Zac Echola is muffin but trouble

Say it: How to Internet (or, God help me, I’m a nerd)

Published on 15/07/07
by Zac Echola

How I use the Internet I got a few requests to explain the flowchart in my previous post a little more, to give a few details as to how I integrate everything I do on the Internet.

So here goes nothing.

Let’s start with the central point of my Internet adventures: Gmail. Everything happens here. Everything. Gmail isn’t just my email client, it’s a very good record of everything I do on the Internet.

I primarily use Google Talk for chats, so if I need to remember a conversation, it’s usually there. That’s the beauty of Gmail. It’s a personal database. Search Gmail from Firefox.

I have 5 email accounts filtered into one central Gmail account that I’ve had since the second week Gmail launched. I’m only using 20% of my storage (though, that percentage is growing quickly as of late, and you’ll see why in a bit). Chances are, if you’ve ever contacted me, it’s sitting in a Google server somewhere.

But Gmail itself is a little unruly if you wish to dump tons of data into it. I’m one of those weirdos that likes to have his inbox empty at the end of the day, so I find myself constantly labeling and archiving messages, even though I had several prefilters set up. That’s where Lifehacker’s Better Gmail firefox plugin comes in handy.

I had previously been using a smattering of Greasemonkey scripts I found on Userscripts.org, but it was difficult (and a serious pain) to keep everything up to date.

This customizable plugin helps increase work flows and I’ve installed it on every machine I use. But there’s two features that make it a killer plugin: Google Calendar and Google Reader integration within Gmail. Say goodbye to Outlook.

It gets better. Using RSS and a little trick with Yahoo! Alerts where I email myself RSS feeds, everything I share in Google Reader gets emailed back to me. I filter it out of my inbox, tag it and when I have a vague recollection of some obscure blog post, I just search my Gmail account.

And that link blog from Google Reader gets pushed elsewhere too. A few recent reads end up on my link blog, but they all also get pushed onto my Facebook profile via Mario Romero’s Google Reader application.

I use the same Y! Alerts trick for just about everything with RSS, including but not limited to del.icio.us and flickr. And I can push information back out to flickr, Facebook and Backpack using Quick Contact emails set up in Gmail.

Most of this communication happens in the background as I passively push a button or two to bookmark items for future reference. I hardly use Gmail to actually make one on one (or even one to many) communications.

That’s where Facebook comes in.

After much wrangling, I’ve finally convinced all of my friends to join Facebook. All of them, and quite a few acquaintances too. I think of Facebook as a media hub. Where I use Gmail to collect massive amounts of data I think is relevant to me, I use Facebook to push that media saved in Gmail I think might be relative to at least one friend. I do this through a fairly simple series of Platform applications:

    • iRead - to share books I’m reading.
      myTV - to share Youtube videos with friends without having to actually go to Youtube.
      Netflix Movies - to display my queue and see what my friends are watching.
      Notes - to import my blog posts via RSS.
      Posted Items - to share quick one-off items that aren’t in my feed reader or need to be in del.icio.us.
      Video - to post videos relevant to my friends. Mostly drunken madness, a lot like Facebook’s photo application.
      Photos - to post and tag photos. This is Facebook’s greatest feature.
      zuPort Flickr - Post my flickr photostream, which has fewer photos of me drinking than Facebook, but also a place to see what my friends are posting on their flickr pages. Without ever leaving Facebook.
      Events - It’s like a calendar, but not nearly as organized as I’d like. So I usually export to Gcal with this Greasemonkey extension.

    • Note that I have Facebook send me a ton of email (all of it processed and filtered before it reaches my inbox) and so the cycle begins anew.

    The end. Or is it?

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