It’s too hot to think and terribly inconvenient to imagine that global warming might be to blame, so let me use the minimum wattage of brainpower and point to a series of snippets that interest me, beginning with this suggestion that Apple Computer if gearing up to challenge Audible in the books-for-ears market. And now I imagine you thinking — if indeed biological microprocessors can even function in this heat: “Why bother reading further if MiniMediaGuy proposes to simply harvest links like some blogger-bot?” For the amusement, mon cher, for the attitude, which artificial intelligence has not replicated … yet.

Speaking of ‘tude I know there’s gazillions of video upload sites ’cause one of my day-job colleagues counted 240 of ’em in a recent San Francisco Chronicle article, but I gotta say I just love the calculated in-yourface ethos of Lulu TV. This is a case in which you are strongly advised to pay attention to the man behind the curtain, Bob ( Red Hat) Young, who made a fortune in figuring out how to give away Linux, and has now created Lulu, an interesting citizen-media, mashup site about which I’ve blogged previously. The point is (in case you have also put your brain in no-think mode) is that Young has money and has been-there, done-that in the monitizing free-stuff department. The Raleigh News & Observer had a piece about this recently, which leads me to one significant drawback I see with Lulu — it’s in North Carolina. Duh! This is a company built on concepts that seem thoroughly Californicated and it’s on the wrong coast! Someone show those Lulus a map. Please!

A mind map might help my buddy Tom ( SiliconValleyWatcher) Foremski keep track of his brainstorms. I bring this up at this particular juncture because the devil in new media is getting someone, somehow, to pay for something. And if you sniff around the Lulu.tv site, you’ll see it contains some ideas for how to do that with regard to video uploads. Anyhow, back to Foremski who, in addition to plunging ahead with the ad and sponsor supported model for his high-tech insiders’ site, is continually coming up with ideas about how to get some sort of subscriber-like support for journalistic content, recently wrote a blog entry about “The Virtuous Trackback” that had some interesting ideas. But when I brought this up the last time I saw him, he had no idea what I was referring to. So here’s a guy with so many good ideas he can’t even keep them straight. So maybe my destiny is to play Boswell to his Johnson — which is a truly frightening thought, laden with a crude double-entendre that simply serves to reinforce my opening point — it’s too damn hot to think today!