Monthly Archives: September 2010

The end of wallets

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I’m not a wallet guy. I rarely have it with me and keep no more than the bare minimum in when I do. Health plan card from work; auto insurance car; voter registration card, etc. No money.

Today I scanned a couple of cards and dropped them into GoodReader on the iPhone. Probably wouldn’t satisfy a trooper or the lady at the doctor’s office (even though all she does is photocopy the health plan card), but better than nothing and the info is there.

I think the days of carrying around little pieces of plastic are just about over. Already over in more technically sophisticated countries.

JotNot Scanner Pro

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Call 911, I’m having a handy attack! George turned me on to a wonderful iPhone app called JotNot Scanner Pro. Snap a photo of a document or page in a book or magazine, and the app converts it to a PDF. And the quality is very good, almost the same result you’d get with a flat-bed scanner.

I’ve been snapping pix of text and saving the images since I got the iPhone. But having it converted to PDF on the fly is the bee’s knees (mixed insect metaphors).

Living in the cloud

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I’m no longer on the company computer network. My iMac is one of only a half dozen or so Macs in the building and I made very little use of the network anyway. And it’s something of an experiment.

I had one of the first personal computers in our company. I bought a Zenith back in the late 80’s and used it for word processing and for tracking affiliate stuff. It was connected to no thing and nobody (except my little dot matrix printer)

The first “network” in the company –as far as I can recall– was a peer-to-peer lash-up in the Missourinet newsroom. No network server, just individual PC’s (Compaq’s with 20 MEG hard-drives) talking to each other.

I don’t remember the exact evolution after that but before long the building was networked and as we added offices throughout the country, they came online. And we now have two full-time network administrators and the network has become critical to the operation of our company.

So why did I cut the cord?

As one of the “web guys,” most of my work has been taking place “in the cloud” for some time. I access company email from a web browser and can do just about everything I need to do, without being on the company grid.

Plus, anytime there was a software upgrade, I had to ask someone with admin privileges to do it for me. Sort of like having your mom come unzip your pants so you could pee. Unpleasant for everyone.

When coworkers need to send me a file that is too large to attach to an email, they drop it on one of the network drives I can no longer access from my iMac. I’m working around that and will eventually get them to put it up on my iDisk, Dropbox or drip.io. Which works in the other direction, too.

For me the Net has become the network. Lots of storage, nearly ubiquitous access, great tools. I feel like a dog that chewed through his leash. Woof!

iPad stories

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The company I work for has been giving iPads to our sellers as incentives for meeting sales goals. The iPads are theirs to use any way they choose. Here’s some of the feedback to date:

“I use it at home more than anything for web browsing etc.  But also bring it in the office everyday, just in case I made need it for meetings, etc”

“I never see it, but my family loves it!”

“My family and I have been enjoying the iPad since receiving it back in early August. I tend to use it more as an informational resource, especially to view daily newspapers and other on-line publications. My kids love the game apps and we have started to explore some of the educational programs. Much like the Wii and the Flip Video Cam previously, the iPad was a very popular gift this year for my gang.”

“Using it at home right now for personal use.  I am sure when sales season picks up I will use on some presentations.”

“Yes I use my iPad all the time at home…my laptop is collecting dust. I use it some at work for taking notes in a meeting. I can’t really use it beyond that because it’s not 3G. We have bad WiFi in the stadium where our offices are.”

“Using the iPad a lot at home actually. Funny enough, other than iTunes, we use it most with our 2 year old son. There are flash card apps on there that he LOVES, he asks to play on it almost every night. Pretty cool. Also really nice to have a second device with good internet access when either Stacie or I am on the MacBook at night. For work, not much lately just because there haven’t been the fact findings and presentations like we will have staring back again in January.”

“My 15 month old little boy is loving the iPad.  We have downloaded several Pixar movies to keep him entertained in the car as well as when we are dining out.  My wife has also downloaded several kid friendly apps that she uses as teaching/learning tools for him.  It has been awesome!  My mother-in-law has had an iPad for a while now, so (our son) knows his way around it much better than I.”

What do you think? Is the iPad a transformative (new) device? Will this (and similar) devices replace laptops one day? I expect our company to take the initiative in showing our sellers (and others) how to use the iPad as a communication tool in all kinds of settings. I find these stories very exciting.

“I’m there, you’re not, let me tell you about it.”

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“Your authority starts with, “I’m there, you’re not, let me tell you about it.” If “anyone” can produce media and share it with the world, what makes the pro journalist special, or worth listening to? Not the press card, not the by-line, not the fact of employment by a major media company. None of that. The most reliable source of authority for a professional journalist will continue to be what James W. Carey called “the idea of a report.” That’s when you can truthfully say to the users, “I’m there, you’re not, let me tell you about it.” Or, “I was at the demonstration, you weren’t, let me tell you how the cops behaved.” Or, altering my formula slightly (but retaining the essence of it…) “I interviewed the workers who were on that oil drilling platform when it exploded, you didn’t, let me tell you what they said.” Or, “I reviewed those documents, you didn’t, let me tell you what I found.” Your authority begins when you do the work. It should be obvious from this that if an amateur or a blogger does the work, the same authority is earned. Seeing people as a public means granting that without rancor.”

— An excerpt from a post by Jay Rosen, advising the next generation of journalists:

This is why I blog

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In March of of 2009 I posted an idea for an iPhone app for people who suffer from Alzheimer’s Disease. It continues to get comments, the most recent from a researcher in Australia New Zealand:

“I like your ideas! I am leading a small team of researchers that are in the process of examining uses of mobile computing technology in neurorehabilitation, including developing custom software for the iPhone. Our initial work is in traumatic brain injury, but it is likely that much of the work would be applicable to people with dementia, including Alzheimer’s Disease. That’s an area I’ve worked in previously, so will certainly be interested to extend the research into that area in the future as well. Thought you might be interested to know a little of what we’re up to.”

It would be fun to know that one of my ideas made it into an app that helped those dealing with this disease. If you or someone you know are using smart phones to “compensate for cognitive difficulties,” get in touch with Dr. Babbage.

Assuming Dr. Babbage found my post via a Google, I searched “Alzheimer’s Disease iPhone App” and it was number one result of 424,000. Twitter, Facebook, etc are all fun and/or useful but blogging is the only way I know to reach so many different people.

Scott Adams: “Shape Shifters”

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“One idea we all share is the narrow view that ideas are not alive in any way we like to define such things. We believe ideas are our tools, not our masters. That is exactly what the Shape Shifters have programmed us to believe. While we know that the ideas in our head control our behavior, we have an idea that we can choose any path we like, so we are blind to the fact we are little more than milk cows for our non-corporeal overlords. Everything we humans do is in the service of creating a better environment for ideas to reproduce. We create more babies so there are more brains to fill with ideas. We write books, make movies, build schools, and expand the Internet, all to help the reproduction of ideas.”