The next likemind will be Friday, May 15, 2009 in dozens of cities around the world.

In Chicago, it will be at Argo Tea, 140 S Dearborn St. at the corner of Adams and Dearborn Streets in the Loop from 8:00 am to 10 am.

I call likemind a gathering of creative-minded people, from various disciplines including Internet, advertising, art, social media, et. al. For more information on likemind, you can read this great article on likemind from the New York Times.

No RSVP is required. You are also welcome to join the likemind Chicago Facebook group.

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For me, it is more fun reading and replying to comments on my blog The Hot Iron than it is writing the blog posts themselves. Where I do enjoy writing, reading comments means someone was interested in something I had to say, for whatever reason, and was compelled to join the conversation. I also enjoy commenting on posts on other blogs for those very same reasons.

Once I have commented on a blog post, I sometimes forget about it, or forget to go back to the post and see how the conversation has evolved, if it has at all. These challenges of following blog comments – and as a result conversations – means I am missing out on something, from alternate ideas to if anyone is interested in the topic at all.

Many blogs have functionality built into it to help users following the conversations on a blog post. One form is email notification, where if you posted a comment and opted-in, you can receive an email every time someone else posts a comment. This is handy as you can follow without having to revisit the Web page. Most all blogs which offer this also allow you to unsubscribe, though I have found some blogs that do not and I continue to get emails from them. I have heard larger, more popular blogs don’t offer this as the potential for large volumes of email could be viewed as spam by some email networks. This is an option on The Hot Iron, and as the blog owner I get emails for every comment posted.

Another way to follow along is by RSS feed. Some blogs have a link to subscribe to the comments of a blog post. This is nothing I have tried myself, as I wondered if I would truly be able to follow along. The opt-out of the RSS feed by unsubscribing is very clean. This is not an option on The Hot Iron, yet. I will try this out and am hoping with using folders in Google Reader it will be easy to manage.

There are 3rd-party services for hosting and managing blog comments. One I have heard of is Disqus. I do not use this myself and have had some reservations about turning over all of my comments to another service I have no control over. I would be interested in hearing from others about how this has worked for them.

The purpose of this particular post is to get ideas, as I am not sure how to best proceed with following comments. Please feel free to share what works – or doesn’t work – for you. And please check the checkbox to get informed on what others say.

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Happy Cinco de Mayo! Today is a day when many – at least in the US – drop down to their local pub and have a Mexican beer or drink. Or 5. However many may not know the real meaning of the day, which is celebrated in some parts of Mexico for the country’s defeat of the French army in the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862. Ok, I’ll admit I had to look it up myself as I didn’t know either.

Isn’t it interesting how people accept something for a particular meaning when the reality is different, and in a good way? It’s almost perfect timing that I received a box from Don Cenobio of his recently rebranded Tres Generaciones (or 3G) premium tequila. As it came in an attractive wooden box, I thought it would be great to make an unboxing video. Though they’re typically done for electronics, why not tequila? You can see the video below, or watch the 3G unboxing video here.

Late last year I was invited to a 3G tasting at Chicago’s Frontera Grill. There I met people from the brand, as well as others in social media to try 3G and talk about tequila, among other things. In the presentation by the brand ambassador, stereotypes of tequila – mostly negative ones - were brought up, and this was something discussed afterwards. The idea of premium tequila, one that can have a taste similar to vodka or even a single malt scotch, breaks some of those stereotypes. In other words, revealing the true definition of what tequila is.

Enjoy the video, and now I am going to enjoy what I unboxed. Responsibly, of course.

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This Saturday marks the 135th running of the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs in Louisville, KY. I have been fortunate to have attended twice, once when working and living in Louisville years back where I got a lot of the local flavor of the event leading up to it. Though I usually watch it every year on TV, I don’t get into it as much as I did when I was there.

Then the other day I found out one of the horses running is named Dunkirk! Its jockey even wears a blue jersey. As of the writing of this post, Dunkirk is listed with 4-1 odds and some news stories I have read have it picked to win. Whether it wins or loses, gotta love the name Dunkirk. Well, at least I do. I don't know for sure if it is named after the city in New York (as my Internet consulting firm is) or the city in France (which the city in New York is named after), but I do know who I will be cheering for.

Go Dunkirk! I will be watching with more enthusiasm this year!

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A few weeks back there was a meetup for S60 users and enthusiasts at the Nokia Flagship Store in Chicago. It was coordinated by S60Users.com though as they are in New York nobody was there from them. Despite this, there was a small but might gathering of 5 of us, as shown in the accompanying photo courtesy of Jon from JDMOTO Photography.

Our hosts from the Nokia store let us play with an earlier model of the forthcoming Nokia N97. As it was an earlier model of hardware and software, they wouldn’t let us take pictures of it. For myself, it was my first hands-on with the device. I liked its size, feel and layout. Though the keys on the keypad are small, they are easy to feel, especially compared to the new N75. Drawbacks to the keyboard are no separate row for number keys (there’s room for one!) and that they are hard to read. Of course the true test of the device is in its real-world use, and I would love to help the cause and try one out – hint!

Speaking of the N75, they had them on display and I spent some time using one. Where I like the form factor and how the keyboard slides, the screen is not much bigger than the E71, and the fact that they keyboard is flat is a drawback, as you can’t “feel” out the keys as you type. They are larger keys and there is also no separate row for numbers. As I have called this out twice now, it is obvious I enjoy this feature on my E70 as well as when I evaluated the E71.

And it wouldn’t be an event without swag! The friendly staff had some S60 items, including a flat 512MB Flash drive, pen and refrigerator clip. They mentioned they may be hosting other events in the future, so I will be on the lookout for them and will report back here on The Hot Iron. You can see more pictures from the meetup on Jon's blog.

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