tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-89562642024-02-27T20:34:43.059-08:00Blog AwayMagazines and miscellaneaAndrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.comBlogger90125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-80486706538964428692009-10-07T23:57:00.000-07:002009-10-08T00:01:09.144-07:00A look behind Norman Rockwell's processFascinating.<br /><br /><embed src="http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f8/1569972706" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" flashVars="videoId=43985103001&linkBaseURL=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vanityfair.com%2Fonline%2Fculture%2F2009%2F10%2F07%2Fnorman-rockwell-dead-but-busier-than-ever.html&playerId=1569972706&viewerSecureGatewayURL=https://console.brightcove.com/services/amfgateway&servicesURL=http://services.brightcove.com/services&cdnURL=http://admin.brightcove.com&domain=embed&autoStart=false&" base="http://admin.brightcove.com" name="flashObj" width="306" height="277" seamlesstabbing="false" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" swLiveConnect="true" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"></embed>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-22532860339221033412009-06-25T16:27:00.000-07:002009-06-25T16:45:52.710-07:00MagCloud geeks wow 'em at Cannes Lions ad fest<a href="http://www.bizcommunity.com/Blog/GiseleWertheimAymes/2009/6/25/-Cannes-Lions-Technology-rules-Cannes">Gisele Wertheim-Aymes reports from the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival</a>:<br /><blockquote>Sorry to say, it's not the creative talent or marketers who are setting the agenda here. Sure there are cool ideas, but it's the geeks who have created and will create more and more tools, unlocking a world of free and flowing communication and importantly captivating consumer attention.<br />...<br />Coming from a magazine publishing background I marvelled at MagCloud....<br /></blockquote>As chief geek at <a href="http://magcloud.com/">MagCloud</a> I couldn't be more proud :-), but let's be real: tools and services like these are nothing without creatives to drive them. What motivates me each day is seeing people discover MagCloud and doing things with it they never could before.Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-76235282853880240872009-03-27T20:18:00.000-07:002009-03-27T20:18:10.533-07:00That Which I've Missed While Paying Attention - John Battelle's Searchblog<a href="http://battellemedia.com/archives/004886.php">That Which I've Missed While Paying Attention - John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Battelle's</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Searchblog</span></a>: "I spent a good couple of hours at HP this week as well. FM has done business with nearly every division of HP over the past four years, and it's remarkable to spend time simmering in the culture of a company that is, in just about every way possible, Really Grown Up."<br /><br />Damned with faint praise.Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-62839416172739215602009-03-05T13:56:00.000-08:002009-03-05T13:58:11.357-08:00The world of money<style type='text/css'>.cc_box a:hover .cc_home{background:url('http://www.comedycentral.com/comedycentral/video/assets/syndicated-logo-over.png') !important;}.cc_links a{color:#b9b9b9;text-decoration:none;}.cc_show a{color:#707070;text-decoration:none;}.cc_title a{color:#868686;text-decoration:none;}.cc_links a:hover{color:#67bee2;text-decoration:underline;}</style><div class='cc_box' style='position:relative'><a href='http://www.comedycentral.com' target='_blank' style='display:inline; float:left; width:60px; height:31px;'><div class='cc_home' style='float:left; border:solid 1px #cfcfcf; border-width:1px 0px 0px 1px; width:60px; height:31px; background:url("http://www.comedycentral.com/comedycentral/video/assets/syndicated-logo-out.png");'></div></a><div style='font:bold 10px Arial,Helvetica,Verdana,sans-serif; float:left; width:299px; height:31px; border:solid 1px #cfcfcf; border-width:1px 1px 0px 0px; overflow:hidden; color:#707070; position:relative;'><div class='cc_show' style='position:relative; background-color:#e5e5e5;padding-left:3px; height:14px; padding-top:2px; overflow:hidden;'><a href='http://www.thedailyshow.com/' target='_blank'>The Daily Show With Jon Stewart</a><span style='position:absolute; top:2px; right:3px;'>M - Th 11p / 10c</span></div><div class='cc_title' style='font-size:11px; color:#868686; background-color:#f5f5f5; padding:3px; padding-top:1px; line-height:14px; height:21px; overflow:hidden;'><a href='http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=220252&title=cnbc-gives-financial-advice' target='_blank'>CNBC Gives Financial Advice</a></div></div><embed style='float:left; clear:left;' src='http://media.mtvnservices.com/mgid:cms:item:comedycentral.com:220252' width='360' height='301' type='application/x-shockwave-flash' wmode='window' allowFullscreen='true' flashvars='autoPlay=false' allowscriptaccess='always' allownetworking='all' bgcolor='#000000'></embed><div class='cc_links' style='float:left; clear:left; width:358px; border:solid 1px #cfcfcf; border-top:0px; font:10px Arial,Helvetica,Verdana,sans-serif; color:#b9b9b9; background-color:#f5f5f5;'><div style='width:177px; float:left; padding-left:3px;'><a target='_blank' href='http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/index.jhtml'>Daily Show Full Episodes</a><br /><a target='_blank' href='http://www.comedycentral.com/shows/important_things/index.jhtml'>Important Things With Demetri Martin</a></div><div style='width:177px; float:left;'><a target='_blank' href='http://www.indecisionforever.com'>Political Humor</a><br /><a target='_blank' href='http://www.jokes.com'>Joke of the Day</a></div><div style='clear:both'></div></div><div style='clear:both'></div></div>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-56873713984751429302009-02-26T11:17:00.000-08:002009-02-26T11:25:50.065-08:00Out of the stone age -- for another year or two!My dev workstation as of two days ago was about 5 years old. As usual it is so much trouble to recreate the work environment that you have accumulated over such a long time that performance has to get *really* bad before I'm willing to upgrade to a new system.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbKs-wpKK4mfw_TZDExtJBadhx_z93zI4Tl3dw9uZwiUlpFZTKIMxj4eybtJMD6I0eu50Ll929-L5ifOvWfBWqxoxtft4LZLlph4G7RwOafpMPLEmY9_DCCCIxTz6SYH5vL2OH/s1600-h/system.JPG"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 98px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbKs-wpKK4mfw_TZDExtJBadhx_z93zI4Tl3dw9uZwiUlpFZTKIMxj4eybtJMD6I0eu50Ll929-L5ifOvWfBWqxoxtft4LZLlph4G7RwOafpMPLEmY9_DCCCIxTz6SYH5vL2OH/s320/system.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5307188202091902514" /></a><br /><br />What is not obvious is that's two quad-core 64-bit CPUs. Along w/8GB of RAM, I am now a *much* happier camper! My qualitative experience exceeds what Vista tells me it is, and that's not bad.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixnNhV7iY7RvypRkPoErRhHxlIk0cAemw3obdpYcG1nwGtmVWndA5-TI121QEPVGW_AQLfJFnGCnXy6odQeWxRU2sHieSUEqooUQchCk8oSHLXX23sRS_Anqo42AcUPm_3EVDw/s1600-h/rating.JPG"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 125px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixnNhV7iY7RvypRkPoErRhHxlIk0cAemw3obdpYcG1nwGtmVWndA5-TI121QEPVGW_AQLfJFnGCnXy6odQeWxRU2sHieSUEqooUQchCk8oSHLXX23sRS_Anqo42AcUPm_3EVDw/s320/rating.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5307188779861625298" /></a><br /><br />Let's see how long this lasts before I'm waiting on disk swapping again....Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-52906388327970113522009-01-27T21:49:00.000-08:002009-01-27T21:54:58.934-08:00How it's made: a personal newspaperPrinting & finishing, ooh la la! Can't get enough of videos like these.<br /><br /><object width="400" height="302"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="movie" value="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=2739027&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" /><embed src="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=2739027&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="400" height="302"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://vimeo.com/2739027">the most fun Ben's had all year</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/russelldavies">russelldavies</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.<br /><br />By contrast, digital production in an HP Indigo shop seems so, well, <span style="font-style:italic;">tame</span>. Modern technology always seems to lose the visceral qualities of what it replaces....Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-6670435034848538492008-12-09T00:17:00.000-08:002008-12-09T00:18:55.754-08:00YouTube - The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UX0p7uAW2s">YouTube - The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name</a><br /><br />Saw <a href="http://www.thetingtings.com/">The Ting Tings</a> on a DirecTV special yesterday, they had our 2-year old dancing wildly (she's good!) and the 8-year old pounding out the beat. Quirky vocalizations reminiscent of B52s and Talking Heads, just great!Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-48333671559734737592008-11-24T15:11:00.001-08:002008-11-24T15:14:28.369-08:00The MagCloud publisher experience, phase 1<a href="http://comics.com/peanuts/2008-10-24/" title="Peanuts"><img style="width: 417px; height: 119px;" src="http://assets.comics.com/dyn/str_strip/000000000/00000000/0000000/200000/30000/7000/700/237728/237728.full.gif" alt="Peanuts" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:85%;" >Thanks to</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:85%;" > Bill Holland</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:85%;" > for the reference :-)</span>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-31226318086936956572008-11-07T10:13:00.000-08:002008-11-07T10:17:19.939-08:00Underground Art School, Passing You a NoteWow! I like where this magazine is going.<br /><br />"Here we are, first issue (or class session)! This issue is designed like a note we'd like to hand to you. It's a little bit of an introduction from us. Mainly, it's a TYPOGRAPHIC BONANZA to get you riled up to live and make. Then, we will leave it up to you to create a statement."<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://magcloud.com/browse/issue/4781"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 308px; height: 401px;" src="http://api.magcloud.com/Issue/4781/Preview" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://magcloud.com/browse/issue/4781">MagCloud | Magazine Underground Art School | Issue Passing You a Note</a>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-69701148275827775742008-11-04T16:38:00.000-08:002008-11-04T16:38:56.396-08:00Luscious Garage in SFI think I finally found a garage I would enjoy patronizing.<br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">The fig tree and the philodendron are the first things that meet the eye in the repair bay of Luscious Garage. Then the two Toyota Priuses come into focus — one with a slightly dented rear door, the other on a lift with two tires off and rusty brake rotors exposed. Then comes the eerie sense that something is missing: grime.</blockquote><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/05/us/05garage.html">San Francisco Journal - At Specialty Garage, Making Hybrids Even Greener - NYTimes.com</a>:Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-88766802045806632662008-10-18T23:18:00.001-07:002008-10-18T23:18:02.302-07:00Campaign sleepover w/Little Mermaid<style type="text/css">.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; }</style><div class="flickr-frame"> <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jurvetson/2951271941/" title="photo sharing"><img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3049/2951271941_9d3b6fe8f2.jpg" class="flickr-photo" alt="" /></a><br /> <span class="flickr-caption"><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jurvetson/2951271941/">Obama Groove</a>, originally uploaded by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/jurvetson/">jurvetson</a>.</span></div> <p class="flickr-yourcomment"> Steve Jurvetson had lunch w/Joe Biden today, and solicited questions to ask via his Flickr photostream. This answer was not quite to the reader's question, but I love it anyway:<br /><br />“Well, let me share a story. On the second day of the convention, my young granddaughter Finnegan came to me in the hotel and said “we need a sleepover.” I had promised her a tent and all when we got back, so I told her that it would have to wait a few days. “Well, no, I mean now. Barack’s kids have already talked to Barack. Can you pull the beds out of the room and we’ll put in mats, and have pizza and popcorn and Little Mermaid.” So Barack’s two daughters, two of Michelle’s brother’s children, my 11 year old nephew and two grandkids all had a sleepover. When I looked in the room and saw all those black and white children cuddled up together, it tells me more about what the core of this election is about. I knew we had made the right decision. We have become genuinely close friends.”<br /><br />Many thanks to our roving reporter!</p>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-52907410382904858972008-10-08T08:41:00.000-07:002008-10-08T08:41:56.271-07:00Scott Adams tells us how he draws a comic stripMaybe some budding cartoonists using MagCloud can get a tip or two from Dilbert creator Scott Adams over on his dilbert.com blog:<br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">Most syndicated cartoonists still draw on paper, then scan the art and e-mail it to their syndication company. They're going to be pissed when they see this video and realize how much extra work they have been doing.</blockquote><blockquote></blockquote>Read the whole article and find a link to the video: <a href="http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/cartoonist_tools/">Scott Adams Blog: Cartoonist Tools 10/08/2008.</a><br /><br />The video is ok, but would be more compelling and drive more sales if 1. there was a narration, and 2. it was posted to YouTube rather than being held captive on the Amazon page.Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-79558210824158101412008-09-20T10:28:00.000-07:002008-10-08T08:44:16.583-07:00Manufacturing a book, circa 1947Love this!<br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/w3rlsj-KEZE&hl=en&fs=1"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/w3rlsj-KEZE&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Edit: the Vimeo version I found was deleted, updated to one I found on YouTube.</span>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-74417193494951491342008-08-27T14:03:00.001-07:002008-08-27T14:20:35.881-07:00New Magazine: Go Away Come Home<a href="http://magcloud.com/browse/issue/3390"><img src="http://api.magcloud.com/Issue/3390/Preview" align="left" style="padding-right: 20px;" /></a> This <a href="http://magcloud.com/browse/issue/3390">new magazine</a> documenting the Seattle band <a href="http://spanishfor100.com/home.php">Spanish for 100</a>'s last two summer tours is fantastic, and even better with the <a href="http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=3587190">band's music</a> in the background!Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-47496032097608889852008-07-29T23:10:00.000-07:002008-07-29T23:22:11.094-07:00Enabling storytellingJonathan Saunders is one of the first to take the plunge as a publisher on MagCloud.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.iliketotellstories.com/2008/07/stories-now-touchable.html">i like to tell stories: Stories, Now Touchable.</a>: "the printer is still in beta, but has been helpful in addressing my concerns and honestly reacted well to all my thoughts and attention to detail. i am a stickler or pain in the ass, so i was impressed with the good effort the printers have put forth."<br /><br />He's a pain in the ass? Sure, but the kind who is <span style="font-style:italic;">a perfect Beta user</span>. He's let us glimpse his process for creating a quality product, and that won't only help him reach his own objectives, it's going to help future MagCloud publishers everywhere. Thanks, Jonathan!Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-13418270782200691682008-07-15T21:10:00.000-07:002008-07-15T21:20:46.682-07:00Putting the "New" in "Best New Magazines"<a href="http://magcloud.com/browse/Issue/2344"> <img src="http://api.magcloud.com/Issue/2344/Preview" alt="" width="240" /> </a><br />There has been a fair bit of blogging about MagCloud since we went public last month, and most of the attention is on our print on demand fulfillment of magazines. Yes, HP is well positioned to provide this service given we are a market leader in commercial digital print with our Indigo presses, and thousands of print service provider customers worldwide. I have no doubt the HP machine of R&D and marketing will continue to win in the POD marketplace.<br /><br />But at MagCloud we are really doing something a bit different than POD. We're lowering the barriers to access POD services to enable whole new categories of publications. Our tagline is, after all, <span style="font-style:italic;">The Best New Magazines</span>. My colleague Nathan provides a perfect example: what he likes to call a "reference magazine." We're all familiar with reference books: bulky and generally expensive tomes that provide critical information you need to refer to repeatedly. Online search engines have replaced the need for many hardcopy references, but Nathan's Color Thesaurus cannot be so replaced.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3qPU0pt3JWFjKr1vI5VbgO9bU_BffcTeNHkVYZkxFwH4OS11To8W2shR_OxUmCtK_hNODhowvWkxzNJMP-nHzxgOOQJTIbw9loAVfDQfrazUncbQCrwi8SYLmAgzNyI2W8eEl/s1600-h/thesaurus_spread.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3qPU0pt3JWFjKr1vI5VbgO9bU_BffcTeNHkVYZkxFwH4OS11To8W2shR_OxUmCtK_hNODhowvWkxzNJMP-nHzxgOOQJTIbw9loAVfDQfrazUncbQCrwi8SYLmAgzNyI2W8eEl/s320/thesaurus_spread.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5223459776301046994" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Not only is Nathan's reference magazine a valuable compilation of the results of an online color naming experiment (what words do people use to describe specific colors?); when published via MagCloud it also provides an excellent wysiwyg color reference to use when producing a MagCloud magazine!<br /><br />Read more about Nathan's magazine on his Mostly Color Perception blog: <a href="http://www.communities.hp.com/online/blogs/mostly_color/archive/2008/06/27/digital-pages-are-different.aspx">Digital Pages Are Different</a>.Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-53748956103789437972008-07-03T17:26:00.000-07:002008-07-03T17:30:22.045-07:00More on the technical metric, "suckiness"Derek graciously provides one answer to the question in my blog's tagline.<br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">According to Powazek, the current business model for magazine publishing “sucks”, as about 70 percent of printed magazines are unsold.<br /></blockquote><a href="http://www.sfnblog.com/index.php/2008/07/03/1874-magcloud-print-on-demand-service-for-magazine-publishing-launched">MagCloud, print-on-demand service for magazine publishing launched - sfnblog</a>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-27806717426125005252008-06-27T18:13:00.000-07:002008-06-27T18:14:57.579-07:00design for mankind: best. news. ever.<a href="http://www.designformankind.com/2008/06/best-news-ever.html"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAr5S_P-qWKjYeq29LVhrx44gZuv_3MJb-WfTl6pLZG9tiXxLjm9G8nmpTjkE6sBfi5Y2Xghg6uA1b773bbeT5R5Gd9Z0cp_36yCMAOUSK97Bq6c4j0vlRAtRl5XKS8bgH7cvDuQ/s400/Picture+1.png" /></a><br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;"> Thanks, <a href="http://www.designformankind.com/2008/06/www.magcloud.com">MagCloud</a>, and Mankind Mag's lovely advertisers [to be revealed on Monday] for making my dreams come true! -- <a href="http://www.designformankind.com/2008/06/best-news-ever.html">design for mankind: best. news. ever.</a></blockquote>Wow, to be someone's best. news. ever. is a dream come true. MagCloud couldn't be more proud! I wish my blog had more than 3 readers so I could send some more love back.Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-85704930843608681862008-06-26T00:07:00.000-07:002008-07-21T14:11:19.138-07:00MagCloud publisher invitationsFor those folks who have requested MagCloud publisher invitations, thanks! Just wanted to let everyone know that we've received a <span style="font-style: italic;">few </span>;-), and are churning through them as quickly as we can. We're not running a secret MagCloud Idol competition with a panel of judges, so if you haven't heard back yet there is no need to worry that we've deemed you unworthy. We're simply trying to ramp up reliably and predictably; we're accepting invite requests somewhat randomly to try to sample many different types of publishers, with a bias toward first-come, first-get.<br /><br />For all our new Beta users, publishers and non-publishers, thank you on behalf of the MagCloud team. Never have I seen such supportive bug reports :-). Can't tell you how much that helps as we're stomping the bugs.<br /><br />If you have an existing account and want to use an invitation to upgrade it to have publisher capabilities: when you click on the accept invitation link, look for the link highlighted below.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNdzGkkXCL8JXv80vFpv0s-ZOgRUUKbTFJy33EBtH0-yYnclUN74cxxIAd_TEI205oy9OgxjRF56XHvQDv2PSIzE-T1NoTQGmPC-znR2mpG1bE4w_nAl-vFC2deXLMib84KLAL/s1600-h/invite_info.png"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNdzGkkXCL8JXv80vFpv0s-ZOgRUUKbTFJy33EBtH0-yYnclUN74cxxIAd_TEI205oy9OgxjRF56XHvQDv2PSIzE-T1NoTQGmPC-znR2mpG1bE4w_nAl-vFC2deXLMib84KLAL/s320/invite_info.png" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5225576658780671602" /></a>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-73711055538240252342008-06-21T16:09:00.000-07:002008-06-21T16:09:52.206-07:00POD goes Mag | photostream<a href="http://www.auspiciousdragon.net/photowords/?p=1645">POD goes Mag | photostream</a>:<br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">I guess that a lot of people are about to find out that producing issue one is fun. Producing issue two is easier and a bit less fun. Producing issues four and on is plain hard work. But somebody will make a success of it. And good luck to them.</blockquote>Oh, so true. Giving anyone access to magazine printing and distribution services does not mean anyone can make a living publishing magazines. There was at one time a similar giddiness about AdSense ("wow! I can make money from my blog!") and eBay ("wow! I can make money selling my junk!"). Only a small percentage of people ultimately figure out how to make a living from the new opportunity.<br /><br />However the rest of us still benefit, though perhaps in more incremental ways, from the more efficient marketplace that results. Personally I can't wait, assuming MagCloud can take hold, to see the opportunities that emerge for independent designers, illustrators, writers, photographers et al. (<a href="http://pixish.com/">Pixish</a> provides an early glimpse of that future, I think.)Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-38938480318551357922008-06-19T18:06:00.001-07:002008-06-19T18:08:07.202-07:00MagCloud Shipped<style type="text/css">.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; }</style><div class="flickr-frame"> <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/fraying/2593880812/" title="photo sharing"><img style="width: 380px; height: 278px;" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3243/2593880812_1592d64d42.jpg" class="flickr-photo" alt="" /></a><br /> <span class="flickr-caption"><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/fraying/2593880812/">MagCloud Shipped</a>, originally uploaded by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/fraying/">fraying</a>.</span></div> <p class="flickr-yourcomment"> I've printed dozens of prototype mags in-house over the past months, it's been fun. Only about two weeks ago did I order my first issue and have it mailed to me at home. <br /><br />Totally different experience! Somehow having that sucker come in my mailbox, with postage on it and stuck in a bag, felt very different. Reminded me of the excitement I'd have as a kid waiting for <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/fitzhugh/83957750/">new stickers</a> to show up.</p>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-63925536897112156322008-05-31T22:40:00.001-07:002008-06-19T18:08:30.416-07:00Coming soon...no more!<style type="text/css">.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; }</style><div class="flickr-frame"> <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/fitzhugh/2531551307/" title="photo sharing"><img style="width: 361px; height: 218px;" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3214/2531551307_f2d1fb0454.jpg" class="flickr-photo" alt="" /></a><br /> <span class="flickr-caption"><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/fitzhugh/2531551307/">Coming soon</a>, originally uploaded by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/fitzhugh/">aefitzhugh</a>.</span></div> <p class="flickr-yourcomment"> MagCloud.com has been launched in conjunction with the humongous Drupa commercial printing show in Dusseldorf, Germany. HP supposedly has 20 presses running on the show floor (!), it is a truly massive event (held every four years, called by some "the printing olympics").<br /><br />Fortunately we've managed to keep MC a soft launch. Being able to bury it under all the hardware and usual commercial print talk of Drupa is a blessing. In time I hope it will be clear to all that we're breaking more than a few traditions in commercial printing, and changing magazine publishing in dramatic ways. But we've got a ton of work ahead of us still. I hope to share more in the coming weeks, especially about the amazing folks who have enabled us to get this far.<br /><br />I got my first MC mag in the mail just last week, and despite the dozens of mags I've gotten off the presses as "inside jobs", it was incredibly satisfying to pull a copy out of the mailbox, wrapped in plastic, my name and address on the back. Damn that's sweet.</p>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-42267757276300263402008-05-01T21:43:00.000-07:002008-05-01T21:43:00.791-07:00Microsoft Pro Photo: Geotagging Goes MainstreamI had to give up on <a href="http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Andrew_Fitzhugh/virgil/index.htm">Virgil </a>in 2005 after 4-5 years due to lack of, well, not lack of interest, but lack of <span style="font-style: italic;">will</span> on behalf of HP's product divisions to do anything with it . For a company struggling to differentiate our offerings in digital imaging, particularly digital cameras, you would've thought they'd be all over geotagging and location. Unless you're familiar with Rules of Life in a BigCo, that is :-(.<br /><br />I've been happy to watch Flickr bring geotagging to the masses, but have remained disappointed at how little they've integrated location into normal Flickr functions like tagging, search and more (and especially disappointed in Y! Trip Planner's inability to exploit it; c'mon, could anything be more obvious?). So at Flickr, location is mostly about pushpins on a map, and you still have to go out of your way to do things like location-based search instead of having them seamlessly integrated into your photo browsing experience.<br /><br />I'm thrilled to see Microsoft's Pro Photo Tools (<a href="http://www.microsoft.com/prophoto/articles/progeotagging.aspx">Microsoft Pro Photo: Geotagging Goes Mainstream</a>) with a few geotagging features I prototyped in Virgil, and also implementations of things I filed disclosures on. Most notably the idea of using a time-offset controlling slider in combination with a tracklog and geotagged photos to interactively position the photos correctly. One of my disclosures went a bit further to describe what I never showed I could implement: automatically determine the error in your camera's clock setting based on spatial clustering of mapped photos and assumptions about photo-taking behavior vs. movement. The key assumption? How many photos do you take when you are moving? I'll let you figure out the rest :-).<br /><br />The first version of Virgil was built atop MS MapPoint (800MB desktop version!), then later on their MapPoint web services -- both well before mapping was a thought over at the Googleplex or Y!. MS knew there was value in location, had it locked up really, and fumbled the ball right to Google & Y! by not moving MapPoint forward quickly enough. I'll be glad to see them recover some of the leadership they demonstrated in the past -- but they'll need to stick with it.<br /><br />Can't wait to download Pro Photo and give it a whirl. Will post a review when I get to it.<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/prophoto/articles/progeotagging.aspx"><br /></a>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-46945862308706892292008-04-21T23:20:00.000-07:002008-04-21T23:37:40.422-07:00Wanted: print magazine publisher wannabesDo you have high value content you've always wanted to publish in print, but never knew where to start? Do you have a likely distribution in the 100s or 1000s?<br /><br />I have a limited number of invites to an innovative magazine publishing service in private Beta. Sign up over on <a href="http://magcloud.com">MagCloud</a>, and include a brief message about why you think MagCloud will be good for you. Don't know what MagCloud is? Nobody does -- but tell us what you need. There will be a few of you who fortuitously fit our current limited feature set and can start right away in the private Beta. Others will be free to play as soon as we open up for business, which we hope will be Real Soon Now (TM).<br /><br />ps -- The ideal publisher will have no fear of producing a press ready PDF (but probably should!); MagCloud uses HP Indigo digital presses for awesome full color output.Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8956264.post-35765755131449564682008-04-06T14:08:00.001-07:002008-04-06T14:21:06.902-07:00HAPA rocksSpent a week in Oahu a while back, and was delighted to hear HAPA playing in lobbies everywhere while there! A friend convinced me to go see them in Santa Cruz a bit over 10 years ago and their live show was f*ing amazing. It ain't their live show by any means (despite the tasty solo Flanagan offers at the start), but here's a good fix: their classic "<span>Haleakala Ku Hanohano" (<a href="http://www.hapa.com/lyrics/hapa_haleakalakuhanohano.html">lyrics</a>).<br /><br />HAPA lives at <a href="http://www.hapa.com/">http://www.hapa.com/</a><br /></span><br /><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/9SwhM7h73_U&hl=en"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/9SwhM7h73_U&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object>Andrew Fitzhughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09977804871502152257noreply@blogger.com0