Loving my iPad

Well it’s been over a month now and I have to say it… I love my iPad.

This morning I was waiting in line at the DMV to renew my license. When I got there the line wrapped all the way around the building. So, I dutifully found my place at the back of the line and pulled out my iPad. For the next 40 minutes, while standing in broad daylight, I read the first five chapters of “Moby Dick”.

Yes Virginia, there is a readable screen in the daylight on the iPad.

It was great. Before I knew it I was at the front of the line being given a number to, you guessed it, wait in a different line.

No problem. Out came the trusty iPad, once again. Reading commenced, once again. And once again the time just flew by. With the minor interruption of one DMV employee who wanted a demonstration of the iPad and a brief discussion of what’s possible on it. She was thinking about getting a Kindle, but once she saw the broader usefulness off the iPad she was converted. I imagine she’ll have her iPad by the end of the week.

Yes, there are shortcomings on the device currently. It’s still frustrating that there’s no printing from the device. But Steve Jobs sent an email out to someone yesterday assuring them that printing is coming to the iPad. So I can wait. It is also frustrating that there is no way to pull a Word Doc, or PPT or Excel file from a USB thumb drive. This would be very useful in the field when someone throws you a last minute file to edit and you have no WiFi signal, or additional computer on hand to send the file from. Perhaps this will be corrected in the future too? We’ll see.

But aside from some, “If A happens when I’m in B, then I can’t accomplish C” scenarios the iPad lives up to my expectations and exceeds them in most respects. And those ABC scenarios are not daily occurrences for me, and can usually be avoided with enough careful planning ahead of time.

Anyone else out there with an iPad with some thoughts to share?

Sometimes the past is beautifully present…

A classic steam engine train came through town today. It was breathtaking.

Las Vegas 2010 v3.0

I’m in Vegas for the next two days to attend the NAB Show. This is the big annual show that we attend to see all the video, sound and computer gear in our industry. This year we have Josh and Jessica attending with us. OH! Did I mention that Baby Sean is here too?

Tomorrow is our first day and we will end it at the Final Cut Pro User Group Supermeet! We’ll also see Victoria for lunch tomorrow and Rita for lunch on Wednesday. Should be fun!

Got my iPad

Well I have it. My very own iPad. Bryan and I went down to the Apple store at 5 this morning. First in line. Awesome. More details to come. But first impressions are very good! I love this thing.

Another Good Read for Slide Presenters

Here’s a very good site with 10 tips for creating better slideshows. Please read it and make your audience happy!

Garr Reynolds/Presentations.

The 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint

This is a must read for anyone who is giving presentations out there in the world. The post is written by Guy Kawasaki… this man is someone you should really listen to.

As a slideshow Operator/Designer myself for many years in a few thousand settings for several hundred clients… I can’t stress enough how much thought should really go into someone’s presentation slides. Have a read and make your audience happy!

How to Change the World: The 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint.

Apple Seeking to Stimulate Mac Development With $99 Mac Dev Program – Mac Rumors

This is good news for us who are moving into software development.

Hooray!

Apple Seeking to Stimulate Mac Development With $99 Mac Dev Program – Mac Rumors.

Working in Palm Desert

Well, Bryan and I are up in Palm Desert this week working with IMS Audio Visual on the eTail West conference.

I enjoy working with the boys from IMS. They are good guys. Nice to work with.

Bryan is here working, even though his wife (my sister) is at home ready to pop with their first child. Hopefully she won’t go into labor while we are here. She’s acutally due on the 7th of March. So we are assuming we have another week, although, we all know Teesa would prefer to have the kid sooner than later at this point.

This is an interesting conference to be working at this point. With Apadapa Labs getting ready to launch we are quickly preparing to become a company with actual products to sell. Not just services. So the sessions here on email marketing and online data collecting are extremely relevant and interesting.

It’s coming…

Apadapa Labs

Oh yeah.

January Rolls Into February

2010 is 1/12 over. January has passed us by.

*Blink* It’s over!

Amazing. February is already upon us. The next month should be very interesting. We are making some great headway on launching our software company. We have meetings on Thursday to determine our name, meet with the lawyer to file all the incorporation papers and truly launch this thing.

I’m very excited about the prospects of this new venture. I think there is a tremendous amount of talent in our group and we should be able to hit a few homeruns on this software business. It’s really going to be great!

February… we will see the completion of our first iPhone app this month as we complete our very first app that is being developed for a client. Very cool. I’ll be sure to let everyone know when it’s available on the App Store.

Look out world! We’re putting our cloud out there in the sky!

Further toughts on the iPad

Ok, now i’m being called an Apple fanboy again who’s drinking the Kool Aid.

That’s funny.

Now to say that I’m drinking the Kool Aid is just lame, and typical of people who are Anti Apple. And believe me there are many out there who just despise Apple. I know that.

Apple does not always do it right. They do make missteps along the way, it’s true. In the Jobs era you have The Cube, the weird colored Clam Shell iBooks, to a lesser extent AppleTV (though it delivers on what was promised, just the promise is totally underwhelming).

But Apple’s latest Macs, notebooks and iPods/iPhones are awesome. And every step of the way the Anti Apple zealots have started to sound as out of touch as the Mac Addicts. (There’s Kool Aid to be sipped on both sides!)

The name does have it’s problems. But that doesn’t bother me. If nothing else I’d love to see a move away from the “I” names, but that probably won’t happen. Not soon anyway.

iPad: Apple’s New Lust Gadget?

So Apple unveiled the iPad today.

Some people are already calling it a big failure. That it’s underwhelming. That it’s too pricey. That it just doesn’t make any sense.

Well… those are all the same criticisms we heard for the iPod, and the iPhone and iPod Touch. Yet, here we are. Apple is a $50 Billion a year business, and I’m pretty sure they are onto something here.

Now, the iPad is not a netbook, or a “traditional windows style tablet” or a replacement for a notebook.

No, the iPad is truly something new. It’s a device that is geared for those of us who are truly mobile internet users for whom the iPhone screen is too small for hours of use, and for whom a notebook is still just too much computer to lug around.

I think there’s a lot more of us out there for this than a lot of people realize.

Sure, right now the application capabilities of the iPad are not much greater than that of an iPod Touch or an iPhone. They do share the same core OS, but as a developer I know already that the iPad has greater functionality built into it’s interface than the smaller siblings it complements. In time developers are going to make killer apps for this product. Apple themselves have already shown us some of that power in the new iWork for iPad apps. Sleek desktop level apps, in a clean iPhone OS form factor. Nice.

I’ve watched the Keynote twice. And I’m sold. This is my next computing device. I don’t need a full fledged notebook to check email and surf the web and type up word processing docs while I’m sitting at the soccer fields. I just don’t. But I also don’t want to do those things on a tiny iPhone screen either. This is going to be perfect.

I’m looking forward to getting my hands on one as soon as I can! And at $499 to start, the price point is pretty sweet. It’s Apple’s cheapest entry into the computing line. I’m willing to bet they’ll sell a ton of these.

Apple Event on Monday

The iPad? The iSlate?

Just what is Apple up to in Cupertino?

We all get to find out on Monday. And I’m sure my pocketbook is going to wish it had more funds in it when they announce it.

NASA – LRO Sees Apollo Landing Sites

NASA – LRO Sees Apollo Landing Sites .

I can’t wait until we go back to the moon!

The New Star Trek is actually Star Wars 2.0?

Online video viewing clears three hours per month | Digital Media – CNET News

Someone said to me that online video is the “wave of the future” over the weekend. My response to them was that it’s already my present.

Looks like the future is getting closer and closer for more people.

Online video viewing clears three hours per month | Digital Media – CNET News.

The New Ghostbusters Videogame looks AWESOME!

Tell me this doesn’t look like it’s going to be a blast!

Original Cast + New Cast = GHOSTBUSTERS III — Aint It Cool News: The best in movie, TV, DVD, and comic book news..

Most gigantic model railroad in the world

This model railroad is simply amazing. Check out the video below!

DVICE: Astonishing video: Most gigantic model railroad in the world.

Ten business lessons from Battlestar Galactica

This is very funny reading for all my fellow BSG geeks. Read it and laugh!

Ten business lessons from Battlestar Galactica | Topics | Macworld.

Digital vs. Paper Media – An analysis of the NYT

The linked article has an interesting breakdown of the cost of delivering the NYT to its subscribers via traditional newsprint, or by giving every subscriber a free Amazon Kindle.

Interesting. And a good point as to why traditional print media is a dying industry.

Printing The NYT Costs Twice As Much As Sending Every Subscriber A Free Kindle.

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