I wrote recently about the disparity between my Cocktail Party Online Self and being a real human. The shorter version: I am, online, a constant stream of accomplishments and links to friends and cool things, but, believe me, it’s not like that. Sometimes for the worse, often for the better. I received some very thoughtful emails about Part 1 of my 2012 review, and quite a few kind Facebook comments. I also picked up some responses that suggest inadvertently offering advice on how people might behave online is a fraught enterprise. The results, all of them, made me want to write: more, better, with purpose. Thank you.

On a related note, I also pledged in that post to try and write about things from 2012 in an “honest” way. Honest does not mean “every last detail,” but it’s a good frame to work in.

The theme from this year, reading it over now, seems to have been “Doing this stuff right is hard.” Off we go.

CoworkBuffalo

Four guys thought Buffalo could use a space where independent and remote workers could escape the distractions and loneliness of their house, yet have solid Wi-Fi, unlimited plugs, and coffee you don’t have to buy every hour. CoworkBuffalo opened in May 2012 and has worked out so far. We have paid our bills, hosted some neat events, made iterative improvements, established a small contingent of regulars, and we keep meeting new and interesting knowledge workers from around the region.

It is a really steep learning curve, though, going from “Working on a computer for people hundreds of miles away” to “Doing your best to make people 5 feet away comfortable.” We are learning the medium-hard way about space design, social dynamics, business partnerships, landlord relations, picking out usable feedback from tossed-off requests, and many other new things. Some days the place is humming with energy and warm bodies and collaboration, and some days not. There is so much I want to improve there, right as I’m sitting here typing this, but we don’t have unlimited capital, we’re all operating on spare-time-plus, and we want to keep things relatively lean, so we can actually last for a little while and discover more demand.

In any case, I’m really lucky to be able to plug away at creating a shared space in downtown Buffalo. My dad made his office downtown, I helped make an office downtown, and it’s usually a good challenge to keep it going.

TEDxBuffalo 2012

Seeing TEDxBuffalo 2011 come to fruition was one the greatest moments of my life—let’s go with one of the five greatest, actually. I’m not big on graduations.

The event license had seemed doomed, but was brought back. It felt like we had tapped some unknown desire in this small city for a fun day full of ideas . At one point in the last hour or so, my exhausted brain, unable to process how so many tiny threads that had come together into this big, positive mesh, just said to my body, “Start sweating!” My T-shirt from that year still has a kind of endearing smell.

TEDxBuffalo 2012 was much, much harder for me. I’m fairly certain it was harder on the other volunteer organizers, who had more than one occasion to wonder if their nominal leader was incapable of learning lessons from one year to the next. I assumed too much of what worked by coincidence and novelty in 2011 would work again. I started too late. I clung to that magic pairing pairing of “Having too many time-sensitive tasks for one busy person” and “Refusing to delegate and explain things sensibly.” My paid freelance writing suffered as I pulled last-ditch sprints on different aspects of a full-day conference.

In short, I learned a lot about what I don’t know about planning, events, and cultivating talent.

Many pieces of TEDxBuffalo 2012 worked. If nothing else, a dozen speakers and performers got a great chance to share their ideas and talents. But the best thing I did in 2012 was hand the reigns over to a very capable Chaz Adams, and pledge to commit myself in 2013 to the parts of the show I can definitely make better, without making myself worse.

In Pod Form & In Beta

I’m really proud of the side project Phil Dzikiy and I took on, In Pod Form. We started the podcast in late 2011, tried our best to record every week, but had to scale it back as both Phil and myself had our schedules up-ended (baby for him, TEDxBuffalo for me). I hope we get to do a few more episodes. A few high points:

• Episode 34: The Pure Drama of Olympic Female Weightlifting – In which we discuss the crucial need to reboot Street Fighter as a movie.

• Episode 30: Continue On with Mary-Kate and Ashley – In which Phil describes what can only be described as the epic battle that would ensue if the T-1000 from Terminator 2: Judgement Day squared off against Bill Cosby’s character from Ghost Dad. (Seriously. It’s the one episode everyone who listens to us likes).

• Episode 13: The Devil’s French Fry Oven – Toaster ovens.

Meanwhile, In Pod Form directly inspired Gina to push forward with In Beta, a podcast I do with her every week about apps, development, privacy, and whatever else we can come up with.

Both shows take me out of my comfort zone. If the goal is to give someone 36 or 45 minutes of discussion that’s worth listening to, that means catching yourself on tangents, scaling back interruptions, avoiding nervous “Yeah-uh-huh-totally” agreements, and choosing topics that aren’t just “Android security—go!,” but are usually about more than one thing. The first In Beta of 2013 is a pretty good example of when it works (and partly inspired Part 1 of this annual review).

My poor, mistreated Android Guide book

There is no good excuse why The Complete Android Guide hasn’t been revised since Android 3.0. Books about moving targets are not easy (believe me, I know). But if there’s one thing I want to accomplish in 2013, this is it. No more excuses.

The Phantom King of Buffalo

I wrote a rather long investigative feature for Buffalo Spree for the June 2012 issue. It was about Michael Wilson, the young guy who bought the most expensive homes ever sold in Buffalo, but also didn’t really buy them. It had a timeline, a sidebar or two, and even a “web exclusive”. It was a weird feeling, wearing an Actual Journalist hat once more.

But I’ll cut it straight with you—you, who are already more than 1,100 words into this self-indulgent thing. I researched the Hell out of that story, and did more edits on it than probably anything I’ve published. And while it’s cliché that feature writers can never let go of their copy, I left a bit too much raw data in there. I could have done more “heavy lifting” for the reader. Onward.

My family

I do not write or call them enough.

Miscellaneous

• My 2012 on Twitter

• According to Google Account Activity, from Feb. 27 through Dec. 31, I used my Gmail account to:

  • Send 4761 emails, averaging 432 per month
  • Received 17,773 emails, averaging 1,615 per month

• Wrote for: Fast Company, ITWorld, Lifehacker, Buffalo Spree, my own site (once, besides this review, Block Club, and a few other outlets I can’t recall right now.

• Interviewed two noted venture capitalists at Z80 Labs, the startup incubator located in the very same space where I once answered customer service calls at the Buffalo News. Union Square Ventures founder Fred Wilson, in text, and Lowercase Capital proprietor Chris Sacca, live and on video (below):

• Wore Sergey Brin’s Google Glass headset and might have been the first to publish something about it. Alright, so this and Sacca are just straight-up year-end link-bragging. Forgive me.

• Put my ThinkPad t61p laptop, bought right when I started at Lifehacker in 2007, into retirement. Picked up a ThinkPad X1 Carbon, installed Ubuntu on it straight-off, love it.

• Started posting select photos to Flickr once more.

Howard

A family friend once gently chided my wife and I, telling us that when people ask us how many kids we have, we needed to stop responding with, “None, but we have two cats!” The implication was that it made us sound—I’m not sure. Crazy? Unaware of how different cats were from kids? Eager to give someone an answer other than “Zero, you heartless cudgel”?

In any case, I once heeded that friend’s advice. Now I’ve come to think “Any kids?” is the worst of all the anxious social questions, because it presumes quite a lot about, well, just about everything about someone you meet. Yes, you are sometimes compelled to ask someone about something. But not kids. If you insist on asking me whether I know what it’s like to care about something other than my credit score, I will tell you about Howard.

Howard is a puggle, probably, likely with some other breeds mixed in. Liz and I adopted him from the City of Buffalo Animal Shelter. I had to be persuaded. I had it on good advice that dogs are not like cats (or kids), that they did not make traveling easy, that training them went far beyond housebreaking, that separation anxiety can obliterate your patience. As my friend Phil put it, training and connecting with a dog was way outside my comfort zone.

Dogs don’t work for everyone, but Howard and Liz and I (and, to some extent, our cats) are getting along.

It’s been a trying, occasionally rewarding, lesson-teaching, sometimes delicious, reality-changing, coffee-making, business-starting, family-losing, friend-supporting, dog-adopting year. Goodbye 2012.

There was a time in 2012 when my ability to conceal my looming personal and professional collapse and failure was so great, so skillful, I might have qualified as the CEO of a major corporation.

A relatively big event seemed doomed. My occasionally profitable writing career was headed down with it; a small guy drowned on the rope used to rescue a big guy. Deadlines and obligations caught me flat-footed every day, or every few hours. I was stress-eating, drafting tell-off rants in practice for the inevitable, and constantly pushing the start of beer o’clock into funny-sad, not funny-ha-ha hours. Everyone who seemed to enjoy their own particular mix of work, friends, and frivolity became my secret antagonist. And my wife really wanted to adopt a dog.

You wouldn’t know that, though, because I am unnaturally optimistic, productive, and adventurous in my online sharing. I think most people are like that. Which is sad and bad for my history, and maybe yours. It’s the equivalent of recording yourself answering a “How’s it going?” greeting over and over again, splicing it together, and calling it as a conversation. You see the dog, you read about the dog quite a bit, but never get the why of the dog.

We all have our versions of a following now, be it on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, an infrequently updated personal site, or email correspondence. Over time, sharing ourselves seems less of a newfound kick and more of a\ mandatory recreation. We become “better” at maintaining that following: conscious of what people could search out years from now, savvy on what draws Likes and replies and sharing. When you write something honest and it fails to draw much attention, it can feel like confirmation that nobody cares about you. You arrived at the cocktail party in a sour mood, you told people why, and their attentions quickly shifted elsewhere. See? You really are a loser.

Realizing this, I think there are three real options (besides ignoring me, which is always an option). One is to broadcast less about your life’s particulars and focus on the many interesting things happening outside your own head. That is a very worthy cause. Another is to care less about Facebook and the like, realizing they are not real and not worrying too much about how you come across, because real people know the real you. That is a very realistic goal.

The other option, the one I’m aiming for here, is to treat each hard-come-by opportunity to write about yourself and a lesson you’ve learned as a chance to do some reporting on yourself. File a records request on your memory. Balance the positive and negative. Do not just make fun of yourself, no matter how good you are at it; earn your audience’s interest by showing them something new.

My grandfather Purdy, my father’s father, passed away in 2012, at the age of 85. There are a fraction as many pictures of his life as there would be if he was born now. What pictures there are are deliberate, mostly staged, kept in one or two stationary albums. The big and small moments of his life were passed around verbally. One of his sons tried to capture so much of his life’s achievements that the eulogy ran 10 pages, single-spaced, and more than an hour in telling. That eulogy is very hard to recall now, less than two months later, although I have a copy in Google Drive and Gmail.

What I can recall with eerie accuracy is my aunt, my grandfather’s second-oldest child, standing up when the time came for “any other remembrances.” She turned to the small and now restless crowd and told them about the time on Long Island. There was no Purdy & Sons meat company in those days. There was no big farm with about a dozen kids running around, no Christmas presents piled to the ceiling. There was a second-hand piano, grandpa’s tub bass and singing until the very late hours. And there was my aunt and my father, hiding under the table and sneaking leftover sips of the drinks they were supposed to clean up.

“Not many of you know about the early days,” I think she said. “But they were so happy. So happy together, and with their friends.”

My dad, understandably, didn’t make a point of telling his son about pilfered gin. His and others’ stories about my grandfather stuck mostly to the farm, the meat shop, the big moments and the broadly funny stuff. But I’m really glad I got to know Grandpa Purdy, and a bit of my father, in that bittersweet moment.

It is my concern, you could say, that you and I and everyone we know treat the public responses to the “How’s it going” question, asked by corporations that sell advertising, as knowledge. Actually, I want to strike a deal with you: I won’t be that guy who brings his story about the difficulties of selling personal essays to your cocktail party. In return, you won’t assume that my posts about all the big things happening at all the different things I’ve glommed onto don’t also mean that I’m any less worried than you are about how we’re all frauds, due to be called out at any moment.

As for what actually happened in 2012, I will try and be honest about those things tomorrow. And the dog, too.

Are you fairly well versed in Square games from the Super Nintendo period? I’m talking Final Fantasy II & III (technically IV and VI in the full Japanese canon), Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana–epic quests with a late Victorian/semi-steampunk setting. The protagonist was usually a revolutionary, a freer of people, and probably an inadvertent one. Almost always, one character or another had to hide a secret past, both from newfound allies and relentless authorities. There was usually an epic battle at the height of the plot, after which everything might seem lost. And the music had recurring, swelling themes that made you want to sit up a bit in your comfy seat, raise your hand off the L and R buttons, and maybe pump your fist a bit toward victory.

As you’ve probably guessed, these games were not an insignificant part of my formative years. Which is why when I saw Les Misérables for the first time (I know, I know) earlier this month, I had one of those weird moments where you came across a source material long after you’d absorbed all its varied offspring. The connection is definitely there, at least in the eye of fans of musicals and role-playing games. Witness “Chrono Trigger: The Musical,” performed by a man aiming to recreate the voice of the original Jean Valjean . Search out “Les Miserables Final Fantasy,” and you’re treated to a long list of Fantasy/Miserables mashups. And the last paragraph of a Final Fantasy III/VI review on Amazon puts its best:

Have you ever wondered how the cast of Les Miserables would fare in a steampunk world where they were pitted against Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine? Play this very entertaining game and find out.

So Les Mis made me reminisce. Did I enjoy the show any less because of it? Maybe. Even with a conscious effort to place the Broadway classic, more so Victor Hugo’s novel, far, far ahead of Square’s founding in 1983, or maybe because of that, I kept apologizing to myself for many moments, big and little, feeling familiar. Because my wife knew I’d never seen any version of the show, and knew only a few lines of one song due to a Seinfeld plot gag), she was probably expecting more surprise, more reaction from me at key moments. Instead, I’d just grin and think about flying galleons and dark-cloaked mages who took on new names.

So I let down my own expectations, and maybe a few of my wife’s, but that’s the deal with expectations. Do I wish I’d seen Les Mis sooner? Should Square have made it more explicit in what they were cribbing, pulling, and outright jacking from a classic tale of revolution and personal redemption? And did “Les Mis” become such a popular abbreviation because it’s really annoying to find the European accent for the full Les Misérables on keyboards or, in my case, search it out on the web and copy it?

To the first paragraph-creating-question, no, and to the second, no. But I do wonder how many of my peers are going to hit upon these themes and connections at this later stage of their life, and if it means that keeping track of the roots and original references is going to become a labor of love for more genres. That’s already the case with music. It is always some poor soul’s job to trace back this and that techno. To remind us all of where the hip-hop samples come from. To tell the story of how American R&B, arriving over trans-ocean radio waves, mixed with island rhythms to give us reggae, and how at the root of both of those are the gospel-derived field hollers from work camps, with the long-handled ho always landing on the one.

Will a similar kind of archiving, reference-tracing, and credit-giving be meted out for those of us who grew up with plot-driven games? I sincerely hope so.

Top image taken from “Arm Joe,” a seemingly defunct free Street Fighter-style game that lets you fight for, uh, the title of Most Wretched? (Description at Wikipedia)

Look closely, and you’ll notice I’m holding only half a kayak paddle. Which could be a metaphor for how I feel writing about my own year in review. Yup. (Photo by Jennifer Phillips)

Man, this week was slow. This last week, the one between Christmas and New Year’s? Really slow. I never liked it when, as a reporter, sources would answer questions with, “Slow news week, eh?” But I’ll say it to myself. Nobody wanted to read much of what I get paid to write about this week. So I did what everybody else does and just ran out the annual clock with a year-end review. Of myself.

Leaving Lifehacker

It was a big deal, stepping away from the job that changed my life. But after three and a half years of waking up early, scanning hundreds of headlines, and pinching five or six rapid-fire posts, plus a feature or two every week, it was time to go.

I’m really proud of the work I did at Lifehacker. I’m extremely grateful to Gina Trapani, Adam Pash, and Nick Denton for giving me the chance to write about topics I really enjoyed, for money, every day. I had a great crew of coworkers, almost always. And there’s no doubt that my time at Lifehacker, and the truly impressive spread of the site’s content, allowed me to start writing as a paid freelancer at a number of other web sites (along with the occasional return visit to pick up a day shift or two).

Then again, the weird thing about that kind of instant writing, about getting your hooks into topics the moment you hit them, is that it accelerates everything about the job, not just the word count. The reactions and results from your writing are seen and felt instantly. And if you’re not jazzed about what you’re writing about, give it 30 minutes, and you’re onto the next thing. But you also start to feel like you’ve “covered” something many, many times over. Like a political reporter inured to the same campaign tricks and scandals year after year, but in one-eighth the time.

After a year or two of writing for Lifehacker, I became my own worst enemy at feature pitch meetings–more self-antagonizing than usual, anyways–because I couldn’t think of anything that hadn’t been written. Anything respectable, relevant, helpful, it seemed, had been covered four times. There’s the general notion that there’s no such thing as new stories, just new writers. I think that’s true, and in my case, it became a good reason to move on and let some talented young guys get paid to write more.

Freelancing

Since I’ve yet to hit it big with my Fancy Coffee Illustrated app (wait, is he joking?), I took up a few offers to write freelance for web sites. Some of it is very much in the same realm as Lifehacker, but it’s usually up to me to pick the topics, the angle, and the depth. So it’s been fun to occasionally lean back in my Aeron knock-off, stroke my entirely non-existent chin hair, and scan past the immediate headlines.

So I wrote about my “knitting circle”, finding a job these days, and using caffeine strategically for Fast Company. I told the tale of how a small group fared with a free Google Apps installation at TechRepublic. And I’ve just started regularly blogging for ITWorld, where I’ve lately proven that even an Android guide book author can get fired up about bad moves by his bread and butter.

TEDxBuffalo 2011

Photo by Tricia Marcolini

For the first part of 2011, I was an eager participant in TEDxBuffalo, an independently organized conference in the style of, and under license from, the global TED brand. The conference, as scheduled for April of 2011, didn’t happen, due to a key figure’s personal issues that I shall not dive into here. But when it came time to apologize to the stakeholders and possibly regroup, I found myself more eager, and more leader-ish, than I’d ever thought I could be.

Why? It sounds so idealistic now, but I thought the first outcome, the one where we tried, gosh dang it, but never quite got a conference together was just a terrible rap on Buffalo, and the associated crew. I kept thinking about what the web searches would look like. I’m serious. You know what I’m talking about: you’re wandering the web, and you suddenly come across the sad remains of a business, an event, a project–something where the last update was more than a year ago, and it’s about “Big plans for 2011!” or something akin. I really, really didn’t want people to wonder if Buffalo ever put on a TEDx event, and have the answer be, “Oh, kind of, I guess, but in a sad, bicycle-with-a-flat-tire way.”

I thought I’d long since grown the psychic armor to deflect the arrows of What People Might Think. But I couldn’t resist the urge to fire back and get at least one show done. The folks who put together this event made that show far greater than I thought it could be, and I’m freaked out about how 2012 might turn out.

Anyways, I wrote up a post-conference wrap-up and a “What I learned” post, and it’s hard to believe it went down just over two months ago.

Google+: The Missing Manual

When I wasn’t making my friends sick of hearing about TEDxBuffalo, I was deflating all their remaining camraderie with grumbles about “the book.” The book was my second instructional tome about a Google product, after The Complete Android Guide, but this time published and edited by what you might call a more traditional publisher, O’Reilly Media. Even though O’Reilly is an innovator in many areas of the publishing field, it’s becoming a kind of standard-bearer for tech publications, and there’s a well-defined process for pitching, writing, and producing a book.

I was, to say the least, unprepared for the demands of this type of book when I started. You might also say I was spoiled by the Complete Guide process, which left me to make most of the decisions about organization, templates, copy styles, and other details. It took a good deal longer to write this book, and I probably ended up writing it 1.8 times, really. But I’m quite proud of the finished product, and I think it’s a real help for anyone looking to learn more about Google+.

It’s an ebook sold without any digital restrictions, with free lifetime downloads and updates, and easy transfer to any e-reader device, and I’m pretty sure the printed version will be very nice, too, in keeping with O’Reilly’s standards for putting out the best tomes around. You can buy a nice print/ebook combo at O’Reilly’s store, or buy the paperback at Amazon.

In Pod Form

Here’s another thing that was hard to do this year: start a podcast. Not with Lifehacker, or O’Reilly, or from any other pre-existing platform I’ve lucked into. Just from the efforts of myself and Phil Dzikiy. It has been humbling, in all the right ways, to start from scratch, learning how to not suck at planning, recording, editing, publishing, and promoting a show where two guys you (probably) don’t know are trying to entertain you with takes on the news, not-that-young dude culture, technology, and other not-too-specific topics.

Phil and I work pretty hard at In Pod Form, though most of it doesn’t show, hopefully. We argue out topics, try to keep the show flowing, and, on the technical end, sweat the details as much as possible with our amateur recording and editing equipment. I clip out a few “Umms” and “Likes” where I can, and I try to keep it between 35-40 minutes per episode. We want to respect people’s time, and we provide all the links we talk about on our show notes.

It’s been revealing to see how hard it is to build an audience from scratch. And I mean scratch–if you have a cousin in South Dakota, they have almost certainly gathered more Facebook “Likes” than In Pod Form. But Phil and I are proud of each episode, we’re learning the ropes in a new medium, and heck if it isn’t great to have a mandatory weekly appointment to see a good friend.

Travels

TripIt says that I traveled 0 miles in 2011, but I trust my memory more than their apparently twitchy API.

• I got to visit Los Angeles for a week in February and hang out with the Lifehacker crew in-person, which was damned fun. We shot video for the Lifehacker Show
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  , ate at a number of wonderful spots, and got to see whether we actually laughed out loud when we typed “lol.” And, while I wouldn’t diminish a week spent in L.A. during a Buffalowinter, but Adam P. gave me an AeroPress
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  to take home, and it totally upgraded my life.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

• I hit up SXSW 2011, my third South-By visit, with a crew of Buffalo geeks working on a start-up: Steve Poland, Nick Barone, Dan Magnuszewski, Chris Moyer, and Michael Collins. We stayed in very close quarters.
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

• I flew solo at Google I/O 2011
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  , but I got to meet up with Adam and Gina, meet some really neat folks from O’Reilly, and spent a good bit of quality time with Paddy Foran. Paddy even snuck me into Twitter’s headquarters for an impromptu lunch. And I finally had a chance to meet up with Pete, one of the my father’s unofficial brothers (long story), and it was just a great extended weekend.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

• I vacationed in Maine for a week. I ate a lot of seafood, read more than one book in a week, and continued to fail at tanning.
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

• I tagged along with my wife to Washington, D.C., where she was sworn in to the Supreme Court Bar
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  , and where we watched a morning session of the Court. It was intense. And Clarence Thomas really does look very close to nodding off at times.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

Miscellania

• I was the “Most Saved Author” on the web in 2011, according to Read It Later
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  . Nifty. On a related note, I compiled my five favorite Longreads “of” 2011
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  .
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

• I turned 30. The best part was the bowling alley party that involved pitchers
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  of White Russians.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

• It was bittersweet to see The Main Washington Exchange
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  come and go in what seems so quick a fashion, looking back. I think most of the Buffalo-area tech types I know think that a communal space for our projects, gatherings, and, yes, working can happen, but it probably needs to start smaller, and probably as an outgrowth of a tech firm that ends up with a little extra space on hand.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

• Elizabeth and I finally saw the end of a total kitchen remodel, which took more than half a year and which had us finding new appreciation for a working stove. I wouldn’t recommendit to people who aren’t looking to watch how fluidly a project can double in cost, size, and time, accompanied by numerous reassurances of how nice everything is going to be. And it is very nice. But it was the Let It Be/Get Back
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  of our home ownership experience. I’m serious. I can definitely play this metaphor out and point out who the Phil Spector character was, if you’d like (you wouldn’t).
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

• According to my personal ThinkUp installation, this was my most-retweeted Twitter post of 2011 (at least as long as ThinkUp has been tracking): “Just because you’re self-employed doesn’t mean you can’t be mad at your boss and his total lack of focus.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  .
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

  
  
  

TEDxBuffalo took 17 months to launch, but there were really only five months of solid planning. That is, there was a year-long initial attempt that fell apart on very short notice, followed by a rather quick revival. But our first actual event, put on by about a dozen core volunteers and many more contributors, made everyone hungry to do it again.

Buffalo, NY is a rust belt city filled with chances to start over, build something new, and shake things up. It’s also a place where the status quo is palpable: waterfront projects have been debated endlessly, preservation and development movements constantly butt heads, and even a nascent surge in gourmet food trucks has met with thick red tape. That’s why our first TEDxBuffalo event had a theme of “No Permission Necessary.” We invited speakers and performers who encouraged, and had often started, projects that don’t require a grant, a board of directors, or even a whole lot of money&emdash;just a good idea.

It would have been easy to find speakers to talk about job creation, preservation, waterfront development, and regional coordination. Those are Buffalo’s go-to topics, and each has its own events and organizations. We strove instead to tell untold stories and to find people whose ideas played well together. Our speakers came mostly from our volunteers’ own research and backgrounds. To select our dozen speakers, and a small group simply scored them, on a 1-to-5 basis, on how their interests and obsessions fit: with our theme, as a unique topic, and as an idea worth spreading. Our volunteers also knew a few performers who did interesting things: built their own techno-acoustic instruments, for example, or engaged in “guerilla improv.”

Because TEDx talks are limited to 18 minutes, and because TEDx events are required to screen TED Talks as 25% of their event content, we broke the whole day into 20-minute blocks. That meant each talk, video, or performance had about 2 minutes of buffer time and that breaks, lunch, and anything else had to fit into those 20-minute slots. 2 minutes doesn’t sound like much time, but when you factor in speakers running long, speakers finishing early, and the occasional technical glitch or missing person, it ends up working like a freshly-molded set of LEGOs. You make up or add time around lunch, you shift slots around if someone goes missing, and if you end a bit early, it feels a lot better than running late. Using 20-minute blocks made a big day full of variables feel very manageable.

We had some seriously talented, self-motivated people working on TEDxBuffalo, some kind sponsors willing to take a chance on a first-time event, and attendees, speakers, performers, and many others who carved out an entire day&emdash;a Tuesday, after Columbus Day weekend in the U.S., no less&emdash;to make this event happen. Keeping them all organized and making sure everybody had the right information at the right time was just as hard as everybody knew it would be, and it’s the primary focus of our improvements for 2012. If I met a first-time TEDx organizer, I couldn’t stress enough how important it is to make sure everybody knows where to look: to contact people, to find the “final” version of a document, to see their next task on the list, and to know when and where the next meeting is. Everything else isn’t exactly easy, but good people will know what to do, if they know what they’re doing.

I’d also suggest staying away from live streaming for your first (or first few) TEDx events, or at least live streaming on a public scale. The most important thing, in the end, is to help speakers and performers put on the best possible presentation to the audience, and to the audience that will be watching on the TEDxTalks channel (and, potentially, the wider TED audience). I took to heart a lot of negative feedback on the 100-person audience limit, both internal and from the public, and gave a constant, public web stream undue importance. That meant dealing with a flood of criticism and outright snark when our streaming provider went down, a few lasting video glitches in trying to compensate, and too many day-of headaches.

What we did right, though, was engage a half-dozen locations around Buffalo as satellite locations. A dedicated team set them up with dedicated streaming accounts, delivered TEDxBuffalo-branded goodies, and helped make them feel part of the festivities. Next year, we’d like to get more sites involved and possibly bring schools and universities into that day’s conversation.

More than anything, the TEDxBuffalo team walked away struck by the result of our efforts and how receptive Buffalo was to them. For an event so different from the standard conferences, speaking engagements, and networking events that we’re all so familiar with, a disproportionately large number of people liked what they saw and were eager to see more. We can’t wait to deliver for them (and many more newcomers!) 11 months from now.

Google+: The Missing Manual just entered the review phase, after months of effort by yours truly and O’Reilly’s very capable team. So now is a good time to peek above ground and look around. Scoping out the Android landscape, there’s a lot to see. Ice Cream Sandwich, or Android 4.0, is on its way, promising a unified, simplified foundation for smartphones and tablets. As soon as I can get my head around it, an update to the Complete Android Guide should follow.

As a kind of warm-up, and as a way to clear the air, I thought I’d note the apps, features, and little tricks I’ve found to be essential to enjoying an Android phone since I first picked up a G1 in June 2009. More than just my latest obsessions, these Android bits have stuck with me a long time, or significantly changed my experience. First up, the apps, with other tricks to follow.

I’ve left out all the things that are more of a matter of taste–app launchers, to-do managers, Twitter clients, and so on. What’s left are the apps I think just about anyone using Android would find useful. Enjoy.

Apps

• Alarm Clock Xtreme: It’s a tough one for a self-aware Android fan to start out with, because the design is so full of buttons and settings and less-than-elegant transitions, but it’s a very good alarm app. I particularly dig having to do math problems to “earn” a snooze or dismissal.

• Amazon Kindle: Not enough people know that you can read anything you buy for a Kindle on an Android, and that the experience is pretty darned good.

• ClipStore: Ever had to juggle more than one copy/paste operation, or needed to call up something you copied a while back? ClipStore watches your Android clipboard, copies text from it every so many seconds, and makes it easy to call it back up. Really handy when you’re trying to pull off a good bit of writing or quick editing.

• Dropbox: On a standard desktop or laptop computer, you drop a file into your Dropbox folder, and it’s saved on the web, and then updated on all your other computers, too. On an Android (or iPhone), Dropbox is a great way to get at those files without having to connect with a cable, and also a simple way to share anything.

• Goggles: The stated purpose (take a picture and search for anything) is nifty, if truly hit-or-miss. I use it for the deeper features: barcode/QR code scanning, and scanning business cards for easy contact adding.

• Google+: I’m obviously partial. But even if you never used the social network itself, the Instant Upload feature is amazing, automatically uploading your smartphone photos to Google’s servers for easy sharing.

• PdaNet 3.02: If you want to use your phone’s internet connection as a regular connection for your laptop, buy a tethering plan from your cellular provider. If you need just a quick connection now and then, as a backup, grab PdaNet. The free version limits the sites you can connect to, so pay for PdaNet if you find yourself really leaning on it.

• RockPlayerLite: It’s the Android equivalent of VLC Player: an app that plays nearly any kind of media file you throw at it. Handy for plane or train rides where you don’t have time to convert a video for viewing.

• Shopper: Scan anything with a barcode, or snap a picture of any book, DVD, or video game cover, and Shopper will tell you how much it costs at a whole bunch of online and brick-and-mortar stores. Even better, you’ll see what stores nearby are selling it for, and sometimes exactly how many they have of that item in stock.

• Square: You go out to restaurants, bars, and other places you need cash, right? With this app (and the free card-reading device and bank account setup), you can take credit card payments, and so make settling bills and I.O.U.s really easy.

• Torch: If your phone has a decent LED-based camera flash on it, find a “flashlight” app for it by searching out your phone model and “flashlight” in the Market. It’s like the camera function itself–not as good as an actual flashlight, but good enough, and you always have it with you.

• Unlock with WiFi: You really, really need to enable some kind of lock-screen security on your Android phone. Left open to the wrong people, it has your entire Gmail life, and maybe even sensitive data right on the device. But unlocking your phone when you’re at home, or at the office, shouldn’t be a pain. This app disabled security locks when you’re connected to Wi-Fi networks you add to a list.

• Voice Actions Plus: This is pre-installed on some newer Android phones, but if you don’t see it in your main app list, you don’t have it. Hold down your Search button anywhere, and you can pull off a few neat tricks: text or email people with your voice, listen to music, get a map or directions, or write a “note to self” (email yourself). Nowhere close to the iPhone’s Siri in terms of recognition or versatility, but nicer than having to type everything.

Everything I have, everything I’ve been able to do, and everything I am is due to the compassion of others. Friends and relatives who tolerated and encouraged me in my upbringing. Teachers, professors, editors, coworkers, and contacts who trusted me not to embarrass them too much. And, today, a growing network of people I can turn to and ask dumb questions. I bet it’s much the same for you. It’s nice to be thankful and grateful, when you can, for all the people who have a hand in helping you do things and not starve while doing them.

Also, my wife, without whom I would have a very different, very dollar-menu-oriented existence. I have proof of this.

You wouldn’t see that gratitude in a glance at my Twitter, Facebook, or Google+ accounts. I am all too susceptible to “self-enhancement,” “self-reinforcing spirals of reciprocal kindness,” and other implicit social media trends detailed in Evan Ratliff’s great Wired essay. I try to promote others, I try to keep my accomplishments in perspective, but I don’t do online what I used to do so well in my newspaper career: bitch, reveal, and put odds and deadlines on future disasters. I know people who engage in that flip side of sharing almost exclusively, and that’s not grand, either. But I do think I could do more to quit making like a low-wattage megaphone quite so often.

Part of that is my line of work. I write mostly for online publications, or the web component of print publications. When a piece goes up, I feel a good faith obligation to point to it and give it what exposure I can muster. I also appreciate the built-in check that puts on my writing: if I’m ashamed to show it to people and put my inherent stamp of approval on it, maybe I should have spent a bit more time on revisions. I’m also lucky to have a larger Twitter and Google+ audience by means of my work at Lifehacker and on the Complete Android Guide, and some measure of connectivity in my Facebook friends list, and I occasionally use them to promote the good work of friends, acquaintances, and strangers I think are firing on all cylinders.

Do I need or want everyone following me to know my quirks, downfalls, struggles, and moments of utter self-doubt and despair? Probably not. Am I aware that taking the “just-lucky-to-be-here” approach gets on people’s nerves just as quickly? Yep. Are rhetorical questions just a lazy way of getting to the point? You betcha. So let’s just say that I’m going to try and appreciate the people who make what I do possible more often, and also try to be a more responsible self-promoter. (Fellow guilt-promoters: I’ll gladly take advice and experiences on that front at kspurdy@gmail.com, or @kevinpurdy).

So here’s a good start, with some self-interest: what I’ve been up to lately, contained in a single blog post that doesn’t show up on your phone every two hours.

Google+ book

Now that I have a countersigned contract with O’Reilly, I should be less nervous in announcing that I’m working on a Missing Manual book covering Google+, Google’s newest, much-discussed social network. Except that I am, in fact, scared at the challenge, not exactly chugging toward a scheduled go-date, and feeling as though writing my own book, on my own deadline, and setting my own template and style guide left me far too spoiled. So think good thoughts about the people who are handling me at O’Reilly. They are trying their best to keep me from falling off the horse as I tilt at, and over-explain, various Google-y windmills.

Regular writing

I’m contributing regularly to Fast Company’s Work Smart section and TechRepublic’s Google in the Enterprise blog, I’m occasionally found going a bit longer at ITWorld, and I recently went very, very long on the challenges of publishing for tablets inside Media Magazine. All of these editors have put up with a host of excuses, bad puns, and Google-Docs-copy-paste copy nightmares. They are kind people.

TEDxBuffalo

The last time I wrote about TEDxBuffalo here, I was an eager volunteer, helping out with a very loosely knit project to put a TED-licensed conference together. We met in coffee shops, we talked about all the things we wanted to have at the conference, and then, when the lead on the project dumped everything and moved away, the conference didn’t happen. That is, at least, the much shorter version of that story.

This time, we have a time, date, and place, we have a very intriguing set of speakers, and an amazing team that’s making sure all the details, funds, food, and other details are in place. I’m the organizer, but I mostly just write things that need writing, double-check things, and email people who are doing a lot of great work..

Complete Android Guide App

One person I’m really, really grateful for is the publisher of the Complete Android Guide, 3Ones (and, specifically, Kelly Abbott. In his time between 30 other projects, he walked my how-to book into an actual Android app, so somebody who’s just getting into their first Android phone can look up how to fix and fiddle things right there, on the screen. It’s 99 cents in the Android Market. Give it a look.

Moore’s Law is a popular tech journalism touchstone. It states, roughly, that the raw processing power of electronics will double every two years, and it’s been generally true for the last 45 years. It’s why trying to make a smart computer, tablet, or smartphone purchase these days feels like choosing a car in a Formula One race happening 18 months from now–after alien xenomorphs have arrived on Earth and started working with Ferrari engineers.

There’s a parallel to Moore’s law in how we appreciate bold-for-its-time technology. Call it Szekely’s Principle, derived from this inspired oration.

Try to remember the impact the iPhone had on technology, popular culture, and the future of wireless technology when it arrived. It revolutionized touch-based interfaces, modern phone designs, the nature of mobile data (by means of including a browser that made one actually want to access the web on a phone), location-based services, the cultural significance of a fancy phone, and, soon after, the direction of software development. But these days, we’ve already decided that the next version of the iPhone and its software–already many times more powerful and stable than the first version–is disappointing (if still closely watched). Because, presumably, Apple isn’t adding yet another hardware capacity or brand new, never-thought-of feature.

It’s harder still to think back to when the Nexus One launched and appreciate what it really meant, both at the time and for the future of the Android platform. But allow me to give it a shot.

There were Android phones before the first Nexus, of course, and even Google-blessed “launch” phones. The G1 (code-named HTC Dream) was the first Android phone you could buy, and it looked the part. The myTouch 3G (HTC Magic) brought out Android 1.6, and the first touch-only Android interface. The Motorola Droid (Milestone) was basically the first Android that made some waves, shipping with Android 2.0, a built-in turn-by-turn Navigation app, and, most significantly, at least $1 million in Verizon-backed “Droid Does” advertising.

Then came the Nexus. For a good while, rumors of a “Google Phone” cropped up in overly hopeful headlines, despite steadfast denials. But this was before Google had botched their Buzz social network launch, before too many go-nowhere acquisitions–before it looked like they could falter. It seemed like Google was poised to target the U.S. wireless providers and introduce some overseas-style competition and device freedom. Maybe they’d even go so far as to offer a data-only phone driven by Skype-like VoIP services–after all, they had bid on wireless spectrum, and they needed something drastic to really shake Apple’s confidence in the iPhone, right?

Google employees picked up a Nexus One as a kind of holiday bonus in late 2009, and they couldn’t help but tweet them. It looked like the soothsayers were right–this was Google’s purest vision of what an Android phone could be, hardware and software. Google would sell the phone directly to consumers, with no contract lock-in, for $530, but one could make a case for long-term cost over initial sticker shock. Google was even going to handle software support for the Nexus One, and assured us that this phone would be the first to get software updates. It’s hard to imagine how novel that concept was, even at that early phase of Android–someone handing you an Android phone and actually promising that they’d stay on top of the updates. What’s more, the Nexus One would be the easiest phone to unlock, “root,” and load with a third-party operating system.

When it finally, actually launched, the Nexus One introduced universal voice input, a now common feature on smartphones that’s still under-utilized. Say “Navigate to Target,” and Google, using its best knowledge about where you are and what’s near you, comes back with turn-by-turn directions and time estimates to the nearest big red box. Navigation technically launched with the Motorola Droid, but let’s step back and keep Szekely’s Principle in mind. You are talking to an immensely powerful computer in your hand. That computer takes your voice, turns it into a text command, and beams it in wireless fashion to a giant data center. Meanwhile, that computer and data center are also using space-based satellites and massive Wi-Fi databases to figure out where you are. When it has the request and your location, Google’s thrumming servers then reference that data against extensive maps of the United States, which they acquired by driving camera-topped cars literally everywhere, and returns all that to you, with a computerized voice to read each step as you approach. But then your phone suggests you take a left onto a street closed that morning for construction, and you get really mad at it.

Just as important, the Nexus One was the first direct approach at the iPhone–shape, feel, and a good bit of the function. The Nexus One certainly looked the part, being the flattest, sleekest Android to date, with just one physical button on its front and simple branding on the back. It was also the first phone to include iPhone-style multi-touch gestures. The players and dates change in different tellings, but the basic story is that Google kept “Pinch to zoom” finger actions out of Android to appease the CEO of then-friendly rival Apple; eventually, though, Google’s CEO left Apple’s own board, and the niceties ended (and the lawsuits began).

After the initial buzz, though, the Nexus One proved to be an earnest failure, at least as an actual product. Sales didn’t exactly sing, the forum-and-search-based support didn’t win much praise, and, as tends to happen, the limitations made themselves known: limited room for apps in the internal memory, somewhat mediocre-to-okay camera and speakerphone performance, and (initially) a dependence on T-Mobile’s 3G network, which remains a solid fourth place contender in the U.S. Google made a point of pointing to future Nexus One releases through Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T, but only AT&T materialized. And, to say the least, the Nexus One didn’t change the way phones are sold and connected in the U.S.

Me? I loved my Nexus One. Best device I’ve bought in my life. Part of that is how I bought it: off-contract, with a cheap T-Mobile data plan already in place (for my contract-price G1), enthused about using it to write an up-to-date Complete Android Guide. It felt just fine in my pocket, it didn’t need a case, and while the camera wasn’t amazing, it was the camera I always had with me, as evidenced by my (kinda neglected) Flickr stream. The Nexus One was indeed the first phone to get the Android 2.2 update, and since it’s the phone of choice for Android developers, I’ve basically never had a compatibility issue with a Market app or third-party firmware. But then the Nexus S launched, and ol’ model One took a good long while to get its Android 2.3 fix, behind the new Senior Prom King Nexus.

I sold my Nexus One recently, mostly because I changed cellular carriers, and mailed it out yesterday. The HTC Thunderbolt isn’t a bad trade-up, but it lacks the bravado of the N1. The first release from Google’s Nexus project shows that an Android phone could be sleek, unashamed of its iPhone aspirations, and still delightfully geeky deep in its guts. It was a benchmark for almost all Android phones that followed, and, forgive the overused analogy, but like “The Velvet Underground & Nico,” it might have sold only a few thousand, but almost everyone it sold to became an even more devoted Android fan.

Lately, of course, when people have asked to see my former phone, they wonder where the front-facing camera was. Or why it doesn’t have Instagram.

I’ve become something of a coffee snob lately. The snobbery took root in research for a Lifehacker feature, then quickly grew to encompass two kitchen cabinet shelves, quite a few spare thoughts, and whatever discretionary dollars I can justify. It’s at the point where, standing outside myself, I can see what it looks like to make a pained decision between single estate Colombian and triple African Kona blends. The word “precious” comes to mind, but here’s how I can forgive myself.

Warning: This post has a larger point than coffee. But it does contain a lot of coffee nerdery. So it’s both pretentious and presumptive, and possibly a piece of professional procrastination. You’ve been warned. If you don’t want to second-guess your own coffee setup, I recommend skipping to the part where I try to make an analogy out of a hand-cranked Japanese thingamajig, and also switch into the second person, as just happened earlier in this warning.

Whether you’re making espresso or drip-based coffee, you have control over certain factors: the quality of your beans, the ratio of coffee solids (beans) to water, the way in which you’re grinding and exposing those beans to water, the temperature of the water, the length of time the bean grounds and water interact, and how you extract the water from those grounds. Each of these facets has many smaller facets: “quality” means the origin, age, roasting, and storage of your beans, for example. Every coffee system has its trade-offs between control and convenience. Using a Keurig system, for example, surrenders control of basically every part of the process, save the basic choosing of a box of plastic K-cups, in exchange for a one-button cup of coffee. On the other end, you can own a coffee plantation, invest heavily in roasting equipment, and keep only the most finely tuned brewing and heating instruments on hand. Somewhere in the middle lies most of the coffee you will really, actually enjoy.

My preference is the inverted Aeropress method, which is something like a hybrid of a French press and hand-powered espresso machine. To get better coffee from the system, I’ve run some experiments and taken some notes. For each amount of coffee I want to make–every 1.5-ounce espresso-like “shot,” or every five ounces of espresso-plus-water “Americano” coffee–I’ve measured out the coffee-to-water ratio set down by the Specialty Coffee Association of America, along with the timing on my particular microwave to get that amount of water to a certain temperature.

Knowing all that, the only thing left is to get some coffee grounds ready. The AeroPress is like a syringe, creating a vacuum seal that you press liquid through with your hand power. If you grind your coffee too finely, a la espresso, the grounds can create a seal and cause you some serious anguish and embarrassment, as even the most dedicated gym rat will look ridiculous trying to out-muscle the universe. Grind too coarse, closer to French press styles or the pre-ground supermarket stuff, and your water doesn’t get optimum exposure to enough surfaces of your beans. So you aim to get a consistent grind that’s just in the right in-between spot, and that is best accomplished with a burr grinder, not an electric-powered blade.

So most every night, or sometimes early in the morning, it’s time to pull Hario hand grinder off its shelf, grab an airtight container of beans, and get down to it. To adjust the fineness of the grind, you must manually open or close the opening between a ceramic cone and its sheath by tweaking its central screw. With experience, you can generally eyeball the pieces and know what will come out between them. You load beans into the top, but not so many that you’ll spill them while you’re grinding. Then you start grinding.

At first, nothing is happening. You hear something and feel the resistance shiver up your arms, and if you lowered your eyes and looked into the reservoir, you’d see that there was, indeed, grounds starting to pile up. But you look at the beans, and despite how your arm starts to feel after a few dozen turns, it looks like the beans haven’t moved at all. You think about the electric grinder, which is more like a chopper, but at least you see the beans fling themselves about in its lid and get smaller with each pass, and all you have to do is stand there and keep the button pressed down. Still–keep grinding. If you must, take a break and look at what you’re turning out. It’s consistent, it looks really nice, and you’re the one who created it. Now–back to the grind.

Photo via Gimme! Coffee.

Eventually, you notice the level of beans has indeed lowered, and soon after that, you’re just grinding in a state of contentment. If you’re alone, you might even be able, to paraphrase The Miracle of Mindfulness, to grind the coffee not just to ensure good coffee the next day and get back to your evening, but to grind the coffee in order to grind the coffee. You’re investing in a better product, giving your arms a workout, and cementing in your mind the real cost of good things. But all you know is the crank, the container, and the sound and vibration of the job. And then you’re done.

My wife has yet to say my grinding habit is ridiculous in so many words, but I catch that feeling. We don’t have shades or curtains on our kitchen windows yet, so the neighbors might think my late-night hand-cranking sessions are–well, let’s just hope for the best there. But I’m going to keep doing it. Having left my pre-defined job at Lifehacker for a more pick-and-choose freelance writing gig, and now trying to pick up some web and coding skills despite the seeming enormity of the field, I like to think my tiny hand grinder is teaching me big lessons. About dedication and quality, sure. But also about when it’s time to simply work at something, forget what you “look like,” and take good notes on what you’ve learned.

Like I’m trying to do here.

If you want something done, the saying goes, give it to a busy person. Except a personal blog post.

The busiest people I know, especially those that write online for a living, wear their guilt about personal blog neglect in constant, public fashion, like one of those rubber fundraiser bracelets (CMStrong?). But forces outside the reluctant ego-blogger occasionally align and conspire against them. Forces like a tardy FedEx deliveryman, two cold fronts, a reluctant Jet Blue, and an eight-hour train ride. So, here goes:

The Complete Android Guide

It’s a how-to guide for Android smartphone users, covering all the little buttons, menus, inter-app capabilities, system settings, and interface differences that make owning a Droid, EVO, Galaxy, Nexus, or any other Google-powered smartphone so fun–and intimidating. The first edition is available for purchase, both as a print edition and an ebook that looks great on a Kindle, iPad, or any screen, really.

I’m majorly proud of the team at 3Ones that helped put this together, and continues to support the product, but I’m also inspired by the business model they’ve put together. New editions come out just as soon as I have time to check out new Google releases, and those who own previous editions can get new ebook copies, covering all the changes, for just 99 cents. At this very moment, I’m only hours away from turning on a Nexus S and taking screenshots of Android 2.3 (a.k.a. “Gingerbread.”) And the whole thing is available as a free wiki for anyone to read–that’s where I write my changes and rethink the sections. And the ebook product is unencumbered by copy protection or device-specific coding. You can use those PDF and ePub files on any device you choose, as many as you have.

(I’ll write more about the book, writing it, updating it, and the whole process in another post. No, seriously! It’s already half-drafted, and just taunting me from the WordPress queue.)

TEDx Buffalo

If I haven’t been working on Lifehacker, procrastinating on the Complete Android Guide, or learning to make better hard cider of late, I’ve probably been pecking away at the huge mountain of group effort that is TEDx Buffalo. It’s a locally organized version of the inspiring and viral TED conference, where big thinkers in technology, education, and design have given phenomenal 18-minute talks.

Our version is certainly smaller-scale, but only in raw size. A group meets about once a week to patch together speaker lists, think out logistics, and argue passionately but politely about what kind of conference puts the most spirited people together to talk about making Buffalo better.

Want to help out? We can use all you have, whether it’s a speaker pitch, an offer of free services, or straight-up sponsorship, in any amount. Follow TEDx Buffalo on Twitter, “Like” it on Facebook, and you’ll get notified about our open meetings and iterative progress. The go date is April 7, 2011–help out now, if you can.

Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town:

[[Overly earnest bit about personal loss, characterizing people through public personas, and esoteric Buddhist reference Goes Here and Here]]

Fanboy

Speaking of simplification! Writing a book about Android phones, while simultaneously trying to cover the latest updates and finds for Windows, Mac, Linux, more than a dozen notable browsers, and thousands of nifty webapp services, has certainly made my input streams more, shall we say, pointed. Other Lifehacker writers experience this, too, from time to time. So, here’s some air-clearing. (Photo by Snazzo.)

I did write an entire 280-plus page book about how to use Android. I do own a Nexus One, perhaps the most geeky of Android phones out there (up until the Nexus S). And I’m lucky enough that Google sometimes lets me borrow a new device to try it out and document the best ways to use it. I am enthusiastic about the potential of Android, and I’m generally more sympathetic to open-source projects than walled gardens, cathedrals, or whatever Renaissance-era allegory you want to use for proprietary technology.

But I also think Apple products, and many of the third-party developers working in the Apple-sphere, are so, so sleek. And when it comes time to do my morning shift at Lifehacker, I generally boot into Windows, because it is, at least for my particular needs, where everything works.

My job, at both Lifehacker and my Android guide writer’s desk, is to explain and detail the ways one can use technology-quirks, bugs, aggravations and all. So, in turn, my list of complaints and failings and what-the-whats about Android is much, much longer than it is for iPhones. Similarly, I spend a good deal more time digging into the possibilities and not-quite-there-ness of Boxee than XBMC, Roku units, AppleTV, or other set-top systems. I try, in every post, to keep it fair, but I’d bet that the areas of technology I’m writing the most about are also the subjects about which I have the most, and the most varied, complaints to lodge.

Except Instapaper. There is nothing wrong with Instapaper.

#FirstWorldProblems:

If you happen to notice a Facebook-styled sticker on the front window of an H&M clothing store, you’d see that if you “check in” through Facebook places, you can get a “special discount”–20 percent off one item, for instance. Then you find out that you only see that discount if you check in through the iPhone app or the iPhone-style touch.facebook.com mobile webapp. One clerk, in fact, might tell you that they can’t process your discount, even if you hand them your phone, because “The web site needs to tell me what to type in.”

“Fine,” you might say, “I’ll forego a perfectly decent Android app, load up the ‘touch’ site, and nab that coupon.” Sure enough, there’s a coupon listed under another H&M check-in, even if it doesn’t happen to actually provide any codes or links. But you did it! You checked into one particular location-based service through a very specific client, and you’re on your way! Except this time, another clerk tells you that “We can’t use any coupons unless you print it out.” You hand over your phone, again, showing that previously mentioned “what to type in,” and you get a repeat of the print requirement.

So now you’ve checked into H&M twice on Facebook, opening yourself up to all manner of chain-fashion backlash, and done nothing but anger two different store clerks. Resigned to this fate, you almost give up on “checking in” for the weekend, but you do want to note the greatness of a Korean fried chicken shop nearby. But, hark! Your hotel, apparently, offers a free hotel with a Foursquare check-in, and you’ve got a four block walk in the rain! Except … yeah, the clerk has never heard of this deal, and they’re out of “promotional umbrellas” (which you may liberally steal for your band/fantasy league team/Xbox Live name).

My wife previously had it out with a hotel that offered a “Tell us you saw us on Facebook” discount, learning just how vast a container “certain restrictions apply” can be. In conclusion, I feel really, really bad for the customer service team at Groupon, and I feel like I’ve learned a lot about the high reputation cost of cheap advertising.

Various media things

• On NPR’s Marketplace, as a Lifehacker contributing editor offering advice on securing and reclaiming your passwords, the same week everybody (legitimately) freaked out about having passwords exposed by Gawker Media (which owns Lifehacker).

• Appearing occasionally on This Week in Google to talk about Android matters and, well, Chipotle.

• Spoke on a panel at the RIT Social Media and Communication Symposium (SMACS) conference about how social media and technology will change journalism. I got to do what my wife calls my “Bubba Buffalo” thing, turning two different questions into short stories about Sabres rumors and crotchety complaints about my local paper.

• Lots of very kind write-ups about the Complete Android Guide, including a very deep read by The Buffalo News, blog posts from Android Guys, The How-To Geek, and others, and a really nice nod from Gina.

• E-interviewed by Buffalo Eats about, well, eating in Buffalo.

• Asked Five Questions by Artvoice, Buffalo’s alternative weekly.

Finally …

Since my last update of any broad reach was quite some time ago, I’d like to announce the following:

• Hard cider: I finished a batch of dry, “artisinal” hard cider to give out as holiday gifts. My only failing was in letting too much yeast sediment into the bottling container, hoping it would up the carbonation. Not harmful at all, but not quite refined. And it’s all natural, as far as Mott’s apple juice, raisins, brown sugar and champagne yeast strains go.
• Windows Phone 7: Surprisingly good! I had the chance to watch my wife set one up, and she was up and running with her Gmail (seriously!), contacts, Facebook friends, and personalized weather and news in about 10 minutes. I couldn’t say whether they really have a shot at becoming the fourth major U.S. smartphone force, but I’d vastly prefer a WP7 model to one of AT&T’s locked-down Android devices.
• I’m a lucky man: To do what I do for a living, to live where I live, have the friends I do … I’m really humbled.