…And another thing

On Saturday, March 29, Independents Hall held its first blood drive. Indyhall co-founder Alex Hillman totally supported the idea the minute I asked. He blogged about the drive and talked it up, and organized the transformation of the co-working space into a co-donating space the night before. Indyhall members moved the furniture so that the donor beds could be set up, and at 7 am on Saturday, the Red Cross arrived. At 9am, Alex was in the first slot, with Jason Hill of National Mechanics (our favorite place) right next to him! It was a terrific feeling to be a part of this lifesaving effort! Twenty-two people rolled up their sleeves and donated, and afterwards Ruth Kalinka led a large crowd to Franklin Fountain for ice cream.

Here are some interviews with the great folks who made this happen!

Went to the Past of Web Apps (POWA) conference. The best session covered the first tablet – used to launch the Ten Commandments. It became very popular in spite of being TOTALLY proprietary. Compared with earlier Templetops, it was mobile but still very heavy, and relied on inflexible hard-coding. Now, it did format side-by-side columns with a clean, table-free design, but they only displayed correctly in one browser – Mosezilla. The code itself was easy to learn, though, and represented the first universal set of standards.

Many of us would like to make the world better, but there are so many complex problems that the task seems overwhelming. Here’s something you can do about a real problem: donate blood. Blood is needed every single day, not just in emergencies. Donating blood takes about an hour or so. It’s safe, easy, and free! And you really do help save lives.

Sign up for the Independents Hall Blood Drive on Saturday, March 29, from 9am to 3pm. Independents Hall is located at 32 South Strawberry Street in Old City, between 2nd and 3rd and Market and Chestnut Streets. You can sign up online here: Registration page

What does it take to make you happy? Ask anyone you like. Most will respond with something like “A million dollars” or “A new job.” Some, after some thought, might say, “A family.” Some, of course, have no idea.

You need to focus on what matters; otherwise, you waste a lot of time. Below, you’ll see a list of items on which I would tell you to focus. The items are open to interpretation, so later on, I’ll provide some specifics. Note: This is not engineering. You don’t need extreme specificity.

Work toward having:
1. Health, physical and mental
2. Enough money to have all the food, clothing, shelter and health care you need, as well as some luxuries
3. Friends: a few very close and some less so
4. Interesting, meaningful work
5. Something you enjoy doing that is not your work
6. A committed relationship with another person
7. Peace of mind concerning your relationship with your family
8. Peace of mind concerning your relationship with religion or religious questions

In later posts, I’ll expand on these areas and give you some ways to define each one more closely. You may find overlap or conflicts – for example, your work may or may not be interesting and meaningful. You still need the money.

PANMA’s educational events attract larger and larger audiences. On February 21, 100 people – an SRO crowd – attended the Video on the Web presentation held at the Holiday Inn at 13th and Walnut.

Nick Floro of Sealworks Interactive discussed the technical aspects of making web video: compression, software, formats etc. Then Scott McNulty of ForkYou.tv, the Unofficial Apple Weblog and Blankbaby launched into a funny, entertaining (and sometimes even informative) talk on how to start a video blog and hold an audience. Mark Schoneveld of The Poverty Jet Set and too many other Web 2.0 ventures to list spoke about how to make money with web video, and no, ads aren’t the best path. Kurt Sensenig, of ArtImperial explained how to encourage the rapid proliferation of your video around the web by means of YouTube and MySpace.

If you weren’t able to make it, you might enjoy watching some of the highlights of the evening.