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I haven't been creating many polls or writing any blog posts because I have been busy helping launch a new semantic web destination called Evri. I joined Evri back in early February, and the team at Evri has been aggressively pushing to launch by the end of the second quarter of this year (we made our deadline...we launched in the middle of last week!)

Evri is running a private beta at the moment, and you can sign up for a preview on the Evri homepage. Sign up and let the Evri team know what you think.

Posted on Wednesday, July 2, 2008 at 04:27 AM by Ryan-Kuykendall | Comments (0) | Add a comment on While you were stacking...I was building Evri...

I skipped out on programming today and took advantage of the rainy weather to go see Cloverfield. I haven't seen a monster movie in years (in fact, I can't even name the last one I saw...does Starship Troopers count?) But Cloverfield is the only movie I have ever seen where the theater had signs up warning viewers about the possibility of motion sickness. And the warnings weren't in vain. After the movie ended I felt like I had a mild case of sea legs. The camera work is that bouncy!

When I was walking out, I was trying to think of the best monster films that I have seen. To be honest, I couldn't think of more than two others. Most are too campy to be worth considering.

Here's the list that I came up with (including Cloverfield):

Best...Monster...Movie...Ever!

I am sure there are others that are obvious, but these other two stand out for me.

The Cloverfield trailers certainly piqued my interest, but this interview with director Matt Reeves at the LAist really caught my attention.

If you scroll down in the article, you'll notice a YouTube clip about the war in Iraq which includes battle quality video footage shot by American soldiers. Reeves points out a moment in one of the combat videos where the camera hits the deck with the cameraman. I won't spoil Reeves' description of the shot or even try to paraphrase it. But when you compare the Iraq video segment with a number of the most tense scenes in Cloverfield, you'll quickly see how deep the inspiration was.

Come to think of it, we shouldn't be surprised that the most powerful inspiration for a Godzilla remake (I use that term loosely :) comes from another war.

Posted on Sunday, January 20, 2008 at 02:24 AM by Ryan-Kuykendall | Comments (0) | Add a comment on Is Cloverfield the Best Monster Movie Ever or just the Best Homage to Godzilla?

I get giddy when the San Francisco Macworld rolls around in early January. And I am particularly excited this year, because the top rumor I have seen floating around the internet involves Jay-Z and Apple creating their own record label.

This comes as no surprise. According to NPR, the record industry saw its largest decline in album sales in the fourth quarter, with revenue down 20%. The labels are toast.

But it is just a rumor right? That's right. But it's not just any kind of rumor, it's a Macworld rumor!

I compiled a list of 15 rumors that I have read about in the last few weeks. Do you have a rumor that didn't make the list? Take a crack at stacking:

Top 2008 Macworld San Francisco Apple Product Predictions

...and let the world know what which Macworld 2008 rumors you think are true!

There are a few things I put below the bar. For instance, I don't think Steve Jobs will introduce an iPhone SDK to the Macworld audience. He will wait until the World Wide Developer's Conference, and give it to those folks (since they will be the ones who create apps for the iPhone.)

And Blu-ray support belongs below the bar too. It's irrelevant, particularly if you consider that iTunes already has a movie store. It's just a matter of time until Apple starts providing all of the DVD extras that you can not currently get in the store.

And I don't expect to see a 3G iPhone, an entry-level iPhone, or any kind of second generation iPhone. It would be too early after the holidays, and Apple doesn't want to have a sequel to the iPhone price reduction fiasco.

So how would you stack these predictions?

Posted on Friday, January 4, 2008 at 04:52 AM by Ryan-Kuykendall | Comments (1) | Add a comment on Apple Product Predictions for Macworld San Francisco 2008

And why shouldn't they?

I was just over reading Talking Points Memo and read the following post:

Obama to Iowans: Pick me at least as 2nd choice

Giving voters a second choice is a great idea. And a third choice. Not to mention a fourth choice.

It turns out that even Dennis Kucinich is telling his supporters to vote for Barack Obama if they can't find enough Kucinich supporters in their precinct.

Posted on Wednesday, January 2, 2008 at 11:55 PM by Ryan-Kuykendall | Comments (0) | Add a comment on Democratic Iowan Caucus Goers get a Second Choice

December just wouldn't be December without the The New York Times Magazine's "Year in Ideas" article. I thought it would be fun to take the list of ideas and turn it into a poll:

The Best Ideas in the New York Times Magazine's 2008 Year in Ideas

Take the current poll summary with a grain of salt: When I was creating the list, I simply put everything below the bar. As I work my way through each idea, though, I'm going to be finding a proper place for each one in my stack. I hope you do the same.

Start stacking it now...

Posted on Monday, December 10, 2007 at 05:56 AM by Ryan-Kuykendall | Comments (0) | Add a comment on My Favorite Time of the Year: The New York Times Magazine's "Year in Ideas"

Well, maybe that is a stretch. But you will agree that what we have here is an interesting stab at something that I will call Social Polling. So why does the world (or the Internet) need Social Polling?

The web is filled with lists!

Blogs have become outstanding forums for users to express their opinion. In many instances, those opinions take the form of lists. Many of those lists are titled with one of the following words, "best" and "worst." But they are all missing five fundamental elements that prevent readers from interacting with them.

The first rule of Poll Stacks is anyone can create a poll with a simple list.

What happens when you see a list that is missing an item that belongs to it? Typically users will add a comment to the blog entry naming the missing item. Accommodating (and perhaps agreeable) bloggers will sometimes edit their lists to include the missing items. For lists on blogs to be more valuable to readers, readers need to be able to add items to those lists. For example, we are running a poll for the Best 2008 United States Presidential Candidate. If you want to add someone like Al Gore or Colin Powell to the list, you can!

The second rule of Poll Stacks is anyone can add an item to any poll.

The order of a list matters. Order is opinion. Is the best first? Or has the best been saved for last? And what if you disagree? With Poll Stacks, you can drag and drop your opinion.

The third rule of Poll Stacks is that anyone can express their opinion by simply stacking the items in a poll.

Sometimes a list has items in it that are superior to all others in the list. Sometimes someone puts an item in a list that doesn't belong there, or is just simply below the bar.

The fourth rule of Poll Stacks is every poll has a bar, and that the bar can be raised or lowered, and only the items stacked above the bar count in the final poll tally.

Your opinion matters. When you stack a poll to give us your opinion, we think your opinion is so important that we create a new page for your stack. You can return to your stack page any time you want to share with your friends or re-stack the poll if your opinion changes.

The fifth rule of Poll Stacks is that stacking is authoring, and each of your stacks deserves its own page.

So what are you waiting for? Create a poll! Or stack our featured poll.

Thanks for dropping by, and keep on stackin',

Ryan

Posted on Tuesday, December 4, 2007 at 06:37 AM by Ryan-Kuykendall | Comments (0) | Add a comment on Welcome to Polling 2.0!