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The word HeyDoYouKnow prefaces most everything that comes out of my son’s mouth right now. Most of the time, I do… so far. He occasionally comes out with something I don’t. It’s a bit too early for me to give up my role as the Wizard (“pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!), since I never get to play it again. But the days are already numbered, clearly.

Of course, I still love my dad even when he doesn’t know, not that he ever admits to a gap in his knowledge. Maybe all will not be lost when he finds out I’m not much better than sliced bread. I’ll keep my fingers crossed.

Fever set in Friday night and hasn’t fully let go. Oof.

Several weeks ago, my team started using a Wiki (collaboratively edited website… more. While it took longer than I expected to get going, the results have been more than I expected: it really is (slowly) changing the way we communicate with each other.

This morning, I introduced the Wiki to a large group internally. I wondered if the benefits and the attraction would be clear. Short answer: they were, and I think several folks are going to jump in. It won’t change the world, but I do think Wikis will help us work better together.

There are many flavors of Wiki software. I don’t know the scoop on most of them, but we’re finding TWiki to be a compelling package.

I went to an alumni event for my high-school this evening, and Chris Gallagher was playing some of his new music. I haven’t seen or heard from Chris in 15 years (literally), but I remember him singing “California Dreaming” a cappella in morning chapel back in 1987. Seems he did several things along the way since then (check out his website), but recently returned to music. A bit mellow for my tastes, but still interesting stuff.

If you were baby Trixie, do you think you’d be touched by your website, or embarrassed? Since Trixie is less than a year old, she has no say in the matter. I’ve been delinquent in keeping my kids’ websites updated, but I certainly have tried to make sure I embarrass my children even before we get to the adolescent stage, where I’m sure even my way of breathing will have them hanging their heads in shame. Speaking as a wannaba-geek, I admire the quantative approach (and the visual representation) of the sleep periods and bottle logs, although the diaper log is a step too far. [via Widgetopia]

There’s no price like free. Killjoys tell us that nothing is free, you just don’t know what you’re paying since it’s not cash (they’re right, but let’s skip over that inconvenient fact). But watching the buzz about music.download.com start to build, it’s obvious that the appeal of free isn’t dead. What’s on offer? Free music.

Of course, since this is 2004, not 1999, and the RIAA killed off Napster (the original), free music doesn’t mean any music you want, from every artist you’ve heard of. It means the concerted availability of lots of independents who want to give away a few promotional tracks. Not bad, just not everything. But it’s early in the game.

Dare Obasanjo defending Microsoft employee blogging, in response to Joel Spolsky:

I do agree that like most things there are high quality blogs from Microsoft employees and others that aren’t as useful. But that’s life, 99% of everything is crap.

Words to live by?

From Sunday’s SF Chronicle, a column decrying the dumbing of America. Nothing new here except the specific examples, which are funny and sad at the same time. One short clip:

Only nine out of 31 know who John Kerry is. A couple of students think he is an actor, and one thinks he is a serial killer. None knows Karl Rove, our shadow president, though one student ventures the guess that he must have something to do with “Rove versus Way,” the famous Supreme Court case. Only two can identify the British prime minister; many guess that post is occupied by Prince Charles.

Maybe if Kerry is elected half of the remaining 22 will figure out who he is. Or maybe not.

From the Safari windows I left open last night because I wanted to read/skim:

• Quoteblogs vs. Linkblogs (Inluminent) – Some probing questions (no answers) on the legality of some blogging styles and aggregators… think copyright.
• National Geographic MapMachine – Mix of street, satellite, population, topographic, and more more.
• Doc on Disclosures and the blogosphere as editor
• eWeek interview with Brin on Gmail – “print [a conversation] to RSS” … Gillmor is an RSS fiend.
• Russell Beale notes the deconstruction of content to smaller units than the page. Not the first, but I like to catch these references.
• Walkthrough on moving from Movable Type to WordPress – I don’t have that conversion to make, but I’m using WordPress at work, and considering it for here. Nine pages!?
• 10 Classics from Cognitive Science – OK, I’m not likely to read any of these, but at least #6 looks interesting

Two weeks ago, I noted with mild surprise that Microsoft offers a way to control the distribution of individual emails (digital rights management, DRM). Earlier this week, News.com dove deep on these technologies in “Software makers ready desktop lockdown.”