Pinpoint Accurate Photos

We recently took a vacation to Alaska. One of the greatest things about it was that 5 of us on the trip had digital cameras, and we used them. In all we gathered nearly 2000 still images that do a fantastic job of capturing the beauty of the terrain and the fun we had. The problem lies in making sense of all of those photos.

Writing code for a living, I'm well aware of "garbage in - garbage out". Unfortunately, this concept applies to far more than computer software. Of those 5 cameras firing off images for over a week, only 2 of them had proper dates set in them, and none of them were adjusted to the local time zone. So what? Well, now that I have the power of iPhoto's Smart Albums, I want to be able to sort the pictures by location, and without useful geocoding of those images (we'll talk more about that later), I'd like to rely on the timestamp and my own knowledge of where we were on that day to sort out the pictures. Since I now have a few hundred pictures that think they were captured in 2047, I'm going to have to figure out the power of Automator to fix that metadata. So my first wish for more accurate picture taking is cameras that can auto-set their own date and time.

Next up, location, location, location. By no means is this an original idea, but I want GPS enabled cameras! Built in is great. Bluetooth enabled cameras so that I can use an external Bluetooth GPS is fantastic too. I'd even be happy with a manual setting on the camera where I could pull up a map and point to where I was. That location would then be assigned to the photos. The software could have a setting of "Expire location after 1 day" to prevent false location data for pictures you'd take later.

We're starting to see products that do this. Ricoh has a GPS ready camera, and Mappr! is the start of just what I'm wanting.

My second wish for more accurate picture taking is location based Smart Albums in iPhoto. These would be both assignable, and searchable in iPhoto. To assign, you could select a group of photos and choose "Assign Location". Hopefully that would bring up a selection of methods for assigning location including an Atlas, Google Maps, whatever. You'd also be able to browse based on the location. Certainly Apple could create some slick panning map that would zoom photos up as you passed over the location. They could also make Spotlight smart enough to translate location names in to geocoded locations. That way, I can search for "Chicago" and get pictures of a Cubs game without having to tag the photos manually.

I don't know about the rest of you, but iLife was one of the major draws to get me away from Windows. If Apple continues to step it up and deliver features like these, I see even more switchers.

Deets

Moving contacts from Oulook under Windows to Address Book under OS X can be a pain until you figure out the easy way to do it.

I tried exporting to a .pst and importing that in Address Book. It didn't like that. I tried exporting to tab delimited and comma seperated. Outlook complained it needed to install a translator and then wanted the CDs. Forget that. I'm not digging those out. Finally, I found the way. Forward as vCard. Why Outlook doesn't offer vCard as an export type, I have no idea.

Anyway, just open your contacts in Outlook. Select all and then click Actions->Forward as vCard. Send that email to something you can retrieve on your Mac. Get the email on the Mac. Save the attachments out and then drag them from the Finder in to the Address Book. Bang, done, and you even have your contacts as vCards that can be easily backed up.

Hike and Float

Ben has been on me to post some pictures from my trip to Alaska. Well, here you go...






This is a picture of the Chilkoot Trail. We only went a few miles on it, but I'd love to go back and hike the whole thing. The Chilkoot Trail has quite the history behind it. This was the trail the gold seekers had to travel and Canada required 2000 pounds of food and gear per person that they could survive on. As 100 pounds is a lot to carry, most of the rushers had to hike the trail both ways, carrying near 100 pounds, at least 20 times. Ouch.

We took the hike and float tour with Skagway Float Tours. These guys were fantastic. I highly recommend them. The guides knew their stuff and were a lot of fun to talk with.

So who wants to go back and hike this with me? If you're driving, I call shotgun.

New Evil Nine on iTMS

I just got an email from Apple letting me know that two new Evil Nine tracks are now up on iTMS. Downloading now. That is all.

Like a Sound You Hear That Lingers In Your Ear

California Soul

I've been absolutely intoxicated by this song over the last few days. I first heard it in Product Placement, an amazing live mix of soul, jazz, hip hop, and funk by DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist. It's actually a combo CD and DVD and in the DVD, they have images of the 45's they are playing spin across the screen. I latched on to California Soul and then began the hunt to find out more.

My journey has taken me to many corners of the web (thanks Google). Here's what I know. It seems that California Soul was originally recorded by The 5th Dimension in 1968. If I'm wrong on that, please tell me.

I also found that 2 versions of it are used in Product Placement. First is a version by the Gerald Wilson Orchestra. This is followed by a version recorded by The Messengers.

Finally, I picked up a copy of a live recording by the daKAH Hip Hop Orchestra on iTMS. Great stuff. It's quite worth the dollar.

Watch the Movie, Take Home the Soundtrack

How many times have you walked out of the theater at the end of a movie thinking "Wow, that had some good music. I should buy the soundtrack and/or score."? I know I've personally done it many times.

Wouldn't it be cool (and highly profitable) for the movie theater to have a CD vending machine in the lobby filled with the soundtracks of the films it is showing? You could even stick the crappy, we made it in a week, companion video game in there. Don't tell me there isn't room for it. Kick out that beat up Mortal Combat game and get with it.

Sell the soundtracks at $10 each and you'll make a fortune. Why collect quarters, when you can collect 10 spots?

What Color Is This?

Links to this color blind test seem to come up in discussions every now and then. I am colorblind with a few colors (you already knew that), so the site is of particular interest to me. If you haven't been there, go check it out. If you are wondering, yes, other than the first one, all of the red-green tests are spots to me. If I know what I'm supposed to see and I stare at it long enough, I can make out the hidden number.

Now to add something here, let's talk about the real world and colorblindness. As stated on that page, 12-20% of males are colorblind. 1 in 5! That's a lot of people. Why don't product designers take that in to consideration when they design their latest gadget? Nearly everything with a battery uses green for good battery and red for bad. Yep, that's all but useless to me. Working in the color amber doesn't make it much better. My simple request, use seperate LEDs or add a blink pattern so those that can't make out the colors can still make sense of your product. Green should be a slow pulse of green. If you've seen the power LED on a sleeping mac, you know what I mean by pulsing. Red should be a sharp, quick, blink.

Next time - how the hell do I get my clothes to match?

Recent Music Purchases

Everyone seems to be in a music talking mood lately, so let me join in with thoughts on my recently obtained tunes.


Moby - Raining Again
Typical Moby single. Halfway decent title track. A lame B-side. Remixes from hot producers.

I picked this up for two reasons. One, I'm a Moby collector (although I'm steadily losing interest), and two, it includes a freakin' Evil Nine remix! I like the Evil Nine remix. Not their best work, but well worth it.


DJ Nu-Mark and Pomo - Blend Crafters
Yow, this is some good stuff. If you like instrumental hip hop with some funk flavor, you gotta check this out. DJ Nu-Mark is the DJ for Jurrasic 5. If you haven't heard of Jurassic 5, please bring some cookies and milk to my house and we'll have a listening party.


The Chemical Brothers - Galvanize
Power, grace, style. That's all that needs to be said.

This track rocketed to the top of my iTunes most played list. You gotta love Q-Tip on the vocals. In case you care, the iTMS version is different from the album version. The single version is also different from the album version with the single version being the longest and quite DJ friendly.


Lyrics Born - Same !@#$, Different Day
A very strong remix album. This is the follow up to Later That Day.... There are some tremendous remixes on here. It's tough to capture the same panache when creating a remix album. This is one of the rare few that do. If you like lyrical hip hop with beats that make you grin, give this a spin. Also be sure to check out the Stereo MCs remix. They can still drop a groove.

Switch!

It has begun. It seems like it has been forever but I finally have my own Mac. I first decided that my next computer was going to be from Apple nearly 2 years ago. I really didn't need a new computer at the time, so that idea was put on the back burner. My enthusiasm was resparked when I got an iBook at work to do some testing. I fell in love with the thing and knew that it was time for Windows to go bye-bye at home.

That began "the wait". I knew Tiger was coming and I knew I wanted it. I didn't want to buy anything until Tiger released because I didn't want to pay for Tiger and I didn't want to deal with upgrading, no matter how easy it was going to be. I waited a loooonnnngg time for Tiger to release and by that time I was going to be away from home for most of the month of May and with WWDC coming in June, I figured I better wait just a bit more. WWDC came and went with no new hardware, so I stuck to the original plan of getting a Mac mini. I'd been hoping for a G5 Powerbook, but I knew the chances of that were slim.

I chose to build up my Mac mini a bit. WiFi (cough AirPort) and Bluetooth were a must for my needs, and I didn't have any USB keyboards or mice, so I went with the Apple Bluetooth stuff. These items greatly increased the cost (relatively), but it was still far cheaper than any new PC I've ever bought. BTO added 8 days to the ship time. During that time, rumors swirled that the Mac mini might get an update this past Tuesday. As mine was scheduled to ship on Tuesday, I was nervous that I would miss out on the new stuff, and excited at the same time, thinking I might have hit the cycle just perfect and I'd get a fresh one with the latest goodies. Well, they didn't up them, so I got what I originally ordered, and that's just fine.

I've spent tonight copying files off of my old Dell and getting things setup on the Mini. I'm typing this on the mini right now, using my Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, which worked cold out of the box. Neither a USB keyboard nor a mouse touched the mini. That's kick ass user experience. My gigantic iTunes library copied over perfectly, preserving all of my treasured play counts. Even my Casio camera, which does not work with XPs Photo management, hooked right up with iPhoto and pulled in my recent vacation photos.

I also signed up for my trial of .Mac. That was the most confusing thing so far, but obviously I figured it out because the image in this post is hosted there.

There is so much more to explore, but that'll have to wait until another night.

Apple, having used your gear before, I had high expectations for my Mac mini. So far you've met or exceeded every expectation.

My name is Ryan, and I'm a Software Engineer.

I Think We've Met Before

So what kind of fan would I be if I didn't mention the rerelease of my favorite album of all time. Dj Shadow's Entroducing... has been rereleased in a 2xCD deluxe edition.

Me, I love it, but I fear that there isn't a whole lot in the deluxe edition for those new to Dj Shadow. There are a couple of remixes that may be of interest, but most of the extras are demos and slightly different versions of the original album tracks. The price will also keep most newcomers away. At $24 or more, it is lots more than many other 2xCD releases in your local record shop. If you are intimately familiar with the album, the bonus CD is an intriguing look in to the creation of the album and the time following its release. I enjoyed it but I gurantee I'll listen to the album 20 times for every one time I listen to the extras CD.

Without Me

Has it felt empty in here? Yeah, it's been awhile since I posted. Well, to get back in the swing of things, I thought I'd share a story from my recent cruise vacation.

We were at sea one day and saw they were having a martini demonstration. I like martinis (I drank way too many of them on the cruise) so we decided to go. We get there and they have a setup of bottles, glasses, and...a boom box. Ok, sure. Let's see where this goes.

The first demo starts and it turns out to be typical Cocktail style bottle tossing and goofy dancing. As the one guy starts tossing bottles, another fumbles with the boom box. Next thing we know, Eminem's - "Without Me" is blasting. I think to myself, that's odd. The track continues on and I realize it is not the radio edit. That boy is swearing. Now I don't care, but half the people in the room are over the age of 60. We hit the part of the song where Em decides to put his "bum on your lips" and then changes his mind and gets a little more graphic. If you know the song lyrics, I'm sure you are laughing and singing along at this point. I see a few horrified looks in the crowd and can't contain myself. I'm LMFAO!

So I regain my composure and we move on to the next drink. The woman that is hosting isn't a native english speaker. She's having a rough time with it. She starts to talk about the next drink which is a chocolate martini. This martini includes melted chocolate drizzled on the sides of the glass. She proceeds to tell us that you can write things with the chocolate. Things like "I love you honey, I love you Dan, I love your Dick." Yup, she said it. Loud and clear. At this point many of the 60 somethings are laughing with me. The host gets a confused look on her face and can't figure out what is so funny.

I didn't know it was going to be that kind of cruise :)

Lateral Stability Fluid

I love movies and I love Netflix. I love Netflix because it allows me to see movies I wouldn't normally see. I've watched plenty of stinkers, but you only need to find one good one to make up for a whole handful of bad ones.

I just got done watching Equilibrium. Now, if you don't like Sci-Fi movies, then quit reading right now. This movie floored me. Remember the first time you saw "bullet time" in The Matrix? Yeah, I felt like that. It's obvious the movie didn't have a huge budget, but they did a fantastic job with what they had. The fight scenes in many of these sci-fi fighter movies grow tiresome and make me want to join the fight just so I can get my ass knocked out. The fight scenes in Equilibrium left me mesmorized. There is even a fight that is all about not being able to fire a gun at a guy. Think Jackie Chan, but without the bad jokes, and with big, big, guns. I enjoyed. I enjoyed.

Ohh, I nearly forgot, I dug the plot too. I found myself pondering the world on display in the film. I definitely would be part of the underground and I bet you would be too.

Give this film a shot, it deserves it.

Z-Trip Link

The Z-Trip album is growing on me. I plan to use a track in my next mix which should be a fun one. I promised you a live set from Z-Trip long ago. I was just over at the official site and was surprised to find a link to Old Mixes. I haven't finished downloading anything from there yet, so maybe it is all whale noises or something, but if you want to hear some live Z-Trip, you might give it a shot.

The Night Speaks To Me

I was in Las Vegas last week and had a great time. One night stuck out more than the rest. I won't say it was the best night, but it certainly was the most surreal.

Things started with a visit to friend's room in THEhotel. Wow, what a nice place. Widescreen TVs on the wall, barware, a DVD player, and nice artwork. I really wished I had stayed there instead of the regular Mandalay Bay hotel.

From there we went on to Red Square, a resturant with a Russian/Soviet Union theme, and a large selection of vodkas. The martinis here were good. If you want a spectacle, order a Chernobyl and watch them mix it. We had a Russian speaker with us, so it was nice to get the translation of things written on the walls and menus. Oddly enough, he skipped out on the pre-dinner drinks because he couldn't resist the siren song of the nickle slot machines (lol).

The surrealness began when we sat down to dinner. I began to hear very familiar music building in the background. As they turned the music up a bit, I was able to confirm that it was indeed DJ Shadow - Building Steam With a Grain of Salt. Wow, I thought. I'm liking this place even more. If you've been following along, you'll remember that I named this DJ Shadow album in my top ten of all time. I offered anyone at the table $5 in the could name who was playing. I'm pretty annoying with that game. I'm not sure why, I just do it.

After Building finishes, I hear another DJ Shadow track, The Number Song, come in. Wow, I'm really liking this place now. The vodka is setting in, I'm with friends, and my favorite music is playing. Again, I offer up the $5, and no one thinks to guess the artist that I told them the last time. No winners yet.

The third song is again DJ Shadow. I'm getting the hint that they are just playing most of the album now. No complaints from me. I again offer up the $5 prize and no one wins. I guess my friends are slow learners. The DJ Shadow experience continues for the next hour as we dine on traditional Russian dishes and put back a few flights of vodka.

After spinning about the town for the rest of the night, I returned to my hotel room and decided to check the weather for the next day. Of course, the only proper way to end the night was by hearing an old ambient Moby track playing behind the forecasts of sun. Moby is also on the top ten list and is my most collected artist. The night had spoken, and I listened. Thank you Las Vegas.

More Apple Gushing

So last week I was pissed off at my iPod. I thought it was dying. It wouldn't sync for crap with my XP box. It would BSOD the Dell. The iPod would lockup and I'd have to warm boot the iPod. I warm booted that thing more in two days last week than I have in the entire time I've had it.

I got fed up enough to decide I needed to attempt the dreaded "restore to factory defaults". I couldn't get the XP box to live long enough to do it, so I used my iBook from work. Everything went great. I was feeling better. I hooked it back up to my Dell to sync to my library and "blah blah blah, I need to make this work with Windows, shall I do that?" came up. Sure, whateva. Go for it you hunk of crap. So, it did, but of course it restored to an older version than what is current because Apple doesn't software update the installer to PCs, only Macs. So after it finished that, I had to go download the current installer and do it again.

It was finally latest and greatest and Windows flavored and it still took a dump when I connected it. WTF? I disabled iTunes enough that I could mount the iPod and run scan disk on it, even though Apple says don't do that. Scan disk found nothing. Then I checked iPodlounge and found the disk check secret handshake. It ran and said everything was fine.

So, last ditch effort, I decide to load music in to my iBook and sync from there. Guess what? It worked perfectly. Yeah, no problems at all. Once I drained the moron juice from my head I remembered that you can turn off the "Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library". Even better, now I can sync through the iBook without filling the drive.

But then, I found the ultimate. Did you know that you can just drag files from wherever onto your iPod icon in iTunes and it loads them up? No need for them to be in the iTunes library. It will happily copy them on to the iPod and leave the library out of it. Maybe you knew that, I didn't. So, I still need the iBook, but only as a "drag between" my external Firewire drive and my iPod, my lovely iPod.

Installing - Are you sure?

This is the poster child for bad app design. I can't blame it all on Firefox, most installers look like this. As a software engineer, I'm ashamed. Why do we need to tell the user 4 times that we are installing? Surely some of those other status areas could say something more useful, or not be there at all?

Even better, if what we are doing is called installing, why did I run Firefox Setup? Sure, someone will jump in with why setup includes installing, but to the I-just-want-to-use-it user, it's all pretty confusing.

While I'm picking on Firefox 1.03, why, as I sit in the Blogger editor, is the status circle continuing to spin and the status bar still says "Transferring data from www.blogger.com..."? IE doesn't say that. Safari doesn't say that. Firefox, take note, the page has loaded.

Don't get me wrong. I like Firefox, and I'm glad that folks spent time writing software to give to my whiny ass.

A Google Loop

Google is building an empire. It may not be an evil empire, but it is an empire none the less. Google has tremendous services and is slowly evolving from a search technology, to a provider of data. This data is coming in maps, answers, blog content, and whatever else they announced today. Sooner or later, they are going to weld all of their services together. This blog entry is an observation of one of those possible Google solutions, or what I'll call, a Google Loop.

My Google Loop involves digital photos. I love my digital camera. I love that I can shoot as many images as I have MBs and battery to allow. I love that I can make backups of those photos. I love that I can edit those photos easily. I love that I don't have to pay for developing costs. I love that my ReplayTV will use them as a screensaver.

As great as all of those things are, we haven't even scratched the surface of what we can do with these digital photos. For one, I can't wait to get a Mac so I can play with the photo books in iPhoto. But, that's still just a pretty presentation of the pictures. We need to go beyond looking at the pictures and add further context to them. Where were they taken? When were they taken? How are they different from photos that other people took at that same place, but perhaps at a different time?

They key to all of this is metadata. Without metadata, the picture's true value could be locked in the heads of the people who were there.



1. We'll start our Google Loop by importing some pictures we took at Yellowstone Nation Park in to Picasa. Now ideally, the picture already contains GPS location data inserted by the camera, but those cameras are still rare, so let's say that Picasa allows us to assign location data to that picture.

2. I never have enough disk space, and Google is nice enough to give me 2 gigs and counting in Gmail. Let's say that Google lets me use that Gmail disk to save Picasa pictures. Thanks Google!

3. I have a blog (duh, you are reading it) and on occasion, I'll put up a picture. I'm lucky enough to have server space to host those images, but most people don't. Let's say that Google allows me to link in to those saved images in my Gmail disk. Thanks Google, you're the greatest!

4. I blog about my great vacation to Yellowstone. Pictures are included and, what's this? You can click my pictures and pull up a Google Map or satellite data of the location? Very nice. Hey look, there are even "pinned" locations on the satellite view that are clickable to see my other pictures. The world is good.

5. AdSense does it's thing to the right of my blog. I see that there are tour packages available for Yellowstone. Hmmm, I'll have to check those out next time, and maybe even stay in "super-duper-fantastic hotel" that says they will give me a great rate. My friends read my blog and think Yellowstone looks like a cool place. They make use of the AdSense and book a trip. Now sure, this is possible today with AdSense, but the only reason they stuck around was all of the cool photos that I was able to host for free and nifty maps that let them do a little armchair exploring of their own.

6. OG (that's original Google) makes note of all of this and returns search results of my blog and my images when people are looking for Yellowstone.

7. Desktop search is right there too. From my Google deskbar, I type Yellowstone when I want to be reminded of that great trip and Google Desktop gives me my original images, my blog entry, and the same maps that I was able to show other people. Google, I love you.


What do I get from this Google Loop?

* Incredible usability of my pictures
* Internet hosted storege for sharing my pictures
* A one company, integrated solution
* Related information that I might find useful

What does Google get?

* A happy customer
* User profile data on me that they can use to sell me things
* Chance to serve ads to me in GMail, Google Maps, and Google Desktop
* My images in their Google Images cache which lets them show ads to others

Certainly Google isn't the only one capable of this sort of thing. Apple has a huge buzz going around Spotlight right now. I'm eager to make use of it too.

I'm really surprised that Apple isn't doing something like this. They have iPhoto and .Mac for image hosting. Add in Spotlight and things are starting to cook. What they don't have over Google is blogging, map data, and a way for them and I to make extra money just for using all of this software. Maybe that's good though. Apple gets to sell me hardware and software and I don't have to deal with ads anywhere.

In closing, this is just one loop. I'm sure you can think of others, and I'm sure you could access these services in a different loop order. That's the power of cooperative services and metadata.

Thinkback - Slices and Goofy Plastic Boxes

So Slashdot has Slashback. That's where they revisit a previously posted subject. I'll copy that theme and present Thinkback.

Today's Thinkback takes a look at some recently released Mac mini slices, and a USB hub that is not a goofy plastic box.

So, I still don't completely have what I want, but MicroNet and Macpower have brought forth some nice offerings. The Macpower slice appears to be slightly vaporware. The Micronet slice is at least orderable. I like that I can put my own drive in the Macpower slice, but I like even more that the MicroNet slice will come with a drive that it *knows* will not require an extra fan. Neither of them have front mounted ports or card readers though, so I'll hold off a little longer.

Belkin brings us a 4 port hub that is different than the regular lot. It's claim to fame is a top load USB slot that apparently is meant for iPod shuffles, but I'll get one and use it for generic flash drives and frequently attached/disconnected test tools. I can't help but notice that with the right object sticking up, this will look like an Atari joystick. Hey, there's an idea. Give me a USB hub that looks like an Atari joystick with a matching cylindrical flash drive!

Free Hip Hop

Today is just a few links to some music that you might enjoy. These links all came from my search for the setlist from DJ Z-Trip's Live at Uprock in Austin TX show. I haven't found the setlist yet, but I did find some fun stuff along the way.

What do you get when you combine DJ Shadow and Boyz II Men? Well, you get DJ Erb - Goodbye, of course.
[Edit: This was cool the first time. It was interesting the second time. I'm over it now.]
I'm going to have to explore DJ Erb some more. He has quite a few rock influenced hip hop sets for purchase. I downloaded his remix of Lyrics Born as well. Don't forget, Lyrics Born has a new CD coming out on Tuesday.

Over at Solesides, there is a page for Nostalgia Progression. You can grab their track Stepping Stone. I'm digging it. I'll bring Lyrics Born in one more time and recommend that you grab RL Burnside feat. Lyrics Born - Going Down South off of the Solesides main page.

All that and you didn't have to spend a dime.

Do You Crokinole?

Last weekend I visited my buddy who lives in Milwaukee. He introduced me to a 1800s Canadian game called Crokinole. It is played on a wooden board using pieces that look like checkers. You flick the discs at scoring areas and each other, much like shuffleboard, which I also enjoy.

I had a lot of fun playing and started looking more in to the game when I returned home. I checked out the site that my buddy bought his board from and even took a spin through eBay. At eBay, I saw a combo Carrom/Crokinole board that awakened my memories. I thought to myself "That looks just like a board my parents had when I was a kid." I called my parents up and arranged to take a look at the board the next day. I tried explaining what a Crokinole board looked like, but they didn't much care. "Just come look at it" was the response I got :)


Well, I went and looked, and sure enough, it was a Crokinole board. This thing has to be nearly 30 years old. Amazing how things come full circle huh? Boy, the game probably would have been more fun as a kid if we knew how to play it. My parents let me have the board, which was quite nice of them, especially since I probably would have shelled out the cash to buy one over the web. There was one peg broken off, but I spent some time in the garage and came up with something that seems to do the trick.
I still need some decent pieces though. We've been playing with Othello discs, which aren't quite regulation :)

I'm hoping the Crokinole board will be a big hit at our next Poker party. It should be a fun side game for the people that get knocked out.

Take a Trip - Cheap, New, Music

Best Buy's $6.99 CD this week is Shifting Gears by DJ Z-Trip. This should be a great album. The album includes collaborations with Jurassic 5, Chester Bennington from Linkin Park, and even Public Enemy. You can hear some samples here and over at Amazon.

I was first exposed to Z-Trip from reading the Denon boards. He does some incredible live sets. I'll have to dig up a link to one of those. Some of his tracks sound a bit like my favorite artist, DJ Shadow. Z-Trip even did some remixing for Shadow on the Mashin' ON the Motorway single.

I'll be at Best Buy on Tuesday, how about you?

Shack Up Your Mac

Hey, one of my predictions came true. I'm not Nostradamus, I just put in writing what I'm sure many people were thinking. A couple of weeks ago, I said "The Mac mini is begging for a USB hub and card reader that matches it." Well, The Plasticsmith made it happen. They now have the Mac mini shack.

The shack is a little ol' place where your USB peripherals can get together. There's no card reader (yet), but there are 7 USB ports. These guys are progressing from the silly Mac mini skirt, but I hope they don't quit with this hub. 7 USB ports is cool, but where's the FireWire? Where are the card readers? Surely they can cram some more good stuff in there.


You know I can't pass up a good 'shop opportunity, so I did a quick mock up for what I think the Mac mini Shack should be. First, it needs ports on the front and back. The front ones are for connecting your friend's camera, an iPod shuffle, or maybe a portable hard drive. The back ones are for your permanent Mac mini peripherals. I also added two flash card readers. The scale in the drawing is bad, but the idea is one SD slot and one CF slot. You get the idea. Plasticsmith is selling a do-it-yourself shack, so I just might have to see what "guts" I could buy to make this happen. If this thing did exist, I'd buy two. One for the mini and one for work, to use with my Dell. This would not be a goofy plastic box because it has some design to it, it would have some weight, and it would give me the front and back ports and cable management like I want.

Keep at it Plasticsmith. You are real close to getting some of my money.

Live, Location Enhanced, Data

It is amazing how the value of information increases by orders of magnitude when presented in a familiar context.

Google Maps + Craig's List = Home Buyer's Dream

Polish the Apple

Just some Apple linkage today. While we wait for Tiger to ship, you might be interested to look at Apple's latest facts and figures. I wonder if we realize the history that is being made here. All signs seem to point to "grow" for Apple right now. I bet we'll see 1st gen iPods in museums in 100 years.

Death to goofy plastic boxes

At work, I have to use quite a few USB devices and I also use CF and SD flash cards. Currently, I use some silly card readers from SanDisk that have cords that are way too long and they take up way too much space. I also have a USB hub that doesn't space the ports apart far enough to actually use them all and it is poorly designed for me since all of the ports are on the back. I got tired of my setup at work and decided to find something better.

All I found was a wasteland of flimsy, ugly, me-too plastic boxes. It seems that most USB hubs these days all include the following design criteria:
* Plastic, the more the better
* Rectangular, don't forget to round the corners
* Silver, LEDs are spiffy too, but silver is required

I don't think I'm all that demanding. I just want a nice USB hub with built-in flash card readers. I define nice as:
* Good build quality - give it some heft so it doesn't slide all over
* Thoughtful design - let me get at the ports and space them far enough apart that I can use all of them. Make the hub power supply stay in. Barrel jacks suck.
* Tasteful design - Metal is good. Wood would be fine. I have no need for see-thru plasic windows and the LEDs are usually more annoying than useful.

Let's take a quick spin around the web and see the junk that is available.

Adaptec - Goofy little plastic boxes

D-Link - Goofy little plastic boxes

Linksys - Goofy little plastic boxes

Belkin - Gggggggggggoofy plastic boxes


Targus - At least they have the best looking Goofy little plastic boxes

Keyspan - Goofy!

-------------------

Now, I did find a few devices with potential, but even these didn't wow me.

Macally - Attractive hub plus card reader. It figures that this would look halfway decent. It's marketed to Apple owners.

Iogear - I like the vertical design and styling. Unfortunately, I read a lot of reviews that say the thing plain doesn't work most of the time and plugged in cables tend to topple the thing over.

Fellowes - This one has an interesting swivel design which would be useful. Too bad it doesn't read flash cards.

Kensington - I like the dome design of this one. Unfortunately, no flash card readers and I read bad things about plugs not fitting in to it well.


Maybe something will come out of all of the Mac mini accessories. The Mac mini is begging for a USB hub and card reader that matches it. Given a decent weight, I might look at something like that for work.

How about you guys? Anyone have any products that they like that they can share? Have you seen any devices out there that fit what I'm looking for? Links please!

All Day I Dream About Soccer

If you didn't know, I'm the freak behind sadida.com. Sadida.com is the original adidas fan blog. It was a blog before they invented the term blog. I started it very humbly in 1996. I started the site more to learn about HTML than anything else. For a good laugh, you should head over there and check out the way-back link to the original 1996 site.

I sort of gave up on sadida.com in the last few years, but recently I've gotten the itch and have decided to try keeping it updated again. If you have any adidas related info for me, send me an email at ryan@sadida.com. If you write me a review to post, I'll give you a cookie!

Do One Thing and Do It Well

Throughout this blog, you'll see me complain (err, suggest) how products could be designed better. Last week I came across another perfect example of poorly designed products. Clocks, specifically, alarm clocks.

My Grandma got a new alarm clock. I can't recall the brand right now, but if I could, trust me, I would publicly shame them. Her alarm clock has two alarm settings. Nothing wrong with that. The problem is, she couldn't figure out how to set them. One of the alarms was set for 11:52 at night and it would wake her up every single night. If I were her, I would have unplugged the damn thing until I figured out how to turn the alarm off, but I guess she needed to know what time it was. I was called in to save the day and I too was initially perplexed at how to set the silly alarm. A quick consult of the instructions solved the problem, but why did I have to resort to that?

An alarm clock isn't a complex beast. It shows the time and makes noise once a day. How is it possible to design a product that makes it difficult to do those tasks? Apparently the Hilton Family thinks they have this problem licked. They are putting their easy-to-set alarm clock in all of their hotel properties. You can get a better idea of how to set the alarm clock by looking at this picture. Honestly, it looks pretty good. There is a clear indication of whether the alarm is on or off and it seems simple enough to tell the clock when you are setting the alarm time.

Finally, to balance out today's negativity, I'll tell you about a positive clock experience. Daylight savings required us to change our clocks this past weekend. I always hate that task, but at least Nissan makes it a little nicer. The clock on the CD player in my truck is cool. There is one button, and it says "Clock". If you push it, it turns the clock on. If you push it again, it turns the clock off. If you hold it, the stereo beeps and you can use either set of up/down buttons to set the time. I like this, it JFWs! I've had plenty of finger cramping combos to set stereo times before, so this is welcomed simplicity.

Your Laziness Astounds Me

Lazy American? Yes, I've seen quite a few. Let me share with you my latest encounter. In my neighborhood, we have shared mailbox areas. The mailboxes from about 10 houses are clumped together. I'm always amazed that folks drive to these mailboxes, when they are 3 driveways away at the most. On Friday, I witnessed the following... My neighbor that lives no more than 40 yards away from the mailbox came home from work, she drove past her house and proceeded to park in the middle of the frickin' street, turn off her van and get out. She walks over to the mailbox and gets her mail. Remember, she is still blocking the street. She then walks back to the van, gets in, starts it up, and then drives down one more house. She pulls in to their driveway, the WHOLE way (wtf?), and then backs out, drives up the three houses, waits for her garage door to open, and drives in.

She's not disabled. She didn't have heavy things to carry. It wasn't raining. There are nice sidewalks the whole way. I don't see any excuse to not get two minutes of fresh air. Maybe she is on one of those no exercise diets.

Bluetooth isn't dead, it's common

This article over at Blueserker was quite interesting to me. Bluetooth has now arrived. When you can buy headsets in discount stores, it isn't a niche product. It isn't just for geeks. It's for everyone. I especially like the price trends lately. Bluetooth products are reaching price point where people can buy a headset or people can buy a Bluetooth mouse, just to play around with it, try it out, and see how they like it. Next up, Bluetooth enabled GPS receivers in truck stops along I-80.

Rock Out

So I finally got around to finishing a new mix. I'm not going to go as far as to say I am proud of this one, but I do enjoy listening to it and you might as well. It starts better than it ends. You'll have to ignore the slight train-wrecking in parts. I make no claims to being good at DJing, but I do have a lot of fun doing it.

This set uses a lot more vocal tracks than I normally include. It leans towards the rocking side of Prog and Breaks. You'll notice an Evil Nine and Marine Parade flavor to the set. This is not light switch rave type stuff.

Tracklist:
Gardner & Thomas - Turn to Try
Trafik - Your Light
Infusion - Better World (Infusion Mix)
Freeland - Supernatural Thing (Adam & The Evils Remix)
Evil Nine - Cakehole
Moguai - Get:On
Phil Kieran - I Love You (Phil Kieran Remix)
Paul Jackson & Steve Smith - The Push (Far From Here) [Radio Edit]

Supernatural Thing, Cakehole, and I Love You are available on iTMS if you need to spend some free songs ;) I don't plan to leave the set up for long, so grab it while it is hot. If you know me, and want to save Ian the bandwidth, just ask and I'll bring you a burned CD or the .mp3.

Then We Can't Get Down

Evil Nine are easily one of my favorite groups right now. Today must have been Evil Nine day for me.

First, I was working on a new mix which happens to be very Evil Nine influenced. Look for more on that in a future post.

Second, I came across their video for Crooked, online. You absolutely must go watch the video. Talk about a head nodding track!

Third, I purchased some Evil Nine tracks off of Beatport. I've known of Beatport's existence since day one, but I've stayed away because I really don't enjoy buying music for lots of different sites. I like iTMS. I'd prefer to just do business with them. Evil Nine made me crack. I just had to have a copy of Crooked, and I had to have it now. Hopefully I haven't opened another set of flood gates. I already buy too much music.

BTW, Evil Nine's album releases (again) on March 29th. I can't wait.

I think we woke the baby up

Huey, Louie, and Mountain Dewey

My plan to reduce my daily consumption of Mountain Dew is proceeding as planned. I have established a baseline and as soon as the Pepsi/iTunes promotion is over, I'll start the reduction. Today, I tried something a little different. I replaced this Dew drinker's regular Dew with Diet Dew. Let's see if he notices. Hell yes I noticed. I honestly can't remember if I have ever drank a full Diet Dew. Today I did and it was not a good experience. That stuff is bottled ass! I swear I had the exact same taste in my mouth as when I leave the dentist, and that's not a good thing. I even had to add a third bottle for the day just to cleanse myself of the purgatory that is Diet Dew. Diet Don't!

So, the obligatory idea of the day. Pepsi comes in a full range of sugar pain. You start with the high octane regular, then the Pepsi Edge, then the Pepsi One, and then the Diet Pepsi. You truly do get to pick your poison. Dew drinkers have no such luxury. You either get the full caloric goodness or you get to drink spider spit. Where is my Mountain Dew Halfpipe? They make Dew in regular, Cherry, Orange, Grape, and some bastard creation, Baja Ass, they only sell at Taco Bell. Where's the reduced calorie, but non-sucky version? I smell an Apprentice episode!

Bring On the Auxiliary Displays

Many computer users today run a set of applications that is no longer requiring them to upgrade their PC every two years or so to avoid being frustrated at the sluggish performance. Now that I'm to that point, I look to how I can make my computing experience more enjoyable and productive, other than by buying the latest x.y GHz processor. Notebook PCs are one of those categories that improve the experience, but there are plenty of times that I don't need the keyboard and notebooks are far too expensive to be add-ons for most folks. I already have the computing horsepower in my desktop. I just need to untether it.

Last August, rumors started to fly about a "Wireless Display" that was in the works from Apple. This product class is very interesting to me. The idea of the Wireless Display is that the "computer" still resides in your desktop machine. The Wireless Display isn't much more than a display, battery, wireless connectivity, and perhaps a touchscreen. This is like the tablet computer class, but without the processor, seperate RAM, hard drive, and optical drive. The goal is to be able to control your main computer from this display and keep the display cheaper than buying a notebook or tablet computer which can be used to run remote desktop software.

I have also noticed a trend in "burst information" lately. I define burst information as those little notifications and tasks that are accessed frequently, and for short periods of time. Examples of burst information include:
* Email notifiers
* Instant Messages
* Meeting reminders
* Stock quotes
* Weather

Steps have been taken to improve burst information. For instance, many apps now have windows that slide out of the task tray, but burst information is still one of the primary distractions and productivity killers in today's busy lifestyle.
I'm certainly not the only one to notice this trend. More likely, I'm noticing it because of the actions of the big guys in the computer world. For those paying attention, the writing is on the wall. Microsoft is pushing their Smart Personal Object Technology [SPOT]. Today this exists on watches, but I see potential in them directing this technology to other displays.
In fact, Microsoft is calling on developers to bring apps to this platform. Apple is also trying to seduce developers with design contests for their new Dashboard technology.

Now, finally to my point. I want auxillary displays. These displays can be of varying size. Some may be monochome. Some may be full color. Some may be tall. Some may be wide. Some will have touchscreens. Others will just be screens. To make this happen, we need two things, hardware and software. The hardware won't happen without the software. The software could be SPOT. It could be a flavor of Dashboard. Most likely it will have to be something beyond what we have so far.



I did some playing and created a concept of a high end aux display. Again, nothing real ground breaking here, just evolutionary changes to existing products. Take the widescreen off of the 15" PowerBook, slim the bezel, add a touchscreen, add WiFi, add a video card, and add a fat battery. Click on the concept picture to see some further notes. Toshiba recently wsa showing off a concept similar to this.

Think of all of the things you could put on your aux display. Here are a few:
* Stock quotes (every computer tech must involve stock quotes)
* iTunes remote display with full album art - How cool would it be if you could glance at the wall in your favorite club, resturant, karaoke bar, or cycling class and see the full details of the music you are hearing?
* Vendors and presenters at conferences and expos could display more live information with less wiring and fewer computers to run the displays.
* Live picture frames - These already exist, but they are never a complete solution. They often have their own storage, require subscriptions, and some require you to upload pictures to a website. Why mess with all of that? You could just have a button in iPhoto that sends an album to that aux display. This isn't a stretch. We already have that exact button in iTunes to send the music to an aux sound output, the Airport Express.
* Weather Displays
* TV Lineups for the evening

I wouldn't expect seperate screens for all of these things. I would want a way to time share the device, either automatically or with a controller attached to the aux display. Obviously this could get very expensive, and I'm already hearing the chants of read a newspaper.

Good Control Not So Remote

Do you remember my whining about what makes a good remote? Well, Logitech has nearly granted my wish.

My buddy Nick has a Harmony remote and he loves it.

Color screen - check
Rechargable - check
Programmable - check
Download from Internet - check
Limited number of buttons - check
Durable - maybe
Not IrDA - no, but they can't do much about that until the electronics manufacturers wise up

$250 appears to be the damage. If I didn't love my Marantz remote so much, I'd order one up right away. I'll keep this in mind though.

Rules of the Purchase

I'm currently steaming from the latest round of Slashdot idiot posts regarding DRM. I figured I'd cool down a bit by putting to digital paper my rules of purchasing music from the iTunes Music Store.

I buy music that is...
1. Music that is no longer in print or extremely hard to find in physical form.
2. Music that is only available at import prices. $10 is far better than $27.
3. Individual songs that I know I like and know I don't want the whole album.
4. Individual songs that I am exploring from artists that are unfamiliar to me.
5. Music that I can only find on iTMS or big city record shops which I don't get to often enough.
6. Music that I must have, right now!

Also for the record:
Do I like DRM? [Shaking head side to side] Noooooooo.
Do I understand why it is necessary on iTMS? [Nodding head] Yessssssss.
Do I feel that the "rights" that iTMS grants me are reasonable? [Nodding head] Yesssssss.
Do I wish I had the ability to sell, or transfer ownership, of purchased songs? [Nodding head] Yessssss.

Who won?

March madness is upon us. A week ago I woke up in a cold sweat thinking, "wow, it would be cool if I could get the tournament scores on an RSS feed". So how about it? Anyone know where I can get such a feed? All I can find is NCAA Men's Basketball news feeds. All I want is the final scores (half-time scores would be nice). I know Yahoo! had something last year, but I did some digging today and didn't see it.

Bottled Anger

An updated "Bottle Bill" is in discussion by Iowa's lawmakers. For those just tuning in, Iowa is one of the 8 states that takes a deposit on certain beverage containers at the time of purchase and then returns that money when the container is returned, at least that's how it works in Iowa. It's quite possible other states do it a bit different.
Today, you deposit 5 cents and you get back 5 cents. The new bill looks to take 1 cent from the 5 you'd normally get back and give that to the redemption center that is handling your return. They say this is because the redemption centers can't make back the costs of being a redemption center and at the same time, being a redemption center is unsanitary, loud, and space consuming. You know what? I believe them.

The can redemption program is fully self-funded. It processes 1.5 billion containers a year, which adds up to 75 million dollars getting handed around. In addition, 15 million comes from beverage distributors. That's 90 million dollars. Nothing to sneeze at.
At the time the Bottle Bill originally went in to effect (1978), it probably was a good idea. Recycling centers were nearly non-existant and people didn't have the concern for the Earth that they do now. Who am I kidding, people still don't care, but I digress. In addition, 15% of beverage containers today, including bottled water and juices, are of
the variety that do not fit in to this program. That's a hefty chunk.
Certainly if people must be motivated by money to not litter, these non-program containers would be all over our roads, but they really aren't. I've participated in Iowa's adopt-a-highway program about 5 times. I've spent Saturdays picking up junk. I honestly can't say that I picked up more juice bottles than I did Pepsi bottles. If we are going to keep this program, let's add in that 15% of beverage containers that isn't covered. But what about the other percentage of containers that aren't beverage containers? Why don't we have programs for those? Ohh wait, we do, it's called curbside recycling.


My point is, I think the whole idea of returning cans to the store is past due. We have curbside recycling now. In fact, 600 communities in Iowa have it now.
Why don't we just ditch this can return nonsense and sink the $90 million in to improving existing recycling programs? According to the Iowa DNR, 500 containers per person per year are returned. That calculates to $25. I know my total is far higher than that, but I think I'd tolerate $25 more in taxes to not ever have to take bottles back to the store. I already recycle. Just let me keep doing that and get rid of this extra process for these "magical" beverage containers.

Proponents of the bottle bill like to point to the number of jobs the program has created and the energy that is saved by creating new bottles from all of the recycled ones. That's fantastic. This will still be true if we
switch to curbside recycling for beverage containers. The stuff still needs
handled, so now the high school kids will work for a state or city recycling center instead of Hy-Vee. The containers still get recycled, so we still save all of the energy.

From recent protests and public posturing by grocery stores and other redemption centers, it's obvious that they don't want to be in the business of turning aluminum in to nickel. Let's take that energy and reapply it to state and city recycling programs.

Six Degrees

Boy it's quiet out there. I'm going to lay it out there and see if I can get some crowd participation up in this mother. We've all heard of the six degrees of Kevin Bacon, right? Well, if you don't know, you better ask somebody.
Well, I like music (not necessarily from the artists we'll use in the game), so let's play the game with a music influence. For starters, let's link Tupac Shakur to Justin Timerlake. You've got six links, but you get bonus points for less. And, no, I haven't done this yet, but I'm sure it can be done.

Ready go.

Falias

Alias on ABC used to be a show I enjoyed. The last two seasons have really turned me off though. The double, triple, ocho crossing is way out of hand. It's as if they've run out of ideas so they just keep bringing back the same characters with recycled plots. My wife still enjoys the show tremendously, so I "watch" it in the background while doing other things. Ok, enough bashing of the plots of the Alias show. That's not the point of this post.

What I'd like to discuss is the Ford emphasis in Alias. If you haven't noticed (how could you not), Alias is sponsored by Ford. They have Ford commercials at the breaks, "Sponsored by Ford" messages when the show is starting up again, and a plethora of Ford vehicles throughout the show. Now, I really don't have a problem with all of that. I don't even mind the vehicle placement in the show. Anyone remember that Viper show on NBC? It can't get much worse than that. In the end, anything that gets us closer to content with no commercial breaks is ok by me.

The thing that really got me this week, was the apparent Ford politics inserted in to the episode. As I said, I wasn't really watching the show, but I was listening. Next thing I know, Sydney and her "family" are sitting around having dinner and they bust off in to an out of place discussion about hybrid vehicles and how they are the future. Hybrid vehicles? WTF does that have to do with tracking baddies? Then it registered. I think that scene was in there just to bring hybrid vehicles in to focus as it were.

I'm all for hybrid vehicles. We nearly bought a Toyota Prius a couple of years ago. Now, Ford is finally throwing their hat in the hybrid ring and I guess pimping hybrid technology on Alias is part of their plan to build market share. Maybe this subliminal shit will help, but maybe folks will see through this and not appreciate being preached to in a show that they are watching to be entertained. In the meantime, be sure to drink your ovaltine.

Wrist Top Data

My daily "cargo" is pretty limited. I carry a wallet, car keys, and, unless I forget to put one on, a watch. I don't own a cell phone. I don't want a PDA. I'd like to carry my bucktool, but the number of times I'd actually use it lose out to carrying the damn thing around all of the time. As you can see, it takes a lot to earn a spot in my pockets.

For Christmas, I got a flash drive. That's a good thing, I'd been wanting a flash drive. The problem is, like the bucktool, the flash drive is bordering on too much for me to carry for the number of times I use the thing. It's great to have when you need one, but I still hate that I have to plug it in, and it's not as small as I'm sure it will be in a year.

That got me thinking to how I could still have a flash drive, but not have to add to the mass of my key chain.
The first idea, and possibly still a good one, is to lose my ignition key. How will I start my car? Well, I already have the keyless entry dongle, so why can't that thing start my car. I guess I don't see the value in a separate physical item to start my car. If someone is already inside the interior of my vehicle, they already can take it, so what does having a key prevent? So, the first solution is to ditch my ignition key and keep the flash drive. Right or wrong, I don't think many folks are going to dig this idea, and maybe I don't either once I start to think about times where I would want people to get in to my vehicle but not start it (child getting a soccer ball out of the truck).

The next thing that came to mind is my watch. The watch is already one of the physical things I carry with me. If I could add utility to it, I don't add any items. Now, there are data watches out there, but you're drunk if you think I'm going to pull a USB cable out of my watch. Microsoft is also heading this direction with their SPOT watches. Do you think they'll ever add a wireless interface? That way, I don't have to have a cable. I don't have to crawl on the ground to plug in the flash drive. I don't have to take the watch off. If only there were a low power technology meant to replace cables (cough *Bluetooth* cough).

So hopefully this Bluetooth watch that someone is going to build me isn't going to be huge. Then again, it can't be any bigger than the tuna can I already wear. Suunto doesn't call them watches. They are wrist-top computers. Kind of like garbage men are waste management engineers I guess. [No offense to garbage men intended] Anyway, Suunto's exercises in excess already are computers, so pop a Bluetooth stack in there (cough CSR virtual machine cough), add some flash storage (1 gig please), and tell me where to buy one.

My pockets will end up lighter, not only because I lose the flash drive, but because I'm sure this thing won't be cheap.

Does Blockbuster Sell Used Cars?

Did Blockbuster bite off more than they could chew? I scampered over to
their site just now and found an interesting statement on their online sign up page.

Sign Up Today To Guarantee Your Price Through January 2006*

What's that all about? Hurry up and give us your money before we complete the bait and switch? Netflix did raise the monthly price on me once, but then they turned around and made it far cheaper than it was when I first signed up. Netflix might win this war yet.

Sound of my Soul

You can tell a lot about a person based on their taste in music. Here's your chance to judge me. I sat down a couple of months ago and went through my albums. It was a struggle, but I came up with my 10 favorite discs of all time. These aren't necessarily my current 10 favorite, but over the years, these are the ones. I can't gurantee these will stay my top 10, and I know for sure there are dozens right behind them, but here they are anyway. I'm not going to get all misty about why each of these is a favorite, but some do have more meaning than others. I also don't intend any order here, just that these are the top 10.



* Moby - Everything is Wrong
* DJ Shadow - Endtroducing...
* Underworld - dubnobasswithmyheadman
* UNKLE - Psyence Fiction
* The Chemical Brothers - Exit Planet Dust
* DJ John Kelley - funkydesertbreaks2
* Fatboy Slim - On the Floor at the Boutique
* Stereo MC's - Connected
* BT - ESCM
* The Prodigy - Music for the Jilted Generation

What does your soul sound like?

Pavlov's Dogs Do the Dew

Overcoming an addiction requires admitting you have a problem :)
I drink way too much soda, partly because it is free where I work. I don't know that I'll ever give it up completely, but I would like to cut back a bit.

I'm not sure how much I used to drink per day, but I do know how much I'm drinking now - 40oz. I've put myself on a "2 drink maximum" restriction. I decided to begin this limit along side the iTunes/Pepsi promotion. This gives me the opportunity to win back some of the money I am spending on the soda (it used to be free), and I also like to win free iTMS songs, even though I probably end up spending more anyway.

So far things are going well, and hopefully I'll be able to scale back to 20oz + 12 oz, then 12oz + 12oz and so on, but the funny thing is, I feel more addicted to the sugar water now more than ever. Maybe it is because I have added a quantity and a time frame to my pop drinking. Whatever it is, I find myself craving that "first dew" more than I used to.

Even weirder is the phenomenon of the dew tasting better if it had a free song on the cap. Those bottles that tell me to "Please Play Again" make me want to just drink water instead!

The Music Keeps Playing On and On

I love it when technology makes life easier. Let me give you an example. We hosted a poker night last night and everyone seemed to have a good time. I'm the sort that enjoys music playing in the background pretty much any time other than when I'm watching TV or asleep, so you know we had music at the party.

In the past, to keep the music going, I've used a CD changer, and even just a stack of CDs by the DVD player for easy access. Both of these solutions are less than ideal. The CD changer holds 300 discs, which is great, other than the guests at the party really only care to listen to about 10 discs in there. Combine that with slow disc changing times and you end up with pauses in the music, and stuff you didn't want to hear. Playing individual discs with a DVD/CD player is nice because you can limit it a little more, but you still have to come up with albums that everyone likes, or you have to spend time burning CDs ahead of time. There is also a terrible pause when the disc finishes and you haven't yet gotten up to start the next one. Of course, there is always radio, but then you get crappy commercials and you still have the problem of deciding on a station that satisfies everyone.

Last night, I tried whipping up a playlist with a little something for everyone and letting iTunes stream to my Airport Express. I think this worked well. It only took me 10 or 15 minutes to select enough tracks for an 8 hour playlist and I was ready. The music never stops (other than a couple of WiFi interference moments), I can easily include a wide variety of music, and folks can even check out the playlist to see what they heard that night. Try doing that with 300 discs on shuffle. You better sit close to the person that knows all of the music so they can hand write you a playlist as the tracks play.

Now certainly Apple isn't the only one offering a streaming audio box that you can hook up to your stereo, but I'll tell you what, it couldn't get much easier. The Airport Express is a small brick that plugs in to the back of my receiver, so I don't need any extra room for the component, and I don't have one more power cord. Once configured, iTunes lets me choose "Living Room" as the output source. I get to use all of my organization (ripping and playlists) that I've already applied for my iPod. It all just works!

BTW, anyone want to buy my 300 disc CD changer? I have no use for it anymore.

2 Bob Burnquist T-shirts Please

First off, I really don't play video games anymore, but this is pretty cool. You can now
buy pizza from within the EverQuest II video game. Apparently this is the first such linkage of the real world to a video game. I knew some folks in college that suffered from an EverCrack addiction. I gurantee they would have used this feature. They would have loved it even more if they could have typed /captain_and_coke. I can see this sort of thing becoming more popular.

I can see games like the Tony Hawk series letting you earn the virtual skate board decks in the game and at the same time allowing you to buy that same deck right from the game. When you complete the game, you could have the option of buying a limited edition t-shirt. Imagine how much money they could squeeze out of you.

Sports games could offer special edition collector cards. Maybe you could even get a 4"x6" glossy of the scoreboard displaying the whooping you just put on your buddy mailed to your house for $4.

And the ultimate. This would probably get me back in to playing video games. They could hook an online game to something like the iTMS. If you don't like the tracks in the game, you can import a whole new set, either from iTMS, or from your own library. You could even earn free tracks by completing different parts of the game. Of course the game will have ads built in on billboards and such, so you really don't get the track for free, you just earn it based on the count of ads the game has served to you. As much as I used to play the THPS series, I think I could own a stable of punk bands.

I'm aware that some games were starting to allow stuff like this 3 or 4 years ago. I even remember experimenting with the original Sims that would allow you to plug-in your own .mp3s to get played on the stereos in the game, but it was far too manual and they didn't get the chance to take my money for the convenience of having it built in to the game. This might have progressed since then because, like I said, I really don't play games anymore. This could be big.

Red Means Stop, and So Does 'X'

I'm colorblind and I run in to a lot of instances where information is conveyed by color. Occasionaly, there is additional information to help provide distinction (position of stop lights) but not always (multi-color charge LEDs). Stop lights could use a little bit more information. Most people wouldn't even think twice about it, but to some people the red and yellow and/or the red and green lights look very similar (they actually add blue to the green light to help with colorblindness). When I am unable to see the position of the light in the stack of 3, it is hard to tell yellow from red at a distance. This is worse at night as you can't see the housing of the light to distinguish position. Luckily, 4 way stops on country roads with blinking lights also include the familiar octagon stop sign.

I don't know for sure, but it seems like stop lights are round because the original light sources within them illuminated a circle well. As stoplights made of LEDs become more and more popular, it seems that we are given the opportunity to use shapes, in addition to color, to let people know whether they should stop or go.

I'm not proposing a huge change here, just suggesting that we add a simple shape within the round stoplight. The green light would include a dot. The yellow line would include a line. The red light would include an 'x'. These shapes could be made of white LEDs, or perhaps a void of light, resulting in a black shape. I wouldn't think this would cost much more, if any. You'd only need to use a different color LED, or leave it out completely. However, this minor change could add safety and clarity to a lot of people out there on the roads.

New iPods - Just Missed

Hey Apple, you just missed.

In an earlier post I said "Give me a 60 giger at .5 inches in height. Give it the features of the iPod photo and keep it under $500 and I'll be in line to upgrade my 3G."

You got real close with the new iPod photos. The 30GB model still needs to lose a little elevation (.63 to .50), and the 60GB doesn't appear to have changed (.75), so it is still getting struck by lightning when it is out hiking with the rest of the iPods. But the price, the price is nice.

Looks like the next gen might be what I'm looking for. Until then I'll continue to smile every time I turn on my 15GB 3G model.

I do like how Apple is systematically mowing down every complaint with the iPod line.
It's too big and costs too much. - Here, here's the iPod mini.
It's doesn't hold enough and it can't show photos. - Here, here's the iPod photo.
It costs too much and I don't have much music. - Here, here's the iPod shuffle (do not eat iPod shuffle).
It costs too much and the battery life sucks. - Here, here's a drop in price for the minis and the photos, and we're increasing the battery life.

I'm a loser baby

It seemed in the last iTunes/Pepsi promotion, I couldn't lose. Every cap I picked up was a winner and it was great. This time around, I'm not getting much love. Today, I finally won a song. I am now 1 for 8. That's loser numbers since the odds are 1 in 3. I realize I really don't have much to complain about yet, but this is definitely a different experience from the last time.

Now, honestly, the only reason I wanted to put this post up is so that I could use this Regis photo that I've been meaning to use for quite some time. Where did that photo come from you ask? Well, a couple of years (?) ago, ABC allowed you to play along with the "Who wants to be a millionaire" show. This was when it was still cool to watch that show :) Anyway, I would play online with this interactive client they had and they would put stills from the show in a window. One question involved the "loser sign" and Regis felt the need to act it out. The stills in the client were usually quite boring, but someone apparently had a sense of humor and put the cap of Regis making that sign in the display for about 20 seconds. I was lucky enough to grab a copy of it and it still makes me laugh every time I look at it.

Trust the DJ

Philips has some new MP3 players with a feature called "Like Music". This is a smart shuffle of sorts that will pick the next track based on the current one you are listening to. Apparently it bases these selections on tempo, instruments included, and the like.

This is interesting stuff. The art of being a DJ (dance and hip hop) is not only technical bits of being able to beat match and use consistent levels. It's also about choosing like songs and stringing them together to form a vibe. At the same time, good or bad, it's about keeping the latest tracks in your mixes.

I've always thought that the hardest part of all of that is keeping up on what's new and knowing the music well enough to be able to drop it in a set. Computers could certainly help with this right? They can tell me things like style of music, BPM, even the key of the music. Certainly this could all be meta-data that is hand assigned to files, but Philips is going a step farther and attempting some of the heavy lifting in software. How cool would it be to be able to mix an hour of music that you've never heard before? The tracks would be pre-selected by the software as close enough and then it would be up to you to make it sound good.

What if it even did the mixing and left you out completely?
Certainly this could never replace a real DJ could it? What if it could? What if it started by playing the songs in between singers at the local Karaoke bar? What if it was good enough for the middle school parties at the bowling alley and the roller skating arena? What if it became the sound of the hip restuarants and martini bars?

I'm sure it's all coming, but until then, this tech sounds great for keeping my Kilowatts & Vanek away from my Tidy Tracks.

iPod Tech Specs Analyzed

I like the color screens in the iPod photo, but once I saw one, I immediately thought, "wow, that's too big". Then I got to thinking, exactly how much bigger was it? Well, to figure that out, I dipped in to the Wayback Machine and compiled the following chart of iPod tech specs.


There are a few models left out, particularly the Windows flavors of the 2G models, but the major players are all there. The iPod photo is included in the data. Some may argue that this is a whole seperate member of the iPod family, but I believe that the distinction between photo and non-photo in the full size iPods will disappear in the next generation. The photo models do add some interesting data points in some data we'll get to later.

So, first we start with the weight over the generations. I liked the dip around the 3Gs, but I'm troubled by the rising weights again. Yes, I know the hard drives are getting much bigger, but I think this needs to turn around and focus on weight first and GB size second.


Next, let's look at the volumes over the generations. They haven't changed a whole lot, but again, the volumes are rising over the last few models.


Height is an obvious dimension difference in the iPod photos. Here are the heights.


Ahh, here's a good one. The following chart displays how much each GB of data storage weighs in the various iPods. This is the category where the latest models really kick.


Ok, now I'm going to give you a headache. The next two charts display the percent change in weight and volume. I didn't think the percent change vs. the original iPod was all that interesting. I was more concerned with how things are changing generation to generation. So, in the charts, the data point for a particular gen is in reference to the previous gen.

I also charted two sets of data. One set compares the smallest in one generation to the smallest in the next generation. The other compares the largest in one generation to the largest in the next generation. Since there was only 1 iPod at the start, it gives us a nice beginning with two pathes leading away from it.

I hope I don't have to explain this, but a 0% change means that nothing changed between those generations, a positive change means bigger, and a negative change means smaller.

You can see that the 3Gs gave us a nice dip in weight and that the photos are bricks.


The percent change volume chart shows that the 4G is where it's at if you want the smallest iPod, other than the shuffle of course.


To sum things up, I don't like the recent trends. I like that the iPods got more storage, but I don't like that they traded off weight and volume. I guess I'll take some comfort in the fact that battery life was improved as well, so I can't pin all of the extra on the hard drive changes.

It was nice to see that my 15GB 3G iPod fits in the sweet spot of quite a few categories. It's relatively thin, light, and has a decent amount of storage. However, the color screens in the photos really has me interested.

In the next generation iPods, I'd like to see the focus shift back to form factor and less on the raw storage. Give me a 60 giger at .5 inches in height. Give it the features of the iPod photo and keep it under $500 and I'll be in line to upgrade my 3G.

The clicker, the clicker, what what, the clicker

The future is near. My dream is slowing taking shape.

You may remember me complaining about remotes back in November. Well that wish got a whole lot closer to granted today. I've known about Salling Clicker for a long time, but I've never made the time to try it out. Today I happened to hit their site and saw a screenshot of a Palm Zire 72 running the software. Hmmm, I don't remember seeing that before. How did I miss that? I had a Zire 72 available to me, so I fired up the software and was blown away. This is incredible stuff.

* iTunes remote display - Yes, this is exactly what I need to work with a Mac mini. Leave the TV off and have the album art and time displays right in your hand.
* DVD player launching - This part needs a little help. I need to launch DVDs that are ripped on to an external hard drive. As of yet, the open VIDEO_TS command isn't available. It looks like it can be added, but for now I'll use the...
* Remote mouse - I couldn't believe it. You can control the mouse on the computer via the touchscreen on the palm.
* Put the computer to sleep - Time to test some Bluetooth wakeup scenarios
* You can even browse your iPhoto library directly on the palm without displaying any photos on screen. This is really cool. I can see this being popular around the holidays. Just pass around the "digital photo album" and never miss a step.

The problem now is finding a cheap handheld computer with Bluetooth. Add-on SD and CF cards are still more than you'd like them to be and the cheapest handheld with Bluetooth built-in might just be the Zire 72. It looks like the Zire 72 is still $300, so things need to get cheaper before many people can go that route, but I love the idea of buying a kick-ass "remote" and getting a free handheld computer out of the deal.

I do wish that Clicker was a bit more graphical but because it is meant to run on phones and other smaller devices, I can understand the menu flavored UI. Seeing Clicker work just might inspire me to get off my butt and write a similar piece of software to run on Pocket PCs.

Last thing. You did remember to configure your Mac mini with Bluetooth in it didn't you?

Stuporbowl Commercials

I'm watching the new XXX commercial and I kept waiting for the Engergizer bunny to march through. It didn't and now I'm left wondering if this is going to be the worst movie ever. The title is XXX - State of the Union? Are they serious? Ohh, and Ice Cube is the new XXX? I like Ice Cube in some movies, but I wonder if he is still pissed about his whip getting trashed in Are we there yet? (no, I haven't seen it) and now he wants to bust some heads.

Ohh, thank goodness, the Bud Light skydiving pilot commercial just offset the XXX one. Back to the game now.

Edit: I also enjoyed the m:robe commercials. The music in the first was unknown to me. Apparently it is "Pure Gold" by the Offcuts. I checked and couldn't find it on iTMS. The second is a track that has been one of my favorites for years. Les Rythmes Digitales - "Jaques Your Body". I annoyed Julie by running in to the other room and producing the LRD CD that was included with Revolution magazine in Sept. 2000. It has the cut as well as the incredible "What's Going On? (Jon Carter Mix)" by Mekon featuring Roxanne Shant. I can't comment on the m:robe, but the music is worth buying :)

Excessories

I'm with Jason, the Mac mini skirt is squarely in the WTF category. I have an accessory for you, it's called a thermal dispursion, ornamental, computing mat. It comes in many colors and styles and is just the right size for your Mac mini. You can already find them in stores. Just go in to Pier 1 and ask for "place" mats. Don't be confused by the name, they are really the Mac mini super mats, there was just a mix-up in shipping.

I'll take this opportunity to again beg for useful Mac mini accessories. I'm digging the design of the LaCie F.A. Porsche external FireWire drives. I'd like to see them in bigger capacities and I'd like them to run off of the FireWire bus like the smaller drives do, but until then, how about a power supply/cord with takes offs for a couple of these drives and the Mac mini. That way I'll only need one plug and cord running to my Mac mini and assorted external drives.

I'd also like to see a redesigned power supply that reshapes the Mac mini power brick in to a "slice" that fits under the mini. I already have a power conditioner in my home theater rack so this would save me the trouble of hiding the brick since I won't be able to put it on the floor. They could even put a small, glowing Apple logo on it.

Finally, in the spirit of the Mitch Hedberg vending machine that dispenses vending machines, I want a Mac mini stakka. You can put it in classrooms so Jimmy can easily grab his machine on the way in to class :)

Home theater usability - still sucking

If you've ever put together a home theater, you know that it isn't simple. The sea of connectors, cable types, and menus for setup are plain silly. I was reminded of this, again, when setting up an HDTV tuner for my wife's parents. I didn't mind setting it up for them, but it was still way too hard. Let's recap what it took to hook up that damn thing.

- You have to know the difference between component inputs and HDTV component inputs and you have to know which kind your TV has.
- You have to know that component cables are better than s-video and composite.
- You have to know the difference between analog stereo audio and digital audio.
- You have to know the difference between coaxial and optical digital audio.
- You have to know which video setting you want to run, 480p, 1080i, other?
- You have to know how to tell the HD box how to output the video format you want.
- You have to know how to tell your TV what format the video is going to come in as.
- You have to know which input on your TV your HD is coming in at.
- You have to understand that not all content coming in over the HD tuner will be in HD.

The mind boggles.

Companies like Mitsubuishi are working to make this better with things like NetCommand and FireWire connections, but compared to the computer industry, things seem to be moving glacially slow.

Continuing my infatuation with all things Apple lately, I'd like to see an iChat AV style video selector on TVs.

When I turn on my TV, it can show me my cable. When I turn on my ReplayTV, it can push the cable to the left and add my Replay on the right. I can then run the Replay in the right screen or select it for full screen mode. Next up, I connect my digital camera or iPod photo (whoops, don't have one of those just yet) and it just automatically presents that to me for selection. Certainly you could configure the auto items off, but for the majority of people, when they plug in a new thing, they want to use that new thing.

I also hate the color screen that has replaced static on TVs. I prefer it to the static, but if the TV is smart enough to know there is no signal on that input, how about showing me the inputs that do have signals? I'm specifically thinking of when I finish watching a DVD. I turn the DVD player off and then get to stare at a blue screen while I find the TV remote to change the input. When the screen goes blue, it should switch back to the "iChat AV like" multi screen selector.

Lately I've been reading all of these sob stories about how the big consumer electronics companies are facing stiff competition from "no-name" asian electronics producers. Apparently Sony can't sell as many $6000 TVs as they'd like to when their are folks selling similar, but possibly lower quality sets, for lots less. If Sony and the other regulars wants to continue to command price premiums, let's see them continue to step things up with usability. I will pay extra for convenience, quality, and simple design. Take my money, please.

Unseen vs. Unheard

I buy a lot of music, many times purely on recommendation or knowledge of prior work. I buy music without ever hearing it. Some people think I'm crazy for doing this. "What if you don't like it?" they say? Well, I don't just randomly pick. I do choose, so I'm pretty sure I'll like it, or at least not hate it. The great thing is when I end up loving it. It's very satisfying to me to branch in to new music and find stuff I love to hear over and over.

The thing is, even though I'm the fool for buying music unheard, everyone goes and sees movies unseen. Sure, you get to see 30 seconds of it on TV, but I can listen to 30 seconds of music on iTMS too. Take a friend and see a movie and if you end up not liking it, you are out the $16 and have nothing to show for it. If I buy a CD and end up not liking it, I can get back at least a portion of that $16 by selling it.

My advice, go buy something slightly outside your comfort zone. You might just like it.

Bluetooth 2.0 is for iPods

I'm going to start a rumor, right here and now. There has been much speculation in the past about Bluetooth (or some other wireless technology) in the iPod. So far, we haven't seen anything. I think that Bluetooth 2.0 is going to change that.

In case you missed it, Apple just updated the PowerBook line and added Bluetooth 2.0. They even updated their Bluetooth page to reflect the introduction of 2.0. Apple is the first to have a Bluetooth 2.0 product that I'm aware of and that's a big deal.

One of the biggest grips folks have had (I'm not one of them - another post) with Bluetooth has been the speed. Bluetooth up to version 1.2 had a 1 Mbps theoretical, and roughly 723 kbps actual, possible, transfer speed. Whether or not you got near that number depended on lots of things, but we'll save that for another day. With 2.0, the spec has been upped to 3 Mbps. That's triple the speed for those still reaching for their calculators. Three times as much isn't spectacular, but it will help.

The files are huge dummy!
Yes, I realize that there still isn't a great amount of bandwidth when you are comparing against FireWire, but I did some quick real world testing. I used a bare bones 12" iBook which is the cheapest one you can buy right now, plus Bluetooth and WiFi. On the other end, I used a 2 year old Dell something-or-other running Microsoft's Bluetooth stack in XP SP2. The iBook was using built-in Bluetooth. The Dell used the Microsoft dongle that comes with their Wireless Desktop for Bluetooth.

I picked a song, and I even picked one you've probably heard of, U2's "Beautiful Day". This track was purchased from the iTMS and weighed in at 3.92 MB. I ran some transfers of that file both from the iBook to the Dell and vice versa. On average, I got transfer rates of about 43.5 KBps for transfer times of about a minute and a half. That isn't all that great, especially if you are going to transfer more than a few songs, but once we cut that in a third, we start to approach something usable.

Loading up a new album every so often would now be tolerable over Bluetooth. Even if you stick to wires for the music files, certainly you'd love Bluetooth for iSyncing your Address Book, calendar, and notes files. I know I would. Transferring those items would be, dare I say, fast!

The audio.
You might not know it, but Bluetooth can do more than crappy GSM audio. There are products now emerging that provide stereo audio over Bluetooth. I'm looking forward to ditching one more cable, especially that one to my headphones that knocks over my Mountain Dew all the time.

Finally, Apple is clearly leading the way with Bluetooth on the desktop. Their stack implementation is far better than any I have used, and if you know me, you know that means something. The fact that they already have a strong base in Bluetooth and now Bluetooth 2.0 means that a wireless iPod can't be all that far off. Even they think they are great. Check out these quotes from their Bluetooth page.

As the first company to certify a system supporting Bluetooth 2.0+EDR (enhanced data rate) specification with the Bluetooth Qualification Board, Apple continues to popularize Bluetooth technology.

Apple’s Bluetooth implementation is the latest in a series of bold strategic moves that have caused tectonic shifts in the computer industry — and greatly benefited customers.

The iPod has to evolve somehow. You can only go so long putting in bigger hard drives. Hopefully wireless connectivity via Bluetooth 2.0 will be part of the next generation. I can't wait.