I have been researching different ways for live-blogging on WordPress these past few days and I thought I’d share them here, in case anyone is wondering.

Most of my research revolved around localized WordPress plugins and attempting to blog via Google Wave. Most of the WordPress live-blogging plugins I tried were completely crap. They didn’t give me enough control, and were very buggy. Embedding a Wave for live-blogging seems to have a little more potential, but it’s still not usable. The most ambitious solution for that, in my opinion, is Wavr, but it’s also really buggy and took me forever to get to work. My main problem with live-blogging using Google Wave though is that only users with a Wave account can view the Wave. Nope, that won’t work.

There also various ways of displaying a Twitter live-stream in a blog as a “live-blog”, but that doesn’t make sense.

In the end, I decided that the best method for live-blogging on WordPress is by using “Scribble Live“. There are many similar live-blogging platforms, but this one is my favorite because it’s very easy to customize and has a lot of options that make live-blogging an event actually fun.

I love the Twitter integration of Scribble Live; you can pull tweets from certain Twitter profiles or by following a keyword. It supports audio, video, and images, multi-bloggers, and commenting. Pretty nifty if you ask me…

Here’s the one I will be using for ArabNet, you can check try it out now. Add your avatar on their website. If you are attending the event and interested in live-blogging here or adding your Twitter account, let me know as well.

When the picture of “Mansushi” was making rounds last month, I couldn’t help but think “Dude, now that’s a great idea, someone should totally do that.”

What I did not expect was that “someone” would be the way-too-upscale Four Seasons:

Although the idea, conceptually at least, would have worked much better with some experimental and smaller-scale eatery, I must say I’m impressed with the fact that an organization as polished as the five-star hotel would make a creative addition to their menu.

On a non-Mansaf related sidenote, how awesome are these geeky cupcakes?

 
Clevercupcakes, a bakery based in Montreal, have created what looks like the world’s first cupcake embedded with a working, edible QR code. If you take a picture of it on your smartphone (and have a scanning app installed), you’ll end up at the website of the Montreal Science Center Website. (via FastCompany)

If you’re in Beirut, don’t miss out on Formless by the awesomest person ever, Yasmeen Ayyashi.

Haifa Wahbi’s latest Gladiator style video clip for her newly-released song “Inta Tani” reminds me of the last paragraph of Philip Hitti’s masterpiece, “History of the Arabs”, first published in 1937:

“Originators of the third monotheistic religion, beneficiaries of the other two, co-sharers with the West of the Greco-Roman cultural tradition, holders aloft of the torch of enlightment through medieval times, generous contributors to European renaissance, the Arabic-speaking people have taken their place among the awakened, forward-marching independent nations of the modern world. With their rich heritage and unmatched natural resource of oil, they should be able to make a significant contribution to the material and spiritual progress of mankind.”

Ahem.

In true super-geek fashion, you can tell I’m super-excited about ArabNet, can’t you? :)

I’m really, really looking forward to attending this conference. I have recently made the decision to sort-of cut off my design career and become a webbist, but I’ll tell you about that later.

For now, here’s why I’m really excited about next Wednesday:

1. Listen to what others, many very influential, are thinking and envisioning for the Arab Web.

2. Get to meet some of the most brilliant Web personailities.
 
3. Get an update on several aspects of the Arab Internet that I’m interested in: especially the mobile Web.

4. Meet Amira Al-Husseini, one of the speakers, whose blog I’ve been reading for five years, and who has cats called Twitter and Flickr!

5. Bombard you guys with live-blogging :)

6. Get annoyed at how there ARE NOT ENOUGH WOMEN IN TECHNOLOGY IN THE ARAB WORLD. Dude.

7. Yasmeen! Yasmeeeeen! (One of my top five friends in the world, hands-down).

8. Perhaps get inspired to come up with the next brilliant life-changing Web idea ;)

9. Mingle with all the cool geeky people of the Arab world, including Mohammad Khawaja, Naseem Tarawneh, Frankom, Maya Zankoul, Corrine Martine, Amer Kawar…

10. Experiment with live-blogging, I promise I’ll make it interesting for you guys :) If you have any ideas, suggestions, etc. let me know! :)

You can visit http://www.ArabNet.me for the Full Program & List of Speakers

When I was a child, I was very picky about every single item that goes into my bedroom, whether an actual piece of furniture or a cassette tape. Mostly, I’d color, cut, and glue to make items suit my preferences, and I actively dreamt about the day where I’d have access to all the world’s beautiful design pieces.

Then comes adulthood, and the discovery that shit, nice things are REALLY expensive in this part of the world. And I don’t have the time to color, cut, and glue.

What I end up with is jpegs of awesome pieces of furniture… Like these:

The Fade Out Chair:

(via Design You Trust)

And this AWESOME RGB light:

(via MoCoLoCo)