culture

My company, Alfresco, has a pretty laidback company culture. We work hard and pretty much all the time, as near as I can tell, but it's also a culture that is friendly to families.

How friendly? This morning, Jessica Sant, one of our key developers, and I wanted to meet up because she was in town. However, we both had encumbrances, also known as "kids."

No problem! Along came Amiya, Greta, and Lily.

Over breakfast we talked through the work that Jessica is doing on Alfresco's Network offering, as well as ways to improve processes and … Read more

NEW YORK--Spotted, Gossip Girl-style: Teen pop sensations the Jonas Brothers, heralding the launch of MySpace Music atop a billboard in Times Square. The launch of the News Corp.-owned social network's music service is coming any day now.

The Jonas Brothers display can be seen on the billboard on the corner of West 43rd Street, with the slogan "Songs We Can Agree On" and a short list of songs in the manner of a mixtape (which include selections from Elvis Costello, Prince, and Albert Hammond Jr.) That's a hint at the playlist-creation focus of the new … Read more

Once the global leader in youth culture, MTV's attempts to address the social-networking craze have seemed a little puzzling sometimes (the Twittering Moon Man?) But now we've seen another piece of the entertainment brand's puzzle: Backchannel, a play-while-you watch game that's one part chat room, one part Digg, and one part Mystery Science Theater with a Mean Girls twist.

It's debuting on Monday night with that evening's episode of wildly popular reality-soap The Hills.

Here's how Backchannel works: Watch the show (for now, only The Hills is on Backchannel, but later this fall … Read more

There's no reason to panic at Google over the rumor that the perks-happy tech giant would be cutting back on free food for employees, we hear.

A source close to the company told CNET News that the rumors are really just spin over a small management decision. Google isn't depriving employees of dinner, the source explained. The issue was that several smaller eating establishments at the company's Silicon Valley campus had been seeing low attendance at dinner, and so their evening food service will be consolidated into a smaller number of cafeterias. The source said that steps … Read more

Blame the mounting economic pressures, or too many chubby engineers: Google has decided to stop offering free dinner, afternoon snacks, and its "tea trolley" to employees, according to an unconfirmed rumor floated on Valleywag.

A Google representative did not immediately return my request for comment, so this one is still hanging around in the gossip-sphere. But Valleywag reported that the changes are slated to be announced Monday, which would mean that either a confirmation or debunking should be available within hours.

Google has become renowned for its employee perks: massages, game rooms, gyms, laundry facilities, and free food … Read more

If you've ever dreamed of watching a Mia Hamm/Sugar Ray Leonard beach volleyball smackdown (and who hasn't, really?), Electronic Arts' upcoming Celebrity Sports Showdown (PDF) could bring a new level of fulfillment to your life. The title lets you play as (a sometimes odd-looking version of) select celebrities battling their way through outdoor games including smash badminton, rapid-fire archery, wild-water canoeing, inner-tubing, and hurdle derby.

Fergie jousting with Keith Urban? Reggie Bush locked in an arena dodgeball deathmatch with Kristi Yamaguchi? Don't even get Perez Hilton started on the possibilities here.

The game, which will be … Read more

Timeline creator Dipity has finally been put to a completely awesome use: a user called "tatercakes" has created a timeline of fads and memes that have surfaced on the Internet since its earliest days. And, as far as I can see, almost nothing has been left out--if you're a Dipity member, you can add to the list.

Among the chronological listings are some memes that pre-date my knowledge of the Internet ("Trojan Room coffee pot"); a few classics like All Your Base, Hampsterdance, and Peanut Butter Jelly Time; and more recent ones like lolcats and … Read more

Geek culture is once again showing its influence over the mainstream lexicon in the latest version of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, which includes word additions such as webinar, malware, netroots, pretexting (thank you Hewlett-Packard), and fanboy (thank you Apple).

Webinar is "one more example of the significant ongoing trend for electronic technologies to add words to the language," Merriam-Webster publisher John Morse said in a Monday press release about the 100 or so new words in the 2008 edition of the influential reference guide.

That's in line with Merriam-Webster's choice of the term "wOOt"… Read more

Stephan Tr?by is a theoretician, curator, and architect, and his new book "Exit-Architecture -- Design between War and Peace" is essentially a pamphlet that condenses his preceding writing. He rehashes the key theses of his previous publication, the anthology "5 Codes -- Architecture, Paranoia and Risk in Times of Terror," and substantiates them in his own words and with more contemporary examples.

"Exit-Architecture" maintains Tr?by's obsession with "anti-panic design" and examines how paranoia, as a cultural force, shapes architecture and ultimately entire societies. In a time when war and … Read more