The boy's down for his nap, and wifey's conked out on the couch. She got up extra early to make my favorite special breakfast: Eggs Meurette (poached eggs in red wine sauce).
++++++++++++++++++
Next week's BloggerCon will have a session entitled "Standards for Users" led by Niall Kennedy. In his blog Kennedy compares standards to the Stephenson gauge railroad tracks: "Two pieces of steel laid at 4' 8.5" apart carries rail traffic for 60% of the world's railroads."
Perfect analogy. I'm always a sucker for comparing Internet technology with the railroad industry, last semester describing our automated podcast system as a locomotive and our lecture podcasts as the figurative and literal "tracks". (Anyone know the history of the music industry term in relation to the rails?).
In light of Father's Day, yesterday took the boy for a ride on the mini stream train in Berkeley's Tilden Park. I was reminded of the "tracks" comparison to podcasting (and music) rolling and clicking along through the redwoods. Periodically we'd catch sight of a narrower set of tracks downhill where other miniature train enthusiasts were tinkering with different vintage cars. And onward down to the scale model set of Lionels we have in our basement from the 50's, and so on to the electrics sets in Richmond and San Francisco where the best part is the cantankerous enthusiasts screaming at each other over walkie-talkies for not switching tracks in time.
And there it is. Different tracks, different trains, different users. This is where we are with different standards for internet audio and video.
+++++++++++++++
Went to the trains with my buddy Erik Herz and his boy. Erik started his blog today. The conversation grows already…
