John Turner

Switched out my MOTU Ultralite for an Apogee Duet. The Ultralite was fine, but I didn’t need all those inputs and all those menu options…it was way overkill. The Duet is uses FW and is bus powered like the MOTU but is simpler and smaller. The stellar pres don’t hurt it any, either. It is good to know I have a fallback is something ever happens to the Aphex 230. Everything sounds great…gotta tweak some levels yet but no big deal. I’ll probably put the Ultralite on CL in a few days…its in pristine condition so it should sell pretty fast.

I deactivated my Facebook account today. As long as I don’t log in during the next two weeks, the account will be deleted. At least, that’s what Facebook says will happen. We’ll see. Why did I break up with Facebook? I’m not interested in letting Facebook pimp out my personal information for their gain. Article 1, Article 2, Article 3. Knowing me, Twitter and all of the other sites that a person of the 21st century allegedly can’t do without will follow. I’ll probably keep LinkedIn because I use it for work. Otherwise, I’ll pass. My new title: Social Networking Hermit.

Finally set my laptop’s Time Machine to back up to a FW drive connected to a Mac mini I’m using as a file/print server. Works pretty well, no muss, no fuss.

Got the motorcycle out last week and rode to work. Temp was about 30 degrees F when I left in the morning. A little cold, but not too bad at all. I only have a short commute, about 11 miles each way, so it is not a problem in the cold. And while it may be cold in the morning, it is totally worth it in the afternoon when it warms up! I think I’ve got 4 or 5 days of riding in already for the season. Not too bad at all. Stopped riding last November about mid-month, and started riding again on March 8, so that makes about 14 weeks of no riding. But I got down to FL in January and rode about 850 miles, so really it has only been 7 weeks since my last ride. Hmmmm…maybe I need to make a riding vacation in January an annual thing. (note to self)

While doing research for my paper due in a couple weeks, I ran across this old web page from Microsoft: The 10 Immutable Laws of Security. It is amazing how many people, even so-called “I.T. professionals”, do not grasp even these simple concepts. Strike that…”amazing”? More like scary, considering that a lot of these folks are responsible for some pretty big and pretty critical systems.

OK, so Apple’s iPad and upcoming foray into eBooks aside, let’s consider the Kindle. I’m an avid reader. I read practically anything, fiction and non-fiction both. I read just for fun…not just for school or for work. I’m also a published author. In short, I love books.

However, there are three reasons I won’t buy a Kindle. Or even any other eBook reader.

Reason #1: I have thousands of dollars invested in printed books. Some I no longer read, others I keep around for nostalgia and glance at occasionally, and others I refer to frequently. There is no way to convert this significant investment in printed books into some sort of eBook format. I feel this is a key flaw in the eBook business model which touts convenience. Sure, it is convenient, but only for books you buy after you buy the reader. For the thousands of dollars you already have invested, tough. What are your options then? Recycling? Sharing or trading? The point of a book is to have access to knowledge. Either you keep the physical copy around so you have it for later, or you get rid of it. If you get rid of it, you “lose” that knowledge.

Reason #2: There’s no option to get a book’s Kindle version later, for a discounted (or even free) price. Let’s say I want to buy a book, but the publisher hasn’t released it for the Kindle yet. No problem…as I pointed out above, if it is a book I want, I have no problem buying the hard copy, reading it, and storing it on my shelf. However, I’d probably be a lot more inclined to buy the book in the first place, especially for those books that are more “that sounds like a good read” vs. “I definitely want to read this” books, if I was offered a future Kindle version for a discounted price or better yet, free. Something like “Not available on Kindle, but buy now for $14.99 and we’ll ship if for free and when it does become available on the Kindle, you’ll get the Kindle version for just $1.99.”

Reason #3: This is more of a deficiency in Amazon’s web site than a problem with the Kindle. I have a fairly sizable wishlist with books as the overwhelming majority of items. Scrolling through my wish list, there’s absolutely no indication whatsoever whether any of the books are available on the Kindle. Why not? If I was looking through my wish list, and saw that 60% of the books were available on the Kindle, I might seriously consider buying one and getting the books that way. Further, there should be options on my wish list, like “Purchase all books from your wish list that are available on Kindle”. It is this type of library management that Amazon is lacking. Something like iTunes gets it, though. I can log in, and iTunes will tell me that X number of songs I purchased earlier are available at a higher bit rate and without DRM, with a “one-click” option to upgrade all of them. I don’t see this at Amazon.

The Kindle is a great idea. It just seems to me that Amazon is seriously missing some opportunities for better marketing tie-ins and web site integration with the product.

Apple announced the iPad today, their version of the tablet computer. It looks awesome. Starting at $499 for 16GB and WiFi only, going up to $849 for 64GB w/ WiFi + 3G cellular support. 10 hour battery life. I think I am in love. I was going to buy a Kindle, but now I won’t. I realize they are apples to oranges, the point is that a Kindle DX is $400 and it is just for books and grayscale. Who wouldn’t spend another $100 to get a computing platform with a full color touch screen? I’ll probably sell my MacBook Pro, too, and buy an iMac. iPad + iMac + smartphone (Android, iPhone, etc) sounds like the perfect mix to me. Heck, get a decent headset and use Skype and you don’t need the smartphone.

You have to wonder what other companies are doing when Apple consistently is first to market with pretty amazing technology. Yes, other companies get some cool stuff out (Archos media players, Nokia tablets) but Apple is the only company that consistenly gets the whole experience out first and integrates it into a person’s life. That’s the key right there…they get the technology out and the user doesn’t worry about it: it just works.

It only took 5.5 years (roughly), but I finally got an actual royalty check for The Definitive Guide to Linux Network Programming (Expert’s Voice). Yippee! I always wondered if they would actually come after me for my advance which was spent long ago (a man has needs after all!). Now I don’t have to worry. On to the next book for all my fans!

So last night I decided to jump into MW2 for a bit. I was close to getting promoted and wanted to wind down before going to sleep. Anyway, I got my level up, and as I was logging off I noticed that MSFT was advertising last.fm as a service for Live Gold members. Sure enough, you can get last.fm streams on your Xbox now for free. Very, very cool. Ever since giving up my cable TV service, I’ve wondered about how to get some music streams into the house. The iPod is fine and all, but sometimes you want a different playlist, or want someone else to make the choices. I had almost settled on a Sirius or XM system for the home when I saw the last.fm blurb. Now I don’t need to spend any money. Thanks, MSFT!

Started using Chrome today. I wasn’t going to succumb to the hype, but then I saw this video. I’m a sucker for clever. I wonder if it does full auto?