The Gadgets Page

I’ve have received so much joy and laughter from the iPhone app, Ghost Radar by Spud Pickles [iTunes link], and that’s just from the user reviews. As far as I can tell, the app is a fancy random word generator. Now, I’ve always been a friend of The Random, so it sounded like something perfect for me. After I read the reviews, however, I just HAD to buy it.

Here are a few of the funniest reviews for your enjoyment.

One Word “Wow” by Night Lover: ok I bought this app this morning thinking that it’s fake and also being a skeptic I’m not sure what to make of it. After I installed it I launched it in my garage and it was dead silent and a few minutes later it started showing strong feilds and then said my name, after that I was a little creeped so I got up to leave and it said “don’t leave” I’m not saying it paranormal but it’s deffinetly strange.

Should I tell him that iPhone apps can access the phone owner’s name?

Is a quiet house worth 99 cents? by monkeyrotica: I have on idea if this really detects anything or if this is just a random word generator. I don’t care. All I know is that I put this on the table in front of my kids and whispered to them, “Ever notice haunted houses are quiet? Ghosts hate noise. The Ghost Detector only works if you’re QUIET.” For the next HOUR they sat silently and listed to the app spit out a bunch of random words. They then whispered among themselves what those words could possibly mean. If you have kids and want some peace and quiet, buy this app.

I actually tried this with my husband’s little sister. We had a very enjoyable (and quiet) half hour talking to the iPhone, OuiJa board style.

Still testing by SoYLaVoz: Ok so it’s been 3 months since I used this app. I thought it was a random word generator until that one day it said my grandmothers name while she was talking. So now 3 moths later I’m playing with it again noted that I’m still thinking this app is a joke. 2 mins into it the word came “Keplar” now this isn’t a random word because I’m a cop and my Keplar (bullet resistant) vest is on my top shelf next to me. So I’m still wondering…

I don’t have the heart to break it to him that Keplar is a random name and KEVLAR is what his vest is made out of.

As I’ve said before, I’m a BIG fan of The Random. I talked about it in detail almost seven years ago:

• Pick Me! » Gathering Randomness

Music Match is long ago defunct, but the iTunes shuffle feature has nicely taken the place of Auto DJ. When I don’t know what to write about, I put iTunes on shuffle, listen to the songs and do whatever they tell me. It’s a true exercise in creative writing and very helpful to me.

Ghost Radar is yet another way for me to get creative inspiration from randomness. I can just turn it on, collect a few words and write a short story based on them. It rarely produces something I can post on any of my blogs (fiction or otherwise), but it really gets the creative juices flowing.

How Could They Make It Better?

I really wish the programmers for Ghost Radar would take it a step further. Instead of believing their own baloney, I wish they would cross over into full-time chicanery. Here is what I’d like to see Ghost Radar do in future updates:

• Look up location and spit out words of nearby streets and points of interest based on data from the GPS
• Access the contacts folder and regurgitate names of people in the contact list or, even better, the recent calls list
• Listen to the people playing with it and using word recognition, parrot back the words said
• Scan for laughter and give more words when people interact with it
• Track the reaction to certain words and give synonyms to the ones that receive more laughter or speaking

In the end, I’ve enjoyed Ghost Radar far more than the 99 cents it cost me. Does it channel the words of non corporeal spirits? No. I don’t even believe it measures electromagnetic fluctuation. Is it entertaining? Hellya.

I was browsing through my old Seventeen Magazines from 80’s and I found this AWESOME article in the May 1986 issue called High Tech Turn Ons.

The most interesting gadget is the second one on the list:

Pocket Watch: Liquid crystals may sound like something in a diet drink, but the only thing they make thin is a TV set. A liquid-crystal display (LCD) makes a TV set flat because it replaces the whole picture tube, much as a tiny microprocessor chip replaces a clunky, old-style circuit board. Less than an inch thick, Panasonic’s CT-301 Pocket Watch is the first high quality TV to use a liquid-crystal display. There have been other color TVs with LCDs, but this exceptional new model is the first to deliver a subtly hued, finely detailed TV picture. Measured diagonally, the screen is 3 inches across. $300

Here we are over thirty years later and now 20% of Americans have a tiny TV in their pockets at all times. It ALSO is a phone, a keyboard tutor [iTunes link], music player, and game machine. In fact, my iPhone can replace EVERYTHING that was featured on this High Tech Turn Ons article all for less than the cost of ONE of these items.

After reading this old article, I realized that the future is AMAZING. The iPhone and other smartphones are everything I wished for as a kid and MORE. I thought that I’d have a flying car by now, but I guess I’m willing to forgive that in exchange for my iPhone.

This week’s postcards from PostSecret told a couple of interesting stories. Here is the first one:

It reads:

I liked you better before you got your iPhone.

But the second one tells a different story.

It reads:

I’m automatically more attracted to you if you use Apple products.

I found the dichotomy of the two interesting and even laughable. Our computers and cell phones are TOOLS. They shouldn’t make us more or less attractive to others, but they DO. Why?

This strange attraction (revulsion) might go as far back instinctively as our Cro-Magnon days. Those early humans started using tools and the best tools guaranteed survival. Mating with a human with better tools might be like mating with a human with a healthy glow in their skin or wide child-bearing hips. It assures survival of our progeny.

I find it interesting that Apple is able to elicit two very different instincts in people.

PostSecret’s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.

For the last two years, I’ve loved Zenses Rainforest for my Nintendo DS. I talked about the game here:

• The Gadgets Page- Zenses for the Nintendo DS

Now that I do most of my game playing on my iPhone, I have been looking for a soothing and relaxing game to lull me to sleep. Imagine my delight when I found my favorite game for the DS was now available on my iPhone!

I downloaded the free app, but I had been perfectly willing to pay for it. After I loaded the game, I realized that it was just a demo version of the stacker game. An in-app 99 cent purchase later, and I had the full version.

With this game, you make stacks of three items of the same shape and color. It differs from the Nintendo version slightly because you can’t make stacks of the same shape with different colors for less points. Sometimes, if I was running out of time, I would make a couple of desperate stacks out of different colors, but that’s not an option with the iPhone version.

One of my favorite aspects of the game is the music. I’m the type of person who immediately turns the music and sound effects off on most games, so the fact that I love the Zenses soundtrack is a testament to their ability to create a soothing atmosphere. When I bought the Nintendo version, they gave me a code to download MP3s of the songs in the game. I still listen to those songs at least once a week. In fact, the only reason I searched the iPhone app store for Zenses this weekend was because of a bout of insomnia in which I lulled myself back to sleep by playing Bejeweled with its sound effects turned off and the Zenses soundtrack playing in the background.

Unlike the Nintendo DS version, there is only ONE game with Zenses Rainforest. Fortunately, it was my favorite from the collection, but there were others that I enjoyed and I’m worried that they won’t be ported over to the iPhone because this game is being marketed with the same name as the multi-game version. I hope to see the other relaxing games show up on the iPhone soon and I’d willing pay extra for the multi-game version on the iPad. Here’s to hoping there is more to come from Zenses.

Update 06-03-10:

I just got an email from Christian at Kiloo

Hi all, I tried to respond to your post about Zenses for the iPhone (written by Laura) but as it didn’t seem to work, I try here instead.

There is indeed more games in the Zenses series on their way to iPhone and iPod touch – we’re actually developing the next one as I type this, so hopefully it wont be too long.

Good to hear you enjoyed the first game in the series

Best,
Christian

www.kiloo.com

At CES 2010, Konnet showed off their Shine iPhone Cases. I loved these cases because they are so very shiny.

Each case comes with a matching shiny screen protector.

The screen was so shiny that I could check out my hair and makeup in its reflection, so I was pretty worried that it would interfere with the screen, but when the iPhone was turned on, the screen showed through sharp and clear.

The case itself is slightly translucent.

If you’re looking for an iPhone case that will really get noticed, the Shine Metal case from Konnet is a real attention-getter.

The news in the air is that Palm is dead. They created the Palm Pilot and STARTED the palm computing revolution a decade ago, but what are they doing lately? With their stock plummeting, there are people out there saying that Palm is dead. Even Joy of Tech commented on it:

• The Joy of Tech comic… Desert Palm.

Considering that Palm was at CES for only one day, didn’t have a booth on the convention floor and only a suite at the Venetian, I’m not surprised by the lackluster earnings. They MUST have known that they were hurting for funds and that’s why they skimped on CES this year.

Here are Kevin Rose’s thoughts on this subject:

Palm IS dead, but they have been dead for a LONG time. It just took the tech world nearly three years to NOTICE their decaying corpse. I knew they were dead when I wrote this entry about putting video on the Treo.

• Gadgets Page » How To Put Your DVD on Your iPod or Treo

It took me a LONG time to just figure out how to convert a movie file and put it on my Treo. If you look at my face in that video, you can just SEE the frustration and exhaustion from dealing with this issue. Instead of an easy way that just worked, I had to jump through hoops, search for software and even write a whole tutorial so I would remember how to do it again.

When Apple released the iPhone and I was able to just download a movie and immediately put it on my phone, I heard the death rattle of Palm from across the country. I imagined all those years of being betrayed by Palm. They made machines that had the capability of playing music and video, but made it so convoluted, complicated and inconvenient that I was never able to get it to work consistently.

That was in JULY of 2007! Palm died a long time ago, folks. It just took you guys three years to notice the smell.

As useless as Teledynamics was for the normal consumer, they had the foresight to show off these beautiful steampunk phones from Paramount Collections.

This is the Paramount Collections 1892 Eiffel Tower Reproduction Phone

This is the Paramount Collections American Eagle 1911S Reproduction Phone.

If you are looking for an interesting land line phone, Paramount Collections has an entire line of them:

• Paramount Collections Biscuit Barrel 1893 Reproduction Phone Black at Amazon.com
• Paramount Collections Antique Wall 1903 Reproduction Phone at Amazon.com
• Paramount Collections Roman Column 1897 Reproduction Phone at Amazon.com
• Paramount Collections Viscount 1920 Reproduction Phone at Amazon.com
• Paramount Collections Classic Christie 1921A Decorator Phone Black at Amazon.com

I wish I still had a land line just so I could have one of these gorgeous steampunk phones in my home.

Kevin Rose, of Digg Fame, has jumped into the credit card payment fray with his investment in Square. Here he is, showing it off:

With a Square device and an iPhone, you can accept credit card payments just like any merchant. It’s pretty impressive, actually.

I can accept credit card payments using PayPal, but they don’t have an easy way for me to process a transaction on the go. If I want to accept credit card payments, I need to have a laptop AND wi-fi. They do have a PayPal iPhone App [iTunes Link], but it doesn’t allow me to accept payments with it. It would be nice if they included that feature in a future update.

There are applications at iTunes that let you accept credit card payments, like Swipe Credit Card Terminal [iTunes Link], but you have to type in all the information by hand instead of being able to easily swipe their card. Additionally, they require you to sign up for a merchant account. How Square will handle that issue hasn’t been revealed.

Square looks like a really good idea, but until we know the details, like what fees they will charge, I’m holding off my judgment.

E-book readers, like Amazon’s Kindle and Sony’s Reader, had a huge amount of sales this last Christmas season—in fact, our smackdown between the two recently became our most popular post, and the Kindle was Amazon’s best-selling single item. We saw about 20 new entrants into this market at CES. Nonetheless, I think the current generation of e-book readers won’t be flying off the shelves by next Christmas.

Yes, the Apple iPad is probably one reason. But I think e-book readers have been flawed from the beginning. Here’s why.

They use black-and-white e-ink displays.

The Sony Reader was the first popular gadget to make use of e-ink technology, an alternative to LCD displays that looks more like paper, has longer battery life, and doesn’t require a backlight. This was seen as innovative, and copied by the Kindle and Barnes and Noble’s new Nook. But I think it’s time we started wondering why anyone would buy a device with a black-and-white display in 2010.

The phone in your pocket probably has a nice color LCD display that can display perfectly readable text. The Amazon Kindle app certainly looks great on my iPhone. Why buy a book reader that’s stuck in Gutenberg-era black-and-white? Paper books have had colorful illustrations since about 1890. Why can’t electronic books?

E-ink advocates talk about better contrast and better battery life, but I like the contrast on the iPhone screen better than the grey-on-light-grey displays of the e-book readers. And only the most devoted of readers will stare at a Kindle’s screen long enough to notice the supposed benefits to the eyes, or to take advantage of the long battery life. Most of us don’t read for more than 1-2 hours at a time.

And don’t say “but you can read in bright sunlight!”. Who the heck does that? People who enjoy sunlight have better things to do than read, and nerds like me who read for hours on end rarely see sunlight.

They aren’t good Web browsers.

While I still read books regularly, I do far more reading on the Web. Why would I want a reading device that can’t also read Web pages? The Kindle has a very limited Web browser on a black-and-white screen, and the Sony Reader has none at all. Neither one has Wi-fi access.

This is the 21st century. The Web should be as readable as a book, and when an e-book mentions a URL I should be able to click on it and see that page.

They can’t show video.

You can watch videos on a Sony PSP, on a phone, or even on a watch. Why on earth would a device that gives me access to books not also include video? Or even audio? Or even color pictures?

I’m as much of a literary elitist as anyone. I enjoy reading Shakespeare and Dickens, and I certainly don’t want books to be replaced with video. I don’t even want the cheesy “bonus video content” that e-novels of the future will undoubtedly be bundled with. But think about non-fiction books—what if a computer book could include a video to show you how to use software? What if a book on how to play the guitar could include audio examples? Old-fashioned paper books already have this feature, thanks to the high-tech approach of sticking a CD inside the front cover. Why can’t 21st century e-books do the same thing?

And anyway, it’s a device with a screen. Let me watch a TV show when I’m done reading my book.

Maybe they’re not really doomed yet.

There’s one reason I think people will still be buying Kindles and Readers next Christmas. Someone (probably Apple) will introduce a device that does all of the things I’m asking for. But given the current cost of things like 10″ color LCD screens, that device will be expensive. Maybe the Kindle, Reader, and Nook will survive for a few years as low-cost alternatives for people who don’t want to spend $900 on a “real” e-book reader.

I hope I’m right about that. I really want an e-book reader myself, but I don’t want the limited, monochrome, low-cost alternative. I want the real thing, and I’m willing to pay for it.

Apple has a special announcement planned for this Wednesday, January 27th, and the rumors are that they will release a tablet device of some sort. At these times it is customary for gadget blogs to make fools of themselves by predicting what Apple will announce, so here’s my attempt.

• The tablet will run iPhone OS, and will essentially be a giant iPod Touch. Probably with more memory than the current iPhones and Touches, but no hard drive.
• Steve Jobs will focus on three areas of use for the new device: reading books, watching videos, and running any app from the existing App Store. He’ll show off some new games that use the full screen.
• The tablet will cost $1000 and every single technology blog and media outlet will complain about this, saying that netbooks are cheaper, that you can buy a “real” computer for the same price, and that Apple won’t sell many tablets. They’ll be hilariously wrong.
• There will be no keyboard, and initially no external one to attach. The virtual keyboard will resemble the iPhone’s. Everyone will complain about this, but Apple won’t care because they designed the device primarily for consuming media, not creating it.
• It will have a backlit color LCD screen (probably 10″). Steve will make fun of e-ink devices on stage.
• A new iPhone OS and SDK will be announced, and support for the tablet’s big screen will be the biggest change. They might also support multitasking, since running multiple iPhone-sized apps on the tablet’s big screen makes sense.
• Apple will announce deals with publishers for e-books. I suspect they’ll emphasize newspapers, magazines, and college textbooks. The New York Times will be shown as an example, followed by a novel with an embedded video interview with the author to show off how much better it is than a Kindle.
• I wouldn’t be surprised if the “regular” book support comes from a licensing agreement with Amazon. You might think the Kindle is the tablet’s competition, but I think Amazon wants to sell books, not hardware platforms.
• I think cell-phone data access will be built in. I hope it’s optional and doesn’t cost $30 a month.
• The name: When Apple changed their baseline notebook computer’s name from “iBook” to “Macbook”, my theory at the time was that they wanted to eventually use “iBook” for an e-book reader. While I doubt the tablet will be just for reading books, I still think “iBook” is a great name for it, and it will fit their new naming scheme: the Macbook runs MacOS and the iBook runs the iPhone OS.

Please note that my predictions are not based on “confidential sources”. I just made them up, and most of them are probably wrong. But whatever the outcome, I hope Apple does something insanely great.