Real Men of Genius: Cell phone holsters
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Tag Archives: iPhone
My first iPhone
It’s done. After a little agonizing and a little nagging, I bought an iPhone. Lisa, the AT&T rep couldn’t believe I didn’t have a mobile number I wanted to keep. She spoke very slowly as she asked me if I had an iTunes account and explained that Safari would be my browser.
Chuck came in while Lisa was showing me how to turn the iPhone on and off. He’s a serious road warrior who is giving up his beloved Blackberry for the iPhone. We are similarly motivated: our clients –and the world– are increasingly mobile. I need to be there and the iPhone is the state of the art.
Obviously, I’ll chronicle my mobile journey here in coming weeks and months.
Get Me Out of Here
Planet Nelson points us to getmooh.com, an automated service designed to help you escape a variety of situation by "…calling you automatically on your phone at a pre-specified time and playing you a recording which will either instruct you on what to say to elude your tormentor(s), or which will simply give a convincing sense of you being on an important call."
Wouldn't this make a great iPhone app? Simply program the phone to call at specified time… or you could simply reach in your pocket, press a button … and get the call 5 min later
Maverick Secure Mobile
If I ever break down and get an iPhone, I’ll want something like Maverick Secure Mobile. If your phone is lost or stolen, the application encrypts your data, sends you a text message with the location of the phone and, best of all, plays an annoyingly loud siren to torture the thief.
“The Maverick software is hidden on a phone, so a potential thief can’t tell whether or not your phone has it. You give the company a second phone number — your spouse’s or a friend’s, for example. As soon as a thief replaces your SIM card with his own, the phone encrypts all of your remaining data, like your phone book, photos or text messages, so the thief can’t see them. It also sends that data to your second phone so that you have it.
Then you can start playing tricks on the thief. By sending text message commands, you can see all the phone calls and text messages he sends or receives and any new contacts he enters in the phone book. With a feature called Spy Call, you can call your phone and eavesdrop on the thief’s calls — without him knowing. Then, when you get really exasperated, you can make the phone play a blaring siren. Just when he is about to toss your screaming phone in the trash, you can send him a text message with your name, location and, if you want, a reward for returning the phone.”
Naw, I don’t want the phone back. I want to fuck with the thief as long as possible.
Still in love with my Tracfone
I paid $19.95 at Wal-Mart for my Tracfone (sometime in 2005). A year ago I bought a prepaid card (1 year/500 minutes) that expires in a few days. I still have 172 minutes which I lose if I don’t purchase another card. Despite pressure from all quarters to get an iPhone, I picked up another prepaid card. 60 minutes/90 days. I just punched in the PIN number and I’m good till mid-December.
I gotta tell you… I love the Tracfone. It’s like a Bic pin or a Swatch or drug store reading glasses. Does one thing well. Demands no maintenance. Disposable. And I don’t have one of those little holsters on my belt. The Tracfone goes in the glove box or the laptop bag.
It has an ugly little LCD display and a charge can last me a couple of weeks (I only turn it on when I want to make or receive a call.)
What I really want is a Flip video camera that can stream live to Qik. Small, inexpensive, does one thing well.
Sprint in the NFL radio business
“Sprint Nextel subscribers will be able to listen to live radio broadcasts of National Football League games this season as part of new partnership between the wireless provider and sports league.
The live, cell-phone-accessible radio broadcasts—the centerpiece of the new NFL Mobile Live platform–will be available to all Sprint wireless subscribers who purchase a basic data plan as part of their services. In addition, as part of the agreement a select group of premium subscribers will be able to view live broadcasts of the NFL Network’s eight Thursday Night Football games on their phones starting on Nov. 6.” — MEDIA WEEK
Hmmm. Here’s one of several “take away’s” from this story by Mark Ramsey:
“For some reason, many broadcasters confuse the term “content” with “the stuff that’s on our air.” When I use the term “content” I mean the material that’s of serious interest to listeners. Stuff they will seek out. Not filler. Not commodities. McDonalds and NOBU may both offer “food,” but that’s where the similarity ends, and don’t think for a moment the patrons don’t know the difference.
In this case, the content is owned in its entirety by a third party – not a radio company. When it comes to professional sports play-by-play, radio is a distribution channel, not a content owner. Thus we will lose out to the owners of content in deals like this.”
Our company does broadcasts for a whole bunch of big (and small) colleges. We’ve been streaming (via Yahoo!) for years and on satellite radio for the last few years. It seems inevitable that these broadcasts will go directly to phones, sooner or later. Stay tuned? Dialed in?
Coffee Zone Radio
Coffee Zone proprietor Tasir Yanis has an amazing mix of songs on his iPod. That’s what we listen to here at the Zone. Maybe it’s just the ambience of a coffee shop but the former radio program director in me often thinks Taisir’s mix would make a great radio format. Except for all the commercials you’d have to jam in between the songs.
Or we could just download this little app for our iPhones. If I understand this correctly, it enables you to tap into your entire music collection on your home PC via your iPhone – and the music collections of your friends, too – and stream all of the above to your phone, wherever you go. [YouTube demo]
I found this on Mark Ramsey’s Hear 2.0 who describes it as being able to “create our own radio stations from our own content and share them with friends who are mobile.”
So I could listen to Coffee Zone Radio wherever I am? Or Planet Nelson Radio? Or Scott Brandon’s Friday Funk?
Okay, the iPhone is starting to look more and more like something I’m going to have to have. But I really want the thing to stream video, too. I’m getting close.
Email is yesterday. Maybe the day before.
If you want to glimpse the future, spend time with those that will live there. Back from a weekend with my brother and his family. The kids are 18, 16 and 12. They’re back in the states for 6 months to help Ryan get settled in college.
Uncle Steve was a big hit with his belated graduation present, but after giving Ryan his new iPod Touch, he was a little distracted the rest of the weekend. I also miss a lot of birthdays so we did a little catch-up with the other two. They opted for PSP’s (Play Station Portables).
The family is international with friends all over the world. But the kids do not use email to keep in touch (“Uncle Steve, please!”). The primary comm tools are SMS (texting) and Facebook. I had read that but it was interesting to hear it straight from the teenage horse’s mouth.
I’ve had a Facebook page for a while but never use it. If I want to keep in touch with my nephews and niece, that has to change.
Oh, and those PSP’s? Wifi ready so when they’re not gaming (or while they are), they can keep in touch with friends.
PS: On Saturday we stopped by the local Apple store. Packed. An iPhone class was underway and there were more gray heads than mohawks.
Waiting for iPhones in KC
George just got off the phone with Alice (his wife). They stopped by the Kansas City Apple store and found 120 people waiting in line. The store is out of phones. They’re waiting for the UPS truck in hopes the store gets more iPhones. [Photo is from June 11th, courtesy of Bob Heater. Don’t have a shot of today’s madness.]
Why no iPhone for smays.com
Given my love of tech toys in general and Apple stuff in particular, I find myself frequently explaining why I don’t have an iPhone (or plans to own one). Put aside the fact that I might make or receive 5 mobile calls in a week… it’s really a matter of time.
The time it would take me to get up and running is manageable. But I know I would be tweaking and “playing” with the phone until Steve Jobs is called back to that Garage in the Sky. It would be all-consuming.
For someone with very few real-world responsibilities (kids, chores, community service, etc), my days are full. Work, reading, exercise, dogs and, yes, blogging. Oh yeah… and Barb. She doesn’t get her share of my time.
The iPhone would be one more digital child I don’t have time to raise, care for and play with.