I was just reading feeds for my link blog.

Aside: there’s TONS of stuff about Windows Vista shipping that I DID NOT put on my linkblog. Why? It’s all the same. Vista shipped. Vista shipped. Vista shipped. Why do I do my link blog? So that I can filter out all the duplicates for my readers. Only the best posts get shared on my link blog.

Anyway, this is the first day I’ve been sad about not being at Microsoft. I remember the day when I was an MVP about four years ago (before I was an employee) where they showed off some Macromedia Director movies about what Longhorn (the code-name for Windows Vista) would do.

The UI doesn’t look as cool. There isn’t any .NET code in Vista, which is a complete shift from what I saw back then. It took two years longer than I thought it would (taught me a lesson that software at this scale isn’t easy and you should never even think about a potential release date if the developers won’t let you play with the product).

Lots of people are underestimating Windows Vista. It’s gotten that kind of tarnish that comes from being a little too public with the sausage-making process.

I learned a lot from watching Vista be built close up. I learned that it’s better to spend an extra two years and possibly billions of dollars to do something right. Many people told me “no one will care in the end that it’s late, if it’s good.”

Someone told me that they’ll never load Windows Vista. I said I’m going to load it on the first day that it’s available. He seemed amazed by that.

I said “it’s way better than Windows XP.” I also acknowledged that there’s probably going to be things that drive me absolutely bonkers. Lots of blog posts to come on those, I’m sure (said with no irony that I’m fighting with Apple’s Final Cut Pro running on a different OS while I type this blog).

Anyway, I’m rambling.

The Vista team, under Jim Allchin, suprised me. They shipped it on time. With a lot better quality than I was expecting.

Kudos to the team. My hat is off to you and can’t wait to get the final bits and start using them. I’m sad I can’t be there.

The father of the Internet, Vint Cerf (who now works at Google) talked with Catherine Girardeau at the Web 2.0 conference.

Channel 9 has a video with Jim Allchin that says that Windows Vista has shipped.

Here, let’s try a few things and see how Like.com works.

Let’s look for these things:

Watch with square face. Worked pretty good. I loved the square dancing face.

Steel tipped shoe. Found only three results. I’d expect more.

Black dress shoe. Lots of nice results.

Diamond and garnet ring. Maryam would like this.

Silver watch. This brought back a lot of silver watches.

Pretty good, although I want a lot more choices than what they’ve given us.

The problem is it’s taken 250 servers with four processors each to do just this small subset.

Well, not exactly, but Michael Arrington lays out how things happened at about midnight tonight.

UPDATE: Riya’s CEO, Munjal Shah has a bunch of reports leading up to the launch.

OK, so, what’s the 250 machines for?

A better way to find stuff. A way better way.

Just don’t tell Maryam, OK?

Why not?

Well, it’s the first time you can search for “red strappy shoes” and have every type of shoe show up VISUALLY.

This is cool stuff.

It’s called Like.com.

TechCrunch has a report up.

I interviewed Munjal Shah, Riya’s CEO and here’s the interview. Here’s a demo of Like.com. They are both videos published to my ScobleShow video blog.

More shortly.

I hear that Like.com will be turned on shortly. Like.com is up now.

This is a lot of fun.

Some stories about Like.com.

1) The URL cost him $100,000. In the interview he explains how they bought it. It involved finding the guy who owned it, jumping a fence, and leaving a bottle of wine with a note on it (he wouldn’t answer his email).
2) Riya was pretty close to being sold to Google. If it had been, they never would have worked on this search engine. So, by getting turned down by Google Riya came back with a much better business.
3) Just the jewelry set takes 20GB of RAM.
4) Munjal still believes in blogs, but for this launch Riya talked with fashion bloggers, and journalists outside the tech world like at People magazine. Why? Well, this site — in its current incarnation — will be most interesting to women and non-geeks. If you’ve looked at who participates here, it’s heavily male.
5) Why not keep working on face detection? Because they learned through user testing that they’d never be able to make it good enough. They found that by focusing on visual image searches they can get a much more satisfied user base.

What do you think? It is the most interesting search experiences I’ve had since I first laid my eyes on Google about eight years ago.

UPDATE: Liz Gannes of GigaOm has a report too, but isn’t as impressed. “I do think this is a cool idea but it’s not dazzlingly good yet.”

UPDATE 2: Dan Farber has a report too. So does Rafe Needleman over on his new Webware blog.

UPDATE 3: Andre Ribeirinho writes “What I like most about Like is that being a shopping comparison site they are targetting a specific target, Women and pursuing a market worth of $15-$30B.”

Where’s the best political news aggregation site on the Web? Memeorandum? TailRank? Google News?

Where you going tonight for online political news and views?

I just got a look at a new thing. I can’t talk about it until sometime tomorrow morning. I have video, of course. In the morning you’ll also read about it on TechCrunch and over on Dan Farber’s blog and probably a few other places — I compared notes with several other people who I trust and they say it’s the coolest thing we’ve seen so far this week (and that’s saying something because there’s something like five conferences going on in San Francisco this week).

But, I’ll tease you because the company who built it turned off all their servers, and upgraded the RAM tonight. Why? Cause the working set of what they are building takes 20GB’s of RAM. Whew!

And that’s just for a small part of their new service.

It is massively cool. I love teasing you.

Hey, it’s almost as much fun as Ze Frank on voting day — at the end he has his Vloggie acceptance speech.

Anyway, come back tomorrow to see what some smart developers can do with 250 servers.

Oh, and this wasn’t part of the Web 2.0 Summit that I was hanging out in (there were several other companies that presented there this afternoon. Richard MacManus has a list; Mike Arrington of TechCrunch has a report too). They weren’t cool enough to get invited to present their stuff.

I think John Battelle will be very interested in this particular 250-server app.

Oh, and their domain name is one word. The story around how they got that is fun too. But, that’s another tease. Yes, I’m like those jerks on TV who tease a show that’s coming tomorrow.

See ya then!

UPDATE: CNET and Rafe Needleman have a new blog called WebWare. Rafe ran into me in the lobby and says he’ll cover the “250 servers” story too.

Heheh, last night Chris Coulter, my son Patrick, and I filmed an episode of Beach Walks with Rox. Great burritos from Tres Amigos and a wonderful sunset at the local beach. Talking Mac’s and PCs.

If you want something a little more filling than burritos and geek talk on the beach, I put up a 38-minute interview I did with Alex Castro, CEO of Seattle startup Pluggd, which is working on a new search engine for podcasts which is really cool. I got him to give me a 3-minute-short demo too. See, something for everyone! Long interview for those who want depth, short demo for those who just want to get the meat.

That interview is one of those that I did up in Seattle. There’s a lot of interesting startups being built in the Seattle area. We’ll have some more from Seattle this week and next.

Here’s an article about Pluggd over on TechCrunch.

Anyway, wonderful time yesterday hanging out with Roxanne on a couple of Half Moon Bay beaches. She inspired me back at Vloggercon to live a beach-oriented lifestyle and I’m so blessed that we can walk to the beach from our new home.

Ahh, now we’re seeing what Microsoft is thinking of doing with Xbox as a media-distribution platform (Microsoft is announcing TV programs and other video shows distributed onto your Xbox). My question is: can I watch Lost? I don’t have a TV hookup, so I have to either wait for IP networks to get it (and I ain’t gonna watch 640×480 on iTunes, that’s too low a resolution) or I have to wait for NetFlix to get it on DVD. We just finished watching the second season of Lost. I want to get the third season of Lost for a reasonable price. In HD of course.

In addition to Christopher Coulter, Jeremiah Owyang, Hitachi Datasystems’ top corporate blogger, just announced that he’s coming to PodTech too.

I guess this is a good chance to announce that we’re looking for a videographer and a video editor to hire too.

It’s going to be really great working with Jeremiah and Chris. Jeremiah is someone I’ve admired for a long time and put together an awesome Lunch 2.0 event. He’s going to be a great addition and can’t wait to see what he does.

Oh, you going to CES in January? We’re hosting BlogHaus I there in the Bellagio — it’s gonna be a fun place to hang out. That is about to get a whole lot more interesting. If you’re going to CES, drop me a line and let me know where you’re staying.

If you’ve been reading here for a while you know that Chris Coulter doesn’t exactly see eye to eye with me. He’s been the longest-running commenter on my blog, dating back to my days when I worked at NEC — most of those comments have disagreed with a position I’ve taken.

That’s why when he stayed at my house a few weeks back it raised eyebrows.

So, why hire someone like that?

Well, the side of the story you don’t see when he comments here is that he’s sent me more news than anyone else and he’s been consistently good. He has contacts all over the place and is what I call an “invisible influencer.” Someone who loves trading information with other people.

Podtech needs those skills as it builds out the news department. You might not see his name on a podcast, but you’ll feel his presence as he gets us to focus on the breaking stuff.

Second, he has video skills that I saw but other people wouldn’t have recognized. He helped run a wedding business, but was sending me lots of other stuff over the past few years, including lots of news about equipment and non-linear editors.

Third, he has writing skills. If you’ve ever suffered one of his barbs, you know that he can be quite persuasive with his writing. He’s also edited books, articles, and I’ve read a few of his screenplays and found his writing to be compact, insightful, gripping, etc. I’ve always wanted him to blog, while thankful that he wasn’t out there competing with me.

Fourth, if I’m going to grow as a manager and as a leader I need people I work with who see the world differently than I do. Translation: who can tell me I’m full of it. Why is that important? Well, beyond keeping the ego under check, it’s where great ideas come from. For instance, look at Irina. She doesn’t write with the style I use. Doesn’t see the world the way I do. But she came up with the Vloggies. Having diverse ideas on a team is important and brings better ideas.

Fifth, in person he’s a lot more fun to hang with than he comes across in the comments here.

So, he’ll help with editing my show, coming up with some new ideas (I’d love to do a “TechCrossfire” show with him, but not ready to announce anything like that), he’s gonna work on doing a blog for PodTech and help the news group set its priorities, and help do some other video shows and segments.

Anyway, that was my secret that I’ve been keeping a while. Glad to have Chris aboard.

Whew, lots of stuff came in about the Vloggies.

Weird America has a fun video from the evening.

We got on Valleywag.

Tom Foremski, of Silicon Valley Watcher, has more Vloggies interviews.

PodTech had its own video crew there and captured the event.

Thomas Hawk has killer photos, as usual.

Rocketboom is selling its award on eBay and has pictures of Andrew Baron, Rocketboom’s founder, getting on top of Ze Frank’s duckie that he sent in his place to pick up his award.

Thank you to everyone who came and made it a great evening, now back to work. Er, editing. Email. Oh, and I have a fun announcement to make. Coming soon.

The Local Live team just introduced 3D maps which competes with Google Earth. Pretty cool and good for us that Microsoft and Google are going at it. Requires a download and IE 6 or 7, which will keep it from being seen as cool.

Google isn’t taking this lying down, though, and has just released a beta of Google Earth 4.

I link to many of the best reports over on my link blog.

More on TechMeme.

Microsoft’s On10.net and Channel 9 have interviews with the team and demos of the 3D Virtual Earth too.

OK, I have a complete list of winners from the Vloggies up now — the big winners was Alive in Baghdad (they got the only standing ovation of the evening). Interestingly enough, before the Vloggies, I had never seen their stuff and it really is incredible. In fact, I haven’t seen many of the award winners before tonight and there’s some really interesting video going on out there. I’m slowing going through the list and will share my favorites from time to time. I love Ze Frank and Rocketboom, but there’s really a lot more incredible work being done out there and I’m glad we got a chance to highlight just a little bit of that tonight.

Vloggies really was an incredible show, so many interesting people there and a great vibe, which has always been true of the videoblogging community from when I first saw videoblogs at Northern Voice, to the vloggercon, to here. Irina Slutsky deserves credit for having the dream and getting it to happen. Valerie Cunningham did a huge amount of work behind the scenes. So did Maryam and others that I’m forgetting.

Technorati’s Kevin Marks filmed Jerry Zucker’s remarks, which were pretty funny.

Sebastian Prooth interviewed the voice guy, Joe Klein.

Tom Foremski, Silicon Valley Watcher, has a good report. One thing that Tom got sorta incorrect is that Irina was the one who got most of the people to come out and it was her vision that got this to happen. Valerie kicked ass, though, too. Both deserve credit, not just one.

Thank you to the sponsors as well. Yahoo Video; Blip.TV; GUBA; Revver; Webex; Dabble; Pandora; Intel; Cafe Nord, and the presenters, PodTech.net. We really appreciate the role they played in making the evening really special.

Rox, of Beach Walks, has a video report from Vloggies. She won three awards.

Thanks to Scott Beale for the photo used in this post, and for posting a ton of photos from the Vloggies.

UPDATE: Scott just posted his Vloggie Wrapup with lots of great photos.

Josh Wolf is the videoblogger who is in jail for refusing to hand over his videotapes to the Grand Jury. He won several awards tonight and didn’t get a chance to give an acceptance speech. So, his mom transcribed this and sent it to us, which I’m running here in full:

It seems like mere moments ago that I was here in this
venue for blogger con. I remember telling my story
about how the federal government was trying to send me
to prison for refusing to turn over my unpublished
material and testify in front of a grand jury for
asserting that I am a journalist, and for refusing to
be an agent for the government by providing
intelligence to aid in an anarchist witch hunt. Some
were shocked by my story, others were not surprised
that the government would go to such lengths, and
still others maintained disbelief, preferring to think
of me as the boy who cried wolf, rather than opening
themselves up to the idea that their government would
do such a thing.
That weekend at vlogger con was one of the best in my
life. It was euphoric getting to hang out and party
with so many stellar individuals, and I am
disheartened that I can only join you in sprit to
tonight. I’ve always heard that the best par t of
award shows are the after parties and I’m sure that it
will be a rocking good time. I’ll be there for the
next one.
Thanks for the awards guys. It feels good to know that
I’ve been able to stir up a bit of controversy in the
blogosphere and I’m touched by being awarded best male
blogger
I’d like to thank everyone who has blogged or vlogged
about my situation, whether you are in agreement with
what I’m doing or not, and I’d also like to thank
everyone who has supported me throughout this
endeavor, whether its through sending me books or
letters, donating money to my legal fund or helping
out with my blog, wiki or the various projects I’ve
been involved with.
Thank you all and have fun tonight I’ll be out soon
enough

Joe Klein announced the Vloggies tonight and did an awesome job. He also did it for free. Which I greatly appreciate. He does this stuff professionally. He’s an accomplished voice over guy.

Well the Vloggies is done. Here’s the People’s Choice awards:

Favorite Vlog: Ask a Ninja
Male: Josh Wolf
Female: Nontourage — Julie Daman and Sarah Atwood
Group: Alive in Baghdad
Comedy: Ask a Ninja
Community: Minnesota Stories
Education: Wine Library TV
Entertainment (fiction): Galacticast
Entertainment (non-fiction): Beach Walks with Rox
Experimental: 90 Seconds with Dave
Inspirational: Beach Walks with Rox
Kids: Phil Hamilton Hits the Big TIme
Cooking: Wine Library TV
Green: Freshtopia
News: Goodnight Burbank
Diary: Josh Leo’s Vlog
Political: Ze Frank
Tech: Diggnation
Travel: Amanda Across America
Viral: Invisible Engine and The Singing Woodchuck
Funniest: Ask a Ninja
Collaborative: Node 666 Project
Documentary: Freetime
Editing: Freshtopia
Interview: Geek Entertainment TV
Music: Nontourage
Special Effects: Galacticast
Most Controversial: Alive in Baghdad
Vlogging Books: Secrets of Vlogging, Michael Verdi and Ryanne Hodson
Video Hosting: Blip.TV
Tool: VPIP
Directory: MeFeedia
Website Design: Galacticast

I’m hearing that Windows Vista left escrow yesterday, which means that it’s done and on its way to OEMs. I haven’t heard this from a Microsoft source, though. So, not completely sure it’s true.

Favorite Male videoblog: Ze Frank.
Best Community Vlog: Chuck Olsen. Minnesota Stories.
Best Cooking Vlog: Freshtopia.
Favorite kids and teens videoblog: Jetset Show.
Favorite news vlog: Rocketboom.
Best Female Vlogger. Ryanne Hodson.
Favorite Tech Vlog: Bleeding Edge TV.
Entertainment Vlog: Chasing Windmills.
Controversial Vlog: Josh Wolf (who’s currently in jail for refusing to turn over his video tapes).
Videoblogging Book: Secrets of Videoblogging.
Green Vlog: Treehugger TV
Vlog directory: Mefeedia
Best Vloggervangelist: Michael Verdi for his work on Node 101.
Comedy Vlog: Ask a Ninja.
Diary Vlog: Josh Leo.
Entertainment Vlog (non Fiction). LoFi St Louis
favorite entertaiment vlog (fiction): chasing windmills
Video Hosting: BlipTV
Site Design: It’s Jerry Time
Experimental Vlog: Pouringdown TV
Insirational/Spirtual: Beachwalks.
Vlog Collaboration: Bottom Union, Carp Caviar
Best Vlog: Alive in Baghdad. (Big Winner, got a standing ovation — their stuff is really awesome)
Best Group Vlog: Alive in Baghdad.
Best Political Vlog: Alive in Baghdad.
favorite interview vlog: alive in baghdad
Favorite Corporate Organization vlog: netsquared
Favorite Travel Vlog: travelvlog.org
favorite video production tool: enric’s vpip
favorite viral video: singing woodchuck
Favorite Special Effects: Galacticast
favorite documentary vlog: american king
favorite educational vlog: freevlog
favorite editing : stutterframes
favorite site design: itsjerrytime