This is why I love the Internet

Over the last 24 hours:

Microsoft and Yahoo! - 44 Billion

Who cares!?! Unless you own stock in Yahoo, of course :)

Microsoft has nothing to offer Yahoo, IMHO, they've never been great with the internet (search, MSN, webTV, etc.) and that's okay. Really, Bill, it's okay. It really is.

I'm assuming Yahoo! will take the money and run, unless they've got a lot of debt, this is a nice chunk of change (and if they've got a lot of debt, this'll pay it off).

I do worry about Flickr, Del.icio.us, the nice mobile web portals and whatever other sites that Yahoo owns. But at the end of the day, I think the 'net will be okay and not have anything to worry about...

I don't really understand the concept of business at 44 billion dollars, so maybe I don't know what I'm talking about but I promise I'd be a fast learner if anyone ever put me into into a situation where I would need to learn about it...

I just think about Guy Kawasaki and he must be really kicking himself for not taking Yahoo's offer to be president way back in the day. Several years ago I saw him speak and he mentioned that tidbit after mentioning other people's famous mistakes like "640k is all anyone will ever need".

Technorati Tags: Guy Kawasaki, Microsoft, Yahoo

Introducing "The Book"

If you've ever helped anyone with a computer you'll love this! This is can also be referred to as "The Medieval Helpdesk".

This is in Norwegian, so you can probably turn the volume down, but it's subtitled. I just watched this with a bunch of technology directors and we were all laughing out loud.

Technorati Tags: Introducing the book, learning, manual

Apple TV Takes Over The World

My Apple TV has been one of my favorite technology purchases and I never expected that I'd like it that much. Actually, I'd been interested in it but it took a visit to Best Buy, after happy hour, for me to finally commit to the 40 GB version. I took it back a few days later but only because I knew I needed the 160 GB version, bigger is better after all...

Apple TV is pretty much an 'iPod for your television' and iPods are pretty much the standard to beat for portable media players (at least the standard for handheld audio players) so these should be selling much better. I've always been impressed with my Apple TV and had been surprised they hadn't really caught on more than they have. The Apple TV interface is excellent, it's as good as the TiVo (except it doesn't record), you can buy videos (and music) on your computer to load it up, but that is a little inconvenient for some people. You can convert videos for it, but that's not for the average user. I knew it was close to what people want but it wasn't exactly there yet.

A few weeks ago at MacWorld they announced movie rentals for the Apple TV. $2.99 for old movies, $3.99 for new ones and $1 more for HD quality. Plus, you can buy music (and music videos) on-line and view/subscribe to podcasts (for free). They changed the interface, I personally think it's a little more complicated, but since you need to be able to browse an infinite number of music and movies I can understand it (and maybe I'll like it too). This new interface is free to original Apple TV owners and should show up in a few weeks (I keep checking).

I heard all this when they announced it and I've been mulling it around in my head, but I finally just watched that part of the keynote from MacWorld (on my Apple TV, of course) and now I really think this is getting even closer to being the media box for your TV.

So I was thrilled to get my XO laptop

But I just haven't had time to play with it. I've been working, shopping or sick (something hit me yesterday in the middle of the night, but I'm way better now) and there just hasn't been the time.

It's funny this morning I got my e-mail notice that it was shipping with my tracking number and everything (don't forget, I got my laptop this past Wednesday). It also included my T-Mobile activation info, which I sadly cannot get to work.

The laptop is way cool, it's nice and tiny, feels durable and has great reception. It could be a little snappier speed-wise, but if every kid in the world had one of these things it be interesting to see where we are in another 10-20 years. Heck, if every adult had one (and learned to use it) it'd be interesting to see where we'd be.

I can't wait to see what I can eventually make this do...

Technorati Tags: $100 laptop, OLPC, one laptop per child, XO, XO laptop

Digital Camera Time & Date Settings

So I'm always trying to adjust the date and time on my camera, making it fit the time zone I'm in / adjusting the time changes (DST) and it's pretty much just turned into a pain to keep correct. I'm thinking of just using GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) and then it'll always be right and if I even need to know when I took a picture it'll technically be right and I'll be able to figure out the difference (if I need to).

I'll have to test a few photos to Flickr and a few other places to see if they adjust or do anything to offset the time from where I say I am. Anyone who's also been annoyed by this have any thoughts on the matter?

Technorati Tags: date, digital camera, digital camera settings, GMT, time zone, time

Tech Deals Today

These deals probably won't last (especially the cables) but I thought I'd mention them:

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!!

Technorati Tags: 1 and 1, 1and1

The Future of Television

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.

Technorati Tags: Amazon Unbox, Apple TV, AppleTV, BitTorrent, future of television, TiVo, Unbox, video distribution

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...

What I don't like is that it only lets you sync with one computer. I'd like to sync music with one, videos with another and podcasts with another (not so sure if I care about the latter).

What I need:
1) A way to automatically convert videos and stick them into iTunes for me (so when I drop/download a file to a folder, it starts processing for me). I could probably do this via Mac or Windows....

2) A way to play other file formats on the AppleTV, such as AVI and DiVX files. I think I can hack it to do that but I'm not sure if I want to take it apart yet.

Technorati Tags: Apple TV, AppleTV, iTunes, Ken Burns, Ken Burns effect, Flickr, TV

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.

Technorati Tags: Apple TV, AppleTV, iTunes, TV

Will it Blend? - iPhone

The title really says it all. But you have to see it to believe it!

And when you're done watching it, you can bid on it and other extras (it's up to $1,100 for some weird reason).

Technorati Tags: Apple, blend, eBay, iPhone, will it blend

Best Buy Grand Opening - Allen Park

As we've discussed before, I've got a new Best Buy Opening nearby in the north end of Allen Park (Fairlane Green). We'll I just saw a billboard and the Grand Opening is June 29th 2007. There is another BB in Dearborn just 4-5 (7?) miles away so I wonder if that one might be closing soon...

Technorati Tags: Allen Park, Best Buy

50 Best Tech Products of All Time

So PC World has a story on the Best 50 Tech products. Considering a few of the items in the list, I think few things are missing: Skype, one of the early pieces of ZIP/StuffIt software, maybe a Palm (or even Windows) cell phone, a TRS-80, the Sony WalkMan set standards for portable (choose your own) music players and I'm sure I'll think of a few more later. Half of the software "tools" seem to be things to fix parts/utilities missing from the Windows OS. And there isn't any software for creating web pages / FTPing files (from the era of Netscape and Eudora) or blocking spam. Should flickr or Google be considered a product? Amazon or eBay? Okay, so I'm getting ahead of myself, lets show the list.

Of the 50 I've bolded items owned/used (some were free or work owned for my use) and added comments to many items (even ones I don't use):

1. Netscape Navigator (1994) - Netscape and NCSA made the Internet (and Eudora), thanks!
2. Apple II (1977) - I never owned one until years later when I got a deal on one.
3. TiVo HDR110 (1999) - Early adoptor and I've added many converts
4. Napster (1999)
5. Lotus 1-2-3 for DOS (1983) - More of a VisaCalc/Excell user but they're all great.
6. Apple iPod (2001) - I waited for a color one with a big hard drive and spent the early adopter prices for it (now better ones are 1/2 the price).
7. Hayes Smartmodem (1981) - I can't be sure I actually had a Hayes, but I had one of the first generics if I didn't (I've had so many modems, I can't recall). Hayes changed computer communications IMHO.
8. Motorola StarTAC (1996) - Several of these from several carriers and they were all awesome.
9. WordPerfect 5.1 (1989) - I used it but I'm not proud, I think it's awful
10. Tetris (1985)
11. Adobe Photoshop 3.0 (1994) - This has almost always been too complicated for any needs I've ever had.
12. IBM ThinkPad 700C (1992)
13. Atari VCS/2600 (1977) - I always wanted one of these (even years later) but I never had one.
14. Apple Macintosh Plus (1986) - I was a late apple adaptor but I loved it. I still love Apple and I think I always will...
15. RIM BlackBerry 857 (2000) - no interest in one of these ever
16. 3dfx Voodoo3 (1999) - I don't think I've ever had a machine with this card.
17. Canon Digital Elph S100 (2000)
18. Palm Pilot 1000 (1996) - I jumped on the palm bandwagon late but now I'm a fan
19. id Software Doom (1993)
20. Microsoft Windows 95 (1995) - I'm sure one of my work Machines ran this, I'm not sure if I ever owned a machine with it. I think I jumped from Windows 3.1 back to DOS and then to ME or 98 at home.
21. Apple iTunes 4 (2003) - THE best/easiest way to shop for music on-line
22. Nintendo Game Boy (1989)
23. Iomega Zip Drive (1994) - These folks dominated the market. Everyone I know had one of these drives and then they just faded away...
24. Spybot Search & Destroy (2000)
25. Compaq Deskpro 386 (1986) - We sold these and I'll always remember the customer that pronounced it Comp-A-Que and we had no idea what they were asking for.
26. CompuServe (1982) - Had an account for a while, this was pre-Internet...
27. Blizzard World of Warcraft (2004)
28. Aldus PageMaker (1985) - I have never been a PageMaker fan.
29. HP LaserJet 4L (1993)
30. Apple Mac OS X (2001) - It just works! (generally)
31. Nintendo Entertainment System (1985)
32. Eudora (1988) - Probably one of the best e-mail clients ever, way way way before it's time.
33. Sony Handycam DCR-VX1000 (1995)
34. Apple Airport Base Station (1999)
35. Brøderbund The Print Shop (1984) - This was why people never wanted to get rid of their dot matrix printers (the pinfeed paper for banners).
36. McAfee VirusScan (1990)
37. Commodore Amiga 1000 (1985) - I always wanted one of these!
38. ChipSoft TurboTax (1985) - I love tax software, it's so worth the money
39. Mirabilis ICQ (1996)
40. Creative Labs Sound Blaster 16 (1992) - This was the standard for audio cards forever.
41. Apple HyperCard (1987) - Best software ever! This was the premiere application using hyperlinks and (almost) had plug-ins and supported multimedia. Think linking and interactive pages (cards) of information and graphics all running on your computer (pre-internet)
42. Epson MX-80 (1980) - These were one of the most durable dot matix printers ever.
43. Central Point Software PC Tools (1985)
44. Canon EOS Digital Rebel (2003) - I love this it feels like a real camera in my hands. It works like one too.
45. Red Hat Linux (1994) - Awesome easy to use/maintain version of a free OS.
46. Adaptec Easy CD Creator (1996) - I have/use various versions of it, but I'll always love toast.
47. PC-Talk (1982)
48. Sony Mavica MVC-FD5 (1997) - The floppy disk cameras made it easy for everyone to get their photos off the camera. This was always my favorite camera to have schools use.
49. Microsoft Excel (1985) - Excel is an awesome spreadsheet.
50. Northgate OmniKey Ultra (1987)

Technorati Tags: Apple, Google, iTunes, Palm, Skype

The Victorian Internet - Review

So a long time ago Dave Goodman recommended The Victorian Internet to me (that's 3 links in this sentence). After a while I finally ordered it and then after a while I finally read it and then I finally remember to post about it.

A very interesting book on the how long distance communications took place centuries ago. Eventually the story focuses mostly on the 1800's and how the telegraph was build, used, subsidized and grew all over the world. It's a great book with all sorts of obvious parallels to the last 30 years and computer communications that just jump out at you. At least they jumped out at me, the last chapter kinda spoon fed the similarities to you in case you didn't get them but I think if you made it through the book you don't really need that wrap up.

I'm not going to say any more about the book itself, if it sounds even mildly interesting I really think you'll enjoy it.

I'm looking for some similar books for two reasons:
1) I like stuff like this.
2) I'm thinking they're going to ask me to teach the Tech Leadership 900 level course again at a local university. And I think an understanding of "stuff like this" is helpful for people working in technology. Plus it's a short book and less than $12 new so what college student isn't going to like that?!? Last summer we used The World is Flat (revised), which was cheap and interesting but it's long and gets repetitive and if it's not interesting to you it just more uninteresting as you read. It's a great book, don't get me wrong but if it's not your cup of tea it's really long, while if this book isn't at least it's over soon.

Buffalo High Speed wireless router - Mini-review (and DD-WRT info)

So I picked up a Buffalo WHR-G54S Wireless Broadband Router because you can never have too many routers in your house but mostly because ever since wireless existed I've wanted someway to bridge across my house (mostly to hook some old non-WiFi equipment that was in the living room hooked to the stereo) for older equipment that wireless wasn't an option. So I just wanted a box with an ethernet and an antenna that would then connect to the network. The stuff I tried was too expensive (although that was a few years back) didn't work as advertised or didn't pass Appletalk packets. In general, my favorite home router is the Netgear brand wireless routers but I thought I'd try thing.

So the packaging on the Buffalo WHR-G54S made me think it would work (or that I could make it work). It seemed like a nice wireless router but it looked like it wouldn't do what I wanted, but more importantly I knew I could make it work with the DD-WRT project. This is pretty much a way to put a different OS inside the router and it supports a lot more options, it's kind of a mini-linux (it might actually be all linux now, mildly confused on that) and there are a few projects like this out there. The most important option (for me) is by being a bridge (a mega-bridge that I can hook 5 computers up to). But it'll also support radius authentication (if you need it, it's a big deal), a mini web-server and even a way to power (and charge) your internet cafe.

Warning the content gets pretty geeky from here on.

So you have to flash it with a new OS which is mildly tricky, I recommend printing the instructions and crossing out all the non-relevant stuff. It was pretty simple once I found the parts to ignore. Once done it was pretty much how you'd expect any wireless router to be (but better).

It had an option to be a the bridge I wanted this meant I could take any old computer that had ethernet and make it wireless by just plugging it in the router and it would connect to my wireless connect in the other room. I told it what my network was and it was ready to go. This would also be handy for running operating systems that don't have support for some odd wireless card or USB dongle. Not only would it let me hook up 4 devices it could actually use the 5th port too (that's probably overkill but it does it anyways).

It'll run a little web server too. I haven't figured out all the parts but I will. What I'd like is to set it up like a regular router and as soon as you connect it'll give you a default web page welcoming you to the network (I figure if I can make this work I can more easily convince my local hangouts to WiFi.)

As a router goes, it supports the blocking options that many routers support but it has 10 different definable options by IP number than you can use (plus you can block by keyword and URL).

Other stuff: It supports multiple DDNS Services (Dynamic Domain Name Services), multiple VLANs, and some VPN stuff. Also some QoS options (Quality of Services) which might be handy if you don't want those computers sucking up all your bandwidth (just lower their limit). You can telnet in and all sorts of fun stuff.

Technorati Tags: wireless

You can be on Battlestar Galactica!

So you can be in your own mini episode of Battlestar Galactica! Here's a few sample videos (both with a Cylon fetish). But if you go here you can get footage, music and sound effects to create your own video. Kinda neat, especially since you can probably use any editing software to put it all together.

Technorati Tags: Battlestar Galactica, television

What is a Network?

So my Mom asks me what her network is, I tell her the name of it but she wants to know what it is. We talked for a bit but she's not liking any of my (wonderful) analogies. Plus the fact that she's wireless now means I can't just say it's the wire...

The closest on a home scale I could come up with was her phone network. She's got the phone wires just like the computer wires and a cordless phone in the house. It's not weird that she doesn't understand the computer network, it's weird that she thinks she understands the phone network...

It's funny the questions people ask when they use technology that they never asked before (I don't mean just my Mom, I'm picking on millions of people here). There are just so many computer similarities with phones, cable tv, and plumbing but people just never seem wonder about it; but when they get a computer they want an answer. I'm thinking that when she's over my house next she'll see all the other wireless networks (in my neighborhood) in her list and that'll help (at least the why of why it has a name). I was sure to leave out the fact that her phone now goes over the cable with the internet and the television channels.

One of the communications issues was to her “network” was a computer word so it just didn't apply when I tried to talk about the network of highways and roads (or the phone network). I'll make sure I have some visual aids next time (and wave my arms around while I talk, that always helps).

And it turns out her community education computer class was canceled. Not enough people signed up...

Hormel Tries to Stop Use of Spam

Spam Arrest will be featured on ABC's World News with Charles Gibson tonight (Monday, March 5th, 2007). World News will be discussing the ongoing trademark dispute between Hormel and Spam Arrest over the use of the word “spam”.

Spam Arrest has been defending itself against Hormel for the last 4 years while Hormel has been attempting to cancel the Spam Arrest trademark granted by the US Patent and Trademark Office. (more info)

Spam Arrest is my favorite way of blocking e-mail spam from home. It's practially impossible for spammers to get automated junk mail past their filter!

Technorati Tags: spam

My Mom is On-Line

So miraculously my mother is now on-line. I had it on my list of things to do but I had finally given up, she just didn't seem that interested the last few times I talked to her about. About a week ago she decided she wanted to and I jumped on it; she came over we got a new laptop for her: HP 15.4 inch Dual Core, 1 GB RAM, 120 GB hard drive, Dual-Layer DVD burner w/LightScribe, SD chip reader (maybe reads more than that, with the media center “stuff” and a remote for that (which slides nicely into the laptop). BTW, that was $699 after rebate at Circuit City this week. A bit more machine than she needs right now but she won't need anything else more than that for a while and it's small enough she can bring it over when she has questions/problems instead of me having to always go over there.

We went over to get a book for her and ended up with Easy Microsoft Windows Vista. Lots of pictures and very clear to read. We looked at some other ones even the seniors ones, and while they were very well written, the images were black & while and not every high resolution, very difficult to see. Mom's pretty young, not 60 yet, but very low tech considering I'm her kid and I turned my step-dad into a geek before he passed away a few years ago.

So I set her all up, it's Vista so I'm not very familiar with it but I figured it out. Then I set up an easy to use home page for her to use with with Internet Explorer. I set her up a page at http://GaryLaPointe.com/mom/ and I can modify it whenever I want for her. But I stuck a bunch of stuff on it like local news, weather, on-line shopping and stuff. This includes some of my photos and links to trips she's never seen and her musician granddaughter's page. At some point she'll have to learn favorites/bookmarkss, but for now it's perfect for her. Take a peek and if you have any suggestions (either for the page or just some good introductory web sites.

She just called and the cable guy left and she's on-line!!! I had her get the $42 a month service which is 384 up + 5,000 down, the next service down was only $6 less but it was only 500 down, I wanted her to have a more pleasurable experience. In a few months she can try the lower speeds...

I'll go over next week and hook up the wireless for her and she can set up in the corner of the dining room where she wants it. Right now she in my old attic bedroom.

I think she's going over to sign up for a 4 week (2 hours a night) computer class that starts next week at the community education center.

When Arcade Game Creatures Attack!

So imagine this: You've got some kind of handheld inviso-detecter-o-rama and through the viewfinder you can see the invisible creatures in your world. Better yet, if you can see them, you can shoot them. Now imagine this handheld device looks an awful lot like your Treo.

ToySpring has created a game, called Arcade Reality, using your Treo that uses the live image from your camera to to superimpose the creatures on. So it appears as if you are fighting arcade creatures in real life. Here are some more screenshots.

Personally, I don't see how they can get enough processing power out of these handhelds to do this, but the machine might have overlay capabilities that I'm not aware of (I've never tried to program a Palm like that). Or they might just be faster than I think. I have seen some zippy video games, I juse don't play them that much these days...

I love my iPhone

So I really like my iPhone. It's the Linksys CIT200 iPhone and works with Skype and you'd might not even realize it was a real phone. It looks more like a generic Nokia cell phone than a home phone and it works great. Actually, the one thing that makes it “not normal” (which doesn't bother me as much as others on-line) is if you are manually dialing you need to dial the “+1” before all calls, to me it's slightly silly, you should be able to configure it to have a default country (and area) code.

You can see all the people you have on your Skype list on the display of the phone so you just scroll down and pick who you want to call. I've wandered all over the condo and it's clear everywhere (I'm on the 3rd/4th floor and it's clear on the first level too!). It's got a headset jack on it, a great speaker phone and supports call waiting. From the USB base the plugs into the computer it even has a button to press so you can page the phone so you can't misplace it. You do need to route the audio on the computer so it properly goes to the phone (Skype has audio settings but it seems like the computer overrides them).

I initially set up Skype when I dropped my land-line phone. I wanted a way to make phone calls in case I forgot my phone somewhere (or it broke) and wanted an easy backup. Plus when I'm out of the country if I have interent access, I can make phone-calls to the US very inexpensively (2.1 cents a minute).

If you use Skype it's a must have, if you don't have Skype and you need an extra phone line in the house get Skype and pay for unlimited outgoing calls to land-lines in the US and Canada for $30 a year. If you don't get a phone like this you just use a headset on the computer.

What don't I like about my iPhone? It's got a crappy wallpaper background and while they have several to choose from, none are a plain background so it's always hard to read the screen. The “+1” is a minor annoyance, but since I really don't use it that much, it's okay. The audio configuration is mildly annoying, I'm hoping an update fixes that (update: I did just install the Jan 22, 2007 update and the audio confusion seems better, we'll see how it feels after a few days).

So I bought an iPhone!

No not that iPhone. The iPhone that's been out for a while, the one that Linksys/Cisco owns the trademark to (but debating that is not the purpose of this thread). It's a regular old looking phone, kinda cellphone-ish, it's cordless and you can carry it around the house and it connects wirelessly to your Windows PC and can make and receive Skype calls. Your Skype friend's list shows up in the display and you can dial from there. I thought it was pretty cool and it was on the odd clearance rack at Target (the UPC on the box didn't scan and the had an extra price tag on it, like they received it by accident but needed to tag it to get rid of it) it was a great deal! It's even got a spot for me to plug in a headset!

I like Skype, it's a great idea and even though I only intermittently use it, it always seems to work for me. You can call other computers for free from your computer to and from anywhere in the world (this includes conference calls and video calls). You can call land lines in the US or Canada for just pennies a minute with no monthly fees (or unlimited for $30 a year) from anywhere in the world. Calling other countries cost a bit more depending on the location. Getting a number where people can call you at your computer (no matter what computer you are at, anywhere in the world) is about $60 a year. So going on vacation, it doesn't matter where you are just load up Skype and connect to the net and people can call you! Get several skype numbers, one that's close to Grandma and one that's close to the kids in college and you're just a local call away for each of them.

Then phone's charging and so I haven't even used it yet. But I can't wait to try!

FYI, they do make some other models of the iPhone that don't require a computer, they just need WiFi to work. I see that as a minor problem in some places since you need a web browser to activate the Wifi (Panera, McDonald's, Border's, etc.). And they're a lot more expensive. When they get smaller and cheaper, or better yet when they come built into my cell phone...

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The iPhone

So I haven't said much about the iPhone since it was announce but what's to say it looks awesome!!! It's a widescreen video iPod with an internet browser, e-mail and it makes phone calls. The downside (IMHO) is it's only on Cingular and I don't think the network the iPhone is using is as fast as the EVDO speed networks.

The negative I've seen some reviewers mention is that it only accepts music from the iTunes music store. Which isn't true, it only accepts protected music from the iTunes music store. And it's important to remember all other players don't allow music from the iTunes music store, I see that as a problem. You can buy from some (smaller) music sites and put your CDs on it. FYI, the iTunes music store sells 58 songs a second (5 million a day) that makes them the fourth largest retailer of music (Wal-Mart, Best Buy and Target are above them) then just pulled ahead of Amazon. The iTunes and iPod experience makes it so pleasant to use I don't think most people care if you can only use one store to buy (protected) music from...

On a side note there are rumors that Apple is making a huge advertising announcement during the SuperBowl. The rumor is that they are going to start carrying the Beatles CDs, I just don't see that is a major announcement, but we'll see. It's interesting since Apple Records (the Beatle's label) has sued Apple more than a few times for infringing on their trademark but I just don't see it as that huge of a deal. I see them maybe running some new AppleTV ads and maybe some iPhone ads or maybe a new widescreen iPod ad, who knows, the SuperBowl is where they started their ad blitz for the Macintosh in 1984.

My New TV - Acer XD1150 DLP Digital Projector Review

So I was watching television the other day and I knew the picture looked a little dim. I use a computer projector for my TV so I use the wall as my screen (it's about 100 inches diagonally) and it's great for movies and regular TV. So I checked the hours for the bulb and it was supposed to be good for another 350 hours but then it abruptly died that night.

My intent when I bought the projector a few years ago was to keep it until it died and replace it with a much brighter one with more features once I used up the bulb (bulbs are about $300). Projectors drop significantly in price all the time. For example, the cheapest Epson projector 5 years ago was in the $2200 range and now a significantly brighter model (possibly with a higher resolution) is now $675-ish (those are education prices and I'd have to pay more). But I don't want the comparable model, I want the deluxe model!

So now I've got a dilemma, do I replace the bulb ($300) or buy the projector I want ($2000 that I wasn't ready to spend) knowing the prices will keep dropping and features will keep growing?? The answer was the Black Friday ads, I saw multiple projectors for $400 (after rebate) and $500. I settled on the $500 Acer XD1150 DLP Digital Projector (from Staples), no rebate and it was available to ship. It looks like the one in the picture but the one in the picture is the next model up but still looks the same.

So, for spending $500 for the projector instead of $300 for the bulb, I got a new smaller, lighter (under 5 pounds) in-warranty projector a brighter bulb (1800 lumens vs. 1100 lumens) and it's smaller. It's got inputs for composite video (regular video), s-video (like from your DVD player) and SVGA (which doubles as a component video port which supports 480p). It doesn't have any audio inputs but I run it through the stereo so that's okay. It came with a remote and a great carrying bad too.

I like it a lot, even pulling it out of the box was nice. It was packaged excellent everything individually wrapped. It wasn't the same experience of opening up an Apple product but it made me think of it. I came with a composite video cable, a 15 pin SVGA cable but no S-video cable. It came with a CD (which I haven't looked at yet) and a 20 page manual. Actually it was a one page manual, the other 19 pages were the same page in 19 other languages. The zoom is limited but it got the picture where I needed it so I was okay with that. It's also got a digital zoom which is great for watching non-HD shows on the HD channels. The focus was a bit touchy, I may need to look at another one later to see if it's just mine or if they are all that way. All in all I'm very happy with my new TV!

I did just notice there is a 45 page on-line manual in English. I'd guess that's on the CD if I had put it in...

Google Maps On Demand for my Treo!!!

So they finally released Google Maps for Treo so I can run it on my SPrint Treo 700p. With this application I can pull up Google Maps from an application, not just via the web! This means I can zoom, get directions, see satellite views, get very cool driving directions, find local businesses, see traffic patterns (this is a little hard to decipher) all while dragging the map around with my stylus. Very cool!

It's been out for some other handhelds but it never ran on mine. It's pretty zippy with the Sprint EVDO speed. It's pretty big, it weighs in at 423k. It seems to do a good job caching the maps, I wonder how it runs on the slower models and slower networks...

You can down load it directly to your Palm (and other handhelds) from http://www.google.com/gmm

It's missing two features:

The LifeStraw

Over 6,000 people die a day (most of them children) from water releated illnesses. These folks have created The LifeStraw, a straw about the size of a small clarinet that can be worn about the neck and weighs about 0.095 Kg (3.3 ounces). It'll filter 2 liters (half gallon) a day for about a year! And they only cost about $3 each.

Over a billion people in the world don't have safe drinking water! (Drinking salt water will reduce the life expectancy in half).

More info (from the FAQ):

The Future of Television

The TV industry needs to catch up with reality and the Internet (the 'net is real). They've tried a few things like elling shows on iTunes (for $1.99 an episode!) and other sites and free downloads at their websites (really it's sitting at your computer and watching).

Here's the thing, people (not me) can download it faster and cheaper from the 'net. Oh yeah, it's higher quality and there isn't any ads (but illegal). Over at MiniNova they list an approximation of downloaders (there are dozens of sites like this, some are private). Here's some numbers (and info):