The political night continues…it’ll be short, I promise :)  Just got done watching Blog Wars on the Sundance Channel.  While the title would lead one to think that it would be about the back and forth between blogs in the political world, what it turned out to be is far different.  In the end it seemed more about the rise and endorsement of the left-wing bloggers then a balanced look at both sides.  But still, the behind the scenes look was somewhat interesting.  It could have been subtitled “How We Think The Daily Kos Is Changing Politics”.

It looks like Ford is partnering with Microsoft to release a new autocomputing platform next year.  Since I bleed Ford Blue, and will be needing a new car soon, this is exciting news.  I hope my Escort lasts one more year so I’m not limited to the Focus or the Five-Hundred.  Oh, and please hold the “Fix Or Reboot Daily” jokes.

As Teresa points out on her blog, the same old men (and women, of both parties) have been in charge of the country for a long time. According to the Congressional Research Service the 109th Congress was the oldest in history (average age 56 years (Senators averaged over 60 years! (Representatives averaged 55))). When you consider that the minimum ages for Representatives and Senators are 25 and 30 respectively, then you get some idea how long these people have been running the country. In fact the longest serving congressman is John Dingell, Democrat Representative from Michigan. Mr. Dingell first took office in 1955. That’s over 50 years! The founding fathers never imagined congressional terms this long. They believed in the citizen congress. Congressmen were meant to serve few terms and then return to their professions, politics where not meant to be their profession.

Obviously it’s time for some young blood, from both sides of the aisle. John Edwards has shown that the time of the young, internet savvy politician is, if not here, at least close at hand. Given that Al Gore invented it, it’s not surprising that Democrats/Liberals are often viewed as more internet savvy then their peers. Though being young and Democrat doesn’t automatically mean you’re an internet expert.

But at least the Democrat’s have somebody. Where is the internet savvy Republican/Conservative? Contrary to the popular wisdom; there are plenty of small-government-wanting, personal-responsibility-believing, technically savvy people out there. Why aren’t any in politics? Are they too intelligent? Is John Edwards simply the smartest idiot? I would be very interested to see how a internet wise conservative candidate (Republican or third party) would play out, I think the results would surprise a few people. If anyone knows of such a person, please let me know.

I haven’t actually seen this one around too much, looks like I’m Big and Bad and I like it!

Michael.NET’s results are:
Michael.NET is Apocalypse

Apocalypse 91% Magneto 86% Dr. Doom 81% The Joker 76% Lex Luthor 74% Venom 67% Riddler 67% Green Goblin 65% Dark Phoenix 62% Juggernaut 57% Kingpin 56% Mr. Freeze 53% Two-Face 49% Mystique 45% Poison Ivy 43% Catwoman 36%

You believe in survival of the fittest and you believe that you are the fittest.

Click here to take the “Which Super Villain are you?” quiz…

Looks like I’m a Super Ironman…(coincidently two of my favourite superheroes growing up), this seems to be the popular thing to post lately, which one are you?

Michael.NET’s results are:
Michael.NET is Superman

Superman 80% Iron Man 80% Spider-Man 75% Green Lantern 65% Robin 60% Catwoman 60% The Flash 55% Hulk 55% Supergirl 53% Batman 50% Wonder Woman 28%

You are mild-mannered, good, strong and you love to help others.

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Quiz

With the recent talk about Google perhaps replacing Digg as a social news/link site, a lot of people made the point that you can’t share non-feed items through Reader. While it’s true that you can’t click on a URL and add it to Reader, there is a work around. Admittedly it’s technically a feed…but it’s your own personal feed of links.

The first thing to do is to setup an account on del.icio.us (note: Originally I wanted an all Google solution, if there was a way to embed HTML in Spreadsheets (or if notebook had RSS feeds) then del.icio.us wouldn’t be necessary, and if Google Bookmarks ever becomes shareable with an RSS feed then watch out), this will be where all the non-feed items you want to share will be put. After you’ve registered browse to your bookmarks (http://del.icio.us./username) at the bottom of the page they’ll be an RSS icon, right click this icon and select copy link. Since Google Reader doesn’t like del.icio.us feeds for some reason, we have to burn it. Go to FeedBurner and follow the directions on burning your feed. Add the FeedBurner feed to Google Reader.

Now, here’s where the trick comes in, once it comes up in Google Reader, Click the Add to folder button and select new folder. Let’s give it a good name like…Shared-Links. You should now have a folder that contains the feed of your bookmarked items. Now in order to share it just go to your Settings, click the Tags tab and you’ll see a list of all your folders, including the newly created shared-links. There’ll be a grayed out RSS icon and the word private in the third column. Simply click the icon and the folder will become public.

Click on the “view public page” link and you’ll be given the URL for those items, in my case it’s http://www.google.com/reader/shared/user/17930628540914156026/label/shared-links . As you add items to your del.icio.us account they’ll appear on that page. You can then spread both your Link Blog and your Bookmark Blog. Enjoy!

Steve Mermelstein of /usr/bin/geek asks what would happen if Google started using some of the stats in their Google Reader app to pull up the most popular stories of the blogosphere (ie techmeme, technorati, et. al.). A couple of others have also picked up on it now. Google Reader’s shared items and starred items certainly seem ripe for the picking, I’m surprised there’s not already a “Most Starred” and/or “Most Shared” story page. Could Google Reader really be a stealth entry into the user-generated news business? With Blogger recently adding an easy way to put AdSense on their user’s sites, you can definitely see Google wanting an easy way to draw people to their user’s blogs. Remember, Google’s primary business is Advertising, a site ala Digg, using blogs from their Blogger Service has the potential to draw a lot of revenue. Of course not everyone uses Blogger, but how many people use AdSense? It’s really in Google’s best interest to be driving as many people to as many blogs as possible, and putting a user-generated news aggregation service on their front page would sure do that, and nobody would even have to work that hard! No more “digging” just hit “s” or “shift-s” as you’re going through your feeds. And there’d be no overhead for Google, everyone is responsible for their own blog! It’s a win-win.

Christmas was very enjoyable. Since Marissa doesn’t have to be on the apnea monitor 24/7 any more we got to take her out an about. The resulting activity caused her to sleep very well over the night! I also got my first chance to play the Nintendo Wii first hand, it really is a different experince. Wii Sports shows off the console and control schemes very well I think. It’s also quite a work out in the end! Twillight Princess is enjoyable, but not quite as revolutionary as Wii Sports I think. The channels show real promise, but there’s not alot there, browsing with the Opera browser (trial edition) is suprisingly enjoyable and functional (Youtube on the TV is a sight to behold).

In the Technology arena we have the whole Wikiasari news hitting, seems the founder of Wikipedia is setting out to revolutionize searching. TechCrunch posted a screenshot that purported to be an early beta of the service, but Jimmy Wales denied it’s related to Wikiasari. Has one of TechCrunch’s readers pointed out to them, the screenshot seems to be from this site. As Michael Arrignton asks, if WikiSearch isn’t Wikiasari…what is it? And will Wikiasari contribute to the end of the Google Era? 2007 looks to be the year alot of sites go mainstream. Youtube get’s sponsored by Chevy, and Myspace get’s used by the Colts. The next week or two should be interesting…

Sean Lyndersay, Program Manager Lead for RSS at Microsoft, has responded to the RSS Patent Flap. Microsoft is essentially saying: “We only patented what we feel is some cool additions we invented, we promise not to try and take over RSS.” Niall Kennedy has a good in-depth analysis of the patent application which essentially says “Most of this stuff is all obvious prior art, there’s a few new ideas, but not many.” He also asks the scary question of “What other “inventions” are yet to be unveiled as the patent system’s 18-month privacy rolls forward?”.

Stephen Griffen over at MSDN as discovered an easter egg in LEGO Star Wars II. The Santa Clause code was already known, but he discovered a Rudolph Code (using strings no less)! He’s asking for your help getting a screenshot, so leave him a comment with a link to one if you can.