mb palaver

WebPalaver: LinkedIn

So after months of scratching my head when people sent me computer-generated emails asking me to link to them, I finally joined LinkedIn the other day. So far I haven't really figured out what the point is, or if there is a point, but for the moment it's just a fun new toy. But like many fun new toys, not to mention social networking sites, it can also be dangerous. I'm sure I don't know close to the full range of ways that putting my personal information on there is going to come back to haunt me, but in poking around the site I did come across one tip I thought I'd share.

On your Home page, toward the bottom right, you can click on a link to "Who's viewed my profile?" That can be interesting from your own voyeuristic point of view, but the voyeuring goes both ways. If you don't want people to know that you've peeked at their profiles, you need to tell LinkedIn not to show that information.

• Go to Account & Settings near the top right-hand corner of your Home page.
• Go down to Privacy Settings, on the lower right part of the page, and click on Profile Views.
• Once there, select the box that says "Don’t show users that I’ve viewed their profile."

If you don't do this, I believe the default setting is "Only show my anonymous profile characteristics, such as industry and title." Anonymous my arse! Someone viewed my profile today and it said it was "Someone in the Entertainment function in the Non-Profit Organization Management industry from Greater New York City Area," which might sound kinda vague, except when I clicked on the link it was easy enough for me to see who it was. (This wasn't a big revelation -- this was a friend I'd invited to link to me. But still. I'm making a point here.) You can also choose the most revealing setting, "Show my name and headline." But if you don't want the kid you were sweet on who sat in front of you in European Civ. II to take out a restraining order against you (again), best to go with the "don't show" option.

TechPalaver: A Couple of Comments about Email Subscriptions

If you'd like to subscribe to mbpalaver via email, just enter your email address into the yellow box on the upper left corner and hit the "subscribe" button.

If you are an email subscriber, you might receive tomorrow or later an email with a post from last night.  Feedburner is supposed to send out emails between 5 and 7 am containing any posts that went up since the day before.  Sometimes they don't.  I don't know why, though it seems most likely to happen when the expiration date of the information is particularly short.

Also, although the subscription emails do include photos that accompany the post, they evidently don't always include an indication that a video clip appeared with it.  So if you want to see a video of Mats and Yannick playing tennis on a minicourt on top of a barge on the Seine, and get some infectious music (including a cover of OutKast's "Hey Ya!") stuck in your head, just go directly to mbpalaver.  (By the way, I replaced the youtube link with one from Dailymotion, as the picture quality is markedly better.)  In the future I'll try to indicate in posts when video clips are included.  I wouldn't want you to feel deprived.

WebPalaver: Googling Within

Although most websites these days include search functions, occasionally I'll come across one with no search function or one that just returns gobbledygook. Here's a trick to using Google to search within other sites.  In the Google search box, just type:

site:www.whatever.com search terms

Google then shows a list of hits in that familiar, helpful, google format.  I can't think of a good example to give of a site with a bad search function because it wouldn't be nice to mention my employer, so here's an example of a search within a site with a perfectly good search function, but that shows how you can use Google as a short cut. To find comments that Tom Sietsema, The Washington Post restaurant critic, has made about Cork, the popular new wine bar on 14th Street, NW, you can type something like this:

site:www.washingtonpost.com sietsema cork

The search returns a list of Washington Post articles and chat discussions that mention Cork.  You can also sometimes use this trick to circumvent the requirement on some sites that you register before being able to use the search function.

Alternatively, you can use Google's advanced search form and enter the site name into the "search within a site or domain" field.  But once you get used to typing "site:" it seems to cut out a step in your searching.  Which allows more time for watching "Law and Order" reruns.

Speaking of Tom Sietsema, in tomorrow's Post he reports that a new Belgian restaurant, called Et Voila!, is opening in the Palisades neighborhood in northwest DC. Check out his May 7 Dish column.

RandomPalaver: Doodle Me This, Batman

Sometimes scheduling something as simple as dinner with a few busy friends can lead to dozens of emails, the handwritten equivalent of an Excel spreadsheet, and a diminishing desire to go through with the event.  Fortunately, mysterywriter tipped me off to Doodle.  This simple, bare bones, Swiss website offers an easy way to pick a date for an event or to select among options (for example, movies, restaurants, menus).

It's free, it's easy, and you don't have to register or otherwise provide personal information. The organizer just sets up a "poll" (as they call all the services), with either dates and times ("Schedule an event") or other options ("Make a choice"), then emails a link to all participants.  The organizer can enter an email address if she likes, in which case she'll receive an email anytime someone participates in the poll.  Participants follow the link and vote for their choices.  Doodle does not ask participants for personal information other than a name of some sort so the organizer can keep track.  You can leave a comment if you want, such as this one my friend Lynn left in response to a fake dinner poll/pre-mbpalaver post test run:  "i simply cannot make thurs. the 28th at 7:00....i know it is fakely ok for everyone else, but i have a life to live and entertainment tonight to watch."

Note that the website is Doodle.ch (not .com).

TechPalaver: Email subscriptions and Chicklets for Eejits (Repeat)

I realize my posts lately have been few and far between, and was determined to post something today, but here it is after 11:00 and I'm torn between my resolve to post and my resolve to begin the week with a halfway decent night's sleep. In a remarkable and perhaps unprecedented move, I'm opting for sleep. So that I don't leave you completely high and dry, and because a couple of friends have asked me how to subscribe to mbpalaver (perhaps because they're tired of coming here and wondering why I'm still celebrating Rose Marie's birthday), I'm repeating a post from last November that explains how to subscribe to the site via a news reader or email.  (This is also an experiment to see whether, if I redate this post, it will disappear from the November 20th listing, or just appear twice.  I am winging this stuff.  It's all trial and error. Thanks for being my Guinea pigs.)  So, previously on mbpalaver . . . .

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Wonder what that orange button is on the right-hand side of your screen?  It is a feed icon, more deliciously known as a "chicklet."   (Don't blame me for the spelling anomaly.)  By clicking on the icon, you can add this site to what's known variously as a feed aggregator, news reader, or feed reader, where you can keep track of updates to your favorite newspapers, blogs, and other websites that include frequently updated information, without having to go to all those websites individually.  Other indicators that a website has a feed available include the terms RSS, XML, or, simply, "subscribe."  According to FeedBurner, there are now more than 2,000 feed aggregators.  Many of the usual suspects -- such as portals My Yahoo! and Google Reader, web browsers, and email programs -- offer free aggregators.  If you'd like a more informed discussion of this topic, Wikipedia is a good place to start.

If you click on the orange button on this site, FeedBurner's default allows you easily to add the site to Google; if you click on "show all subscribe options" it brings up about 15 more options.  (You can also RIGHT click on the "Subscribe to this blog's feed" link above the button, choose "properties" from the drop down menu, copy the URL, and paste it into the news reader of your choice.   I'm not sure there's much value to this option and I'm considering removing it as an option; if anyone uses it let me know.)  Does anyone out there have a favorite news reader?

Email Subscriptions:  For a more low-tech way to keep up with mbpalaver, I've set up email notification.  If you'd like to receive an email with updates on the site, just enter your email address into the block on the right.  Note that my new best friend FeedBurner only sends out one email a day (on days where I've updated something), currently between 7 and 9 5 and 7 a.m.  So if it seems like old news to you, that's why.

Also, please feel free to send me comments through the "Email me" link at the upper right.  This is a work in progress -- please keep the suggestions coming.

TechPalaver: Mac vs. PC, or Preening Tosser vs. Lovable Rubbish

NorthernOutlaw sent me this Guardian article by Charlie Brooker about the British version of the Mac vs. PC ads.  Just passing along an article seems like a lazy excuse of a post, but this was spot on.  Besides, I'm knackered.  Here's an excerpt:

The ads are adapted from a near-identical American campaign -- the only difference is the use of Mitchell and Webb. They are a logical choice in one sense (everyone likes them), but a curious choice in another, since they are best known for the television series Peep Show - probably the best sitcom of the past five years - in which Mitchell plays a repressed, neurotic underdog, and Webb plays a selfish, self-regarding poseur. So when you see the ads, you think, "PCs are a bit rubbish yet ultimately lovable, whereas Macs are just smug, preening tossers." In other words, it is a devastatingly accurate campaign.

Unlike Mr. Brooker, I don't even hate Macs.  Or I didn't.  I hate the ads.  And the ads are making me hate Macs.  Whose ads are they anyway?

WebPalaver: No Comment

A comment about commenting

Who wants to listen to me palaver nonstop?  Please add your thoughts by clicking the Comments link below the posts.  You don't have to give any personal information -- in fact if you don't want to use your name you can just leave the name field blank (though wouldn't it be more fun to make one up?).  You don't need to list an email address or a URL, and you don't need a TypeKey or TypePad account.  All you need to do -- other than write out your thoughts -- is transcribe some letter/number combination in a funky-looking box (that will pop up) to verify that you're a real person and not a computer.

And, as always, if you just want to send something to me (suggestions, criticisms, money), just email me at [email protected], or click the "Email Me" link on the upper right hand side of the page (it's the same thing).  Thanks -- and thanks to those who have commented already!

TechPalaver: Clearing Your Search History

If you share a PC with someone and don't have separate log-ins, that someone might be privy to your Internet searches.  You might think your Christmas gift is going to be a big surprise, but when she starts googling something about the Man in Black, types in "Cash," and the search term "cashmere sweater" pops up, the cat's out of the bag.

Fortunately, browsers make it easy to delete the search history so that you can keep your search terms to yourself.  Internet Explorer gives the following instructions:

You can configure AutoComplete to save and suggest only the information you want. You can choose whether to use AutoComplete for Web addresses, forms, and passwords, or not use it all. You can also clear the history for any of these.

1. In Internet Explorer, on the Tools menu, click Internet Options.
2. Click the Content tab.
3. Under Personal information, click AutoComplete.
4. Select the check boxes for the AutoComplete options you want to use.

After step 4, you can also click on "clear forms" just to clear the prior history but not disable autocomplete.

If you use Netscape, go to the Tools drop down menu, choose Options, the Privacy tab, click on the plus sign next to Search History, then click on the Clear button.  If you don't want to keep doing this, just put a checkmark in the box labeled Clear Search History on Browser Exit.

Also, be sure to sign in under a separate ID if you shop on sites like amazon, which remind you of any items you've recently viewed.

You can also clear the history list of searches you've done (under Tools, Internet Options, General in Explorer, and Tools, Options, Page History in Netscape).  But this smacks of more extreme paranoia or surreptitiousness than warranted by mere gift shopping, in which case, I don't want to know . . . .