Category: del.icio.us

FriendFeed’s response about del.icio.us feeds not updating

Posted on by Sol Young with 2 Comments

FriendFeed

Ross Miller at FriendFeed responded to my question about FriendFeed del.icio.us feeds not updating. It seems del.icio.us is blocking mass spidering of their site.

Ross’s email:

“Hi Sol, del.icio.us places restraints on our ability to crawl their site. So if for some reason the item is missed, it becomes very hard for us to retrieve the del.icio.us link. Unfortunately for now the refresh button is your best option when this happens. Sorry for the inconvenience and we hope to get this resolved with del.icio.us soon.”

Looks like this is a restriction on del.icio.us’s end.

Posted in del.icio.us, FriendFeed, Life Streaming, Micro-blogging, Microblogging, RSS, Social Networking, Web Services

Homeless, Keyless, Wednesday

Posted on by Sol Young with Leave a comment

Today was strange…

I am homeless

Image courtesy of Malingering on Flickr – it is not of either of the homeless men I met today.

 .

I started off the day by going for a great morning run. On my way home I realized my house key fell out of my shorts pocket, so I was looking around on the ground for it.

A homeless man asked if I lost something, and immediately followed up asking if it was a water bottle before I could respond. After telling him it was a key he informed me the water bottle he saw earlier was very nice.

I walked away cursing the fact I would have to break in to my house, but also thinking about a man with concern over my loss who didn’t have keys of his own to lose.

Breaking in requires scaling a tall wall, jumping through a window a-la Trinity escaping in The Matrix, and finally possessing the key to our inside apartment (which I still had).

At the end of the day I hit the bank for a friend and locked my keys in the car in the process… Two key losses in a single day. It would have been my first key loss in years if it were only once.

As I waited for my wife, bringing the spare key, a homeless man with a harshly weathered and flushed face approached. The conversation went like this:

  • Homeless man: Hello, sir?
  • I kept silent, posting to del.icio.us.
  • Man: Sir, is that your car?
  • Me: Yep?
  • Man: <upbeat> Where are you from?
  • Me: Here, Philadelphia…
  • Man: Sir, I could use a cup ‘a coffee, could ya spare some change?
  • Me: …
  • Man: <poorly rehearsed> Sir, I’m homeless, hungry, scared, and need something to eat. Anything you can offer will help.
  • Me: I’m sorry, but I won’t give cash, but I’ll get us cups of coffee.
  • Man: <confused, back pedaling> But I’m hungry. I have 55-cents <jingles pockets> and only need a little more for coffee.
  • I twittered
  • Man: Sir, pay attention to me. I need some help.
  • Me: I’ll buy us cups of coffee and a snack then.
  • Man: <pausing again> But… I’m hungry.
  • Me: <Genuine smile> Let’s go get a cup of coffee, Starbucks is two doors down.

He turned his back to me and walked off without another word. His “hello, sir?” introduction was repeated to each passerby.

Posted in del.icio.us, Economics, Etiquette, Homelessness, Philadelphia, Running, Twitter, YouTube

FriendFeed items not updating

Posted on by Sol Young with 10 Comments

FriendFeed + Delicious = 0

I’ve been using FriendFeed and del.icio.us more and more lately. Viigo (one of the best mobile RSS experiences available) has direct push to del.icio.us. It’s far superior to the iPhone’s mobile Google Reader sharing experience, so I’ve been happily consuming and sharing.

But FriendFeed isn’t updating these del.icio.us posts. It would be understandable if everything weren’t updating, but it seems to be del.icio.us entries. Flickr, blog entries, Google Reader, and Twitter items are nearly instant.

To get around this one can view his or her page, edit/add services, click the del.icio.us item, and finally click ‘refresh’ – but that’s hardly worth the effort.

Is FriendFeed feeling growing pains? Bret Taylor mentioned in a comment to Robert Scoble (who had similar updating problems) FriendFeed had a hiccup during a spider.

Personally, I doubt this was anything more than a technical glitch, but geez… The purpose of FriendFeed is to share what we’re doing on the Internet. If things aren’t pulling through, it’s a critical issue.

Posted in BlackBerry, del.icio.us, FriendFeed, iPhone, Micro-blogging, Microblogging, RSS, Viigo