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It’s Alfresco’s end of quarter, and so as ever I’m spending my last few weeks of the quarter wading through contracts. If you’ve had the joy of working with contracts and those who make a living reviewing, editing, or creating them, you will have heard or read these words:

“I was able to accept most of the changes. There are just a few last items to discuss. I think we’re almost there.”

Translation?

“I approved all of your formatting changes but we’re still oceans apart on the truly nettlesome issues that neither you nor I want to budge on. Bring a sleeping bag to work because we’re not finishing up any time soon.”

Maybe people say “almost there” to try to soothe the opposing counsel; to lull them into accepting odious terms that they would never approve if offered to them. Whatever the reason, we’re not “almost there” until the contract is black and white with no redlines. At that point it will still take a week to find the person with signing authority back at her desk.

“Almost” lasts an eternity.

CNN gained nearly a million Twitter followers on Wednesday when it acquired the @cnnbrk Twitter account.

The account, the largest on Twitter with more than 947,000 followers, had been maintained and nurtured by James Cox. CNN did not disclose financial details of the acquisition, probably because rules at the microblogging site prohibit the selling of Twitter accounts.

The acquisition comes as the race to 1 million Twitter followers heats up. As of Wednesday afternoon, Ashton Kutcher was in second place with 917,000 followers, followed closely by Britney Spears, who has about 913,000 followers.

Kutcher publicly challenged CNN to a race to 1 million users on Tuesday in a video posted to Qik.com.

“I found it astonishing that one person can actually have as big of a voice online as what an entire media company can on Twitter,” Kutcher said. “And so I just thought that was just kind of an amazing comment on the state of our media, and I said that, if I beat CNN to 1 million viewers, then I would ding-dong ditch Ted Turner–because I don’t think it’s gonna happen.”

CNN accepted Kutcher’s challenge Tuesday on the “Larry King Show.”

Kutcher, who is best known as star of TV’s “That ’70s Show” and husband of actress Demi Moore, has said he will donate 10,000 mosquito bed nets to charity for World Malaria Day if he is first to 1 million followers.

Meanwhile, game publisher Electronic Arts is getting in on the action, promising to put Kutcher’s 1 millionth follower in a future EA game and give that person a copy of every game EA produces in 2009–but only if Kutcher beats CNN to the million-follower mark.

Ashton Kutcher campaigns for 1 million followers on his Twitter page.

(Credit:
CNET)

For many of us who grew up before PCs became ubiquitous and long before it was cool to be a geek, Gygax’s creation meant Friday nights spent playing games with your friends, not wishing you were someone else. Instead of finding creative ways to break the law, we were busy rolling 20-sided dice and doing battle with Orcs and other evil beasts.

It was a fantastical world for adolescents. Gygax managed to mix The Lord of the Rings and mythology with comic book adventures. Naturally, there were absurd D&D-related scares in the early-1980s regarding kids delving into Satanism and disastrous episodes of real-life sword fighting. (I always thought if kids were dumb enough to fight with real swords, they had bigger issues than the influence of a role-playing game).

I also seem to recall my ranger/barkeep met his untimely demise at the hands of an Ochre Jelly monster that made a home in his bar. It was an ignominious death for a guy named after a mighty Japanese warrior.

(Credit:
Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)

I was saddened earlier Tuesday to hear that Gygax, the co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons and the father of modern role-playing games, has died. He was 69 years old. My CNET Reviews colleague Will Greenwald has already written about Gygax’s role in the gaming community.

So let’s pay our respects: You have to wonder how many of today’s writers, computer programmers, video game creators, and other creative sorts wiled away their winter nights playing D&D. Thanks, Mr. Gygax. You allowed us to use our brains.

My own memories: Before moving on to the decidedly autocratic role of Dungeon Master, my favorite D&D role was a long-sword-wielding ranger named Toranaga (I think the miniseries Shogun was big at the time and that’s where I got the Japanese name). He had a magic girdle of strength and ran a speakeasy on the side. For the record, Toranaga was Chaotic Good, had a 17 strength (that’s non-magic girdle-enhanced), had a sturdy constitution of 14, but was a bit clumsy due to his 9 dexterity. For those of you who never played the game, well, sorry, this probably doesn’t mean much to you. Let’s just say 17 is good (18 is the highest you can get); 9–not so good.

Times have changed, of course. Like most kids, I moved on from D&D and hadn’t even looked at a D&D book in decades, until a former colleague of mine brought his son’s old gaming books into the office. While we may have been oddball hobbyists 25 years ago, role-playing games are now mainstream, thanks to gaming consoles and the Internet. World of Warcraft is a billion-dollar enterprise, and D&D lives on in various forms. But without D&D paving the way, it’s hard to imagine WoW would even exist.

Gary Gygax helped keep me out of trouble when I was in junior high school.

I don’t ever believe in failure. I believe in learnings. Our first sock package almost disintegrated in your hand, but it was a totally unique package…it failed functionally, but it led us to where we are now. We are only four years old as a company, so each step we take is a learning. Success never happens spontaneously. As they say, “practice makes perfect.”

I admire everyone trying to think differently. There are so many people innovating there isn’t just one person to name. I think ultimately innovators are successful because of their passion for success. Remember Steve Jobs failed his first time at Apple and was fired by the board. A good idea isn’t the key to success. It is execution, timing, market conditions and a whole lot more.

What lessons can you pass on to others from how your organization has changed to make itself more innovation driven?

My company is 100% based on innovation. We created a company that was founded on the premise of selling three-packs of non-matching socks. Talk about a challenge — we were completely changing the way people got dressed each morning. We set out to tell the world that it was okay to not match your socks and as such, you should buy them in a novel way. Our socks are uniquely paired to look great together. What we discovered is that our socks are something that are simply FUN. They are so fun that people what to tell their friends about them. Our customers lift their pant legs and say, “Hey check out my socks!,” this is certainly innovation in the world of socks. Our challenge is to translate this innovation into other product categories so that our brand is cohesive. At LittleMissMatched we believe that simple product innovations make our success. People will talk about our products if we give them unique products that are easy to talk about. We have furniture that you can draw all over with a dry erase pen. Why have you ever done that before? We have bedding that flips and switches to make 192 combos in one bed set. For us, innovation is key to our long term success. The good news is that every product category in the world can be missmatchified.

(Credit: Boston.com)

If I had a list, I would be working on those innovations instead of what I am doing at LittleMissMatched! With all seriousness, I am very focused on building a brand based on creativity and innovation. I believe our brand has a broad enough foundation to explore the world!

It depends on how we define success. I personally love our furniture. Maybe that is because I flew to China to help finalize its development. It was a brutally challenging trip so I am enamored with the end result. If we look at units sold, our socks win the award. If we look at dollars/SKU sold, then our bedding wins. Each of these innovations were found by breaking conventional norms to bring a true value proposition to our customer. Imagine a world where now one bed in a bag we sell gives you 192 combos when all of our competition only gives you one option. When we are at our best, we subvert the marketplace…in other words, we don’t talk about thread count, we talk about combos. What this means is that we don’t actually have competition. Why? Because of our version of innovation!

The kind of people who are innovation seekers are what I call “yes to no” people. They are the type that says, “Hey that is a really great idea, but I think it would be even better if…” They are expansive thinkers. They are not the type that says, “Nope, that idea won’t work because xy or z.” We have worked as hard as we can to hire “yes to no” people. We want everyone to have an open mind, but ultimately, we want them to be filters/curators at the right time so that they can make the hard decisions that will grow our business. If I can pass one lesson on, it is to hire “yes-to-no” people!

(Credit: Bluewater)

Which innovation “failure” did you learn the most from, and why?

We are a small company with a short history. Our historical benchmarks are not relevant yet because we are rapidly growing. I think the biggest barriers are companies that say they want to be innovative but they don’t truly plan for innovation. They look at their historical benchmarks instead of forward at the possibilities. At the McKinsey panel I described earlier, a chief strategy officer from a Fortune 500 company said, “20% of our new products are now required to be driven by innovation.” I asked, “Is the company setting aside 20% of your time to develop innovation?” Of course the answer was no. Innovation doesn’t just happen. Organizations must understand that they must change culturally and structurally to enable innovative thinking. Ultimately, I believe the executive office suite must also be populated by innovative thinkers or innovation doesn’t have a chance of success.

How do you define innovation?

Beyond your organization, who do you admire for risk-taking innovation and what do you think makes them successful?

Jonah Staw, co-founder and CEO of LittleMissMatched, heads-up a lifestyle brand that is based on “innovative and creative mixing and mismatching.” LittleMissMatched launched in 2004 with a collection of mismatched socks sold in odd numbers to encourage girls of all ages to express themselves. The “nothing matches but anything goes” philosophy knocked people’s socks off, and sales jumped from $5 million to $25 million in just three years. Today, the LittleMissMatched product line includes everything from socks, winterwear, and sleepwear to books, bedding, and furniture for mismatched mavens of all ages. LittleMissMatched products range in retail price from $5 to $1,200 and are available at specialty boutiques and department stores nationwide. The company recently announced $17.3 million in private equity funding, expanded distribution, a new flagship store in Manhattan, and a series of new products.

What is your most successful innovation? How did you find it?

In your opinion what are the biggest barriers and challenges that stand in the way of organizations becoming more innovative?

What are the most important areas of innovation in your organization?

What innovation are you still waiting for?

Innovation is such a broad term. I was recently on a McKinsey panel discussing innovation, and we opened by going around the room. There were more than 25 chief strategy officers from major US corporations. The moderator asked what was the most innovative product, and 90% of the audience said the
iPod. I said the Post-It Note. Why? It is so simple it’s obvious. It has become a fixture on the physical American desktop. It is useful. It invented a new category…before there were note cards, stationary, thumb tacks and more. Now we have the Post-it. Innovations are simple, elegant solutions that make things better. Better doesn’t necessarily mean more efficient…it could be more fun, easier to use, beautiful. You get the point.

If you’ve been waiting for something revolutionary to replace Canon’s two-year-old XL H1 HDV model, then it’s not quite time for the fireworks. Instead, the company’s delivering a modestly enhanced version in conjunction with a feature-reduced, but significantly less expensive spin-off.

The following products are available:

On Sale Now: $5,999.99
View the latest prices for Canon XL H1A

Like its fixed-lens, handheld counterparts, the XH A1 and XH G1, the XL H1 now splits into two personalities: the $8,999 H1S, which, like the original H1, will come replete with the HD SDI, Genlock, and SMPTE timecode support necessary for operation in a multicam environment when it ships this June, and the H1A, which eschews those features to save you about $3,000. The one possible drawback to the H1A is that it’s not upgradeable to the H1S, if that’s a consideration for you. Offering the less-expensive model is a smart (and possibly long overdue) move on Canon’s part, putting the shoulder-mount, interchangeable-lens HD camcorder in people’s hands this July for a still-not-cheap $5,999.

Basic specs remain the same. They use three 1.67-megapixel, 16:9-aspect, 1/3-inch CCDs coupled with the Digic DVII image processor, and the lens is still a 20x zoom with Canon’s SuperRange optical image stabilization system. For both models, Canon concentrated on improving the H1’s usability and adding more granularity to the controls. The lens especially has been upgraded. Though it uses the same optics, Canon has addressed user complaints about its operational feel and responsiveness and increased the iris adjustability to 1/16-stop increments from 1/4-stop. They also include increased gain and white balance ranges, selective-color noise reduction, and more color adjustments. Though the camcorders drop from 4-channel to 2-channel audio, it now supports simultaneous on-camera and XLR mic inputs.

Canon XL H1S

On Sale Now: $9,999.00
View the latest prices for Canon XL H1S

(Credit: Canon USA)

Want to really show off that new Blu-ray player? Get yourself the BBC documentary series Planet Earth, which Best Buy has on sale for $49.99. I first caught it when it aired on the Discovery Channel, and it didn’t take long before I decided I had to own it.

Find more deals, coupon codes, and bargains on CNET’s Shopper.com.

The series’ 11 episodes take you to oceans, jungles, deserts, rainforests, and other remote parts of the planet, where you’ll see incredible environments and wildlife. You don’t have to be a nature buff to enjoy this; you just need a heartbeat.

I paid about $70 to buy Planet Earth on HD DVD (sigh), and that was on sale from the $99 list price. Here’s your chance to get it half off. Don’t miss out; the sale ends on St. Patrick’s Day (March 17).

(Credit:
BBC Warner)

The names of the two upcoming product families have been widely reported: The ATI line is branded as the Radeon HD 4800, while the Nvidia is dubbed the GeForce GTX 200.

Less seems to be known about the Nvidia GTX 260 and 280, though a Turkish site is claiming to have all the specifications.

AMD-ATI and Nvidia are preparing for the next graphics chip showdown. And there is already a good deal of information (and rumor) on the two chips due in June.

Advanced Micro Devices is expected to launch the HD 4850 (price estimates of graphics boards range between $189 and $219) and then follow with the 4870 (estimates range between $199 and $279). In the fourth quarter, AMD plans to add the dual-chip ATI Radeon 4870 X2.

Tech site tg daily said “that card vendors will start printing their boxes next week, which means that the specifications are final at this time.”

VR-Zone has already gotten its hands on some preliminary performance numbers for the HD 4850 and 4870. German-language site Hardware-Infos has posted a table with specifications of the HD 4850 and 4870.

Nvidia will respond with the high-end GeForce GTX 200 family. Initial products will be the GeForce GTX 260 and GTX 280.

TimeDriver can link to Google or Outlook calendars if you want to make sure you’re not booking appointments on top of your one-off meetings, and the system will then write appointments back into your calendar when people claim times. There are advanced options that can prevent people from scheduling last-minute meetings or from seeing more than a few time slots; you wouldn’t want to look unbusy, would you? But there’s no way to automatically enforce buffer times between meetings, which might matter if you make house calls.

You can also just put a link on your Web page or in your e-mails and take appointments from anyone. Yikes.

TimeDriver is designed to help people who need to schedule a lot of one-on-one meetings. If you’re interviewing job candidates, for example, or taking appointments with customers, you can set up either one-time or recurring blocks of time, and send people links that let them grab appointment times in those blocks that remain unclaimed.

Future versions may include variable privacy, so specific people or groups can see more detail of your calendar, or so some users need confirmation from you before a meeting is booked, but others don’t.

My time is yours. Live demo. Try it.

The basic TimeDriver service is free. Paid and enterprise versions will get additional features, such as calendar pooling–so multiple people can service appointment requests–analytics tools, and custom branding options.

See also: Timebridge (review), Jiffle (formerly iPolipo; review), ScheduleOnce (review).

TimeDriver is a different beast than a meeting negotiation product like TimeBridge, which allows for multi-person meetings and encourages a form of voting on best times to meet. That kind of solution is better for people like me who treat each meeting separately; TimeDriver is better for people who see one meeting as much like the next.

The service has tools to send out blast e-mails to people (for example, job candidates you want to interview) and will track all their responses. Coming soon is a new Outlook plug-in that will let you send meeting requests from within your Outlook client itself; in the current version you can only manage mass meeting invitations from within TimeDriver.

I look forward to seeing this tool integrated into other online customer management solutions, like Salesforce.com. Or better yet, adopted by my dentist.

My weekly demo timeslots.

The meeting time broker TimeDriver, which has been in closed testing since I covered it back in January, will finally enter its public beta period on Monday. I had a chance to play with the product Thursday. For a lot of people, this service could be a great help.

Mountain Hardwear does this, in part, due to its “conduit technology.” The conduit laminate mixes hydrophilic and hydrophobic materials to push water vapor out but refuses to let it in, thus making for a very breathable, very waterproof material.

As you know I wear a large hinged knee brace post-ski surgeries and was concerned a medium pant would be too tight. They were a great fit after all because they flexed out well with the brace. They were soft, comfortable and warm.

The Mountain Hardwear Hairpin ski jacket, along with the other jackets we reviewed, has a slew of thoughtful, useful touches. Waterproof zippers and plenty of pockets, for one, including vents along both arms to allow you to cool down on the trail. The powder skirt kept absolutely every flake of snow out when we took the jacket through deep powder at Alta. Super warm. Not bulky. Lightweight. Form fitting.

I’ve saved my review of Mountain Hardwear’s ski jackets and pants for last for a good reason. First, because the Mountain Hardwear Hairpin jacket is the best jacket I evaluated. Second, because you can’t buy it until the fall of 2008. (It’s next season’s model.)

While I really liked Mountain Hardwear’s 2007/08 models, I will admit that I’ve found it extraordinarily difficult to peel Mountain Hardwear’s Hairpin jacket off. It is such a cool advance over anything I’ve seen in any jacket manufacturers’ 2007/08 lines that it makes me anxious to see what the other ski apparel companies are planning for 2008/09.

It’s just one of many technological innovations that Mountain Hardwear has been developing.

Other jackets have fleece liners, but this one actually proactively reaches out to the skin. Instead of feeling like a frozen tarp, which is what many hard shells feel like when they gets cold, the Hairpin felt like I was wearing a bearskin rug against my neck and cheek. (Don’t worry - no bears were harmed in our evaluations.

Mountain Hardwear Edge Jacket

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Which brings me to the entire Mountain Hardwear Synchro line. If you’ve skied you know the difference between a hard shell (superior weather proofing but less comfortable) and a soft shell (more comfortable but not as wind/waterproof as a hard shell). Mountain Hardwear appears to be trying to turn that old distinction on its head with the Synchro line which provides the comfort of a soft shell (very soft and supple) with the weatherproofing of a hard shell.

Lily prefers Mountain Hardwear

Coming full circle, Mountain Hardwear has put this to good use in its Edge jacket. Like the upcoming Hairpin, the new Mountain Hardwear Edge jacket has what they call MicroClimate Zoning (same as the Hairpin above). Rather than line the entire jacket with the same material, Mountain Hardwear uses different lining material for different parts of the code, making it more lightweight, more breathable, and more tuned to the wearer’s needs. That “shaggy fleece” I mentioned above? It’s only on part of the back and neck. Right where you need it.

Think about that. The Stance pant actually made room as Jaime pounded down through the powder (see the Alta video referenced above - Jaime is wearing a black coat and the Stance pant in that video), not holding onto the brace. It’s rare to find a touch like that in a ski pant.

First, the Mountain Hardwear Hairpin. I let my two-year old terror, Lily, wear it in the picture at right, but this was about the only time I was willing to part with it. It is amazingly comfortable because of an internal liner of shaggy fleece (see the pictures below). Mountain Hardwear calls it MicroClimate Zoning. I call it warm and comfortable.

The only problem we found with the Stance pant is that it collected a few cuts in the fabric from the new Scott skis that Jaime was using at the time. The sharp edges cut it. It would be good for Mountain Hardwear to add some stronger material at the bottom of the pant to prevent this.

Like the Mountain Hardwear Hairpin jacket. When it becomes available for sale, buy it. It’s awesome.

Mountain Hardwear also sent 2008/09 Stance pant, which I’ll review below. From Mountain Hardwear’s 2007/08 line we received the Edge jacket and the Synchro jacket, bib, and pant. So, consider this a retrospective and prospective Mountain Hardwear jacket and pant review.

As mentioned, I had never worn a Mountain Hardwear jacket before. I just figured Mountain Hardwear made backpacking gear, since that is the Mountain Hardwear gear that I have. But it just took our reviewers a few days of skiing to realize there is much more to the company.

Mountain Hardwear Synchro Pant

Mountain Hardwear’s Stance pant is also excellent. Mountain Hardwear seems to put a premium not just on the bare necessities (waterproofing, breathability, warmth), which it provides in abundance, but also on comfort. The Stance is a great example. It’s super flexible, as evidenced by Jaime’s review:

Perfect. This is the sort of jacket you won’t just wear on the slopes, but will choose to wear it everywhere. (In fact, if you’ve seen me lately in the Bay Area, you will have seen me sporting the Hairpin. With style.

I’ve never worn any Mountain Hardwear apparel before, ski jackets or otherwise. I have a tent of theirs and some other things but this was my first foray into their ski gear. I wasn’t expecting much. As is often the case, I was wrong. Blissfully wrong.

Mountain Hardwear Hairpin Jacket

Despite the year to date stock chart (right) Apple’s business isn’t exactly limping along. Sure you can worry about the
iPhone not selling 10 million units, or
iPod profit margins and even whether the MacBook Air is that big of a deal. But what’s the point? Until proven otherwise most of us would love to have Apple’s business.

ZDNet’s Larry Dignan provides a great counterpoint to the recent “angst” over Apple.

The Macalope has given Dignan a hard time in the past, but this piece is eminently reasonable, raising the issues and providing a retort to each. As they say, read the whole thing.