Jared W. Smith

Transparency of many different types — whether it be the authenticity type, the Saran Wrap type, or the Windows 7 Aero window border glassy type — was interwoven all throughout the show tonight. It proved to be a pervasive theme, to say the least. Also, our first call-in over Skype! There’s still some kinks to work out, but they’ll get there. Overall a good stepping stone. Video after the jump. read more »

Tonight’s Serious Business will start with a fairly serious topic: Openness, transparency, and disclosure online — how much is too much? Where should it stop? What kind of image are you creating based on what you put online? I’ve been mulling this for a while in a series of blog drafts, and Scobleizer’s recent comments on responsible social networking for those who are looking for a job have brought that issue back to the forefront.

Tonight, for the first time, I’ll be taking your calls over Skype. (It’ll work best if you use a headset.) Finally, you won’t have to listen to me talk for an hour. And, as always, we’ll have the Serious Business Afterglow Party at Gene’s Haufbrau starting roughly at 9:45. Bundle up, it’ll be cold. :)

Hope to see everybody tonight at 8:30 ET!

Serious Business hit the ground running on its new night last night — we’re doing it live Wednesdays now at 8:30 PM ET. I saw a lot of new faces in the show last night — very cool! Here’s hoping next week I won’t fall asleep before preparation so I can start doing some Skype call-ins. :) An hour of my voice hurts your ears and my vocal cords, so it will be awesome to bring more into the mix. Last night’s show, where I say my piece on Twitter’s first-week-of-2009 struggles and demonstrate Windows 3.11 on my 386, lives on after the jump. read more »

2008 was Serious Business. I’ll be taking a look back at what 2008 did and take a stab, with the assistance of the infamous Dragon Dagger, at what 2009 might possibly bring (though I will likely be very, very wrong). I’ll take your predictions in the chat room, and we’ll likely derail the conversation in some awesome direction as we always do. :) We’ll do it live on Ustream.tv at 8:30 Eastern, 5:30 Pacific. Hope to see you in chat!

Yes, I’m bringing Serious Business back tonight for the first time in three months. While the plan is to do another show next Tuesday, I can’t guarantee that Tuesdays will be the permanent night yet. (Honestly, it all predicates on the day of the week after work I go to Norm’s.) It’ll be the usual 8:30 ET starting time.

What’s on the docket tonight?

• OMG LISTS: If you ask some people, lists are The Scourge of the Internets. Others deem them necessary, and even more people think “There’s two Internets?”
• 12seconds Is The New Hotness: 12seconds.tv — a service that is essentially Twitter for videos, limiting you to 12 seconds to speak your mind — recently went into public beta. With more community building there, it’s starting to become a real blast, and I may have found a great use for it as well…
• The Answers: A new segment wherein you ask me a question, I consult my source, and give you the answer. You’ll just have to see it.

There’s likely more, and who knows what tangents we might go off on in the conversation — the only way to find out for sure is if you join us at 8:30 ET tonight!

I had a wonderful time at ConvergeSouth and the impromptu but rabidly successful (at least in my mind) Independent Bloggers’ Conference this weekend. I’ll have a full recap post in the next day or so after I drive back from Greensboro, but here’s my demonstration of Charleston Weather from Saturday’s sessions, which was a fun and loose workshop with really cool questions from the crowd and a couple mishaps (because when you DO IT LIVE, sometimes things go wrong). Many thanks to Patrick for taping in high definition (and boo on iMovie for weirding it out a bit; this upload will be replaced by something a bit better soon).

Tonight’s briefing started with a recap of Gustav and its impacts in Louisiana. We then moved along to Hanna; the 5PM track continues to take the storm in at the GA/SC border and up the gut of SC, and could potentially bring hurricane force winds to Charleston by Friday. Also, I took a quick look at Ike and yet another area under investigation out in the Atlantic, Invest 99.

I’ll have a full post with the next full advisory at 11PM.