Archive by Author

One More Thing…

What’s the word for that moment when you realise that the work you do is appreciated by many, many people all across Australia?

Yeah, that.

This weekend was nothing short of amazing, all thanks to a little site called MacTalk.

Back in 2007, I joined a little site called MacTalk. Fast forward a couple of years, a few thousand posts, and many internet arguments later, and I come across a little post by then-overseer and hater of pants, decryption, asking for volunteer writers for some news posts. I put my hand up.

The rest is turtles all the way down.

This weekend was basically the culmination of all that; a dinner with most of the people who have contributed to MacTalk in some way, those who have silently decimated the not-so-silent spam, those who have kept things ticking over behind the scenes, and those who have written articles, reviewed products, or gotten on their perennial soapbox and given a few thousand listeners an earful about how non-developers shouldn’t be using beta releases on the podcast, past and present.

There were a few people missing, but by and large, most of the big players where there and a fantastic time was had by all. Putting faces to online personas is always good fun, even if it can be a little daunting at first. Once you get over that initial awkwardness of “hey, do I follow you on Twitter? What’s your name on the forums?”, then it’s apples, ladies and gentlemen, apples — which is lucky, because that’s pretty much what MacTalk is about (Apple, Inc).

At some point during the night, there was a thing where had to go around the table and tell everyone about ourselves — our Twitter or MacTalk usernames, what we did, and so on.

Some people were known simply by name or by reputation, others had to describe their role in MacTalk a little more. When it came around to me, I simply said “I’m Benny, and I write the news”.

Cue thunderous applause.

In all seriousness, I was kind of taken aback. Stunned, that people recognised me, just from what I had done. Little did I realise how far my daily news posts reached. Little did I know that people actually recognised —nay, applauded — my work.

This isn’t just me being naive, it’s a genuine realisation of the culmination of hours of early morning (and some not-so-early) news posts over last two years. It’s me realising that podcast topics which were formed off the words I had written, it’s about me realising that “whoa, people actually read this stuff — and they like it!” Me realising that the words I type into one of those new-fangled computers actually has some sort of impact.

One comment (from Chrome, I believe): “everyone sets their clock from Greenwich Mean Time, but Greenwich set their time from [me]”.

There’s nothing quite like the feeling of being appreciated and recognised for your work, which, I guess, was really the whole point of that night; everyone in that room had contributed in some way, shape, or form to MacTalk over the past few years.

This morning I considered writing a piece on Steve Jobs (you know, seeing as he stepped down as CEO) as a sort of editorial on MacTalk (like all the cool kids are doing), but as I thought about what I would write about, I couldn’t think of anything. Seriously, not a thing — not because there wasn’t anything to say, but because anything I wrote about would be so, so, insubstantial compared to the big picture.

And yet it’s times like the above, when I was applauded for simply saying my name and what I do, that make it all worth it.

Thanks guys 🙂

A month with some Windows Phone 7, er… phones

I’m in the privileged position where I can buy whatever the fuck I like. No kids […] and no debt – just disposable income and a bloodlust for gadgets. Some people smoke, do drugs, drink booze, gamble, go out, whatever. I like buying electronics I have no use for, other than to say “I’ve used that”, and to be able to throw my opinion into nerdly discussions with some sort of authority. The pinnacle of this is my T-Hub – currently acting as a glorified clock in the living room.

via Anthony – An Apple loving nerd from Melbourne.

* give or take a few days

Pretty much this. It’s not that don’t like having money, but what use is money if I can’t do anything with it? This way, my “bloodlust for gadgets” — as Anthony so eloquently puts is — is satisfied and no one gets hurt in the process. Win-win, really.

I don’t know quite how it happened, but at some point during the last month I managed to acquire not one, but two Windows Phone 7 Phones; a HTC 7 Mozart and a Dell Venue Pro. I’ve already written about the hardware of those a little, so this will mostly be about Windows Phone 7 as a platform and how it compares to, say, the iPhone.

Small note before we get into things proper: in the above review of the hardware and intro to Windows Phone 7, I (incorrectly) say that even though the HTC 7 Mozart includes a notification LED, WP7 doesn’t seem to use it. That is just plain untrue — it just doesn’t flash for things like unread emails or messages. It’ll definitely flash for missed calls though, but whether the notification LED is a standard thing or something HTC has tacked on still remains to be seen.

The next small note before I start giving you opinions on stuff: I used the release of Windows Phone 7 called NoDo (7390), as well as the as-yet-unreleased (to the public, anyway) Mango (7712) for my evauluations. Besides Twitter integration, groups, and threaded messages across communication platforms, there is little else that I discovered in terms of differences between the two. There may be a few little changes between the developer beta 2 refresh of Mango and the final, carrier-released version, but your mileage may vary.

Final small note: if you haven’t read Lukas Mathis’ excellent Windows Phone 7 write-up, you should go read that. I echo a few of his points here, but he also looks at WP7 from a usability perspective (something I don’t do much of here).

Windows Phone 7 Phones

If you’re ready to get this show on the road, take a deep breath, and read on.

Continue Reading →

Smartphone Lust

As someone who is interested in technology, there are few things that make me happier than a shiny new toy to play with. Unfortunately this also means my bank balance is relatively bare most of the time, but what money I save from not driving, smoking, drinking or, uh, courting means more money to be spent on new shiny, and that’s a-ok by me. Isn’t disposable income great?

For the moment, smartphones are where it’s at. Perhaps I just haven’t caught up to the rest of the world when it comes to tablets, or perhaps I think they’re not quite there yet – either way, my interest (for the moment) likes solely with the likes of those smartphone manufacturers like HTC, Motorola, Samsung, yes, even Apple and HP/Palm.

My personal interest in technology means that I have an iPhone 4 as my daily carry. In the past, I’ve experimented with a HTC Desire running Android 2.1.

This time around, I’m currently playing with the Windows Phone 7 platform, and not one, but two phones — the Dell Venue Pro and the HTC Mozart 7.

The Venue Pro is kinda weird. It’s my first 4-inch smartphone, and while the extra screen space is kinda nice, the phone itself is pretty heavy and quite bulky (especially compared to the chic Mozart). It’s also a portrait slider, which makes it even more unique. The AMOLED screen is nice and vibrant, as expected, but there’s one thing I can’t quite put my finger on that I don’t like about it. I think the display is too far inset from the glass, maybe. The glass that it uses is the famed Gorilla Glass, but it’s not the same as the same Gorilla Glass-touting Mozart. Not sure if it’s an issue with my phone or what, but I find it has moisture issues — like it’s more slippery than it’s supposed to be on the surface. The sleep/wake button is difficult to press, but overall, it’s a okay-ish phone. Average, I would say.

The Mozart 7 is a different story. It’s slim, light, and is everything I would expect from HTC. It’s a shame the notification LED isn’t used for any Windows Phone notifications (I’m not sure that’s actually a feature that WP7 offers), but it’s very, very nice. The phone itself is very responsive, the included HTC ringtones are even nice (Harp Glitch is my current ringtone of choice — WP7 doesn’t offer custom ringtones), and perhaps the only complaint I have is about the capacitive buttons — they’re a little too easy to hit. Apart from that, no complaints.

I’ve been using the Mozart as my daily carry for close to a month now, and I’ll have some thoughts on Windows Phone 7 up shortly (week, perhaps two, perhaps three if I’m lazy), as well as a nice comparison between the two phones.

For now, I’ll just say that Windows Phone 7 is very nice (contrary to what you might have read). There’s consistency everywhere, things are nice and simplified, and it’s overall very polished. The apps aren’t quite there yet, but that’s a story for another time.

The best Windows Phone 7 endorsement I’ve read

The only good WP7 apps that exist are:

1. Games

2. Apps that do not require vertical list scrolling

List scrolling is so bad, that I think WP7 devices should come with Epilepsy warnings. That’s how bad it is.

Lists stall, jump, you end up selecting items you never wanted to select, etc.

Also, the horizontal scrolling needs a threshold to trigger pane switches. If you tap up to scroll up a bit in a list and your finger moves from side to side, it can trigger horizontal pane switches and in some applications that means you lose your place in a list. That’s terrible.

via xda-developers – View Single Post – Birdsong Twitter App.