Mini rant: On fanboyism, sucky telecomm providers, and why I don’t care about being faithful to any single vendor.
It's not about iPhone OS4 vs Android 2.2.
It's not about HTC EVO vs. iPhone 4/3Gs
It's not about HTC Incredible vs iPhone 4/3Gs
I have a problem with the telecomm providers in the USA and how they go about building out their network infrastructure. Here's an exerpt from a Friendfeed conversation sparked by a Ping.fm post by @ChrisPirillo. I agreed with Chris' comment, but I'm sick and tired of the fanboi bashing in either camp.
My comment:
That's pretty much an apples to oranges comparison, and therefore I agree. It's a stupid comparison. I ditched my iPhone 3G on AT&T's crappy 3G network for HTC Incredible on Verizon's 3G EVDO network. I bet my Incredible gets better battery life than the EVO. I don't need (want) a 4G wimax (sucky tech) modem in addition to Sprint 3G CDMA tech crammed into a single device. No wonder the EVO is so big. How many radios does it have anyway? The EVO is an intermediate device that will be relevant until the *REAL* 4G LTE networks come online next year. I'll take Verizon 3G over 4G Wimax (especially for the price) any day (especially given 4G coverage vs. Verizon 3G. I'll also take the Snapdragon 1Ghz chip over my old iPhone 3G. There. That's my position and I'm sticking with it. Anyone want to buy my iPhone 3G?
The conversation thread: http://friendfeed.com/l0ckergn0me/a10d7582/people-want-me-to-compare-iphone-4-battery-with
BOTTOM LINE: I'm an UBER GEEK. I use whatever works best for me at any given point in time. Right now, Android on Verizon is making me a lot happier than iPhone on AT&T.
Right now, my iPad is working better than my old ASUS 1005HA netbook. I am using my iPad for more and more business purposes each and every day and I consider it to be an integral part of my workflow.
I have a Macbook hooked up to my 56" Samsung DLP HD set that I use for music streaming and watching Hulu and Youtube. I run a copy of Windows XP in VMware Fusion on this laptop. I keep all the books for my businesses on Quicken running inside XP on Mac OSX.
I have a Dell Vostro 3300 running Windows 7 with VMware Workstation 7.1 running an Ubuntu VM for active prototyping and development.
#suckitfanboys
Reclaiming my river
I want to own my data. All of it. Period.
Rather than relying on external sites, services and aggregators, I'm going to try and use my blog as the dumping ground for the meta I speweth into the river. I realize that there is no silver bullet or perfect solution for this, but I'm hoping that with a few new tools, APIs, services, and techniques, I can piece together a reasonably complete archive. Once I have the archive, I can continue work on the LifeSplicing Engine I conceived a few years back.
Just an early sketch from a couple years ago.
To start, I'm looking at the Lifestream WP plugin (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/lifestream/) to see how many services I can pipe in for free. For services, sites, and data sources that don't readily make themselves available, I've got a few ideas I want to try using some RSS/ATOM/OPML trickery to normalize the floe.
This is likely going to be a very messy, noisy, and disruptive exercise. Please forgive any unwanted noise I spill into the river and remember that you can always block/delete me from your social graph if I become too much of an annoyance.
Streaming LIVE ALL WEEKEND from my rooftop in Eastlake, Seattle, WA USA
Happy 4th of July!!! We'll be streaming live all weekend. Come join in the fun and watch the fireworks over Lake Union. This stream has a pretty clear view of the fireworks barge.
The hashtag for this party/event is #july4eastlake and we'll also entertain the Friendfeed crew in this new group I just created: http://friendfeed.com/july4eastlake
Labor Day Weekend Projects
My day started at Zoka Coffee in the University District.
Coffee, breakfast, and some light coding / app config. Then bailed for home, which is where I'm at right now. As it's a holiday weekend, where many our out squeezing in one last extended summer weekend, I'm pretty well tied up with the reality that are my unavoidable deliverables. I've got no problem spending my weekend this way, as I know I am working hard towards something much bigger. So with that, here's a list of what I've got on tap this Labor Day weekend.
What are you all doing? @infinitelymeta me on Twitter or *Like* this post on Friendfeed to get in on the conversation. That's where I tend to hang out on socnets these days.
Happy Labor Day everyone!
Brian's Uber List
- New range/oven delivery for unit 2214 (one of my new tenants stove broke so I replaced it with this:
- Put out For Rent sign for my soon to be available 1BR apartment in Eastlake, Seattle WA 98102. It rents for $1400 and is the entire lower floor of an historic Victorian home that was built in 1908. An excellent spacious unit with great lighting. Email eastlakeassociates at gmail if interested or call 206.328.3379 and leave a message.
- Java/JSF/AJAX - I'm putting the final interfaces and code tweaks in place for a project that I've spend a quarter working on. Final interfaces in place, but still have 75+ line item bug list. Need to go code complete by Monday evening to begin FTP transfer of Development VMware image from one side of our network to an internal only host. Still have A LOT of work ahead of me to finish this project and go into team only beta next week with Public Beta (internal corp net) on Sept 8.
- Landscaping & trim to prep for fall. Luckily, I really enjoy this task. Especially when my 5.5 yr old nephew Logan joins me. He makes some pretty good coin and he's a GREAT helper.
- Working with my friend Thom, the Ichthyogenius on our latest project, Reef In A Box that we are looking to launch in the coming months.
- Working on the YTranslate.us engine. Coding in PHP/mySQL/Python/etc. Toying with new SMS gateway (thanks to Mona' Friendfeed post).
- Meeting with contractor on some fix-r-up-r projects for 3 of my apts in preparation for Fall/Winter.
- Looking for electrician to install some motion-sensor aware lighting in my back alley and in between my building to deal with my unwanted-persons-on-my-property challenge.
- Water changes & general maintenance on my 300 gallon reef tank.
- Prep/meet with GC on new reef tank project. Wait till you see what I'm going to build. It's gonna pop!
- Shade garden v2. Part of the landscaping stuff I suppose, but definitely worthy of mention.
- Replace fire extinguisher in common area to be in compliance with recent Seattle City Fire Department inspection.
That's all I can remember for now.
Gnomedex – mind blowing electricifying neural stimulation transends geospatial dimensions and teleports us to the fifth dimension
OMFG. I can't muster the energy right now to capture the energy, passion, class, & inspiration that is Gnomedex. Until I come down off cloud 9, here's where my attention's currently at.
Follow the Friendfeed conversation.
Top 10 Reasons I should get a free Techcrunch50 invite
10. Seattle is the new San Francisco
9. I've had breakfast AND lunch with Scoble.
8. I once strapped a camera on my head and pretended to be iJustine.
7. I got better Gadgets than Nik Cubrilovoic.
6. I got .flv video clips of Mike, Shel, Nik, Loic, & Calley talking all sorts of nonsense on Qik.
0. UPDATE: I had to unblock Jason McCabe Calacanis before I sent my @reply on Twitter.
- ∞ +