There sure is a lot of chatter going on about the latest Web 2.0 social networks to hit the scene, Twitter and FriendFeed.  If you haven't discovered one or the other yet, you're either to be chided or congratulated, I'm not really sure which.

Fads come and go on the internet.  Sites can become wildly popular overnight only to disappear a few months later.  At the moment both Twitter and FriendFeed are vying for everyone's attention. 

Twitter reminds me of an instant messenger on steriods.  It also contains elements of the earliest blogs, personal comments and the minutia of daily living posted for the world to see.  Do I really need or want to know that Bob had a meeting today or that Cindy is heading off to work? 

Then again, depending on the quality and quantity of the friends you have on either service, you can be privy to the inner thoughts of a venture capitalist or learn what the CEO of a major web company finds interesting .  Recently Robert Scoble mentioned that he sees a significant difference between people with a large number of follers who aren't following many others and those who are following far more people than follow them.  Those who follow more than are followed are listeners.  They are more interested in learning and listening than being considered profound and worthy of being followed.

Both services offer a unique opportunity to listen to people you might never otherwise have a chance to hear.  To hear not only what the people you follow have to say but also hear what others think of their thoughts, FriendFeed offers a better experience.  There you can see not just the original Twitter postings but the comments and replies made to them.  And now, thanks to a GreaseMonkey script for Firefox, you can post to Twitter from within FriendFeed.  You can also set up FriendFeed to send your posts to your StumbleUpon and Tumblr account as well.

At the moment it appears both Twitter and FriendFeed are trying to find direction, trying to solidify their position in this odd niche they fill.  Are they blogs, instant messengers, open contact portals?  No one is even sure just yet what future they have, if any.  In six months we could very well be referring to them in the past tense. 

But while they last, they offer an experience unlike most others on the internet.  If it sounds interesting, check them out.  See if they appeal to you.  Perhaps they'll fill a need in your online experience.  Perhaps you'll find them pointless and unnecessary.  Either way, you won't be alone.

I just returned from the Google campus in Mountain View, California, USA.  The developers of the Linux desktop environment called KDE had a release event for the much improved 4.0 version.

This release, which isn't quite finalized but will be a lot more usable in July with the release of 4.1, is a major overhaul of the familiar KDE 3.5 version.  The underlying structure has been reworked in an effort to make KDE better looking, more useful and more accessable.   Nearly the entire framework has been improved.  Application developers will find it much easier to call on libraries and integrate their programs into the desktop.  Users will enjoy better search (a major factor with today's ever-increasingly larger hard drives and the increasing amount of video and audio we save), a more customizable desktop and a cleaner appearance, thanks in part to a switch from using .png images as icons to using scalable vector graphics which allow resizing without distortion.

I'm not supposed to comment on the Google campus (we were asked not to by the Google folk) but I can't resist at least thanking them for supplying the meeting room, the hotel rooms and the food for three days.  I must also say that after touring their campus, it takes all my willpower to not apply for a job there...any job...I'd be thrilled to empty wastebaskets.

You can read more about the event and see some pictures here and here.

I've known for many years that I was fortunate.  I was approaching my mid-50s and still both of my parents were alive.  That luck eroded two years ago when my dad died and ended this last September when my mother died. 

I find it hard to be sad.  They both had long, good lives.  I believe they fulfilled most if not all their expectations.  They both died rather quickly without suffering.

What has been difficult is trying to pretend that life goes on as usual when two of the closest people in my life for over 50 years aren't around anymore.  The strangeness comes up at random moments.  I'll see a website I know mom would enjoy and I start to think, "I should send this to her", then remember.  I'll think, "Dad would enjoy this book" then come back to the present. 

Despite that, life really does go on, just not as usual.  At least not as it had for the last 12 years.  After mom died, I moved from the larger house where I'd been living, having moved her in with me.  It was too big for just myself.  I moved into a studio bungalow with my 3 cats (pictures in my gallery).  I still have the same job I've had for the last 3 years.  That's practically the only carry-over from my "old" life to my current one.

I'm reading more these days, spending a bit more time on the internet and trying to learn to relax.  Before, there was always something needing to be done.  Every day was a bit frantic.  Now, with a smaller house to care for and a far smaller garden, I have more free time.  I'm unaccustomed to relaxing but I'm trying to learn.  As someone once said, I'm trying to fit into my own skin.

I have to wonder what 2008 holds in store.

I'm curious how popular Linux is on your side of the wet stuff.

I know the statistics say Linux is more popular in Europe than in the U.S., but how many people who blog or otherwise write for the internet use it? Is the concern for interoperability requiring you to stick with a Windows OS, and if so, which is more useful for you, XP or Vista?

Or have any of you made the jump to Linux, providing you haven't gone completely over to the dark side and run a Mac?

I'm wondering because in January I'll be attending the KDE 4.0 release party at Google HQ. Google runs Linux on their servers and has long supported the Open Source community. Yet it seems every week I read an article in ComputerWorld or InformationWeek describing the shrinking market share of Linux and how it will never challenge Microsoft for the average user's desktop.

So what's the deal there? Any other Linux fans in the crowd?