Category Archives: Gadgets & Apps

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

Phone calls from Gmail

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The new service puts Google in competition with Skype (and all the other telcom providers). Gmail has offered voice and video chat for two years, but both parties must be at their computers.

I made a couple of calls tonight and the quality was pretty damned good. Will I call someone from my laptop instead of just picking up the mobile? Probably not when away from my desk, but I can imagine using my MacBook as a speed-dialing speaker phone. And my brother and I have been calling (laptop-to-laptop) back and forth from Indonesia for a couple of years. Sounds like he’s in the next room.

Calls to numbers in the United States and Canada will be free at least through the end of the year. International calls range from 2 cents a minute to many countries.

And if you need to reach me, my Google phone number is 573.200.6776

Scott Adams: “Editors are the chefs of the Internet.”

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Scott Adams points to Newser to illustrate what he sees as the future of the Internet:

“Newser works, I believe, because somewhere in their back kitchen is an editor who has an uncommon feel for what stories to highlight, how to summarize them in a folksy voice, and in what order and combination they should appear. There’s some genius happening there. When I read news from other places, I often come away feeling deflated. When I read Newser, I always leave in a good mood. That’s why I return so often. It’s a mood enhancer masquerading as some sort of news site.

And that’s your future of the Internet. The cost of content, such as this blog, and my comic strip, will continue to approach zero. The art will happen with the editing. Others have made the obvious point that editing will be important for the future of the Internet. All I’m adding is the notion that most editors have skill, but few are artists. The world of print publishing is driven by editors who are exceptionally skilled. But they aren’t artists. Newser is edited by an artist. He or she isn’t giving me information; he’s adjusting my mood. That’s art. That’s the future.”

I don’t think I’ve ever visited Newser but I’m headed there now. Like thousands of others.

I’m back. And I wasn’t impressed by Newser but Mr. Adam’s point is a good one, nonetheless.

Readability

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I’m sure I’ve posted on Readability before but I keep running into people who don’t know about it and that’s just sad. Here’s an example of a web page:

…and here’s the same page, viewed with Readability…

You just click a little bookmarklet in your browser’s tool bar.

Apple’s Magic Trackpad

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I almost remember my first computer mouse. The weird sensation of coordinating my hand movements with the cursor on the screen. And –once I got the hang of it– how wonderful to be able to click and drag and all the rest. From time to time, you had to take the little ball from the guts of the mouse and clean off the crud sucked up from the desktop or the mouse pad (remember mouse pads?).

I tried some of the early touch pads but found them klunky. So, when I got my first MacBook –which came with a touch pad– I made sure I had a mouse close at hand. But the more I used the Mac’s touch pad, the more natural it felt. In time, I left the mouse at home.

Apple recently began shipping the Magic Trackpad and I have to say I love it. It took a few hours to feel completely natural but I now find myself using all of my fingers to do lots of things that are much more difficult (if not impossible) with a mouse. And it all feels completely natural and ergonomic.