David Ortez

I entertained the impact that the Internet but in particular YouTube had in the last Presidential Election and it seems that I was not the only to notice. It seems President Bush was observant and realized that YouTube is a force not to be reckoned with.

President Bush claims, “I am the very last President not to really have to worry about YouTube" while campaigning for the White House.”

In an interview with RealClearPolitics he discussed “the role the Internet and new media played in the November 4th elections.”

My website has been invited to join the prestigious Alltop network. My blog feed can now be found in the Politics category of the Alltop website. You can find it @ http://politics.alltop.com at the bottom since I am a recent submission.

I am excited and honored to be included on the Alltop network. This motivates me to blog even more and as the New Year approaches I will reach a milestone with my blog as it will be 1 year old. So much has happened in a year and this is an exciting moment for me. Hopefully, this is the beginning of wonderful things to come.

Sometimes I stumble into some pretty interesting things that make me think twice about how I discovered them. Case in point … a conspiracy that claims that Facebook is a front for the CIA to collect data from millions of Americans (and World citizens) in order to aid in their surveillance.

I would like to take credit in coining this new Orwellian term as Big Brother 2.0 where social networks and the Internet are used to spy on people. I do not know exactly how I came around to this conspiracy but it reminds me of the one my friend has about the iPhone being used by the NSA as AT&T being their cover to collect data on American citizens.

I was told about Flock by friend about a month ago but I did not bite. I am not sure why I did not want to give this new web browser the time of day but for some reason today that changed.

I headed over to the Flock website and downloaded the free web browser which is powered by the Mozilla Firefox browser. How much different could it be you may ask?

A Ton! This web browser claims to be the "Social Web Browser" and that is no lie. It integrates flawlessly to all major Social networks. I was able to connect and set up shop in 20 minutes. Now I have an instant hookup to my Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Digg, Delicious, Flickr, YouTube, Yahoo! Mail and Gmail accounts.

Is it Going to Rain? is a cool website to bookmark so that you can use as reference about the weather in your local area. It is perfect even if you do not know the city or zip code that you are in. The website relies on your ip address to give you an accurate report on your local weather.

Along with telling you if it may rain or not, the website informs you of the current temperature. You also have the option to display the temperature in the setting of you choice be it Fahrenheit or Celsius.

Go ahead an bookmark Is it Going to Rain? and share it with friends!

What do you get when you have an immensely popular President and a hunger for a nostalgic game from your youth? Super Obama World!

Nintendo fans but in particular Super Nintendo fans will be delighted to find a mashup of Super Mario World with one about Obama. Play as the charismatic and hope driven Barack Obama as you collect as many campaign contributions a.k.a. coins as you dodge shady lobbyist, pigs with lipstick and pitbulls. If you are lucky you will even see a guest appearance by the self proclaimed hockey mom herself trying to run you over in her snow machine.

I love to take photographs and at times I fancy myself as a Photoshop wizard …a guru like no other. But, editing and perfecting a fun photo takes time in Photoshop so I love it when a website automates the process.

Enter PhotoFunia … the coolest, fun-nest photo related website since … well there is nothing like it. As you can see from the above image that I took with a sexy Nikon D90,that is not the original image.

The website requires no intelligence other than your common web sense in order to upload any photo (ideally a headshot) to take advantage of any of the 60+ templates. The hardest part is selecting the photo … you do not even need to know how to open Photoshop.

I like anticipating what the future of gaming will be and its impact on social interactions. I was interested in the approach that World Golf Tour took to establish a fascinating game with a unique business model.

Some of my friends are not crazy about Politics like I am . . . actually most of them are not but that is why I am their friend. They rely on me to guide them during the confusing and hectic political season we call the General Election.

The Internet has made registering to vote easy. It has also made finding your polling station even easier. It makes sense why you may forget where to vote when you only do it once every four years. Google has decided to step in and help new voters find their voting booth.

You may visit Google Vote Map to find out where you should vote. All you have to disclose is your home address you registered to vote with and voila. But, what if you are not registered? That’s okay, they provide a link so you can register or even request an absentee ballot.

I mentioned Hulu before, so I felt I should revisit the website a year later. Hulu is your personal Internet based DVR that lets you watch popular shows or movies on demand. The best thing is that it is free!