All Screened Out
August 21, 2008 | 3 Comments
Technology seems to be everywhere these days and definitely permeates my life. In fact, it is so intertwined with my life that I spend almost every waking moment staring at a screen of some sort. I mean, in the morning I check email and RSS feeds while eating breakfast, then it’s off to work where I spend most of the day in front of a computer, then it’s home where time is split between the TV and MacBook — and don’t forget all the looks at the iPhone and iPod throughout the day as well. I do nothing but stare at screens. So, for fun, here’s a breakdown of my favorite screens:
iMac
This screen is a whopping 24″ and might possibly have a hand in causing me to go blind. Even at it’s lowest brightness setting it’s too bright. The good news is I can code and design like a fiend on there.
MacBook
This screen, compared to the iMac, is a tiny 13″. Unfortunately those 13″ are what I spend almost all day looking at as the MacBook is what I use in the office — and everywhere else. This one will probably cause me to go blind but not because of the brightness.
iPhone
This screen is an even smaller 3.5″. Since OS 2.0 came out I find myself staring at this screen more and more. The Twitterriffic and Facebook apps don’t really help. Oddly I don’t think this one will cause me any future blindness.
TV
This screen is a very nice 32″. If you spend any time reading this blog then you know I spend way to much time watching TV. It’s really hard not to watch it when it’s on a beautiful Aquos HDTV. Let me tell you, there is nothing like the Olympics in HD. But that’s the story for another day (probably not because that’s really all I have to say on that subject).
There you have it. The collection of my typical daily screens. It seems like the bottom line is I spend too much time in a stationary position and will more than likely drive myself blind.
Do you stare at too many screens? Let me know about them in the comments section below.
iPhone 2.0 Initial Reactions
July 11, 2008 | 0 Comments
The iPhone 3G was released today to much hype and excitement, but I have been looking forward to today for another reason: the iPhone 2.0 Software Update. It wasn’t as smooth a road as it could have been, but 2.0 is running on my phone and I’ve got to say it’s pretty awesome.
A year ago when I picked up the original iPhone it was pretty much the greatest personal computing device I’d ever laid eyes on, let alone owned. While it pretty much revolutionized the cell phone industry it had a few things that I grew to live with. The biggest flaw was that it only supported one calendar. On my computer I have iCal set up with three calendars: Home, Work, Birthdays, and Holidays. They all synced to my iPhone but were all considered to be one and the same. If I added an event to iPhone’s calendar it was added to the Home calendar. There was no way to mark it as a work event. Now, with iPhone 2.0, all calendars are supported! I mentioned this on Twitter earlier, and I’ll say it again now: the greatest feature of iPhone 2.0 is multiple calendar support. What can I say, it’s the little things that make me happy.
But there are other, more high profile features in iPhone 2.0 that excite me as well, namely the App Store. I’ve downloaded a few Apps and have found some great ones and some bad ones. Here’s what I think so far:
NetNewsWire
I use NetNewsWire on my Mac more than any other application (behind Safari and Mail). Yesterday when I found out there was an iPhone version, I had to give it a try. It only lasted about ten minutes before it was deleted. It’s got the worst UI I’ve seen, it’s not really fun to use and it makes reading feeds more or less a pain. They’ve got a long ways to go to match the desktop version’s functionality.
MLB At Bat
When Steve Jobs gave this years WWDC Keyonte and started to preview iPhone apps, there was one that caught my eye had be looking forward to it ever since. The momentous app in question was MLB At Bat. It’s a baseball fan’s dream: every game, play-by-play, and almost instantaneous highlight clips. The UI is great and the video quality is ridiculous. There are so many clips per game, it’s like having ESPN in your pocket (MLB can use that if they can get around the trademark issues). This app is top notch.
Twitterrific
The final app I’m going to look at tonight is Twitterrific. Like NetNewsWire, Twitterrific is the iPhone version of it’s desktop counterpart, but unlike NetNewsWire the iPhone version has the desktop version beat. While on my Mac I prefer using Twitter’s web interface to any of the tweet applications I’ve tried though on the iPhone I have been a fan of the web-interface Hahlo for it’s simplicity and UI. Though when the App Store launched I figured I’d give the native Twitterrific a try. Twitterrific might be the best app in the entire store. It comes in two flavors: free and premium (no ads just like the desktop version). I run the free version because the ads (from The Deck) aren’t that bad. Twitterrific (it’s really hard to type this word over and over again) has the best UI I’ve seen from an application, iPhone or otherwise, in a long time. It’s simple to use, looks great, and makes Twitter a breeze to use. Sorry to say it, but Hahlo and I are dunzo.
There you have it, my initial reactions on iPhone 2.0. There are a bunch more apps and a lot more features but these are the highlights that I thought were worth sharing. Oh, and all the screen shots were taken with the new iPhone screen shot feature (hold the home button and then hit the lock button) and then uploaded to MobileMe — the other great thing that came with iPhone 2.0 but I’ll save that for another day.
Juno Digital Copy is Blogtastic!
April 19, 2008 | 2 Comments
One of the things announced at MacWorld that excited me was Fox’s digital copy. Applications like Handbrake and Mac the Ripper have enabled people to copy DVDs to their hard drives for years. The argument for this process has always been fair use. However RIAA and the MPAA would beg to differ and have you spend money on a DVD and a digital version from a vendor like iTunes. With Fox’s announcement it became very easy and unquestionably legal to copy Fox’s movies to your hard drive. I’ve been itching to try it out since January and finally there was a Fox release that interested me enough to give it a whirl.
Once I put the disc into my computer I was greeted with a simple menu with one icon reading “Double-click to transfer movie to iTunes.” So, I double-clicked. (Note there is a little more involved process for Windows. I don’t know what it is, but I’ll call it the Windows Penalty.) After double-clicking iTunes opened and read the dick and pulled up the code entry page. I typed in the code, as found in the DVD case, and iTunes communicated with some distant server and agreed that it was OK for me to have the digital copy. After that it was on like donkey kong.
I was presented with this “Thank You” screen. It’s a very similar screen to the one shown when you purchase a movie from iTunes. I thought it odd it said my movie was now downloading considering it was really just being copied from the DVD. Note the recommendations in the image. Their all great movies, except for Kissing Jessica Stein which I’ve never heard of.
It took about four minutes to transfer the roughly 1 GB file from the DVD. Again, interestingly enough, while it was transferring the movie was considered a ‘download’ by iTunes. Once fully transfered, Juno appeared in the ‘Movies’ tab of iTunes, as well as the ‘New Stuff’ playlist.
At native size the quality of the picture is quite impressive. It was solid at full screen on the 24″ iMac, though the DVD version would be preferable if watching on a screen that large. On both the iPhone and a 5.5 gen iPod the picture is clear. Pictures of all the different versions are included below for your viewing pleasure.
Overall the process was extremely easy and produced some pretty quality results. The Digital Copy version of Juno was $2 more than the Standard Edition, but it also came with swanky Dancing Elk High School t-shirt. It’d be nice if more studios got on board with the Digital Copy and finally put the fair use debate to rest.
Native Resolution
AT&T is My Friend
April 14, 2008 | 0 Comments
Over the last few months my text messaging activity has been increasing. Being a youth minister, text messaging is a primary method of communication with students. It’s also very expensive when you double your text messaging allotment for the month.
That’s right, I almost hit the 400 text mark for the month of March. Since the AT&T iPhone plan is some special plan (even though it’s really just an unlimited data plan with a fancy iPhone name) you can’t make changes to it through the online account system — I couldn’t even find out how much the text messaging levels were for iPhone plans. So today I called the handy 611 line to talk to customer service.
The girl (she sounded young and bubbly but was more than likely a 56 year old Indian man given corporate call center locations) told me that my current iPhone plan, at $20 a month, allows 200 text messages and that the next step up is the $30 iPhone plan which comes with 1500 text messages a month. Seems like a huge jump, going from 200 to 1500, but I figured it was better than paying the $20 in overage charges so she upped my plan. Then she did something completely unexpected.
Before I go on, let me say that I find it rather odd, given my almost decade-long relationship with BellSouth Cingular AT&T Wireless, that it’s reputation among gadget blogs and the greater internet population is a negative one. Gizmodo doesn’t run an AT&T story without some reference to the “evil empire” or the AT&T Deathstar. I’ve had nothing but good experiences with AT&T over the years and the girl in the call center somewhere over the rainbow was about to reaffirm that.
She waived my overage charges citing a “Customer Credit” because of my long and good-standing relationship with the company. My monthly bill closed yesterday and hadn’t officially posted yet, so she said she’d call back next week to confirm the credit and wave any additional charges. So instead of paying an additional $20+ this month I’ll instead pay an additional $10 a month for the rest of my life and in turn, text the hell out of my phone. So if you know me, look out, cause there will be texts.
But I digress. It’s not every day that a big corporation does something nice that they really don’t have to do without even being asked. So, long story short, AT&T is my friend.
Sliming Down the Newsreader
April 11, 2008 | 0 Comments
In the ongoing attempt to encourage more creativity in my life I took a few minutes to slim down NetNewsWire yesterday. Dropping the subscription count from an impossible to keep up with 73 feeds down to a very manageable 33 has actually given me a chance to read the stuff in them. Imagine that? Reading more witty writing will encourage me to write more of my own thus circulating those creative juices.
The 33 feeds that I remain subscribed to are an eclectic mix of news, sports, Apple related, and entertainment sites plus a few personal blogs to keep things spicy. A few of my favorite feeds come are:
- Daring Fireball, John Gruber’s slim-lined Apple and related technology blog
- Life Hacker, which has all kinds of tips on how to, well, hack your life
- TED Talks, which is filled with inspiring people talking about inspiring things
While reading through the feeds earlier this evening I stumbled across Macenstein’s latest “Celebrity Mac Chick” sighting which featured High School Musical star, Vanessa Hudgens using an iPhone. While she may be a big (if you can call the Disney Channel big) movie star, I’m pretty sure that Steve Jobs did not intend for people to use an iPhone while holding a teddy bear. There’s something just not quite right about the whole thing.
Happy Friday