What Santa didn't bring me this Tuesday

Tuesday, October 14, 2008, 10 AM PST – Apple unveils a new lineup of mobile goodness to the world, available online immediately. The news of redesigned MacBooks and MacBook Pros is exciting, but I’m still underwhelmed by the much-awaited unveiling.

Here’s a few things that I wish Apple had considered:

1. A smaller MacBook Air. That’s smaller, not lighter. Maybe a 10″ or 11″ widescreen would be absolutely perfect for me, even if the weight stayed the same. I’m sure I’m not the only one craving a smaller Apple laptop. Many questions have been asked about the possibility of a tablet, which tends to go hand-in-hand with the smaller form factor, but this is a feature I am much less concerned about, and certainly wouldn’t influence a decision for me to buy it.
2. Firewire on the MacBook. It may be uncommon for devices other than camcorders, but Firewire is definitely a much safer bet than USB for many purposes. Though I don’t find myself using Firewire alot these days, the opportunities still arise, and when they do, I’m always glad that the connection can be made with something other than USB. For video editing, I’m not sure how users will cope. OK, so you don’t normally buy a MacBook for video editing, but iMovie is included. How does Apple expect users to capture from their cameras without Firewire?
3. Option of matte screen. This isn’t a huge deal for me, but as I work opposite a window everyday, I do appreciate the non-reflective finish of my office MacBook Pro and Cinema Display. It’d be nice to have this choice.
4. The old MacBook (white plastic) is still in the lineup at a slightly reduced price. This just seems weird. I would have rather seen a lower spec for the white MacBook and a larger drop in price, down to the 800 range.

Those are the major concerns I have. I find myself leaning towards one of the new aluminum MacBooks as my next computer upgrade, which I plan to hold off on, until the jury comes back on how they do.

Better MagSafe than Sorry – or not

So I’ve tripped over my power cord on more than one occasion, and yes, just maybe the MagSafe plug has prevented my laptop from taking flight.

I’m not so sure it’s been really helpful to me, though. In my past experience giving your laptop a little airtime once in a while isn’t usually fatal. Sure, it scares the buh-geezes out of you or the person who’s laptop you borrowed to check your Gmail account, but usually the little wonder comes out relatively unscathed.

Now, a bit past a year of having my MacBook, the power cord is shot. I’m kinda grumpy about it. Why does Apple keep making power cords with ridiculously crappy strain reliefs. Maybe the magnet in the plug is still just a bit too strong to make it truly MagSafe. Though it saves your computer, clearly the resistance on the cord is enough to kill it in time. BLAH.

Anyway. I have a mind to reinforce my next powercord with mounds of electrical tape. Not sure if I’ll do it, but it’s a thought.

I guess I can be glad mine didn’t completely melt and spark as some Internet reports reveal.

Anybody else have trouble with their MagSafe’s? Or am I the only one?

if you can't beat them, beat them with sticks

what happens when you have a great idea and somebody else comes up with the same idea at approximately the same time? frustrating..

so today, in an ironic feat of web-searchification, while working on my very own foto:blip, i discovered a lovely little app that does nearly the same thing as foto:blip. note, nearly.

clearly i’ve been beaten to the punch in providing a way to use photos instead of words to share the play by play of your life.

so what to do now? beat them with sticks!

the key differentiation that i see right now is that TwitPic (what a silly name) is a bolt-on application. it connects with the Twitter API and (sortof) extends the functionality of Twitter. not a bad idea at all. Twitter has a large and growing userbase. but, i believe that what is really needed to take the next step with microbloggery is to have a completely new application which is built from the ground up to work with images. while two Twitter add-on clients support TwitPic, allowing the posted photo to be viewed directly in the client, other venues such as the Twitter web site and the all-important Twitter Facebook application merely show a link to your photo posted via TwitPic. degrades nicely for those clients, but how will it bode for the visually-inclined user? not so well.

foto:blip has, from the very beginning, been designed to use photos as the users’ primary means of communication. to emphasize that point, photo captions are limited to a short 50 characters. we want users to communicate with their images. to do this, it is a necessity that every viewer can see the posted images alongside the caption.

i’ll be having a closer look at TwitPic shortly as I continue working on foto:blip. perhaps it will inspire me even more.

foto:blip coming soon.

i’m about 80 percent done my new social site, foto:blip.

the concept is pretty simple. we live in a visual world, not a textual one. though words can describe many things, a picture still captures so much more.

tools like twitter are cool. it allows you to update from a variety of places, most commonly the web site, a facebook application and from a registered mobile device. it’s really cool to be able to share your day as it happens with your followers and see what your friends are doing with their days.

it’s time to take the next step. foto:blip merges the quick-posting ease of use of applications like twitter with the increased level of communication that can take place with a photograph.

some of the features include:

• built in flash-powered foto:booth. you don’t even need to save a photo to your computer first, simply take a picture with your webcam and upload it immediately, all from within your browser window
• mobile uploads. using your cell phone provider’s sms to e-mail gateway or e-mail account, you can send messages with picture attachments that will be posted to your account when received
• no-login-required access to your foto:blip profile
• rss feeds for foto:blip profiles
• more coming..

stay tuned for launch information.

A Worthy Cause

Anyone who knows Jeremy knows that he has had a desire to own an ultraportable laptop for a long time.

Since he switched to Macintosh, he has been unable to fulfill his desire.

Today, January 15, 2008, Apple has released the MacBook Air. Today, Apple has made Jeremy’s dream possible.

Please help Jeremy live out his dream of owning an ultraportable Macintosh laptop.