technology

Google Wave = ?

/ Shane / 1 Comment

What to say about Google Wave?

First off, let me say that it is pretty cool. I could see the potential there. It is sort of a combination of chat and email, but the possibilities really shine when multiple people are using it at the same time. It also has some cool potential for work/school/group collaboration. I can see where they were going with it.

BUT

For the average person there doesn’t seem to be much point. It fills a niche that most people didn’t really need to be filled. It doesn’t offer me much more than Gmail already offers me (I even have chat built in to Gmail!). So the net result is that I just have one more website to check. As far as I can tell, Google Wave seems to be a website where people can go to ask each other what the heck Google Wave is and what we are supposed to be doing with it.

So, in summary, Google Wave is kind of cool but kind of useless, until such time that it completely replaces email (a.k.a. just short of never). Anybody disagree?

(And after all that, I have invites! Ask in the comments and I’ll send you one!)

It’s the wave of the future, dude

/ Shane / 2 Comments

Check this out:

This demo — from Pattie Maes’ lab at MIT, spearheaded by Pranav Mistry — was the buzz of TED. It’s a wearable device with a projector that paves the way for profound interaction with our environment. Imagine “Minority Report” and then some.

How cool is that? And the thing is, it’s not some crazy idea from way out there. It’s just a camera, projector, some finger tip things, and boom! Obviously it will get smaller / more useful over time, but the future is here! I thought iPhones were crazy…

Technology is out to get me

/ Shane / 1 Comment

I may have mentioned a little problem I had a while back with AT&T and a certain pay per view charge.  Well someone is up to their old tricks again because we received a notice in the mail that we signed up for Cinemax!  Now, it is possible that Evie has somehow ordered these things, however, there are a couple of glitches in that theory.  1) Cinemax was ordered while she was on vacation in MI and 2) if she is ordering them she has a very particular taste.  So far the things ordered are WWE Smackdown, the movie Spiderman, a *ahem* pornographic movie and Skin-a-max.  Do those sound like the viewing preferences of my sweet baby girl?  Despite their insistence, there is obviously something more going on here, although I can see why they suspect me.  It’s a frame job I tell ya!

Luckily the guy I talked to this time was super nice and quickly put everything in order.  I don’t understand why they couldn’t be like that the last time I talked to them.  Apparently it is easy to remove Cinemax but hard to remove a pay-per-view.  I also came to learn there were notes in my file based on my previous…uh…disagreement with them.  Whatever.  Just cancel anything that I could possibly order and leave me alone!

I have also been having some problems with my DSL modem.  Long story short it just stopped working when we got back from vacation.  Eventually I learned how to get it to work in 5 minute spurts.  After several calls to tech support and online searches, I discovered that it was overheating.  Removing the casing and exposing the bare circuit board wasn’t enough, but throw in a box fan blowing on it and voila!  Internet!  This was obviously not a viable long term solution and I had some vague notions about somehow buying a heat sink and attaching that, but I just broke down and bought a new modem.  The thing is, this is now my 3rd modem in about 2 years and they are like $70 a pop (although my first one was free from AT&T and the second one was a replacement when the 1st was still under warranty).  Still, I don’t have a good feeling that this one is going to last.  And there are surprisingly few choices.  AT&T basically just offers the one.

So we’re up and running full time again (as of today) and hopefully this will last for many years to come!