Wayne Sutton examines how he and the fine folks at TriOut used social media tools to launch and manage location based services startup. #lbs

Steve Bruner showcases new aspects of customization available in the upcoming WordPress 3.0 release, including custom post types and the new menu management feature, using the new default Twenty Ten theme as an example. #blogging #video

The latest episode of the video podcast “Beer Diplomacy TV” attempts to solves the world’s problems (and decipher the season finale of Lost). Answers provided by Stuart Tracte, Baratunde, and Brian Brushwood, moderated by Owen JJ Stone, who I met at SXS10 via Twanna Hines and Adria Richards). #politics #video

Food Network’s new, 24-hour Cooking Channel, launches. But why isn’t it in HD? #food #tv

Thumbs Up

I have to give props to rapper Wale for turning around a PR fiasco. After news got out that the rapper was canceling his appearance at D.C’s. Black Gay Pride, the web was on fire with “homophobic” linked to his name.

Wale maintains he was unaware of the obligation (like most popular artists, he doesn’t book his own shows). After the dust settled, Wale made a special guest appearance at D.C. Black Pride Legacy Festival. For free. Now that’s gangsta. #black #hiphop #lgbt #video

Thumbs Down

Despite BP’s various cleanup attempts, the company and U.S. government warn that the oil could be leaking until August. Ugh. Houston Business Journal has continuous coverage. #news #environment #bitchlips

As some people have noticed, Apple has eliminated the blue lego icon that indicates a missing plugin on the iPad. I believe that this is a not so subtle way of shifting users from believing that the iPad browser is lacking something, to believing that the site they are viewing is broken.

[...]

This post was *not* a Flash pro/con, or Flash vs HTML5 statement.

Apple made a conscious decision to move from fairly and correctly showing users that they were unable to display a certain type of content (whether you like that content / technology or not), to making it look like the site itself is broken. It places the apparent blame not on Adobe or Apple, but on content providers. Regardless of your position on Flash or plugins, this is wrong, and it’s a dirty play by Apple.

via Return of the Blue Lego

Another aspect of Mavis that makes her unusual is her race. In a techie world traditionally dominated by white males, an African-American woman on the front of a software box tends to get one’s attention. ”The whole concept was this idea of trying to anthropomorphize computer software and to put a person on the cover,” Mr. Abrams said, ”so people would think it was a person trying to teach them how to type, as opposed to a computer.”So the ”Mavis” creators decided they needed a strong character to present the lessons, and Mr. Crane was put in charge of finding a model to photograph for the box cover.

”One day he walked into Saks Fifth Avenue in Beverly Hills to buy some cologne, and there behind the cosmetics counter was a beautiful black woman named Renee L’Esperance,” said Mr. Bilofsky, reading from a file that was put together to celebrate the 15th anniversary of Software Toolworks. ”Born into a well-to-do Haitian family, she fled the Duvalier regime and wound up at Saks. She had never modeled, and her extremely long fingernails made her an unlikely typist, but when Les looked at her, he saw Mavis.”

via Next They’ll Say Betty Crocker Isn’t Real, Either