Want to simplify your finances? What about get in shape with your own trainer? This video covers my 5 favorite free websites that have really changed my life for the better. They include…
BlackBerry Purse Update.
Remember a few months back when I was practically obsessed with this Violet May BlackBerry Purse? Well, you may also remember that I was searching for a similar and cheaper alternative, and I actually did! Below is my houndstooth Merona clutch wallet from Target ($15) that is not only a similar tri-fold style but also fits my BlackBerry, cards, money, change and checkbook! It might not be the hyper stylish silver python, but it is pretty cute for nearly $250 less!
By the way…
You have probably noticed over the past few weeks that instead of reading posts by me, you have been graced by a few of my boyfriend’s tech posts. As I assumed, things became a little busy for me with the move and promotion and life in general, so Cousy stepped in to make sure I didn’t loose my loyal readership (plus, lets be honest, he loves discussing tech as much as I do!) I never formally introduced him as a new contributor or anything, but he will be posting from now on to take some pressure off of me. So, let’s welcome him now with a nice round of applause and a big thank you for keeping the pink mac alive, and for adding a little blue (aka male perspective) to the mix!
Thanks honey and welcome!
{Yes, that is his 15″ Unibody Macbook Pro in the picture above. Save the whales!}
iPhone’s Dilemma
Post brought to you by Cousy the Boyfriend.
Well it didn’t take long but Apple rumors are swarming the internet all over again. After months of iPad fever it was nice to have a little break of the constant barrage of theories. But like all good things, it must come to an end and new rumors have started again. So what is the buzz on the internet now? Well it turns out people are gravitating their focus towards the iPhone. Part of the fever is because the iPhone 4G could be coming out…. soon…sometime…maybe. A lot of features are being speculated like it will be made of titanium, have a removable battery, have GPS, and will cook you bacon anytime you want (a guy can dream). Let’s be honest, like all Apple rumors most of them will probably be dead wrong so I’m not trying to get my hopes up too much. But what fascinates me is what people think will “solve” all of the iPhone’s problems. And what I find odd is that many are saying that it is all about the Benjamin’s baby. Yes people are saying that the $99 price point is just too great of a commitment to make and is the big turnoff for them. In face a recent survey by Morgan Stanley Research says that people are focused on this most of all.
But I have to wonder about this, since to me $99 isn’t a horrible price to pay for a phone with a camera, internet service, and games. Sure the prices of the phone, plan, and contract length aren’t the best things in the world for the iPhone… but why is the service provider ranked as 6th on the chart? People are more concerned by a battery than the service? No offense to AT&T, but their service hasn’t been getting a lot of great reviews both for quality and price, and I’m not switching from my very good carrier to that just for a phone. If Apple really wants to expand their market they need to not renew their exclusivity contract with AT&T and let more carriers in. Besides if they did that that might bring down the 2nd and 4th items on the list with more options for service plan costs and lengths.
I know this plea that the iPhone should open up to more carriers has been said a hundred times before and will be said a hundred more times, but to claim that the price is a bigger problem than the carrier just seems stupid to me. So what about you? What do you think is the biggest problem for the iPhone that needs to be solved? Leave a comment below and let us know!
The Million Dollar Video Game
(A post, brought to you by Cousy the boyfriend)
Ladies, as a man, I like so many face the difficult position of trying to balance pleasing and spending time with my girlfriend with going for a triple kill in the latest online game versus kids half my age. Now I am aware that the girlfriends of the world would much rather have us men doing better things with our time; massaging your back, doing the dishes, or applying for grad school. But ladies next time you see your man playing some dumb game you might want to cut him some slack, because it could be worth one million dollars.
MLB 2K is a popular baseball title for the major video game systems (PS3 and the Xbox 360) and it has issued an unprecedented challenge. In the past an achievement of something a player does in game has usually been rewarded with a pop-up message followed by some badge or mark signifying that yes, you did in fact beat this game on hard mode with out using any first aid kits, or winning the race by ten full laps. Usually this was just for “bragging” rights that really did not mean much unless you were a 13-year-old boy on a message board you loved to troll. In some more extreme cases a contest would be set up where the winner of a tournament would win a few thousand dollars.
But with the release, 2K Sports is spouting their new “realistic” pitching simulator where the player has even more control of the ball then ever before. Because of this MLB 2K series has launched a challenge for its newest release MLB 2K10. What’s the challenge? Pitch a perfect game.
A perfect game in baseball is when a pitcher wins a game that lasts a minimum of nine innings and no opposing player reaches base. The pitcher cannot allow any hits, walks, hit a player and let them take their base, or any opposing player to reach base safely for any other reason. Basically it is when 27 people of the opposing team get up to bat and never reach 1st base for any reason at all, whatsoever, no if’s and’s or but’s. So why is this worth a million dollars? In the entire history of the MLB there have only been officially 18 perfect games. That’s 18 in over 134 years and the first two in 1880 came within 5 days of each other. There is a perfect game once every 11,000 games. More people have gone around the moon than pitched a perfect game. Sinking in yet how rare of a feat this is?
So the theory behind MLB 2K10 is that the new pitching simulator that was created will be so exact to the real thing that pitching a perfect game will be impossible for the average Joe to do. In addition to the mere fact a perfect game is tough enough to achieve the contest only runs for two months, you have to live in the US but not in Arizona, Connecticut, Maryland, North Dakota or Vermont, you must be signed in online over your PS3 or Xbox 360, play with the up-to-date rosters, be playing in All-Star mode, and have a video camera recording your whole game which the tape will get reviewed by Twin Galaxies International which also handles Guinness Book of Records entries. Okay pretty daunting isn’t it?
But the point of all of this here is you didn’t know video games could pay you a million dollars just for playing did you? So ladies, the next time you catch your man playing some game all night instead of walking the dog, he might just be trying to win some money for a dog walker for life, personal masseuse on hand, and a shopping spree at Manolo Blahnik.
Moving and such.
I know I’ve been missing for a week or so since January ended, but I have a very good excuse. The last few weeks have been crazy time for me because I was (1) promoted and (2) transferred for work! So, in said time frame of me being absent, I have been (a) looking for apartments, (b) buying obscene amounts of furniture, and (c) moving during one of the biggest snowstorms to hit the Northeast in years! Finally, just yesterday I was able to set up the Airport Express in my apartment so that I could get wifi and not have to sit at the edge of my bed attached to a chord if I wanted to surf the web. Actually, I have been doing a good amount of NOT surfing the web in the last few weeks, aside from when I was at work while I had nothing to do because my impending transfer caused restrictions on my workload.
Tomorrow I start my new job in this new city in which I now reside (clue in picture above). So I thought I would take this time to warn you that I could possibly go missing for a week or so again, but I will try my hardest not to!
By the way, since this is a technology blog I should probably say something related in this post, so I will just mention how much I love my Airport Express! It is small and easy to set up- I just used Airport Utility on my Macbook Pro and it was set up in like 2 minutes! I also like that it is compact (since it was meant to be portable) and the range is perfect in my little apartment! I actually used it at home a few times and the range is really awesome for this little guy- I had it set up downstairs and I still had a full signal from upstairs (and this is in a home that is about 3,000 square feet I would say- so it covered the range of the linksys router at home).
Moral of the story: Apple’s Airport Express= Awesome + I love WiFi!
{Picture via my boyfriend, taken on a snowy walk yesterday}
Could Content Redeem the iPad?
I read this article the other day, writen by the notable tech writer Andy Ihnatko that got me thinking about the practical nature of the iPad, which I had previously deemed impratical. Okay, so as I have already said, this thing is a big iPod Touch- I wouldn’t say it’s an iPhone necessarily because thus far it is not a phone, although with a Skype application this could indeed make voice chatting and even calling a feature, but that is a conversation for another post.
Never the less, the iPad’s greatest asset is its screen real estate, which is arguably larger than a majority of netbooks out in the market (if anything 10 inches is the max for netbooks), but unlike said netbooks, the iPad comes with a multitude of content, some you may have to pay for, some you may not, and of course I am referring to iTunes. See, for someone who already has an iPod(s) full of content (movies, music, apps, ect) you are already pretty well set up if you were to buy an iPad, which is certainly not the case if you were to buy a netbook or a tablet of another brand.
Now the big A-HA moment I had while reading the Ihnatko article was that, I, and I am sure a nice slice of the consumer market, have an interest in ebook readers, and so the ibookstore available to iPad users (question; is this ibookstore going to be available to iPhone or touch users??) gives me (and you!) the ability to fullfill ebook desires and make use of my iPod content at the same time. Of course the math of this decision would be more than simply…
ereader= $250
netbook= $300
total= $550
$550>$499 (iPad)
iPad Wins!
You have to take into consideration the fact that the iPad would be a means to spend even more money on content that you now need to own because you have a screen larger than a cell phones to work with. Apple is running a business after all and they will try to seduce you into their ever growing content market one way or another.
For me, I think it is time to refocus my thoughts in a new area. I know I want a tablet, and in light of the availability of content for the iPad perhaps it could be the tablet for me. I certainly have a good amount of time to think about it, but I fear my anticipation for the device may cause me to purchase too soon, something I ended up regretting with my iPod touch. Remember, longing makes the heart grow fonder!
It’s a Big iPod Touch.
Over the last few hours since the announcement of the iPad, I have been thinking about it’s features and lack of features to decide if this is something I would even bother owning. Let’s discuss these features.
The iPad has a few things I am very excited about. Not only does it do web, video, music, email, documents, calendar, contacts, and a wide variety of apps, it is a nice sized ebook reader as well. My favorite feature, however, is the 3G connectivity that comes at a decent rate without a contract. This means you can take all this fun with you when you leave the house or wifi enabled areas.
When it comes down to it though, this thing is just a big ipod touch that can (if you buy the 3g enabled model) constantly access the internet. The only difference will be that the apps developed for the iPad specifically will probably make the device feel more like a Mac. That being said, it is a far cry from a Macbook. One of the biggest problems with the iPad is that it, like an iPod touch or iPhone, can only run one application at a time it seems and I am definitely someone who has multiple applications running on my Macbook at a time, so why can’t I do this on the iPad?
This also brings up a few connectivity issues I have been thinking about in regard to the iPad. I am a little disappointed that there is not an SD card port for importing photo’s. Since this is such a portable device, I would think they would include one so that you can add photo’s to the device while you are away from your computer. There is always importing from email or the web, but if you wanted to take this on a family vacation for instance, and you just took a bunch of photos you want to email to friends and family, you won’t be able to. The lack of flash built in to the device also concerns me especially with viewing webpages, you think Apple would have been able to build this in somehow by now. Also, there is no video output which I think is odd since this is a media device. {I know Apple is making a whole variety of cables you can buy to do some of these things, but that seriously takes away from the fact that this is supposed to be a very wireless device.}
So, those are my main complaints for now. I am thinking that perhaps maybe this device isn’t for me. Although that could change as I begin to see all the amazing apps that are sure to be developed for this thing that would perhaps make living with the few issues I have worth it.
Welcome iPad!
I am completely flabbergasted! Apple has finally done it, they have just announced the iPad, the not so mythical tablet mac! Here are some quick pictures from the live blogs, and I will have to get back to you more later, but basically this thing is a giant ipod touch. It appears to be running a more advanced version of iphone software and is about 10 inches. It is pretty much everything we have been hearing and seeing from the rumor mill.
Apple Event Live Blogs!
The day is finally come! At 10 am pacific time, Apple will begin it’s live media event in San Fransisco. If you are like me and would like to follow the progression of the event, you can do so at Gizmodo and Engadget– both are live blogging!
See you all after the event- I’m sure I will have something to say about it!