The Gadgets Page

I hate Bluetooth headsets. Being a geek, I liked the idea of them and tried to be an early adopter, but they all sucked. From the static introduced by poor Bluetooth connections to minor incompatibilities between phones and headsets to the problem of keeping them charged and the fact that they either hurt my ear or fell off, I never found one I could use. And that’s after purchasing the best that Logitech, Plantronics, and Motorola had to offer.

I looked at the Apple Bluetooth headset, but the reviews on it all stated that the range and connection quality was poor. I also have rather small ears, so headsets designed to be held in place by the ear canal have never worked for me.

I’ve got friends who use the original Jawbone headset, but it was clearly too large and too heavy to be comfortable, no matter how good the sound quality could be. But when Jawbone released their new and much smaller headset, Jawbone II with NoiseAssassin, I decided to give it a try.

In one word, it’s amazing. It’s the most comfortable headset I’ve ever worn, with multiple ear buds and ear clips to guarantee a good fit. It pairs easily and seems to be 100% compatible with my iPhone. The charger is easy to use and charges from USB, ensuring that a charger is always nearby and that I won’t be screwed for another $40 just to charge it in my car. Nobody I’ve spoken with complains about the noise quality, and I’ve had the kids run through the room screaming without bothering people I’m on the phone with. I can use it in my convertible at freeway speed without bothering people. It seems to be a better microphone than the built-in microphone on the iPhone.

The speaker sound quality is a bit tinny at higher volumes, which I require because I have significant hearing loss in the ear that I use it in) but quite acceptable. My friend with an original Jawbone says that it’s not nearly as good as the original, but the original is considerably larger and heavier. The battery life is exceptional—in excess of five hours in my testing. It’s more than enough time to be considered “all day”—I’ve not had it run out of juice on me during the day yet. Battery life is considerably better than my Plantronics or Motorola headset, both of which would die at about two hours of talk time.

It’s expensive at $140, but that’s actually far less expensive than the sum of all the headsets I’ve bought in the past that are just unusable. I bought mine at Best buy, but it’s available at Amazon.com here:

• Jawbone Bluetooth Headset with NoiseAssassin at Amazon.com

In the end, headsets can be a lifesaver when I’m driving and need to take a call, but they are useless if they don’t work with my phone, the sound is bad, or if the battery is dead. Fortunately, the Jawbone II excels on all of those levels and is a perfect addition to my workday armor.

After much anticipation, Nintendo FINALLY announced Animal Crossing: City Folk, which is the Wii version of Animal Crossing. I am STILL a big fan of Animal Crossing: Wild World, even though I have pretty much done everything that I could do in this game. You can imagine how eager I am to play Animal Crossing: City Folk. For more information about it, here is the Wikipedia entry:

• Animal Crossing: City Folk – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The primary new addition to Animal Crossing: City Folk is a new city area. Accessible to players by bus, the city offers a variety of activities. In the city, players can shop for clothes and accessories at Gracie Grace, a fashion boutique shop, and can redo their hairstyles at Harriet’s hair salon (like in Wild World). Players can even choose to replace their face with that of their Mii’s. Other activities available at the city take advantage of the Wii’s Wi-Fi capabilities, such as an auction house, where players can auction off items to other players via Wi-Fi connection, an office for the Happy Room Academy, where players can see how well other players’ towns are progressing, and a theater to learn emotions. Redd is back, but you still need to know a password like in Wild World.

Here is a video (the demonstrator and interviewer are BORING, but they show you a lot of cool stuff) that shows you a lot of the city:

Here is the Nintendo announcement about the game at E3 this month:

Here is a video of gameplay:

Here is the official Nintendo trailer for the game:

Here are some screenshots:

I’m glad to see so much of what I loved about the game has returned better than ever. I can’t wait until November when it’s available!

My friend, Jesse Stay, has finally given up on Twitter. He states all his reasons why he is leaving and why he thinks you should join him:

• My Hiatus From Twitter – Why You Should Join Me | Stay N’ Alive

I stopped really using Twitter several months ago and I basically agree with Jesse’s reasons for leaving, but I refuse to jump ship for just another social network like FriendFeed, Tumbler or indenti.ca. The reason why Twitter is more appealing than these other options is because I can use my cell phone to do an update. A simple SMS can keep me in touch and I can receive SMS updates of my favorite friends. THAT’S why Twitter is the killer app that people aren’t abandoning.

Honestly, I’ve been disappointed with Twitter. Instead of offering me a pay service that will turn my IM back on (along with other features), they have been putting out fires because of scaling issues. I still read my friend’s tweets to keep up-to-date on their lives, but if I have 140 characters to say, I’ve gone back to using Flickr’s post to blog feature. Then I can include a picture and say as little or as much as I want about my life.

With the advances in mobile options, Twitter’s killer app won’t be as important to me as it has been over the last two years. Until then, I’ll still read my friends’ Twitter feeds to keep up to date. Sadly, I fear that Twitter is just an intermediary technology. As soon as the cell phones increase their capabilities (or when there is an iPhone in every pocket), Twitter will no longer serve any use.

Saturday’s Sheldon comic attacked digital photo frames. You can see it here:

• Sheldonâ„¢ Comic Strip: Daily Webcomic by Dave Kellett

Since Sheldon’s grandpa doesn’t quite understand the concept, I thought I’d shed light on all the reasons why I LOVE my digital photo frame.

1. I don’t have to cover my wall with photos of my family: I love my family and I WANT to cover my walls with pictures of them, but with the digital photo frame, I can have ONE thing that shows me all my loved ones on a rotating schedule.

2. I can be impartial: If you think the kids and grandkids aren’t going around the house counting photos of themselves and comparing these counts to the number of photos of their siblings and cousins, then you’re fooling yourself. With my digital photo frame, I can easily see how many photos there are of each special person in my life.

3. I LOVE to sit and watch it: Sometimes, when I have a quiet moment in the house, I love to just sit at the kitchen table and watch my digital photo frame flip through the pictures of my loved ones. I find it enjoyable and almost meditative.

4. Kids love it: Even children who can barely speak will become vocal around my digital photo frame. The few words children learn at first are “Momma” and “Pappa.” When they see a picture of their parents or siblings they will light right up. Of course, the older children are casually trying to count their ratio of photographs, but they still will watch it for longer than any normal photo frame.

5. It will bring your mom into the digital age: We bought my mom a digital camera many years ago. It sat unused until we got her a digital photo frame. We gave it to her pre-loaded with some family photos, but she very quickly understood that if she took photos with her dusty digital camera that had been hanging around the house, she could add new photos to her snazzy new picture frame. The digital photo frame single-handedly brought my mother into the digital age.

6. It’s not just about photos: As the larger digital photo frames become affordable, I suspect that artists will use them to exhibit their artwork. Imagine being able to showcase EVERY piece of art you have created in one spot on your wall. Even after you have sold your work, you would be able to show it off on your wall at home. Additionally, you can have a photo frame that shows all of the greatest artwork of the centuries in one simple place.

In the end, I’ve found the digital photo frame to be FAR superior to the old school frames. It is one of the few technological devices that happens to be better than the thing it replaced.

Here is a video showcasing the Ford Comuta in 1962. They were hoping to bring it into production by 1977.

It took a little longer than that, but electric and hybrid cars are finally making it into the mainstream and not a moment too soon considering gas prices.

Via: Retro Futurism: Ford Says Electric Cars “Commercially Feasible” By 1977

Musikvatur has recreated a video game for his hamster to play. You can see it here:

The maze is a recreation of Monty on the Run. I had never heard of the game, but Games Yanks Can’t Wank was kind enough to tell me all about it. Apparently, it was never released in the states, so it’s no wonder I’ve never heard of it.

After seeing the screen shots, it looks like Musikvatur did a pretty good job recreating the old Commodore 64 video game.

In honor of Independence Day, here is a 3D image of the flag raising at Iwo Jima. We all know the famous photograph from World War II, but the filmographer who DIDN’T win a Pulitzer Prize, Bill Genaust, was standing right next to Joe Rosenthal. Using a frame from Genaust’s filming, we have documentation of a single historical moment in time from two different perspectives. You can use the two images to create a 3D image.

Read more here:

• TBO: Dimensions Of Valor

By juxtaposing Rosenthal’s photograph with the matching frame from Genaust’s film, it is possible to produce an authentic 3-D image of the Iwo Jima flag-raising.

For the first time, we can see one of the most iconic moments in U.S. military history with a real sense of depth and spatial relationships.

The 3-D effects are not the result of digital manipulation or computer trickery. They are based on the same photographic techniques that have been used to produce stereoscopic imagery for more than a century.

A 3-D photograph allows the viewer to see a single image from two slightly different viewpoints, mimicking the natural separation of human eyes.

If you were good at those Magic Eye stereograms back in the Nineties, then you’ll be able to view the image without 3D glasses here:

My whole life, I have seen the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima over and over so many times that it seems fake to me now. There is a whole debate about whether this flag raising was staged by the reporters so they could get a good shot of it. It has been proven that it this icon was the SECOND flag raising on the island.

The first flag raising was photographed by a Sgt. Louis R. Lowry.

Wikipedia has some great information on this controversy:

• Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

However, the photo was not without controversy. Following the second flag raising, Rosenthal had the Marines of Easy Company pose for a group shot, the “gung-ho” shot. This was also documented by Bill Genaust.[24] A few days after the picture was taken, back on Guam, Rosenthal was asked if he had posed the photo. Thinking the questioner was referring to the ‘gung-ho’ picture, he replied “Sure.” After that, Robert Sherrod, a Time-Life correspondent, told his editors in New York that Rosenthal had staged the flag-raising photo. TIME’s radio show, ‘Time Views the News’, broadcast a report, charging that “Rosenthal climbed Suribachi after the flag had already been planted… Like most photographers [he] could not resist reposing his characters in historic fashion.”

As a result of this report, Rosenthal was repeatedly accused of staging the picture, or covering up the first flag raising. One New York Times book reviewer even went so far as to suggest revoking his Pulitzer Prize. For the decades that have followed, Rosenthal repeatedly and vociferously refuted claims that the flag raising was staged. “I don’t think it is in me to do much more of this sort of thing… I don’t know how to get across to anybody what 50 years of constant repetition means.” Genaust’s film also shows the claim that the flag-raising was staged to be erroneous.

There are some that use the film and the photograph to prove that they hadn’t been staged, but I have never understood the argument there. I don’t believe that a member of the press can be independent and just document what is happening in a war or any other event. Just being there changes things whether you photograph, film or write about them. It’s like quantum mechanics. Anything observed is changed by the observation.

Did Rosenthal stage that photograph? I don’t care. It’s impossible to merely document history without becoming part of it. Staged or not, Joe Rosenthal documented a moment in history and deserved the Pulitzer Prize he won for it.

Via: Iwo Jima flag-raising in 3-D on Flickr by BlogjamComic