May 11, 2000, 7:25pm

Hey, if you missed the first part of this rant, go read the May 4 2000 rant first!

Hola! Part two of this very long rant. Before I get into a continuation of what I was talking about last time, there's just a few news updates.

Brag Mode Site logs (as opposed to weblogs) are very cool. They let you discover things like this. Coffeekid.com has been a pretty good success, and in any given day I get about 10 to 15 complimentary emails (along with as many as 25 or more question emails), but when peers in the industry recognize the site, or more importantly recognize something I pride myself on - navigation controls - it really makes my day. Brag Mode Off

And now for part two. As I said at the end of the last rant, my company WebMotif went from a 1 man show a year or so ago to 5 people doing what I think is pretty good work. We're creative, we do some innovative things, and if I had to place the company on a rating system, I'd say we're a 7.5 out of 10 in terms of quality, innovation, skill and ability. The 10 out of 10 guys are the ones who charge a million bucks for site development. The 5 out of 10 guys are the ones that are one man shows and just able to use Homesite. The 4 out of 10 guys are programmers who think they are designers, and everyone below that are folks using WYSIWYG editors like Front Page :-).

WebMotif is doing well, but we're not quite "there" yet. We hope to have a proper office environment by the end of this year, and maybe double the staff. I'm working on this, which is partially the reason why this site has such infrequent updates.

I've been thinking a bit about back when I first started this company. I had the idea I could work as partners with two other people - a javascript expert down in Nevada, and a Photoshop expert in Georgia. At the time, my photoshop skills were weak (these days, they are pretty superior, lemme tell you :-)). I would be the coder and programmer. But the scheme didn't work out. One of the participants lost interest or went nuts or something, and the other disappeared for a year, then called me out of the blue expecting to go back as full partners, after I had worked to build and maintain my business, on my own, for a year.

I'm not pissed or anything, but I did realize that while I try to work with my subs on an equal basis, I realize that at least in my situation, there can be only one boss... the client. Okay, well, I'm the boss, the guy in charge, the guy who takes the fall if things fuck up. I don't mind that, because the perks of running the company are finally coming to fruition for me. I'm just very, very thankful the original plan for the business fell through :-)

Okay, for something completely, totally different, you may remember that near the top of part one of this rant, I mentioned the CoffeeKid site. I was interviewed by a radio station in New York City called WNEW, and it was on the Ron and Fez show. The interview went well, but before (and after) the interview, I had one thought in my head: what exactly am I trying to promote? CoffeeKid's a non-commercial site. I don't generate any revenue from it. In fact, because of the site's current traffic (as much as 3,000 unique visitors a day, about 30,000 page views per day, and about 14 gigs of traffic in March), it's costing me extra in hosting - one of the reasons why I'm spinning off the review section to its own domain at www.coffeegeek.com soon.

Everyone who writes to me about the site and my hosting charges thinks I'm nuts for not running advertisements. But to me, coffeekid.com is my hobby site, my personal site. I've always had a problem with people running ads on their "personal sites" Always. I hated Link Exchange when it first came out. I eschew any kind of webring, which I feel is just some sort of hit generator for the organizer's site. I don't like it when sites have Amazon.com partnerships. Ditto for cdnow. The day Glassdog had those things on that site, I kinda lost faith.

Which segues me into the tease from the part one of this rant. Ezines.

I love the new ezines online. Some are for men and are trying to be like Maxim (but are still cool). Others are creating their own niche, like the aforementioned Nerve Magazine and Spark Online. I love these things. The writing is fresh, the topics fresh, the writers good, and the content is cutting edge.

These sites are leaving the oldbie zines like the Onion and Salon in the dust.

Which makes me think. A few years ago there were some people online who thought "they" were "the web". They thought theyo embodied it, who were "the voice of the web"... where are they now? They sure as heck ain't writing for Nerve. They ain't writing for any of the cool ezines. They're still writing for their own core circles.

Maybe they feel what they have to say is still important, is still "the conscience of the web", but I have to say they sure aren't the voice of the web today. The Web has moved on. The Internet has grown up, and I think it's ready to move out of the high school, clique-ey mentality that existed for the last 4 years or so. Pretty cool, eh?

If you want to see the state of the Web conscience today, I'll push it one more time - Spark Online. This is where it is at. I think it's heading in a very cool and innovative direction, yet again.

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Mixelania

Photos from Algonquin Park
Photos from my trip to Algonquin Park this fall with my Mom and two brothers.

War Stories

Making Snow for the Fortress
One of the worst jobs I ever had... till I got out.

Webiffied

Tools I Use
The tools I use to build websites and lead a tech life.

iPod and iTunes Offline

iMark's iTunes and iPod isn't iPlaying anything right iNow.

Most Recent Songs

Fiddlers Green by The Tragically Hip

Around The Bend by Pearl Jam

Here With Me (Rollo's Chillin' With the Family Mix) by Dido

With arms open wide by Creed

truffle pigs by Matthew Good Band

In the News

Burundi and Beyond - NY Times
Great article by Peter Meehan - provided some background.

St. Petersburg Times
Side mention in an article about good machines

AP Story on Espresso
Background and information provided

NY Times - Grinders Article
Especially proud of this one - got the reporter to focus on grinders

Globe and Mail
LOL - showing bad reporting, dude says I'm an American-based site!

The Olympian, WA
Talks about my love for the El Sal Siberia Pacamara

Seattle Times - Clover
Interviewed for comments on the Clover brewer

NY Times - How it Works
Background and information for various espresso machines

Time Mag Article
Just a brief mention, article about roasting beans.

NY Times
Front page article about consumers getting into specialty coffee.

Washington Monthly
Quoted reference to what I wrote in an article at CoffeeGeek.

USA Today - Barista Jam
Intereviewed for my thoughts on what the epitome of espresso is.

WSJ Article
The Wall Street Journal has interviewed me 3 times. This is the first time my name got in a story.

Reuters Interview
Interview with Reuters, Jan 2 - this is the USA Today version.

My Other Stuff

CoffeeGeek
Launched Dec 22, 2001, this is THE online community for espresso and coffee fanatics.

CoffeeKid Website
It's all new, as of March, 2002. My personal coffee obsession site.

WebMotif Services
My company's site - needs an update!

Amazon WishList
Hey, if you feel the need to buy me something, check here!

Daily Visits

enGadget
Great gadget site run by the guy who used to do Gizmodo.

Google News
This is how I get my daily news fix.

DPReview Forums`
The most active forums for digital photography online today.

Daily Zen
Need my Daily Zen fix!

Jalopnik
A blog about car stuff. Vroom Vroom.

MoCo Loco
An industrial design blog. Very cool stuff.

Friends and Family Plan

Beata Blog
Beata's got her own blog! She updates it most days.

Riddla on Flickr
Matt Riddle's flickr account, updated regularly

Irdy Photos
Irdy, my friend from Jakharta, on Flickr

Recent Acquisitions

Canon EF 24-105 f4 L Lens
The best lens I've ever owned. Super sharp and quick.

Canon 5D
A full frame dSLR, with luscious colour reproduction.

Alzo Digital Lights
Some amazing florescent cold lights for product photography

Canon Xsi dSLR
Amazing technology and image quality in a tiny package.

Canon 40D
Latest prosumer camera from Canon - a much better upgrade than the 30D

Fujitsu P1610
Great 2.2lb computer that does most of my travel / writing needs

28mm f1.8 Lens
A great lens for closeup work and full picture photography

Foodsaver Advanced
Finally got the right tools for freezing green coffee.

Canon 50mm 1.4
Most amazing lens I've ever owned. Produces stellar photos.

Canon 10-22mm
Super wide angle (full frame fisheye) zoom for my Canon 20D