Writing Stuff

I didn't last a week. I gave dropping Google almost entirely about 3 days before I just had to go back. Google is a bit like crack (and food ), it seems, and I just can't kick the addiction yet. The biggest thing I missed were my personalized homepage. When switching to MobileMe, I switched to using Yahoo! as my browser homepage and dumped Chrome as well. iGoogle used to bring in my Gmail account, Google Calendar, RSS feeds and news to me in once place and it loaded quickly. When I stopped using Gmail and Google Calendar, this page became pretty bare and ugly so I stopped using it. Yahoo! looks nice, but it takes too long to use and isn't as personalized and interactive as iGoogle. The overall switch on my Mac wasn't as hard as I thought and the MobileMe integration with my iPhone and work Mac were pretty awesome. Switching my iPhone over from Google wasn't a huge deal, for the most part. The calendar integration was similar but the contact syncing was great. I h...

I think that I’ve finally decided to part ways with Google’s grasp on my most personal information. I’ve been a loyal Google user for many years now and use just about every free service that they provide, but this weekend I’ve decided to start the process of moving away from some of their core services. For privacy reasons, I’ve taken my email and calendar hosting elsewhere. To replace the awesome support and syncing that Google offered for the iPhone, I’ve gone back to using MobileMe. Sure, it costs money but it’s nice to not have absolutely everything relating to my online existence be with one company. Not only is one point of failure a concern, but so is a single point of court ordered privacy violations. Having all of your eggs in one basket makes it that much easier for hackers or law enforcement to find out everything about me, who I’m talking to and what I’m doing for the forseeable future. Finally I’ve realized that that may not be right for me. That’s a concern with anyone...

One of the biggest expectations for Apple’s iPhone event yesterday was that a new piece of hardware, one capable of running on Verizon’s network, would finally be unveiled. This was obviously not the case and Steve and Co. gave no indication of any future announcements on Big Red’s front. There’s still the expected hardware announcement in June or July (Apple has said the iPhone is on a yearly hardware development cycle), but my guess is that we’ll see the event come and go without so much as a hint of Verizon being mentioned. The iPhone doesn’t work on Verizon for technical reasons, not just because Steve may hold a grudge (Verizon originally  turned down  Apple’s offer for exclusivity… Oops!). Verizon’s network operates using the  CDMA  wireless protocl whereas AT&T and most other international carriers use  GSM . There would need to be an entirely new wireless radio developed and a new manufacturing process introduced for the iPhone to support Verizon’s...

While I haven’t been lucky enough to get an invite to an Apple event (hey, I’m pretty small-time) I do spend a great deal of time poring over the wealth of information that comes in from those that are lucky enough to attend the event live. You’ll be able to find the sources of my information after the break, but enjoy the details first! I didn’t think the event was going to be as exciting and filled with information as it actually turned out to be, so there’s quite a bit of content here. I’ll do my best to summarize what’s not super important or interesting and spend some good time with what is. Apple generally releases video of their keynotes a number of hours after the event. I’ll download and watch this once it’s available and update this with things I may have missed. Tidbits – Steve loves to throw stats around, and here they are: 450,000 iPads sold since opening day (4/3) 600,000 iBooks downloaded since then. 250k downloaded in first 24 hours. No word on how many were ...

This weekend sucked. Sure, the iPad finally released but I didn't have one. I, kind of unfortunately, pre-ordered a 3G iPad and have to wait about another month before I'll get mine. Saturday was an annoying day for me, to say the least. I spent most of the day regretting the decision to not purchase a Wi-Fi iPad or trying to keep myself from buying a Wi-Fi model while I await delivery of my 3G one. Thankfully I was able to restrain myself. I guess what I was most disappointed with was that I opted to not be part of the "experience." When I originally placed my pre-order I figured it wouldn't be a big deal to miss camping out and picking up my iPad in store on launch day, but I immediately regretted that Friday night when the coverage started exploding after Apple removed their press embargo. Apparently some major tech. pundits had had them for about a week and were finally able to reveal this and release their reviews. I knew that I had made a mistake once I st...