My dad sent me a link to this Flickr slide show from Barack Obama and his family on election night. It’s a mixture of intimate and public moments. Very nice.

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Anyone got a Brawny handy? I think I just slimed my keyboard……..

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Why is it so hard to find a good car these days?  Not that I’m actually looking yet…my Subaru Outback ‘99 only has 75k miles on it and should easily last another 5 years (nice not to have a car payment…) but eventually, vanity will triumph over finances and I’ll begin to crave that new car smell–or at least the spray they use for the slightly used cars.

But when I do finally cave in to replace my car there are a few things that are definitely on my list of “must haves”…namely,

1) it has to be all wheel drive or offer 4-wheel drive for those snowy Maine winters…I’ve always had 4-wheel drive and could never go back at this point.

2) it needs to have the capability of seating more than just 4-5 people…yes that’s right, I’m talking about that 3rd row seating capability all the new cars are toting.

3) and finally, it would be super nice if I could get 1&2 along with a hybrid option with the way gas prices are going these days.

So why is it so hard to find what I want?  currently there is only one, ONE car out there that meets my requirements– The Toyota Highlander.  I can find cool hybrids with all wheel drive, like the Saturn Vue (Green Line) and I can find plenty of cool cars with all wheel drive and a third row, like the Hyundai VeraCruz…but none that meet all three.

I wouldn’t be caught dead in a mini-van, and even there, only one option offers all wheel drive, the Toyota Sienna…but they are really bigger than I need, (only occaisionally will I need to actually transport more than 4-5 people) and their fuel efficiency is a joke (18 miles/gallon) with gas prices pushing $4-5 /gallon soon enough.

I’m totally in love with the Mazda CX-9, sleek, sexy, and 3rd row with all wheel drive.  All they need is a hybrid option and I’ll stand in line.

So why is this so hard?  Increasing fuel costs, increasing desire to transport more people/car pool and be cost conscious with a hybrid car and so few options.  We need more family friendly cars, that are safe in the snow, and fuel efficient.  Is that asking too much???

I can only hope that by the time my trusty Outback kicks it, there will be plenty of options available.  For now I can only dream about my perfect next car.

-Family chauffeur, green mom

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Google and Disney have teamed up to create the most detailed 3-D model in Google Earth to date. Save yourself a flight, an $85 ticket, and a $7 soda, and gather round Google Earth!

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I came across this in my recent travels. It’s an interesting take on the computer desktop. It does remind me a lot of the whole touch screen interactive technologies being developed by both Microsoft and Apple. This one is from an independent developer and it’s called Bump Top. I’ll be interested to try it out when it’s released which by all accounts will be soon http://www.bumptop.com/

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Google released the latest version of their geographic playground last week. The imagery-rich Google Earth 4.3 seems more deserving of a full version number update, but it leaves one to wonder just how much more sophisticated a full version 5.0 could really be.

Having cut my teeth in business at a mapping company, I have an appreciation for where GIS (Geographic Information Systems) technology is coming from and where it’s going to. It wasn’t 5 years ago that very low-resolution painfully out of date satellite and terrestrial imagery (often in indecipherable shades of black and white) was available on only a very limited basis, and a respectable company could still charge several thousand dollars for enormous, awkward images of a select few locations. When the company called Keyhole released their EarthViewer product about 4 years ago as a paid service, heads turned throughout the GIS industry. The product was revolutionary in its simplicity and in typical Mountain View style, “gussied up” and ready to be purchased by a certain search company. Google did just that and in June 2005, released the product as Google Earth at no cost.

Today, just 3 years later, Google Earth is a household term and used by a hugely diverse array of industries. Thousands of layers are available documenting everything from crime statistics to dolphin migratory routes. Arguably, Google Earth has become the official map of the world (a costly feat that many government agencies failed miserably at).

With Google Earth 4.3, viewers can access the amazing, yet still somewhat unknown, database of oblique images known as Google Streetview. These images are available in a growing grid across major population hubs. It will only be a matter of time before the images are available for every street in the country, maybe the world.

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If you think this is cool, wait a year for Photosynth to make a splash.

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Having trouble coming up with that perfect Web2.0 sounding company name? Well worry not, for the Web2.0 Company Name Generator has arrived!! Some of my favorite results (so far)

Ainoodle
Twidel
Wikimba
Gexo
Jabbercube
Quible

Once you’ve got your name picked out, just toss it in the Web2.0 Logo Generator (with optional “BETA” crest).

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…I could never really get the hang of those things anyway. Media behemoths NBC Universal and News Corp have teamed up to create the potential YouTube killer hulu - a pleasantly simple, and frighteningly generous little site. I can picture a day when hulu has courted enough major providers to make people really question why they’re spending $20-100/month on a television package. YouTube could easily find themselves as a new public access or PBS-like source for the content you won’t find on the major stations (like the Dramatic Prairie Dog).

I’ll leave the full description of the service to the professional copywriters of the aforementioned corporations.

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While I was in Texas my iPhone’s browser seemed to choke on the WordPress WYSIWYG interface, preventing me from making any posts “from the road”, but I got plenty of good stories and even more pictures from my vacation. Among the most exciting moments was holding the absolutely stunning MacBook Air. The weight and profile were much smaller than I ever imagined! The photo (which features cameos by both my dad and the flyte crew blog) doesn’t begin to capture just how snazzy this baby really is.

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I haven’t got a family member for a little under 1700 geographic miles (my folks in Texas), in fact, my brother is a solid 6500 miles away (in Dubai) from my little roost in North Freeport. Although seeing one another in person on a regular basis isn’t very feasible, that doesn’t stop my family from having some great face-to-face contact every couple of days through Skype. Like most disruptive technologies Skype is free of charge and quite revolutionary. With a decent internet connection, a cheapo web cam (or a fancy built in iSight), and the free Skype client, you can speak and see friends, family, and/or business contacts from all over the world!

At first try, Skype seems a little strange. I remember the first time my folks sat on my desk and spoke to me face-to-face. It was almost disorienting! The strangest part being after we “hung up”. I almost expected to see them down my driveway. After about 40 uses or so with about a dozen people, it’s become a very innate method of communicating. I prefer it over the telephone in most cases.

Using Skype with different flyte crew members seems to be quite useful too. Even though they are just a few steps away in most cases, it’s nice to be able to give somebody a jingle for a quick face-to-face, or drop them a text in Skype’s slick IM agent.

Whether they’re .0001 miles or 6500 miles away, Skype is hugely useful and will likely evolve in ways nobody can imagine today - just as txt messaging grew from a technology to accommodate the deaf into the preferred language of youth.

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