san-jose

James Byers, a sailing friend of mine who also happens to be quite the successful techie, tipped me off to his new startup project: WhoAt.

Yes… it is in fact YASNP (Yet-Another-Social-Networking-Project). But this one has an interesting twist that might make it pretty cool… it’s location aware.

So the theory is that when you hit the coffee shop with your PowerBook (or ThinkPad), you can let the network know where you are and it will alert you to possible new friends in your vicinity. You can then learn more about them or send them messages. You can also use the service from your mobile phone using SMS or a WAP browser (the phone interface is very simple, I was impressed).

Right now the service only covers NYC and San Francisco, but James said he’d be adding San Jose to the list within a week or so.

Update: Be sure to check out my profile, and if you for some reason want an invite (instead of signing up on your own), leave a comment.

I’ve started a page in my wiki where I’ll be posting all the coffe shops and similar establishments I find around downtown San Jose that have free wireless internet access.

After spending 4 years in Ann Arbor where there are 3 coffee shops per corner and they all have free wireless, it was a bit of a shock to find out the rest of the world wasn’t the same. This is Silicon Valley… I expected there to be free WiFi on every corner!

Last week I finally moved into my new studio apartment. Its about what you’d expect for $875/mo with utilities near downtown San Jose: partitioned out of an older house in one of the “older” neighborhoods in town, with heavily replastered and repainted old walls and architecture straight out of the 60’s.

But its still awesome to finally have a place of my own. For me, it couldn’t be better. Its got great old hardwood floors, which I love. As studios go, its pretty large, and its even got a backyard. Its also in the “student ghetto” area near San Jose State, so its close to lots of cheap restauraunts and convenience stores and only a few blocks from downtown, so I can finally ride my bike to the coffee shops or the light-rail station. Most importantly, its all mine.

Update: I stole the lamps from my friend. I’m not nearly that stylish. Or strange.