Steve Jobs - My Opinion
01/15/2009 10:17 PM
Steve
Jobs's (temporary, perhaps) absence from Apple, Inc.
will be just a blip on the radar.
In an e-mail to Apple employees, Steve Jobs announced he would be taking a medical leave from the company until June. Saying that his “ health-related issues are more complex” than he originally thought. He told employees that Tim Cook would lead the organization during his leave and that he looked forward to seeing them again “this summer”.
Rumors about his declining health have been flying around as furiously as iPhones off store shelves. Ever since it was announced that he had pancreatic cancer in 2004, we have heard from analysts, critics and bloggers that have predicted the end of Apple’s market dominance if Steve Jobs were to depart.
Read More...
In an e-mail to Apple employees, Steve Jobs announced he would be taking a medical leave from the company until June. Saying that his “ health-related issues are more complex” than he originally thought. He told employees that Tim Cook would lead the organization during his leave and that he looked forward to seeing them again “this summer”.
Rumors about his declining health have been flying around as furiously as iPhones off store shelves. Ever since it was announced that he had pancreatic cancer in 2004, we have heard from analysts, critics and bloggers that have predicted the end of Apple’s market dominance if Steve Jobs were to depart.
Read More...
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100 Things?
07/28/2008 09:52 PM
Recently, on Dancing with Elephants, I heard
about a man trying to whittle his personal
belongings down to 100 items. Greg and Tonya
asked their audience to write in with what 10
things they couldn’t live without. That got me
thinking: as a self-professed, but improving,
pack-rat, could there be only 10 things with
which I couldn’t live?
So, to start, I did a rough inventory of the Outback. For those of you that are new here, that’s the name of our home office / recording studio. Our first home had a separate room in the back yard, which was the whole reason I wanted to buy that house, that served as an office and studio. When my oldest brother, Ken, saw it he instantly christened it the Outback. On a somewhat unrelated note, it was also Ken that gave Emily the nickname she uses today, Emo, the day she was born.
Back to the story. These days, the Outback is inside but still serves, in addition to a home office and recording studio, as my personal junk drawer. While I was up late recently I started counting and cataloging nearly everything in the Outback. Here’s what I came up with so far:
So, to start, I did a rough inventory of the Outback. For those of you that are new here, that’s the name of our home office / recording studio. Our first home had a separate room in the back yard, which was the whole reason I wanted to buy that house, that served as an office and studio. When my oldest brother, Ken, saw it he instantly christened it the Outback. On a somewhat unrelated note, it was also Ken that gave Emily the nickname she uses today, Emo, the day she was born.
Back to the story. These days, the Outback is inside but still serves, in addition to a home office and recording studio, as my personal junk drawer. While I was up late recently I started counting and cataloging nearly everything in the Outback. Here’s what I came up with so far:
87 shot glasses
9 century patches
iPhone 2.0
07/14/2008 01:35 AM
After returning home from camping, I finally
downloaded iTunes 7.7 and iPhone 2.0. Even though I’m
not getting the new 3G iPhone I have been really
looking forward to the new software.
I had just won a $50 gift card from Stacey over at Pill’s Place so I decided to get an iTunes card, just in time for the opening of the App Store (and the purchase of Alan Jackson’s Good Time).
In addition to the App Store, 2.0 has some new features, such as the ability to do a screen shot (Jason Tucker explains how). Now I can easily show the applications I’ve downloaded.
So far, my favorite apps are:
Remote - now I can control my iTunes from my iPhone... awesome!
Guitar Toolkit - A great portable guitar tuner
Where To? - An app that shows nearby restaurants, attractions, etc.
Super Monkey Ball - fun game, kids will probably play more than I do
Fuel Gauge (MPG) - helps me track my gas mileage
Tetris - amazing game for the iPhone, a must have!
AOL Radio - I know, it’s AOL, but the interface is beautiful and the music choices are great!
I was also thrilled to see the push services work. Since I rely heavily on iCal and Address Book (and, oh yeah, Mail) I can now go about my day no longer worrying that I may double book myself. Another new feature I really like is the way passwords are masked. Now, the last character is left un-masked until the next character is typed - very helpful when I fat-finger a password and forget what I’ve already typed.
So, thanks Stacey, for letting me go wild on the App Store!
Do you have an iPhone? What are some your favorite apps? E-mail me (mb@mattbeckwith.com) or post your favorites in the comments section.
I had just won a $50 gift card from Stacey over at Pill’s Place so I decided to get an iTunes card, just in time for the opening of the App Store (and the purchase of Alan Jackson’s Good Time).
In addition to the App Store, 2.0 has some new features, such as the ability to do a screen shot (Jason Tucker explains how). Now I can easily show the applications I’ve downloaded.
So far, my favorite apps are:
Remote - now I can control my iTunes from my iPhone... awesome!
Guitar Toolkit - A great portable guitar tuner
Where To? - An app that shows nearby restaurants, attractions, etc.
Super Monkey Ball - fun game, kids will probably play more than I do
Fuel Gauge (MPG) - helps me track my gas mileage
Tetris - amazing game for the iPhone, a must have!
AOL Radio - I know, it’s AOL, but the interface is beautiful and the music choices are great!
I was also thrilled to see the push services work. Since I rely heavily on iCal and Address Book (and, oh yeah, Mail) I can now go about my day no longer worrying that I may double book myself. Another new feature I really like is the way passwords are masked. Now, the last character is left un-masked until the next character is typed - very helpful when I fat-finger a password and forget what I’ve already typed.
So, thanks Stacey, for letting me go wild on the App Store!
Do you have an iPhone? What are some your favorite apps? E-mail me (mb@mattbeckwith.com) or post your favorites in the comments section.
My Hopes for iPhone 2.0
06/08/2008 06:00 PM
I originally planned on waiting until June 29th to
write "Why I Still Love the iPhone One Year Later".
With any luck, however, I won't have the same iPhone
on 6/29.
I was one of those crazy people that stood in line overnight to get my hands on the first iPhone. Emily and I spent 20 hours in line in front of a local AT&T store and were, in fact, one of the first people in the store when they opened the doors at precisely 6:00 PM on Friday, June 29, 2007, amidst cheers and applause.
My impression of the new device and the launch event was very favorable. In my mind, I had built up the new super phone to be the greatest thing since the invention of, well, you guessed it, the phone. How do I feel about the phone a year later? I still love it. The seemless integration with my e-mail, iCal, Contacts, pictures and videos makes it one of the most useful tech gadgets I have ever used.
Having said that, I am super-excited about the rumored next generation iPhone announcement next week. Nearly all rumors point to the new iPhone running on the much faster 3G wireless network and being available in larger capacities, among other exciting offerings.
Of course I understand that next week's WWDC is about more than just the iPhone. Perhaps we'll see some new hardware. Perhaps all of the iPhone chatter has provided a convenient cloak for some other new whiz-bang; only time will tell. For me, it's all about the iPhone, so here are my hopes for what happens tomorrow on the iPhone front (in order of personal importance).
* New iPhone available for purchase
* Lower price, subsidized by AT&T
* 32 and 64 GB models
* Copy and paste (c'mon, why did I have to wait a year for this!?!)
* Picture messaging (I am so tired of the "... has sent you a picture..." messages)
* Search functionality (like PBF Search)
* Video camera (like PBF ShowTime)
* Over-the-air syncing with dot-mac (or whatever it'll be called after next week)
* Native IM with video
* Flash
* GPS
I am also excited about the launch of the new App Store. I am not much of a gamer but the games that were shown at the SDK launch were pretty cool. Also, I can't wait to see what the jailbreakers have been bragging about.
If you have some time to kill tomorrow morning, check out 2008 WWDC keynote bingo. Me, I'll be following on MacRumorsLive and Twitter (although, based on the recent health of Twitter I would venture to guess that this site will crash tomorrow).
I will not be attending WWDC but, as luck would have it, I will be in San Francisco on Monday afternoon, perhaps a trip to Stockton street will be in order.
I was one of those crazy people that stood in line overnight to get my hands on the first iPhone. Emily and I spent 20 hours in line in front of a local AT&T store and were, in fact, one of the first people in the store when they opened the doors at precisely 6:00 PM on Friday, June 29, 2007, amidst cheers and applause.
My impression of the new device and the launch event was very favorable. In my mind, I had built up the new super phone to be the greatest thing since the invention of, well, you guessed it, the phone. How do I feel about the phone a year later? I still love it. The seemless integration with my e-mail, iCal, Contacts, pictures and videos makes it one of the most useful tech gadgets I have ever used.
Having said that, I am super-excited about the rumored next generation iPhone announcement next week. Nearly all rumors point to the new iPhone running on the much faster 3G wireless network and being available in larger capacities, among other exciting offerings.
Of course I understand that next week's WWDC is about more than just the iPhone. Perhaps we'll see some new hardware. Perhaps all of the iPhone chatter has provided a convenient cloak for some other new whiz-bang; only time will tell. For me, it's all about the iPhone, so here are my hopes for what happens tomorrow on the iPhone front (in order of personal importance).
* New iPhone available for purchase
* Lower price, subsidized by AT&T
* 32 and 64 GB models
* Copy and paste (c'mon, why did I have to wait a year for this!?!)
* Picture messaging (I am so tired of the "... has sent you a picture..." messages)
* Search functionality (like PBF Search)
* Video camera (like PBF ShowTime)
* Over-the-air syncing with dot-mac (or whatever it'll be called after next week)
* Native IM with video
* Flash
* GPS
I am also excited about the launch of the new App Store. I am not much of a gamer but the games that were shown at the SDK launch were pretty cool. Also, I can't wait to see what the jailbreakers have been bragging about.
If you have some time to kill tomorrow morning, check out 2008 WWDC keynote bingo. Me, I'll be following on MacRumorsLive and Twitter (although, based on the recent health of Twitter I would venture to guess that this site will crash tomorrow).
I will not be attending WWDC but, as luck would have it, I will be in San Francisco on Monday afternoon, perhaps a trip to Stockton street will be in order.
What's all this Twitter about?
05/26/2008 08:51 PM
If you follow me on Twitter, feel free to ignore this
entry; this information is not new to you.
If you have no idea what Twitter is, please keep reading. Many friends, family and other readers to this site have asked what is all this Twitter about? Before we get started, let me just say that Twitter is not new. In fact, there were more than 14 million other people that discovered Twitter before me (courtesy of Twitterholic).
Wikipedia defines Twitter as, "... a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send "updates" (or "tweets"; text-based posts, up to 140 characters long) to the Twitter website, via short message service (SMS), instant messaging, or a third-party application..."
In short, Twitter is like text-messages you can follow online or via text message to your cell phone. The first person I started "following" on Twitter was David from the FredCast (the internet's premiere cycling podcast). With a quick text page of 'follow FredCast to 40404 I was getting text page updates from David. Besides getting updates on my cell phone, I can also go to the internet and read his updates there http://twitter.com/fredcast.
I now find myself following a handful of my podcast friends, other cyclists, writers, technology gurus, the three leading presidential candidates, and a guy I went to high school with among others. Twitter loads especially easy on my iPhone so I check it often throughout the day.
I also track keywords in the public Twitter via text message. By sending a text message of 'track beckwith' to 40404 I get updates to my cell phone any time someone in the Twitterverse uses the word 'beckwith'. What else am I tracking?
The name of the company where I work. Because I work for a large corporation with millions of customers it is very interesting to see what the Twitterverse thinks of us. Mostly negative, some positive, but still a interesting angle on the voice of the customer.
Where I live, where I ride, where I work. I track Stockton, Lodi, Pleasanton, Livermore. I also track 580 and 205 which helps when there is a traffic issue.
Still confused? Well, don't be. The fine folks at Common Craft have done it again with a great video explanation of Twitter. Check it out here.
Also, in case you always wanted to know what a podcast was, Common Craft has a great video explanation of that, too. After you watch that, hop on over to Pizza Go Here and subscribe to our podcast.
So, now you know all about Twitter. Sign up and follow me. You'll wonder how you ever lived without it.
If you have no idea what Twitter is, please keep reading. Many friends, family and other readers to this site have asked what is all this Twitter about? Before we get started, let me just say that Twitter is not new. In fact, there were more than 14 million other people that discovered Twitter before me (courtesy of Twitterholic).
Wikipedia defines Twitter as, "... a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send "updates" (or "tweets"; text-based posts, up to 140 characters long) to the Twitter website, via short message service (SMS), instant messaging, or a third-party application..."
In short, Twitter is like text-messages you can follow online or via text message to your cell phone. The first person I started "following" on Twitter was David from the FredCast (the internet's premiere cycling podcast). With a quick text page of 'follow FredCast to 40404 I was getting text page updates from David. Besides getting updates on my cell phone, I can also go to the internet and read his updates there http://twitter.com/fredcast.
I now find myself following a handful of my podcast friends, other cyclists, writers, technology gurus, the three leading presidential candidates, and a guy I went to high school with among others. Twitter loads especially easy on my iPhone so I check it often throughout the day.
I also track keywords in the public Twitter via text message. By sending a text message of 'track beckwith' to 40404 I get updates to my cell phone any time someone in the Twitterverse uses the word 'beckwith'. What else am I tracking?
The name of the company where I work. Because I work for a large corporation with millions of customers it is very interesting to see what the Twitterverse thinks of us. Mostly negative, some positive, but still a interesting angle on the voice of the customer.
Where I live, where I ride, where I work. I track Stockton, Lodi, Pleasanton, Livermore. I also track 580 and 205 which helps when there is a traffic issue.
Still confused? Well, don't be. The fine folks at Common Craft have done it again with a great video explanation of Twitter. Check it out here.
Also, in case you always wanted to know what a podcast was, Common Craft has a great video explanation of that, too. After you watch that, hop on over to Pizza Go Here and subscribe to our podcast.
So, now you know all about Twitter. Sign up and follow me. You'll wonder how you ever lived without it.
Podcast and New Media Expo 2007
09/29/2007 11:42 PM
Dawn and I made the drive down to Ontario
(California, not Canada) for the 2007 Podcast and New Media
Expo. We have met a ton of other podcasters
and are having a great time.
Last night we met up with some other podcasters at the Couple Cast meet-up at the Ontario Mills Mall. It was great to meet Dan and Cj from Love Long and Prosper, Steve and Dawn from For What It's Worth, Matt and Amy from the Redboy Podcast, Rob and Tina from Learning to Fly Together and Barely from Barely Podcasting. There were a lot of other podcasters there but we didn't get a chance to meet them all.
It was great to finally meet Steve and Dawn from For What It's Worth. We have been listening to their podcast for a long time but really wanted to meet them to personally thank Steve for the Pizza Go Here art work.
Today, we met Chuck and Kreg from Technorama (and others), Doug Welch from Career Opportunies (and others), Shelly Brisbane from Shelly's Podcast, Rob Walsh from Podcast411 and Today in iPhone, Ken Ray from Mac OS Ken, Tee Morris from Billibub Baddings and Podcasting for Dummies, Adam Raimer from Mad Town Aces, Don McAllister from ScreenCastsOnline, Aaron from the Big Show, Charles Cadenhead from Mostly News and Desperate Husbands, and a bunch of others.
Congratulations to Chuck Tomasi on being named the co-author of the upcoming Podcasting for Dummies book, along with Tee Morris!
Tonight we had dinner with Steve Holden from Tech News Radio and the Jersey Boys Podcast and Mike Auzenne from Manager Tools. Afterward, we hung out with Victor, Adam, Steve, Chuck, Kreg, Mad Marv, Chris from Amateur Traveler, Steve from Geek Cred - thanks guys for letting us hang out with you.
Check out the pictures here.
Last night we met up with some other podcasters at the Couple Cast meet-up at the Ontario Mills Mall. It was great to meet Dan and Cj from Love Long and Prosper, Steve and Dawn from For What It's Worth, Matt and Amy from the Redboy Podcast, Rob and Tina from Learning to Fly Together and Barely from Barely Podcasting. There were a lot of other podcasters there but we didn't get a chance to meet them all.
It was great to finally meet Steve and Dawn from For What It's Worth. We have been listening to their podcast for a long time but really wanted to meet them to personally thank Steve for the Pizza Go Here art work.
Today, we met Chuck and Kreg from Technorama (and others), Doug Welch from Career Opportunies (and others), Shelly Brisbane from Shelly's Podcast, Rob Walsh from Podcast411 and Today in iPhone, Ken Ray from Mac OS Ken, Tee Morris from Billibub Baddings and Podcasting for Dummies, Adam Raimer from Mad Town Aces, Don McAllister from ScreenCastsOnline, Aaron from the Big Show, Charles Cadenhead from Mostly News and Desperate Husbands, and a bunch of others.
Congratulations to Chuck Tomasi on being named the co-author of the upcoming Podcasting for Dummies book, along with Tee Morris!
Tonight we had dinner with Steve Holden from Tech News Radio and the Jersey Boys Podcast and Mike Auzenne from Manager Tools. Afterward, we hung out with Victor, Adam, Steve, Chuck, Kreg, Mad Marv, Chris from Amateur Traveler, Steve from Geek Cred - thanks guys for letting us hang out with you.
Check out the pictures here.
Weird Al is a Geek!
06/07/2007 10:24 PM
I am Weird Al Yankovic fan! There, I said it, out
loud. I really like his music and have nearly
everything he's ever released. As I was listening to
some Weird Al recently it struck me that, in addition
to being a big polka guy, Weird Al is quite the geek,
a proud geek I bet.
After going through my Weird Al collection I came up with a Top 10 Weird Al Geek Songs.
10. Spam - not really about junk e-mail but still a classic
9. Virus Alert - the craziest virus ever written
8. The Saga Begins - "My, my, this here Anakin guy, maybe Vader someday later now he's just a small fry...."
7. Bob - C'mon, a song written entirely of palindromes... that's cool!
6. Ebay - "...Tell me why, I bid on Shatner's old toupee..."
5. Ode To A Superhero - All about Spidey
4. Jurassic Park - this should have been the theme song!
3. Slime Creatures From Outer Space - what a great title
2. White & Nerdy - can you count the nerd / geek references?
1. It's All About The Pentiums - even though it's not really "all about the Pentiums" anymore, he really showed his geek side in this one
Click here to view the the iMix I created in iTunes.
Enjoy!
After going through my Weird Al collection I came up with a Top 10 Weird Al Geek Songs.
10. Spam - not really about junk e-mail but still a classic
9. Virus Alert - the craziest virus ever written
8. The Saga Begins - "My, my, this here Anakin guy, maybe Vader someday later now he's just a small fry...."
7. Bob - C'mon, a song written entirely of palindromes... that's cool!
6. Ebay - "...Tell me why, I bid on Shatner's old toupee..."
5. Ode To A Superhero - All about Spidey
4. Jurassic Park - this should have been the theme song!
3. Slime Creatures From Outer Space - what a great title
2. White & Nerdy - can you count the nerd / geek references?
1. It's All About The Pentiums - even though it's not really "all about the Pentiums" anymore, he really showed his geek side in this one
Click here to view the the iMix I created in iTunes.
Enjoy!