Month: February 2008

I’ve really enjoyed using Facebook for the last year or so. Of all the social networking apps out there I  think it’s been one that has actually added to my overall happiness.

That said, with any new social medium, we still need to figure out what the ‘rules’ are to what we as individuals are happy with. A good case in point for me has been what to do with Facebook and colleagues at work.

Facebook has work ‘networks’ which are interesting ways of seeing what your co-workers are up to if you’re friendly with them in an extra-curricular way, but this situation can start getting complicated if your work relationship gets strained in any way. For instance, I recently saw a Facebook status update of a ‘facebook friend’ who I work with that made an already tricky situation more frustrating for me.

As such, I’m introducing a new policy for myself to limit my Facebook / work overlap somewhat – I’m not going to have any ‘facebook friends’ that are within my reporting hierarchy (i.e. if they report to me to any level, or if I report to them from any depth). For now, I’m happy to be linked to people outside of that, but even that is questionable for the long term.

Has anyone else thought about this at all?

The high definition disc war is pretty much a done deal now – Blu-ray is the victor. I knew it was happening, but when I got an email from Netflix today telling me I wouldn’t be getting HD-DVDs from them for much longer it confirmed my suspicions.

I did pick the wrong team – I bought an HD-DVD add-on for my XBox 360 only a few months ago. In fact the speed at which the tide has shifted is the one thing that has surprised me.

One good thing is I didn’t waste too much money – most of the HD-DVDs I’ve watched have been rented from Netflix (Heroes Season 1, Letters from Iwo Jima, etc.), so I’ll just buy a Playstation 3 in a couple of months and switch to rented Blu-ray discs instead.

That said, I don’t think Blu-ray will even last – Apple’s new HD movie rental is the sign of things to come, and I predict before too long on-demand, internet streamed, HD content will dwarf any Blu-ray sales or rentals. So my PS3 will likely be the last physical medium video entertainment device I buy.