tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-118385152024-03-13T04:08:12.721-07:00innovez! - \'in-oh-vey\ - (innovate!)The professional blog of Bryan Hoffpauir, Jr. (BJ Hoffpauir) on the intersections of innovations in technology, business, and the arts.beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.comBlogger82125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-38284754648520405672016-08-22T19:13:00.001-07:002016-08-22T19:13:05.803-07:00The Problem with Time & Timezones - Computerphile<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-5wpm-gesOY" width="480"></iframe>beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-82243928543139426672016-03-15T05:04:00.000-07:002017-02-09T10:26:58.450-08:00keybase.txt<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">==================================================================</span><br /><div class="post-body entry-content" id="post-body-3479510139100631312" itemprop="description articleBody" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; position: relative; width: 676px;">
https://keybase.io/beejhuff<br />
--------------------------------------------------------------------<br />
<br />
I hereby claim:<br />
<br />
* I am an admin of https://innovez.blogspot.com<br />
* I am beejhuff (https://keybase.io/beejhuff) on keybase.<br />
* I have a public key with fingerprint 5CAF 226B 52B0 03F8 11DA 47D6 5311 7C1A 8673 E297<br />
<br />
To do so, I am signing this object:<br />
<br />
{<br />
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"host": "keybase.io",<br />
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"uid": "ac6bc551ee09b2253bea19e6286f8219",<br />
"username": "beejhuff"<br />
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"service": {<br />
"hostname": "innovez.blogspot.com",<br />
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"seqno": 60,<br />
"tag": "signature"<br />
}<br />
<br />
which yields the signature:<br />
<br />
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Comment: https://keybase.io/crypto<br />
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jF+Db+Z3nvOmrfhYn51743t79YS22iOvTuUdfTp5SctvBsZJRg==<br />
=nXnw<br />
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<br />
And finally, I am proving ownership of this host by posting or<br />
appending to this document.<br />
<br />
View my publicly-auditable identity here: https://keybase.io/beejhuff<br />
<br />
==================================================================</div>
</div>
beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.comLafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045402 -92.342566200000022 30.4436392 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-64235899936856341702016-01-05T10:36:00.001-08:002016-01-05T10:44:11.487-08:00Managing Infrastructure as Code with Terraform<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Watching a fantastic DevOps Webinar now: <a href="https://t.co/7KUt1QrVDW" target="_blank">Managing Infrastructure as Code with Terraform</a>!<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZXiYhNSeelg/VowOfR5dDEI/AAAAAAABOm8/To4g2jC1syQ/s1600/Capture.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="369" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZXiYhNSeelg/VowOfR5dDEI/AAAAAAABOm8/To4g2jC1syQ/s640/Capture.PNG" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
You can also <a href="http://event.lvl3.on24.com/event/10/84/71/8/rt/1/documents/resourceList1451962358808/managing_infrastruce_as_code_with_terraform.pdf" target="_blank">download the slides</a> if you missed the live show.</div>
beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-38467415588748694512015-07-25T19:06:00.001-07:002015-07-25T22:22:28.078-07:00#LafayetteLives #LafayetteStrong #Love<style>.embed-container {position: relative; padding-bottom: 120%; height: 0; overflow: hidden;} .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }</style><div class='embed-container'><iframe src='//instagram.com/p/5hbXHjmrCb/embed/' frameborder='0' scrolling='no' allowtransparency='true'></iframe></div>beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA 70506, USA30.2002897 -92.07632530000000829.9806872 -92.3990488 30.4198922 -91.753601800000013tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-82892051045279114252015-04-15T12:12:00.000-07:002015-04-15T12:12:04.957-07:00Helpful Git Command Tips and Happy 10th Birthday Wishes<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-skVgem1MYps/VS6optrWqeI/AAAAAAAAPh0/YgqMpPqRHNA/s1600/10_Years_of_Git___Atlassian_Git_Tutorial.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Helpful Git Command Tips and Happy 10th Birthday Wishes" border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-skVgem1MYps/VS6optrWqeI/AAAAAAAAPh0/YgqMpPqRHNA/s1600/10_Years_of_Git___Atlassian_Git_Tutorial.png" height="360" title="Helpful Git Command Tips and Happy 10th Birthday Wishes" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Happy 10th Birthday Git!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
This year marks the 10th birthday of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git_(software)" target="_blank">git</a>, the distributed version control system created by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linus_Torvalds" target="_blank">Linus Torvalds</a> who's more famously known as the creator of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux" target="_blank">Linux kernel</a>. If you're a software developer, I hope you're at least familiar with source control systems because they make your professional life SO much easier (though I admit they can be a bit challenging to first get accustomed to...).<br />
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Even if you're day job isn't in the software development space, my guess is that if you're in IT in any capacity, you've probably interacted with Linux or other open source software systems, most of which use git (and / or <a href="http://www.github.com/" target="_blank">github</a>) to manage their source code repositories.<br />
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Below, I've included a few helpful tips and tricks I've discovered to make using git even more productive for your daily workflow, along with links to learn more about the history of git and an interview with Linus on his take on git after it's first 10 years...<br />
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<a name='more'></a><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1EkfE6s36mM/VS6rcITQbrI/AAAAAAAAPiA/wGKpGX9b3A8/s1600/41NGJMEVVRL._SL500_AA300_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1EkfE6s36mM/VS6rcITQbrI/AAAAAAAAPiA/wGKpGX9b3A8/s1600/41NGJMEVVRL._SL500_AA300_.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a><br />
I was first introduced to version control systems for software source code via <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Visual_SourceSafe" target="_blank">Microsoft's Visual Source Safe</a> (I know, I know, it was a brutal beast to work with, but at the time I mostly developed Visual Basic & .Net applications and it was one of the few games in town...). <br />
<br />
I used to wonder why other developers I knew working on "enterprise" software development projects used to rant and rave about how great source control systems were compared to the old days...<br />
<br />
...until inevitably, I made some destructive changes to an application's source code and when I went to restore a backup of previous work discovered (to my absolute horror) that the backup system had developed some problem that had gone previously undiscovered. After a frantic few days I came to the realization that the last good backup I had of the source code was over a month old and after re-coding over 4 weeks worth of changes made a resolution to figure out how to do this whole "version control system" thing.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cw9HvtiSTvs/VS6z86Yq2mI/AAAAAAAAPiQ/yf-RMuqsmfo/s1600/subversion_logo-384x332.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Apache Subversion Source Control System" border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cw9HvtiSTvs/VS6z86Yq2mI/AAAAAAAAPiQ/yf-RMuqsmfo/s1600/subversion_logo-384x332.png" height="172" title="Apache Subversion Source Control System" width="200" /></a></div>
Admittedly, since I was new to the topic, it took a little getting used to. But for the most part, I had to agree that knowing I could easily revert back to previous versions of my source code if needed made me both a better developer and much more productive. Of course, as anyone who has ever really used VSS for any length of time will tell you, it wasn't REALLY that great of a version control system.<br />
<br />
After beating my head against the limitation of VSS, I eventually moved on to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_Subversion" target="_blank">subversion (aka svn)</a> and although it was markedly better than VSS (especially as I branched out to work on more non-Microsoft platform development projects) I did have to deal with the pain of merging changes manually for many years.<br />
<br />
Thankfully, I soon discovered <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercurial" target="_blank">mercurial (hg)</a> and later git and along with them the wonders of being able to (mostly) merge changes from multiple developers working on a shared code base with ease and simultaneously learning how much more pleasurable distributed version control systems were compared to their centralized counterparts.<br />
<br />
So, as a sign of thanks to <a href="https://github.com/git/git" target="_blank">all of the developers</a> who've contributed to git and in honor of it's 10th birthday, here's a few links of helpful resources on git and it's history:<br />
<br />
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li><a href="https://www.atlassian.com/git/articles/10-years-of-git/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=git-insiders-newsletter_apr-2015" target="_blank">Atlassian's Historical Timeline of git</a> : a fun and interactive way to learn more about git and the major milestones in its development<br /><br /></li>
<li><a href="http://www.linux.com/news/featured-blogs/185-jennifer-cloer/821541-10-years-of-git-an-interview-with-git-creator-linus-torvalds" target="_blank">10 Years of Git: An Interview with Git Creator Linus Torvalds</a> : Published by linux.com, this interview includes some funny tidbits from Linus and the story of how he hacked the majority of it together on his own over the course of a week or so.<br /><br /></li>
<li><a href="http://blog.rlmflores.me/git/2015/03/31/8-small-git-tips/" target="_blank">8 Small git tips</a> : a short collection of helpful tips you can put into practice right now to make using git even more productive for your everyday workflow</li>
</ol>
<div>
One of my favorite tips included above is how to use the advanced features of git's <span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">log</span> command to display the history of your repo in an easier to read format:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SkrBPUfbDnE/VS62ptSMFwI/AAAAAAAAPic/eMqD7jn9bJU/s1600/insured_amedadirect_com_%E2%80%94_less_%E2%80%94_197%C3%9747.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Using the advanced flags of git's log command to better format yrou repository's historical log" border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SkrBPUfbDnE/VS62ptSMFwI/AAAAAAAAPic/eMqD7jn9bJU/s1600/insured_amedadirect_com_%E2%80%94_less_%E2%80%94_197%C3%9747.png" height="315" title="Using the advanced flags of git's log command to better format yrou repository's historical log" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sample output of
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: xx-small;">git log --graph --decorate --pretty=oneline --abbrev-commit</span></span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA 70506, USA30.2002897 -92.07632530000000829.9806872 -92.3990488 30.4198922 -91.753601800000013tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-36846799583447394012015-04-11T23:26:00.001-07:002015-04-12T06:29:46.286-07:00Dax Riggs performing What a Wonderful World<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I've long been a fan of <a href="http://www.daxriggs.com/" target="_blank">Dax Riggs</a>, a fellow South Louisiana native. Like the proverbial prodigal son, he's returned and now calls Lafayette, LA his home. I've had the good fortune to see Dax live on many occasions, from my first show of his when he was fronting Acid Bath (and opening for Marilyn Manson), to his reincarnation in Deadboy and the Elephant Men, to several of his solo appearances from Austin, TX to my home in Lafayette, LA.</div>
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It's always a great show, and Dax shows his love for his fans at every show. If you get a chance to see him live, take it. You won't be sorry. In fact, there is no doubt in my mind that you'll become a fan instantly.</div>
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But don't take my word for it, watch this performance I captured of him wailing "What a Wonderful World" If you don't hear the pain and passion in his voice, your soul must have been lost a long time ago.</div>
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His style has been called a lot of things, though <a href="http://www.laweekly.com/music/henry-rollins-the-column-diggin-dax-2411756" target="_blank">I personally like Henry Rollins' take</a>:</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: left;">
For me, Dax is re-defining Blues music. Even though he plays his songs through the guitar-bass-drums model for the most part, he is the self-contained unit. He is, as they say, the whole package and the real deal. Musicians like Dax come along very seldom. When I listen to Dax's work, it makes me think of another great stand-alone, the late great Jeffrey Lee Pierce of the Gun Club, who so clearly demarcated his territory...</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: left;">
With the next incarnation of Dax, The Agents of Oblivion, he and his bandmates leave genre specificity behind and this is where, at least for me, it all gets very interesting and really great. You can hear an evolution in the writing and arrangements; there's a Bowie element that can be detected here and there. Again, Dax's vocals and lyrics dominate the album. There are no happy songs here. It's all heavy. Death, sex, drugs and darkness permeate the lyrics, the songs are hard rocking but there's definitely something more going on. It's not everybody's thing but it sure is mine. This album is one of my favorite suggestions to people when they ask for the record of a blink-and-you-missed-them band.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: left;">
Next was Deadboy and the Elephantmen. Their first album, If This Is Hell, I Am Lucky has been re-released on Fat Possum under Dax's name. It is different than Acid Bath and the Agents recordings. Way more out there, more ambitious, another one of those records that went away for awhile but is now back in print and another one of those that makes you wonder how it could have gotten by you. You can hear Dax stretching himself and taking his work forward. It almost makes the Acid Bath and Agents recordings sound slightly derivative.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: left;">
Dax's next release, Deadboy, and the Elephantmen's We Are Night Sky, are when I finally caught up with Dax and all of these great records. Heidi, a woman who has been working at my office and running my life for well over a decade, came into the building years ago with this album and told me to stop what I was doing and put it on. She had heard it the night before and said she was riveted for its entirety. I put the album on and had the same reaction. Where Hell is a full band, We Are is stripped down to a twosome of Dax and Tessie Brunet and it succeeds in a very big way. This is a gem of an album. While everything that came before did well with volume and density, this album triumphs in its minimalism and strong songs. It's too bad that the band never released this on LP.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: left;">
After Night Sky was released, Dax went solo with We Sing Of Only Blood Or Love in 2007. This and Dinosaur Jr.'s Beyond were my two favorite albums that year. Blood and 2010's Say Goodnight To The World still find Dax in a dark, heavy and very compelling place. Great songs, great songwriter and singer.</blockquote>
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Of course, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL87D2B5E2690D074B" target="_blank">I've got a YouTube channel for all my favorites from his collection</a>, and I <a href="https://vimeo.com/album/3344974" target="_blank">also did one up on Vimeo</a> (you should watch BOTH) but you should check out his site and (obviously) buy all of his albums at once! But don't worry, I'm making it easy for you, just click on any of the links below ;)</div>
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<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="//ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=US&source=ss&ref=ss_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=bjhoffpsblogi-20&marketplace=amazon&region=US&placement=B0000017CA&asins=B0000017CA&linkId=WW7YNX62KXEJDAQM&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;">
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045402 -92.342566200000022 30.4436392 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-80763515484012298862015-04-10T14:29:00.001-07:002015-04-10T15:01:37.074-07:00Increase Conversions and Reduce Cart Abandonment by moving to Magento Cloud Hosting (Webinar)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Key business drivers for moving to cloud-based Magento Hosting</td></tr>
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The Magento Commerce team recently hosted a webinar discussing the key business drivers for moving to cloud-based hosting for your site. <br />
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The short version is that EVERY SINGLE SECOND of page load time costs your site money. The presentation started with a great overview of exactly how:<br />
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<li>You can increase conversions (read Sales) by 7% for every 1 second you reduce your site's latency</li>
<li>Lowering load times by 3 seconds results in 40% fewer carts being abandoned before checkout completion.</li>
<li>Maintaining the much sought-after 5 9's (99.999%) of availability will reduce customer churn by roughly 28%</li>
<li>Migrating to cloud hosting can save your IT budget an average of 15% vs. traditional server-based hosting</li>
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I found the webinar well produced and complete with insightful information and anecdotes to help make the business case for moving to a cloud hosting system for your e-commerce store. Although it was targeted towards Magento, the broader themes are applicable to every e-commerce platform.</div>
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The full webinar is embedded as a Vimeo below, but you can find it, along with a lot of other great webinar content on the <a href="http://www.magentocommerce.com/media/webinars/archived/" target="_blank">Magento Commerce Webinar Portal</a>.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://vimeo.com/124626100">Why Cloud? Why Now?</a> from <a href="https://vimeo.com/magentoecommerce">Magento</a> on <a href="https://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.</td></tr>
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA 70506, USA30.2002897 -92.07632530000000829.9806872 -92.3990488 30.4198922 -91.753601800000013tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-89902991578676386282014-09-29T10:38:00.001-07:002015-04-10T14:14:03.395-07:00The complexity of designing, developing, and managing PHP Mobile & Web Applications in the Cloud<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/searchSOA/app_integration/soa_article_004.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Comit Developers used Zend Server 7 on Amazon Web Services to address the complexity of designing, developing, and managing PHP Mobile & Web Applications in the Cloud" border="0" src="http://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/searchSOA/app_integration/soa_article_004.jpg" height="212" title="Comit Developers used Zend Server 7 on Amazon Web Services to address the complexity of designing, developing, and managing PHP Mobile & Web Applications in the Cloud" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=76429036" target="_blank">Maxine Giza</a> from Tech Target recently <a href="http://searchsoa.techtarget.com/feature/Web-and-mobile-integration-platform-eases-architects-life?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=searchsoa_mg" target="_blank">interviewed me for an article</a> on the opportunities and challenges facing PHP mobile and web application developers migrating to the Amazon Web Services platform and how Zend Server 7 can help. We discussed how Comit Developers addressed these challenges as we migrated from a LAMP stack over to Zend Server 7 running on the Amazon Web Services cloud.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Fair Warning: I did an hour-long interview with Tech Target for this piece and it was pretty substantially condensed. Some addition details can be found over on the AWS blog at</span><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/redirect?url=http%3A%2F%2Faws%2Eamazon%2Ecom%2Fblogs%2Faws%2Fsimplified-php-dev-z-ray-in-the-cloud%2F&urlhash=O9c2&_t=tracking_disc" rel="nofollow" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #7b539d; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="blank">http://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/simplified-php-dev-z-ray-in-the-cloud/</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"> for anyone interested in a deeper technical dive on the topic.</span><br />
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045402 -92.342566200000022 30.4436392 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-53330788332576413482014-08-27T01:39:00.001-07:002014-08-27T01:47:03.644-07:002014 Evolve or Perish Becoming the CIO of the Future<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.3199996948242px;">Are you ready to be the CIO of the future? See the insights of Doug Menefee, a personal friend and fellow Lafayette, LA native </span><i class="_4-k1 img sp_EM2HXYHHm4y sx_332f1b" style="background-color: white; background-image: url(https://fbstatic-a.akamaihd.net/rsrc.php/v2/yZ/r/FKYwtkMOy-M.png); background-position: 0px -8003px; background-repeat: no-repeat; background-size: 26px 8167px; color: #141823; display: inline-block; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; height: 16px; line-height: 19.3199996948242px; vertical-align: -3px; width: 16px;"></i><br />
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0MIT Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 30 Memorial Drive, Cambridge, MA 02142, USA42.3610069 -71.08299449999998415.0091329 -112.39158849999998 69.7128809 -29.774400499999985tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-55125776692930131952014-07-16T21:56:00.001-07:002014-09-11T16:18:28.498-07:00Funniest Moment in Modern Film - Robin Williams and James Earl Jones in "The Angriest Man in Brooklyn"<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">Without a Doubt, IMHO, this is the funniest moment recorded in Modern Film. Starring Academy Award Winning Actors Robin Williams and James Earl Jones from the film <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZ2qRWPda78" target="_blank">The Angriest Man in Brooklyn</a>...</span><br />
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Brooklyn, NY, USA40.6781784 -73.944157940.4854094 -74.266881399999988 40.8709474 -73.6214344tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-55694535965488962132014-05-20T17:52:00.000-07:002015-03-07T21:53:46.179-08:00What do you consider a "real-time" transaction?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image Courtesy of <a href="https://www.eligibleapi.com/" target="_blank">Eligible</a></td></tr>
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There's a fantastic write-up from <a href="http://www.eligibleapi.com/" target="_blank">Eligible</a>, a company I've had the pleasure of working with recently, on the <a href="http://blog.eligibleapi.com/post/69931092781/problem-with-service-level-information-in-271-return" target="_blank">state of "real-time" transactions in the health care sector</a>.<br />
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With the passage of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hipaa" target="_blank">The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA)</a>, our government created a set of standards defining the kind of transactions that your doctor, your insurance company, Durable Medical Equipment Providers (DMEs) and a whole host of other participants in the health care sector carry out while delivering your health care to you (and making sure it's paid for...)<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.liveconferencepro.com/images/hipaa_compliance.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA)" border="0" height="159" src="https://www.liveconferencepro.com/images/hipaa_compliance.jpg" title="Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA)" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image Courtesy of <a href="http://www.cms.gov/" target="_blank">CMS</a></td></tr>
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While most of the attention around HIPAA tends to be focused on the <a href="http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/privacy/" target="_blank">Security, Privacy, and Breach of Notification Rules</a>, this legislation was the first time any of the participants in the health care sector attempted to create a single unified standard defining what types of information should be included, for example, when a doctor's office sends an electronic request to an insurance company to verify what kind of coverage you have before providing you with services.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>There's quite a <a href="https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Billing/ElectronicBillingEDITrans/index.html?redirect=/ElectronicBillingEDITrans/18_5010D0.asp" target="_blank">few other standard transactions included in HIPAA</a>, of course, but the one we all most often FIRST come into direct contact with (through our physicians anyway) is what's called an Eligibility Inquiry.<br />
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As you might imagine from the name, this is when your doctor (or pharmacist, or medical equipment supplier, etc...) <a href="https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Billing/ElectronicBillingEDITrans/Eligibility.html" target="_blank">sends an electronic request to your insurance company</a> asking...hey, does this person that's asking me to provide services / products actually have insurance? and what does it cover? and what is their co-pay? how about their deductible? ... you get the idea...<br />
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So here's the funny thing, at least from my perspective. HIPAA mandates that your insurance company returns a response in less than 20 seconds. <br />
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20 SECONDS<br />
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And ok, I can admit that I was freshly out of high school when that law was passed...and 1996 was still the age of <a href="http://www.surfthe.us/reference/modem-timeline.html" target="_blank">dial-up modems</a> (I think I had a blistering 28.8 <a href="http://techallica.com/kilo-bytes-per-second-vs-kilo-bits-per-second-kbps-vs-kbps/" target="_blank">kbs</a>, <b><i>yes kbps</i></b>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USRobotics" target="_blank">US Robotics Modem</a>, which was screaming in those days...) but can you imagine waiting 20 seconds for a web page (of ANY kind) to load today?<br />
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Of course not.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.mhcari.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/cmslogo1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS)" border="0" src="http://www.mhcari.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/cmslogo1.png" height="144" title="Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS)" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image Courtesy of <a href="http://www.cms.gov/" target="_blank">CMS</a></td></tr>
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The CMS is sort of a baseline for these kinds of requests & responses, since they manage these transaction types for Medicare & Medicaid patients and they provide a status page that gives you an idea of how they're handling the transaction load at any given moment - check it out at <a href="http://www.hetsstatus.com/">http://www.hetsstatus.com/</a><br />
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That page indicates that the CMS considers a 5 second response time <b>"responding normally to all eligibility requests"</b> and that does seem fair on today's modern web.<br />
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But as <a href="http://www.eligibleapi.com/" target="_blank">Eligible</a> notes in their post, they've had to create a feature in their system to automatically kill any eligibility inquiry from one of their customers to an insurance provider that lasts longer than 20 seconds (and they even re-submit it for their customers at no cost, which is a killer feature, by the way).<br />
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Basically, this means that transactions times are longer than 20 seconds often enough, during certain periods, that they found it cost effective and a valuable enough service to their customers to develop this feature, test it, and support it. Which led me to think that this is a fairly common issue among some statistically significant portion of their customer base. Eligible's CEO recently also <a href="http://katgleason.tumblr.com/post/69993033321/eligibles-analysis-of-service-level-information-271" target="_blank">offered a nuanced analysis of the situation on her blog</a>.<br />
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This opinion of mine is due in no large part to a significant amount of anecdotal evidence I've accumulated through the last year of being one of their customers - designing software using their API, working with their Support & Engineering teams, interacting with their management team, etc... <br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/1nx0wEGzALs" width="640"></iframe><br />
<span style="font-size: 13px;"><br />Katelyn Gleason discussing Eligible's RESTful API for HIPAA X12 EDI Health Care Transactions <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/keligibleapi" target="_blank">via YouTube</a></span></div>
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Your experience may differ, but I've found Eligible to be a company with a really bright collection of talented people who are genuinely quite passionate about the problems that they help their customers solve.<br />
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They've gone out of their way with us to share their knowledge and hard-won expertise working with thousands of insurance plans to help us develop solutions that make it easier to interface with insurance companies using <a href="https://github.com/eligibleapi" target="_blank">modern web development technologies</a> and a <a href="https://www.eligibleapi.com/rest" target="_blank">RESTful API</a>.<br />
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Eligible is a <a href="http://pando.com/2013/01/24/yc-alumni-eligible-raises-1m-in-under-48-hours-via-angellist/" target="_blank">well-funded</a> graduate of <a href="http://yclist.com/" target="_blank">Y Combinator</a> (<a href="http://techcrunch.com/2012/12/22/yc-grad-esther-dyson-backed-eligible-wants-to-be-the-stripe-for-healthcare-transactions/" target="_blank">YC S12</a>) and is led by a smart, driven, and customer-focused <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/katelyngleason" target="_blank">CEO Katelyn Gleason</a> (who is not only <a href="https://github.com/katgleason?" target="_blank">active on GitHub</a>, but has on many occasion jumped on calls with my engineering teams and also our Executives to work through technical / business development issues we faced during our rollout). So has the rest of Eligible's truly talented team of professionals...I'm just saying it's not often you can get that level of support when working with a technology partner.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CVz9NTbl8Ro/UiNOwdoIefI/AAAAAAAAALA/JkitPPT9rDU/s0-d/1229924_625603594145920_1982351850_n+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Katelyn Gleason and Lance Cotter, two of the founders of Eligible in San Francisco, CA" border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CVz9NTbl8Ro/UiNOwdoIefI/AAAAAAAAALA/JkitPPT9rDU/s0-d/1229924_625603594145920_1982351850_n+%25281%2529.jpg" height="320" title="Katelyn Gleason and Lance Cotter, two of the founders of Eligible in San Francisco, CA" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image Courtesy <a href="https://plus.google.com/105140808127318239287/posts" target="_blank">Katelyn Gleason</a></td></tr>
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She is joined by cofounders & staff who are equally smart, dedicated to their customers, and just in general exciting to work with - their enthusiasm is infectious - I can genuinely not find much to complain about when most of my day is spent with <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1590598385/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1590598385&linkCode=as2&tag=bjhoffpsblogi-20&linkId=3ACMAM3BMHNVETE7" target="_blank">partners & people who are smart and gets things done</a>.<br />
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But then I remember that the main point of this post wasn't just to praise Eligible, but to bemoan the fact that we DO live in a world in 2014 where we have to wait sometimes for up 20 seconds to make a simple HIPAA 270 eligibility request and receive a (271) response. If Eligible is feeling this pain for their customers, there are others feeling this pain as well.<br />
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<b><i>TL&DR:</i></b> this problem is WAY too prevalent today - technical solutions to these problems exist, they just need to be implemented.<br />
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Of course, if you also happen to be in the business of developing software in this space, you should probably be using <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asynchronous_I/O" target="_blank">asynchronous calls</a> in your web or mobile applications when you're submitting this kind of query (to Eligible or any other clearinghouse)....<br />
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I know I wouldn't be waiting around 20 seconds to see if your software provided a response if I was the one using it. I have better things to do with my time, and so does EVERY one else.<br />
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Here's to hoping that the passage of the <a href="http://www.hhs.gov/healthcare/rights/" target="_blank">Affordable Care Act</a> kickstarts some much-needed investments in the infrastructure used by Hospitals, Insurance Companies, Physicians, and all the other participants in the multi-faceted US Health Care System. <br />
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We are doing our best at <a href="http://insured.amedadirect.com/" target="_blank">ACA Ventures / Ameda Direct</a> to invest in these kind of technologies to help improve the experience our customers have when they engage with their physicians, suppliers, and insurers to address health care needs of their families. Only time will tell what kind of returns these investments yield and which wind up best suited to the most recent changes in the health care marketplace.<br />
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<a href="http://www.denverdemocrats.net/files/u206/pictures/affordable-care-act.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) commonly called the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or Obamacare" border="0" src="http://www.denverdemocrats.net/files/u206/pictures/affordable-care-act.jpg" height="179" title="The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) commonly called the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or Obamacare" width="320" /></a>Maybe in the next decade we can get all of our participants in the health care system to work together to get these load times down to a respectable 10 seconds....one can certainly hope.<br />
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After all, providing more efficient access to our health care information and speeding up and bringing down the cost of providing health care to Americans is a great idea!<br />
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I am not 100% sure I'd be willing to hold my breath for that long, though...do you realize how long it would take my doctor to figure out if I even have health insurance if that didn't work out????<br />
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045402 -92.342566200000022 30.4436392 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-1931968168343538362014-05-04T11:44:00.001-07:002014-07-11T14:52:01.762-07:00Radio Radio & Chubby Carrier and the Bayou Swamp Band @ Festival Internationale de Louisiane <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="text-align: left;">We recently celebrated the 2014 Festival International de Louisiane here in Lafayette, LA - truly one of my favorite reasons to be back living in Cajun Country. If you weren't able to "come festival with us" this year, you missed out on an amazing celebration of french music, food, and culture - but don't worry you can come pass a good time with us next year when we do it all again!</span></div>
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I was only able to catch a few shows this year, but two of my favorite bands in the world happened to be playing and delivered amazing performances. In honor of both my own "patrimoine français" & this year's lineup, here's a few of my take-aways "en francsais," as Madame Price would remind me to say ;)<br />
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Première ca c'est la confiture musicale! J'aime Radio Radio, vous devez vérifier cela maintenant!<br />
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Merci beaucoup, Radio Radio, pour livrer une autre performance incroyable ici en pays cajun. Nous vous aimons et voulons que vous revenez de nombreuses fois NOMBREUX!<br />
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When I was a younger lad I got the opportunity to work with Grammy Award Winning Recording Artist <a href="http://www.chubbycarrier.com/" target="_blank">Chubby Carrier and the Bayou Swamp Band</a> to record their album, "It's Party Time" and develop an accompanying interactive CD-ROM.<br />
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During those sessions I was INCREDIBLY fortunate to be able to get to know Roy, Jr. (or as everyone calls him these days, "<a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Chubby-Carrier/109133702438279" target="_blank">Chubby Carrier</a>" and the talented team of Cajun Musicians AKA the Bayou Swamp Band.<br />
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Their professionalism and enthusiasm impresses me to this day and I can sincerely say there's no other musical act that I've ever had a chance to work with that represents everything I've ever wanted the world to know about <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cajun_music" target="_blank">Cajun Music</a>.<br />
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Alors, voici Chubby Carrier et le marais bande Bayou pour donner une chance d'écouter le marais-Funk du pays cajun le monde. Je sais que si je dois répondre, I'l toujours dire "J'ai la sauce chaude, bébé!"</div>
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045402 -92.342566200000022 30.4436392 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-35531644205257532352014-03-31T18:26:00.000-07:002014-09-11T16:23:02.922-07:00The Social Media Breakfast Club - Via The Comit Developers Blog<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Social Media Breakfast Club (<a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/shanna-perkins/46/132/930" target="_blank">Shanna Perkins</a> via <a href="http://www.comitdevelopers.com/wordpress/the-social-media-breakfast-club/" target="_blank">The Comit Developers Blog</a>)</td></tr>
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Shanna Perkins, SEO & Internet Marketing Specialist at Comit Developers, wrote a great post on the different strengths and weaknesses of the most popular social media platforms last week.<br />
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Given that I'm old enough to remember watching The Breakfast Club in the movie theaters, I was particularly fond of her use of the characters from the movie to describe the traits of each social media platform. It's a great way to offer a perspective that everyone can relate to - even if you didn't watch the movie ;)<br />
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From the blog post:<br />
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As the social media landscape expands, it becomes difficult to know which ones to use and how to speak to so many different audiences. What often happens is that businesses stick to platforms they’re comfortable with. The problem with this is all social media networks are not created equal; each plays a different role in building your business and strengthening your brand. </blockquote>
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We’re going to take a look of some of the major social media platforms, the roles they play and how to best utilize them. Let’s pretend these social media outlets are the cast of “The Breakfast Club.”</blockquote>
<a href="http://www.comitdevelopers.com/wordpress/the-social-media-breakfast-club/" target="_blank">Check out the full post now</a>!</div>
beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045402 -92.342566200000022 30.4436392 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-87398191974858731292014-03-15T00:28:00.001-07:002014-07-11T14:53:27.252-07:00Birthday Wishes to Jennifer Kendrick & Joining the Comit Developers Team!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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So I've been contracting now at <a href="http://www.comitdevelopers.com/" target="_blank">Comit Developers</a> (and it's sister e-commerce company <a href="http://www.amedadirect.com/" target="_blank">Ameda Direct</a> / <a href="http://insured.amedadirect.com/" target="_blank">ACA Ventures</a>) for almost a year, but I've recently decided to join the team as a <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/bjhoffpauir/" target="_blank">full time employee</a>.<br />
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I'm excited about the vision of our <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/comittechnologies" target="_blank">leadership</a> <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/gerald-miguez/15/632/a58" target="_blank">team</a> over at <a href="https://twitter.com/ComitDevelopers" target="_blank">Comit Developers</a> and I've been honored to have the opportunity to be a part of such an <a href="http://www.comitdevelopers.com/about" target="_blank">AMAZING group</a> of individuals in the design, development, engineering, and internet marketing / SEO divisions within this <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keiretsu" target="_blank">keiretsu</a> (i've always wanted to work that term into a blog post...).<br />
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One of the main reasons I decided to join the team at <a href="https://plus.google.com/+Comitdevelopers/" target="_blank">Comi<span style="text-decoration: underline;">t</span> Developers</a> and <a href="http://insured.amedadirect.com/" target="_blank">Ameda Direct</a> is their genuinely open culture and their commitment to assembling the best team possible from a diverse mix of people. </div>
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It's that diversity and the distinct personalities and perspectives of all the members of our organization that allows us to attack problems from many different angles simultaneously and that same diversity helps us to develop truly innovative solutions to the challenges our customers face every day.<br />
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One of the other factors the influenced me greatly is their commitment to building a business with / on Open Source Technologies like <a href="http://www.magento.com/" target="_blank" title="Magento eCommerce Systems">Magento</a>, <a href="https://wordpress.org/" target="_blank" title="Wordpress Open Source Blogging Platform">Wordpress</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LAMP_stack" target="_blank" title="Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP stack on Wikipedia">LAMP</a>, and others and using Open Technologies to address their Customer's needs. Too often I've seen businesses attempt to lock customers into a proprietary technology stack with no real reason besides an attempt to lock in the most profits possible for themselves. In my mind, that's not the way to build a truly mutually beneficial relationship with a customer and that mentality all too often infects even the interpersonal relationships within a company.<br />
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I've worked at a <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/vsearch/p?company=Time+Trend+Computers&trk=prof-exp-company-name" target="_blank">few</a> <a href="http://www.atg.com/" target="_blank">big</a> (and some <a href="http://www.dell.com/" target="_blank">giant</a>) companies before, and they all seemed to have a corporate objective of at least professing to be as inclusive as possible. Sadly, I've noticed that delivering on that promise is not all that common at most of the technology-focused businesses I've encountered.<br />
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At Comit, we really strive to create an environment where everyone can participate in helping grow the business and we do everything possible to make sure that every team member knows that they're a valued member of the organization. <br />
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This post is dedicated to one of those amazing members of our organization - <a href="http://www.comitdevelopers.com/author/jennifer" target="_blank">Jennifer Kendrick</a>.<br />
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Today is her birthday and I thought this would be a nice way to show how much we appreciate everything she does for our team.<br />
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Time and time again <a href="https://www.facebook.com/T3kT3hGrrl" target="_blank">Jennifer's</a> proven herself to be a creative, innovative, and incredibly generous member of the Comit Developers team.<br />
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Jennifer is a <a href="http://louisiana.edu/" target="_blank">ULL</a> alumni (and also a former <a href="http://www.neworleans.com/" target="_blank">NOLA</a> resident like me). After recently breaking her foot in a <a href="http://ebbandbow.com/violin-vs-martial-arts/" target="_blank">martial arts incident</a>, she decided to <a href="http://ebbandbow.com/plateau/#.Uu3zoPhh7KU.google_plusone_share" target="_blank">learn</a> how <a href="http://www.violinist.com/directory/bio.cfm?member=T3kT3hGrrl" target="_blank">to play</a> the <a href="http://ebbandbow.com/read/#.UwA5pLc5PRk.google_plusone_share" target="_blank">violin</a> and has been actively supporting the <a href="http://www.acadianasymphony.org/" target="_blank">Acadian Symphony Orchestra and Conservatory of Music</a> in her spare time. That's in addition to her <a href="http://raptr.com/t3kt3hgrrl/" target="_blank">time spent</a> in the <a href="http://steamcommunity.com/id/t3kt3hgrrl" target="_blank">gaming</a> community (she was rocking some <a href="http://www.elderscrolls.com/" target="_blank">Elder Scrolls</a> as I pinged her for bio details the night before her birthday - Go get 'em <a href="http://www.gamergrrls.com/im-the-one-thats-cool-by-the-guild-felica-day/" target="_blank">GamerGrrl</a>!!!!!). She's obviously got a lot of things going on, but she always manages to develop great software for us and our customers while consistently helping our team to improve our processes and expand our knowledge.<br />
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Day in and day out she displays a dedication to perfecting her craft and broadening her perspective while engaging her teammates and having a bit of fun at the same time. It's inspiring. You can read more about what she's up to on her <a href="http://ebbandbow.com/blog/" target="_blank">blog</a>, and also her <a href="https://github.com/T3kT3hGrrl" target="_blank">github</a>, <a href="https://bitbucket.org/t3kt3hgrrl/" target="_blank">bitbucket</a>, <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/t3kt3hgrrl" target="_blank">linkedin</a>, <a href="https://plus.google.com/117192780770366145328" target="_blank">google+</a>, <a href="http://www.reddit.com/user/T3kT3hGrrl" target="_blank">reddit</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/T3kT3hGrrl" target="_blank">twitter</a> profiles.<br />
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<td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_TOGcyNU0gw/UyPzosBGb8I/AAAAAAAAKMY/VTKaB-ga9G4/s1600/1512733_10201704593835799_333733508_n.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Jennifer Elizabeth Kendrick displaying her exquisite sense of humor and serious gamer cred via moustach + starcraft II tee shirt" border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_TOGcyNU0gw/UyPzosBGb8I/AAAAAAAAKMY/VTKaB-ga9G4/s1600/1512733_10201704593835799_333733508_n.jpg" height="320" style="margin: 0px 20px;" title="Jennifer Elizabeth Kendrick displaying her exquisite sense of humor and serious gamer cred via moustach + starcraft II tee shirt" width="239" /></a></td>
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She's helping us build an organization that attracts world-class talent to <a href="http://www.lafayette.org/uploads/LafayetteTopsfDiAmericanCitiesoftheFutureList.pdf" target="_blank">one of the best places in the world to live</a>, my <a href="http://www.lafayette.org/uploads/MilkenBestPerformingCities.pdf" target="_blank">home town of Lafayette, LA</a><br />
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Jennifer also spends a good bit of her "free" time working with other members of our local tech community to share her knowledge and considerable experience to help develop some of the <a href="http://www.lafayette.org/site326.php" target="_blank">most innovative technology systems in the world</a>.<br />
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As you can tell, I'm a fan. Jennifer is one of many people working at Comit Developers that make me excited to be a part of this team. <br />
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Since this talented group of professionals has provided me with such an incredible opportunity over this last year, I've decided to make this sort of post a bit of a tradition while I'm working here....<br />
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I'm excited to learn more about everyone in our organization and when each of your birthdays comes around, I'll do a little write up here on the <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">innovez blog</a> about you and the specific awesomeness you bring to our team. <br />
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It's the least I can do for all of you who make working at Comit such an amazing experience. To Jennifer and everyone else on the <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/company/2757942?trk=prof-0-ovw-curr_pos" target="_blank">Comit</a> team - keep up the amazing work!<br />
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If you also happen to be <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1590598385/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1590598385&linkCode=as2&tag=bjhoffpsblogi-20" target="_blank">Smart and Gets Things Done</a> and are interested in joining this incredible organization, <a href="http://www.comitdevelopers.com/contact" target="_blank">contact us</a>.<br />
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As a special treat for all of you who have read all the way down to here, here's a video which, in my opinion, is AWESOME SAUCE and embodies all that I love about Jennifer and the rest of the Comit Developers Team (while not taking ourselves too seriously) : <a href="http://feliciaday.com/" target="_blank">Felicia Day</a> & <a href="http://www.watchtheguild.com/" target="_blank">The Guild </a>in <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFhgupR565Q&feature=kp" target="_blank">I'm the one that's cool</a><br />
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-6221330661823327562013-12-21T14:26:00.001-08:002014-07-11T14:53:52.223-07:00Join me for a free webinar on making the most out of Git in your development workflow!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i><b>UPDATE 1/23/2014: Since the webinar has already come and gone, I've got the entire session's YouTube video <a href="http:/#embed">embedded below</a>!</b></i><br />
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I've been using <a href="http://mercurial.selenic.com/" target="_blank" title="Mercurial Open Source Distributed Source Control System">Mercurial</a> for a few years now, but have only recently tackled a serious software project using <a href="http://git-scm.com/" target="_blank" title="Git Open Source Distributed Source Control ">Git</a> as my primary distributed software source control system.<br />
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The transition was easier than I thought it might be, but even after using it day in and day out for the last few months, I find every now and again I get tripped up on a command or two (or find myself Googling for <a href="http://www.stackoverflow.com/" target="_blank" title="Stack Overflow">Stack Overflow</a> tips when I get stuck ;)<br />
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Fortunately for all of us, <a href="http://www.atlassian.com/" target="_blank" title="Atlassian">Atlassian</a> (makers of <a href="http://www.bitbucket.org/" target="_blank" title="BitBucket Source Control Repository Hosting">BitBucket</a> and <a href="http://www.sourcetreeapp.com/" target="_blank" title="SourceTree visual Git & Mercurial Client for Windows & Mac OSX">SourceTree</a>, two tools I use every single day of my professional life) is hosting a free webinar on Git best practices. Best of all, it's going to use REAL CODE EXAMPLES!<br />
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That's right, you'll be learning as <a href="http://nl.linkedin.com/in/durdn" target="_blank" title="Nicola Paolucci, Developer Advocate @ Atlassian">Nicola Paolucci</a> Developer Advocate @ Atlassian works a real bug report - from branch creation to code review to final merge! <br />
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I've always found "diving in" and getting my hands dirty working a real problem to be the best way to learn and you'll get a chance to check out an expert at work for free during this webinar :) Nicola will also be available to answer any questions you may come up with during the presentation, so it looks to be a great opportunity to expand your understanding of Git and help you integrate it into your daily development workflow.<br />
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You can <a href="http://www.atlassian.com/git/webinar-registration" target="_blank" title="Register for the free Git Webinar from Atlassia featuring Nicola Paolucci">register for the free webinar online</a> - what are you waiting for?<br />
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Webinar Highlights:<br />
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<li>How to kick off development in a feature branch.</li>
<li>What rebase is, and how and when to perform it as local cleanup.</li>
<li>How to have colleagues to review your work via a pull request.</li>
<li>How to work through feedback on a pull request.</li>
<li>When and how to merge your work back to the development main line.</li>
<li>Clean up considerations after the work is complete.</li>
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<a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=11838515" id="embed" name="embed"> </a>If you missed the live webinar, have no fear! Atlassian has posted the complete session on their <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/GoAtlassian?feature=watch" target="_blank">YouTube Channel</a>, and I've embedded the presentation below:<br />
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You can also check out the video of his last tutorial - <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzDInd4WBno" target="_blank" title="Git Ready Workflows, a Webinar by Nicola Paolucci">Git Ready Workflows from YouTube</a> below:<br />
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045402 -92.342566200000022 30.4436392 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-72043262003591159442013-05-25T11:34:00.001-07:002013-05-27T22:05:32.876-07:00Follow Up to Paul Jay's Knowledge Centered Support (KCS) - Key to Great Service<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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A short while back I posted about the webinar hosted by the ICMI & Paul Jay on Knowledge Centered Support and it's role in delivering the best possible customer experience. Whether you had a chance to participate in the live webinar or have watched the saved recording, you probably noticed that there were a TREMENDOUS number of really great questions posed by the participants.<br />
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Fortunately for all of us, Paul is a fantastic contributor to the KCS community and has taken time out of his busy schedule to respond to many of the questions that couldn't be covered during the initial webinar.<br />
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You can see the responses to the top 21 questions posed during the webinar over at the ICMI blog:<br />
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<a name='more'></a><a href="http://www.icmi.com/Resources/Articles/2013/May/21-Questions-Knowledge-Centered-Support-Webinar-Wrap-up" target="_blank">21 Questions: Knowledge Centered Support Webinar Wrap-Up</a><br />
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If you missed the original webinar, you can catch the <a href="http://vimeo.com/57426113" target="_blank">vimeo recording</a> below:<br />
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<a href="http://vimeo.com/57426113">Knowledge Centered Support (KCS) Knowledge Management Framework - Introduction</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user7675938">Paul Jay</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.</div>
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045402 -92.342566200000022 30.4436392 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-26312595768656250292013-05-02T20:26:00.000-07:002013-05-03T22:30:40.326-07:00Fuji san by Thanapol Marattana - breath-taking landscape of Mount Fuji, Japan<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://500px.com/photo/30213135" target="_blank">Fuji san</a> by <a href="http://500px.com/ThanapolM" target="_blank">Thanapol Marattana</a> via 500px</td></tr>
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Mount Fuji, Kitayama, Fujinomiya, Shizuoka Prefecture 418-0011, Japan35.3605555 138.727777699999938.0136014999999965 97.419183699999934 62.7075095 -179.9636283000001tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-88320978008073028002013-05-01T09:12:00.000-07:002013-05-03T10:52:01.312-07:00Billy Joel Plays George Rodrigue's Blue Dog Steinway During New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival Fundraiser<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-atXlgH4Rq9U/UX7EGKkjWpI/AAAAAAAAFdg/KuWFUNkdjY8/s1600/Billy+Joel+Apr+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Billy Joel stops into the George Rodrigue Foundation of the Arts (GRFA) to play the Rodrigue Steinway for the 2013 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival Fundraiser" border="0" height="579" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-atXlgH4Rq9U/UX7EGKkjWpI/AAAAAAAAFdg/KuWFUNkdjY8/s640/Billy+Joel+Apr+2013.jpg" title="Billy Joel stops into the George Rodrigue Foundation of the Arts (GRFA) to play the Rodrigue Steinway for the 2013 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival Fundraiser" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Billy Joel stops into the George Rodrigue Foundation of the Arts (GRFA) to play the Rodrigue Steinway for the 2013 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival Fundraiser Courtesy <a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/" target="_blank">Musings of an Artist's Wife</a></td></tr>
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Another inspiring post from Musings of an Artist's Wife - By Wendy Rodrigue, Wife of Artist George Rodrigue</h2>
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This time of year is a wonderful time to be living in Cajun Country. Not only is it Crawfish season, but for several weekends in a row we celebrate the amazing cultural heritage of our south Louisiana communities.</div>
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I'm particularly fond of the <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/2013/04/festival-international-de-louisiane-best-world-music-festival.html" target="_blank">Festival International de Louisiane</a> and the <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/2006/05/jazz-fest-2006.html" target="_blank">New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival</a>, having spent a substantial chunk of my childhood in both Lafayette and New Orleans. In Wendy Rodrigue's latest blog post, she shares some of the ways music, art, and storytelling intersect through George Rodrigue's own past.</div>
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... AND Billy Joel stops by to jam on George Rodrigue's Blue Dog Steinway piano!</div>
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This particular post hits home for me, not just because I grew up in New Orleans and Lafayette. The funny thing is I lived about a mile from where George Jones' house was "north of Lafayette," as <a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/2013/04/dance-with-me-george.html" target="_blank">Wendy quotes George Rodrigue saying in her post "Dance with me, George!"</a>.</div>
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As I've <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/2013/01/musings-of-artists-wife-blue-dog-book.html" target="_blank">mentioned before</a>, although I love George Rodrigue's Blue Dog paintings, his Cajun themed work touches a sensitive spot for me and I'm glad Wendy shared a few pictures that included this piece, one of my personal favorites, Dance With Me Henry.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dance with Me Henry, 1989; oil on canvas by George Rodrigue; Courtesy <a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/" target="_blank">Musings of an Artist's Wife</a></td></tr>
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Read more over at <a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/2013/04/dance-with-me-george.html" target="_blank">Musings of an Artist's Wife - By Wendy Rodrigue, Wife of Artist George Rodrigue</a>.</div>
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0New Orleans, LA, USA29.951065799999991 -90.071532329.951065799999991 -90.0715323 29.951065799999991 -90.0715323tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-67288276014471069662013-04-30T12:31:00.000-07:002014-07-11T14:54:44.862-07:00Watch the Best Video Introduction to Gamification & Explanation of its Pros & Cons from Penny Arcade<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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It's a funny and informative introduction to gamification and I guarantee you will laugh out loud at least once :)</h2>
This may actually be the first simple explanation I've ever seen of any of the potential <b><i>positives AND pitfalls</i></b> of using gamification as a strategy. Clocking in at around 6 minutes, it's a great introduction to share with people who are interested in learning about the basics of gamification.<br />
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The fantastic work done on this particular episode deserves to be called out:<br />
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Written By: <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/james-portnow/5/636/150" target="_blank">James Portnow</a><br />
Scripted & Narrated By: <a href="http://ca.linkedin.com/in/danieljfloyd" target="_blank">Daniel Floyd</a><br />
Art & Video By: <a href="http://ca.linkedin.com/pub/erin-siegel/42/349/610" target="_blank">Erin Siegel</a><br />
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Brought to us all by <a href="http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/gamification" target="_blank">Penny Arcade</a>. If you're not already a fan, you're missing out. Trust me.</div>
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.004541200000002 -92.342566200000022 30.4436382 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-17966939290421157892013-04-29T11:22:00.000-07:002014-07-11T14:55:11.669-07:00Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Medium Team hard at work at Obvious HQ</td></tr>
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I know 6 months seems like an eternity in Internet time, but it was only back on September 25, 2012 that Ev Williams, Biz Stone, and Jason Goldman (the original founders of Blogger, Twitter and many other web platforms) unveiled <a href="http://www.medium.com/" target="_blank">Medium</a>, one of the latest creations from their startup incubator, Obvious.<br />
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Medium announced only a few weeks ago that they've acquired the long-form publishing startup Matter, and I have to agree with Matter's founder Jim Giles that <a href="http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/17/matter-co-founder-jim-giles-on-being-acquired-by-medium-and-future-of-longform-journalism/" target="_blank">the Medium / Matter acquisition seems like a natural fit</a>:<br />
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"So the offer was a surprise, and we just had to think really hard about whether it was the right thing for the kind of journalism we want to produce. But actually, after spending a lot of time thinking about it, it really became clear it was. That’s partly a values thing that’s come out of our discussions with Ev over the last year or so. Medium is set up – although it’s a much bigger and more ambitious project than Matter – at heart it has very similar goals. </blockquote>
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We both want to find a way of publishing and supporting really great writing and making that look really beautiful.</blockquote>
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Then there’s the practicalities, which also made a lot of sense. We’re a new publication. We have nicely growing subscribers but it’s still really tough for any new startup, and coming over to Medium means we can do a whole bunch of experiments that we probably would have struggled to do if we remained independent. We can start playing around with tweaks to our business model. We definitely have no plans to change it, but there’s lots of different ways that you can tweak the idea of selling individual articles."</blockquote>
Given that you are reading this post on one of the most popular blogging platforms on the planet and that you likely heard about it through Twitter (both of which were created by this team) I would imagine that you might agree with me in noting that <b><i>the tools that this team builds tend to change the world</i></b>.<br />
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So, like me, you may be a little curious about what all the fuss is about over Medium and want to try it out for yourself. But of course, as is the case so often, there's a catch... <br />
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<i><b>Read on for my initial thoughts and an informative YouTube fireside chat with Ev Williams...</b></i><br />
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Medium is still in public beta mode and you need an invitation from an existing member to write on the platform (though requirement this will be removed after the public beta is over). Fortunately, I received just such an invitation yesterday.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;">Biz Stone, Jason Goldman, Ev Williams (Original Twitter Team) at SXSW - Image: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/laughingsquid/" target="_blank">Flickr / Scott Beale</a></td></tr>
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The Dismal State of Status Quo Online Content Publication</h2>
I'll be doing an in-depth write up on the experience of publishing on the Medium platform at a later date, but below I've covered my initial impressions on using the service and a little bit of history on Medium and why I think it's poised to be the next evolution in content creation, collaboration, and consumption for the web.<br />
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You may already be asking yourself why we need another online content platform, especially when there are already so many options available. At least, that is what my first thought was when I heard about Medium. But I have to agree with Ev on a couple of key things that bother me about the Status Quo of content publication online:<br />
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<li>The tools we have now for content creation are not intrinsically collaborative. We bloggers tend to write as lonely islands in the oceans of Internet content. Sure we can share and communicate via social channels, but those REALLY feel like the old model of broadcasting, just given to individual people. The collaboration may come in comments / feedback, but that's not the same thing as collaborative authoring.</li>
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<li>There is a deluge of content being produced on the web. Some of it is great, most of it is garbage. And it's getting harder and harder to separate the two. The tools that we have to create and share content, being focused on siloed sole-creator publication, inherently promote a broadcast model that discourages quality and curation - leading to more and more not-so-great content being produced and distributed online.</li>
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<li>Craftsmanship matters. It counts in Design, Writing, and basically all human endeavors because the greatest things in the world REQUIRE it. And anyone who has ever learned to appreciate greatness can appreciate craftsmanship, even if we don't know how to define it. But even when we're not aiming for "greatness" we can value and appreciate quality and craftsmanship and if given the choice between garbage and craftsmanship, people who CREATE will choose craftsmanship.</li>
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<li>It doesn't have to be this way. The Internet is young and we've only scratched the surface of the capabilities we've developed. </li>
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A Glimpse Into The Future of Online Content Creation, Curation, and Distribution</h2>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UezyBJJOrrk/UYE5i2uEaPI/AAAAAAAAGsU/EirxH110BL8/s1600/Medium-Sharing-Ideas-Moves-Humanity-Forward.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UezyBJJOrrk/UYE5i2uEaPI/AAAAAAAAGsU/EirxH110BL8/s320/Medium-Sharing-Ideas-Moves-Humanity-Forward.jpg" height="320" title="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" width="264" /></a>
Medium is an attempt to address these concerns. <br />
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From <a href="http://medium.com/about/9e53ca408c48" target="_blank">Ev William's initial About Medium post</a>:<br />
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"Lots of services have successfully lowered the bar for sharing information, but there’s been less progress toward raising the quality of what’s produced. It’s great that you can be a one-person media outlet, but it’d be even better if there were more ways you could work with others. And in a world of overwhelming quantities of content, how do we direct our attention to what’s most valuable, not just what’s interesting and of-the-moment?</blockquote>
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It’s not too late to rethink how online publishing works and build a system optimized for quality, rather than popularity. Where anyone can have a voice but where one has to earn the right to your attention. A system where people work together to make a difference, rather than merely compete for validation and recognition. A world where thought and craftsmanship is rewarded more than knee-jerk reactions."</blockquote>
The <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/14/medium-twitter-co-founder_n_1777374.html#slide=1381198" target="_blank">Huffington Post</a> also had a great write up on the launch, noting that<br />
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"Williams and Stone acknowledge that Medium is still a work in progress, but outline a few qualities that, in their view, help define it. First, it's designed to accommodate people who want to post or simply hope to peruse.</blockquote>
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Users can also work together to curate 'collections' of anything from childhood snapshots to stories, though collections can be either open or closed. Within a collection, updates that have received the highest ratings from the Medium community get top billing, which Williams calls an effort to "[help] people get the most out of their time in this world of infinite information." Williams says posting 'is elegant and easy,' though we'll have to take him at his word as that feature is currently available only to a select group of 'friends and family.'"</blockquote>
Ok, so here in Medium we have a platform that allows me to not only create content with the people I most respect and admire and also provides better tools for sharing curated content and filtering through the alarmingly high signal-to-noise ratio of the Internet? Count me in...terested....<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ev Williams and Biz Stone with Charlie Rose</td></tr>
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There are bound to be a few snags along the way as Medium attempts to actually execute on objectives that have so far eluded even the brightest technologists and business leaders of the Internet age. Honestly, just articulating the notions of content curation, collaborative creation, and sharing that improves quality are difficult for me. <br />
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And as if these goals aren't lofty enough, Ev is convinced there's a new sustainable economic model for Journalism somewhere inside the Medium experiment, as <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2013/03/05/ev-williams-medium-wants-to-help-build-a-sustainable-economic-model-for-journalism/" target="_blank">TechCrunch reported last month</a>.<br />
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A solution to finding and creating quality web content online with collaborators you admire and respect</h2>
I have confidence that if there's anyone who is best suited for the task, it's most likely the team behind Medium.<br />
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Alex Martin from the Silicon Valley Business Journal summed up the thought nicely when he <a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2013/01/20/twitter-cofounder-evan-williams-medium.html?page=all" target="_blank">caught up with Ev Williams back in January 2013</a>:<br />
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"In his own words on Medium’s site, he explains what it is he’s “taking away” from Medium to make it a better product:</blockquote>
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“…anyone can have a voice but ... one has to earn the right to your attention.”</blockquote>
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By taking away the power of the masses to determine what content is “quality,” Evan is reinstating a metaphorical “gatekeeper of information” on the platform; a gatekeeper that some would argue has been lost in the age of social media.</blockquote>
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How will the team behind this publishing medium (see what I did there?) create that kind of subjective, selective infrastructure? Evan admits himself that the answer isn’t entirely clear yet:</blockquote>
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“Truth be told, we’re just starting the journey of figuring out what all that means,” he writes.</blockquote>
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I trust that if anyone can make online publishing an intelligent exchange of information once again, Evan and his team at Medium can. His products have given millions of people, including myself, the means and ability to publish to the internet and made it as simple as pushing a button. Now, it’s just a matter of figuring out how to make signal rise up out of the noise.</blockquote>
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As we walked through the courtyard of the search engine giant’s campus, Evan looked tired. But not in a bad way.</blockquote>
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He looked tired in a trying-to-build-something-extraordinary-from-scratch kind of way.</blockquote>
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Tired in a trying-to-change-online-publishing-as-we-know-it-(again) kind of way.</blockquote>
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Tired in a Silicon Valley kind of way."</blockquote>
After participating on the site for a few weeks now as a reader and feedback-provider, I can attest to the fact that they're making progress on this mission. It's slow and steady, but it is discernible. One of the first things I noticed was the lack of traditional comments.<br />
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<h2 style="text-align: left;">
Features that separate Medium from other blogging / content production platforms</h2>
I wrote about <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/2013/04/google-adds-google-comments-to-blogger.html" target="_blank">Google+ comments coming to the Blogger platform</a> a while back and I still think it's a substantial improvement over the previous system. But after using the <a href="https://medium.com/help-center/dd1be9f1418e" target="_blank">new Notes feature on Medium</a>, I feel like even the new Google+ system feels old and archaic.<br />
<br />
Notes is one of the features released at launch that is core to the Collaboration tenet of Medium. Essentially, Notes allows members of the Medium community to comment not just on the article as a whole, but on specific sections of content. <br />
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<a href="https://d233eq3e3p3cv0.cloudfront.net/max/640/0*iFbTmIbSoPtVkc4e.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" border="0" src="https://d233eq3e3p3cv0.cloudfront.net/max/640/0*iFbTmIbSoPtVkc4e.png" title="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" /></a></div>
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The key user interaction is to click the "Add Note" button and enter your input near the text upon which you're interested in commenting. You can also highlight snippets of text to target your comments even more granularly, as shown in the animated graphic below:<br />
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<a href="https://d233eq3e3p3cv0.cloudfront.net/max/640/0*ZbM17O_TeidBxbVM.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" border="0" height="180" src="https://d233eq3e3p3cv0.cloudfront.net/max/640/0*ZbM17O_TeidBxbVM.gif" title="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" width="640" /></a></div>
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The key concepts that separates Notes from traditional blog comments are<br />
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<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li>Notes are designed to focus on a specific section of the text, prompting direct feedback and a constructive conversation around a specific portion of the content. This discourages "me-too" and "great-post" feedback, and encouraging actual suggestions that might improve the content.</li>
<li>They are private by default, and only you and the Author can see them when submitted. The Author of the post can choose to Reply, Make Public, or Hide the note, after being notified of its submission via email or twitter.</li>
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As a result, on Medium the default mode of conversation becomes a two-way dialog between the author and people who actually have something constructive to say about the content. Innovative, I know.</div>
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<a href="https://d233eq3e3p3cv0.cloudfront.net/max/640/0*ka08p4dMSxM5P8Sk.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img alt="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" border="0" src="https://d233eq3e3p3cv0.cloudfront.net/max/640/0*ka08p4dMSxM5P8Sk.png" title="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" /></a></div>
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But Medium is still releasing new features, the most recent of which is the <a href="https://medium.com/about/8304190661d4" target="_blank">Pre-Publish Collaboration authoring mode announced on April 10, 2013</a>. </div>
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<a href="http://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/0-e7ttmyxqjiibtp5k.png?w=271&h=226" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/0-e7ttmyxqjiibtp5k.png?w=271&h=226" height="166" width="200" /></a>After creating a new article and saving a draft, Authors are presented with a new button - "Invite Collaborators." Clicking this button reveals a link to a secret draft version of the post that can be sent via email to anyone you're interested in inviting to collaborate on your content. </div>
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They're able to use the aforementioned Notes feature to leave feedback and engage in a dialog on the content, and when the article is published, all contributors who collaborated on the post with you get a special mention in the "Thanks To" section of the post. </div>
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<a href="http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/09/medium-adds-collaboration-tools-to-its-publishing-platform-allowing-people-to-add-notes-to-your-posts/#" target="_blank">Drew Olanoff over at TechCrunch</a> noted</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"It’s interesting to watch Medium evolve, as we know that Williams has come from creating Blogger to shoving Twitter into the mainstream. It looks like all of the little things that Blogger never had as a publishing platform are now being put into the Medium product.</blockquote>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/screenshot_4_9_13_9_05_pm.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img alt="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" border="0" src="http://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/screenshot_4_9_13_9_05_pm.png" height="281" title="Video Interview with Ev Williams on Medium - the next evolution in the way we write, share and consume content on the web" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image Courtesy of <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/09/medium-adds-collaboration-tools-to-its-publishing-platform-allowing-people-to-add-notes-to-your-posts/" target="_blank">TechCrunch</a></td></tr>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The interesting use case for something like this is when your friends take a look at your posts and catch some typos, or perhaps a link that doesn’t work. Instead of firing off an email to you or an instant message, you can see notes in-line and then take action on them before or after you’ve published. You really get a sense for how useful this is once you see notes dropped into your own posts...</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Imagine being able to write an article together and then publish it, which is something that you can’t do on any other competing service. I wouldn’t mind trying it out. Nor would I mind being able to launch a note into a new post, giving that person the credit for sparking a new idea for me."</blockquote>
<br />
<h2 style="text-align: left;">
The Internet could be a place where great quality content is created collaboratively by insightful people, will you help?</h2>
<div>
It of course still remains to be seen if Medium can execute on their mission to enable content creators to create better things together, but as <a href="http://www.fastcompany.com/3008132/creative-conversations/mediums-new-collaborative-publishing-feature-encourages-authors-creat" target="_blank">Fast Company points out in their latest coverage</a>, they certainly seem to be doing a fantastic job so far, even if they're not the only players attempting to tackle this challenge.</div>
<br />
I'm excited to see how Medium develops and I'm thrilled to have a chance to play a part in that process.<br />
<br />
Let me know if you're interested in joining and I'll invite you to collaborate on one of my posts (you get an invite to join when you're asked to collaborate by an existing member, at least as of now...). Just leave a comment below or contact me <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/bjhoffpauir" target="_blank">via LinkedIn</a> and I'll get your contact info and send the invite over.
<br />
<br />
If you'd like another in-depth look at Medium, there's a really great post <a href="http://www.niemanlab.org/2012/08/13-ways-of-looking-at-medium-the-new-bloggingsharingdiscovery-platform-from-ev-and-obvious/" target="_blank">over at the Neiman Journalism Lab blog on 13 Ways of Looking At Medium</a> that I heartily recommend.<br />
<br />
And here's the fireside chat from this year's LAUNCH 2013 Conference with Ev Williams where he discusses the goals and objectives of Medium.
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.004541200000002 -92.342566200000022 30.4436382 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-64119229938604078112013-04-26T17:36:00.000-07:002013-04-29T00:28:01.150-07:00Living Social Hacked: security breach leaves 50 million users compromised<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Living Social Hacked: security breach leaves <br />50 million users compromised</td></tr>
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I'm not sure how much we have in common, but I'm pretty sure neither of us would want to receive this email at 7:16 PM on a Friday evening.<br />
<br />
But sadly, I did. Right before I dropped <a href="http://instagram.com/p/YmIgSOPHm5/" target="_blank">some delicious BBQ onto the grill</a> to celebrate the kick off of Festival International de Louisiane, I heard a little ding from my email client notifying me of an important message (you may have gotten one too).<br />
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It would seem I am one of the 50 million or so LivingSocial registered users whose account information was compromised in an cyber-attack on their computer systems in which attackers gained access to sensitive personal information about LivingSocial's customers (namely, me).<br />
<br />
The breach appears to have been contained, though there are only scant details about the attack being released from LinkedIn at this time.<br />
<br />
The information that was accessed includes (but note they do not say "is limited to," which means <i>additional information may have been accessed</i>) <b>Customer Names, User email addresses, Birthdates</b> (only for some users, not all 50 million, WHEW), <b>and encrypted passwords.</b></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Living Social Hacked: Data of 50 Million Affected</td></tr>
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Fortunately, LivingSocial doesn't store plain text passwords in their database system and use a salting / hashing system to enhance security. <br />
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Also, at least according to the official announcement from LivingSocial, <b><i>the database that stores user credit card information was not "affected or accessed" by the attackers</i></b>. And, thankfully, if you login to LivingSocial using Facebook Connect, your Facebook credentials "were not compromised."<br />
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It is reassuring to note that they seemed to respond quickly to the breach with their public statement and emails to affected customers (it takes a while to deliver 50 million emails, even when you're LivingSocial). Even so, if you were one of the affected users, you should head over to LivingSocial to <a href="https://login.livingsocial.com/forgot_password/?reset=true" target="_blank">reset your password right away</a>. Or delete your account, I suppose.<br />
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The traditional Business & Tech news outlets have been running some pretty extensive coverage for a Friday night announcement of a website hack, and if you're curious to learn more head over to <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/100680253" target="_blank">CNBC</a>, <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-57581718-83/livingsocial-hacked-50-million-affected/" target="_blank">CNET</a>, <a href="http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2418239,00.asp" target="_blank">PCMag</a>, or <a href="http://lifehacker.com/livingsocial-hacked-time-to-change-your-passwords-483012132" target="_blank">LifeHacker</a> to see their reporting about the security breach. </div>
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Personally, I'm going to <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/2013/04/festival-international-de-louisiane-best-world-music-festival.html" target="_blank">Festival International de Louisiane</a> to celebrate my LivingSocial troubles away.</div>
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Here's the full text of the email I received at 7:16 PM CST & 11:36 PM CST April 26, 2013:</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>IMPORTANT INFORMATION</b></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
LivingSocial recently experienced a cyber-attack on our computer systems that resulted in unauthorized access to some customer data from our servers. We are actively working with law enforcement to investigate this issue.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The information accessed includes names, email addresses, date of birth for some users, and encrypted passwords -- technically ‘hashed’ and ‘salted’ passwords. We never store passwords in plain text.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Two things you should know:</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li>The database that stores customer credit card information was not affected or accessed.</li>
<br />
<li>If you connect to LivingSocial using Facebook Connect, your Facebook credentials were not compromised.</li>
</ol>
</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
You do not need to take any action at this time, but we wanted to be sure you were fully informed of what happened.</blockquote>
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The security of your information is our priority. We always strive to ensure the security of our customer information, and we are redoubling efforts to prevent any issues in the future.</blockquote>
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Please note that LivingSocial will never ask you directly for personal or account information in an email. We will always direct you to the LivingSocial website – and require you to login – before making any changes to your account. Please disregard any emails claiming to be from LivingSocial that request such information or direct you to a website that asks for such information.</blockquote>
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If you have additional questions about this process, the "Create New Password" button on LivingSocial.com will direct you to a page that has instructions on creating a new password and answers to frequently asked questions.</blockquote>
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We are sorry this incident occurred, and we look forward to continuing to introduce you to new and exciting things to do in your community.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Sincerely, </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Tim O'Shaughnessy, CEO</blockquote>
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.004541200000002 -92.342566200000022 30.4436382 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-80873742872175172812013-04-25T10:48:00.000-07:002013-04-26T22:31:19.427-07:00LinkedIn transforms Contacts section into super-powered personal assistant that integrates with EVERYTHING<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image Courtesy of <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/25/linkedin-turns-its-contacts-section-into-a-personal-assistant-with-google-yahoo-evernote-outlook-apps-integration-and-a-standalone-iphone-app/" target="_blank">TechChrunch</a></td></tr>
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Today, LinkedIn released a few important new features for members that really <b>turbo-charges</b> their Connections section of the site. In addition, they released a new mobile app called Contacts for Apple devices (with other platforms slated for future release dates).<br />
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If you're like me, you have probably already imported some of your Contacts into LinkedIn from your gMail, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc accounts. Which was great...except of course, that it was a one-time affair. If you have added any contacts since your original import, those won't appear on your LinkedIn Connections because the import is a one-way process.<br />
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<i><b>Well, go back and do it again</b></i>, because now LinkedIn creates a permanent connection to your mail system's contacts and will keep your contacts synchronized between those systems (should you choose to permit it) and your LinkedIn profile. Unbelievably, LinkedIn also now supports synching your mobile device's contact lists with your LinkedIn profile if you also install the mobile application.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>There was a broad range of support for web email systems announced today, with more coming in the pipeline. The list of supported systems announced today include Gmail, Google Contacts, Google Calendar; Google Apps Mail, Contacts, Calendar; Yahoo! Mail, Contacts, Calendar; Outlook Mail, Contacts, Calendar; iPhone Address Book (via LinkedIn Contacts app); LinkedIn’s CardMunch service; Evernote and TripIt.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">New LinkedIn Collection Timeline View</td></tr>
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Unfortunately, this update doesn't work with offline clients, so if you're using Outlook or Mac Mail to connect to your company's internal systems (unless you use Exchange / Outlook Web Services), you may not be able to take full advantage of the new updates to the system. They do support one-off imports of some desktop clients (Outlook Contacts CSV, Mac Address Book vCard and Yahoo! Contacts CSV initially), but those of us hoping to keep our desktops, mobile devices, and LinkedIn profiles in sync will have to wait for another update.<br />
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Even better than just being able to import these contacts and keep them in sync, LinkedIn's latest updates also allow you to manage, organize, and keep in touch with your connections with just a few clicks. They've also included a new view that organizes any communications you've had with your contacts through LinkedIn in a timeline format that is visible whenever you view your Connection's profile.<br />
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Although this update is targeted towards regular users of the service, "Power Users" and Recruiters who use the service daily for work to identify leads or potential new hires will find this feature a blessing, especially if you handle a large number of contacts through LinkedIn. I've got over 1000+ connections on LinkedIn, and one complaint I've long voiced about the interface was the difficulty keeping track of communications. This is particularly true if you participate on discussion Groups with your connections and want to see not only your email communications, but how they interacted with you on the other sections of the LinkedIn site.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">New LinkedIn Contacts app for iPhone</td></tr>
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Although the new Sync features have been rolled out site wide to all users, some functionality is being rolled out on an invitation-only basis during the first few weeks of launch. If your account hasn't already been pre-selected to enjoy the new features, you can <a href="http://contacts.linkedin.com/waitlist" target="_blank">sign up to join and participate in the new feature Beta release here</a>.<br />
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A quick note for iPhone users - if you go to download the app through the Apple Store, be sure to search for "LinkedIn Connections" - I couldn't find the app by searching for LinkedIn alone in the first 20 or so results. Even with this search term, I had to scroll through a few other contact managers before I found the new Connections application. This may be resolved by the time you read this if the app starts climbing the Apple Store download charts, but for now a little extra effort is required. Or you could just <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/linkedin-contacts/id635424128?mt=8" target="_blank">click here to download it now</a>.<br />
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Business Insider even claims the new app does a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/linkedin-contacts-app-tour-2013-4" target="_blank">better job of managing your contacts than your iPhone does</a>. I'm not sure I'm ready to agree with that verdict just yet, but I can definitely say it's definitely better than manually keeping all this in sync.<br />
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You can see more on the latest release by visiting the official LinkedIn announcement page or by browsing their SlideShare presentation below:<br />
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045387 -92.342566200000022 30.4436407 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-13769895119514843402013-04-24T15:27:00.000-07:002015-04-14T06:59:46.253-07:00Festival International de Louisiane - Best World Music Festival - Come Festival With Us in Lafayette, LA<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Parc International for <a href="http://www.festivalinternational.com/" target="_blank">Festival International de Louisiane</a> in Lafayette Louisiana</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xWPHRBev-C0/UXrzE0S90pI/AAAAAAAAGqo/Hqm3MDfwlpA/s1600/festival_international_de_louisiane.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xWPHRBev-C0/UXrzE0S90pI/AAAAAAAAGqo/Hqm3MDfwlpA/s400/festival_international_de_louisiane.png" height="301" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Festival International de Louisiane <a href="http://www.festivalinternational.com/" target="_blank">Home Page</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--AdQD5_C0K0/UXr9TMuwNCI/AAAAAAAAGq4/Gc-icuULCFY/s1600/Festival+International+de+Lousiane+Abou.com+Winner+Readers+Choice+Best+World+Music+Festival.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--AdQD5_C0K0/UXr9TMuwNCI/AAAAAAAAGq4/Gc-icuULCFY/s400/Festival+International+de+Lousiane+Abou.com+Winner+Readers+Choice+Best+World+Music+Festival.png" height="282" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Festival International de Louisiane<br />
<a href="http://worldmusic.about.com/od/2013-Readers-Choice-Awards/ss/2013-World-Music-At-About-com-Readers-Choice-Award-Winners_5.htm" target="_blank">About.com Winner Readers Choice Best World Music Festival</a></td></tr>
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It's that time of year again: time to come to Lafayette, Louisiana to experience the world's premiere exhibition of Francophone culture, art, music, food, and entertainment at Festival International de Louisiane.<br />
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From their "<a href="http://festivalinternational.com/about" target="_blank">History & Mission</a>" :<br />
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"Festival International de Louisiane is a community-based, non-profit arts organization formed in 1986 to produce an annual visual and performing arts festival celebrating the French cultural heritage of southern Louisiana - primarily a combination of French, African, Caribbean and Hispanic influences. The largest outdoor, FREE Francophone event in the U.S., the Festival places special emphasis on highlighting the connections between Acadiana and the Francophone world. Each year performing, and visual artists from Europe, Africa, Canada, the Caribbean and the Americas are invited to share their talents with Louisiana artists, residents and visitors.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Since its creation, Festival International de Louisiane has become famous as a premier presenter of some of the most unique world musicians and performances in the United States. Popular Louisiana artists such as Aaron Neville, Dr. John, Irma Thomas, Allan Toussaint, Zachary Richard, Sonny Landreth, Beausoleil, Buckwheat Zydeco, Boozoo Chavis, Amedee "Bois Sec" Ardoin, D.L. Menard, Terrance Simien, C.J. Chenier, Geno Delafose, Marc Broussard, Marcia Ball, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, Canray Fontenot and Buddy Guy have all performed on our stages."</blockquote>
That's right - deep in the Heart of Cajun Country there's a global gathering of french-speaking people and cultures that converges on Lafayette, LA every year to celebrate our rich heritage, delicious cuisine, and foot-stomping music and the best part?<br />
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It's 100% free & open to the public!<br />
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Because Festival International de Louisiane is sponsored by the <a href="http://www.lafayettela.gov/" target="_blank">Lafayette Consolidated Government</a> (here in Lafayette we have combined our municipal and parish [you might call them counties where you're from] governments into one]) as well as a <a href="http://www.festivalinternational.com/site.php?pageID=317" target="_blank">host of corporate sponsors</a>) visitors from anywhere in the world can come down and celebrate all that is wonderful about Francophone cultures with my fellow Cajuns and all of the entertainment is provided gratis. <a href="http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/de_rien" target="_blank">De Rien</a>.<br />
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Although the <a href="http://festivalinternational.com/music" target="_blank">music, art exhibits, street shows,</a> etc are free to the public, you will want to bring both a significant appetite as well as a few dollars (most vendors at Festival International de Louisiane accept cash only, except the <a href="http://vivalawaffle.com/news" target="_blank">food trucks</a> typically) to sample some of the most <a href="http://festivalinternational.com/site473.php" target="_blank">delicious morsels of cuisine</a> your lips have likely ever tasted.<br />
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This year's Festival is not only the winner of the <a href="http://worldmusic.about.com/od/2013-Readers-Choice-Awards/ss/2013-World-Music-At-About-com-Readers-Choice-Award-Winners_5.htm" target="_blank">About.com Reader's Choice Award for Best World Music Festival</a>, it's also a bit higher-tech than usual. I've written about Lafayette, LA's innovative <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/p/about.html" target="_blank">Fiber Optic Network</a> and the excitement around that <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/2013/04/free-event-fiber-for-breakfast-fueling.html" target="_blank">system's impact on health care</a>. But the impact of Lafayette's burgeoning and rapidly developing technology ecosystem is also being felt on Festival this year.<br />
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First of all, they've created a <a href="http://lineup.festivalinternational.com/" target="_blank">Interactive Musical Lineup Creator</a> that allows visitors to run through the entire schedule of shows and create a custom line up of only the acts they want to see at the time they want to see them. It also shows which bands are performing on multiple nights which makes figuring out conflicts between acts you want to see a good deal easier.<br />
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Even neater? You can share these with your friends so you'll know where everyone is going to be during the festival! You can also share them publicly, <a href="http://lineup.festivalinternational.com/user/1581675/bands" target="_blank">as I did here</a>, so that everyone can see what great musical performances you're going to be enjoying while at Festival International de Louisiane.<br />
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They've also released a couple of Mobile Apps for Festival-Goers (I've only tested the <a href="http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/festival-international-louisiane/id361916513?mt=8" target="_blank">iPhone version available here</a>, but this year there is also an <a href="https://market.android.com/details?id=com.seedlabs.festintl" target="_blank">Android version available</a>) that will pull the information you save when logged into the site down to your mobile device so you can keep your Custom Lineup with you as you see everything Festival has to offer.<br />
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And, if you're like me and are a bit of a history buff, you may enjoy reading <a href="http://calzonemedia.blogspot.com/2013/04/festival-international-founding.html" target="_blank">this post in the Calzone Media Blog from Herman Mhire</a> on the history of the founding of Festival International de Louisiane.<br />
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So what are you waiting for? <b><a href="http://www.festivalinternational.com/site.php" target="_blank">Come Festival With Us</a>!</b></div>
beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.004541200000002 -92.342566200000022 30.4436382 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-12646551457277094992013-04-20T06:43:00.000-07:002013-04-23T07:16:49.212-07:00Wendy Rodrigue & George Rodrigue Share California Adventures with Blue Dog<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-P2XWiy5hGxY/UWuNql38PBI/AAAAAAAAFcU/fIQIofhV2b4/s1600/P1090509.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-P2XWiy5hGxY/UWuNql38PBI/AAAAAAAAFcU/fIQIofhV2b4/s400/P1090509.jpeg" width="353" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image Courtesy - <a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/" target="_blank">Wendy Rodrigue's Blog</a></td></tr>
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I wrote recently about a fellow Blogger Wendy Rodrigue's post <a href="http://innovez.blogspot.com/2013/04/the-road-wendy-rodrigue-george-rodrigue.html" target="_blank">The Road: Wendy Rodrigue & George Rodrigue from Musings of an Artist's Wife</a>. I always love reading Wendy's <a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/" target="_blank">blog</a> - it's like listening to one of your favorite Artists and his Muse communicate openly through this channel that didn't exist when <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CDUQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.picasso.fr%2Fus%2F&ei=4412UdjtJoSy2gXu4oCgCw&usg=AFQjCNG-Ny2DjG_D3D8r-vVqkfGlbzQCeg&sig2=WQSx3VuEomEZexQXiHFGVg&bvm=bv.45512109,d.b2I" target="_blank">Picasso</a> was around.<br />
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It's exciting :)<br />
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That post was a prelude as they began their trip across country for a sojourn out to their Carmel, California beach house. Not only is the prose delightful (thank you Wendy), but the Candids they get of George in the zone are fantastic.<br />
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The first is the sequel to her previous post (a' la The Road Part 2): <a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/2013/04/america-unexpected.html" target="_blank">America, Unexpected</a>.<br />
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The second post she shared<br />
<a name='more'></a><a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/2013/04/looking-for-beach-house.html" target="_blank">Looking for a Beach House</a>, is the source of the picture to the left. I also managed to snag great picture of Jacques Rodrigue, Mallory Page Chastant, Wendy Rodrigue, and George Rodrigue clearly having a great time shown below.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Congratulations!</b><br />
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From the post:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"He also spoke of his relief over his unexpected return to health, found just in time as his son Jacques, Director of the George Rodrigue Foundation of the Arts, announces his engagement to New Orleans artist Mallory Page Chastant"</blockquote>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bo3FORRYEAc/UWdDR_O2doI/AAAAAAAAFbw/VeLn7_D59Vs/s1600/Las+Vegas+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="290" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bo3FORRYEAc/UWdDR_O2doI/AAAAAAAAFbw/VeLn7_D59Vs/s400/Las+Vegas+2013.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image Courtesy - <a href="http://www.wendyrodrigue.com/" target="_blank">Wendy Rodrigue's Blog</a></td></tr>
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beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette, LA, USA30.2240897 -92.01984270000002730.0045387 -92.342566200000022 30.4436407 -91.697119200000031tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11838515.post-72564078945628168352013-04-19T16:49:00.000-07:002013-04-23T07:16:39.568-07:00Free Event: Fiber for Breakfast :: Fueling Healthcare - See how Lafayette, LA is using innovative fiber-powered technologies to deliver new experiences in patient care.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UrdW6aT-jIE/UXW3I7wLv6I/AAAAAAAAGoE/hTdFRQLUFBA/s1600/Louisiana_Immersive_Technology_Enterprise_LITE_Lafayette_LA.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="435" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UrdW6aT-jIE/UXW3I7wLv6I/AAAAAAAAGoE/hTdFRQLUFBA/s640/Louisiana_Immersive_Technology_Enterprise_LITE_Lafayette_LA.png" width="595" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;">Screen Capture - The Louisiana Immersive Technologies Enterprise (LITE) Center's <a href="http://www.lite3d.com/" target="_blank">Home Page</a></td></tr>
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One of the reasons Sam and I were excited to move back to Lafayette from Austin, TX was the innovative things the community was doing around Fiber To The Home.<br />
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That's why I'm delighted to share this wonderful free event with you that is being held at the LITE Center in Lafayette, LA : <b>Fiber for Breakfast: Fueling Healthcare</b>.<br />
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During the event, there will be brief presentations from representatives from<br />
<ul>
<li>Lafayette General Medical Center</li>
<li>Our Lady of Lourdes Regional Medical Center</li>
<li>Acadian Companies</li>
<li>Schumacher Group</li>
</ul>
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I can assure you this is not an event you are going to want to miss....<b>Plus if you're one of the first 25 there, you get a free lunch.</b></div>
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<a name='more'></a></div>
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We're fortunate that the event's coordinators (it's a part of <a href="http://innov8lafayette.com/" target="_blank">INNOV8 Lafayette 2013</a>) have gathered together a group of incredibly experienced professionals from some of the most innovative firms in the world in health care and information technology.<br />
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And, since so many of them happen to be located in Lafayette, LA, home of one of the first <a href="http://www.lusfiber.net/" target="_blank">community owned gigabit fiber-optic networks</a>, you can catch 4 of the leaders</div>
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And for those who are naturally curious, yes we <a href="http://www.lafayettela.gov/presidents/dpt120pressreleases.asp?id=6868" target="_blank">had it before Google rolled it to Kansas City</a>.<br />
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With cheap and accessible access to giga-bit, and in some cases multi-gigabit fiber optic connections between businesses, health care providers, schools, and hospitals in the area, it's no wonder so many of them are <a href="http://www.acadianabusiness.com/mais-oui/13213-innov8-lafayette-year-two" target="_blank">pushing the boundaries of what it means to innovate in health care delivery and information technology</a>.<br />
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From the <a href="http://www.eventbrite.com/event/6088511903?utm_source=innovez-blog" target="_blank">EventBrite Registration & Details Page</a>:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
On April 24, 2013, as part of INNOV8 Lafayette, LUS Fiber will hold Fiber for Breakfast: Fueling Healthcare, an exciting event that will showcase ways our healthcare community is currently utilizing technology to provide new experiences in patient care.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
....Participants will learn about successful telemedicine clinics allowing patients to receive care from a doctor located miles away. They will learn about the successful collaboration between physicians in remote locations to provide the fastest and best care to a patient, and more.</blockquote>
</blockquote>
Join us by <a href="http://www.eventbrite.com/event/6088511903?utm_source=innovez-blog" target="_blank">registering to attend the event</a> at the LITE Center (<a href="http://www.lite3d.com/" target="_blank">Louisiana Immersive Technology Enterprise</a>) - Wednesday, April 24, 2013 from 7:30 AM to 10:30 AM (CDT).537 Cajundome Blvd. Lafayette, LA , 70506.<br />
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I'll be covering this event and many others being held for this year's <a href="http://innov8lafayette.com/about/" target="_blank">INNOV8 2013 Lafayette Conference</a>, so check back regularly.<br />
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<a href="http://m.c.lnkd.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/shrink_200_200/p/2/000/02d/18c/005f70d.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://m.c.lnkd.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/shrink_200_200/p/2/000/02d/18c/005f70d.jpg" /></a></div>
As a side note, I've had the good fortune of being granted the opportunity to work with <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/kamngonr" target="_blank">Dr. Kam Ng</a>, CEO of the LITE Center, as part of <a href="http://www.the705.org/mentorship" target="_blank">the705's Young Leader's Mentorship Program</a>.<br />
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I have already had an initial meeting with him, which was a real delight. He's genuinely excited to be a part of the program and you know it because he infects you with it within 5 minutes of saying hello.<br />
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There's going to be a real-time demo of some of these technologies and you're not going to want to miss seeing this in person!<br />
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You can also find a complete breakdown of all the INNOV8 Lafayette 2013 Events in their <a href="http://innov8lafayette.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/INNOV8_event_guide.pdf" target="_blank">downloadable PDF</a>.</div>
beejhuffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02170187134987334046noreply@blogger.com0Lafayette Lafayette30.208671 -92.062021