The Best Christmas Gift - From a Driver in Sri Lanka

On Christmas Eve of 2004, Sachi and I made a decision.  We decided that, in one year, we would depart on a year long trip.  We reserved a web site address that night: www.theworldisnotflat.com (TwinF).  In January of 2006 we departed, dedicated to blogging the whole trip.

What's Missing From This Sign at Airport Security?

Me (to the friendly TSA ID checker):  Do I have to remove my laptop computer?

TSA Employee: Yes, you do.

Me: It's not listed on the sign

TSA Employee: Well, it's the most important thing to remove.

Me: But not important enough to be on the sign?

TSA: It's supposed to be on there, the people that printed it messed up (rolls eyes).

The TSA folks have hard jobs and I appreciate what they do. However, it doesn't exactly give me a safe feeling when the instructions for moving through the line efficiently are "messed up" and no on seems to care. 

Going to Gnomedex and/or BlogWorld Expo?

I'm heading to a couple of tech conferences this Fall and I'd love to meet you there. 

Gnomedex - Seattle, August 21-23

Nerds of all types converge on Seattle for Chris Pirillo's annual conference. This will be my 3rd one and it rarely disappoints.   If you're headed to Seattle, or in Seattle and going to the conference, let me know.

China Week: Pretty Pictures for 08-08-08

To finish up China week, I'd like to share some of our favorite photos from China. Enjoy the Olympics!

Shanghai from the Pearl City Tower

A squished pig from a Nanjing market.

Summer Palace

China Week: Lessons in Line Breaking (A Story)

Below is a short story that was posted to our travel blog from Shanghai.  Almost any visitor to China is likely to experience a higher-than-expected level of competiion while standing in line for something like a subway ticket. In the case below, I had made up my mind to be a competitor.  Unfortunately things didn't work out as planned.

From the post: Lessons in Line Breaking

China Week: Strange Translations

If making signs in Chinese characters was my job, I would be very, very bad at it.  However, I might hire someone who knows the language well before erecting a permanent sign at a major tourist destination.  For a long time, this didn't happen in China and we snapped the photos below before they invested in changing the signs for the Olympics. 

China Week: It All Started In China

In honor of the start of the Beijing Olympics, we've decided to make it "China Week" here on the Common Craft blog. 

In a lot of ways, China was where we first started to experiment with video.  We bought our first video camera (a Sony DCR - PC 1000) in Hong Kong, just before spending about a month in mainland China in 2006.  Over the time in China, we edited and posted our first "real" videos.   

This week, we'll share a few of those videos and some stories from our time there.  It's stuff you won't see on NBC, I promise.

Assuming Too Much About The Web We See

I wouldn't call it disappointment, but rather a dose of reality.  I spent the last week in Las Vegas at the Community 2.0 conference and with my family thereafter.  Coming back, I must say that the trip gave me some much-needed perspective. Let me explain.

We work from home.  We make videos, we put them on the Web, people watch them.  We track our views, our Technorati links, our mentions in Twitter, our blog comments. A good percentage of people we see in social situations in Seattle are aware of our work.  Most of the email we receive is about the videos and of course, it dominates our discussions at home.  This is all misleading and a bit unhealthy.

Japan Tobacco's Clever and Strange Smoking Manners Signs

Japan is surely one of the politest places you're likely to visit.  If you ask someone for directions, there is a good chance they will walk you there themselves. Behaving honorably is an important part of the culture and there is never a lack of signs, often cleverly illustrated, reminding the public of what is expected.

One of the most interesting and clever examples I found is produced by Japan Tobacco. In smoking areas, on trains and near ashtrays, there are often signs related to smoking and behavior in crowds. Notice the minimalist illustrations and the strange-but-effective messaging from these examples.

Northern Voice, SXSW - Will You Be There?

Updated: I've created a schedule of sessions and parties I plan to attend at SXSWi (maybe Sachi too!).  You can see the schedule here.

I suppose it's the time of year for directionally-based conferences. 

I'm heading up to Northern Voice in Vancouver this weekend and Sachi and I both will be heading south to Austin, Texas for SXSW Interactive starting March 7th.  I hope we'll be able to meet you at one of these conferences.