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iPod Review – Five Years Later

iPod

I got an iPod for Christmas in 2005. I’m going to review it now. Wait, 2005… Is that a typo!? No…

I’m still using the first iPod I ever got. My wife gave me the 5th generation 30GB iPod with video. And yes, I did review this iPod back in 2007. So what? I’m reviewing it again.

I love this iPod. I have not felt the urge to upgrade or replace it. It works as well as it did 5 years ago when I got it. The interface is simple and easy to use. It does one thing, and it does it well.

I use this iPod almost every day. At least, every day I drive. I’d guess that 98% of its usage is in my car as an audio player connected to my car stereo. I have no desire to get an iPod touch, as I actually think the interface would be much more difficult to use while driving. In my previous review I did mention something about this:

The iPod interface also requires you to look, or at least be able to feel around and guess where to push. Other players (with actual buttons) allow you to memorize where the buttons are and what they do. I could operate my Rio while driving and never take my eyes off the road. This seems to be a big concern with the iPhone as well, it will require visual attention to be able to use it.

Maybe it’s because I’ve been using the old iPod interface for so long, but I feel much more at ease using it to navigate for music playing than I do for my iPhone. It’s all spin and click, no typing or swiping.

I still on occasion have an issue with the iPod not turning off, but it happens seldom enough that it’s not really a bother. Battery life also seems a bit shorter than it used to be, but hey, it is 5 years old and has been used a lot. The battery does hold a charge, so that’s good. The only really bothersome thing is that at some point it got confused and started showing the wrong artwork for some of the files on it. So I’ll be listening to Sleep and it shows album cover art for Cat Power. I’ve gotten used to it. A restore might fix that, but I’ve never had the energy to do one.

I don’t need apps, or wifi, or a camera, or anything except a music player, so as long as it holds out, I’ll keep using the 5th generation 30GB iPod for my automotive audio needs.

(And yes, I do realize that by posting the sentence above, it will somehow cease to function within a matter of weeks. I’ll let you know when that happens.)

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The Business Journal…Unread!

The Business Journal

I followed a link to a Business Journal article and when I saw a little red circle at the bottom with a number in it, I thought “Hey, I have some unrea…. Wait-A-Minute!!!”

Did you think the same thing? Many of us have been conditioned by Mac OS X, iOS, Facebook, and other applications/interfaces to instinctively click on any icon with a red circle and a number it in. Those of us who are obsessive will click on these things for just one reason, to make them go away.

Whenever my wife would log into Facebook I’d yell “You have messages, click on the red thing!” so much she banned me from looking at her screen until I stopped. She never clicked on it, and didn’t care about, and I eventually came to accept that.

Hey Business Journal, you almost got me. I almost clicked on it… but I didn’t.

So for those of you in the web design, marketing, advertising, publishing, and UI/UX worlds… Is this clever as heck, or deceptive as hell. (Or both!?)

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The dea.th of del.icio.us?

dea.th of del.icio.us

So the news is that del.icio.us, er, I mean “Delicious” is all set to be jettisoned by Yahoo! I’m a bit saddened by the news because I’ve been a user and fan of delicious since the early days… my oldest bookmark goes back to December of 2003… that’s 7 years worth of bookmarks.

I’ve written a lot about delicious over the years, but even through all of my posts, I was always prepared for the day it would go away, the day it would disappear, the day it would die. Last week it looked like that day had come.

I’m not concerned about my data, as it lives on elsewhere… See Scuttle rides again for info on that. My main concern was losing what many considered the whole point of del.icio.us… the network.

del.icio.us was the first big success in “social bookmarking” and one of the first sites to really get (and push) “tagging” as a way to categorize things. Back in the 2004 many of us thought Yahoo! acquiring del.icio.us was going to lead to great things, not just for Yahoo! but for the web itself.

It appeared that del.icio.us was all set to become a success story for Yahoo! but as is often the case, trying to fold what made something great into a larger organization doesn’t always work. In fact, it’s probably rare that it works.

If anything good comes out of this whole thing, it’s the ideas people have, and the code/services that may crop up in the future. Just check out these posts:

I’m proud to say that Jon and Les and I were all, uh “comrades” back during the web’s heyday of the mid-2000’s… I think were we called “bloggers” back then. It’s neat to see their thoughts on this issue. Les has even more insight, as actually he worked on del.icio.us.

So now what? Well, I did get a Pinboard account, and I’m still collecting everything at p2url.com/bookmarks, and both of those are currently syncing with del.icio.us, which (for now) is still the master. I’ll figure out what to do next, but I’m not worried about the data going away. I am interested in what kind of distributed social bookmarks network may come out of this…

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iPad

iPad

I haven’t done a drawing in a while, so here’s a drawing of an iPad. It was drawn using a Wacom tablet on a Mac Pro, and not drawn on an iPad. I do look forward to seeing what the results of trying to draw on the iPad will yield. If you’ve got any suggestions for iPad drawing apps, let me know.

(Also note that this is actually a drawing of the iPad on the box that the iPad comes in… but I did take a photo of the box, and used that as the basis of this drawing, so it’s either self-referential or recursive… or both.)

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Heat Gun vs. Blow Torch

Heat Gun vs. Blow Torch

It’s winter. If you live in Wisconsin that means you may have to decide between a heat gun and a blow torch for many tasks around the house. I’ve written this brief guide to help you out based on my heat gun and blow torch usage in the last week.

Frozen door knob on garage. For this task I choose the blowtorch. The door knob is metal so I figured it could take the heat of the propane blow torch just fine. Also, since there is no power outlets on the outside of the house, it would have meant running power from the kitchen, and that wasn’t appealing in any respect. Blow torch wins.

Frozen water line. There is a water line running into the refrigerator from the basement. The line is a small plastic tube and it’s close to the outside wall of the house so it freezes easily. For this task I choose the heat gun. Power was readily available, and there were too many flammable or melt-able items near the water line to risk using the blow torch. Heat guns wins.

Frozen gas tank door. This was a tough one… I would have preferred to use the heat gun, but the lack of power outside forced me to use the blow torch. While this worked, I was slightly nervous about putting an open flame to the fuel tank door. A few quick swipes provided enough heat to get the door open though, and it all ended well. Blow torch wins, but Heat guns would have been preferable.

As always, caution must be exercised when using either a heat gun or a blow torch. They can both melt things (including you!) and they can both set things aflame.

Respect your tools, and your heat sources, be careful, be safe, and hopefully you’ll have no problems.

Enjoy the next 6 months of winter!