Welcome

Welcome. My name is Ian Mikutel.  Here I share and discuss my ideas, thoughts, and opinions on everything from technology to politics and health.  For work I'm Founder/CEO of The Wiire where I also host a weekly podcast on the gaming industry.  For school, I'm studying human computer interaction at RIT.  To learn more, read my About page.  Thanks for visiting.

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Monday
14Dec2009

What Matters Now: Inspiration For 2010

As 2010 fast approaches, many look to the New Year as an oppourtunity for new beginnings, fresh starts, and overall reinvigoration in whatever it is you do. To help you, over 60 people with big ideas have collaborated to create "What Matters Now", an 82 slide presentation filled with messages meant to inspire and suprercharge your 2010.

Everyone from author/marketing expert Seth Godin, Zappos.com CEO Tony Hsieh, inventor Saul Griffith, social media maven Gary Vaynerchuk, Fast Company magazine co-founders Alan Webber and William C. Taylor, Editor in Chief of Wired Magazine Chris Anderson, venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki, and Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington—and dozens more.

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Tuesday
20Oct2009

Why I Just Pre-Ordered The Barnes & Noble Nook And You Should Too

Today Barnes & Noble unveiled a new electronic book (eBook) reader named "nook" that will compete with Amazon.com's Kindle. Dubbed as "The World's Most Advanced eBook Reader", it has a compelling set of features that ultimately made me decide to put my pre-order in today. Read on to find out all about the nook, and why you should pre-order too.

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Monday
19Jan2009

TechCrunch Shows Off "CrunchPad" Web Tablet Prototype

Technology blog, TechCrunch, introduced a second prototype of its low cost touch screen web tablet today, named the CrunchPad.  The device began development 6 months ago after TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington wanted a "dead simple and dirt cheap touch screen web tablet to surf the web" and found that no company was developing such a device.  TechCrunch reached out to its community and 6 months later has the second working prototype to show.

 

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Thursday
15Jan2009

Final Verdict On Bush: Good Guy, Poor President

Tonight President George W. Bush gave his farewell address to the nation, his last scheduled public appearance before President-elect Obama is sworn in on Tuesday as the nation’s 44th president.  As President Bush used this speech to look back on his Presidency, I too, decided it was time to reflect on the man that led our great country for the past 8 years.

Ultimately, President Bush is a good guy, but was a poor president.  A man with good intentions, a caring heart, and a strong, deep love for his country—but also a man who did not surround himself with good people, made many poor decisions, and had an unyielding lack of curiosity.

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Wednesday
14Jan2009

3 Reasons You Shouldn't Sell Your Apple Stock Due To Steve Jobs Absence

Today Apple CEO Steve Jobs sent an email to all Apple employees letting them know that he would be taking a medical leave of absence until the end of June.  There are many implications to an announcement like this, however in this post I want to discuss the most immediate--what Apple shareholders should do.

My first reaction, as many probably had, was "#@$!, how fast can I sell?".  Yet that was my emotional side talking, not my rational side.  After my emotions subsided, my pragmatic side was able to prevail.  Here's why you absolutely should not sell your Apple stock now.

Jobs joking about his health at Apple's "Let's Rock" event in San Francisco on September 9, 2008

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Tuesday
25Nov2008

A Team of Rivals

I haven't had much time of late to write about the election, but as most of you know I explained why I supported Barack Obama for President back in February. 

I've been following the transition process closely, and am currently reading A Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln to learn about how one of our most successful Presidents used this period to build the team necessary to lead our country out of darkness.

Amazon.com Editorial Reviewer, Shawn Carkonen, explains:

Goodwin makes the case for Lincoln's political genius by examining his relationships with three men he selected for his cabinet, all of whom were opponents for the Republican nomination in 1860: William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, and Edward Bates. These men, all accomplished, nationally known, and presidential, originally disdained Lincoln for his backwoods upbringing and lack of experience, and were shocked and humiliated at losing to this relatively obscure Illinois lawyer.

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Sunday
23Nov2008

My Take On Google's New Wiki-Style Features

Google recently launched, then took down, then re-launched a set of new features that add Wiki-style capabilities to the search results pages of their site.  The features (see video below), let you do things like put comments on search results and adds Digg-like voting to results that consequently change the ranking of that result.

These changes are substantial to the rarely modified Google Search user interface, and as someone who studies and works in the User Design field, I thought I would share my thoughts on them.

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