tech ronin

Watching Video Podcasts on iMac 24

I just watched my first episode of Girls Gone Geek. About 5 minutes of quite high quality video. I'm impressed. I'll be watching more episodes. Yes, it is partly because it is done by women. If things were not so lopsided in the geek world, I wouldn't need to seek these shows out. But there it is.

I've found with my iMac 24, that I spend a fair amount of time sitting back about 4 feet and either reading and surfing with big type on the screen or watching video podcasts. Maybe the remote you get with it is actually useful to people not in college dorm rooms.

Now that I have the iMac's 500 gig hard drive to boot from, I'm getting into more video podcasts. I could have done this before using an external drive mind you, but something about this 24" screen plus the 500 gig drive has pushed me over the edge on video podcasts.

I bought an AppleTV back in January when they were first announced but cancelled my order once I found out that it wouldn't really work with my Standard Def 50" TV. In October, I managed to pawn off my humongous SDTV to my sister and acquired a 40" HDTV right-sized for my smaller new Tiburon place. Now I could benefit from watching video podcasts on my TV via an AppleTV. Except it seems obvious that Apple will release AppleTV 2.0 in by spring. I'm waiting for that. In the meantime, this 24" iMac is working for me just fine.

[Book] The Perfect Thing - Great Read

This new book about the iPod by a favorite tech writer, Steven Levy, is a great read. I've previously read and adored Steven's Hackers in 1984. Much later, I liked his book about Macintosh, Insanely Great. I regularly take pleasure in reading Levy's The Technologist column in Newsweek.

The new book is entitled The Perfect Thing: How the iPod Shuffles Culture, Commerce and Coolness. I love it. It is packed with stories and insider information that only a long-time, highly-respected technology journalist could provide. Steven knows his subject well and was able to dig up all sorts of fresh and interesting stories about the iPod.

We get to learn exactly how and by whom the iPod was created. Hint, it wasn't just Jonathan Ive. He was a key player for sure, but lots of other talented people were involved before Jony came in to make the iPod the extraordinary product it was on launch day in 2001. We hear from key players in their own words.

That's only one chapter that I especially enjoyed, but there are many more interesting subjects like the Pod People phenomenon which Levy links to its origins in portable cocooning with the walkman. I found Levy's in depth discussion of cool really well done. You've heard little smatterings about cool, and the iPod phenomenon over and over in the press. But, here you get taken deeper into these subjects by a really good writer. For me, this is a page-turner. Honestly. I bought the book last night and I'm 121 pages into it's 284 pages already.

If you are a Mac and iPod fan, make sure to check out this book. Apple is selling the book for $25.99 even though the list price is $25. I got it at Borders for $20 with my Rewards card. I would normally wait and buy at Amazon where it is selling for $16.50 but I started reading in the store and couldn't put it down.

A nice warm up for this book might be Steven Levy's interview with Steve Jobs at Newsweek Online. If you are anything like me, you'll want to read it.

I should warn you that my iPod technolust was markedly increased by reading this book. The just released [project] red 8 gig Nano and the 80 gig iPod 5G are both tugging at me right now. It's a good thing I already have a wonderful 30 gig black iPod 5G in an amazing red and black Vaja leather case already. That gorgeous, expensive leather is the one thing standing between me and those new iPods. I think I will fall over the edge if Apple releases a [red] 5G iPod though (and there's a rumor...).

If you've had a love affair with Mac and the iPod, you will find all the reasons why in this book. I've owned all 5 generations of the iPod. I'm a heavy-user, you could say. This book helped me understand my experience - my passionate fascination - better than any other iPod book to date.

The Cult of iPod - Highly Recommended

If you are one of the many fans of iPod and you like to read, you've got to check out The Cult of iPod by Leander Kahney. This is a graphics-heavy, designed, oversized paperback book of high quality. With an amazing cover photo. The price is high for a paperback at $24.95 but Amazon comes through with a 34% discount to get it down to $16.47. Which feels just right.

Kahney also wrote The Cult of Mac. I like this book much better. Partly, it's the amazingly vital and current iPod phenomenon. There's a lot going on and it's fun and interesting to read about and see. Kahney writes for Wired and it shows.

My favorite chapter is called I Want to Hold Your Handheld: Cultural Impact. And in that chapter, my favorite story is about an assistant professor in Marketing at the Schulich School of Business in Toronto. Markus Giesler has some interesting ideas. He thinks the iPod transforms listeners into "cyborg consumers". His website solicits iPod stories from volunteers for his research.

Here's a taste:

"The consumer is plugged into all kinds of technologies and networks that affect consumer behavior," he said. "As a result, consumption patterns change: from materiality to information - the internet; from ownership to access - file sharing; and from pattern to randomness - the iPod."

Giesler notes that jacking into the entertainment matrix changes consumption patterns. Random shuffle...isn't just a novel way to listen to music; it's one of the key constructs of digital entertainment. Giesler said that instead of trading individual songs, users are starting to trade entire hard drives: giant libraries of music or movies. When interviewees are asked how they dip into these libraries, picking items at random is the most common answer. "Shuffle mode used to be a gimmick. Now it is the most viable strategy to access information that would otherwise be lost", he said. "It reduces the complexity of consumption..."

Technorati Tags: iPod, videoipod

Lost on the Video iPod

I have to admit to being hooked on Lost. I had seen a 1/2 an episode previous to my start with the first year pilot. I enjoyed it from the beginning. I am at this moment downloading episodes 10, 11 and 12. Too bad I'm running through them so fast. I'm not sure Apple will have something else to my liking once I finish off last season and catch up to the current episode. I like watching the shows in order, so I haven't watched any of this season's shows yet.

Watching on an iPod totally works by the way. The visuals are great. It's not too small. It's light. It's fun. It's not having a big laptop on your lap. It's this elegant little thing in your hand. That you can take with you to the coffee shop and watch an episode if you wouldn't rather read right then. I'm thinking that watching bite-sized TV show episodes of a show with good writing and acting, excellent production values and an on-going plot beats watching most movies. They seem so long.

Of course, the video iPod wows people too. I show it to anyone I know or even don't know that well come to think of it. It's impressive. And kind of a shock to people. They can't believe the quality.

So that's the latest update. I love my new 30 gig black 5G iPod. At $299, this thing is a steal. What about my nano? How is it fairing. Well, when I have a couple good podcasts on it and I'm going out to exercise, it's absolutely perfect. And I still don't have a good case for my 5G, so I feel more comfortable with the nano.

I think both of these machines are going to big hits but I'll bet a lot of what would have been nano sales will go to the 5G. Teenagers are going to want one. I had to have one. I wanted to see for myself what the video would be like. How cool it would be. Right now I'm hoping this is going to change the face of TV, finally. I'm hoping this will generate huge numbers of passionate amateur video podcasters. And options for us to see videos that we would otherwise never have had the convenient opportunity to see. This video play is so cool. I'm hoping Apple can get some more good video content fast.

I'm hoping Apple can do some of the magic they did with music and get the high quality TV shows of all eras and make them available. The popularity of the video iPod will give us an idea of how much people have hated (consciously or unconsciously) the domination of TV broadcasting. Well, maybe it is a love hate relationship, but still.

Technorati Tags: iPod, ipodnano, video iPod, videoipod

5G iPod Early Days 1

You wouldn't want to see my 5G iPod right now. It would ruin the fantasy. It's still got the clear screen protector that is stuck onto it when you take it out of the box. That's not so bad except that the two bottom corners have curled up about 1/4 inch each. Not nice. But I'm not ready to remove what little protection this screen represents right now.

I've got the little pouch that Apple provides. But in order to do anything with the iPod, I have to take it out of the pouch and that's when trouble might occur. I remember how incredibly sensitive my nano was to scratches. It seemed like if you just breathed on it, it would scratch. So I'm not taking any chances. I'm tempted to just keep it around in the case for now and use the nano except for special occasions.

I'm worried it will slip out of my hands and fall to the ground while I'm out walking or something. I had it with me today walking downtown and back. It was in the case except for when I needed to adjust the volume. I was wishing for a tiny little scroll wheel on the top right then so I could keep it in the case.

My nano has a couple scratches and I want this one to stay pristine in its beauty. Kind of like the people who keep their cars covered and in the garage and barely use them. This really is a museum piece. Too bad it had to be delicate.

Now that there's a nano lawsuit about the scratches, maybe this will be the most beautiful iPod ever. Next time, they'll make it more rugged and perhaps a little less gorgeous. Or not. It is Steve Jobs after all. I'm convinced he counts public opinion at about 25% and his personal opinion at about 75%.

But I have been using my iPod since I got it Friday night. I've listened to music and podcasts. I've watched a TV episode. I was surprised just how good the TV show looked on the little screen. I think this iPod will be great for short programs including 43 minute TV episodes.

I would only want to watch a full-length movie under duress. I'll put a couple emergency movies on my 5G so that in case I really need that kind of distraction and have no other options, I will have them there. But this screen is too small for a 1.5 - 2 hour movie. I would get eyestrain.

I tried using PodWorks 2.8.5 to copy TV episodes from my iPod to iTunes on my G5. That worked in case you wondered. Copying episodes is fast, downloading them takes a few minutes on my DSL connection.

I tried watching DigitalLife TV episode 10 from iTunes on my iPod and it was audio only. Disappointing then. But now that I've downloaded the Video iPod version from their site, it's fine - all 168 megs of it. I like this. I could stick this in my pocket and listen and then take a look from time to time.

I'm hoping to find a good blogger who makes it his or her business to learn this stuff find the best video material. There are full-blown TV commercials on here though. Too bad but I guess inevitable for free content. iLounge has a really thorough review but not enough real world user info for my taste.

Saturday I spent a couple hours going through my iPhoto collection and cropped a lot of photos and put them in an album for the video iPod. That was kind of fun. I like doing a best of rather than putting every photo I've ever taken on there.

I was expecting a bigger form factor on the video iPod. And will look forward to such a device in the future, but the pocket-sized device has a lot going for it. On-the-go, the pocket-sized device rules. The iPod is definitely an always-have-it-with-you sort of thing. Once you go beyond pocket-sized, you've got problems in that regard.

Given the state of the art, I'm thinking Apple did about as well as they could. I get to have a single device that can play video when called for. If this video stuff gets really big, I'm guessing they'll do the 3“ plus device Steve talked about a year ago.

New purchases. Some Music Videos. No Doubt with Gwen Stefani - Don't Speak and Sunday Morning and Coldplay Fix You and Yellow for a start. I can see collecting a few choice music videos for my video iPod. I don't watch MTV so I've never seen these videos. But I do like to see my favorite artists performing and now I can do that easily and efficiently. There are lots of and lots of music videos that are not on iTunes, though. I wouldn't mind going back in time and finding some gems here and there.

By the way, I've definitely run into more iTunes download problems since the video iPod came out. Someone is downloading a lot of videos is all I can figure. Apple is probably struggling to keep up with the bandwidth requirements.

Technorati Tags: iPod, iPod5G, music, podcasts, TV, videoiPod

Got the 30 gig black video iPod

Rock and roll! I took a little drive over to San Francisco tonight to make my purchase. I love that big store. It was full of people checking out the new iPods. They had a bunch on this one big table. And in the middle was about 10 black boxes just so you knew it was in stock.

They didn't have the black 60 gig but I was again able to carefully compare between 30 and 60 and I decided to 30 will do. This isn't a lifetime relationship after all. I like the slimmer look a lot. I like the black. I spoke with several shoppers and employees about which to get the differences and what not. One of my biggest conversations was with a fellow shopper who was clear she wanted the 60.

I was in the store for about an hour. I also made it out of there with the new universal dock and the remote control that controls the universal dock mounted iPod. I like that. Could be a great way to deploy my 60 gig 4G in the living room from across the room. Maybe I'll get some use out of my $2500+ stereo. It's worth a try. I also bought the 2-year coverage for $59 that provides battery replacement and support. I hesitated but the price seemed worth it.

I love the little case that comes with the new iPod. very slick. It was probably very inexpensive and an afterthought after the experience Apple had with the nano's scratchability. It's a thin sort of artificial suede leather in white.

So here I am on my black couch. I'll be watching numbers tonight with a bit of a distraction. My iPod is plugged into my powerbook right now. I'll copy over the 5 season 1 episodes of Lost that I've bought so far -- one of which I haven't seen yet. By the way, I know I could buy the whole season cheaper but this way I get to decide whether and when I want to buy an episode. I don't have to commit to the whole season which I've never seen.

OK, back to my new black baby! Woohoo! I highly recommend hanging out at the SF store. It beats the Corte Madera store by a mile.

Just copied my TV episodes over. And watched about 5 minutes. I'm very impressed. Very cool!

Technorati Tags: iPod, video iPod, videoipod

Hands on with the video iPod at the Apple Store

Update: The Apple Corte Madera store is all sold out of their video iPods as of 6 pm Friday night.

I dropped by the local Apple store yesterday and they had all of the video iPods in stock except for the one I wanted - the 60 gig black. I stopped by again today and also called the San Francisco store and no luck.

I was thinking, well maybe I'll buy one online but the main advantage there is that you can engrave them. But engraving is going to hurt the resale value probably, so I think I'll pass on that one. Who knows when the *real* video iPod will come out. After all, I was surprised to see the video iPod out so quickly after the refresh in late July.

The black probably shows fingerprints and even scratches worse than the white. But, it comes with a simple case that will protect it until I find the ideal case. And I think the black looks cooler. I like black much better than white. I own a black car and wear black a lot. Judging by what I wear, it's my favorite color. So, I'll just wait it out.

They did have both the 30 gig white and the 60 gig white so I could compare how they feel, thickness and weight. There's a fairly big difference. The weight is about 15% more for the 60 gig. The 60gig is about an 1/8th of an inch thicker or 27% thicker than the 30 gig. video.

I was told in the store though, that the 60 gig drive is a dual-layer drive and would let you copy stuff to the drive faster than the 30 gig. And we already know that the 60 gig has about 50% more battery life than the 30.

Given these considerations, I'm going to think a little more whether I really need 60 gigs. I'm only using about 25 right now on my 60 gig 4G iPod.

Other impressions. The video iPod looks a lot wider than my 4G color. It's not except that the 4G is rounded so the actual top is not as wide as the widest point. That wider look isn't as appealing. Also, the flatness and square edges make the iPod a little less comfortable in my hand.

Photos on this thing look fantastic, though. That almost sold me without anything else. Darn, I wanted to see how text looks on these. I'm hoping it isn't as unreadable as my 4G. I'll have to check that and get back to you.

Technorati Tags: iPod, video iPod

Nano in ezSkin

Not the most beautiful nano anymore but incredibly functional. This is the *white* ezSkin for the nano. It cost me $23.99 at my local Marin Mac Shop in San Rafael. This is all they have in, but there is a black version which is displayed on ezGear's website. It came with a belt clip and wrist and neck lanyards. This is temporary but comfortable. You see a bigger version here.

The translucent skin has a hard plastic screen protector that is replaceable. It also has a little bump on the back to allow for attachment of the clip in case you feel the need to show your baby off. I'm sure I'll find something I like better, but for practical protection of the nano in a case that doesn't bulk it up much, this is perfect.

Technorati Tags: nano

I Took an iTrip and bought a Color iPod

I've been eyeing the color iPod ever since it was called the iPod photo last October. But the $495 and $595 price tags were too rich for my blood. Now that the price has dropped $200, the color is hard to resist. The high rez color screen is so much better than the mono screen in my 3G iPod, it's ridiculous.

My downfall came while I was in Portland last week staying with my friend Kathy from my college days at Portland State. She had an underutilized 30 gig iPod photo, a brand new Dell PC with 17" flat panel display and a big shelf full of CDs. While I was there in my spare time, I helped her get the better part of her CD collection into iTunes. We also went out one day and picked up a Bose SoundDock. That became the house and patio stereo for the week. We shared music and rocked out.

Once we had the SoundDock, we needed to fill the iPod with some cool playlists. Every so often I would need to handle (fondle) Kathy's iPod. I was surprised how good it looked and felt. Until then, I didn't really know what I had been missing.

Finally, yeserday, I did it. I bought the 60 gig. It would have been so much easier to pop for the 20 gig for $299, but I really wanted more room so I could add photos and do some serious Mac backup in a pinch (remember that's tax deductible). I took a deep breath and pulled out my Amazon Visa.

Regular readers know I am easily excited but I really have something to be excited about with this new color iPod. It is a joy to use. I would say that the color screen is 5x more readable than my 3G iPod. The type looks so close to laser print. The crisp, bright color makes using my iPod so much more enjoyable. Apple has a point when they say "everything sounds better in color." By the way, I bought a high-quality screen protector at the store - this screen isn't going to get scratched!

As Delicious Library allows me to enjoy, appreciate and more fully use my book and DVD library, so does the Color iPod enhance my use and enjoyment of my music (and photo) libraries.

Podcast listening is so clean, so simple. I can read whatever show notes a podcaster manages to post on my iPod. That means I can see what they are going to talk about and decide whether to listen at all or to skip ahead to stuff I want. Operation is smooth as silk with the click wheel.

And, of course, there are the new color subway maps for the color iPod too. If you need one, maybe that's just the excuse you need to get a new iPod.

One reason I hadn't already picked up a color iPod was that the rumors about the video iPod were so persistent. I was waiting to see what that would be like. But, enough rumors said we won't see a video iPod this year, that I decided to make my move.

The rumors of a color iPod mini this Fall sound pretty credible, so you might want to wait for one of those if the mini is more your style. I like the mini, but it's not out yet and I sure like having 60 gigs to play with. I use PodWorks, by the way, so that I can copy from my iPod as desired.

A drawback of putting a big collection of music on a big iPod is that you need to have that music on a computer hard drive somewhere. What's 60 gigs among friends? Not really a problem, but if you don't have the iTunes you use most often on a device with lots of room, you are out of luck. I mainly use my 80 gig Powerbook. I can't just gather music and podcasts on my Powerbook iTunes because I don't have room for a full sync to my huge new iPod.

It would be nice right about now to be able to see the music and photos on my iPod and be able to simply drag stuff onto the drive. Apple? But, back to my trip.

Kathy was so happy with how things went that she loaned me her iTrip for my long drive home. It worked great. Especially when set right underneath my car stereo receiver. Excellent! But, I still had my old iPod then and had to really strain to read the screen to change playlists and select podcasts. Next trip I won't have that problem.

Technorati Tags: Apple, iPod, mobility, music, podcasting

Treo 650 running AeroPlayer iTunes Skin

Here you go. This is a rather low quality photo of my Treo 650 screen. I am playing Om Malik's first pod cast. Cool, huh? I bought AeroPlayer yesterday with AAC and MP3 capability.

You can download a lot of free skins, one of which was this one! One major advantage to listening to podcasts or audio books on a Treo is that you have a built-in speaker. I can set the Treo down and listen to it or play it for myself and anyone else in my vicinity. This is a major convenience.

Besides not being able to do an iTunes-driven sync, you can't playback iTunes store AAC music. This is exactly the music I most want to play. There is a way to remove the iTunes DRM using a 3rd-party app which I haven't yet tried but probably will -- knowing me. AeroPlayer has more info if you want it.

In the mean time, yesterday I burned 17 of my favorite iTunes-DRM songs to a CD. Then I imported them back into iTunes as AAC 256. Then I dragged those songs to my Treo SD card and they played fine. Since I don't have a 2.5mm to 3.5mm adapter, I can't listen to these songs with a high-quality headset but, I have one on order so I can check that out.

Truth is, I'll be listening with my phone/music headset that's on order, so the signal degradation of going from DRM-AAC to CD and then AAC probably won't matter for my purposes.

I knew this, so I didn't spend a lot of time looking for a way to rid my songs of their DRM. I have mixed feelings about doing that and this method still works for my purposes.

Couldn't resist showing you how close one can get to running iTunes on a Treo 650.

Technorati Tags: iTunes, cellphone, AeroPlayer, handhelds, mobilephone, mobility, Palm, PalmOne, podcasting, smartphone, treo, treo650