Bursting out the Bubble

The past week has really been a blast, good times on every front. Good people, good times, and plans for future good times have dominated my time. As I write this I'm working on a solid 36 hours without sleep and still not feeling too tired, there's just too much fun to be had.

I've spent some great times with old friends and new alike, and even doing things with old friends that I should've been doing more of a long time ago, like recording some songs with mark and sean. I'll post those as soon as I finish mixing them, in the meantime you can always check out the latest video of a recent jam session.

I got around the city throughout the week, and even got down to Coney Island for a day at the beach and to enjoy Nathan's hotdogs, god I love those. As much time as I've spent with friends hanging out or playing music, I've some how made a ton of progress on the website front. The Music Slice redesign looks awesome and slick, plus we've set a new launch date, June 14th. I haven't even posted that to the official Slice blog, so consider yourself privileged to that information.

I've also made significant improvements to the Hobo 2.0 website, making it run smoother and adding some new videos, blogs, and other good stuff. I'm also starting to get requests (demands?) from some friends to put them on my route once I set off on that great adventure.

Another semi-secret site I'm working on involving photos is also getting pretty close to being ready, I'll actually fill everyone in on that pretty soon, but it's really cool.

I uploaded a couple new photos to my flickr account, like me in the bubble above, and also just uploaded a video of me battling a 3 year old at the rubix cube, so enjoy those if you'd like. Until the next time, have fun.

The Hobo and a Few Slices of Music.

I've spent the past week living in weeks yet to come. My vision for Hobo 2.0 is becoming abundantly clear, and this summer it will become a reality.

I've set up the site, Hobo2.0Lifestyle.com, and it's just waiting to get filled with tales of my journey as I move through the world. It's become even more real as I now have a replacement room mate to take my place when I leave so Mark and Sean aren't left hanging, and an initial ride across the country to get it started.

As slow-going as Music Slice appears from the outside, it's actually moving fairly quickly and with blistering excitement. Music Slice and my new Hobo lifestyle will go hand-in-hand as I move through the world. My backpack will be just one room in the virtual Music Slice office, and how better to spread the word to musicians and fans then to show up all over the country?

Cyderobin, the band in which I play the drums for with Mark and Sean, will have to go on without me. I'll still be on the other end of wednesday night jam sessions watching on WatchWhatIDo.com, and I look forward to the days of coming in as a guest jammer, because after all, I'm not so much leaving New York as much as I'm going everywhere.

In fact, I intend to pick up some type of pocket instrument, the harmonica seems like a good choice, so perhaps with the help of Music Slice's technology I won't have to leave the band after all, just change instruments. There's still plenty of time before I set off on my journey, and tonight is a Wednesday jam session that I can still enjoy live and in person. Good times.

The Music Slice Playground

While the real Music Slice developers are plugging away at the really complicated code to get the site up and running, I decided to create a little playground for myself to put up some quick and easy ideas for the site in the meantime.

MyMusicSlice.net is where you'll find my playground. What's the first toy I'm sharing with you? An awesome music search that'll find your favorite artist or songs on YouTube and other video sites, shows, news, blogs, and even their myspace and other home pages. Enjoy.

Swimming in Code

I remember way back in middle school I got into programming with Chris Atkinson, wreaking all kinds of havoc. We even made a little program that would write out our compound interest homework for math, if you don't know what I'm talking about, compound interest is the longest and most boring kind of "show your work" math homework known to man.

Since those days I've dropped programming for the most part, only coming back to it once in a while in one form or another. Now I find that a lot of my ideas these days require the skill once again, only this time on the web. Some things require simple html or little scripts here and there which anyone can handle, but larger projects, like Music Slice, require much more.

Wanting to focus my attention on creativity and the necessary business side, I went to seek out programmers who loved programming when I started Music Slice. It's not too easy when you have no money to pay them, and have to find someone with enough faith in your idea to take ownership with you.

Music Slice is still my number one priority, but as more time goes on I can't help but have more ideas, ideas I want to test out right away. Enter Secret Project 2. Secret Project 2 is much smaller in scope than Music Slice, the definition of a side project, but it requires just enough programming talent to be beyond what I can do. If you think it's hard to find someone to get on board with you when you have a great idea like Music Slice, try finding someone to get on board with a tiny idea like this new one. Ouch.

I actually did find someone, they aren't as much help as I'd wanted, but help none the less. Either way, I've found myself trying to jump back into the sea of coding again these past couple days, bringing me back to those middle school days. It just seems a bit more confusing these days, as there's several languages you have to learn, and it's not always clear what languages those have to be. I think I've narrowed it down to PHP, XML, Javascript, and CSS... and hey, if you know all those and have a few free hours a day to spare, I have an idea for you.

Using all 24 hours

I was planning on pulling an all-nighter for the exclusive purpose of setting up the studio and testing some things, now it seems more has come up though.

I'm working on a new *secret* project to keep me busy when I'm not working on Music Slice, and it turns out my partner in crime has turned nocturnal and is working on it at this moment, so I've been going back and forth with him working out the details. It's refreshing to find someone with passion who gets obsessed over what they're doing and has fun with it, this is gonna be a blast.

Patterns and Music

I've been doing some tweaking to the concepts and math behind the best ways to suggest music to people, determine the most popular music overall, and detecting and catering to people moods while playing personalized radio stations.

The whiteboard is the newest addition to Slice Headquarters, it helps a lot. Sean calls it 'old school' media. I wish we could afford the electronic whiteboards... Oh well, this one has been great so far.

Snow Slice

So far the season's snow fall has fluctuated with great moments in Music Slice history. It's no wonder the biggest dump of snow to date comes today, just as we're about to launch.

Poker Slice

Poker Slice, originally uploaded by kennyflannery.

You can always count on king-ten. Always.

180 from the other day

Somehow in the course of the last 'day' I've ended up on the same schedule from the Barclay's days again... At least for today apparently. Instead of heading out to grand central, I'll be wandering into Starbucks just after 7am. Thankfully Starbucks doesn't expect me to answer phones and greet people, an unwanted nuisance when trying to Slice.

Why online video took off, is fading now, and will soon return

Trends online closely reflect human nature, which makes sense seeing as regular "day-to-day humans" are making up more and more of the content online. Video is no exception.

YouTube took off, and people were crazy about videos at first, you could seemingly find anything you wanted to find, or just get sucked into whatever people were throwing at you. TV did this, and still does (probably?) to some people.

So what happened? People's expectations have grown. Now instead of these casual encounters with a string of a few YouTube videos, people now want to "go to the YouTube" and veg out, like good ole' TV once let them do. It's tough to veg out when you're stuck with 1 minute clips though. They may be great, but not when every minute you have to then click on a new video that looks good, or worse click around until you can even find another video that looks decent... every minute.

The answer? Well easily put, playlists. Just like music playlists though, your average joe doesn't know how, doesn't even know about, or just doesn't feel like putting together a playlist, after all that's kind of like work. Videos have a much shorter lifespan than music too, where you can listen to a song 100's, even 1000's of times in your lifetime, that awesome video of a water balloon bursting in super slow motion is probably only good a few times, maybe more if you're showing it off to friends.

The answer (again, but for real this time)? Auto-Playlists that just start playing when you go to the site comprised of suggested videos, each pretty short in duration, all playing one after another with the ability to skip through if you'd like. This allows full vegetation, kick back with your bowl of cereal and enjoy.

Suggested, you say? How? Suggestion techniques are easy these days, especially with so many people watching, and with a strong emphasis and incentive for rating content, the skies the limit. Your suggestions can be based on, among other things, what your friends rate highly. Letting you know that helps too, if when a video starts a message below says "Friends X, Y, Z, and P all loved this video", you'll watch it a little differently and perhaps enjoy it on whatever level you have set with that group of friends.

Wow, what a long rant about some lame basic feature for a video site... it's almost noon, bedtime. By the way, that's just an idea pulled from Music Slice, just for video instead of songs... of course... Music Slice, slice, slice, slice... it's everywhere! Another by the way, Music Slice also has a video section with the exact feature, just for videos instead of videos. You get the feeling I love my Slice? Or maybe you get the feeling I'm losing my mind. Night.

180 from my working days

Back when I worked for Barclays Capital, a regular job, I woke up at 5:30am and went to sleep between midnight and 2am.

Since then I've slowly shifted my schedule to the point where I awake at 5:30pm and don't go to sleep until... Well whenever. My 'mid day' was drunken darts with Sean, and now I'm headed to Starbucks to get some Slice stuff done, they should be open by now.

As sean started to point out, I think we've realized locked in, and now fully appreciate the feeling of summer vacation as a kid during school... with a company that has multi-billion dollar potential... I hope dunkin donuts is open.

Money in the Bank

It's on. Funding has been secured, enough to get us through the first wave of the Slice and keep me out of trouble with outside jobs.

My last day of working a job for someone else, possibly ever, was on January 12, the Friday before MLK day. Since then I've been relaxing, clearing my head, and filling it with Slice. The best part of not having a regular job to go to is the ability to maintain a train of thought all the way through, even if it takes me deep into the night and early mourning like the good old days. Now when I get an idea for the flow of design on the site, I can sit down and implement it all the way through without interruption.

There's a true sense of freedom that Sean has probably been feeling for the past month as well. Every day and night is open, there's no mourning obligation to stop me from having a night at the bar until 4am, or taking a trip to wherever sounds attractive at the moment. I've also noticed that I Slice even more efficiently now that I've increased my leisure time. Being that all I need is my laptop to get Slice things done, I have even more freedom without ever short changing the site.

First music, then media, then!!... we'll see. More fun, more music, good times.

Let it Snow

That's right, snow. For the first time this season, we finally have snow.

I'm coming back from a great night of drinking and dancing (well, getting danced at) and we finally get snow. This mourning I also got "99%" confirmation of the first round of funding for Music Slice, meaning I'll be getting paid to do what I've been doing with the Slice, and can now do it full time without the annoyance of a "regular job". The snow couldn't have come at a better time, signaling the the start of the next chapter of my life.

I'll be slicing, I'll be playing in the snow, and I won't be waking up at 5am ever again unless it's something I really feel like doing. Good times, good, good times.

Unemployed Like Sean

As of today I'm officially without a job, at least not one that pays me. I'm not sure what's next, I'm sure I probably need some money for bills or whatever. We'll see what happens, but I'm looking forward to getting some funding for Music Slice and actually getting paid to do what I love. Soon enough... should be an interesting couple months coming up.

Jack of all trades, Master of none

Good stuff:

• Jack of all trades, master of none is a figure of speech, describing a person who is competent with many skills but is not very good with any one particular skill. The term has become a cliché.

  The above is actually a truncated version of the true epithet. The phrase in its entirety is "Jack of all trades, master of none, though ofttimes better than master of one". This complete phrasing of the term would seem to remove any negative connotations which follow the labeling as such in the former form.

  A Jack of all trades may be a master of integration, since the individual knows enough from many learned trades and skills to be able to bring their disciplines together into a practical finished product. Such a person is known as a polymath or a Renaissance man; the prototypical example of which is probably Leonardo da Vinci.

• via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_of_all_trades,_master_of_none
  

Most of my inspiration for the look, feel, and concepts of Music Slice have come from all kinds of sources, most of which not in the field of music. One reason for that is because most music services today have missed the mark entirely, but mostly because I see the ideas behind things rather than the thing itself, and ideas are interchangeable.

One inspiration of mine that many people know, is Google. They've found a way to make some incredible products online, and offer them all free of charge to everybody through the use of advertising, and in many cases, just by using revenue from other services.

Another example is snowboarding. These guys are out to get a sponsor, the result being free stuff, more exposure, and the chance to snowboard a lot more in many cases without any need for a lame job. Apply this concept to musicians and you'll have some happy guitarists who can spend more of their time jamming rather than asking you what kind of latte you'd like.

Everything has been figured out, it's just a matter of applying lessons from one part of life to another. Sometimes ways of doing things become so synonymous with a certain activity, that it takes an outsider to step in and realize it, and then hopefully do something about it.

I think we all have a great future ahead of us, as we're all exposed to a lot more than the generations before us, and communication with no barriers to stop us from progressing. You can go ahead an entrench yourself in one "career path" if you'd like, just know that it's Jack who decides when and if you're needed.

Power Slice

With the upcoming launch in sight (February 14, 2007), Music Slice is getting stronger than ever. Sean has recently plunged into the Slice pool head first, taking care of major and minor details surrounding the financial and business side of Music Slice. The Coyote Kid (Kayode Dagbo) is swimming in code with plenty of help from Steven Henry, and we're slicing faster and faster.

I even had a dream I was climbing around the website, as if I was in some kind of donkey kong video game or something. I close my eyes and see Slice, when my mind does drift to other topics the result is a new idea or perspective for Music Slice. On the subway I see the eyes of iPod users pleading with me to save them from the apple trap, Zune advertisements embarrassingly whispering "dude... I'm so sorry", and even the occasional discman attached to the man who's been confused into a stubborn daze by an industry of the same state of mind.

The industry he sees has changed long ago, and 2007 is the year when everyone will accept and run with it. I expect a lot of improvements in our music landscape, not just from Music Slice, but from some of the bigger names, names we haven't heard of yet, and guys we wouldn't expect to get involved.

Excitement, good times, and a good slice.

Slice Meeting

We had a great meeting at Starbucks a little earlier, myself Steven, and Kayode. We went over all the details of how things are going to work, who's doing what, and ended up with an initial launch date. That date is February 14, or Valentines day. I do love my Music Slice, who better to spend the day with?

We'll have the events section, blogging, fan and artist profiles, and even some music uploading and streaming. It's way more than I expected to launch with, so I'm pretty pumped. There's a lot of work to be done, and a lot of fun to be had. Good times, stay tuned.

Ending the year slicing

Another long weekend has begun, and we're all looking forward to our new years party. I'm playing with the Music Slice design at the moment, it's looking great. Sometimes I feel like I'm creating this great city below the surface of the earth, and just waiting to pull the ground out from beneath everyone and expose it all. Slice!

Kick back, 4 day weekend starts now

While not as long as seans never-ending vacation that starts tomorrow, a 4 day break sounds pretty good at the moment. I'm going out for drinks and good times tonight, maybe slice it up a good amount tomorrow, and at some point hop a train to spend some time at each of my parents' places. You know I'll be playing some ball with Jack, good times.

Time to slice

Time to slice, originally uploaded by kennyflannery.

Sometimes you need to save the world.