Category: Observations Page 46 of 90

The Cloud

On June 25, 2014

Spotify. Pandora. Rdio. Beats.
Netflix. Amazon instant video. Hulu. HBO GO. WatchESPN.
Dropbox’s camera upload. Flickr auto-upload.
Podcast downloads.

As the world races towards The Cloud™ with open arms, music and movies are more often hosted there. Instead of having a song live on the device I want to hear it come out of, it’s on a server somewhere.

Streamed to me live and on-demand. Except when it’s not.

Servers go down. I ride an underground metro the entire way to work and back. Commutes and lack of connectivity gave rise to Instapaper and local media. Even in those dark days before the internet and mobile phones with the ability to reach across the world for a song or book. These are places where I can’t stream media to my device.

But they’re not the biggest deterrent to The Cloud™. Not for me. There is a bigger problem with moving everything to a distance server.

I have a 3 GB data plan.

That is the single biggest deterrent to using streaming services. If I streamed, I would hit my limit in the first few days of each month. Then I’d have to pay $10 per extra 1 GB of data after that.

Something I know well, because I had a 2 GB plan until I realized it was only $5 more per month to up it to 3GB and with all the travel I’ve done lately, I was consistently going over my 2 GB allotment.

I look at Dropbox wanting to save all of my photos and that’s a wonderful idea. Only I can’t use it until I get home to the plentiful bits provided by my WiFi.

The same goes for Flickr’s auto-upload. I’d love to be able to send every photo to the service and use the generous 1 TB of space I have there. But I can’t because it would kill my data allowance.

I’d love to watch the World Cup, stream Netflix or even enjoy one of the many music services. But I don’t even bother signing up to any of them. I have Netflix and ESPN apps on my devices at home. But never on my phone.

Beats looks interesting. I’ve never used it. Rdio looks neat. I don’t have an account. I have Spotify and Pandora accounts but I rarely use them. And when I do, it’s a Spotify link on Tumblr I want to listen to as I browse my dashboard from my laptop.

As the future moves into The Cloud™ and away from putting files on devices, I’m watching from afar and enjoying my local media. As I will continue to do until data becomes less expensive than printer ink! (I’m kidding. Nothing is more expensive than printer ink.) The capabilities of what we can do using the internet are astounding and moving forward very quickly. Unfortunately, the access to those services are being charged at a premium for mobile devices.

Home broadband is neither inexpensive not ubiquitous either. But it’s still far ahead of what I can do from my phone. Unless I want to keep paying. And paying. And paying.

Pictures of us

By Carl

On June 24, 2014

In Observations

My wife said something last night that has stuck with me. What pictures are you going to frame and remember? The picture of scenery or one with us in it?” It was far more elegant than that. But her point remains. Take more pictures of us! And she’s right. I don’t take nearly enough pictures of us on vacation. As many photographers confess, there is rarely evidence they were on vacation at all.

There is only one photo of us from Bonnaroo.

We were there for four days. We went to over 20 concerts. We sang. We danced. We laid in the grass. We ate. We drank. We slept. And it’s all in our heads. For now. There are no photos of us enjoying ourselves. There is nothing to look back on and remember the good times. There are only stupid pictures of bands and strangers. But no other ones of us. Which we took as a fluke. We almost came away having not taken a single photo of ourselves. For the entire four-day festival.

I did a little better in Canada.

But still fell short of capturing us on the trip.

Sure, I like to take pictures of where we go. But what’s going to be a better picture in a year when the memories have faded?

This?

Or this?

I am going to be better at capturing us doing things together. It doesn’t matter where we are, if we aren’t there. I’m not going to hang up pictures of random people and things when I could have memories and pictures of us having fun together.

We are going to California for a week. We’re going to attend a dear friend’s wedding and see the sights around San Francisco. And while we’re there, I am going to make a point to take pictures of us doing things. Living life. Having fun. Being silly.

I want to remember the trip and be able to show us living it. If you’re finding yourself lacking from the vacations you’ve taken. It’s time to change that.

[Forest Hills Audio Book Month Display](https://www.flickr.com/photos/mysapl/3616239063)

Get 3 months of Audible for $6

By Carl

On June 20, 2014

In Observations

I love Audible. On the way back from Bonnaroo my wife and I enjoyed Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison. Having seen both seasons of the Netflix show, I enjoyed the book. It was interesting to see what liberties were taken with the show. It was fun to see some of the memorable parts from Season 1 show up in the book. It was equally interesting to see who and what were completely made for TV.

Road trips commutes are made for audiobooks. No matter how much music I have I eventually get tired of it. Podcasts are great too, but eventually I wanted something longer I could really get into. Our 12 hour drive was perfect for listening to Orange is the new Black.

When I can lose myself for hours in a book, read by a professional, it can enhance an already great story. When read by the author, it can bring a story to life with the voice and inflections which gave birth to the story.

There are often deals for new customers. However, Audible is running a deal for new and expired members.

Tell me more about this deal!

The deal is a discount from the $14.95/month price to $1.95 for three months. That’s three books, one per month, for $6.00.

Go here to get the deal.
Enter the code TZ2014

Now you’ll enjoy Audible for $1.95 a month for the next three months. The membership will give you one credit to use each month. The credit is good for any book on the service. The deal expires June 30, 2014 so you’ve got a couple of weeks to use it.

Membership comes with some other perks.

30% off all purchases.
Member-only deals and sales
Free audio subscriptions to The Wall Street Journal or The New York Times
Freely exchange any book that doesn’t meet your expectations. No questions asked.

I returned a book with the reason I did not like this book. I got a refund of the price I paid for the book, no questions asked. I haven’t had an active membership in a few months and I had no trouble redeeming the deal with my expired membership.

Be sure to set a calendar reminder to cancel your account after three months. Otherwise, you’ll be charged $14.95 per month after that.

Photo credit: Forest Hills Audio Book Month Display

Windows Quick Tip – How to hide desktop icons

By Carl

On June 20, 2014

In Observations

I first learned Windows could hide desktop icons after answering Help Desk tickets. I would get calls and emails from people saying, ALL OF MY FILES ARE GONE!!! When I would get to their desk, sure enough, their desktop would be empty. Completely empty.

Now there are some people who keep a clean desktop, but even they have a couple of icons there. A folder or shortcut to something they often use. Or they’ve got a shortcut they’re unable to remove due to the lack of admin rights.

There are also uses for hiding the desktop’s icons. When I want to record a screen cast or capture screenshots without the clutter of my desktop, I will hide the icons to give it a much cleaner look.

Whether you’re trying to answer a help desk ticket, or simply want a clean desktop, it’s very simple to hide them.

Right click on your Desktop.
Select View
Under the drop down menu, uncheck Show desktop icons
Enjoy an empty desktop.

To bring them back, repeat the first two steps and click Show desktop icons so there is a check mark next to them.

And now you know how to hide Windows desktop icons.

Roominations – The Story of Nashville

By Carl

On June 19, 2014

In Observations

I went to see a showing of the film For the Love of Music: The Story of Nashville. Upon arriving we were all handed a ham biscuit. Which was a great treat for getting up for a 10:30am showing.

There was a Q&A Session with musicians Brett James and Amy Stroup hosted by Butch Spyron who also created the film. It was interesting to get a bit of insight into the film and the parts which weren’t included.

After watching it, I want to move to Nashville. So it must have worked! There were two lines I wrote down because they stood out to me.

My style’s a product of my limitation. – EmmyLou Harris

So true of any creative activity. We’re all products of our own limitations.

“I think genres are dead.” There’s good music. There’s bad music. And I think the cool thing about Nashville is it is at the epicenter of that kind of thinking. I’m a country music artist in Nashville, but Nashville is way, way, way bigger than country music.” – Eric Church

I would not normally have gone to this film, but one of the people I went to Bonnaroo with loves country music and used to live in Nashville so we all decided to go. An air-conditioned movie tent was an appealing start to a long, hot concert-going day. I am really glad I went.

I want to move to Nashville now. There’s so much music being made everywhere in the city, it seems like a magical place. Like Los Angeles for movies, Nashville is where music comes from.

When we first got into Nashville, we stopped for a gas, restroom, drink break. Going into the restroom, I was in there with a guy on his cell phone.

Overhearing the conversation, he was talking about recording vocals track and mixing down audio. I joked to my wife, we hadn’t been in Nashville even an hour and I’d already run into someone working in the music business.

The town seems to have music in its soul. If you enjoy tapping a toe, bobbing your head or getting up and dancing to a tune, For the Love of Music: The Story of Nashville is worth your time.

I’m not very musical but it made me want to dust off my vocals chords and try to learn an instrument. Then of course move to Nashville.

‘Roominations is a series of posts that came from my trip to Bonnaroo 2014. Four nomadic musical days in Tennessee where I was up before 9am and awake until 4am with random naps in between.