facebook

Facebook has grown to be a ubiquitous network, crossing the boundaries between work and personal. For me, this has only occurred recently. I've tried to keep Facebook as a friends network, people with whom I have close ties or with whom I could imagine having close ties. There's a lot of crossover between work and personal in my life, but also many cases with a clear distinction.

Recently, I've started to get more and more friend requests from people I don't know very well, people I hardly know at all, or people who are firmly in the domain of work. How to manage this? It turns out the Facebook now has pretty good privacy management tools. Key is to group your contacts by "list". Here's how:

1. Select "Friends" from the drop-down menu at the top of your Facebook screen.

2. Select "Create a New List" and name it something like "Work". This will become the list of names to which content restrictions are applied.

3. You'll see a drop down box to the right of each of your friends' names. Click this and you should see the option to select the new list you made, tagging friends as members of that list for whom you want to apply common restrictions.

4. Go up to your menu at the top of your Facebook screen, and towards the right select "Settings/Privacy Settings".

5. Select "Profile".

6. There are ten options, each with their own drop-down list. For the options that you do not want this new "Work" list to have access, select "Customize" and at the bottom of the dialog box, where it says "Except these People" type in the name of your list.

7. Make sure you click "Save" at the bottom when you've finished all your customization.

Voila! You have now restricted access to those on your work list to particular places in your Facebook. Good options might be "Videos" and "Photos Tagged of You". You might also want to restrict their access to your "Wall Posts".

One of my personal connections with Obama

From the always brilliant, Joy of Tech (LINK)

Excel 2003 vs 2007

I've grown to really like the new MS Office, despite the crazy Steve-Jobs-would-have-fired-the-designer RIBBON thing at the top of all of the applications.

But conversions between Excel 2003 and 2007 result in horrible errors, with #N/A replacing some of the formula values. So, I now have to largely go back to 2003 for serious work that involves collaboration.

Anyone else come across problems like this?

Guide to IT for sole proprietor consultants

I've received various requests in the last week or two for a review of the technology that I use to keep track of my life as a consultant to multiple clients and a sole proprietor. Forthwith, what I use for E-mail, Contacts, Calendar and Tasks"

(I generally try for products that are platform agnostic. I use a Lenovo laptop with Windows Vista but a lot of this applies to a Mac as well. I use a BlackBerry, so this is biased in that direction. Much but not all of the same can be accomplished with Windows Mobile or the iPhone.)

E-mail

GMail for domains. In other words, GMail set up with my own e-mail address rather than name@gmail.com. GMail has a different approach to e-mail, which includes always (and only) threa

ding e-mails and using tags rather than folders. Works for me and I couldn't go back to anything else. On the BlackBerry, the GMail program is pretty good for searching for e-mail when you don't have your computer handy. But it's intermittent and tempermental at best when using it to reply and compose. Reason is th

at it has to go out to Google's servers for everything and when it sends, has to connect right then rather than doing it asychonrously, when signal strength is adequate. Therefore, I have the BlackBerry Internet Service (BIS) pull my e-mails from Google and push them to my BlackBerry. If you do this with GMail, you have make sure that you set up filters or everytime you send an e-mail, it will give you two copies of the sent mail--very annoying. You get the e-mail that you just sent listed on your BlackBerry. But you want a BCC of every e-mail sent from your BlackBerry sent to yourself at GMail or you'll lose your reponses. This results in a rebound back to your BlackBerry as new mail. Solution is to filter every e-mail from your own e-mail address, using the BIS online web interface, so tha

t it doesn't show up on your BlackBerry.

Contact Management: Salesforce

There simply isn't anything better than Salesforce and they keep making it better and better (though if you're on a Mac, you shouldn't ignore Marketcircle's Daylite). The basic version is now just $99 per year (you used to have to buy 5 seats but now only have to buy 1). PC syncing is good into Outlook so that you can bring your con

tacts down from the cloud (and then back up to your BlackBerry). There is no Entourage or Apple Addressbook equivalent on the Mac side. However, there's a recently launched free third party sync with GMail contacts. Doesn't work perfectly and produces problems (multiple contacts) when a contact has multiple e-mails, but it is a way to sync into Apple Mail via GMail since there is a way of syncing GMail contacts with Apple Addressbook.

Calendar: Google Calendar

Wonderful in the background and OTA (Over The Air) f

ree sync utility keeps this and my BlackBerry in sync. 

Task Management: Outlook

I've finally returned to Outlook but only for task management and as a sync for contacts into my BlackBerry. You can sign up for an outsourced version of Exchange + BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) for $20 per user (www.mailstreet.com for example). You should be able to get set-up fees waived. Sounds kind of pricey but it is a pleasure and a luxury to have contacts and tasks always in sync between Outlook and BlackBerry. I ma

ke use of the BlackBerry Internet Service (BIS) for e-mail rather than using BES because I use GMail--so I'm paying that $20 just for contacts and tasks. (Added benefit is that this provides a sync between Google Calendar and Outlook, via the BlackBerry but I don't tend to use my Outlook calendar at all.) Note that for e-mail, if you have different addresses, you can use BIS for some addresses and also use BES. BIS is what comes with every BlackBerry as the basic e-mail offering. But it doesn't offer anything for contacts or tasks. Note also that you could do this all with a Mac and Entourage instead of Windows and Outlook as long as you have the version of Entourage that connects to an Exchange server.

To completely obsess on this post of small larger meaning, here's a diagram:

Google Chrome: Not just another browser

This is a really big deal. Google Chrome's new brower. More thoughts on this later. In the interim, take a look at AVC (LINK) which explains why this is a big deal and at the Google Chrome comic book explanation of why and how the browser works (LINK).

Twitter Personal vs Business Use

@matthewcornell asked "do you use Twitter for personal updates (I'm at the __) or quotes/information, or...?"

A few thoughts. Just yesterday my wife Liz and I were talking about this. I had set up Twirl on her computer so she would see my tweets and I also signed her up to follow a few other people I thought were interesting. These included @pearlbear who Liz doesn't know and who I only know via friends (though I think I've met her once). Liz remarked how strange it is that she now is following @pearlbear's move west across the country and she doesn't even know the woman. Twitter does produce a different kind of intimacy. People wonder if produces a somehow "false" electronic intimacy. In my opinion, any kind of connection between people is good. Twitter is a way to be connected to the lives of more people, more easily and what can be wrong with that?

Twitter does seem to divide between those who use it to connect personally with each other, both around ideas and around time and space ("headed to the coffee shop at Main and Hope"), and those who use it to pass tidbits of larger relevance back and forth. For my part, I tend to be following people who provide quotes and links valuable for my work such as @pkedrosky. When I joined Twitter I was amazed at how much more effective it is than other social networking systems at producing serendipitous connections to work-relevant people--for example the connections to the mobile-devices-for-good-crowd I know follow because of @Katrinskaya. Partly this is because you can follow people without the question of whether "friending" them is appropriate or not. There's a low bar to following and deleting a follower. I also follow those on Twitter who aren't work-relevant but are simply intersting, producing their own brand of haiku such as the irreverent and seemingly often drunk @warrenellis. Example of his latest: "Suck it up, hippie. Sarah Palin could break your limp wrist simply by flexing her womb. You Yank owl-huggers are in for it now."

Main point, that's been made by others: the Twitter limit of 140 characters forces a beautiful economy of language. If you can't say intriguing, relevant and catchy things within that limit, you're mundane and not worth following. A great practice for those working up to pitch movies or ventures, actually. Or those who need to be on TV or radio and come up with soundbites.

Best bluetooth headset (take 2)

I've blogged before about what the greatness that is Jawbone1 (LINK and LINK).

Here's a review from CrackBerry of Jawbone2 that states what I expected: it's king again (LINK).

Update: now there is Jawbone Prime that is supposed to be great too. My Jawbone2, however, has been giving me problems and I can't figure out why--sometimes people can hear me really well, other times not. I'm unsure if something is wrong with the device and producing intermittent sound quality for my voice. Thinking about going back to wired . . .

Wonderful explanation of a new startup: Gnip

Can you explain your technology with such a simple analogy?

Explanation: Redeye VC (LINK) via Feld (LINK)

Gnip: LINK

BlackBerry Bold live at AT&T? NOT!

Everyone in the blogosphere who is at all a RIM fanboy is talking about how AT&T has gone live with a BlackBerry Bold website page. They have NOT. They've allowed a messed up, partially complete page to exist out the wild for days. Look at this thing (LINK) on the left. The page is a complete mess! The idea that the executives at AT&T would allow what is their most important phone launch to languish for DAYS with an unfinished web . . . I'm speechless. The most junior Internet wannabe mogul working out of his parents' basement would fire himself if he allowed himself to let such a thing out in the wild! Shows the complete and utter chasm between a company like AT&T and Apple. Steve Jobs must be just dieing for the day when he can separate himself from these amateurs! An intern from a community college could do a better job of management.

OK. Correction. The page loads fine in Explorer. But Firefox 3.0 produces the above mess. My comments above still apply.

How Google Maps "My Location" works

If you want to know how Google Maps on a mobile device works, even if you don't have GPS in your device (like iPhone1), there's a new post on one of the Google blogs that explains everything: LINK.

Someone asked me for a list of "must have" office tools . . .

. . . so if you care:

Google for Applications
Microsoft Office (yes, true, absolutely necessary despite how good Google Apps are)
Skype
Quickbooks
Mozy.com for off-site backup
Lightweight laptop (MacBook Air, Lenovo X61, Lenovo X300 or comparable)
Big monitor at home with external keyboard and wireless mouse
Good office chair
Verizon wireless cellular modem for laptop (pricey but necessary if you rely on web applications)
Blackberry (need real keyboard, not iPhone)
Moleskine graphpaper notebook
Nice briefcase from SFBags
iPod
Noise canceling headphones
JawBone bluetooth earpiece (incomparable)
A headset for Skype, perhaps
Blackberry charger that with the right connecting cables will charge phone, bluetooth earpiece and iPod
A thumbdrive
A tiny flashlight
Slip on shoes for travel through airports
Non-metallic belt

Boy Genius channels Fake Steve and Jezebel

Have to quote this post by Boy Genius about the New Jawbone, in all its Fake Steve and Jezebel inspired glorious genius sarcasm.

Will wonders never cease? As was the buzz around town, Aliph has made their Jawbone successor official yesterday. Dubbed simply "New Jawbone", Aliph’s new bluetooth headset is available immediately from the Jawbone website and through AT&T. What is the wonder we referred to in the first sentence above? No, it’s not that the New Jawbone is 50% smaller in size than the original. No, it’s not that Jawbone now refers to its noise cancellation technology as "NoiseAssassin". The wonder is that Jawbone somehow managed to make the new model even uglier than the original. Astounding. Don’t get us wrong, the first-generation Jawbone headset was a marvel; one of the few products we’ve come across in recent history with function that matched the pre-release hype. It was just so… ugly. The new model seemingly takes its design cues from the pick up trucks typically found in the parking lot of any local dive bar. The body of the Jawbone pays homage to tacky diamond plated tonneau covers while the ear loop is apparently styled in line with after market leather seat covers, complete with contrast stitching. As a launch promotion, we definitely recommend that Aliph toss some samples out to an eager crowd on 80s night at Ultra. How cool will the middle-aged half naked mothers-of-two look when they’re rocking out to Poison with these puppies hanging from their ears? Teased hair flowing… Diamond plating sparkling… Pure magic. Ok, enough. Word on the street is that BG is preparing a Jawbone giveaway of the new model, so check for that soon!

LINK

best bluetooth headset . . . again

The New Jawbone seems to have cinched the honor again of best bluetooth headset . . . again. I haven't bought one yet but the reviews are great . . . now I just have to "lose" my current headset (which I'm pretty good at doing) and buy a new one. One review here:LINK and LINK and lots more just by doing a Web search. Here's my post on the original Jawbone: LINK

Hacking a MacBook Air so it works like a Lenovo

An incredible hack was performed in which someone installed a Verizon wireless card into a MacBook Air. I've stated before that it's ridiculous that the Air has to have an external, USB wireless card while the Lenovo competition, the X300, has that built-in (and more). This person went into his MacBook Air with a soldering gun, removed the Wifi card and replaced it with a Verizon wireless card so he could have a Mac with always available wireless. Brave! LINK via PowerPage.

Fake Steve is on his game AGAIN

Brilliant work from Fake Steve, cutting me down to size and showing just how marginalized I am in my excitement about GMail + Salesforce. One of many good points:

"[Benioff, CEO of SalesForce] ironically, has built his business around a bloated, overly expensive, outdated business model, a model that comes straight out of the late Nineties -- he's running his own data center, and he's using Sun servers and Oracle software." -- FSJ LINK

Joy of Tech continues . . .

JoT continues to amaze me with their ongoing output and creativity . . .

Steampunk Unboxing

LINK

Google Docs Offline

How did I miss this? Google Docs are now available offline. That's a big deal!

Overview: What is Google Docs Offline?

Google Docs now allows you to view and edit your documents offline, without an internet connection. To do all of this, Google Docs uses Google Gears, an open source browser extension that adds offline functionality directly to the browser. Google Docs can be accessed offline by typing http://docs.google.com into your browser or by clicking on the desktop shortcut that is downloaded during the installation process.

LINK