Category Archives: Gadgets & Apps

All posts that don’t obviously fit in one of the sub-categories go here.

Apple polishing

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Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced some new stuff yesterday. These events get Mac users hopping from one foot to the other and –now that I have a Mac– I sort of understand why. I can’t explain why, but I kind of get it.

Speaking of “get it” … I’ll eventually have to get one of the slick new nano’s (I just watched the amazing ad for same). The new Shuffle is literally wearable computing.

And there’s a new version of iTunes. I’m a sucker for a pretty UI and this is about as nice as they come. I haven’t seen them but there’s talk of a new series of Get A Mac ads poking fun at Windows efforts to mimic the sleek look and feel of the Mac OS. I’m sure Vista is/will be pretty but if the new iTunes is a hint of what the new Mac OS is going to look like… it’s no contest for me.

If you spend 90% of every waking moment looking at a computer, that time is more pleasant…more fun… if it’s Mac.

Casio Exilim EX-Z1000

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My beloved Casio camera started giving me some weird white screens and rather than wait for it to completely fail at a critical moment… I upgraded. The Casio Exilim Ex-Z1000 is the new, bigger brother to the model I had. Slightly larger form factor but that allows for an even larger display. Lots of megapixels and some optical zoom. But the real clincher for me was the video. With a 2 gig SD card, I can record up to two hours of video! Amazing. Sound is pretty good, too. Here’s a little 2 min clip (13 meg .wmv) I shot last night. John Fougere and David Brazeal doing the weekly high school football scoreboard show.

Record Skype calls. Easy.

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Call RecorderCall Recorder from ecamm network provides a really simple, inexpensive ($13) way to record a Skype call. For Mac users. David and I chatted for 2 minutes last night so I could check this out. I was using an inexpensive LogiTech headset/mic and I’m not sure what David was using. He sounded a little hotter than I did and Call Recorder does not give you a way to monitor levels (that I saw). But this is literally a one-button plug-in for Skype.

The resulting audio file is a Quicktime .mov file. Call Recorder comes with a few conversion tools that turns your call into an MP3 file. And one of the tools converts to two channels so you can work with either end of the call. For price and ease-of-use, I don’t know how it can get much better.

The quality will only be as good as your connection and your mics. But I think this sounds a lot better than anything you’d get with a regular phone call. And I think I can tweak this for better results. I’ve got a couple of interviews coming up that will give me a better test drive. And, as I told David, I’m sure that are Windows apps that will do this as well or better.

Is your “stuff” good enough to pay for?

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“Alltel Wireless customers will be able to access XM Satellite Radio programming via their cell phones for $7.99 per month. The deal links the fifth-largest mobile service provider in the United States with the world’s largest satellite radio company. Like its competitors, Alltel is facing the imminent prospect of market saturation, so the company is seeking high-value content to gain additional revenue from its customer base.”

Seems to me you’d have to be a big fan of XM to pay an extra eight bucks a month to listen on your cell phone. And wouldn’t that be hell on the battery? But the more interesting question (for me) is: Do you have the kind of content that someone would be willing to pay for?

As businesses figure out that they can –if they’re clever enough– take their message directly to their customers, they’ll stop paying to have their messages jammed down people’s throats. We are approaching a time when the only reason people will listen to an (unwanted) commercial message is because they can’t figure out a way to avoid doing so. If you want to talk to your customers, you better start listening to them.

If you don’t know how to do that, you’re in trouble with a capital T and that rhymes with P and that stands for pool.

Skype: “The whole world can talk for free”

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phoneFinally got around to trying out Skype. Amazing. I waited so long because I couldn’t imagine that it wouldn’t be a bitch to set up and use. Wrong. Took 5 min to install and set up. Typed in David’s Skype name and we’re jabbering way. Sounded like he was in the room with me. I know this is no longer new technology but I had a little 21st century flash of: “Watson, come here! I need you!”

Of course, I remember when it was cool to be able to put a phone caller on the radio. But Skype is cool. A little latency and –once in a while– some of the digital sound, but sooo much better than a regular phone line.

As soon as I figure out how to record a call I’ll post a sample. And you can have up to 5 people on at once. Made for podcasting.

So who’s using Skype? If you’re willing to chat with me as I figure this out, drop me a line at stevemays at gmail.com.