My Oyster

Why add stuff when you can get it built in?

Hehe.  Very cute and very true.  I have the tablet version of this Lenovo and LOVE it.

Could I Hate Apple Any More?

Always pretty.  Rarely functional.  Consistently bad engineering and manufacturing. 

Today I made my quarterly trip to the Apple Store to deal with yet more of their shitty engineering and manufacturing.  While in Europe, my CrApple Craptop  failed me yet again. 

Apple can market the bejeesus out of anything but they don't know how to actually MAKE a product that can be used by a human being over time.

I have already blogged about their lemon logic boards.  I burned through 4 of them in two different iBooks before they gave up on their own product and told me to just get a new Powerbook. 

Today's problem - their power adapters.  They suck.  Their design is so flimsy that if you move the cord at all, it frays and breaks.  I am now on my 4th adapter.  They cost $80 each.  They warranty them for a year.  For me, they never even make it that long.

apple macbook pro magsafe power adapter buring, originally uploaded by WuHongSheng.

After the cord on adapter #2 split, the "Genius" at the Genius Bar told me that I am moving my laptop around too much and it bends the cord and thus causes fraying and splitting.

Umm.  Newsflash Genius.  It's a laptop.  It should be designed for movement.  It's not a desktop.  Duh.

So today I brought in my two non-working adapters that failed while I was in Europe.  Today's adapter problem wasn't the fraying cord.  But the thing was not working anyway.  The "Genius" at the Genius Bar said that maybe the problem was the adapters can really only tolerate very "clean" power and the impure power that I seem to be using basically kills the adaptor's innards.  The solution that the "Genius" gave me?  Buy a top of the line surge protector/power purifier and take it with me. 

Uh-huh.  Take a surge protector with me around the world on trips.  Take it to the local cafe.  Take it to a friend's house.  That's a good solution.

Or - how about...DESIGN A POWER ADAPTER THAT WORKS?!

It's not just me.  A quick scan of the Net shows lots of others with the same problems with CrApple power adapters.  Tons of pix on Flickr.  Lots of blog postings.  Here is one.  Here is another.

Don't even get me started on the problems with the iPhone.  Pretty design tho.  Great marketing...

The Future is Now...

Using your brainwaves to run a computer - to compose music, to work, to communicate with friends and family. 

I saw this today.  It's awesome.  It allows people with very limited control of their body to use all the functionality of a computer. 

This thing, a band around the forehead, actually senses and responds to surface electrical signals generated from muscle, eye movement, and even brainwaves and then uses those signals to run a computer.  It is so scifi - using brainwaves to run technology.

I was amazed.  It's called Brainfingers.  More here.

If you lived in China - you would have to work for two full years and save every penny...

...to buy me this TV.

It's my new 40inch Sony Bravia flat screen LCD TV.  And yes, it cost twice the per capita GDP of China.  It cost 4x the per capita GDP of Cameroon.  For the cost of this TV in my new living room, I could support the per capita GDP of a person in Mozambique for more than 10 years.

Clearly I have mixed emotions about this bundle of consumerism.   It stressed me out all the while I was shopping for it.  I hated the whole experience. It's the best of technology, which I love, but the worst of consumer shucksterism.  If I am paying all this money for the TV, should I really have to buy all the expensive cables and power purifiers to make it all work right?  And that's not even including paying for the high def programming.  Ugh.

Luckily I had friends to support me every step of the way.  Despite having worked in the technology industry for more than 15 years, I have no ability to put this all together and make it work.  Arino and Jean did.  Gott Sei Dank!

I do have to admit, the picture and sound were both amazing.  :-)

Scammin' Me...

I love craigslist.  I have made a lot of money there.  Legitimately.  I have sold some random stuff.  I have rented rooms in my house there.  Fast.  Efficient.  Always a good experience.  Until now.

I have decided to sell basically EVERYTHING in my house before I move.  Over the weekend, I posted several ads for various pieces of furniture - like the English art deco cabinet below.

Almost immediately, I got the note below in response to the ad for the cabinet.  She says she can't come pick it up - because she is "in Argentina" - but she wants to send me a check if I give her my name, address, and phone number.  Then her "mover" will come and get it.

I got nearly identical messages for every other piece of furniture I posted.  One guy's excuse was not that he was in Argentina, but that he had a broken leg and could not come to get the chair.  But his "mover" could.

The Note.

Hey,

Thanks for the prompt response to my enquiry. I want to buy it, I would love to come and check it but i am currently out of state to Continent of Argentina. Pls i wiil want you to remove the advert from web and make it reserved for me.
I should believe the item is in perfect condition as stated on the web. I  will be making the payment through a Certified Check  which which will sent across to you by my secreatary.  I'll be picking the item from you, the mover fee will be added to the money for the Item and the mover will also be picking some otehr items for me in your location. My Mover will be coming to Pick it from you once the Check clears from your Bank which will take 2-3 bus. day. Then you'll get the payment across to shipping vendor.  Pls I will need both your name and physical address along with you phone number to issue out the payment.

I actually think it's kinda funny, except that I bet a lot of people fall for it...

 

Would you lend him money?

Money.jpg, originally uploaded by dcjay64.

He is a single father.  He was recently fired from his job.  He does seem to have some good skills and experience at PR/Marketing/Events Management.

He wants you (and me) to loan him money.  Well, not us specifically - - anyone really. 

He posted his story, including how much money he wants ($5000), what he wants the money for (to start a marketing/PR business), and what he will pay you for the money (16.22% APR) on a very cool website i stumbled across called Prosper.com. 

It's like Match.com - but to bring together people with money and people needing money.  It's grassroots capitalism meets the high tech age and I love it. 

So far 26 people have each offered to lend this guy anywhere from $50 to  $250 and he has raised nearly half his goal to start a business.  He seems well on his way to getting the investment he needs to become an entrepreneur.

Other people on this site are looking for money for all kinds of reasons - paying off credit card debt, paying tuition, home repair.  All of them are offering to pay back their lenders with interest.

I am going to start making some investments.  Kinda fun and interesting.

This is Mike - My date tonight...

He's cute.  He's smart.  He's funny.  We spent two hours tonight at a bar just chatting and laughing and telling stories. 

OK, so the bar was the Apple Store Genius Bar.  Mike was my Genius.  Our date was my weekly (seriously) visit to Clarendon to work on my sickly Crapple Craptop.  Our chatting was mostly about how the four Apple lemon logic boards that have paraded through my laptop(s) have completely whacked out all my pictures - thousands of them.  Our laughing was mostly over the random suggestive pics that would "pop" up as we were working on my iPhotos.  He's married.  To a woman.  Something tells me that these Geniuses see a lot of odd pics.

I am off to Seattle next week, but we already have another date set up for the week I return...

Into the Belly of the Beast...

Is that Apple? 

Or Virginia? 

Or both?

Tonight I made the journey from DC out to the burbs to visit the Apple Store in Clarendon.  This was a  trip I had been avoiding for two reasons - 1) I have a painful history with Apple and 2) the Virginia suburbs scare me.

Lets start with Apple.

I have a never-ending series of problems with every Apple product I ever purchased.  Let me be clear - this rant is NOT because of my new gig.  My love/hate relationship with Apple goes back for years. 

And there is really some love there (Shhhh). 

I actually made the switch to a Mac for my home computer for two reasons - to play with photos and music.  I have a lot of both  But its precisely with those two core functions that Apple has pushed me to the limits of my patience.  OK - granted - I don't have much patience and I have even less technical skills.  But still - does it have to be this painful?  I won't go into the gory details - but i got the iPod with a battery-life of 3 songs, the iBook that required 4 new logic boards, and the Powerbook that has mysteriously lost hundreds of my pictures.

And then there is Virginia...

So tonight I threw my Powerbook into a bag and headed to Clarendon.   Virginia.  The roads confuse me.  The people confound me (sorry to my friends there).  The faux "urban villages"   make me giggle.  I loved seeing two people tonight walking their dogs in a "park" in the middle of the mixed-used Market Commons at Clarendon development (a gussied up strip mall).  It was a bit too - Epcot Center - for my taste.  The dogs didn't seem to mind though.  And I survived.  I even got a couple picture frames from Crate and Barrel to show off the Senior snaps of my nephew and niece.

All in all, it was worth the trip.  Got my 'puter fixed (mostly).  Did some suburban shopping.  Did some people watching.  Bumped into a guy I hadn't seen in years...

The rewards of the journey far outweigh the risk of leaving the harbor - unknown