conference

Eisner's advice to striking writers: Blame Steve Jobs, not the studios

NEW YORK--In his keynote speech on Wednesday morning at the Media and Money conference hosted by Dow Jones and Nielsen, former Disney CEO Michael Eisner talked about writers as though they were a minority group that he didn't particularly understand well. "I like writers. Some of my best friends are writers," he said as though attempting to save face. But nevertheless, his foremost epithet for the ongoing Writer's Guild of America strike was "stupid."

"I see stupid strikes, and I see less stupid strikes. I see smart strikes," Eisner said in the … Read more

Lego fans must not go to Burning Man

If you're the kind of person for whom every year is centered around Burning Man, then there's a certain problem you have with the calendar: you can't go to other Labor Day weekend events.

Not that I would know anything about this, of course, because I only go to Burning Man some years, and it's only coincidence that it's happened 10 years in a row.

But anyway, I noticed today that there's going to be a great Lego fan festival in Washington, D.C., next year, called BrickFair. "Fantastic," I thought, as … Read more

ZendCon: How to Web-optimize your tech show

I've been to dozens and dozens of trade shows in my nine years (gasp!) at CNET News.com, but the introductory remarks at ZendCon on Tuesday were unlike anything I've heard before.

Instead of the usual welcome statements and corporate self-congratulation, the audience was given a brief instruction in how to extend the conference activities beyond the San Francisco Airport Hyatt Regency to many corners of the Internet. Specifically, Zend set up ways to deal with Twitter, Technorati, Yahoo Flickr, Yahoo Upcoming and IRC, which despite being long in the tooth retains geek retro cred in the Linux … Read more

EchoSign provides paperless paper trail

The Office 2.0 conference was set up almost entirely without paper (except for some checks that paid for sponsorships). Even the contracts necessary to set up the show were signed electronically, using EchoSign. There are other companies that provide services to create legally binding signatures, such as DocuSign (review), but EchoSign has simplicity going for it.

If you want to have a document "signed" electronically, EchoSign will convert it to a PDF, send it to your designated recipient, and give you the option to have it signed via a Web form, or with a pen, via fax. … Read more

Final report: The iPhone is not open for business

At the Office 2.0 conference, as you probably know, every attendee got an iPhone with their paid admission. There was a very useful iPhone-friendly Web site set up, and several companies were showing off shiny new iPhone business applications.

But is the iPhone a business-class product? I talked to the developers making applications for this platform, and to attendees at the conference, and came up with a disheartening answer: It is not. From the two-handed interface to capricious keyboard to the slow Edge network to the lack of a real developer's interface to the phone, it's just … Read more

Jotlet calendar to sync with Outlook

Among the announcements at the Office 2.0 conference this week, Jotlet's online calendars will provide two-way synchronization with Microsoft Outlook later this month. At first glance, the calendars appear elegant and easy to use, with visual niceties such as color coding. Personal accounts are free, while corporate accounts allow a company to use branded Jotlet calendars within their Web sites. While heavily customized calendars such as those displayed during the conference demo might cost in the ballpark of between $100 to $200 per month, Jotlet's prices vary widely with the features and support offered. Jotlet allows user … Read more

Office 2.0: Ismael's secrets...and a live videocast

Ismael Ghalimi, the organizer of the Office 2.0 conference (more) is serious about living the Web 2.0 dream: Aside from a browser, he has no applications installed on his laptop, except for iWork, which he says he uses to remind himself what old-style software is like. (Even I use traditional software for writing and e-mail.)

Check out Ismael's notes on Office 2.0 services that work. And this comprehensive database of Office 2.0 applications that he's put together. Useful tips.

But what if there's no available Internet connection for Ismael when he wants to … Read more

Shiny office toys galore at Office 2.0

For a conference about getting work done, there are sure a whole lot of toys here at Office 2.0 in San Francisco. Sure many of them are old hat, like the the Nabaztag/tag, but there's some new stuff here too like Pano Logic's zero client desktop. This shiny metal cube is actually a computer--well kind of. Actually it involves setting up a a beefy server to give everyone in your office a full version of Windows sans hardware. Just give give them a keyboard, mouse, monitor and one of these shiny cubes and they're ready … Read more

Office 2.0 Launchpad rundown

The Office 2.0 Conference is only two days long, and in that time there are dozens of announcements big and small from a wide array of productivity and business companies. Amidst the bevy of panels, and discussions lies the launchpad event, a small 45-minute time slot carved out for product announcements. It's basically everyone's chance to show off their stuff, or as much as they can in the brief three minute allotments. Here's a rundown:

Zoho, mentioned itsits Zoho Business platform, which they launched this morning. We've got a full story on it here.

Veodia, the live broadcasting folks are launching a new portal for the iPhone and iPod touch. The team has been live broadcasting conference coverage all day.

TimeBridge is launching the public beta of its personal scheduling manager. It's a little bit like CircleUp ( coverage) meets Outlook, to lets you sync up your scheduling decision with your Outlook or Google Calendar. Previous Timebridge coverage can be found here.

Pano Logic has a really neat piece of hardware that does "zero client computing." This means with a server setup, you can get little portable computers that run off of these little metal cubes. This is great for small businesses who want to save some cash on desktop hardware, or who want to fool their employees into thinking they're in the future.

OpenSAM discussed creating an open set of standards for sharing online file types and information. ShareOffice is adding calendars from Jotlet, and conferencing from Persony. They've also built an iPhone app for accessing documents on ShareMethods.

Nozbe announced its business service, which features project collaboration for small and medium sized businesses. The team has also put together an iPhone-friendly version of the site for users to access projects on the go.

gOffice has a really nifty service that lets you type a Microsoft Office document on your iPhone. You can type to your heart's content, add a custom signature, and even get gOffice to print it out and send it (via snail mail) to wherever you want for a small fee.

… Read more