Betterness by Kawika Holbrook

Razing Radio

Traditional radio is stupifying. The DJs all sound the same. Songs repeat ad nasuem. And the commericals interrupt the flow of everything. Podcasting, the new art of publishing your own audio for listeners to enjoy on their computers or iPods anytime, portends to change audio the way TiVo is changing video. Only now you get to be the talent. Odeo aims to become a single, simple source for finding, subscribing to, and publishing audio content. Nothing is available from them yet. Services that aggregate self-published audio content are still somewhat klunky. Nothing with iTunes' ease of use. For a fee, you can call Audblog from your phone to post a message on your weblog. Still, it's all so very fresh and new ... I can't wait to see how radio reacts.

Wrong Number, Right Message

About 8,000 Sprint customers mistakenly dialed Stewar Woodworth's phone. Sprint refused to change his cell number, which was a single digit off the company's collection line, so Woodworth changed his message:

"Pay your Sprint bill or your service will be shut off. It’s that simple. If you don’t pay your Sprint bill, you might as well take your Sprint phone and throw it in the trash. Even a person with your limited intelligence should be able to figure that out. Go ahead – write a check. Hang up the phone, write a check, jerk."

Brilliant. Sprint has decided to change its number instead.

"m:robe" review

"Using this iPod competitor is like eating sand." Ha! And ouch.

Nawlins

We've landed in New Orleans for a four-day stay. Attedning one wedding, catching up with an old friend, drinking more than we should, and visiting a few tourist spots are on the agenda. Posting will be sporadic until next week, when I start jury duty. (Hey, this feels like a quick email to a friend. There isn't anything insightful or witty involved. And yet I posted. Weird.)

Home

We're buying a home. Our first. We're on the map, baby. You can see us from space. Click to enlarge.

Goose? Gander? Pot? Kettle? Black?

"Syria and their troop presence in Lebanon is a destabalizing force in the region," the White House said after a suicide bombing killed the former prime minister, a Syrian critic, and 11 others. Hello?  Occupying forces facing suicide bombers? Sounds awfully familiar.

Triple Play

The triple play of video, data and voice (VDV) almalgamation seems to be the eventual goal of all the recent telecom mega mergers. Sprint gets Nextel. SBC gets AT&T. And now Verizon gets MCI. It's what the F.C.C. wanted after slashing regulation. I just hope regulators somewhere scrutinze broadband providers blocks internet calls, because there are only so many pipelines stockholders will let companies lay. I want lower prices, simple bills, and enough choice to keep everyone honest. I'm anxious to see if less regulation is the way to get it.

Acronymity

VoIP, FiOS and F-1000 — three more acronyms with which I can bore my wife.

WiFiHDVDVDVRDVD

Jenny hates going to the laundromat. I want a dog. So we decided to spend our future life earnings on a Campbell town home to accomdate a solution. Escrow closes at the end of the month. What does all this really mean? Yet more time thinking about WIFIHDVDVDVRDVD:

• Wi-Fi — A wireless router for in-home networking, printing, and music streaming ... such as a bridge between Linksys WRT54GP2 or a clearer phone adapter and AirPort Express.
• HDV — For high-definition video, I can rent a klunky Motorola DCT6412 and pay too much for Comcast TV or paying $1,000 DirecTV HD with TiVo and saving on programming.
  
• DV — data and voice services from Earthlink or Speakeasy, or data from Comcast or SBC and voice from Vonage, Packet8 or BroadVoice.
• DVR — I want TiVo.
  
• DVD — digital video disc player.

Of course, I want my WiFiHDVDVDVRDVD in a single box for less than $500. . With my lack of engineering knowledge, I should be able to combine it into an elegant device and mass produce it without trouble. I will call it Bob. And then fairies will make me a flying car.

Shutterbugged

I caught the shutterbug. Well, "caught" in my usual case of "researching every last thing until I drain all the fun out of a potential hobby. I promised myself and my wife I'd take up a hobby this year that didn't require the use of a computer. I chose black and white photography. A friend suggested starting with the Pentax K1000 — a simple, fully manual camera.

And that's when, like clockwork, I started the questioning. "Should I buy better lenses and upgrade the camera body over time? If so, which camera supports the best lenses? Should I spend more for a digital SLR and save on 35mm film? What kind of photography courses should I take?" After a few hours of this, I talked myself back down to action.

1. Buy a used Pentax ZX-M or Nikon FM10.
2. Sign up for a weekend basic photography class.
3. Shoot, study and shoot some more.
4. Publish.

Oh, and have fun. I keep forgetting that part.