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My blog traffic goes way up when I talk smack

It's amazing what a little bit of smack talking will do for your traffic. You commenters take yourselves way too seriously. My last post was designed to address some of the FUD in market and be flame-bait. I do like the fact that everyone thinks Ross is a gentleman. He is. It's that British thing he's got going on.

My ploy to upset some people worked and now I am over it. Moving on...

Off-topic: Videos of the best pizza you haven't eaten yet

I don't know how I've managed to not know about Chow.com (a CNET site no less!) but today I found it through the Webby Awards page.

In the Chow Pizza Obsessives feature, you can watch seven videos of my friend and pizza hero Anthony Mangieri discuss the world of pizza and you too will become obsessed.

In the meantime you might want to try out Pazzia on 3rd @ Folsom.

Off-topic: It costs $482.79 to get a decent pizza in San Francisco

If you grew up and/or spent much time on the east coast of the US you know that the pizza you get in the tri-state area is one of the greatest foods available on earth. Wired's Joe Brown makes the joke that the only way to get good pizza here in SF is to jump on a flight to NYC, grab a cab, a pie and some aluminum foil and you are golden.

Good, even decent pizza remains my white whale here in SF. And yes, we've tried all of them, cheap or fancy; A16, Delfina, Giorgios, Pizzetta 211, blah, blah, blah. All are mediocre to "acceptably pizza" at best.… Read more

Back in the good old days when I had time to think

I had lunch with Gavin Clarke (The Register) and Dave Rosenberg (MuleSource) today at the Open Source Business Conference (OSBC). We ate in the hotel restaurant, rather than getting free food at the conference, because I needed a break. I was willing to pay for solitude. I needed to go "offline" for a bit.

Throughout lunch Dave was checking email on his Blackberry, and took a few calls (from his wife, so no foul called on that). It was probably the only time all day that I was disconnected. (I'm typing this from the back of a taxi.)

Gavin and I reminisced about our days in Canterbury, England, where we both did some of our studies. I used to walk to class - 45 minutes through "downtown" Canterbury - and remember having thoughts. I haven't had a thought for years (as regular readers of this blog will know). I don't have time. I'm too busy emailing, blogging, checking Arsenal scores, or doing something online.… Read more

Off-topic: Mending fences (literally)

The storm this past week did some pretty crazy damage in my neighborhood. Lots of trees and fences down all over the place.

Just to prove that I am actually a nice guy please enjoy this photo of me repairing the part of my neighbors fence that didn't fall over entirely.

And, yes, it was pouring at the time. Had I just waited a few hours I could have fixed it in the sunshine. Meanwhile, after the fence fixing we went to Corte Madera and ran into celebrity-chef Tyler Florence who is opening a place in Mill Valley and … Read more

Why the MLB steriods debacle is a crock

In a slight departure from what I normally cover here on the Digital Home, I thought I would touch on one of the biggest stories affecting all media today -- the MLB steroids debacle.

In the extremely unlikely chance that you've been able to stay away from any and all news surrounding the topic, George Mitchell -- the MLB's resident steroids czar -- released a huge report detailing how deep steroids and Human Growth Hormone (HGH) use runs in Major League Baseball.

According to former Senator Mitchell, a whopping 87 players have been implicated in his first testing and in a statement to the press, he mentioned that subsequent investigations will surely conjure up even more stories about player abuse of both steroids and HGH.

But after reading the majority of the report and going over the finer details describing exactly how Mitchell and his minions caught these players, I'm hard-pressed to see how this even matters. As best as I can tell, only three players -- Daniel Naulty, Wally Joyner and Andy Pettitte -- have admitted to using illegal substances, while many of the others were implicated on circumstantial evidence -- at best.

With that in mind, how can we make a judgment on one man's career if he cannot be implicated of a crime, he will not be brought up on charges and cannot clear his name of any wrongdoing if Mitchell's report was factually incorrect? Sadly, we can't.

And it's for this reason that this report is not only nominally important, it's a crock.… Read more

Old-School Sesame Street makes your kids tough

I can't think of many Tv shows that impacted my generation as much as Sesame Street and The Electric Company (the slightly older sibling replete with live-action Spiderman) so I was disappointed to read in this NY Times article that " Sesame Street: Old School" is considered too hard-core for todays' kids. I personally credit both of them, along with The Muppets for teaching me the joys of sarcasm and irony. "These early 'Sesame Street' episodes are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of today's preschool child."

Fortunately, it's not due … Read more

Off-topic: Japan jetlag and how to practice your writing

Back in 2005 when I was still in business school our MBA program took a two-week trip to Hong Kong, China and Thailand to try and understand how you do business in Asia (I blogged much of it here.) One of my fellow students on that trip worked for a big pharma company and gave some new sleeping pills to take on the flight back from Bangkok->HK->SFO, which seemed like a good idea...except I never fell asleep and basically was up for about 30 hours before I got home and passed out so badly that I didn't feed the dog for almost 2 days (he's still mad at me.)

My recent Tokyo trip was severely lacking in sleep and now I am wide awake and totally jetlagged after about 4 hours of shut-eye this evening.

It's painful.

So, on to some random notes... … Read more