Crosswalks to Nowhere

My impulse buy of the month: an iPod Shuffle.

I was a the Apple Store on Michigan Avenue the other day talking with one of their "geniuses" about the fact that the case on my iBook is a little loose in one corner (they fixed the problem, sorta) and one of the salesmen told me they'd just received a shipment of iPod Shuffles. I had been thinking it would be nice to have a music player with me when I work out, but my 15 GB iPod was too bulky (plus I was worried about it's getting smashed) so it didn't take much convincing for me to grab a 1GB Shuffle.

So far, I'm impressed. I was very skeptical about an MP3 player that had no display and chose music for you, but I realized that (a) a display isn't important when I'm doing something that prevents me from looking at it; and (b) I can still decide on my own what to play.

I won't go into a detailed review of the Shuffle-- there are a bunch of them out there already-- but I will share a couple thoughts.

Getting music on the Shuffle is really easy. iTunes recognizes it right away and you can populate it three ways: (1) click and drag songs to it; (2) create a playlist and drag that to it; or (3) choose the "Autofill" option and iTunes will "randomly" pick songs to download to your Shuffle (more about "random" on the next page). This third option is only available when the Shuffle is plugged in; it does not appear in iTunes when a regular iPod is connected.

Playing music is in two modes: straight through or shuffle. If you load a playlist, the Shuffle will play the tunes in the order in which you loaded them; if you choose "shuffle" it mixes them up.

The sound quality rivals my 15 GB iPod. There is no equalizer option on the Shuffle, but the default setting is very nice. I intend on using my Sony earbuds with this unit instead of the mediocre iPod 'phones that come with it.

Last night I brought it to the club with me and it worked great. I just stuck the thing in my pocket and went about my workout. I never worried about crushing or otherwise damaging it.

I would recommend this unit to anyone who wants a very simple, straightforward music player without a lot of complicated features. The fact that it doubles as a USB flash drive just makes it that much more attractive.

If you want to see what the Shuffle's innards look like, check this out.

As the parent of two internet-savvy kids, there are certain things I knew going into getting them online, and a few I learned along the way. This guide from Microsoft is somewhat helpful, if not entertaining.

Too bad they didn't use the appropriate convention for writing r0X0rZ.

Becky bought a package of Fun Dip last night, and I borrowed one of the candy sticks and took this photo.

One of the items in this photo will put hours of enjoyment in your head and make your ears buzz. The other is manufactured by Apple Computer. :-)

Check this out: interpretations of the iPod Shuffle in food form.

A few months ago, I discovered a site called decalgirl.com that sells cool stickers that you can use to dress up your iPod, Xbox, GameCube, and other electronics.

These are high-quality removable decals that will make your 'pod look unlike everyone else's. I went for the blue neon flames for my Shuffle (above), and Becky got a customized one that looks like a package of Juicy Fruit gum and says "Becka's Juicy Tunes." For a while, my regular iPod had the dark burlwood decal on it, which looked pretty cool and a little like the dashboard of a Mercedes-Benz, if I stretched my imagination.

So if you want to make a statement with something other than a plain ol' white 'pod, here's your way to do it.

Much has been written recently about podcasting as The Next Big Thing. Every time I open the newspaper or a magazine there's something about "get yourself out there" along with recommendations for software and microphones. Radio stations (well, the mega-conglomerates that own the radio stations) are saying that the internet and podcasting are killing traditional radio. Steve Jobs, who not long ago referred to podcasting as "Wayne's World," added podcasts to the latest version of Apple's iTunes software. Oh my God, the whole world is going to communicate through recordings played on pocket devices connected with white headphones!! Where's my charger? Where's my internet connection?! Why do they block this port at my office?!?!

Alright, let's look at this with a cooler head, shall we?

A podcast is a recording that someone makes on their computer, and the listener downloads it to his/her portable music device to be enjoyed later. In many cases, the person doing the podcast produces them on a daily or weekly basis, so as a listener you can "subscribe" to them.

This is exactly what I did when I was a kid, when I recorded my own "radio shows" with a Panasonic tape recorder and played it back later-- the only difference was that I had no internet on which to stick the tape, so those hours of my reading the headlines out of the Daily Herald simply languished in a drawer.

(To be fair, some of my "shows" were pretty cool. One of my favorites was catching all the different slogans on the First National Bank of Mt. Prospect's time-and-temp phone line-- "Don't bank it in your sock, sock it in the bank!")

What the breathless thousands aren't talking about are the other aspects of podcasts, many of which need to be addressed (or at least kept in mind) before we can take it seriously.

1. Content: Let's make an analogy. In the early days of movies, you had technology people trying to create art. Thomas Edison made a bunch of films which, when viewed today, are interesting only from an historical standpoint. It took a few years and people like Méliès and Griffith who saw the camera as a tool (rather than an end in itself) in order for movies to be taken seriously.

Frankly, I've found only a couple podcast series worth listening to more than once. I've heard a bunch which are just people goofing around with the technology ("Hey, does this new mike sound good?"), while others are people talking about what their cat did today. The exceptions are programs that are produced for radio like Harry Shearer's Le Show, or a podcast with a distinct mission like Leo LaPorte and Patrick Norton's This Week in Tech (but to be fair, there's a fair amount of geeky hardware tweaking going on in that show, too). The point is that it's going to take time for podcast content to get up to the broadcast quality we've come to expect.

2. Music Licensing: This is the one area where podcasts ask for trouble. The recording industry hasn't even fully agreed on how to deliver music legally through sources like iTunes and Napster; how are they going to get high school freshman Kyle Smith to pay ASCAP twenty cents for playing AC/DC's "Back in Black" on his "H3vvy Meta11 p0dKaZt" this week? Until this can be ironed out, radio has little to worry about, unless the entire podcast listening audience suddenly decides it wants to listen to unsigned bands or public domain songs.

3. Immediacy: Podcasts are recordings, which is fine if you're listening to something that's not time-sensitive. If the listener relies on podcasts for timely information, he runs the risk of downloading old information and missing out on what's actually news. Radio still has the edge here. There's also the nice (although less common and growing even less common) idea that the person on the other end of the radio is communicating with you right now.

4. Advertising: No matter how much fun it may be to create and distribute a podcast, there are costs involved, and someone has to foot the bill. Unless the entire podcast community suddenly develops an altruistic streak, someone will have to pay for podcasts in order to make them viable. Listeners may have to buy subscriptions (unlikely unless the content is really in demand) or sponsorship will have to be built into the podcasts themselves. The former idea will require podcast content of serious quality: I can't see people paying to subscibe to "The Dawn and Drew Show," no matter how cute it is. The latter idea is a sticky one, because the listener will be able to skip past any sort of traditional commercial announcement. We may have to go back to the days of Jack Benny or Fibber McGee and Molly where commercials were built right into the script, thus tightly linking the program and its sponsor.

All that said, there are some shows which I think would be great on podcasts. I would subscribe to a number of NPR shows (Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, Car Talk, etc.) on podcasts. I would also like to hear a really good old-time radio program, similar to Chuck Schaden's Those Were The Days. These shows would make the jump perfectly.

Consider this a call for the true artists of the podcast form to emerge. In the meantime, we have the words of Moe Howard to keep it all in perspective.

There's an article on Gizmodo this week about how portable CD players are still outselling digital music players by a wide margin. The article quotes an IDC survey that says while 53% of all US households have a portable CD player, six percent have some sort of digital music player.

Six percent, folks. Think about that the next time you read a breathless article about how podcasting is changing the world as we know it, and you'd better join the legions of white-headphone-wearers or you'll be cast to the.... well, someplace where unhip people go.

The author refers to the higher cost of iPods and other digital players being a factor in that low number, but the most poignant part of the article is this:

The other reason you have to factor into the CD player’s continued reign, of course, is that digital audio remains too convoluted for the AOL demographic. Too few MP3 players feature direct encoding; given the inherent laziness of mankind, too few people are willing to use their computers as intermediaries, despite the obvious long-term benefits of having all your music in a single location. And here’s the real kicker in the CD’s favor: Since the latest generation of portable CD players can accomodate MP3- and WMA-encoded discs, too, folks can tote around 100 or so songs on a single sliver of media.

A technology has to appeal to the masses and be ridiculously usable before it can become really successful: it has to become an appliance. Until the technology companies get their act together and make it easy for Grandma to use their products, the numbers will remain low.

The battery on my iPod has never been a stellar performer; it usually died after about 90 minutes of playing.. if I was lucky.

I decided to order this battery kit and performed the installation today. One of the nice things about this kit was the fact that they gave you the tools to pry open your iPod without having to worry about bending the metal case. The other nice thing was that they provide detailed, illustrated instructions on how to do it, which is a good thing since they cram a lot of stuff into those little boxes.

The new battery also has 30% more capacity than the original battery, according to the specifications.

The iPod is now on the charger, so I'll have a report in a few days on how the new battery performs.

Remember these guys? At one time they were the big name in home computing, along with Atari, TI, and um, that company with the rainbow logo in the shape of an apple.

After passing through various hands over the years (including German and Dutch companies, finally landing in the hands of another Dutch outfit called Yeahronimo Media Ventures), Commodore is now back with an online music store.

Huh?

I guess (to them) it makes sense to follow the Apple model: sell some MP3 players and then create a place where people can populate them.

The music selection is a little sparse and unusual, but maybe that will change as time goes on. I guess they're hoping this will bring the Commodore name back in front of everyone, just like the iPod did for Apple.

In the meantime, I'll keep playing my old C-64 games on the VICE emulator while getting jealous of my old Commodore buddy Dan who just bought a complete C-64 system with some new-old-stock software and peripherals.

We're partyin' like it's 1985.

Here's where I had breakfast today, like so many other days-- TNT, the former CNA.

The reason for the photo is that I am putting a new digital camera through its paces-- a Fujifilm Finepix S5200 which I got through a rewards-type program at my company. It's a 5.1 megapixel SLR-style camera, and so far it seems pretty cool. I haven't played much with its features, but since this weblog is the place where the pictures often wind up I figured I would start by posting here.

Here is a closeup of part of Emma's slugbug collection:

In the meantime, we finished 4th Time Around Podcast #2, and you'll be able to download it starting tomorrow at 4thtimearound.net. We're also listed with iTunes now, too, so you can get us that way as well.

Apple Computer released a beta product called Boot Camp today. This is a component of their upcoming operating system OSX 10.5 ("Leopard") which allows the user of an Intel-based Mac to run Windows.

This is a brilliant move on Apple's part for several reasons, not the least of which is the fact that Microsoft's next version of Windows ("Vista") won't be available until next year. Now, people who are looking to buy a computer this holiday season are presented with an option: they can buy a Dell or HP like everyone else, or they can buy a stylish Mac to go with their cool iPod. They'll also have the bonus option of working with a superior operating system, OSX.

I became a UNIX-head in 1986 (SunOS 3.2 was my first exposure to it), but I learned within a few years that Windows was the way of the business desktop world (does anyone else remember WingZ or FrameMaker?). Since then, I viewed Windows as a necessary evil: I have some apps that run only on Windows, so my main computer at home-- the "Big Computer" as the kids call it-- is an XP machine.

Buying a dual-core Intel-based Mini last month brought OSX to the Big Computer's screen. (Through the magic of a KVM switch.) And as of today, I have the option of running the Big Computer's programs on my Mini.

Apple was smart enough to wait until there was a lot of buzz generated from members of the hacker community who managed to cobble together a solution to this a couple weeks ago. Today they were able to pull the Boot Camp rabbit, all ready to play, our of their hat.

Perhaps trying not to completely prove John C Dvorak's theory that Apple will switch to a Windows-based platform, Apple says that through Boot Camp they will provide the means to dual-boot your Mac to OSX or Windows, but they won't actually support Windows. Fair enough.

And now that Apple has given its hardware the capability of running Windows, it's in Microsoft's (and their business partners'-- hello, Dell) best interest to make sure it runs well, lest they lose customer after customer with calls to Apple Tech Support that finish with the recommendation "Well, boot into OSX and let's see if the problem goes away."

Of course, there are limitations: your Mac environment may not be able to write files to your XP space unless you set it up correctly, and your XP space won't be able to access your Mac files at all. I think it's only a matter of time before this problem gets resolved, though. And on a related path, it seems there's an announcement expected later this week from a company which is planning on releasing a new virtualization product for OSX, allowing you to run Windows within OSX. Microsoft's Virtual PC does this today, albeit only on PowerPC Macs and not rather well.

While I may be too hopeful that this will start to chip away at Windows' stranglehold on the desktop, I'm always glad to see competition. I've known way too many corporate IT managers who have burned out with constantly patching and repatching an operating system that was never meant to scale in the first place. Maybe this is the beginning of a trend.

Today's Red Eye had an article about iPods and the fact that a lot of them are dying. Okay, it's not exactly deep journalism, but it's interesting to see other people's experiences with these little boxes.

MEGO warning: geekiness follows.

Last fall, I got tired of my 3rd generation 15 GB iPod dying after about an 90 minutes of play, so I figured I had little to lose by opening it up and replacing the battery. I bought this kit from Other World Computing which includes a higher-capacity battery and the tools and instructions for opening the iPod. Here is my original posting on the topic.

I'm pleased to report that the battery life has been stellar ever since I installed it. My confidence level was high enough that a couple months later I replaced the battery in Lisa's iPod Mini. Now she's a happy camper.

All that said, a few weeks ago I started having more problems with my iPod. The main problem was that when I would try to update the songs on the unit, the update process would freeze in the middle of uploading a song. iTunes said it was updating and the iPod had the "Do Not Disconnect" message on the screen. At one point, I left it for over an hour and nothing budged. One thing I noticed, though: the unit became hot.

I assumed I had a hardware failure, so I went on the web in search of some iPod diagnostics help.

Of course, the first thing I found was Apple's suggested reset procedure. This seemed to bring the iPod back to life, but when I connected it to my MacBook to update it, the same thing happened again.

After another reset, I attempted to restore the iPod by running the iPod Updater. The problem here was that the unit seemed to have gone into a state where nothing would recognize it, even as an attached disk drive. I tried this on both my Mac and my PC.

Finally, after letting it sit for a while and letting the battery drain, I plugged it back into my Mac. This time it recognized the iPod as an external disk drive. I went into Disk Utility, and against everything I've read online, formatted the iPod as a plain external drive. That worked, and I disconnected it.

Strangely enough, when I reconnected it, the Mac recognized it as an iPod and asked if I wanted to run iPod Updater. I did, and my iPod was back as an iPod.

I started to download songs to the unit from iTunes and, of course, the copy process froze again just like before. Another reset and it was back to square one-- an iPod that looks like it should work, but hangs on loading songs.

Back on the web, I found this page, which tells you how to put the iPod into a diagnostic mode. I ran all the tests on the page and came up with no errors.

Then I found Scott Hanselman's excellent page on how to run a disk check on the iPod. I ran the test, and restored the iPod again.

Suddenly, the problem seems to have gone away.

I'm not convinced that the problem is gone-- my gut is telling me I have a hard drive that's about to die, so we'll see what happens. In the meantime, I'm switching off between the iPod and my Shuffle.

I figured I would post this so all the links to these sites would be in one place-- if you found this helpful, you're welcome.

It seems everyone is on the bandwagon to rag about Microsoft's new Zune player. (For those of you who haven't heard of it: (a) I'm not too surprised; and (b) think "iPod competitor.")

I've been thinking about this and I've come up with a theory. Microsoft is not out to succeed in the space that Apple clearly owns with the iPod: Microsoft is in it to own the content and the protection of that content.

Bill Gates is not stupid. I'm sure he knows that going head-to-head with one of the most successful consumer electronics devices in history is a huge task. Why would he think that Microsoft could succeed where Creative and marketplace juggernaut Sony have pretty much failed? Yes, there's some iPod backlash out there from people who have been burned by the iPod's short battery life and some models' tendency to fail, but that's certainly not enough to keep a whole new player and supporting (God forgive me for using this term) ecosystem afloat.

Much has been said about how Microsoft is paying Universal Music $1 for every Zune sold. I doubt they're doing this out of the goodness of their heart. Put this together with the fact that the Zune environment is heavily protected with a new DRM that's not even compatible with the existing Microsoft Media Player and the fact that the much-touted "sharing" feature restricts the number of times you can play a song you receive from a friend and you've got a brand-new model for how to buy music electronically. And I think that is what Microsoft is after.

Much has been written about Apple's desire to keep per-song downloads at 99 cents each; so why wouldn't Microsoft start at the content-provider end and work their way backwards to the hardware? And when it's time for Universal to re-negotiate their deal with Apple, they can point to the Microsoft Zune deal as an example of a hardware company that wants to play ball with them.

If the Zune fails, Microsoft can write it off. If it succeeds, they can open up the platform so the Sonys and Creatives of the world will start making the hardware. Hmmm. Sound familiar?

Microsoft already owns lots of content: they own the Bettman Archive, and its Encarta product is the successor to the Funk and Wagnalls, Collier, and New Merit Scholar encyclopedias. Getting cozy with the music industry is a logical next step.

If Microsoft owns the content, they'll become a much more formidable opponent, even with an inferior hardware and operating platform. (Indulge me again:) Hmmm. Sound familiar?

So the next time you hear Leo LaPorte and his TWiT buddies beefing about how lousy the Zune is, keep in mind that there may be something bigger in the works.

The other night, one of my daughter's friends asked me why I have an Apple sticker on my car.

I gave my usual response, which is "because I use Apple computers and they're cool," but for some reason I felt the need to temper that response because of the way Mac people are perceived these days.

I consider myself a "Mac Person," but more important than that, I've always believed in the philosophy of "the right technology for the job." There are things that mainframes can do that UNIX servers don't do very well, there are things that Linux servers do nicely that a Windows 2003 machine can't. For what I do, a Mac fits the bill better than a PC running XP or Vista.

The Mac is not flawless, by any means. I've had my share of problems with Macs-- but for the most part it's a solid platform that works.

And sometimes, the reactions you get from people who hear you're a Mac person are amazing.

Many people I meet are technology-agnostic, which means a computer is a computer and there's usually no compelling reason for them to care what operating system is running under the hood. When I mention to these people that I use a Mac, they're usually genuinely curious, and in some cases (let's take my real estate agent as an example) ask if the Mac would solve some of the problems they have on their PCs, or at least, how different the computing environments are from each other. It's my hope that most computer users will eventually fall into this camp.

Until then, we'll continue to have the factions of Windows-hating Mac Users and Apple-hating Windows Users.

Not too long ago, I was on a local discussion forum and someone made a comment about the expense and incompatibility of Vista on his computer. When I raised a concern about Windows Vista's new licensing structure, he immediately said "Well, that's what you'd expect to hear from a Mac User."

Unfortunately, this is typical in some corners of the computing world, and it seems no matter how even-handed you are about computer platforms, someone will label you. And it's not limited to that side of the argument (if we must pick sides).

There's also a segment of Mac users who view other Mac users as part of a huge brotherhood who must do everything they can to convert the masses to using the Mac. Often, these people are even worse than the combative PC users because they approach their world as evangelists, oblivious to other opinions or viewpoints. For these souls, Apple can do no wrong. This is the main reason I stopped visiting certain Mac forums on the internet-- reading most of those postings made me woozy. (Posted next to a Hello Kitty avatar: "Omigod, I just looooooove my little Macky the MacBook! It's so cuuuuuuuuute!" Gack.)

What I like about the Mac is the fact that, most of the time, if I want to do something it will simply work. By controlling most aspects of hardware and software, Apple has created a near-seamless model. Plug in your iPod, it works. Plug in a gigabit Ethernet connection, you're live. Viruses? None to speak of, really. These are the parts of the "Get a Mac" TV ads that speak the truth.

What I don't like is the fact that when something goes wrong with a Mac, it's usually something really stupid. For example, I am about to have the keyboard on my MacBook replaced for the fourth time-- not because of abuse, but because of Apple's self-admitted problems with the manufacture of the part. Apple is cheerfully replacing the keyboard free of charge, but what if I didn't live no more than 10 minutes from an Apple Store?

Another example: last week, Apple released an update to their iTunes software that I dutifully loaded on my Mac. The result: about 40 songs that I purchased from the iTunes Music Store wouldn't copy to my iPod any more. (Not all the songs I purchased from iTunes, just these 40 completely random tracks.) The solution? I had to rebuild my entire iTunes library, a 20-minute process.

So I'm faced with a choice-- have a computing environment that works with the occasional stupid glitch, or run what 90% of the computing world uses (Windows) and deal with drivers, antivirus software, and a little more tweaking than I'd like.

I'll choose the former, but I won't be evangelical about it. And the truth is that PCs will be with us forever, and even though I use a Mac, I still run Windows XP (under Parallels) on my MacBook because there's no software for the Mac that's as good as Adobe Audition for mixing our podcasts.

The proper tool for the proper job: that's what it's about. And that sticker on my car? It's not so much a badge as it's a cool-looking sticker.

Last night, we watched one of my favorite documentaries.

It's the story of three people who made history in the world of technology: the first was someone who fancied himself a technologist but appeared far more interested in achieving fame for himself, and was known for his publicity-grabbing grandstanding; the second was a genius who was more interested in solving technical issues than in furthering his own renown; and the third was someone who saw opportunity in a brand-new market and created a seemingly-unstoppable corporate behemoth. These three men (along with many others) took what was a hobby and turned it into a serious business that touched nearly every life on the planet.

The documentary is Empire of the Air: The Men Who Built Radio, and the people were Lee de Forest, Edwin Howard Armstrong, and David Sarnoff.

You're forgiven if you came up with three different, more contemporary names.

Based on Tom Lewis' book of the same name, Empire of the Air shows how each of these people achieved their places in the history of radio. We learn that de Forest may or may not have developed the revolutionary Audion tube, and spent a lifetime promoting himself as "The Father of Radio." We see how Armstrong improved upon de Forest's and others' work and made AM radio practical-- and created FM radio. And we hear the tale of David Sarnoff's rise from a poor paperboy to the chairman of RCA.

And while telling these stories, we spend a lot of time in courtrooms.

Well, not really-- but this was a litigious bunch of people, and as one watches Empire of the Air it's hard to resist drawing parallels to the personalities in today's technology world. And while it's certainly unfair to either set of people to draw the comparisons, I can't help but have the familiar names floating through my mind while listening to the stories.

Produced by Ken Burns in 1992, Empire of the Air is a fascinating documentary even to those without a technical background. The emphasis is on the people, their circumstances, and the world they lived in-- and not the inner workings of a regenerative circuit. Old photos, music, and archival film are mixed in with interviews with family, friends, coworkers, and radio insiders like Norman Corwin and Garrison Keillor.

You can find a copy of the movie here.

Why am I talking about this now, 15 years after the movie was first aired? (Incidentally, it was shown about a week before my daughter Becka was born. :-) Well, two reasons: Lisa and I were talking about my interest in the radio hobby (check my radio page), and then I got the idea to build a radio from a kit, like I did when I was a kid. It's a modernized version of a crystal set, and I'll post about it here within the next week.

In the meantime, check out Empire of the Air-- you'll find it enlightening, especially when you realize things haven't changed all that much.

When I was a kid, my dad brought home a Radio Shack Crystal Radio kit for me to assemble. It was a fairly simple little kit-- there was no soldering necessary because everything was held together by these little spring clip thingies.

Over the years, I built a bunch of other little electronic kits-- never anything like one of those Heathkit Oscilloscopes, but little cool things, usually radios from kit-building companies like Graymark. Between my kit-building and the fact that I worked at an electronics-assembly plant while I was in high school and college, I became fairly proficient with a soldering iron. I think one of my favorite projects was a device I built that decoded weather maps that were sent via fax over shortwave radio. I built that one about 10 years ago from instructions in a magazine. I recently found it in a box of stuff that's been sitting in storage until we moved recently.

A few weeks ago, I built the Little Sister Crystal Radio Kit from The Xtal Set Society, a group dedicated to keeping the spirit of crystal sets alive by developing new ways of creating very simple radio receivers with the most basic parts available. The very essence of a crystal radio is the ability to receive radio signals without using battery power or AC current-- it's an entirely self-powered device.

The Little Sister uses the most basic radio detection device-- a glass diode (the "crystal")-- and surrounds it with components to bring it a few years forward. I didn't have to wind a coil, which is usually a requirement for a crystal radio, because the designer substituted a pre-made solid state coil. And in contradiction to what I wrote above, this radio includes an audio amplification circuit that's powered by a 9-volt battery.

It took a couple of days to assemble the kit, working slowly for about an hour at a time at the workbench in the garage. (In the old days, I didn't need to use reading glasses for close work like this.) When the soldering iron heated up and that classic old smell of melting lead, aluminum, and flux entered my nose, my soldering "chops" came right back.

Like any radio of this design, you need to connect an antenna and an electrical ground. The ground was easy-- there's a pipe leading to an underground well in the garage, and I just ran a wire from there to the radio's "Ground" terminal.

The antenna was a slightly different challenge: normally, you can just run a wire from where you're sitting to a tree or something, but I wanted to put up an antenna I could also use with my shortwave radios. I bought some copper antenna wire from Universal Radio, dug out some insulators I bought from Radio Shack years ago, and strung about 50 feet of antenna wire between the roof of the house and the garage. I connected a wire to the antenna wire and ran it to the "Antenna" terminal of the radio.

Once I clipped the 9 volt battery in to place, the earphone came alive with the stronger AM signals in the area, with WGN and WBBM being the strongest. Like the simpler radios I built in the past, the stations tend to "bleed" over each other, but the tuning knob on the Little Sister helps to separate the stations.

One of the neat things about this radio is the fact that, with its audio amplification, it's pretty loud. I can sometimes hear the weather forecast playing through the earphone while I'm getting in my car in the morning.

I'd recommend this kit to anyone who's interested in beginning a hobby in electronics, or if you're like me, you want to rekindle an old interest. Or if you just want to start saying the word "Fahnestock" again.

(I'll be updating my radio site soon, and this radio will appear there, as well.)

A few weeks ago, my trusty Motorola WR850G router started acting really goofy. It ran flawlessly for over three years at the condo, enduring power spikes and whatnot, and I figured between the move here to the house and a few of the storms we've had there might have been too much for it to handle.

No problem, though: my local Staples had a sale on networking equipment, so I picked up a Netgear WPN 824 router. What appealed to me was the fact that this router supposedly has a technology to provide a greater range, and considering the router is at one end of the house and I occasionally want to be wireless at the other end, this seemed to fit the bill.

First, the good news: the router's range is very good and actually seems to work as advertised. Configuration was easy, as it's been with most Netgear products I've owned (my first being a Netgear EN104 hub, my second an RT311 router, both solid performers).

Now, the bad news: evidently, Netgear has implemented some new firmware code that misbehaves with the Cisco VPN Client that many companies, including mine, use for employees' remote access. The problem is that once the connection is established, regardless of whether it's through either the router's wired or wireless ports, it will randomly disconnect anywhere from 5 to 15 minutes into a session. There's no warning and no explanation: it just drops the connection.

I checked on Netgear's user forums, and I was not the only person with this problem. One of the moderators there helped another user through all sorts of troubleshooting, only to have it wind up with the recommendation to roll back to a previous version of firmware. The troublesome part of this is that Netgear acknowledged they had a problem and further admitted that they may not solve the issue in future releases of the firmware.

Pretty lousy customer service, if you ask me. Undaunted, I decided to exchange the WPN 824 for another router-- this one, another Netgear product: the Netgear WGT 624. I bought this one because someone on the forums indicated that he did not have the VPN problem with this model. He must have been lucky, because I did run into the problem. And rolling back to a 1.0.x firmware version made the problem go away, but it bothered me that I'd have to leave it there, presumably unable to take advantage of any fixes or enhancements to future versions.

The halfway-good news here was that the range of the WGT 624 was pretty good, about the same as my original Motorola router.

That was the end of my Netgear adventure, and most likely the last Netgear product I'll buy.

To solve my original need, I decided to go with what seems to be the crowd-pleaser: the Linksys WRT54g Router. They've sold millions of these things, so I figured I would give it a shot.

Evendently, Linksys has changed this model several times over the years. The version I got (version 8.0) had non-detachable antennae. According to the web sites I visited, it also has a lot less memory than earlier versions. That matters to people who wish to load other open-source firmware on the unit, but not necessarily to me.

Configuration was easy enough, but the initial problem with this unit was the fact that the wireless range was lousy. I mean, really lousy. The signal barely reached halfway into the room at the other end of the house where the Motorola and both Netgears made it.

Aside from this, the unit would just take itself off the network every so often. I was sitting at my PC, which was connected to the router by an Ethernet cable, and a warning came up from a Linksys monitor program that said "Your router lost its connection to the network." Huh?? After a couple more occurences of this, plus a couple occasions where the router decided it didn't want to talk to the Internet (and had to be power cycled to get its connection back) I decided to get rid of the Linksys and move on.

Enter the Buffalo WHR-HP-G54. Configuration was a snap, and the range is wonderful-- better than the Motorola. I read dozens of positive reviews of this router on the internet, and I realized I should have considered this unit in the beginning. It's been running for a week now with zero trouble.

One question which isn't answered clearly by Buffalo or the places that sell this router is whether the unit operates better sitting flat or oriented vertically, as all the photos show. They tell you you can orient it horizontally, which is what I did. I can tell you the signal is great in this position.

I'll post something here in the future if there's a significant change that makes me change my mind, but suffice it to say I am very pleased with this router. And I've pretty much had it with Linksys and Netgear.

My review of the Übercaster podcasting software package has been published in the August edition of Blogger and Podcaster Magazine. Click on the magazine cover under "View Current Issue," and you'll find the Ubercaster review on page 41.

You can also hear the dulcet tones of my voice reading the review at the magazine's site. Click "Reviews" under "B&P: Podcast Edition" and then hit the Play button.

The review encapsulated: Übercaster is an okay program, but it has a bit more growing to do.

Enjoy!

The other day, a coworker came into my office and said, "'Cheap Date,' huh?"

He had discovered our podcast purely by chance.

I realized this was a real opportunity: I was talking with someone who discovered podcasts entirely on his own, looks for shows by searching through the iTunes directory, and listens to material he likes on a schedule he sets himself. In other words, I was talking to someone who could give some real insight as to what a real listener looks for in a podcast.

Brian (his real name, he won't mind) said he looks for podcasts that fit into three general categories: spiritual enhancement, professional enhancement, and-- his term, not mine-- "mindless listening."

He told me about his favorite spiritual and motivational podcasts, and how he typically listens to them as his day begins. On the professional side, he listens to podcasts from the Yale Business School and the Project Management Institute, where he says he finds valuable tips for his career. "Mindless Listening" consists of everything from the videocast of Craig Ferguson's show to, well, Cheap Date.

What does Brian like most about podcasts? "The fact that I can play what I want, when I want." When I asked about radio, he said, "I like being able to decide for myself what I listen to. Radio makes that decision for me, and I don't like that."

He prefers podcasts that sound professionally-produced, primarily for their production values and the fact that they "get right to the content without a lot of messing around."

I explained how many people are trying to monetize their shows, so how does he feel about advertising? "I don't mind ads as long as they're generally in the same spot in every show, and they're short." How likely is he to fast-forward past ads? "Not very. I usually just start a show and let it run through."

Then I asked a critical question: what about the length of a show? In a previous life, Brian was a preacher, and he said he always followed this rule: "If you can't say what you need to say in 20 minutes, re-think what you have to say. And you have to be very good to keep your audience's attention for 30 minutes. Anything beyond that, forget it." He said he will rarely download a show that's longer than 30 minutes unless the subject is compelling.

Any complaints about some of the shows you've heard? "Some show hosts seem to think that all they need to do is turn on a microphone and talk about anything that comes to mind. Howard Stern makes a lot of money doing that, but pays a huge support staff to provide his 'ad libs.' The truth is that there are too many podcasts where the hosts think it's interesting to spend 25 minutes talking about their experience in returning a rental car at the airport."

I think Brian's most compelling statement was "I am giving you my most valued asset: my time. Respect that."

We podcast producers need to remember that there are real people out there, and it's up to us to respect their time, interests, and sensibilities. The audience is granting us the privilege of entering their homes, cars, etc., and we should treat that privilege with respect.

That's the philosophy we intend to continue following on Cheap Date. Others may cling to their "Explicit" tags thinking it makes them edgy, or their "no editing" policy which supposedly adds a sense of "reality," but our goal is to honor that respect for the audience.

And maybe people will keep listening.

I bought this small laser printer at Sam's Club a number of years ago (for almost nothing) and it was a real workhorse until it finally died in January of 2007.

I recently heard from a brand-new Mac user who has this printer and he told me Samsung no longer has the drivers for this printer online.

If you have this printer and you want the drivers for the Mac, click here and the .dmg file will download to your Mac.

Just doing my part to help.

Update: A reader just informed me that he had success using these drivers with MacOS 10.5.1 (Leopard). Great news!

On a Saturday morning a little over 15 years ago, I discovered the radio show by which every technology radio show and podcast I've heard since has been measured.

The show was Computing Success! hosted by Thom Foulks.

I found it completely by accident: I was trying to tune in (what was then) WLUP-AM and instead came across WNVR, which ran syndicated programming by The Business Radio Network. I would have tuned away from the station, but I was intrigued when I heard the host talking about Microsoft's new operating system, Windows 3.1.

After a few minutes, he took a call from a listener who had a question about Usenet and UNIX systems. I may have been new to PCs, but I was already an established Usenet user and UNIX Systems Administrator so this was my chance to "tech out" the host. He passed quite impressively.

What made the show special was the fact that Thom actually listened to his callers' questions and was genuinely interested in getting them the answers they needed. If he didn't know an answer, he'd recommend a book or other resource. Thom never faked his way through an answer, and his easygoing style made the listener, whether experienced or not, enjoy his show.

Thom also reported on the latest technology news, carrying reports from the staff of InfoWorld, PC Computing, and other computer publications of the day. John C Dvorak was an occasional contributor to Computing Success!

I had just obtained my first MS-DOS-based PC (a monochrome Sharp notebook, courtesy of my employer), so I was interested in learning as much as possible about what it could do. Thom's show was a huge help-- he spoke in plain English and kept the jargon to a minimum. While his style was low-key, yet you could tell he was thrilled about the subject matter. Thom wasn't interested in showing off what he knew about computers-- he was interested in sharing what he knew and showed he was always willing to learn more.

Sadly, Computing Success! went off the air about a year after I discovered it. It was replaced with another computer show hosted by a guy who loved to repeat his own name and referred to himself as "your computer answer man" despite the fact that the show seemed bereft of "answers" that did not involve a sponsor's product.

When I listen to today's tech shows that try to accomplish the same thing, I realize how much today's shows are lacking, when taken in the context of Thom's show . Leo LaPorte's The Tech Guy seems to come close, but it's not quite the same because Leo likes to "ham it up" a bit more than Thom did.

Thom Foulks passed away in March of 2004. He was active in the computer arts right up to the end, and if you Google his name you'll find all sorts of projects he worked on, including an extensive geneology project. And here's a link to his Wikipedia page.

I wish I'd taped some episodes of Computing Success! -- it would be nice to hear them right about now.

Last year, I picked up an Elgato eyetv Hybrid for my MacBook. This is a great little unit that picks up not only analog TV signals, but the digital and HD channels as well. The eyetv software that comes with the Elgato is very easy to use and has helpful features such as importing your recordings to iTunes automatically.

When I connect the unit to my Mac, it's attached to an antenna on the roof of the house. I'm about 20 miles from downtown Chicago, so I can pick up all of the local digital (and HD) content easily.

The challenge for me is the fact that the MacBook comes with me pretty much everywhere, so it's rarely connected to the antenna.

I learned that the eyetv Hybrid is that same device as the Hauppauge HVR-980, a newer version of the HVR-950. This unit is marketed to Windows users with the appropriate Windows software. I downloaded the Windows drivers for the unit and all the related software, and voila-- I now have an HD tuner card in my PC.

I used Hauppauge's WinTV application but found it clunky. Then I used the built-in capabilities of Windows Media Center, which was much slicker and easier to use. The problem with Media Center is that I had to manually add the "secondary" channels (e.g. channel 26-2) and the media guide never updated with the correct program material. I have to say, though, that the timed-recording feature that's built into Media Center worked very nicely.

Right now, I'm doing a trial of SnapStream's BeyondTV and so far things are going well. The software found all the channels and updated the guide as it was supposed to. (One test is to see if I can record a program on the PC, have BeyondTV encode it for my iPod, and then transfer it over successfully.) If the coming weeks prove the software to be useful, I may spring for a license.

We've come a long way from VHS tapes...

I've made a change in the way I post updates at Twitter.

Twitter is another one of those web sites that I file under the category called "Dig Me." It's basically a public blogging site/bulletin board where you answer the question "What am I doing right now?" in 140 characters or less. It's sort of like a blog, only with shorter messages and you don't have to visit multiple sites to see the entries of the people you're following.

While it's strangely addictive, I've struggled with finding a real value to Twitter. About 20% of the time I can share information on something useful (like one of my Twitter friends' asking questions about buying a Mac), but the other 80% is pretty much noise, with varying levels of relevance to, well, anything.

Some people incorrectly use Twitter as a personal communication device to all their Twitter friends-- I'll log in some mornings to see an entire page (about 20 entries) by one author to several different people, and many of those messages will be along the lines of "I hear ya, man." I usually wind up "un-following" those people.

Others seem to think the 140 character limit is optional, so they post two or three Twitter messages to get their point across. Imagine someone telling you that they're at McDonald's and they ordered a 6-piece Chicken Selects with Barbecue Sauce, Fries, and... only they tell you this across several 140-character messages. Almost like Water Torture, isn't it? Many of those people get dropped from my "follow" list as well.

It was this latter group, though that brought a challenge to mind.

Last week, I considered dropping Twitter completely, but then I realized I could make it more of a creative outlet for myself. There's already a 140-character limit, so why not challenge myself further and only post in haiku? Not only will this force me to limit the size of my postings, but it will cause me to think even more creatively about what gets communicated and how.

(This also reminded me of something said in a play I saw a few years ago-- one of the characters referred to limits, like those in haiku, as being very freeing.)

Some examples of my recent postings are on the next page.

All that said, my postings on Twitter will remain in haiku, at least until I get tired of the whole thing. :-)

With the advent of the Digital Television Age, I decided to take the government up on its TV Converter Box Coupon Program. This is the program where each household gets up to two $40 coupons towards the purchase of a digital TV converter box: you wire the box between your antenna and the TV, and voila-- digital TV.

Now, I'll admit to being a geek, which led to my installing a new TV antenna on my roof when we moved into our new house last year. Okay, it wasn't all geekiness-- I also wanted to be able to give the cable company the boot in case I got tired of their rate hikes and (potential) lousy service (we do have cable TV, but I use the antenna for my PC TV recording, as discussed here.). Since we live about 20 miles from downtown Chicago, where all the TV transmitters are, we get a pretty good signal on the ol' analog Toshiba (which, by the way, is about 5 years old).

Digital TV, however, is a vast improvement over analog. When I installed the Insignia NS-DXA1 converter I picked up at Best Buy this weekend, my eyes and ears were treated to-- dare I say it-- a whole new viewing experience. The picture is incredibly sharp, and some of our local stations, like the main PBS channel, have multiple sub-channels with different programming that aren't made available to regular cable subscribers.

Setup was very easy: plug the antenna cable into the box, plug the audio/video jacks into the TV (some models, like this one, have a regular "Antenna Out" jack that you would connect to your TV's antenna jack, just like the old days of VCRs), plug in the power, and fire the box up. It automatically tuned in all the available digital channels in under 5 minutes, and I was up and running. The box is very simple to operate, and the remote is very straightforward.

One of the most frustrating things about Digital TV (or DTV) is that until recently it's been very difficult to get straight answers about what all this terminology means. People tend to mix DTV up with HDTV, which is incorrect. Hopefully, this will help anyone who's looking for answers.

DTV (Digital TV): the method by which nearly all over-the-air TV stations will be broadcasting come February of next year. Digital broadcasting gives TV stations the ability to broadcast multiple channels at once, usually defined as channels 26-1, 26-2, etc. DTV is not to be confused with HDTV.

ATSC: the type of tuner in a TV set which is capable of receiving DTV.

HDTV: a special type of high-definition service which brings better video and audio to the viewer. HDTV is a special kind of high-resolution service that you can get when you get DTV, but not all DTV is HDTV. You need a special HDTV receiver and display to get the full HDTV experience.

Do the digital converter boxes pick up HDTV signals? Yes, but they don't output high-definition content. If I tune in an NCAA game on our local CBS station, they're sending out an HD signal, but my converter box is reworking that signal so I can watch it on my analog Toshiba. The picture is very good-- better than the analog signal I can still pick up-- but since I don't have a true HDTV setup I won't get the highest resolution. And that's fine with me-- frankly, we don't watch all that much TV anyway.

So, if you still receive your TV signal through an antenna and you have an analog (pre-2004, mostly) TV, you'll want to take advantage of the free/$40 coupon program. My coupons-- they're actually more like gift cards-- arrived about a month after I ordered them, and were accompanied by a list of stores near me that carry coupon-eligible converter boxes, including Best Buy, Wal-Mart, and Radio Shack. All of these places carry converter boxes in the $40-$60 range.

For more info on the program and the switchover to DTV, go to www.dtvanswers.com. In the meantime, I'll be watching a program about Ireland on WTTWD-11.1.

Update 3/22/08: The previous owners of our home left a TV antenna in the attic, so I ran a cable to the TV in our bedroom and picked up this Magnavox converter box from Wal-Mart for $49.87. It's 10 bucks cheaper than the Insignia model from Best Buy, but it does pretty much the same job. The main difference is that it seems to want to "sync" with the signal every time you change the channel. Also, I can't seem to get the CBS station (WBBM-TV channel 2) because of a weak signal. I'll have to climb back into the attic to see if I can remedy that.

Managing your identity on the internet is a tricky thing.

In the old days, I picked a nickname and used it on various bulletin boards and forums. I used the same one for years on AIM, Yahoo Messenger, etc. The idea was that a certain level of anonymity was desirable as you're talking about the latest XTC reissue CD or how much memory you could put on that Asus motherboard you just bought.

As social networking became more popular and-- dare I say it-- useful, it became okay to be out there with more of your "real" identity. Sites like LinkedIn and Plaxo allow you to create a professional profile with your resume, etc., which could potentially help in networking.

Then you have Facebook and MySpace, which are more for goofing around. My wife and kids are on Facebook, so I decided I'd take the plunge and create an account. I decided that this would be my "personal" social media site, while LinkedIn would be my "professional" place, and I've been very careful not to mix the two.

Well, that lasted for only so long. Soon, coworkers began to mention their Facebook pages and I started to connect with them in limited numbers. And for the first few months, everything was pretty cool: the updates I saw from my coworkers consisted of the standard mundane stuff about going to the zoo with the kids or hanging out watching a movie at home. Occasionally there would be a note about "working until 5 today on an upgrade, but then it's off to the casino." All normal stuff.

The other day, a line was crossed. This past Sunday, a coworker who's a bit of a workaholic posted the fact that he was having a problem with a database server at the office, and gave the name of the server. The problem here is that this particular system is under my team's direction-- so in other words, I learned of a problem at my office through Facebook.

I checked my work email and sure enough, there was a problem. I got my team engaged and resolved the issue. I'm sure this individual wasn't trying to reach out to me in a backhanded way, but I felt that my personal space had somehow been violated.

So for the very first time, I "un-friended" someone on Facebook. I'm not sure if he even noticed.

As the lines between the personal and professional lives become increasingly blurred, I feel it's critically important to maintain that balance, especially online. I don't have any of my personal stuff on LinkedIn, and I never talk about my work on Facebook (or, until now, in this blog).

I may end up dropping the Facebook thing altogether, but then my online friends won't be able to see what I'm making for breakfast on Saturday mornings.

Then again, they could just follow me on Twitter.

Like many homeowners, I'll usually have a radio nearby while working on a project like painting or (intentionally) knocking a hole in a wall. I use a cheapie RCA radio-cassette boombox that's been dropped, kicked, splattered with paint, and otherwise abused, yet it still keeps on ticking in its low-fi way.

There are times when I'm doing these projects and I truly can't find anything worth listening to on the radio dial. And short of digging out my cassette tapes (or recording new ones) or keeping my laptop nearby (and in harm's way of flying paint or drywall), there haven't been too many options.

Then I discovered the C Crane Digital FM Transmitter. This is a unit that plugs into the headphone-out jack of any device and retransmits the audio through any nearby radio that's tuned to the matching FM frequency. I've seen devices like these for use in the car, but this was one of the first standalone transmitters I've found that would be suitable for use around the house.

The transmitter is simple to use: just put in two AA batteries (or use the included AC adapter), plug the attached coiled cable into your iPod or computer, select a frequency, adjust the audio level, and tune the radio to hear your broadcast. I had the unit operating within minutes of taking it out of the package.

Audio quality is pretty good. I've used the unit while it's plugged into my iPod and the computer, and it does a nice job. When listening on my "project" boombox the sound is more than acceptable, and it's even respectable when I tune in through one of my Tivoli radios or the old Grundig 1099. The unit broadcasts in stereo when connected to a stereo audio source.

The range of the transmitter is somewhat lacking; I had to do a lot of re-orienting of the base and antenna unit to get a good signal in certain areas of the house, which was a pain. That said, there are instructions on the internet that describe how to modify the unit to increase its transmission range. I don't advocate this as it will void your warranty, but there are some impressive success stories posted out there.

Now I can listen to Kermode and Mayo anywhere in the house. Some might find that annoying, I think it's pretty entertaining.

I bought the transmitter at Amazon for around $70. Not a bad price for the convenience it brings!

(This article also appears on my radio site, www.joesradiopage.com.)

My advice to those planning on upgrading to iPhone software version 3.0: don't do it.

At least not yet.

I don't mean to sound dire about this, but for me iPhone 3.0 software on my first-generation iPod Touch has caused a lot of unnecessary annoyance, and I wish I'd waited until 3.1 was released. (We hear it's coming soon.)

I upgraded to the new software a few days after it was released; I heard that most people didn't have issues with it, so I figured I'd go for it. The upgrade itself went fine-- I paid $10 through the iTunes store and my Touch was running the new software in a matter of minutes. Most of my apps seemed to work right away, so I didn't think anything was heading in the wrong direction.

Now fast-forward a day.

I have a registered Starbucks card which gives me free wifi at Starbucks stores using the AT&T WiFi network.

When I had the version 2.x software on my iPod Touch, I used Easy WiFi to log on to the AT&T network at Starbucks-- it automatically held my login credentials and I did not have to go through the login/password/"I accept the terms" entries on the AT&T splash page that showed up once I connected to the network at Starbucks. I would walk in, turn on the iPod touch, and within 10 seconds I was on the network ready to browse and check email.

With iPhone software 3.0, there's a new login splash page that comes up when I go to connect with my Touch-- it looks exactly like the Safari page that used to come up before I had Easy Wi-Fi. I enter my credentials just as I had to do before I had Easy Wi-Fi, and I'm on the network. In other words, Easy Wi-Fi no longer handled this portion for me.

When I returned to Starbucks at any time in the future, I had to go through the same drill all over again.

Supposedly the iPhone 3.0 software saves the login credentials somewhere, but that's not true-- I had to go through the login/password/"I accept the terms" page every single time I log in at Starbucks.

What iPhone 3.0 does do for you is remember entries in Safari forms-- but not the popup login screens.

I tried forgetting the network, turning off and on WiFi... nothing worked. I went so far as to completely wipe my iPod and start with the vanilla 3.0 software and the exact thing happened every time. The iPod did not remember my login credentials on the AT&T wireless hotspots at Starbucks.

After scouring the help forums on several sites, including Apple's Discussion Forums (which I've found over the years to be of dubious value), an answer was finally posted on Devicescape's (Easy WiFi's developer) web site.

I loaded the Boingo Wireless app on my Touch, which disables the auto-login process on iPhone 3.0 software.

Now when I visit S'bux I just fire up the Boingo client (no account or password needed-- just bring up the app) and then bring up Easy WiFi. No more squinting and inputting passwords.

It still means I have to go though an extra step, but at least I don't have to waste time entering my login credentials every single time I want to check my email. The fact that Apple broke a great app like Easy WiFi is simply a shame.

Secondly, there have been tons of postings in forums on the internet about the lousy post-3.0-upgrade performance of the iPod Touch's wireless capabilities. Lots of users are complaining that their WiFi connections at home and on the road have simply turned lousy.

Here's a quick anecdote-- you can interpret the data however you wish.

I bought 1st Gen iPod Touches for my daughter Becca and myself around the same time. They both ran flawlessly, and both upgraded to 2.x without an issue. They connected to our home network and hotspots perfectly.

I upgraded my Touch to 3.0, and started to see some strangeness, as described above. Becca did not upgrade hers and it continued to work normally.

A couple weeks ago, we were at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport, where they have free wifi. Becca turned on her Touch and it connected immediately to the network. I turned mine on, waited two or three minutes, and it never found the airport's wifi network-- and the iPods were literally inches apart.

The likely root cause of this situation is clear to me.

I'm posting this here because it was pretty difficult for me to find any straight answers on the internet. I hope some of you find this useful.