Read + Write + Report
Home | Start a blog | About Orble | FAQ | Sites | Writers | Advertise | My Orble | Login
 
Technology, Spirituality, Collaboration, Connectivity

Web - The Geek Speak

iReport turns cell phone user into field reporters

September 1st 2008 00:34
Did you see the FAA computer crash story on CNN? Did you go to CNN.com? If you did you saw an interesting link at the bottom that said "Are you stuck at the airport?" I couldn't help but check it out and it takes you to a service called iReport, this allows you to upload photos and video to the iReport site and add your comments to the piece. CNN then picks the best pieces while the story is hot and some of them do make it to air. So there were a lot of folks with there travel woes on the site of course.

iReport allows you to create your own stories on any topic. This is just another example of video journalism in our always connected world. Im not sure if I like everyone with a cell phone being the "man on the street" but it is still good for CNN to show that they are listening to the regular folks and using some cool technology as well.


Peace.
49
Vote
Shared on
Comments (1)Comments (1) Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


My Google Office

August 3rd 2008 21:08
I confess- I have used Microsoft products almost exclusively for the majority of my career in Tech. The past couple of years I have played with open source alternatives to Windows (Linux) with moderate success, but instead of replacing the whole OS I have looked lately at the applications I used most often. The office suite. I have moved my domain over to
Google Apps for domains so my domain name now has the following services tied to it, all for free:

1. GMail- The bestest email system ever!
2. Google Docs- Spreadsheets, Documents, Presentations
3. Google Sites- Sites for collaboration similar to MS Sharepoint

4.Calendar
5. Google Talk

There are some other small things that go with Google Apps like Google gears, which allow sync with all your docs so you can use them online or offline.

Things I like about this environment:

1. It's free
2. You can share docs with others and collaborate on them in real time
3. Everything is online so you can work where ever you are.
4. Alerting features for Calendar, and document updates
5. Exporting of documents to different formats (Doc to PDF Etc.)
6. You can work offline with Google Gears


So for an office of 5-10 people the Google office suite could save you several hundred dollars or more on software. It's not as pretty an interface as Microsoft Office but it is functional.

With the Google Sites portion you can drag and drop your way to building your company intranet.


The other thing to wrap your head around is that I havent had to install anything on my local machine (unless I want the offline sync cabability) this is the definition of cloud computing in case you were wondering.

There are other internet based operating systems and office suites out there but since this has the Google brand attached to it, it will have the most eyeballs on it. I think that this concept will be the norm as we move forward towards our always connected world, as well as the work anywhere and anytime world.

I will keep you posted as I dig into this suite further.


Peace.
52
Vote
Shared on
Comments (1)Comments (1) Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


Are XM and Sirius Still Relevant?

July 28th 2008 01:19
When I first got my Sirius radio I thought is was the greatest thing ever. It is definitely better than terrestrial radio for music since they are no commercials, for talk you get less commercials as well but they are still there. Well I have been hearing about the XM/Sirius merger for what seems like forever and had high hopes for it. I had heard Mel Carmison speak to congress about the benefits of the merger and had confidence in his ability to run the show.

I am SO disappointed in the FCC and their inability to come to a quicker decision on this. "It's a monopoly" they keep saying. Do they not realize this is a pay service and that ever other audio medium is a competitor. Things like iTunes, internet radio, regular radio are all competitors of satellite radio. How hard is that to see? Do you listen to it in your car, check. Do you listen to it on the go, check. You see my point.

You would think that this were a merging of 2 nuclear weapons manufacturers. The sad fact, I'm afraid is that satellite radio will probably not boom like they expected. Yes they will hold on to some subscribers for their sports and celebrity niche channels (Stern, Martha Stewart etc.) but as the internet becomes more accessible in cars and portable devices (iPhone) the emergence of internet radio as a real player will surface. I already take my laptop and cellular card with me to listen to several stations I can only listen to on the web. This is allow current regular radio stations to be heard as well as the smaller stations who cannot afford to play in the regular radio space. This will create more content for all to enjoy.

Am I off here? Does anyone see this medium (SatRadio) as something that will thrive in the future and what's your opinion on internet radio as a new thriving medium?

Peace.
50
Vote
Shared on
Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web, Gadgets
   


BrightKite, Twitter and Ping, Oh My!

July 25th 2008 02:07
The other day I listened to the Windows Weekly podcast (geeky, I know) but the host was saying how when people email him direct with questions it is kind of a waste because no one else benefits from the answer like they do if the person uses Twitter to post the question and he can share the answer with everyone. That is one of the beauties of social networking for me. The sharing of information among people you may not usually share with.

Today I had something cool happen with several social net tools today, here's the story


[ Click here to read more ]
76
Vote
Shared on
Read MoreRead More Comments (2)Comments (2) Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


81% Spam

July 22nd 2008 01:34
ArsTechnica says that 81% of all email sent in June were spam. That number comes from messagelabs who scans 3 billion emails per day.

"Different socioeconomic factors and levels of security awareness" are the reason for varying spam levels from state to state." Says a spokesperson from Messagelabs


[ Click here to read more ]
66
Vote
Shared on
Read MoreRead More Comments (3)Comments (3) Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


A great web service, YouMail

July 15th 2008 20:13
I've been using YouMail for several months now. It is a free voicemail service that has a ton of features and is a lot of fun. You sign up by registering your cell phone and entering the authorization code you receive. Once that is done you can setup your greetings.

This service has a feature called smart greeting that will enable the greeting to actually speak the name of the person calling in. For example, "Hello Mr. Jones, Daryl cannot come to the phone right now. Please leave a message." The service has a ton of greetings in several categories so if some of your contacts are personal and some business then you can setup the greetings accordingly. Another great feature is voicemail to email


[ Click here to read more ]
48
Vote
Shared on
Read MoreRead More Comments (1)Comments (1) Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


merican Begins Inflight Broadband Access Installation

July 3rd 2008 00:55
Wednesday July the 25th on an American Airlines flight from New York to LA, AA did it's dress rehearsal for in flight Wi-Fi . The full pilot program will be running over the next 3-6 months on about 15 planes. Users will get free access tomorrow but after that you will pay 12.95 for flights over 3 hours and 9.95 for shorter flights. The service is provided by a company called GoGo via a series of cell towers that hand the signal off as the plane travels across the country.

So the question is of course, would you pay 10 bucks to surf on the plane


[ Click here to read more ]
50
Vote
Shared on
Read MoreRead More Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


American Begins Inflight Broadband Access Installation

July 3rd 2008 00:55
Wednesday July the 25th on an American Airlines flight from New York to LA, AA did it's dress rehearsal for in flight Wi-Fi . The full pilot program will be running over the next 3-6 months on about 15 planes. Users will get free access tomorrow but after that you will pay 12.95 for flights over 3 hours and 9.95 for shorter flights. The service is provided by a company called GoGo via a series of cell towers that hand the signal off as the plane travels across the country.

So the question is of course, would you pay 10 bucks to surf on the plane


[ Click here to read more ]
63
Vote
Shared on
Read MoreRead More Comments (1)Comments (1) Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


The new Classics?

June 25th 2008 13:09
This is totally off my "usual " topic but its good for conversation.

Entertainment Weekly published their list of New Classics, the best movies of 1993 to 2008.
[ Click here to read more ]
61
Vote
Shared on
Read MoreRead More Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


New Media DRM and what to do

June 22nd 2008 23:09
Everyone loves the iPod right? It saved Apple as a company and gave us one of the slickest little toys ever invented. It also introduced the quandaries of managing digital music for users and record companies. Apple and other services use what is called Digital Rights Management on all of its tracks so that it limits the user on what you may do with the tracks. Depending on the service you may only be able to move your songs between you computer and your MP3 player. Some may allow you to burn them to CD, some may not. The issue here is what you can or cant do with the songs, you paid for them, right? The problem is that the record companies impose fees on the music provider (Apple for instance) so that they can sell them to you. They work out all the DRM details in the contract with the provider. So why should you have to buy the tracks multiple times in order to have it in multiple places? The answer is you shouldn't, its a rip off!!. The more choices we have in our music providers, the more flexibility you have with the management of the tracks. This is not a post to promote music services (I have those on Fridays ) my goal is to inform the consumer. Here is a good little article explaining the types of DRM from other services and there are some alternatives in the article as well. I guess the point of this post is that if you are buying music or video online. BUY DRM FREE!!
63
Vote
Shared on
Add CommentsAdd Comments
[ Link ]
Posted By: Daryl Goard - Category: Web
   


Next Page (11-20)



[ The Geek Speak Home ] [ Create A New Post ]
Moderated by Daryl Goard
Copyright © 2006 2007 2008 On Topic Media PTY LTD. All Rights Reserved. Design by Vimu.com.
On Topic Media ZPages: Sydney |  Melbourne |  Brisbane |  London |  Birmingham |  Leeds     [ Advertise ] [ Contact Us ] [ Privacy Policy ]