Not sure what’s going on right now, but it appears that Apple.com is borked.

This can’t be good for the almighty Jobs.

There are few tech things I love more than my dear, sweet Blackberry (recent crashing issues notwithstanding), but one thing that comes close is Twitter.

So what could be better than something which marries the two? In an attempt to do just that I downloaded Twitterberry the other day to test it as a client on my Blackberry.

Unfortunately, I found it to be a great concept but poorly executed. It contrasts starkly with the fluid, effortless UI of the Blackberry. My chief complaint is that it’s too difficult to see updates from your friends when using Twitterberry. The screen defaults to an input screen where you can enter tweets, but if you want to see what anyone else is up to, you have to explicitly select the “Friend Timeline” window via the menu button. Doing so not only takes you away from the ability to update, but the friend timeline reloads itself EVERY time you look at it – it doesn’t cache tweets.

Another problem is the fact that you don’t have access to the full menu of actions when you’re looking at any screen other than the input section. So when you’re checking out your replies or your friends’ tweets, the menu button is dumbed down. To do anything useful, you first have to back out of the screen you’re looking at, return to the input screen, and then select whatever action you want. That’s an extra step which gets super annoying if you hope to use Twitterberry with any sort of frequency.

After about 5 hours of having Twitterberry installed, I uninstalled it an returned to using Google Talk for the Blackberry as my mobile Twitter client. It’s super simple, but it’s still more pleasant to use than Twitterberry.

Twitterberry definitely still has potential, but they really need to work on the user interface. For starters, try putting the friend feed and an input field on the same screen. That would make a world of difference.

Hooray! Web 2.0 Expo is here. What does that mean? Well, beside the fact that there are way more tech nerds in SF than usual, it also means a lot of companies are spending perfectly good VC money to get you liquored up.

For all you party animals out there, here’s a quick list of the Web 2.0 parties going on this week. Continue reading ‘Drink for free all week’

Brilliant breakdown of the song “You’re Beautiful” by James Blunt.

I recently returned from two weeks in Europe, attending a trade show, working from our Geneva office, and then a little fun in Paris. Along the way I learned several things. Here are some of those lessons:

1. Mullets are still very much in style among Eastern Europeans.
2. Europeans still like Americans, even if they don’t understand or like our government. They especially like Americans who hate George Bush.
3. At most hotels parking is relatively cheap, but Internet connections are ridiculously expensive.
4. Swedish expats are kind of like the mafia - they all know each other, stick together, and help each other out.
5. It pays to make friends with Swedes.
6. Parisians are not as horribly unfriendly as I remembered (or feared).
7. It’s hard to get less than 100 CHF bills out of an ATM in Geneva. For example, withdrawing 400 CHF gets you two 100 CHF and one 200 CHF bill.
8. When you withdraw 100 CHF in Geneva and select the “mixed bills” option, it spits out two 50 CHF bills.
9. The French and the Germans are pretty much total opposites. A “half glass” in German in a half liter. In France it’s half of a half liter (0.25 L). Germans pronounce every letter in their words. French pronounce maybe 1/3 of them. The rest are silent.
10. Champagne + beer + white wine + red wine + cognac + limoncello = invincibility.

Greetings from Geneva!

I’m working out of our European office this week after attending CeBIT in Hannover last week. The tradeshow was huge, with over 500,000 people attending. And although it was a lot of work, we got some great leads, maintained our existing business relationships, and had a lot of fun in the process.

Now I’m sitting in our Geneva office, with a beautiful view of the Jura mountains and the top of the Jet d’Eau visible above the Geneva skyline.  I’m looking forward to a week of working with my European colleagues. Will post more as the week progresses.

I’ll be at CES in Las Vegas next week, representing Joby and promoting our new product offerings. Come visit us at booth #71037 in the Sands!

If anyone will be in Vegas, drop me a line at peter [at] pberg.com.

I’ll try to post some updates from the field, so watch this space for more info!

UPDATE [2006-12-03 16:05]: Here’s another article, also from PC World, which talks about how nefarious Facebook’s tracking really is. Not even deleting cookies will prevent it from happening.

[my original post]

I just came across an alarming article about Facebook’s Beacon which states that apparently Facebook is receiving data on users activities outside of Facebook.

As if Beacon hasn’t generated enough controversy already, Facebook now admits that it tracks logged-off users through partner sites which send data about users back to Facebook. Their most recent admission contradicts earlier statements which said that Facebook does not track users.

Initially I was of the opinion that Beacon was just the next logical (albeit frightening) step in the whole social network advertising model. It stands to reason that as new adopters (read:young people) sign up for social networks, they will simply be accustomed to fewer and fewer privacy protections. As we slide down the slippery slope of eroding online privacy, things like Beacon will eventually cease to outrage people and will simply become an accepted norm.

I wonder if Beacon would have met with such strong opposition from users if Facebook had cut people in on the revenue. It’s rather alarming to have your picture appear next to your most recent purchase from Fandango or Blockbuster. But what if you got a cut of each purchase that was made thanks to a clickthrough on that ad? Would people still have such a big problem with it then?

And when you really look at who’s protesting, it’s still only a tiny fraction of users. The last time I checked, MoveOn.org’s online petition against Facebook’s privacy violations only had about 50,000 users, which is less than 0.1% of all Facebook users (as of November 2007).

Nevertheless, this latest revelation about the reach of Beacon outside of Facebook’s website and its tracking of logged-out users is very disturbing. Facebook’s contradiction of itself is even more so. I’m waiting eagerly to hear what they have to say for themselves.

In about 18 hours from the time of this post I will be on a bicycle, attempting to ride 150 miles, or until I die, whichever comes first.

I’ll be leaving AT&T Park in San Francisco, headed to wine country for the MS 150 - Waves to Wine charity bike ride to fight multiple sclerosis. It will be my second time doing this ride. I rode last year with a bunch of my friends, and I had so much fun that I thought, “why not do it again?”. Well, that plan would have been great except for the fact that for the past three months I’ve lead an almost entirely sedentary lifestyle. This argely because of my work schedule, but in part also due to my inherent laziness (inertia is a powerful thing).

So now I’m staring a 150-mile bike ride in the face with practically no training. I suspect things will probably turn out ok, but not without a little bit of pain first. Then again, it’s nothing compared to actually having multiple sclerosis.

If you’d like to sponsor my crazy little endeavor, I would be honored if you clicked through to my donor page.

All the money goes to a very good cause (no, not my wine collection) – the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. Donations can be made through October 30, 2007. Thanks in advance!

So I’ve done the blogging thing off and on since 2000, but most of the time I’m too busy living life to blog.

Nevertheless, I’m giving it another shot now. I’ve somehow managed to post a Daily Peter almost every day for three weeks, so perhaps this blogging thing might end up being a semi-regular occurrence as well!