Main Dish:

- Fred Wilson writes about how gmail is being used in some innovative ways, and laments the terrible search features in Outlook. Personally, I couldn't give up Outlook but share the view that the search tools are pretty crappy. I have worked around that with a simple search plugin from Lookout Software that has literally changed the way I use email. Their search is so powerful and fast, as well as including My Documents folders, that I no longer file anything, I just search. This is exactly what is happening in all areas of knowledge management. You don't need to organize data when you can search it instead.
http://avc.blogs.com/a_vc/2004/07/gmail.html

- Michael Powell, Chairman of the FCC, has started a blog column. Good reading, great move toward direct communication, unfiltered by the media, by a high ranking government official.
http://www.alwayson-network.com/comments.php?id=4830_0_1_0_C

- wow, Yahoo acquired my other favorite email provider, Oddpost. This is a great story about a couple of entrepreneurs who bootstrapped the company when VC's couldn't get past the fact that the company is a paid email service. Cash flow profitable and growing, Oddpost proved that you could build something from nothing... and sell it for $30 million. Good job Ethan and Iain.
http://www.oddpost.com/yahoo.html

- Groove released v3, dubbed the Virtual Office. This is one of the most amazing applications anywhere in the business, and least understood. Simply visionary.
http://channels.lockergnome.com/news/archives/20040712_groove_launches_virtual_office.phtml

- Brain implants... no jokes please.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99996127

- the Democratic National Committe has disinvited 20 bloggers previously invited to the convention. It's interesting how organizations first reaction is to shoehorn bloggers into media. Is what I do media, especially if nobody reads it?
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/9134620.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp

- Sony is putting the final touches on the PS3. These are amazing machines, really underappreciated. Just wait until they become media processors for sound and movies.
http://www.eetimes.com/sys/news/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=CHBH5OKD3A1HOQSNDBGCKHY?articleID=22104906

- the entire software industry has failed to solve the basic usability problems facing customers today, what makes the Open Source industry think they can solve it?
http://www.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=04/07/07/1640244

- Vivato mudslinging. The part that interested me in this posting is the stuff about 802.11g being prone to interference.
http://www.smallworks.com/archives/00000068.htm