RSS MAD

Downloading Digital Music

It looks like more people are downloading digital copies of music. In 2006, digital downloads nearly doubled. Overall CD sales are down however.

Wikipedia

I love Wikipedia. Some folks say that it is an unreliable source. I have used it maybe 100 times and each time I have found it to be legit or at least what I was reading appeared to be accurate.

Eye Tracking

Yahoo and Internet TV

It looks like Yahoo is getting serious about Internet TV. They are going to call it My Channel.

Surfing the Web on My Cell Phone

Surfing the web on my cell phone is slow, annoying, and way too expensive. I decided to cancel the service because $15 a month for such slow downloads is simply a waste of my time.

iPhone

Apple has finally announced the new iPhone. It looks pretty cool. It has a 3 1/2 inch wide touchscreen display. The cool part is that it runs OS X with Safari for web browsing. You can get it as a Cingular exclusive for $499 on a two-year contract.

Downloading MP3s

I made a pact with myself to never buy a record from a brick and mortar retailer again. I had only bad luck doing so. That leaves me buying CDs online or downloading MP3s. I can find anything I want at iTunes but I find it annoying that I can't sure an iTunes mp3 with a friend. I love downloadpunk.com but I can only find about 1/3 of the stuff I am looking for.

Updating a Blog

It is really easy to set up a blog but my guess is that huge percentage of blogs are launched but then never updated. I see blogs the same way that I see those free websites of the late 1990's like Geocities and Angelfire. I figure that pretty much all of those free sites are now expired. I figure a ton of blogs will also be deleted in a couple of years.

Some are Calling it the Sofa Web

I think we have turned the corner when it comes to extending web access. Most of us have gotten pretty used at sending emails and surfing websites as we sit in front of a computer at work or in a home office. Accessing the web beyond that has been limited for me. There are numerous other places to look the web but I am a late adapter and have not taken advantage yet. Handheld wireless devices like cell phones and Blackberry's are one. Another are the new wave of gaming systems that also include a web browser. As time moves on there will be more and more places to access web content. It is a pretty cool time to see these technologies moving forward.

Domain Names

We always seem to be looking for a new domain name for different websites we are building. Most good domain names are taken. I go ahead and pull up the website at the domain that we desire and more times than not I just find placeholders. People still seem the stockpile domain names to resell them - at least I guess.

IPTV

IPTV is Internet Protocol Television. It can be either live (multicasting) or Video on Demand (VOD) which is stored video. The TV content is delivered over broadband connections.

Personalized Homepage

I love my custom homepage. I use both My Yahoo and Google's customized homepage. I love getting feeds from all of my favorite sites in one place.

New Yahoo Mail

It has been well documented that the new Yahoo Mail is very slow. I tend to agree. It took me a while to adapt, but I have finally jumped on board with the Beta of the new Yahoo mail. For the most part, I like it. A couple of things that I do not like are the search feature as well as this speed issue.

FiOS Internet access service from Verizon

I see a lot of articles about a technology called FiOS and I am sure that most people don't even know what it is so I thought I would post the defintion. According to Verizon: FiOS is the latest in fiber-optic technology. It delivers laser-generated pulses of light, riding on hair-thin strands of glass fiber, directly to your home. FIOs is available in Verizon areas. It is an Internet access service.

Stumble Upon

Stumble Upon is a pretty neat tool that you can download and install on your browser. You can get recommendations and rate sites that you surf.

Broadband Connections at Home

Check this out. Nielsen//NetRatings mentioned that 78 percent of home Web users have a broadband connection, up 13 percentage points from about a year ago. I can't wait until this hits 100% because dial up is slow and frustrating.

Websites Not Connecting

It is really frustrating when I go to a website and it does not respond. What is going on? Just remember that it can be a number of things but it most likely can be simplified to two common issues. #1 - that website is getting a ton of traffic and it is not responding in a timely manner or #2 you are having issues with your Internet connection. The best thing to do is simply try again. These things typically are resolved within a few minutes.

Click Fraud

There has been claims that there are high rates of click fraud on sites like Google. Click fraud happens when someone will click on one of their competitor's ads on a site like Google. Companies pay pennies or sometimes a few dollars for each click. So every time someone performs click fraud, they are sucking money out of their competitor's pockets

Instant Messaging

Pros

• IM programs are really good at getting right in people's faces. If you need a quick answer to a question, it is the way to go.
• It is a super way to catch up with people. Some people are not good with the phone or even email. Some people think IM is fun and I have found it is a nice way to catch up with some people.
  

• It is tough to get more than one person in a conversation. The odds of 3 people being in front of their computer at the same time is rare.
• I think there is a sense of rudeness associated with IM. At times, you feel like you are in the middle of a conversation with someone and they just don't respond. I am sure that they get distracted with their boss or something at work but it feels like they have just hung up on you.
  

Myspace

I don't get Myspace. I think the site is annoying and I don't see the value in it. Maybe it is because the site is popular for high school age kids and I am too old.

DSL vs. Cable

There have been a lot of websites that compare DSL and Cable High Speed Internet. I was thinking about the things that I have learned about the 2 access technologies from talking to people that have one of the services.

DSL
- Static IPs are available
- It is cheap
- You do need phone line
- The up-time is great. It is truly always on.

Cable
- It is faster
- It is more expensive but you do not need to pay for a phone line
- You can get good deal with bundled pricing - tv and digital phone
- I heard horror stories about down time

Use the Web for Everything

I use the web for everything. It is crazy. I remember about 2 years ago, I had an issue with my DSL connection at home. I was helpless. I didn't know what to do. I had failed to grab a copy of my yellow pages for the past few years from the mail room in my building and my mind was blank on how to get the phone number for my ISP. I simply had forgot about 411 service. I hadn't used 411 in years and years. I called a friend of mine to look up the number for me. The point of this lame story is how I rely on the web for anything and everything. I check the weather, I IM friends, I check sports scores, I check stock quotes, I read news, I update my fun websites, I update my work websites. I don't even remember what I did before I saw the internet for the first time in 1994.

Spam

I have read that about 60% emails that go through some company's email servers are spam. That just blows my mind. I keep wondering who these people are that are sending out spam and why are we not catching them and locking them up?

Skin to transmit signals?

First there were wires. Then there was wireless. Now we are going to use our skin to transmit signals. Wow.