30 June 2008

Helping out The Man

So it's kind of silly, but I happen to like their coffee. Also it's free, and so if you like coffee perhaps you will enjoy FREE coffee

Dunkin' Donuts. Dunkin' keeps me blogging. Try Dunkin' Donuts Coffee For Free. Get a Sample

Unfortunately The Man isn't paying me to promote his coffee. To ease that pain I look to Scarlet and take solace in the fact that "tomorrow is another day."

...yeah, I went there. I said that.

28 June 2008

Cameras, not phones!

Quick list of cameras being considered atm:

Nikon D60

Canon Rebel XSi
Pentax K20D
Pentax K200D

And the new frontrunner:

the Olympus E-510!!

Of course there's going to be a successor to this model in August but I'm hearing it will cost more. And why shouldn't it, it will be brand new. I'm told that the kit lenses sold with Canons and Nikons are actually not all that great. If the K20D was cheaper I might have leaned more towards buying that as I still have a few K-mount lenses and they would work on the body (right?).

Apparently also worth noting is the number of lenses available to each brand. Canon and Nikon have the most to offer in this category in both current and legacy lenses. Pentax, I believe, has a decent number as well. The Olympus has about 30 lenses I'm hearing; honestly, that sounds like more than enough. My thinking is that there is still a lot of flux in the DSLR world and that the E510 looks like an excellent camera to carry me past that tide.

To close this post out I think I'll mention a website I ran across while researching all these various cameras. It is one that I have come across before for other electronics information and I always find the articles there to be informative and pleasurable to read. This is due in great part because they have an index of each article which allows you to jump to the various sections which might most interest you without having to sift through the rest. I give you:

AnandTech.com

20 June 2008

EL OH EL

So, you remember that phone I JUST told you about that I fixed? Yeah, um...

...it broke again.

True story. Perhaps a sign? Who can say. I don't really want to buy another place holder phone, but if this thing just keeps on breaking....*sigh*.

Anyone know where I can buy an inexpensive N82? Because that's kind of what I want now.

He is Ninja

and he's pretty darn funny. Here's a link to the first video of his that I saw:

Ask a Ninja: What is Podcasting?

He's got, like, 70-80 clips of fairly hilarious material. Srsly.

Also interesting to watch, and subscribable in iTunes, is the podcast GeekBrief. I'm not sure if it was something wrong with my computer or if there was some kind of glitch in iTunes, but I had to download an episode and then click the 'subscribe' button beside that to get the subscription. Clicking the normal subscribe button on the main iTunes listing timed out a couple of times. Weird, that.

17 June 2008

OY!

I've run across a few interesting things lately, this time intangibles.

First off, highly impressed by a little deed undertaken by a good friend of mine, Justin. We were hanging out, enjoying a little lunch and he was telling about his iPod and how the click wheel no longer functioned properly on it. Instead of paying a ton of money to have Apple repair it, or worse, throwing it away, he decided to order a $4 dollar part and fix it himself. He's even taking the opportunity to customize his iPod a little. Good show, says I. I was so impressed by this small act that when I found out the pointer knob on my cell phone was broken I decided to fix it myself instead of haggling with the provider, and/or replacing it. I spent a little over $6.00 for small screwdrivers so that I would be able to open the case and get to the broken knob. A small dab of super glue and 30 minutes setting time later the phone was repaired. It's not pretty but it works.

I'm not concerned with it not looking pristine as I am looking into getting a new phone, one that has a decent camera with it. No, I don't think it will be an iPhone because the camera features on it are woeful and that includes the newly released iPhone with 3G. Front runners right now are both Nokias, the N82 and the N95, though I think I'll have to rethink several things if I were to buy it now. By far more likely is that I'll just keep gathering information and buy something at a later date.

The other thing I have run across recently is really two things: Twitter and Qik. These are interesting web tools to be sure; my personal preference to visit is Qik so far, though as far as use I think I'd probably be more apt to use Twitter. Qik is fascinating. There are thousands of short videos that people stream to the website, of conferences and vacations, parties and music practice, as well as other odd things to make the mind wonder...mostly wonder why anyone would stream that. It's inspiring in some strange ways, to me anyway. I very much like the fact that they are ordinary videos of people around the world and though the language is not understand the humanity comes through. Perhaps the beginnings of globalized thinking will spring from such things. One can hope anyway.

Comments welcome of course, you two :)