The New York Times today published a story I wrote about how small businesses and individuals can outsource even mundane tasks to “virtual personal assistants” in India. In reporting the story, I found many people using these affordable services in a variety of creative ways: A woman in New Jersey who works for a health […]
Right and wrong, Giants style
I’m at the ballpark right now, where as my friend Mike Shapiro just put it, it’s a Super Bowl feeling: The commercials are better than the game. In this case, the Giants on the field are playing the pathetic baseball that has them in last place, but between innings, the fans are treated to highlight […]
Bonds away
Tonight is Barry’s last game as a Giant at AT&T Park. I’ll be there. The Road to History signs around the ballpark resonate deeply for me, as everything Barry has done in this decade feels historic, including his departure. I expect he’ll be showered with adulation, and that he’ll give the fans something to remember. […]
Omar, Barry and me
For some, the San Francisco Giants‘ last homestand of 2007 is a sad affair. The team is closing out the season in last place, and many of the players won’t be back. For me, though, I’m having the time of my life. I have an assignment from San Francisco magazine to write a story for […]
Hooked on computing
I recently read Matt Richtel’s Silicon Valley thriller “Hooked,” and loved it. Matt is a tech reporter at The New York Times and a versatile talent — he even writes a comic strip under a pen name — and he really nailed a key element of modern computing culture: Addiction. It’s the feeling of being […]
Second Life will be bigger than the Internet
That was the startling assertion I heard from Philip Rosedale, CEO of San Francisco’s Linden Lab, producer of the virtual world Second Life, at a breakfast hosted by Conde Nast’s new business magazine Portfolio at the St. Regis Hotel in San Francisco on Tuesday morning, Sept. 11. Yet despite such an outrageously hype-filled statement, Rosedale […]
What the world needs now
… is yet another blog. Realizing the lunacy of such an assertion, I’m going to be keeping this site pretty spare. But I will make occasional posts, hoping to satisfy a few goals: 1, to keep anyone who cares informed about what I’m working on; 2, to get the hang of this blogosphere thing; […]
Vanuatu: An Essay
Dan Fost’s literary narrative about a brother and sister’s journey to learn about their father’s World War II experience in the South Pacific island nation of Vanuatu, complete with a trip to the top of an active volcano, appeared in the 2007 edition of Practice: New Writing + Art, a literary journal. Click here to […]
Where Old And New Media Collide: San Francisco Chronicle, March 2007
Two worlds collided at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival this week. Online media of all sorts is coming of age, and the festival was one of its biggest defining moments. The event aims to bring together new technologies and their practitioners to spur innovation. While the mainstream press was barely present, the conference-cum-weeklong-party was […]
WHERE NEO-NOMADS’ IDEAS PERCOLATE / New ‘bedouins’ transform a laptop, cell phone and coffeehouse into their office: San Francisco Chronicle,
A new breed of worker, fueled by caffeine and using the tools of modern technology, is flourishing in the coffeehouses of San Francisco. Roaming from cafe to cafe and borrowing a name from the nomadic Arabs who wandered freely in the desert, they’ve come to be known as “bedouins.” San Francisco’s modern-day bedouins are typically […]