Yearly Archives: 2005

English was never any fun for me. I didn’t mind the writing, but I despised the reading. Reading was my kryptonite, Delilah, and the thorn in my paw. How did I ever survive you ask? I skipped pages. When reading “East of Eden” or “The Lord of the Flies” I would read one full page, then skip one full page. I ended up reading ½ as much, but I don’t think I really missed ½ of the book. I never got A’s in English class either.

Motorola has one-upped my cut-the-bs reading technique with their ‘emails abridged’ idea. This technology cuts out small sentences and frivolous phrases thus giving you only the most vital of information while reading emails on your handset. It can be programmed to keep or delete certain preference list words and phrases as well. I’m sure there’s some holes you may see in this feature, but then again, I did pass English class.

Phones cost money. A ‘good’ phone isn’t cheap. But are we using all that we pay for? Executive Vice President of T-Mobile, David Hytha was interviewed by EE Times, and he says “We are choking on technology”.

Right away I think about my current phone, the T-Mobile Sidekick II, and wish that it had more features. I want Bluetooth, an SD expansion slot, more downloadable ringtones, changeable wall paper, more 3rd party applications, a video player, better camera, WiFi, and my list just keeps on going. So What the heck is Hytha talking about when he says choking on technology? I’m in a desert and technology is my rationed water supply.

Then I give it a second thought, and recall a conversation I had one week ago with my father. He is upgrading his Sprint phone (which is about as old as me), and asks me which models to look at. “I just want a phone that can hold a charge, has big buttons, a screen that I can read, and speaker phone”, he says. I think to myself, if my father were locked somewhere and had my phone, he’d die of starvation before figuring out how to dial 911. Maybe David Hytha is right? Too much technology for the normal human being may be similar to too much clothes shopping for the tech geek.

I never liked history classes. Learning about dead guys who talked funny and looked even funnier was just not up my alley. As time moves forward, history is written. In what feels like the blink of an eye I’ve gone from emailing friends with dialup modems, to attaching pictures to an email with my phone –while holding 3 separate instant message chats. The last ten years there has been quite a bit of writing (still sticking with my history metaphor) for the internet. CNN looks at the last ten years, and gives us a pretty cool lesson in history. And I thought that history would always bore me.

Google has released a free version of Google Earth. If you have a broadband connection and a new enough Windows box running 2000 or XP (they warn off desktops older than four years and laptops older than two), it is worth checking out.

It kind of reminds me of space-age, Hollywood depictions of screen views that heretofore have looked nothing like a real ‘puter. Look, Ma, I’m flying.

Great way to while away some time I shouldn’t be in the office.

A UK study shows that acne helps your heart
, and kids with acne are less likey to die from coronary heart disease later on in life. I’m going to do some of that ‘reading in-between the lines’ that my high school English teacher always yapped about. Us pimple-faced geeks overclocked our CPUs, and talked about the newest video games in our spare time. While the popular kids spent their weekends drinking, smoking, and having sex with girls that wouldn’t even talk to us lowlife late bloomers. Having acne was a default prerequisite for being a geek, taped glasses and a goofy laugh were secondary. My hypothesis is simple: everyone loves the sweet taste of revenge. I’m starting an investigative study to prove that zit-faced geeks somehow contracted coronary heart disease to those who had it made in high school. Heck, if someone in the UK funded the “Acne Helps Prevent Heart Disease” research, then I’m a shoe in with “Geeks Planted Heart Disease in Popular High School Kids”.

My youthful memories are filled with phrases like “just sit still”, and “do you want me to turn this car around and go home?” I wasn’t an attention starved child, but I was easily bored and in constant need of mental stimulation. Car trips, plane rides, waiting rooms, and every other place that parents insist on taking children were my childhood nemesis. If only I could have had Sesame Street on the go… Well kids today have that option, I mean parents have that option. Verizon has seen a much larger usage than expected in the ‘babysitting programming”, and there’s no mystery why that is. Heck, if I was stuck in line I’d rather watch Sesame Street than look at the back of someone’s head.

The not-so-popular Ogo has been laid to rest. This product never really had a chance if you ask me. A phone that doesn’t make phone calls, who would buy such a thing? I have to give Cingular and AT&T credit for trying. $100.00 for the device and then $18.00 per month to have emails and instant messaging was definitely affordable. But for a couple of bucks more they could have incorporated a phone and actually sold some of the devices. Personally I’m a big T-Mobile Sidekick fan, and I see this as being a Sidekick that can’t make calls. The option to use a Sidekick for data (no phone calls) only is available, but all of the 20ish people I know who have sidekicks use it as their mobile phone. Farewell Floppy Ogo, come back someday with voice features and a cooler name, you just may make it in this cut throat wireless market.

iPods are in. They have been in, and will be in. I went to the bookstore with a friend, she wanted an HTML for dummies type book. We found two books on HTML and seven books on iPods. This means that people are buying them, and if people are buying them that also implies that people are selling them. The simple way to buy one is by going to the Apple store (either online or physical), but you’re going to pay top dollar. So smartmoney.com did their homework and reports back the cheapest iPod sales they could find. If you’re thinking about jumping on the wagon (and it’s a nice big wagon at that) then look at this before hitting www.apple.com.

I don’t know anyone who doesn’t like music. I’m not assuming such humans don’t exist, but I am claiming they are a rare breed. For the rest of us music loving people, there are some decisions being made in the near future that just may change our music influenced lives: The MGM vs Grokster case.

For those of you who have never seen a movie, can’t make it out to Las Vegas when your buddies plan a trip, don’t pay attention to that roaring lion before Tom and Jerry episodes or just live under a really big rock, MGM is Metro Goldywn Mayer. Grokster does not have their own Vegas casino, however Kazaa and Morpheus are very closely tied in with Grokster, and those two other names may start ringing some bells. These three p2p (peer to peer) filesharing programs utilize the same network.

MGM is unhappy that people are able to download content created by MGM via these networks. They don’t make money when people download their expensively made media for free, so what do we do here in America, settle this in the court room.

This reminds us of the 1984 trial now referred to as Betamax, Sony Corp. of America vs. Universal City Studios, Inc. Allow me to water this down for you. The movie makers feared that with VCRs, people would halt all spending on the movies that they normally were going to theatres to view, and the fall of the movie industry was upon the world. Being alive today we know this didn’t happen. Home movies have been a huge money maker for the movie industry.

Why am I mixing movies and music? Are they different? Isn’t this court case about music and the internet, where did movies and video cassettes come into view? Continue reading →

Wine. The nectar of the gods. At least, it tastes that way until it turns to vinegar and piss.

What’s amazing about living digitally is that sometimes it applies to more than your laptop or how you listen to MP3s. Here is a story I looked into about how scientists at U.C. Davis took MRI technology and learned to test the contents of a wine bottle without opening it.

Gates probably has a few expensive bottles which have been in storage since he made his first million. Twenty years latter this might be the only technology saving him and Jobs from tasting sour grapes.

I loved Transformers. My friend down the street had each and every Transformer known to man in the spare bedroom that his family deemed “the toy room”. I used to go over and we’d play Transformers all the time. He had the Constructacons, and that allowed me to bust out my favorite Dynobot, Grimlock.

Today I have found Grimlock on steroids, Roboraptor. This dinosaur is toy is great, but it’s not available in the United States. I feel that this is a recurring theme with me. All that is cool and fun does not come to the USA. Could it be that manufacturers hear “the land of the free” and assume that their products have to be sold at no cost due to our most famous song lyric found the National Anthem? Regardless, I want to time travel back to childhood and bring Roboraptor back to help me and Grimlock battle the evil Constructacons.