Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Where Art Thou Perfect Mobile Phone? Is There A Mobile Phone Holy Grail?

n95iphone I have a confession.  I'm a gadget junkie with a very non-techie mobile phone.  I've been sitting on the sidelines while purchasing a Blackjack for my wife, watching many of my coworkers love their Blackberry Phones and drooling over the iPhone's cool user interface and the N95 neat features.

 

 

What do I own?  An LG CU500.  It's nice enough, works well as a phone, has 3G which I've used to tether an Internet connection to my laptop several times.  But it isn't a great phone for the gadget junkie.  I want a phone that handles Internet will, that has a keyboard (or at least a virtual iPhone-like keyboard.)

 CU500

Here's a list of my simple "wants" in a mobile phone (yes I know it's a far stretch from what I now have):

  • Small Form Factor, lightweight
  • Easily locked keyboard (or) flip-phone, slider etc.
  • High Speed 3G
  • At minimum 2MP camera - with decent photos
  • Touchscreen and keyboard input
  • Wi-Fi
  • Replaceable Battery
  • Long talk time before recharging required
  • Flash and Java capable
  • GPS
  • Quad Band
  • Bluetooth 2.0
  • FM Radio
  • MP3 Capable with easy-to-use interface
  • Stereo Headphone Jack and Stereo Bluetooth Capable
  • Removable SIM
  • Affordable - let's just say, if it has all of these features, I'd pay what they're asking for the iPhone :)
  • Ability to install & run 3rd Party and Open Source Apps
  • Ability to unlock and use on various networks
  • Quality Speakerphone

So does this phone exist?  I think it might be the phone you get when your iPhone and N95 get together, but I don't think one exists in the market today.  Anyone have any suggestions or thoughts on the Holy Grail of Mobile Phones?  Help!!!

30 Halloween Themed Wallpapers / Backgrounds for your Computer

Looking to spice up your computer desktop with a Halloween-themed Wallpaper/Background for you Computer?  Flickr's Wallpaper and Background's Group has 30 excellent Halloween Backgrounds for your PC all free for you to use on your PC.   Here's a select few from the group:

 

Halloween Pumpkin Lamp

Halloween Pumpkin Lamp by euart

 

 

Halloween Moon

Halloween Moon by ~Darin~

 

Spider Month Day #23

Spider by jciv

Want more?  Check out vladstudio's six different high-resolution Halloween Wallpaper collection.

 

More Halloween Themed Posts:

30 - Plus Websites for free Jack-O-Lantern Templates for Halloween

More than 14 different geek-themed Halloween Costumes

30 Halloween Themed Wallpapers / Backgrounds for your Computer

Halloween Computer Mods: Using a Pumpkin as a Computer Case

Make Your Own Halloween Hologram

A doorbell "shocker" for scaring your Halloween victims (Don't try this at home)


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Tuesday, October 23, 2007

Contributing to ZatzNotFunny Blog

If you've found BrentEvans Geek Tonic Blog by way of ZatzNotFunny.com welcome!  And if your a subscriber of my GeekTonic Blog here, I recommend you add ZatzNotFunny to your must-read sites.  If your not familiar with the ZatzNotFunny blog read the about page.

I've been a subscriber and reader of Dave Zatz ZatzNotFunny (ZNF) technology blog for quite a while now.  Dave & I have commented back and forth regarding stories on both his blog and mine and recently Dave approached me about contributing to his ZNF site.  Knowing the quality and respect Dave and his ZNF site has around the net, It was an easy decision for me to accept the offer and work with Dave as a contributor at ZNF.  Beginning last week, some of my articles (typically the digital-media-related content)posted here at my Geek Tonic blog will also be syndicated to the ZNF blog.

Zatz Not Funny has a popular following and is read by many of the top blogger's and technology enthusiasts around the net so it opens up my GeekTonic blog to a larger audience and hopefully will help encourage the discussion here (please comment on the posts when appropriate) that I'm striving for as a main goal.  Its a pleasure to be in the company of the excellent blogger's and contributors of ZNF such as Dave Zatz, Mari Silbey and Davis Freeburg.

Make Your Own Halloween Hologram

Want to make a hologram illusion on the cheap for a cool Halloween decoration? Watch this overview that shows the hologram in action as well as how it is made.

CLICK HERE FOR VIDEO



The entire how-to on making a hologram is over at Instructables. Definitely one of the better instructables I've seen and just in time for Halloween!

More Halloween Themed Posts:

30 - Plus Websites for free Jack-O-Lantern Templates for Halloween

More than 14 different geek-themed Halloween Costumes

30 Halloween Themed Wallpapers / Backgrounds for your Computer

Halloween Computer Mods: Using a Pumpkin as a Computer Case

A doorbell "shocker" for scaring your Halloween victims (Don't try this at home)


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Track The Wildfires in California Mashup & Photo Sites

News about the recent wildfires across California have hit the Internet by storm.  Twitter, bloggers, forums, and Flickr all have activity about the fires in California.

Robert Scoble points out a Google Maps Mashup (see screen-shot below) showing the many places in California that are burning.

California Burning

For photosets at Flickr showing the fires head to the Southern California Fires Group or here to discuss the fires.

24 Hrs Later

The above photo is from Flickr member cpm73.  The first photo above was taken on Sunday 10/21 and the bottom one was  was taken the next day - amazing that these two houses survived!

 

My thoughts and prayers are with those nearby and those fighting the fires.

TV News: Two Cancellations- Update on New Shows & Writers Strike

VIVA LAUGHLIN After only two episodes, the new CBS TV Show Viva Laughlin has been canceled.  A CSI rerun will replace it this week and then the Amazing Race will fill that Sunday timeslot beginning November 4th.  The reality show Nashville was also officially canceled (it had been pulled from its timeslot already) as well.

Aaron Barnhart, a columnist for the Kansas City Star says that it is likely that most of the new shows will survive longer than they normally would due to the Oct. 31 deadline for TV writers and TV studios to complete their first new negotiated contract in 22 years.  Obviously if there is no agreement between the writers union and the studios there will be a strike and the TV Networks will need all of the content they can find.

Aaron goes on to give his second impressions of some of the new TV shows and I've now taken a peek at some of the new shows myself as well:

reaper Reaper - He originally picked this one to be the best new show of the season, but calls it "the biggest letdown" after watching episodes two and beyond.  Viewership of this show has been extremely low as well.  I've watched a few of the Reaper episodes and have to agree.  The first one was sort of funny and well done, but it gets old fast.

Chuck - This one about an underachiever who just happens to have embedded in his brain all of the national security secrets isn't great, but its not bad either.  Aaron says this one has improved each week and I have to agree.

Private Practice - I haven't seen this one and didn't watch Grey's Anatomy either, but my wife & daughter say its good and worth watching.  It's getting good ratings and the network has already picked up a second season so its golden.

bionic Bionic Woman - I watched from the sidelines as this show was given bad reviews by  Dave Zatz, Davis Freeburg and a less-than stellar review by Josh Lasser at Blog Critic.  Well this past weekend, I watched the first episode then the second one and well lets just say I've now watched the first four episodes.  I like the show and I think its getting better each episode.  If you gave up on it or never watched it, go grab the first episodes of Bionic Woman at Amazon Unbox or at NBC.com.  Then record the next one this Wednesday.  It has science fiction, a decent storyline, Katee Sackhoff (Starbuck from Battlestar Gallactica) and just enough conflict to make the show interesting each episode - I think you'll like it.  Aaron Barnhart agrees and says this about the show:

"By the third week “Bionic” had debugged itself (and added “Grey’s” exile Isaiah Washington to the cast), and viewers seemed to be in a forgiving mood. It’s still the third highest-rated new series this fall..."

dsm Dirty, Sexy Money - It's really just a high powered soap opera and I don't like soaps.  Still I really like this one if for no other reason than Donald Sutherland is excellent and there is enough funny in the show to make me watch it each week.

Aaron also mentions the following shows which I'm not interested in:

Pushing Daisies - lost 3 Million viewers in one week.  Nuf said.

Kid Nation - my wife is watching this show - I can't really believe it, but it's true.  Aaron admits to liking it too, but I just won't do that to myself....

Women's Murder Club - Not on my radar

Gossip Girl - VERY low viewership, but my teen daughter is watching it when she can squeeze it into her schedule.

Back to You - I tried to like this one as I like Kelsey Grammer.  But I don't and doubt it will make it beyond this season.  It's just okay.

To read Aaron Barnhart's full article CLICK HERE

 

You might also be interested in this post on TV Ratings:  Beyond Nielsen TV Ratings - TV Viewing Statistics From Non-Nielsen Places

 

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Monday, October 22, 2007

Beyond Nielsen TV Ratings - TV Viewing Statistics From Non-Nielsen Places

logo tivo_logo Nielsen, TIVO and Snapstream Media.  One of those three names is well known for tracking television viewership, but the other two: TIVO and Snapstream Media (the makers of the Beyond TV DVR software) are not as well known in this realm, but offer a more transparent  and relatively useful snapshot of what Television Viewers like you and I are watching on TV.  Would you agree that Heroes and The Office are hit shows - at least better than Dancing with the Stars or 60 Minutes?  Well you likely agree more with the users of TIVO and Beyond TV.

heroes

Since the early 1940's the television and advertising industries have relied on Nielsen Media Research to measure the popularity and success of television programming.  Nielsen continues to be the leading provider of this information and their list of the top TV shows by demographic are consistently highlighted in the media and watched closely by Advertisers and the Television Networks.  While I'm still interested in what Nielsen is reporting as the top shows, I'm left wanting more. 

TIVO collects the statistics of all TIVO users and provides a listing of the Most-Recorded Shows as well as the top TV shows of various famous people including actors and directors. 

Snapstream, the maker of the Beyond TV software DVR collects statistics of the users of Beyond TV on a voluntary basis and then provides the top recorded shows each week as well as the top five upcoming recordings by day.

What value is there in these alternative top TV show ratings?  Well for me, I think the Tivo Top Recorded Episodes tend to be more representative of what I might watch.  I think this reflects the fact that Beyond TV and Tivo users tend to be a more tech-savvy group.  Some of the shows that rate high in Nielsen such as Grey's Anatomy also rate high in the other two, but there are many cases where the opposite is true.  Tivo is pretty representative as well.
greys

Here's a comparison of the Nielsen vs. BeyondTV vs. Tivo Ratings for the week ended October 14th.

Top Recorded (or Watched) TV Shows

10/8/2007 - 10/14/2007

TIVO Nielsen BTV Episode Name
1 3 6 Grey's Anatomy
2 5 3 House
3 4 25 Desperate Housewives
4 1 7 CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
5 N/A 1 Heroes
6 N/A 5 The Office
7 10 18 CSI: Miami
8 18 27 Private Practice
9 2 67 Dancing With the Stars 
10 11 30 Survivor: China
11 17 71 Brothers & Sisters
12 N/A 10 Family Guy
13 N/A 32 Boston Legal
14 N/A 39 ER
15 N/A 2 Bionic Woman
16 9 28 Criminal Minds
17 15 40 Two and a Half Men
18 N/A 37 Las Vegas
19 8 19 NCIS
20 19 36 Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
21 N/A 23 Prison Break
22 N/A 51 Ugly Betty
23 14 20 CSI: NY
24 N/A N/A The Closer
25 N/A 22 The Unit
N/A 6 N/A 60 Minutes
N/A 7 69 Dancing With the Stars 
N/A 12 75 Cold Case
N/A 13 57 Without a Trace
N/A 16 N/A Deal or No Deal
N/A 20 95 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition
N/A N/A 4 Chuck
N/A N/A 8 The Simpsons
N/A N/A 9 Journeyman
N/A N/A 11 My Name Is Earl
N/A N/A 12 Eureka
N/A N/A 13 South Park 
N/A N/A 14 Pushing Daisies
N/A N/A 15 Stargate Atlantis
N/A N/A 16 NUMB3RS
N/A N/A 17 Smallville

The numbers above where gathered from TVSquad, TIVO and Snapstream's Couchville Site.  I should note that the Nielsen ratings represent the top 20 TV shows watched by the "Nielsen families" and the TIVO stats represent the top 25 TV shows recorded by owners of TIVO's connected to their network.  The Snapstream statistics represent shows recorded by the "thousands of Beyond TV users" who enabled the statistics tracking (Tracking of Beyond TV users viewing habits is voluntary to alleviate any privacy concerns of BTV owners.)   For those times when the TIVO or Nielsen ratings were in the top 20 or 25 I put in the Beyond TV ratings no matter how low.

 

 

btv top recordings 10142007

This is a screen-shot of the top upcoming recordings I made from a week ago at the Snapstream's Beyond TV Site.  Notice the top show for Monday, Heroes ended up as the top show overall for that week based on BeyondTV viewers.

What value is there in these alternative top TV show ratings?  Well for me, I think the Tivo Top Recorded Episodes & Beyond TV Top Recorded Shows tend to be more representative of what I might watch.  I think this reflects the fact that Beyond TV and Tivo users tend to be a more tech-savvy and possibly even a more desirable demographic for the advertisers.

Here's a few examples of the more obvious difference between the three sources of TV viewing statistics:

Heroes one of the best shows on television didn't even register in the top 20 of Nielsen's ratings, but registers as number 1 with BTV and number 5 with TIVO users.  Another major omission from Nielsen's top 20 is the hit show The Office.  The Office ranked as number 6 with TIVO and 6 with Beyond TV.  What registers with Nielsen that isn't popular with the TIVO and Beyond TV users?  60 Minutes and Dancing with the Stars both show up in the top 10 of Nielsen and below the 50 top shows for both TIVO and Beyond TV.

It's a fact that Nielsen's sample size is quite a bit larger then TIVO or Beyond TV, but not necessarily more representative of what my family likes and watches. Which of the three ratings best represent what you watch?  Do you match the more "tech-friendly" watchers of Beyond TV and TIVO or the more "mainstream" TV watchers of Nielsen?

Other TV-related posts: TV News: Two Cancellations- Update on New Shows & Writers Strike

 

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Watch Ripped DVD's Using Front Row

frontrowdvd

One of the most popular features of my Home Theater PC at home is it's ability to play movies stored right on our HTPC - no need to find the DVD disk and load it into the DVD Player because it's already there on the HTPC and you can pull it up from a menu of the movies stored there.  Well with Mac's Front Row, this wasn't possible unless you transcoded the movie to a non-standard DVD file format.  There is a workaround that allows Front Row users to do this and it looks pretty easy to set up.

 

While I was browsing del.icio.us last night I found a nice DVD solution for Mac, Front Row users.  By dvd assistdefault, standard DVD files - the VIDEO_TS folders are unrecognizable in Front Row.  The workaround was made to allow Front Row to browse these movies (usually ripped/decrypted from DVD's) and allow the playback of the movies including the DVD menus and special features.

 

 

To see DVD Assist with Front Row in action, watch the YouTube video made by MacHDTV

DVD Assist can be downloaded at this link.

 

For other Home Theater-Related Posts, CLICK HERE

 

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Sunday, October 21, 2007

30-Plus Sites For Free Halloween Jack O Lantern Templates

PA312660DSC00685The Internet has a vast supply of resources for every occasion and Halloween is no different.  I've compiled a list of 30 different places you will find Free Pumpkin Carving Patterns to use as Jack-O-Lantern Templates for this Halloween.  There are traditional, political, scary and fun patterns here - something for everyone.
Each Halloween, my daughter and I spend an evening carving several jack-o-lanterns for Halloween.  She usually does two that turn out fantastic and then I do one or two as well.  Each year, we scour the Internet to find free printable templates to help in the carving or at least to give us some ideas.  You can see some of our handiwork on the picture to the left and right from past Halloweens.

UPDATE:  FOR AN UPDATED LISTING CHECK OUT THE 2008 LIST OF 40-PLUS SITES FOR FREE PUMPKIN PATTERNS!

This year I decided to let you in our little secret of where to find the best, free Halloween Jack-O-Lantern Pumpkin Carving Templates.  There are many places out there to find really nice patterns - most of them for free.
1. The Pumpkin Wizard - UPDATE:  THIS SITE HAS LOCKED OUT ANY FREE USERS THE WEEK OF HALLOWEEN DUE TO SUPPOSEDLY HIGH VOLUME.  There are many free patterns and some additional members-only patterns here including traditional, patriotic, sports teams, celebrities and more.
2. Jack-o-Lantern.com - Here at the appropriately named Jack-O-Lantern.com you'll find a pretty nice selection of patterns.  One unique inclusion here is a how-to on making a pattern of your own (or anyone's) face using a photograph and a graphics editing program such as Paint Shop Pro or Adobe Photoshop.
3. Extreme Pumpkin - For the winner of the most "extreme" and unusual Jack-O-Lanterns of the list head over to Extreme Pumpkin.  Here you'll find the flaming pumpkin head, the cojoined twins pumpkins and the puking pumpkin:
extreme1extreme2 extreme3
4. The Pumpkin Farm - A few very simple, traditional Jack-O-Lantern patterns
5. EHow - Ehow has a large selection of simple, traditional Jack-O-Lantern Patters as well as some Letter/Monogram-type templates
6. Zombie Pumpkins - Some free some not - includes Mario, World of Warcraft patterns among others you don't see on any of the other sites listed here.
7. Kim's Free Pumpkin Patterns  - More simple, traditional Jack-O-Lantern Patterns
8. Pumpkin Masters - Three nice Jack-O-Lantern Patterns from Pumpkin Masters, the maker of those pumpkin carving books you see sold in stores this time of year.  There are only three, but they're nice ones including Jack Junior, a Pirate Skull and a Starry Night.
9. FabulousFoods - There are several moderate to complicated patterns here including some traditional templates as well
10. Hersheys - Everyone's favorite candy company has 24 different patterns with 12 each of easy, intermediate and advanced patterns.
11. Kraft Foods - Kraft has six relatively easy, traditional pumpkin carving patterns.
12. Family Fun - Family Fun Magazine has 11 free Jack-O-Lantern patterns as well as some additional pumpkin projects
13. How to Make Your Own Pattern - A nice tutorial on how to make your own Jack-O-Lantern pattern as well as a free Ghost Pattern
14. Pumpkin Lady - Lots of free patterns as well as several "premium" ones.  You'll also find one of the better how-to's on carving your Jack-O-Lantern as well.
15. DLTK - A nice selection of Jack-O-Lantern Patterns with several themed for younger children.
16. Hewlett-Packard - HP has 7 different patterns for your carving pleasure.
17. Better Home & Gardens - BHG has several Jack-O-Lantern stencils as well as many other Halloween themed projects
18. PumpkinGlow - several jack-O-Lantern Patterns
19. Yankee Halloween - has a US Flag pattern
20. Spookmaster -  has a handful of free patterns as well as a bunch of premium patterns
21. Home Logic - Four nice patterns including a Frankenstein, Reaper, Wolf and Skull
22. CBC News - CBC has some unique patters for Jack-O-Lanterns.
23. Paper Pumpkins - 9 different easy, traditional pumpkin carving patterns for the kids
24. Pumpkin Lights - a few additional stencils for Jack-O-Lanterns
25. DIY Network - The DIY Network has several Jack-O-Lantern patterns, how-to's and other Halloween crafts for you.

26. Allrecipes.com - AllRecipies.com has 6 Jack-O-Lantern patterns from Reader's Digest.
27. ChrisDunmire - Chris Dunmire's Creative Slush blog has a very unique pattern he calls the "Nit Wits PUNKin".  Take a look at ChrisDunmire's resulting Jack-O-Lantern to understand why it's called creative...
punkin-carving
28. EvilMadScientist - Here you will find the geekiest of all Jack-O-Lanterns.  It's a Cylon jack-o-lantern and has the how-to, but you'll need to do some electronics work to make this one.
cylonpumpkin
29. Branidjasmine - Here you'll find Political, Jack-O-Lantern patterns for Hillary Clinton, Rudy Guiliani, Barack Obama, John McCain as well as some non-political patterns you won't find anywhere else.
30. Metacafe - A video how-to for a small, LED Jack-O-Lantern.  Cool.
31. Convert a Photo into a Jack-O-Lantern
32. Flickr Jack-O-Lantern Group - If you just need some inspiration for your own design and would like to see some photos of jack-o-lantern's created by others, be sure and check out the Jack-O-Lantern Group at flickr.
To get you in the Pumpkin-Carving Mood I bring you a Jack-O-Lantern Video from YouTube uploaded by Violet990.  These are some photos taken at the The Jack O' Lantern Blaze in Hudson Valley, NY.  Pretty Impressive.
More Halloween Themed Posts:
More than 14 different geek-themed Halloween Costumes
30 Halloween Themed Wallpapers / Backgrounds for your Computer
Halloween Computer Mods: Using a Pumpkin as a Computer Case
Make Your Own Halloween Hologram
A doorbell "shocker" for scaring your Halloween victims (Don't try this at home)

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