It seems that many blog platforms such as WordPress have owners who load them with Web 2.0 widgets for social tagging, advertising, and so on. All these little Javascripts and Flash apps are fetching data from other servers, slowing down page loads, and making the client browser work overtime. This isn’t a big deal for a desktop computer but for a mobile device it spells doom.

I use my Nokia E61 to read news feeds, browse the web, listen to podcasts - all the stuff a computer can do but stripped down. The Webkit-based browser renders pages well, even those using AJAX, but it will die on doo-dad heavy sites. What’s ironic are sites that cover mobile technology such Nokia’s Symbian OS but don’t render on a mobile browser because of the Flash and Javascript.

There are design options: remove extraneous doo-dads and put JavaScript-heavy social networking badges on another page. Better yet, modify your blog’s theme to be mobile-friendly.

For lazy bloggers there’s a solution: WordPress Mobile Edition by Alex King. This WordPress plug-in autodetects mobile browsers and renders pages using text links and no graphics or scripts. Navigation links, posts, comments, and pages are rearranged to make them easier to browse. Best of all there’s nothing to configure: install and activate.

Final Cut Producer recently posted suggestions for using Final Cut Pro on a laptop using external hard drives for storing media. I thought it was worth saving and throwing back a comment or two.

USB hard drives (version 1.x and 2.x) cannot be powered by the USB bus - there isn’t enough power pushed down the cable. You must use the device’s A/C adapter.

In contrast, many FireWire hard drives can be used without an A/C adapter because the FireWire specification includes sending power down the cable. This is handy for making backups, storing your iTunes library, etc. but I’d stick with A/C powered drives for video editing or any other serious work.