Google Reader redesign

 

Google Reader got a major UI tweak this afternoon. Boo-ya. The look feels a lot like Google Docs. It makes me wonder when Gmail is going to follow suit. Then again, they did just announce a slew of new themes.

Speaking of Reader, you can subscribe to this blog by pasting the following in your RSS app of choice: http://feeds.feedburner.com/TheOtherDrummer

Today, we're all winners: FCC Approves Unlicensed Use Of “White Spaces” Spectrum

 

Think wifi on steroids. Everywhere. This could be a big deal. Read about it here.

I may give into peer pressure

Great. Here we go again. It's 11:15 pm and I'm supposed to be in bed but I had a random thought while brushing my teeth.

Most people who know me would probably consider me a tech-savvy/nerdy guy. While I don't know how to program anything, nor do I speak Klingon, Elvish, or any other fiction-based language, I enjoy keeping tabs on what's going on in the world of tech and participating in my own, limited way. Yes, I probably know enough about Star Wars to be considered a complete geek to the average person. Sure, I've had more cell phones in the last seven years than most people will have in their entire lives. So you'd think that I of all people, I would have a MySpace and/or Facebook account. After all, it's how hundreds of millions of my peers function online and off.

But I don't. And that's on purpose. (I shared my feelings about social networks here.)

Up until now.

Here's the thought I had while I was brushing my teeth: why don't I create a Facebook account to tell people I'm not using Facebook.

Weird, I know. But bear with me.

One reason I don't like sites like Facebook is, if I understand it correctly, people login to Facebook and leave me a public message. I then get an e-mail telling me that I have a public message, so I login to Facebook to see what it is. OR YOU COULD E-MAIL ME. (This is similar to the problem I have with Basecamp, but I'll save that for another time.)

So instead of corresponding with people through Facebook, why not use Facebook to tell people the channels I do use to communicate? I picture an empty page with nothing but links to my Twitter feed, this blog, and maybe an e-mail address.

Despite this minty epiphany, I have my reservations:

1. I'm really stubborn about certain things, and getting a Facebook account is one of them. Even if I don't use it, the fact that I have one wouldn't settle well with me. I kind of enjoy not doing certain things everyone else is doing. I know it sounds a bit backward, but it's true. It's why I've never had a Coke and it's why I'm perfectly happy hating potato chips and french fries, thank you very much.

2. My real name and personal information would be linked to this site. Now, most of you know me and I don't think it would take a rocket scientist to probably find out everything about me online. While I've been contemplating dropping The Other Drummer moniker and just using my full name as the title of the blog (and the URL), I haven't decided to make the jump yet.

What are your thoughts on the subject(s)? Two polls have been posted in the upper-right corner. Have at it. Or, if you feel like waxing poetic, leave some prose in the comments.

Verizon Wireless triples SMS charges for mobile marketers

In addition to raising their text messaging rates 100% in the last year (along with everyone else in the industry), Verizon Wireless has now taken upon itself to triple the charge it imposes on sites that allow subscribers to receive SMS notifications to 3 cents per text.

For example, you pay $20 per month for unlimited text messaging. So you sign up for CNN to send you a text message any time there is breaking news. Starting in November, Verizon will charge CNN 3 cents for each message they send out, despite the fact that the consumer is already paying for the text message.

This double-dipping on Verizon's part not only comes across as greedy (it costs virtually nothing to send a text message - they were making a profit when they only charged less than a penny per text) but it stifles innovation. Sites like Twitter, Remember The Milk, Celllfire, and others may have to either close up shop or severely limit their functionality if Verizon insists on charging the fee.

I decided to be proactive and sent an e-mail to Verizon Wireless CEO Lowell McAdam telling him basically what I said here: it's greedy and it stifles innovation. I haven't heard back from him.

Maybe I should have also mentioned how they're delusional for wanting to be content providers instead of "dumb pipes" for giving people access to information. Verizon, when it comes to creating content it's you verses the Internet. And I think the Internet is going to win.

For more reading on the text messaging rate hike, hit up this link.

Logo courtesy of here.

Morning routine

I usually use my iPhone.

Courtesy of here.

Microsoft's second ad is out, and it's better

 The second ad in the Seinfeld/Gates/Windows campaign launched last night and hit the intertubes shortly after. I must say I like this one better. It's funnier and ties in better (although still loosely) to the actual product they're promoting. Check the ads out here.

Note: It looks like Microsoft is using Flash to run the ads instead of Silverlight, despite the "Get Silverlight" link next to the video. See below.

Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld aren't gay

Boy oh boy. People sure are reading a lot into Microsoft's new ad. I've heard everything from the phallic nature of the churro and the implication of two men shoe shopping with leather references to outcast minorities.

It's not a typical commercial. It's 90 seconds and doesn't mention the product until the last four seconds. The rest of it is filled with...nothing. And that's the point. Kind of.

What was Seinfeld all about? It was a show about nothing. Bill Gates is shopping at the "Quality shoes at discount prices store" not as some allegory to say that a Windows machine is less expensive than the Mac, but because it's funny that the richest man in the world is shopping for shoes at a discount store in the mall.

It's also funny that Jerry, also very wealthy, knows exactly which kind of shoes are available and their different qualities.

When Jerry is sizing Bill's feet and asks if what he's feeling is Bill's toe, Bill responds. "No. It's pleather." It's a joke. Get it? It actually sounds like something my sister in-law would say. Bonus: Bill isn't even buying real leather shoes.

I don't think the Hispanic folks who are looking in the store window are a symbol of the outcast people in third world countries who don't even recognize these famous, rich people shopping inside. I think it was a random clip to stick in to break up the shots in the shoe store.

I don't think Bill holding up his platinum membership card to the shoe store to earn "big top points" is symbolic of how Microsoft rewards its customers. I think it was a chance to work a joke in, as well as a more subtle bonus joke: the picture on the card is Gates' mug shot when he was arrested for speeding in New Mexico.

I understand, to a certain extent, why people are digging so deep to find meaning in the commercial because it doesn't talk about Windows at all. But the homo-erotic and/or Microsoft/discount shoe store symbolism people are trying to establish is simply ridiculous.

By itself, the ad doesn't work, no matter how deep you look at it. The additional spots in the campaign will shed some light on the direction they're taking and will tie it all together. In the meantime, take it for what it is: a quirky, somewhat entertaining spot.

Google is getting creepy

So as if Google didn't know enough about you, it now has the capability of recognizing faces in your Picasa albums. (For those of you who don't know what Picasa is, it's Google's version of Flickr, which is a popular online photo storage and sharing service.)

Draw a little box around a face and Google will analyze all your photos and find the ones that person is also in. You can then label all those pictures for easy reference later. So, for example, I'd highlight my mom's face in one image and Google finds the rest of the pictures I've taken of my mom. I label them all "Mom" and even link the picture to my contacts in Gmail.

So, yeah. Google now has pictures and contact information for everyone in your photo albums.

What are your thoughts on this?

Generation gap

My parents watch 22 minutes of the evening news to get to the weather forecast.

I open my laptop and hit "F12".

Just an observation.

In other Google news...

I got this sign-in screen when I tried to login to my Google account. Unfortunately, after sign-in it was the same ol' iGoogle. I wonder if this has anything to do with the problems going on with Gmail right now.

The world is coming to an end: Gmail is down - UPDATED x3

Heaven help us. Russia is bombing Georgia, the ice caps are melting, France is still a sovereign nation, and Gmail is down. It's not an isolated incident as people on Twitter are reporting the same problem:

Whatever could be the problem? I've never really had any issues with Gmail. Interestingly enough, I can use Gmail over IMAP on my iPhone. Weird.

One clue may be (yes, I'm really reaching here) is this new "Create an account" button I saw this morning:

Most of the time it's just a text link, although occasionally I've seen it as a blue Aqua-esque button. New UI?

What do you think? Is Google rolling out a new UI? Is it a technical glitch? Are they going to give us Push functionality? Has your account been affected? Let me know in the comments.

UPDATE: I saw a  Cult of Mac article in my feed reader saying MobileMe's mail is also down.

Oddly, when I clicked the link in my feed reader to go to the actual article, Cult of Mac gave me an error page. Hmmm...strange stuff is afoot. Perhaps my initial hunch that Apple just transitioned all their .Mac stuff to Google's services, masked in a pretty Apple design, is true. ;)

UPDATE 2: TechCrunch is reporting the same thing: Gmail is down systemwide. As a side note, I'd like to point out that I had the "story" up before Arrington did. ;)

UPDATE 3: As of about 4:35, my account is back. Same ol' look and at first glance no new features. Also, no word on the Official Gmail Blog about the outage.

I noticed something weird about iGoogle

Most of us recognize this screen. Notice the pre-selected widgets faded in the background: YouTube, weather, clock, etc. Why anyone would add a clock widget on their homepage is beyond me as most computers nowadays are able to tell time. But I digress.

When I launched my browser this morning, instead of the standard widgets you see above it was populated with what looked like popular, locally relevant widgets. There was a KSL widget, an LDS.org widget among others. I didn't think much of it, figuring they were going to suggest widgets based on popular sites in my area and logged in.

I should have learned by now that when there's some kind of anomoly with anything Google I should get a screen shot because it's not there anymore. If anyone else notices the same thing, please grab a screen shot and e-mail it to me: theotherdrummer at gmail *dot* com.

New Google Reader feature: auto-add feeds from your Blogger blogroll - UPDATED x3

I just had this little notification pop up in my Google Reader. Apparently the web app has taken it upon itself to add feeds from the sites I have listed in my blogroll here at The Other Drummer.

It has the potential to be a nice touch, although so far I've noticed a few flaws:

• It's stuck at 49 unread articles when there is clearly only one unread post. Refreshing doesn't fix the problem.
  
• Fundamentally, doesn't it stand to reason that if I have a feed in my blogroll I've already added it to my RSS reader?
  
• That being said, the three blogs Reader added to my feeds are sites I've already subscribed to. They should compare the blogroll sites against my existing RSS feeds to prevent duplication.

Does anybody else have this feature? Is it working for you? What are your thoughts? Or did I get selected (again) by Google's divine providence?

UPDATE: Clicking the "Learn more" link in Reader took me to a Blogger Help page with an Internal Error/We Can't Find What You're Looking For message. The plot thickens.

UPDATE 2: I just logged in (it's now about 11:40 pm) and the feature is gone. I've checked out the forums over at the Google Reader Blog and three other people have reported the same thing. So far it doesn't look like it's being received well.

UPDATE 3: I just checked my site stats and have had five visitors today from Mountain View, California. Google...are you out there?

New Yahoo interface? Quite Google-like, don't you think?

So yeah. A friend of mine came across this little gem last night and passed it along. Looks like Yahoo may be experimenting with a sleeker, more Google-like approach to search.

Thoughts?

Oh yeah, and speaking of homepages, if anyone can get me in on that new iGoogle action (short of saying I'm a developer) let me know.

Google non-news of the day: Gmail filter assistant

I don't remember seeing this little friend in my Gmail account before. The Filter Assistant option, at the moment, does... nothing. But my gut tells me this feature is going to assist you with your filters.

Also, it looks like the Gmail team has fixed the problem that displays your primary e-mail address when sending an e-mail from an additional, managed account. Boo-ya.

Rock-on Gmailers, rock on.

Bill Gates on Windows XP usability

Bill rants as he struggles to download Moviemaker. Here's the opening paragraph:

"I am quite disappointed at how Windows Usability has been going backwards and the program management groups don't drive usability issues."

It only gets better. Click here for the full, internal e-mail which was published by SeattlePI.com.

I must say that reading the e-mail makes me like Bill more. It's nice to know he actually understands (and experiences) things can are frustrating for end users and isn't living on some other planet.

Image courtesy of here.

Help set a world record - today

Download Firefox today and help set a world record for the most software downloads in a 24 hour period.

For those of you who don't know, Firefox is a free browser and is a popular alternative to Internet Explorer and Safari. I've been using the Firefox 3 betas and release candidates for months now and I must say... DANG this is one speedy browser - you'll notice a difference.

Also, note that when you start typing in the address bar it searches both your history and your bookmarks. And the UI is tailored to the operating system your using which is a nice touch. Oh, and there are more add-ons and extensions than you can imagine (ah, the beauty of open source).

At the very least, you should download it and try it for a while. I think you'll like it.

Giving credit where it's due

According to TUAW:

"As Mark Siegel from AT&T explained to me yesterday, "AT&T wants to be as fair as possible to customers who very recently purchased an iPhone." Thus, if you purchased an iPhone from an AT&T store AFTER May 27, 2008, you have the option of returning the phone to an AT&T store between July 11, 2008 and August 1, 2008 for the new iPhone 3G. Those customers will also be refunded the difference between the price paid for the 2G iPhone and the iPhone 3G."

I must say I'm impressed. Especially because they're refunding the difference in the two phones. Well played AT&T, well played.

Will the iPhone soon be on T-Mobile and Verizon?

Something fishy is afoot. One thing I neglected to mention in my overview of the 3G iPhone is that the notorious revenue-sharing deal between AT&T and Apple is no more. (Up to this point, it was speculated that AT&T was giving Apple a monthly payment for each iPhone subscriber.)

So...why is AT&T still the exclusive provider of the iPhone? What's Apple's incentive to stay with them? Seems like a raw deal for Apple because they're still severely limited as to their potential market.

Don Reisinger over at CNET speculates the relationship between the two companies may be over in the relatively near future. He has some good points, so check out the article.

My speculation is that the (rumored) five-year contract isn't quite that long. In fact, I wonder if maybe the contract wasn't based on length of time, but quantity of phones sold. A wacky idea, I know. But it may explain a couple of things:

1. AT&T would be reassured in the beginning that they'd have a guaranteed number of new subscribers from this unprecedented arrangement.

2. AT&T says it will only gives kick-backs for the first year. Apple doesn't hit the 10 million mark in that time frame, so they lower the price and make it more difficult to unlock the phone so they can hit the target number and get out.

For what it's worth, I think T-Mobile may get the iPhone before Verizon (despite the larger Verizon customer base) simply because the hardware is ready to go. CDMA phones suck a lot more juice than their GSM counterparts, something Apple will have to address, especially if a CDMA phone is going to be using 3G and GPS.

Absurd? Possible? Likely? "You're a freak and should write about something else"? Sound off in the comments.

Apple announces SIM Card Ejector Tool

At long last! Rumors have flown and people have clamored for it for over a year. As one of the biggest gripes about the original iPhone, I know it kept me from purchasing one for a long time. Paying $600 for a cell phone (no subsidy) and having to sign your life away to AT&T for two years for slow data speeds, poor sound quality, dropped calls and crappy customer service were all tolerable and easily overlooked when compared to having to use a bent paperclip to get to the SIM card in the iPhone.

Really, what kind of monsters work at Apple to think people want to deal with the hassle of destroying a perfectly good paperclip just to get to a SIM card most people never need to access?

I, for one, think this addition to the iPhone is welcome and long overdue.