Monthly Archives: July 2007

More Alpha-Bits….

So after my box of yummy Limited Edition Alpha-Bits (now with the sugar back where it belongs) I hadn’t seen it anywhere but Meijer’s so I started feeling anxious that they might stop making it again (it is “limited”). But then I was at Target the other day walking out with my arms were full (I had paid back in the electronics section) and they had just opened (I needed stuff for work) I passed all the employees standing in the aisle having their morning meeting I spied an end-cap with the Limited Edition Alpha-Bits 3 boxes for $7. So I checked the expiration date and managed to stack up 8 boxes in my arms (in addition to my bags and the water, this was all I could hold), this will give me about 1 box a month until expiration, but that’s probably not enough sugary letters for me, I should probably get another 8 or 10 boxes while they’re still on sale today.


Long live Limited Edition Alpha-Bits!!!

1 and 1 downtime (AGAIN!). 1 & 1 has great service when it works but when they aren’t working, they have lousy support…

It went down again. And it took two calls for someone to be able to tell me they are aware and fixing it. They need a way to keep customers all up to date. Have they ever heard of a status page (or a blog)? I wouldn’t mind any downtime if I could check on it in just a few seconds.

Now it seems as if my permissions are goofed up in some directories.

I’m not sure why you aren’t/weren’t seeing all the post content all the time…

I’d get rid of them if they weren’t so awesome when they were working!!

The Future of Television is selling me individual custom episodes

So the future of television is certainly changing. The networks haven’t completely caught on yet, but they will. In a day when users can download higher quality video than they currently receive, get shows from parts of the world that aren’t available and have the advantage of having no ads and are free (please note this means stolen). We can also buy many of these videos from the iTunes store or Amazon UnBox for $1.99 an episode (iTunes has some at 99 cents for an episode and sometimes get that cheap if you subscribe for season). I know “legal” is not what people think when they hear the word BitTorrent, but BitTorrent.com even sells shows legally these days.

If I could subscribe to a lot of the shows I enjoy for 99 cents an episode and have them automatically download to my AppleTV, TiVo, iPod or other device I’d never have anything more than basic cable. I’m sure this goes for a lot of people. Everything needed (except the mentality) to do this currently exists. The networks and producers of these shows need to somehow start embracing this model before it gets even easier for people to get (steal) these shows for free.

Or charge me significantly less and let me trade the produces some statistical information about myself and let them insert in advertising relevant to me. Give me geeky ads, movie and TV show previews that I like, music that I like. Advertise events and concerts that are taking place where I live. I don’t need diaper ads, tampons, bad credit information, refinancing, ads for cars that cost $50,000+, ways to give up smoking. With the right information instead of advertising a new bed which I may have just purchased, they can advertise new pillows or new sheets (and mark in their files to start giving me new bed advertisements in another 5 years) that I might actually purchase.

Even better, let me give “them” lots of information about me, which I’ll update a few times a month with information about what I’ve purchased or I’m shopping for (who in my life has a birthday coming up) or where I’m traveling to. And they can actually pay me to watch television! I’m not looking for a lot of money but just something to make it worth giving them info (besides, think of how much you’d save on cable if it was free!). Maybe some hotel discount coupons when I mention a vacation, or a coupon for Best Buy when they know I’m looking for a new video camera.

AppleTV is Awesome!!!

My AppleTV is awesome! An “iPod for your TV” is a accurate description. I ran the software update (painless!) and it gave me YouTube videos and fixed “enhanced podcasts”.

It mirrors one of your computer’s iTunes just like an iPod does (and allows you exceptions) and will stream from any other computers running iTunes (platform independent) and I don’t think there is a limit. I can’t believe how fast it pulls hi-res movie previews from Apple down to the unit, it’s very very fast. It’s actually much faster than pulling down YouTube videos (many which are low-res).

It really streams full-scren video from other computers really efficiently. Very rarely does it need a moment to catch up. It has no problem with steaming audio. It almost makes no sense to download podcasts, I bet you could stream them live if you had a way to just get the RSS feeds onto the AppleTV.

With “enhanced podcasts” it now properly advances the embedded images to follow along with the audio. The problem is that it just shows them to the side like the album artwork, some images are much larger so it really cheats you by scaling them down. Since you don’t use the up/down keys on the remote during this process “up” would be a great way to enlarge the images.

I have the same image size concern when viewing slideshows with the “Ken Burns effect”, sometimes I want to view the whole image. Once again this would be another great use for the up button. The down button could be used for viewing filenames, date, time and other info about the images. Actually, this would be a good use for the down button while viewing videos or audio.

A few more features (like on the TiVo) like weather, movie listings and maybe Flickr photo viewing and it’d be even better… Continue reading

Mmmmm…. AppleTV !

So I’ve been very interested in the AppleTV and never got around to trying it. But I was feeling pretty happy after happy hour yeast and Best Buy has a good return policy so I’m now the proud owner of an AppleTV (40GB). It’s very cool. Very easy to install. Very easy to configure. Pure yummy Apple perfection. And there is no way I’m going to return it!

Two user-interface suggestions:
1) They need a better distinction between the computer you sync with and the computers you stream from. This needs to be better in the AppleTV and in iTunes.
2) The top menu item says AppleTV and it looks like it’s a title and not a menu item (it actually takes you back to the main menu) and it’s confusing. I’ve read about this but I forgot about it…
3) Put in a DVD player and a video/s-video port. (This doesn’t count since it’s not an interface issue).
3b) Safari would be cool too! This would just be for .Mac members so it would interface with your bookmarks!

If you think you’d like one of these, then run and go get one, it’s way cool.

Karnak Temple

Found this cool 360 degree panorama of Karnak Temple. It requires Quicktime (I was there last year, BTW).

(I was actually looking for something on The Moon Landing which was 38 years ago today….)

PayPal Suggestion

If you use PayPal, this suggestion is for you as an individual (not for the PayPal company itself). PayPal lets you add several e-mail addresses to your account to send/receive money. My suggestion is to add a few other addresses that you use to your account. If someone sends you money to one of these other addresses it’s way easier to claim it!

And I also think it might be better for you if your current e-mail account ever goes under, the other e-mail will already be on file.

I just had the first problem, and PayPal phone support resolved it for me pretty quick (if I would have shut up and stopped asking questions they probably would have resolved it even faster).

The Police

I saw The Police in concert tonight at the Palace in Auburn Hills. They were excellent!!!! You’d never know these guys hadn’t toured in years, any other reunion (or county fair concert) I’ve ever seen you could tell everyone was out of practice, but not these guys.

I had a great seat, I wasn’t real close but I was a few rows off the main floor, I had a way better seat than the people who were 15 feet from me on the main floor that (I think) paid a lot more. They had an incredible stage setup, huge video displays and great camera angles.

Here’s the run down on the guys:

  • Sting – Awesome singer. He probably looks less old than the rest of the gang. (I don’t think he did any of his own songs, but his son’s band did open).
  • Stewart Copland – Excellent on the instruments, probably better than the other guys. Not sure what he’s done lately on his own (remember when he did the theme for The Equalizer TV series?).
  • Andy Summers – Looked a little ragged (sorry Andy). I’ve seen him in concert (he opened for Tangerine Dream), I thought he was a lot more mellow.

    I took a few photos, but I don’t know how to get them off the (stupid) Verizon RAZR v3 phone I have from work (my Treo is in the shop). I can’t seem to bluetooth them or e-mail them to a regular e-mail account, anyone?

    And what was up with the really old guitar of Sting? It looked in pretty sad shape, there must be a story (and someone must know it).