Hodson Blog

The Clash - Live At Shea Stadium

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 21:03:56 -0800

(cross-posted at the BaconMarathon blog)

If you are like me and a fan of The Only Band That Matters (The Clash), you might know that the surviving members just released a stellar live show that was recorded weeks before their demise.

Live At Shea Stadium was recorded on the Combat Rock tour when The Clash was opening for The Who. Overall, the band, sound quality and song selection is top notch.

I also picked up the latest DVD, Live Revolution Rock,

which features the band over several years in a number of venues -- *and* I also ordered the forthcoming book, "The Clash", written by the band.

I wasn't aware that Live At Shea Stadium was forthcoming, I actually learned about it via Top3Clicks, watching The Clash, which was really motivating. The latest feature (news feed integration) was written listening to the Shea Stadium gig and the DVD.

Top3Clicks - Facebook Newsfeed Merchandising

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:31:11 -0800

Mike has a new post up, describing the latest Top3Clicks release.

We've added some interesting aspects to the Facebook Newsfeed, adding merchandising and impulse shopping to the social graph.

Portland Marathon 2008 – Finisher!

Mon, 13 Oct 2008 13:45:31 -0800

Last Sunday (10/5/2008), we ran the Portland Marathon.

The vast majority of the course was the same as last year, with only a minor change crossing back over the river at mile 24. (Yes, the St. John’s Bridge kicked my butt again.)

Unlike last year however, it rained, starting around Mile 9 all the way through the finish! Unlike last year, I left my rain gear in the hotel as it wasn’t supposed to rain at race time (doh!). At the start, the temperature was 52 degrees (F), which meant short sleeve weather. Even with the rain, the temperature never dipped below 50 degrees.

My finish was 3 minutes slower than last year, however, given the fact that I missed the first 8 weeks (out of 16) of training due to “snapping hip syndrome” (I couldn’t even run on a treadmill until week 5), I was very satisfied with my finish. Like last year, the iPod was essential after Mile 20 (and I didn’t have to hide my headphones like I did at the Napa Valley Marathon)

Overall, here's how the run rates in my book:

Organization - Incredible. Very well organized and staffed. Grade: A

Course - Fairly scenic, a few "industrial" spots that could have been avoided. Grade: B+

Aid-stations - Well staffed and stocked, approximately every 2 miles. Numerous gummi-bear stops, along with neighborhood kids handing out jellybeans (Although the honey-based energy gel was nasty) Grade: A

Swag - Long sleeve, dri-fit shirt. Grade: A

Bonus: Dinner at the Bridgeport Brewery. Grade: A+

Top3Clicks – Improved Recommendations

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 14:42:13 -0800

Mike has a new post up on the BaconMarathon Labs site, detailing the new features we took live last night.

New Kings of Leon Available on Last.fm

Mon, 15 Sep 2008 16:45:35 -0800

The new Kings of Leon disc, Only By The Night, is available for streaming on Last.fm.

The disc will officially release tomorrow (already ordered my copy from Amazon). After a single listen, my review is a "thumbs-up"

Portland Marathon Goes mp3 Friendly

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 16:11:47 -0800

When we ran the Napa Valley Marathon in March, we had to hide our headphones/iPods, lest they be taken away by race officials. Fortunately, the Portland Marathon has declared themselves to be “MP3 Player Friendly”.

When we run the Portland Marathon in a few weeks, I can let my iPod see the light of day and not spend the race worrying that someone will jump me on the course! (Now if I can just make it over the St. John’s Bridge intact…)

The NFL Streams

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 10:58:08 -0800

The NFL season begins tonight (9/4/2008) with the Giants taking on the Redskins.

What’s so special about that you ask? Well, unlike NBC with the Olympics, the NFL is streaming the entire game LIVE on the web (first time ever). This will be interesting to see how it unfolds – is there a solid revenue model behind streaming? If so, what does it mean for broadcasters/cable?

La Bamba Wins Best Burrito

Thu, 28 Aug 2008 15:32:07 -0800

My all time favorite burrito joint has won a “Best Of” award from the Palo Alto Daily. I’ve been a regular customer since we started iPrint in 1996 and were leasing space from NASA at Moffett Field. It was just a short drive away and way better than the NASA cafeteria food.

Burrito
Now celebrating 20 years of business, this family-owned restaurant is no stranger to the voting public. La Bamba Taqueria serves traditional Mexican and Salvadorian dishes including the famous nearly foot-long burrito. A model of political transparency, you can watch your burrito as it is made, starting with the bare tortilla and finishing with a tightly wrapped totable lunch. No "mystery meat" here! Don't let the long lines fool you, the staff is quick to handle the masses, proving that the concepts of open government and the Palo Alto Process are not mutually exclusive. Lastly, caution with the salsa, it may not look intimidating but boy, does it bite. 2058 Old Middlefield Road, Mountain View; 650-965-2755

Congrats guys!

FriendFeed Widgets

Wed, 27 Aug 2008 14:54:51 -0800

Friendfeed just rolled out several widgets – I’ve embedded the Feed Widget in the sidebar. Out of the box, it is way too big; Ff has exposed the CSS, so hopefully I can shrink things down a bit.

Top3Clicks: New Release is up!

Wed, 27 Aug 2008 14:44:58 -0800

Mike has a new BaconMarathon post up, detailing a ton of new Top3Clicks features that went live last night. (Thanks for all the user feedback!)

Check it out.

Technorati Tags: BaconMarathon,Facebook,Top3Clicks

MarketWatch.com – Please Fix Your Firefox Support

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 12:59:39 -0800

Note to Marketwatch.com – sometime yesterday (7/15/2008), your support for Firefox went awry, now your site looks like the picture below. Please fix. Thanks.

The Raconteurs Get What Prince Does Not

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 12:47:36 -0800

I received the following email from The Raconteurs today:

We are in the process of creating a live section of our website and need your assistance. We’ll have different areas where you can view video footage and photos from tour dates as well as hear select audio for some shows.
…
Here’s where we need your help, we’ve been scouring youtube for some video content that fans have shot at past shows and we’ll be adding some of that footage to the site. If you have footage you haven’t yet added to youtube please add it and feel free to send a link to the video for review to livevideo@theraconteurs.com , be sure to include show date, venue, city name and video credit.

Jack White and company understand the value of their fans recording content and making it available on YouTube. Their aim isn’t to necessarily sell more records (recall that this is the band that broke all the rules for their most recent album, Consolers of the Lonely), it is to bring in people to their live shows.

Contrast this with how Prince handles his fans, and the differences couldn’t be more stark. Can you imagine Prince emailing his fan base and asking “If you have footage you haven’t yet added to youtube please add it…”?

Technorati Tags: The Raconteurs,Jack White,Prince,YouTube

Last.fm/Squeezebox Team Up

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 13:35:25 -0800

I received an excellent piece of news from SlimDevices today – support for Last.fm scrobbling from the Squeezebox. (Doubtful that my post had anything to do with it)

It was simple to enable and is currently working like a charm as I listen to the new My Morning Jacket.

Technorati Tags: Slimdevices,Last.fm

Great EC2/S3 Tool

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:38:31 -0800

(cross-posted to the BaconMarathon blog)

Tim Kay of ActiveBuddy fame has been working on aws, which he says provides “simple access to Amazon EC2 and S3”. I ran into Tim a while ago and we chatted about aws – around the same time, I also heard about it from Mike.

As all the BaconMarathon apps are running on EC2 and using S3 for storage, I’ve been looking for an easier way to interface with S3 in particular. I finally got around to trying out aws the other day and found it be more than advertised. Finally, I had one simple command to examine buckets on S3:

aws ls

That was it. Creating buckets, puts and gets are just as simple:

aws mkdir BUCKET
aws put BUCKET/[OBJECT] [FILE]
aws get BUCKET

We’re now using aws to push our MySQL backups to S3 on a scheduled basis – a simple change to our existing backup jobs.

Technorati Tags: BaconMarathon,AWS,EC2,S3

Live: The Latest BaconMarathon App

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 13:41:38 -0800

Mike has a post up about our latest BaconMarathon app, a widget for iTunes.

It rolled out live today with our first customer, Heidi Roizen and the folks at Skinny Songs.

Technorati Tags: BaconMarathon,iTunes,Skinny Songs