Betsy Devine: Funny ha-ha and/or funny peculiar

Go on, take a butcher’s at The Fair Dinkum, Ridgy Didge, Dinky die, True Blue, Dyed-in-the-wool, Let’s Talk Strine SAO Quiz.

And, after you finish, you’ll understand “take a butcher’s” and many other useful expressions from Down Under.

Disclosure: I myself have an unfair advantage because, at Ookles, I work with Mike Air, who lives in Sydney, and claims he rides to work on a kangaroo. Although, thanks to this quiz, I now suspect he may have been bunging me on…

Dabble, an exciting new startup in the Web 2.0 space, got a great sendoff from Om Malik. Om says that with so many online sources of great video, people increasingly need some way to organize favorites.

Mary Hodder is calling her early release a “balpha“–I’m on the list to play with the beta version, so I guess I still have some time to wait.

Congratulations to Mary and team on a great beginning. Extra praise–from all who are sick of “Web 2.0”–to both Om and Mary for coming up with evocative new words for the rest of us to play with.

p.s. Podcast: Tom Raftery interviews Mary on Dabble’s business model.

Now appearing in this photoset on Flickr.

Sorry no more now–hope there will be a bit more time and connectivity once we get to Cambridge, some time tomorrow.

Thanks to the University of Liverpool, Alon, Tim, Julia, Ian, and more for hospitality that was both brilliant and fab. Er, not one of these people really has a Scouse accent (translation: sounds like Ringo), but I met lots and lots of others who do.

Wow, the beautiful galley proofs came today, shaped just like a book–I flickred 6 photos with the tagline “New Wilczek baby has its father’s face.”

Meanwhile, running on the same brain circuits, Scott Johnson is planning an Ookles launch world tour! Yes, Scott J and Ookles and I are coming soon to a city near you–assuming you live near a city we’re coming to. More in the Ookles blog as the story develops.

And oh yes, just a little tiny extra–Frank and I are leaving for England today. First Liverpool (you can expect some Beatles blogging), then Cambridge. I hope very much to get down to London on Feb. 7 to lend support to Suw and Cory and all the other fine Open Rights Group ppl networking at … 01Zero-One? Okay, I’ll find it somehow.

Not to mention that Amity and Colin just got back from New Zealand where they saw keas and kakas (sp?) and swam with dolphins whose fins look like Mickey Mouse ears. I haven’t heard enough of their stories yet.

So if Frank Paynter wonders why I didn’t blog Bush’s State of the Union spinny speechette–this will have to serve as my excuse.

Funny, quick Flash quiz–10 anonymous faces, 10 simple choices. Are you seeing a serial killer? Or somebody who invented a programming language.

I guessed right on Gerald Sussman, but wrong on Sam Berkowitz.

My score: 6 of 10.

Their assessment: I’m not cut out for police work or IT recruitment.

You think that’s funny? I’d like to see you do better!

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/101dumbest/

Yes, I know the link says dumbest, the smartest is an untitled popup window. You’re second or third into the sequence. Go Dave!

[Quoting Business 2.0 blurb]

Smartest Technology: RSS
At long last, really simple syndication, or RSS, came into its own. Developed by Silicon Valley technologist Dave Winer, RSS makes it easy for popular sites such as CNN, Reuters, and Yahoo — and tens of thousands of bloggers — to distribute online text, audio, and video worldwide. RSS has been around since 1997, but it got a big boost in the past year as Microsoft announced plans to integrate it into Windows, letting RSS do for online media what the Web did for the Internet.

A scholarly pomo analysis of “dude”? And it comes with a spreadsheet? As Bill and Ted would say, “Heinous!” The term is used mainly in situations in which a speaker takes a stance of solidarity or camaraderie, but crucially in a nonchalant, not-too-enthusiastic manner. . . The reason young men use this term is precisely that dude indexes this stance of cool solidarity. Such a stance is especially valuable for young men as they navigate cultural Discourses of young masculinity, which simultaneously demand masculine solidarity, strict heterosexuality, and non-conformity. It’s enough to send you running to the “aargh” page*…

* Aargh page found via the
Slashdot story about
Google stats on a billion pages of HTML markup, which I won’t excerpt here, but which was pretty darn interesting.

Dervala’s blogging again, after a long break, and Silicon Valley just got a sharp poke in the schnozz:

Los Gatos used to be a farm town, prosperous enough to raise fine 19th century brick buildings. Now it’s home to some of the most materially successful people on this planet. It’s northern California, not Manhattan, so you can’t tell who’s winning by Blahnik shoes and Chloe dresses, but those are probably Marc Jacobs bags that the yummy mummies swing from their Australian strollers.

I first blog-met Dervala when she was roaming the world, sliding on her butt down muddy mountains in Ecuador. Later (such is the blessing of blogging) Halley introduced the two of us in NYC, over bowls of Union Oyster House oyster chowder, or maybe over an ice-skating spill at Rockefeller Center.

Dervala’s real life gets so enormously active that sometimes she doesn’t blog for weeks and weeks. But now, it seems, she’s back, rolling out mini-yarns and occasional long tales.

Welcome back, Dervala, please stick around for a while!