2007 July

For the most part, I think I’ve found a pretty good groove with video production – and this week has been off-the-chain with interactivity. I believe it’s largely due to the new nature of the Ustream player that plays automatically – certainly does help the numbers. The hardest part is coming up with new questions or semi-evergreen discussion points every day – but it’s fueled and funneled through the chat room. Thankfully, Lordkat has been pushing the recordings through HeySpread and TubeMogul, which should actually be a function of the original production point (Ustream.tv, though they seem intent on keeping the video in their own archives for the moment, which drive little to no traffic on their own).

Read more on Video How-to Guru…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – A couple of guys from the AlphaGeek crew interviewed Chris about Software Development – what he thinks is wrong with it and how to correct its problems.

Want to embed our Software Development video in your blog? Use this code:

Read more on Software Development…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – QuadForLife asks: would you recommend having a fingerprint scanner for a laptop?

Yes and no.

For ease of use, it's pretty convenient: swipe your thumb and you're in without having to enter a username or password.

Read more on Fingerprint Scanners…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – Mark wants to know what gadget you would have if you were stranded on a deserted island.

So, it would need to be hand-cranked or solar-powered.

We think the ultimate gadget would be a hand cranked or solar powered laptop with the ability to connect to the Internet via a satellite linkup as well as GPS capabilities.

Read more on Deserted Island Gadgets…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – As many of you watched the other day, Ponzi bought Chris an iPhone for his birthday. Opening and playing with the iPhone was not a difficult experience. Activating the iPhone, on the other hand wasn't fun.

Read more on iPhone Activation…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – Go me, it's my birthday! Go me!

Want to embed our Happy Birthday video in your blog? Use this code:

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/qET5JJ2Ut-0"></aram><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/qET5JJ2Ut-0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/">Chris</a> | <a href="http://live.pirillo.com/">Live Tech Support</a> | <a href="http://media.pirillo.com/">Video Help</a> | <a href="http://feeds.pirillo.com/ChrisPirilloShow">Add to iTunes</a>;

Formats available: MPEG4 Video (.mp4), MP3 Audio (.mp3), Microsoft Video (.avi)

Read more on Happy Birthday!…

Interesting. Someone just told me that I was on Pownce – which is odd, because I never signed up for an account. Lo and behold, here “I” am. I’m not terribly upset about it at this point, but that’s pretty much my identity – and the people following “me” may not know that that’s “me” or have no idea who I really am. This is indicative of the problems all these stupid-ass social network sites face:

Read more on Pownce: Social Networks aren’t Identity Networks…

I was trying to figure out why my iPhone was automatically resizing an image to 640×480 when sending it through email… but that’s a feature, not a bug, according to Mobileburn:

Read more on iTarded…

We didn’t have any cake or ice cream to celebrate my birthday today, but we did have quite an amazing dinner at Rover’s in Seattle. This is a once-a-year experience for Ponzi and myself, although we may make an exception to that rule when my parents visit in a few weeks (for Gnomedex, as they are as much a part of the conference as I am). Anyway, here’s a few of the things we had tonight in the Rover’s tasting menu. It was amazing, as always.

Read more on Birthday Dinner: Tasting Menu…

My birthday was quite stressful (working on Gnomedex and Lockergnome stuff), but it was also very fun. The Internet has changed the way I celebrate my birthday, wholly. Buddies from a variety of social networks have been sending their best wishes throughout the day (ICQ, Skype, FaceBook, MySpace, etc.). It’s been overwhelming, but in a very nice way. If you were awake last night, you may have seen this happen in my home office – as captured by one of my Australian friends. Ponzi tried to coordinate everyone in chat to sing “happy birthday” at the same time.

Read more on Birthdays are Better on the Internet…

I’ve long believed that the future of media playback on the desktop (or mobile device) would ultimately pass through Flash. Why there hasn’t been a truly universal, codec-neutral media player released for any operating system is beyond me. Lockergnome reader Anthony Baker submitted the following, in respect to the future of the Windows Media Player:

Read more on Media is Still in the Dark Ages…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – Does OS X have a learning curve? Can you really get used to OS X after being a diehard Windows user for so many years?

Chris thinks it's very possible. In fact, he's thinking of converting to OS X for his daily computer use, for several reasons:

Read more on Mac Learning Curve…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – There have been rumors of external graphics cards floating around the Internet for years. Recently, though, some of these rumors may have credibility.

With so much heat and power consumption – as well as the growing demands of dedicated PC gamers – it's a real possibility to see external graphics cards hit the market.

Read more on External Video Cards…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – Hard drives are generally a very reliable part of your computer setup. Given the fact that the hard drive is one of the few components that has moving parts and it's active all of the time, it's actually kind of surprising that the hard drive doesn't fail more than they do.

Read more on Hard Drive Failure…

http://live.pirillo.com/ – Back in the day Windows Media Player burst onto the scene and kicked ass. It was slick, played a lot of formats, and was the media player.

As time went on, however, WMP has become bloated and user unfriendly.

Read more on Windows Media Player…