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The Digital Nomads Blog

Green-Collar Jobs: The Van Jones InterviewYesterday

Van Jones is the president of Green For All, which works to combine solutions to America’s two major problems: social inequality and environmental destruction. Jones launched the initiative at the Clinton Global Initiative in 2007; it grew out of his work creating a ‘Green Job Corp’ in Oakland, California, as part of a program at the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. Jones is the recipient of the 1998 Reebok International Human Rights Award, the international Ashoka Fellowship, selection as a World Economic Forum “Young Global Leader,” and the Rockefeller Foundation “Next Generation Leadership” Fellowship. He is a graduate of Yale Law School. Big Think spoke to him about his mission and how technology is helping him achieve it.

This interview is part of a series on BigThink, sponsored by Dell and Digital Nomads.

Redesigned Digital Nomads Site - What Do You Think?December 2

Many of you have told us you wanted us to make some changes to this site and we’ve done that.

First, we’ve worked on the layout and design, making it cleaner, and easier to read and navigate. We’ve increased the font size, we’ve made our hyperlinks more obvious, we’ve gone to a two-column layout and have made a few changes that will enable the site to load more quickly.

On the blog page, we’ve greatly reduced the size of the header to give more room for our posts. We’ve also re-ordered some tools on the right-hand rail of the site to make them easier to find. And while this isn’t new, we’ve now got nearly 1,000 of you following us on Twitter. Hopefully, you’re learning from our tweets just as we learn new things from you.

Second, we’re incorporating your images into the design of the site itself. You’re now able to upload your nomadic

(Managing) a home (while) away from home…December 2

We’ve all heard of “a home away from home” but I’d like to explore what’s going on with *managing* a home while away from home. Like most of you, I not only travel but need to travel - and also manage what’s going on back home. While I don’t have a 100% home automation system I thought I’d put together some of the things I do have as well as some of the things I’m interested in — post up in the comments with your “(managing) a home (while) away from home” tools, services and stories! … Pictured above, one of my many attempts to monitor home away from home…

Home monitoring & home automation
Many options here, I tend to like the solutions I can build/mod myself so here are some good ones to check out…

Open source web based home automation, MisterHouse!
SlugPower - Linux controlled power switch.
Make a power outage sensor and reboot devices remotely.
Control your home

Mobile Devices Dominate Cyber MondayDecember 2

That headline summarizes many of the headlines from yesterday, Cyber Monday, the biggest online shopping day of the year. Netbooks topped the purchasing lists for many online shoppers. New mobile devices from companies like Nokia were also highly discussed. While the global economy may have some uncertainty, one thing is certain: digital nomads will have their pick of new devices to use in 2009.

Netbooks are essentially mini-laptops with screens that range from around seven to ten inches, weighing in at about three pounds or less, and carrying starting costs of anywhere from $200 to $500, depending on your configuration and the manufacturer.

There are many lightweight systems that have been discussed on this blog and elsewhere that have some element of the three key factors (screen size, weight and cost) but not all. In my mind, that doesn’t mean they aren’t worthy systems but they’re not netbooks. Dell’s own

Traveling with netbooksNovember 27

After coming back from a longish trip overseas, I’ve come to see the value - and folly - of netbooks. If you recall, netbooks are the low-power, lightweight notebooks that seem to be all the rage this year. Most of them are smaller than a paperback book and thinner than a magazine and they offer computing power in a package that is considerably smaller than most higher-end laptops.

But are netbooks good for travel? I’ve used a number of them over the past year in an effort to hunt down the best and brightest of the lot and I’ve found that yes, if your travels will take you to a place where you won’t be ediiting video or playing games, a netbook is just right. This trip I travelled with the MacBook Air and I was quite please with the result. My bag was considerably lighter, my back hurt less, and I didn’t notice a single slowdown during the trip. Here are a few cool netbooks I’ve played with and I can recommend.

MSI Wind - The MSI Wind is an $500 ultraportable notebook that weighs about two and a half pounds, features Intel’s new Atom chipset (1.6GHz), and runs Windows XP Home Edition. There’s also a Linux version that’s coming out in a couple of weeks, but the configuration I tested