Ken Schafer

Crossroads Producers Killed Mary Barclay

I hadn't heard of Mary Barclay before stumbling across her obituary by the BBC.

While I know nothing about her other than what I read today I can't help thinking she'd get a good laugh from the unfortunate juxtaposition of the headline and caption in her obit:

I'm sure it wasn't overzealous Crossroads producers deciding to have a hit put out on the nonagenarian but that was my first thought.

A Valentine For All My Girls

Dick & Syl Cut The Cake

A while ago I started collecting up all the old photo albums and shoeboxes of pictures and slides that have been stored at the back of closets with the hope of starting a scanning project to share these with family and (to a lesser extent) the world.
I did a test scan and post to Flickr of my in-laws wedding photo:
I'm pretty happy with the scan given I was using an old scanner and didn't pay that much attention to my settings. I did a bit of cropping and tweaked the contrast.
And now that this photo is out there for the world to see, maybe someone can explain tome why they have a meadow full of flowers on top of their cake!

How Often Does Your Calendar Clear?

I just checked my calendar to see what my week was like and nearly fainted:

I never have weeks like this.

We're not big on "standing meetings" at Tucows but I do like to make time to sit down with all my direct reports at least once a week. And I do the same with the Exec Team and Elliot. After that the rest of the week fills in pretty quickly with project-related meetings, sprint reviews, vendor discussions, customers time, and so on.

Loads of people are travelling on business or sick this week so my schedule is extremely light. Now, to be clear, this won't last. By the end of the week much of it will have filled in.

But still, it makes me realize how little time I often end up with to "do" stuff instead of talking about doing stuff. I look forward to rolling up my sleeves and getting some projects of my own going this week.

Adding Disqus To Schafer.com

Earlier this week I was reading a post on Fred Wilson's blog and clued in to the fact that he's been using Disqus as a substitute for the TypePad commenting system he used in the past.

I really liked the Disqus approach to commenting and, given that this blog runs on TypePad as well, I thought I'd give it a try.

If I did my template manipulation correctly based on Disqus' very easy-to-grok walkthrough, we should now have a new and improved commenting system here. I'd love it if you could try it out and let me know what you think.

The experience is really enhanced if you add your pic to your Disqus account as it will automatically pop up beside your comment - here and on other Disqus enabled sites.

Feel free to experiment in the comment thread below.

I Go On The Record About Microhoo

Earlier this week I was quoted in an IT Business article about the possible acquisition of Yahoo! by Microsoft.

Here's what I had to say:

The two main things going for Yahoo is brand and massive audience, said Ken Schafer, vice-president of product management and marketing for Tucows Inc.

Tucows began as a domain name registrar in the early 1990s but quickly transformed itself into a service and software vendor for Web hosting firms and Internet service providers.

"Yahoo's problem is it has had a hard time in finding out how to leverage its main assets," Schafer said. "Yahoo was not able to execute as quickly as people had been hoping it would."

Schafer said Microsoft's bid for Yahoo did not come as a surprise, as people in the online marketing industry had been talking about its possibility for years.

"Personally, I hope they manage to pull it off. Competition means innovation, and the more competition, the better."

I'm not sure that history will prove me out. Right now it looks like Yahoo!'s board is prepared to put up a fight to keep the company out of Steve Balmer's hands (or at least to make him pay dearly for the honour).

Apple Mail Makes Email More Personal

One of the things I love about Apple Mail is the way it integrates with Address Book to pull out a picture of the sender. Another is that I have installed a Plaxo plug-in that pulls up additional data and reminders from Plaxo's social network.

To see this in action, I submit a recent message from Zoe:

This pic was taken on my iPhone which synced it to Address Book. Here birthday was two days away when I took this capture and Plaxo was nice enough to remind me of this (not that I needed reminding about my daughter's birthday but you get the point).

The only problem I've had is that there is something, lord knows what, in David Crow's Plaxo data that crashes the Plaxo Plug-in and Apple Mail along with it every time I try to open a message from him. The weird thing is that I have this incredible urge to contact David to get him to fix it instead of Plaxo and Apple. :)

Who Cut The Cables?

The same people who pitted Seattle-area windshields in the spring of 1954.

Right now Techmeme is littered with people spinning wild theories on why "five undersea cables have been cut" in a short period of time.

Of course there have been some voices of reason as well.

It's really worth spending some time reading the links above - particularly the comments - to see how people react when they receive a small piece of information that doesn't fit into our every-day world-view.

Check out this digg thread for example:

This is fairly typical. A few people crying this must be a conspiracy and others wise cracking about "frickin' sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their frickin' heads" being the culprit.

Back in 2003 when SARS hit Toronto (in particular) causing mass hysteria, I posted a link to a great article about a bizarre rash of windshield pitting incidents in Seattle in 1954. For anyone getting caught up in the "cable cutting conspiracy", this is a must read.

My Favourite Superbowl Ad

I actually watched the Superbowl today, even though we don't get many of the Superbowl ads up here in Canada. Luckily all the ads are online at myspace.com/superbowlads.

I think this "twofer" was my favourite:

I love Will Ferrell despite an incredibly erratic track track record when it comes to film quality.

Sarah Silverman on Jimmy Kimmel

Mitch Joel pointed me to this YouTube video of Sarah Silverman on Jimmy Kimmel:

I don't watch Kimmel but apparently this is the culmination of several running gags on the show.