Some weeks I have little to say, and others I have too much. This week’s blog focuses on a car ride. During that ride Jeff asked me two questions… ‘Why the iPhone?’ and “What is Twitter?” and I intend to do my best to answer both of those today.
Yesterday I had the privilege of playing an exclusive golf club in Sugar Grove called Black Sheep. A while ago, a friend and fellow Hacker Jeff Hutchison, asked me to work on his nonprofit website for the Aurora Kids Foundation. This group was founded by some soccer dads to help underprivileged kids learn sportsmanship, teamwork and more. I usually discount any work to nonprofits, but since Jeff and I just finished another website, I gave him a really deep discount. Towards the end of the AKF site being completed, I was talking with John Kiple and had to make them aware that I was going to have to start charging something for the flurry of changes and additions they were doing to the site. Understandably, he was not aware of what a site normally costs or how deeply I discounted it. So to thank me for the extra efforts he graciously offered a fun day in the sun… to hit a little white ball all over a finely manicured prairie.
At the halfway point we stopped at the club house for some refreshments and a quick lunch. Usually on a golf course, they serve a drink that’s a mixture of ice tea and lemonade called an Arnold Palmer. Black Sheep’s version replaces the lemonade with two types of tequila, which John’s friend and golf partner Kevin quickly renamed it the Arnold Palmero. To quote my buddy Jeff’s favorite saying ‘OUTSTANDING”. In the clubhouse they have two rules – no hats and no cell phones. So on the 10th tee, while waiting around for another group to tee off.. everybody whipped out their cell phone. The iPhones outnumbered the Blackberry 3-1.
Why the IPhone?
I have to tell you… I love the new iPhone 3GS. I had the original iPhone and skipped the second version. The S stands for Speed, Superior Battery Life, 3G Surfing and So much more. The combination of the newer faster processor, the GPS and the 3.0h software makes this little puppy a powerful handheld computer. Now that I’ve had it a week, I have a good sense of why people complained about the battery life on the last iPhone. I used the GPS map to track my way to a client meeting in Crystal Lake last week. When you’re using advanced features like the GPS and 3G wifi to download webpages and eMail, it does tend to suck up the battery pretty fast. So if this one’s better I can only imagine why people didn’t like the last.
I’ve used pretty much each new feature like… the ‘Video Recorder’ to interview my goddaughter Giada Locke and the improved 3.2 mega pix ‘Camera’ to take pictures on the course. Tap the home button once and it opens up a phone wide search for contact eMail and more! Press and hold the home button and it brings up ‘Voice Control’. Then you simply speak the persons name and it gives you the option to call them. If they have multiple numbers it then allows you to choose work, home or mobile.
On that ride home, I explained to Jeff… what makes the iPhone so cool and so useful is the apps. He asked “Where do you get those?” to which I answered ”Right from the iTunes store.”. So then I proceeded to demonstrate a few. I opened up
‘Omni Tuner’ and showed him how the iPhone works as my guitar tuner as it uses the built-in mic to tune various instruments like a 12 String, Mandolin even an Irish Bouzouki (whatever the heck that is). Then, I flipped on the FM radio, opened 
‘Shazam’, and pointed it at the speakers. Jeff said “That’s just nutz!”, as I handed him the phone and it correctly detected ‘John Mellencamp’ and ‘The Authority Song’. Then it gives you the option to preview or buy it on iTunes. Earlier in the day, I pulled up the app ‘Golf Card’ that downloads a digital scorecard and gives you a hole by hole GPS to track your shots. I can’t wait to see what comes next… like Tom Tom’s turn by turn GPS. Another thing that’s cool is… once you buy an app, you own it for life and most developers keep making them better and better. Like ‘Omni Tuner’… when I first bought it it would only do six strings, but now it tunes ‘Violins’ and includes a series of open tunings for guitar.
One thing the Blackberry will never be is an iPod. Obviously you can store music but the power of podcasts and having full length movies on your cell phone is… in Jeff’s words “OUTSTANDING”. We finished off the ride home with Jeff watching scenes from ‘Caddyshack’ to remind us of what a great day we just had.
The Twit that Tweets…
Jeff’s second question was ” What is Twitter and why would I want to use it?”. It’s kind of a complicated question to answer, but I did say that for a company it’s one of two things… it’s a research tool where you can search for info and links, and it’s a marketing tool to create a buzz about your product or service. I’ve used it to help clients create a buzz on the web… like golf club ferrule maker Cell-Parts or new client NewSeat that manufactures disposable hypoallergenic seat covers. If you’ve been living under a rock and have no idea what Twitter is… it’s a combination of a micro-blog and an SMS text message that limits you to 140 characters. People follow you and you follow others, and you can search through the millions of tweets that happen each day to find information, news or tips.
I’m teaching two classes at Waubonsee Community College this fall on using social networking for your business. This last Thursday, while prepping to give a condensed version of that class to an unemployed executive group, the news broke that Michael Jackson was being rushed to hospital.
A Facebook friend put up the alert. It wasn’t on TV or any of the online news sites I read so I jumped on Twitter and searched it. What I saw amazed me… there were over 1500 tweets per second happening at that time. Twitters social relevance came into focus during clashes in Iran last week when the US government asked them to abandon scheduled maintenance as to not interrupt the flow of information coming out of Iran. While teaching that class that night, I tweeted on my iPhone (Twitteriffic – another cool app) that I was teaching a class on social networking.
It can also be a negative if you say something controversial or just plain stupid like football player Ocho Cinco (Chad Johnson) who stated that the death of Michael Jackson was just as important as 9/11 (which he quickly recanted but not before the Twitter community had that spread everywhere).
So just to clarify… on Twitter you Tweet, and not Twit. A Twitterer is a Twit who Tweets. So don’t become a Twit who over Tweets on Twitter or people will block you. Got it? I’m sure it’s clear as mud.
Bonus Video
This week’s video just gives you another reason to understand why Macs are so much more powerful than PeeCees… Enjoy.
MacBook New Feature from COREANOMAC on Vimeo.
Yes I got it… I couldn’t resist. After bypassing the last iPhone 3G upgrade, this one was just too hard to resist. The last version was cool but did have its flaws. People constantly complained about the battery and the 3G was faster but not all that awe inspiring. I was not in a huge hurry to get the new one. Over the last few days, Tim complained about how his phone would only hold a charge for one phone call and how else it was dying, made a trip to the AT&T store an inevitable reality. Tim had taken the train of old Motorola phones that I had, and one by one turn them into piles of trash. Cracked screens, keys that wouldn’t dial, and other undisclosed ailments that sent those phones to an early grave.
Two years ago, when I bought my first iPhone, I gave him my old LG flip phone. It lasted this long so that’s good. When I was standing in line waiting for this new one, the dewd had to comment ”You’ve really had that phone for two years? I’ve never had a phone last minute long.”. Considering he was in construction, I can see how a hammer or a piece of plywood would turn any one of his phones into a pile of trash (kind like a teenager to do, or college kid). The original IPhone was fairly durable, but I did have to run the first one back to the Apple store once since the screen was displaying information skewed and I could not access all my menu items. After waiting two weeks I got my repaired phone back in the mail, and returned my loaner.
I was really not planning on making a trip last night, since my band had a gig and I figured I could wait to bypass the crowds. I even called a few AT&T stores during the day to see if they had any in stock and they all said the same thing “16 gigs are sold out we have a couple of 32 gigs left.”. Right before i was ready to pack up and head to the gig, the person who booked us called and said, “It’s not looking so good out here and we have no place to put you inside.” he had to cancel our Private Dough! show. Having just watched the Cubs come back from a 7-0 deficit and win it in the 10th, and have in our gig canceled, I decided it was time for a road trip. The monsoon and not started and we figured we take a trip down to the Naperville AT&T store.
With the heavy rain just starting, we made a mad dash from our perfect parking spot to the front door of the AT&T Fox Valley store only to find nearly to 50 people inside and a waiting list of 30 minutes (which should probably could have been three hours). Since we made it that far we decided to try the Oswego store which is where I bought my first iPhone and only had to wait in line for four hours the first time. We walked in and we were only third on the waiting list. We used that time to look through all the potential replacements for Timmy’s now dead LG. We found a couple that looked good and decided to wait to ask our sales person which one was the best. While standing there looking all this over, another salesperson walked by with a box… the ‘Holy Grail’… the iPhone 3GS. She said to the customer that she was waiting on “Are you sure you don’t want this? it’s our last one.”. before the potential new owner could even finish enunciating the oooo in ‘No’, Timmy blurted out “We’ll take it.”. Before you know it, where standing in front of the desk purchasing Tim’s new Samsung touchscreen phone and a new iPhone 3GS (32 gig).
It kind of brought back memories of waiting in line for the first one. I had myself convinced to take the 4 gig model, but after talking to handful of people in line, I change my mind figuring that over the course of two years, that extra 4 gig may come in handy. So once I made it up to the counter I opted for the additional cost in the 8 gig model. For the additional hundred bucks it’s hard to say that was a good choice or not but I think the long run, I was happy that I did.
After standing at the counter for nearly 2 hours, Tim was about to play with this new Samsung and I with my new iPhone along with additional accessories… like a case for Tim and a travel charger for mine. It blows my mind that a small piece of plastic to protect the screen of a phone can cost $10-$30. It kind of looks like something you’d throw away when you buy a new shirt and pull it out from behind the collar (and of course it’s made in China so you know it costs the least 1/10 of a penny). Our AT&T salesperson Jennifer, (630-276-6464) wrangled us up a deal we couldn’t resist. We had $140 in accessories for only $100 extra and Tim’s phone from costing over hundred to only $20. So when all was said and done AT&T had us both locked up for another two years. My plan costs an additional $15 a month to have the pleasure of being rightful owners of the latest and greatest technology. Thank goodness just a week earlier I cut my plan back $20 from 1100 minutes to 450 minutes. We have 8000 rollover minutes that is constantly whittled away to by expiring minutes month after month… so we will now try to use those up.
OK… this bad boy was madness in my pocket… I had to put it to the test. Today was our fourth annual Operation Helping Hands at Ginger Creek. 6 AM came early. Four months of planning, meetings, and challenges was finally at its pinnacle. 500+ volunteers were about to disburse on the city of Aurora, and it’s very needy non-profits who are struggling to keep afloat. First I was greeted by a couple of ‘Hello’s’ and then rudely awoken by the chant of “Where are the name tags?”. After a mad dash back to the house and finding out I didn’t have the right peel off labels, I scrambled and had 500+ name tags printed out ready for the arriving crowd.
I pulled out that that boy and was snapping pictures and taking videos at will. Not 100% sure of the outcome, but giving it the old college try. Having the bum shoulder I knew I was not going to be doing doing much heavy lifting this day, I darted off to a handful of the sites were hundreds of people were mulching and painting and just caring for others. At each place I took out my trusty 3GS and took pictures and videos. A little after noon I headed at home to assemble what I had captured. Earlier in the day I did create a Facebook post, and uploaded a few of the pics.
Once I synced up all the photos and videos to iPhoto, I quickly learned that I should have been taking all the videos in landscape mode instead of portrait. I edited all the videos together (very poorly I might add) in iMovie, and then had to export into Final Cut Pro, flipped 90°, re-export, and uploaded to Mobile Me to get a final viewable video. The 82 pictures I had, were quickly uploaded to Facebook and viewable by all.
When I upgraded to 3.oh, I loved the new cut copy and paste feature, along with the landscape typing for both text and an e-mail, and a very cool — shake the phone to shuffle your songs mode while using the iPod. But the hardware upgrade of the better digital camera, the built-in GPS functions (also available at the last version) and the new voice control, truly make this a worthy upgrade. With voice control, you simply hold down the home button for a couple seconds, and say “Call (insert name here)” and it will make the phone call. If you have multiple phone numbers for that person it will announce… “Which number do you want to call? Home, work, fax etc.”. It also lets you search for iPod songs work and tell you which artist is playing right now.
Yesterday, I was at my weekly human pincushion appointment (acupuncture) and it was slightly different than most. Normally, Mavis Bates (my acupuncturist) pokes me from my head to my toes and mostly on my shoulder. For those of you who don’t know, a rollerblading fall last spring caused a torn rotator cuff tendon and after an MRI and x-rays and orthopedic surgeon said “Son you need surgery”. I had knee surgery to repair a torn meniscus two years ago. It only took about a month to get back in shape. This shoulder surgery means sleeping in a recliner from month and not being able to play guitar or golf for four months or longer. That, my friends, It is unacceptable surgery behavior!
Talking with friends and cohorts Vern LaVia (Fox Valley Carpenter’s Place) and Michael Meyer ( Fox Valley United Way), they both suggested that I try some homeopathic options before succumbing to the knife. Mike recommended a doctor he used to work with, who uses physical therapy, massage and acupuncture and has great success with it. Vern suggested Mavis and loaned me his very cool infrared heat machine. After a month of trying all of the above I have to say I am at least 50% better in on the mend, and hoping that the homeopathic doctor was right. He said “You don’t need surgery as long as you have motion you can heal”. So far so good.
Normally after Mavis makes my body look like the invasion plan for Normandy, she turns on her soothing water over rocks machine coupled with Native American flute music echoing in the mountains, leaves the room, and lets me meditate for 20 minutes or so. Occasionally, she hooks up electrodes to certain needles and offers mild shock therapy (I think is a form of waterboarding) to help the healing ( I think).
Five years ago none of that would have mattered to me, but thanks to David Zinn (a dear friend and pastor and Ginger Creek Community Church) who literally took me by the hand and guided me down the road of how to get involved and make a difference in your own backyard. Now I volunteer on two boards, and either donate or work at very reduced rates for a number of nonprofits in the area. I spend hundreds of hours a year on projects at Ginger Creek like; Operation Helping Hands (happening next weekend) and adopt a child (Christmas gifts for the neediest kids). So now I have a much better perspective of how important and how selfless most of these agencies are. The Aurora Interfaith Food Pantry can barely keep their shelves stocked, because the formally well off families are now having to choose between paying the mortgage and feeding the family. A lot of them were just one paycheck away from disaster. When a husband or wife loses their job they can go from living high on the hog to having to scrounge for ham.
Speaking of paychecks, in a couple of months my wife Kim joins the ranks of the unemployed. After 14 years of working for the same company, they are closing her office and moving the jobs down to Peoria. It’s been a few months since they announced it, so a few in her office have been lucky enough to find a new job. Occasionally they will go out to lunch as a form of goodbye. What the soon-to-be re-employed don’t understand, is that a kind goodbye gesture is used by some as an ‘opportunity’ to say “Don’t let the door hit you in the butt on the way out”. While you’re eating lunch, scavengers are rummaging through your cubicle looking for the most valuable form of booty known to man in corporate environments… office supplies.
Yes… in infinite corporate wisdom, the company has cut off any expenditures including paperclips and post-it notes. Now it’s a form of currency just like cigarettes are in prison. I’ll trade you four yellow stickies for that pencil stub that you found. Next they are going to have to trade in paperclips to purchase toilet tissue to use latrine or the outhouse. Ah yes… it can be hard to remember the days of corporate integrity like when my father went to work for the Bell system they were loyal to him for life. When I worked for AT&T, I was told my face, that I was an expense and treated like it. So in some companies, you’re just a paperclip or post-it note waiting for your trip to the recycle bin.
I think we should rename June – National New iPhone month. Those lucky enough to have one, can update to 3.oh on Wednesday or purchase the new iPhone 3GS on Friday. The S stands for speed. The new hardware features a better camera, video capture, and more importantly, better battery life than last year’s model.
Earlier this week I got a note from somebody on Facebook that said, “Is this the same Brian that played in a band called Rock Candy?”. I answered back “I would be da man… Was Peggy in that band? How are ya dewd?”. Dan was our bass player in that band who we nicknamed “Puppy” for his low-key demeanor. I immediately forwarded to another Facebook friend, Don who was the drummer in that band. We were both floored to hear from him since ‘Rock Candy’ disbanded 20 years ago and went the way of ‘Force of Habit’, ‘Promise’, ‘Equinox’, ‘Freebird’, and a ‘The Pretzel Boys’ and dozens of other bands that are now just memories.
Social networking is the new online wave of catching up with old acquaintances and making new ones. I am on Facebook, Twitter and Linked-in along with a new one, Fast Pitch. Each of these serves a different group; Facebook is more of a personal social networking site, Twitter is more of a micro-blog and news source, Linked-in is more of a professional networking and informational site, and Fast Pitch is just a blatant sales and marketing social networking site. I am also a member of several ‘Meet-Up’ groups, which are online groups that get together for face-to-face meetings.
If you have teenagers, you know that the spoken word and written word are just so yesterday. If you want to talk with your kids and anytime, just text them. That way… you at least stand a 50-50 chance of getting a response. Facebook and MySpace originally started out as a social tool for high school and college aged kids. Now they have been completely hijacked by middle-aged newbies, who spend a good chunk of their time taking quizzes like; ‘Which celebrity would you be’, “Which state should you live in’, or ‘List your five favorite cereals’. Others spend their time playing games like ‘Mafia Wars’, where you trade for playing cards and just like in that old Warren Zevon song, ‘Lawyers, Guns and Money’.
I often hear from some of my professional counterparts that kids coming out of school are very technologically savvy, but people skills… not so much. They spend so much time in front of their technology that their desire to get on the phone or meet face-to-face has been diminished. That’s why I feel that going to networking groups is so important for any entrepreneur, especially those (like myself) who work in a home office by themselves. You just don’t get that quality people time, like I did when I worked in a cubicle for AT&T, Arthur Andersen, and other biggie companies.
I also hear from a lot of my friends, “Dewd when do you find time to work and sleep? You spend so much time online and at these networking groups”. I tell them, “I find quality time early in the morning and late at night, and the rest ‘I’m workin’ it’”. It’s all about impressions. Yes I would like to make a good impression on everyone I meet, but that’s not what I’m talking about. It’s advertising impressions. Each time people see my name, my company, my logo, I have just made an advertising impression. I am out there promoting myself, my business, my classes and presentations, my band, the nonprofits I work with, and anything else that I choose to market.
It’s finally here people! Monday at the Apple worldwide developers conference they are finally releasing IPhone 3.0h. To some of you, it’s not a big deal, but to those of us own IPhones… it will be. 3.0h is the new software release that adds all kinds of functionality to an existing IPhone. They’re also releasing the next generation of hardware.
One of the things I constantly tell people is that… ‘You rent technology, you don’t really buy it’! The lifecycle of most computers is 2-3 years and smart phones 1-2 years. If you are running a two-year-old PeeCee, chances are you’re only 32 bits in a 64 bit world.
It’s time for my ol’ boy to go to pasture since it’s too outdated to handle most of the tasks that the new iPhone can perform and is not compatible with some of the new software. It’s sad… but just a fact of life, that the technology by is usually outdated by the time you take it out of the box (just like when you drive a new car off the lot!).
People often cut corners on web hosting or domain name registration to save a buck. I can tell you that I love GoDaddy as a domain registrar. They offer pretty good tools at a fair price. The best part is that when you make a change, it happens in minutes… instead of days with some other bigger registrars. But their web hosting not so much. GoDaddy, Comcast, and most other bargain hosting companies, are merely reselling someone else’s service at a lower price. The real cost of that savings is often diminished customer service, and watered down features such as hard to use or non-existent back-ups.
Two of my clients learned this the hard way last week. One was hacked, and the other had their website simply disappear. Both had their sites on GoDaddy hosting.
On our Web server, we set up a program that automatically backs up every website once a week. We charge five dollars a month to copy those weekly back-ups and save them so people that are really concerned have legacy back-ups. Every web client is covered for least a week and those who don’t pay for the back-up service are simply charged for the time it takes to restore when that needs to happen. When a restore is initiated, it reconstructs everything, including e-mail, databases, files, and in a way that they all interconnect.
The really stupid one, happened right here in this house. Timmy is fresh back from college and his PeeCee was acting up. He told me it was having a hard time booting up. I was not really concerned since this was the third time that Timmy’s computer had died or the hard drive failed. So we had safety measures in place like, back-up often to a second hard drive in the machine for all that ‘must keep’ data. I was convinced that in the back of Timmy’s mind, the experience of… losing all his files, photos, music and all that stuff twice before would keep him motivated. But can you guess where this story goes? All those precious files were completely wiped out by a Windowz reinstall for the third time… Can you say ‘a fourth times the charm’?
I’m sure you’ve heard of the analogy… trying to fit 10 pounds of (fill in the blank) into a 5 pound bag. That’s what it feels like when you have a holiday week that turns a five-day week into a four-day week. Then you have to work on the holiday anyway just to get caught up on what you can’t do because your weeks been cut down a day.
The only answer I see here is to simply work through it, work harder, and do your best to keep everyone as satisfied as possible… while making the most of your valuable time to forge ahead on the most pertinent projects.
In case you’ve been living under a rock, in two weeks Apple is going to announce the third-generation IPhone. Once that bad boy comes out I’ll be giving you some updated information and start checking out new apps again. Apple had made it clear that all new apps accepted the the ITunes store have to be 3.0 compliant. It just doesn’t make any sense to be downloading more new stuff that may not work on the new IPhone.