Category Archives: Technology

Robin Hood's Barn

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Yesterday I attended a meeting with other like-minded individuals and this merry band of people got to discussing password management. There are a lot of different (and all equally valid) ways of managing your passwords and as I listened to some of these people describe their solutions it struck me, again, just how good I really do have it. I have to admit that once I switched over to 1Password and integrated it with Dropbox I’ve been spoiled rotten. The solution is such a perfect match that I stopped thinking about password management altogether, freeing me to concentrate on other things.

Then I heard about some of the things that my work peers have elected to do. One of them manages it with a password-protected Excel Spreadsheet and then uses Sysinternal’s SDELETE program to securely delete the file after he’s done using it. I sat there, stunned as I followed his description of the procedure that he has to follow and grinning-on-the-inside as others around the table brought up a series of criticisms of his procedure and pointing out pitfalls and the like. I sat back marvelling at 1Password, how I didn’t have to worry about any of this, and I discovered in that moment a hidden value to 1Password that just reinforces the perception of value that product has for me – I don’t have to think about this stuff anymore! It saves me time, brainpower, and attention-span. Just for that I couldn’t imagine not having 1Password in my digital life.

All along this meeting I heard comments peppered throughout that all had to do with a paranoid fear of security loss by taking advantage of cloud services. This isn’t the first time I’ve come across this, it was the central axis that featured prominently in my Webmail Plus v. Google argument that I so spectacularly lost so many moons ago. People fear the cloud. They fear what these companies will do with the data once it’s entrusted to their care. This has always mystified me and left me speechless. Now, don’t get me wrong here, I’m not saying that it’s wise to simply put 50,000 Social Security Numbers in a plaintext file and send them right up to Dropbox, hell, I wouldn’t do that with Amazon S3 service or any other provider for that matter. But what I would do, and perhaps this is what boggles my mind, that people don’t already do this, is encrypt the data using AES. With the data in this format, even if the file security is compromised, without the password, what they have is just as good as noise.

This is where 1Password is great, the central database file is encrypted using AES, so I can put it up on Dropbox and then access it from every device I use that can reach the Dropbox service! This has saved me innumerable hours and a world full of worry. Even if one site is compromised I don’t have to worry because each site has its own unique 16 character random password assigned to it and managed through 1Password. I don’t even care if a site forces me to regularly change my password, because every new password will be a random 16 character entry from the password generator that is already in 1Password. I can’t express how much time, energy, and attention-span I’ve been able to save with using this product. When something like 1Password is built, and built well, I can’t help but rave about it. Everyone should be using this software, it would make everyone so much more secure.

iPhone App Review

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In an earlier post I wrote about how I promised you all an iPhone App review, so without further waiting, here it is. In this review I will be skipping any apps that also appear on my iPad, as I’ve pretty much exhaustively covered those apps, unless the iPhone brings a fresh perspective that I didn’t have with my iPad. Just so that everyone is on the same page, my iPad is a 16GB Wifi only model, and the first generation. My iPhone is also a 16GB model and linked to Verizon, it’s fourth generation. On with the show…

iPhone 4 App Review

  1. Evernote – The recently updated Evernote app is without a doubt one of the single most awesome and compelling apps on my iPhone. The new interface works so much better than the previous iteration of the app on the iPhone device. I am patiently waiting for this kind of refreshing redesign to happen for the Evernote for iPad app as well. Every time I open Evernote, I can’t help but think back to struggling with the very same app on my old Blackberry. The difference? Night and Day.
  2. Photography Group
    1. Camera – The baked in Camera app for the iPhone 4 comes with the device. The controls are very easy and it was a definite pleasure to see that the app does stills and video, and can be configured for either camera, the front-facing or rear-facing.
    2. Camera+ – This app borrows a lot of structure from the plain Camera app. It has a different zoom feature, timed shutter, burst mode, advanced flash handling and a pretty neat focus-fixing gesture system which I’ve yet to really get into. The app also has it’s own “Camera Roll” beyond the plain system one, and this allows you to edit the photos, crop them and apply some pretty cool filters. You can of course export any photos you take from the apps “Camera Roll” to the system “Camera Roll”, so it’s quite handy.
    3. Panorama – I haven’t really gotten a chance to play around with this one, it was free, eventually I’ll get to trying it out.
    4. Instagram – The collision of social media and photography! This app is great. You can configure Twitter, Facebook, Posterous, Flickr, Tumblr, and FourSquare all from the app itself. Take a picture, apply one of its old-timey filters if you want, and then send the photo at once to all the services or specific ones you choose. So far very happy with it.
    5. FoodSpotting – This is more niche than Instagram. It works a lot like Instagram but it’s for food in restaurants. You take a picture and you can share it. The only gripe I have about FoodSpotting is the setup for the social services aren’t very clear, it’s nothing like any other app I’ve used and I kept on hitting my head against a mysterious login box until I realized I had to put in my FoodSpotting.com username and password. Oops. Once it’s off the ground, it’s very handy.
  3. Utilities Group –
    1. Clock – The clock app is one of those baked-in apps that come with the device. I almost never review the baked in apps, except for this one case. There appears to be a gremlin that still lives in this app. I have a handful of alarms, and whether the alarm is on or off doesn’t matter. So far it doesn’t suffer from the previous problem of “alarm doesn’t fire”, but it’s odd in that alarms fire even if they are “Off”. I think this app is still a work-in-progress for Apple’s iOS team to work on.
    2. Voice Memos – This app still has a use for really long audio recordings. It’s lost a fair amount of power when Evernote redid their app and added audio recording – so you could technically audio-record right into your Evernote system. I suppose you could use this app and then email the audio into Evernote later, perhaps it’s six and one half-dozen kind of thing.
  4. Facebook – The Facebook app is odd. It’s there for the iPhone but not the iPad. I’ll never understand that. The app works well enough, it’s pretty straightforward and if you have a facebook account, you should get it. I don’t know many people who don’t have a facebook account any longer.
  5. Social Group
    1. Glympse – I wrote about Glympse when I had it on my iPad. The system really shines when you have a 3G network connection or if you insist on running it on the iPad, to have a 3G-to-Wifi bridge as you are mobile. I used Glympse with my mother and she loved it. She thought it was really neat. You send a “glympse” to an email addressee and they get a link they can click on and see your position, speed, and path in real-time. The only part of this app that irks me is the expiration to “glympses”. I would prefer to hand my mother a link that would always work if I was running “Glympse” on my iPhone, she would know where I am whenever she liked. Some people see this as an invasion of privacy, but really, what do you have to hide? Come on.
    2. Bump – I got this free app to share some pictures that Scott had on his iPhone. Bump works well when the datasets are small. If you want to share a LOT of data, like a bunch of pictures in a Camera Roll on the device, prepare for disappointment. Bump really didn’t work out for me. Another app, which I reviewed on my iPad, called Transfer works much better for moving big data sets between iOS devices.
  6. Travel Group –
    1. Trapster – Before the price of fuel went to obnoxiously high levels I used to have a relatively leaded foot when it came to driving. I regularly find myself pushing 76 in a 70 zone and I’ve been caught “Not Paying Full Attention” to speed zones in the past. This app allows you to share socially the presence of speed traps and other road hazards. Since I keep my speed now pretty much below 60MPH to save on gas costs most of the reason to use this app have gone out the window, but I keep it around, it’ll likely be really helpful on long-duration trips.
    2. StreetPilot – Garmin’s Nuvi interface designed for iOS. I can enter in an address or do a Google Location search and have yet to find something it can’t route me to. This app has vocal turn-by-turn directions and is as “helpful” as a Nuvi. One of the nicest things is that the maps will never go out of date as it downloads map data from Garmin automatically. When I start this app my mind goes back to the Sprint Navigation app on my Blackberry, powered by Telenav. This app, StreetPilot, blows that old Telenav application out of the water. Again it’s night and day. I would never use the Telenav junk because it never worked. So far StreetPilot has not let me down once. Again it’s because an iPhone is a supremely more advanced and better-equipped phone than the Blackberry could ever dream of being.
    3. TripIt – Making big trips, with airplanes and hotels usually is handled somewhat well using Evernote, but not any longer. TripIt is a free app and free web service that enables you to organize all your travel details through one very well designed app. What really blows my mind is the web service provides you with an email address that you can forward your confirmation emails to and the service will automatically extract the details from what you forwarded and populate your trip for you. Incredibly handy. The fact that it’s free blows my mind.
  7. 1Password – I have this app on my iPad, my iPhone and every Mac I own. Without a doubt the single BEST purchase and BEST investment I ever made, beyond buying into the Apple Digital Lifestyle. What makes it shine? Sync with Dropbox. Everything is the same on every device. Everyone should buy apps from 1Password, then use the app to change each site they have an account on with the random generator in 1Password and control them all from that suite of apps. When one site suffers a security breakdown, your loss is microscopic. You lost 1 of thousands of 16 digit random passwords. This app is worth its weight in GOLD. I’m so happy my mother pushed me towards it!
  8. Business Group
    1. DraftPad – If ever you needed just a quick place to jot down some text, this app does a pretty good job. It’s free, it’s very simple to use, and does one thing, taking quick temporary notes, very well.
    2. CamCard – I downloaded the Lite version of this app. It enables your phone to take a picture of a business card and then it scans in the details, does OCR, and populates your Contact List with the details from the card. Very useful. I got the Lite version because I almost never get business cards but when I do, it’s nice to have this as an option.
  9. Scanners Group
    1. Qrafter – This app from Kerem Erkan is free on the App Store and is the BEST QR Code scanner I’ve ever had the pleasure to use. It’s professional, free, and the way it scans, presents the contents of the scan and all the extended features that it can pick up from a QR code is wonderful! There are a few other QR scanners and they are okay, but this one is the top of my list without a doubt!
    2. QR Creator – Kerem Erkan, on his website, also has a QR creator page which has a special mobile rendering on iPhone devices. I browsed to it in Mobile Safari and then made an app-icon-bookmark. You can create custom QR codes and save them to your Camera Roll and print them using AirPrint or send them to someone else via email or even Evernote or Dropbox! Quite nice.
    3. PriceCheck – This app from Amazon.com is a great way to check on local stores profiteering. Just grab an object from the shelf, open this app, scan the bar code with the camera and Amazon will spit out it’s best prices for that item. I’ve yet to use it for more than simply checking on things to see how the scanner worked, but it does work. I’m pretty sure you can one-click order through the App if you set it up with your Amazon login information. That would be too-funny. Especially for Best Buy, Target, and Bed Bath and Beyond. Low prices my ass. 🙂
    4. RedLaser – This works a lot like PriceCheck but isn’t tied to Amazon.com. I have used this app and it’s saved both of us some money and aggravation. There is a scented candle that Scott really likes in the bathroom and it’s a big one, the price tag from BB&B was $22 bucks. He wanted another candle just like it for the bathroom but couldn’t remember what it was called or who made it. While I was in the bathroom I fished it out of the garbage and scanned it using RedLaser. Not only did it find the right make and scent but also found it online for HALF THE PRICE. I then tapped the option button in RedLaser and right there was “email this info” option, I sent it to Scott and minutes later he was thanking me. Don’t thank me, thank that app! 🙂
    5. Color ID – I have what I regard as accurate color vision. Scott on the other hand can from time to time run into trouble identifying colors. This free app is cute, you start it, point the camera at an object and press the shutter button. The phone will calculate the color, give you its “creative name”, its hex code for inclusion on websites, and it will read the color off via voice from the speaker. I spent half an hour identifying all the colors in my bathroom. For anyone challenged with color blindness, this app is a godsend. The only oddity with the app is that it doesn’t like being sent to the background. Once you put it in the background and then call it up again the scanning part doesn’t work. You have to quit the app and restart it. Even with this oddity it’s still quite useful.
  10. GroceryIQ – This app is sort of a scanner, sort of a listmaker, but it floats outside of other groups because it’s different. I like using this app more than ShopShop because the way it’s designed fits better with trips to the supermarket. I love it’s listmaking and check off features. The scanner is quite dumb, and while you can scan an item and put it on the list, it’s just as easy to type it in by hand.

So that’s that. Those are the apps on my iPhone that differ from my iPad apps. It’s nowhere near the exhaustive list of all the apps I have, but these are the ones I felt warranted the most discussion and I think other people would benefit from using. I’m open to reviewing other apps, if you are an app developer please feel free to drop me a line or make a comment and I’ll check out your app and give you my honest opinion or even a review. If you find something in my reviews that helps you, please comment and let me know!

iPad 2

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I caught up with Apple’s announcement of the iPad 2 after I got back from Comixlunch with Scott. It appears at least to me to be an evolutionary enhancement to the original iPad device. The A5 dual-core processor is a very good improvement and the cameras are certainly quite nice to have. In many ways it’s as if the iPhone 4 design team and the original iPad design team had a kegger and came out with a really great new design. It seems to be a forward-thinking blend of the two reference devices.

Along with the actual meat of the matter, the silly stuff is also front and center. People moaning and carrying on about “does it come in white?” will be happy. When I fielded some questions about the iPad 2 today one of my coworkers remarked on the devices lighter weight and thinner presentation than the original device. In response I laughingly referred to the original iPad as being made of neutronium and wondering over how we all coped with the agony of the first iPad. I see this next device to be an evolutionary step up from the original iPad. It’s not revolutionary, to do that would require a wholly new form-factor, a new design, a new OS, new everything. If it isn’t that, then it’s evolutionary. It’s impressively better, but it’s still an evolved form of the original device.

So, for those people who are seeking my advice about buying an iPad, here’s the skinny:

  • If the pricetag is the most important thing for you, then go for the now deprecated original iPad. Apple knocked $100 dollars off the price of the device and now it’s really quite compelling.
  • I would seriously avoid buying any refurbished device. I’m quite bearish on refurbished devices. If you can find the extra $50, you really owe it to yourself to get a factory-fresh model and not some repaired victim.
  • If money isn’t an issue then I strongly recommend buying the iPad 2. The speed, the cameras, the new software and the 1080p via cable is quite compelling.
  • If you already have an iPad and it’s working for you, I don’t see any reason to dump your current device and buy a new one. The only caveat to that is if you are planning on gifting your device to someone else, then feel free to buy the new iPad 2. The new iPad itself doesn’t have enough “Killer Features” to warrant the dropping of iPad 1 and rushing out to the Apple Store for iPad 2.

I forecast that the iPhone 5 will be even less of an evolutionary leap. What more could the device do? Get thinner? Transparency? What new technology could possibly be stuffed into the device to make everyone get all hot and bothered for it? Apple is running out of room to innovate. Saying that, I could be surprised, but it would take a lot to really get me to look at my current iPhone 4 with anything less than utter adoration.

eBooks & Public Libraries

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In earlier blog entries I went on at length about how eBooks were going to change the book business and I puzzled over the role of Libraries providing their users with a pseudo-socialized way to “steal” books, mostly under the comic jab that Barnes & Noble should seek to shut down libraries because they eat into sales.

I also still think that downloading an eBook is virtually indistinguishable from going to the Library and borrowing a book. The destination I reached was a new principle called the Preservation of Inconvenience. That publishers need to maintain a certain basic level of “Being a Pain In The Ass”. To which, the link below points. It appears as though HarperCollins, in an effort to retain their basic level of “Being a Pain In The Ass” will count how many times a library lends out an eBook, and if it goes beyond 26 times, they’ll sell the eBook to the library AGAIN. Over and over.

So once again the old battle is joined. Consumers versus Producers, and the weapon of choice for the producers is Digital Rights Management. The best way to de-fang DRM is to only consume content in open formats. Accept nothing else.

eBooks In the Public Library Under Fire! | Gear Diary.

Metapost: MyWMU.com

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I’m creating a new category called Metapost. I think of it as a “behind the scenes” post where I share some of the details of what goes on behind the scenes. There won’t be any dirty laundry for these posts, but there are some things that I will discuss that might make some people feel awkward and uncomfortable. If this is the case, then you are free to ignore my squawking. Nobody is forcing you to Clockwork Orange my blog.

The development of MyWMU.com started really last year when we had a change of leadership. Our new VP arrived and brought a whirlwind of change in his wake. We kind of already knew that there were some of us in the rank and file who were fond of technology and especially clever with social media. The nature of social media pretty much guaranteed that we’d discover each other and our strengths and expertise. Originally there were three, then we acquired some consultants and the group grew to five. This core group of five started to brainstorm some pretty great ideas. A lot of the power I found was always there but viciously muted by a culture that didn’t understand and didn’t care to understand what possibilities lay before it. Once that culture evaporated, like so much fog in a stiff breeze, the past, the negativity, the railing complaints all fell away and all that was left was a group of very creative people who could finally enjoy the blessings of evaporating negativity and a massive new influx of empowerment. Once given power we took it and marched forward. Some would say we progressed at a breakneck speed, but as far as my perceptions go, it was brisk and refreshing, not an onerous pressure as some would assume. I can remember when “Western Express” came to me. I was driving on Interstate 94 from Paw Paw to Kalamazoo after a wonderful celebratory meal at Bistro 120. As we were making our way towards the I-94 on ramp we started to brainstorm titles for this new blog we were thinking of. I knew it had to feature Western in it somehow, so that was obviously going to be in the title and I had a firm grasp on what we wanted to accomplish with this new blog. Right after we joined the flow of traffic on I-94, headed back to Kalamazoo it was if the title for the blog emerged from the tangle of thoughts in my head and solidified. It felt a lot like how a super-chilled glass of water can freeze if you agitate it, that progressive and fantastic freezing as the liquid acts surprised that it’s still a liquid and quickly marches into order and becomes a solid. Just like that the title fell into my mind, “Western Express” – and then I marveled at it. It was perfect. Express as in fast, Express as in News (Pony Express of old…) it was a title that was short, not schlocky, it had a pleasing multiplicity of meanings and I championed the hell out of it once I got back to work.

The blog took shape shortly thereafter as Western Express. The title was also handy in that it had a delightful initialism, “WE”. Not only “Western Express” but also “Together”. I still softly chuckle at how great it all turned out.

We had selected a host of different technologies to help us with our goal. The biggest technology we saw before us was WordPress itself. It was almost Kismet. A perfect superstructure with which to publish our message. An external entity, a different network, a company that was responsible for 17 million voices. It had everything including a breathtaking cost-efficiency that we could not possibly beat any other way. Twenty bucks to turn off ads, ten bucks for custom CSS adjustments, twelve bucks for custom domains. Such low sums in trade for stability, accountability, and professionalism was totally irresistible. Truth to be told, I didn’t even consider any other path to take. WordPress was so utterly PERFECT, such a great fit, so elegant that any further considerations were thoughtlessly abandoned.

We progressed, establishing our new voice in popular consciousness using this new approach and I felt it vital that certain qualities were branded with fire into this new thing we had created. That it be a refuge of positivity, that it be regarded as a safe place where people won’t be seen as opportunities to be taken advantage of, but rather as guests standing around the bonfire of positivity, feeling welcome without a single worry that there were any traps anywhere near any of them. This was when I realized a truism that I’ve heard many times in the past – “Be that which you wish to see in the world”. So in a way, this “Western Express” was a kind of philanthropy. We express philanthropy into the world so we can reap philanthropy from the world. Is it a waste of money and resources? Absolutely not. The time and money and loving attention that we are giving this entire effort is how we can express our affections for everyone. Western loves our Alumni, we love our Students, we love everyone and we hope that what we put out into the world is reflected back at us. In many ways, it’s quite karmic. Finally we can put our collective humanity, our collective philanthropy into action and undo some of the damage that Western has endured in popular consciousness since I’ve been in attendance with this institution. That’s my personal goal, and as long as I have a role to play, this is what I bring to the table.

Things progressed from there, people think that we actively advertised this new resource but actually, the truth of the matter is that we made an embarrassing mistake. We failed to make this entire thing private and before we knew it we had people poking around this new thing and it became a socialized meme and spread like wildfire. It’s proof positive that social media is damn near a miracle. Without any action on our behalf the blog took off and started to spread. The fact that people regard it that we intentionally spread it always brings a chuckle. We didn’t do anything, you all did it yourselves – and we thank you.

After that, the entire project started to expand. We acquired two more staff members in our team and our technology increased. We turned to WordPress again for more help with hosting and WMYou was born. We purged the notion that what we were doing was blogging, that we had blogs. What we really had was an “Engagement” and we were “Engaging”. Truth to be told this slight change in verbiage is actually more accurate. What we’re after is engagement so instead of “blogging” we’re “engaging”. Perhaps you have to be where I am to see it completely. We also picked up GoDaddy as our Internet domain registrar. After that we also picked up iPage for the glue that is holding what you see how all together. No other technology really entered our minds and it wasn’t out of spite, it was just simpler to do it this way. In many regards some of the people who might feel awkward about what we did should consider themselves the unintentional victims of Occam’s Razor. The simplest path was pretty much all we spent any time on. C’est la vie.

Now we have a full presence, MyWMU.com. The response we received from our audience was absolutely intoxicating. What makes me blush is when I learned that other “bigger” institutions commented that we must have had a huge budget and a sprawling staff to pull off what we did. Truth here is that we did it all for about a hundred bucks and the raw passion of seven very dedicated and talented people.

Some people who went to our new site accidentally fell victim to a GoDaddy landing page. I had to make a last-moment change to our Domain Name System setting for the site and it took about 48 hours for that change to propagate throughout all of the Internet. People who had ISP’s who were lucky to get the “most fresh” DNS information experienced the site without a single hiccup, while others who either had an ISP with not-so-fresh DNS data or had DNS Cache staleness problems ended up seeing the GoDaddy landing page. For those people who fell into the later camp, I offer my apologies and I hope that you try the site again, that problem should no longer affect anyone on the Internet.

Now that we have expended a rather prodigious amount of energy to get MyWMU.com aloft, we are still very active and we’re really looking forward to see just how far all this positivity can take us as an institution. Our story has just begun, to say “Stay Tuned To This Bat Channel” is a massive understatement. I hope everyone enjoys what we’ve brought to our little corner of the Internet. It means a lot to all of us on our team and we’re always seeking feedback and fresh ideas, so don’t be shy. 🙂

Banishment

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Earlier today I read a news article that stated that someone had successfully knocked the Westboro Baptist Church offline effectively silencing them online. There are few people who get under my skin, but these people, they hit all my buttons. They hate gays and are obnoxious about it.

While I don’t approve of their speech being curtailed, as the First Amendment protects us all, despite the quality of what we say and I must respect that. Deep down their silencing does gratify me, despite it technically being a crime.

What I think should be a new element of popular media is a type of banishing. Banishment has always been a really effective punishment for anyone. Yes you committed a crime, and so you are sent away. In this context however it’s impossible by the law to actually physically banish anyone. What I propose is a kind of attention-banishment. In the case of the WBC they are allowed to spout their vitriol and hatred according to the First Amendment, but every popular media outlet agrees that they are to be ignored. This could only work if all the elements of popular media could be brought together in this way, but it doesn’t really have to be an all-or-none deal, a majority would do just as well. Everyone agrees that stories that touch on the WBC are skipped. It’s not that anyone curtails the WBC’s speech, it’s just that nobody really learns of it or hears about it. In many ways, they are banished, ignored, and over time and enough starvation of attention they will fade into nothingness. The majority of the banishment would be covered if Google removed every reference to the WBC from its index and CNN purged all the stories in its archive that touch on the WBC. In a way, it’s a little like 1984, that if we all agree to forget, and if we all agree that organizations like the WBC exist, then in a very real way, they actually cease to exist. Yes, they can continue to scream and protest and carry on without any curtailment to their actual speech, but we all agree to turn our backs on them and ignore them. Eventually there won’t be any reason to grandstand and show off and protest for them because it’s meaningless. Nobody sees them, everyone ignores them, and no cameras will point their way. No reporters will write stories on the WBC and their existence will be struck from public consciousness. It’s even within this argument that the Wikipedia article for Westboro Baptist Church be eliminated. No historical record of them will be shared.

With this type of banishment, especially in our increasing socially connected world, anyone who is declared banished might as well just give up what they are doing, as it’s just a waste of time, money, and energy.

This reminds me of one of those late-night sci-fi shows that used to be on, like Outer Limits, where criminals weren’t incarcerated at all. They had a mark placed on their forehead that they couldn’t cover up and anyone who saw the mark behaved as if they didn’t exist. They weren’t seen, they weren’t talked to, they weren’t THERE. They could do anything they wanted, but they were cut off from the rest of humanity – and in a way, banished. What a punishment. It just takes my breath away.

Verizon, please don't be like Sprint. Please.

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My VP asked if I had included the iPhone Hotspot feature on his device and I discovered that when I had the order set up that it fell through the cracks. So the task was clear, have Verizon turn the feature on. This should have been a shrug, a flick of a switch, and blam, all set.

No.

I emailed my Verizon rep and in the subject put down the person, the line, and then in the message, would they please turn on the hotspot. My iPhone was configured to put a signature at the bottom of the email, Andy McHugh – 269-216-4597. So I sent the email to my rep at Verizon thinking that was that.

No.

What I saw was a CC’ed message from Verizon with a number I didn’t recognize. But then again, I didn’t really look at it too deeply because I remember from Sprint that my Blackberry had a “Real Number” and a “Bullshit Number” and I thought at least on a cursory glance that this iPhone had the same deal. A “Real Number” and some “Bullshit Number” that only means something to Verizon. I didn’t give it any thought at all.

Then I got a message from Verizon Government Care, “Uh, Mr. McHugh, we, uh, we can’t do anything with 269-216-4597, it’s not ours.” Yes, you are right. That’s my GOOGLE VOICE NUMBER! Durrr. So I replied “Dear Sonia, please LOOK AT THE SUBJECT.” and then reiterated my request with the name and the right phone number.

So, is it Verizon’s fault for misunderstanding my original message? Is it my fault for having a rather humdrum signature on my emails? Bygones. There is more than enough blame to go around and it wasn’t like there was anything really life-threatening on the line. I have learned a lesson though, it pays to be really REALLY demonstrative and clear and repetitive with Verizon. It’s not that they can’t do the things I ask of them, it’s just GIGO is apparently a very shallow target.

Huuuurrrr. I started to have Sprint-related flashbacks, that’s never good. 🙂

Comic Tent Flapping

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I’ve signed up for The Weather Channel’s “Notify” service. This is supposed to alert me when there is a meteorological emergency and I use it mostly for thunderstorms as power outages can cause havoc with my systems at work.

Mostly the service runs great, and always alerts me when there is some sort of emergency. The problem is that it alerts me too well. In alert management I believe it’s called tent flapping. The alert spawns a thick group of alerting emails and phone calls. Each alert throws off two calls, and about four emails. It’s always comic when there is an alert as every device I own beeps, vibrates, or rings.

At least I can’t say that I wasn’t alerted. 🙂

Watson

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I’ve been following Watson’s progress against human contestants on Jeopardy. While I’ve been reading along I couldn’t help but think of Blaine the insane monorail train from the Dark Tower series of books from Stephen King. As Roland, Eddie, Suzannah, and Jake attempt to riddle for their lives against the broken personality of Blaine the similarity struck home. Watson is good at answering trivia questions, but if you started to pose “stupid” questions, just like how Eddie did to Blaine, would Watson suffer the same ill effects?

I could almost see Kevin Jennings standing over Watson screaming at the top of his lungs with spit flying “Why did the Chicken cross the road?!?” 🙂

iPhone 4 on Verizon – Delightful!

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While re-reading my old Blackberry / iPhone / Droid post (which is my #1 most viewed page!) I started to chuckle at my May 10th 2010 self versus my February 16th, 2011 self. What has my experience been now that I’ve had my iPhone for a fair bit?

I am in love with this device.

Now I can fall pretty hard for a pretty face, especially when it comes to a new gadget. I categorize myself as a “use it all” kind of iPhone user, the curious geek who refuses to stop fiddling with a device until I have it just so. I don’t go as far as the GPL/FSF folks who want to take a phone and turn it into an Adirondack chair, but I do take my gadgets for pretty intense rides.

So what do I think now? Blackberry is dead. I rescued all the data I cared for out of my old Blackberry device, I wiped it clean and I removed the battery. I haven’t even looked back or even thought of it since then. I imagine in my mind’s eye, a giant crematorium where I open the giant door and start pitchforking all the useless memories and upset feelings and anger and close the door to watch it all burn to ash. I used to fantasize about annihilating my Blackberry. Now that I have my Verizon iPhone 4, I don’t really care to go back there anymore. I don’t care for Blackberry Enterprise Server, or RIM, or any of the other silly things that having a phone with a network endpoint in Canada means.

As I look out now, I respect Droid for its user base and how well it’s progressed. I’m still quite critical that certain manufacturers are keeping their customers from upgrading to the latest and greatest version of the Droid operating system in order to squeeze as much money as they can from them. I can appreciate the Droid, but I don’t espouse it’s use or recommend it to anyone I know. Most people aren’t seeking my recommendations when it comes to mobile device operating systems anyways. One small problem I have with Droid is the kill-switch that Google maintains on the devices apps and the laissez-faire style with which the Droid App Store is policed. It’s too wild and too uncontrolled for my tastes and I don’t think exposing people who aren’t interested in the hows and the whys is a very wise move. These people get it in their head to download something hazardous like a trojan horse and then the show is over.

How about the iPhone? It’s amazing. The devices display, the two cameras, all the apps! It’s kind of overwhelming. There are so many things I can do now, now that I am using a real network with a real device. I can browse the web the way I want to, not the way that my old Blackberry forced me to do. I can read my emails, including HTML emails with ease and pleasure. The network is snappy, nice and quick and about the same speed as Sprint when Sprint was in its heyday. Those days are done, by the way. This device, this iPhone does everything that Apple promises and does it exceptionally well. Everything from fit, finish, to overall quality is as I expect from Apple, beyond my wildest expectations. Of course, every cute puffy cloud does have it’s darker sides as well. There are only a few of those, and mostly it comes down to ringtones, using the iPhone on multiple machines, but beyond that, which none of them are show stoppers. Instead of wanting to throttle the Blackberry devs to death with my bare hands I just want to tousle the hair of the Apple devs who baked these oddities into their device.

Soon I will write a review sheet about all the apps I’ve gotten for my iPhone. Instead of duplicating all the apps that I reviewed already for my iPad (as there is a huge overlap) I’ll only review those apps that are unique to my iPhone and why I chose them. That’s coming up soon, keep an eye out for it if you like my reviews.