Hello, everyone.
I’m going dark here on the blog for a couple of weeks. I have a backlog of things I want to write on, but Henley Royal Regatta is coming up and my entire non-work focus is dedicated to that. The photo above is a IV, but I’ll be racing in an VIII.
Wish me luck! (Particularly this Friday and next Wednesday.)
While I’ve lusted a bit over the original iPhone, I wasn’t really interested. 2.5G speeds just aren’t that good compared to 3G. How would I know? Well, I’ve had a 3G network dongle for my laptop for the past year + and it is a dramatic difference when I have a 3G signal. London is flooded with 3G, so there’s no reason not to take advantage of it.
The real killer app for me is the MobileMe service. I’ve used .Mac since before Apple started charging for it. It’s been a bit of a rip-off lately, but so many accounts are set up with that address I would have a serious pain in the ass to change it. But now that there is e-mail, calendar and addressbook Sync through the MobileMe “cloud” I am absolutely hooked! (And it’s finally getting to be worth the cost.)
I’ll have to spend some time experimenting with how it can or might integrate with Plaxo. Plaxo to me is great for doing all that syncing, but not that many people in my addressbook use it, so the automatic update of my addressbook when they change their information isn’t that useful. It looks like I’ll need to do some experimentation as to how to hook Plaxo up with the MobileMe addressbook so that I can try to capture those changes.
So as of July 11th Apple is releasing the iPhone 3G world-wide, and I certainly plan on being in line to get one. (Maybe not the first day, but probably within the first weekend!) I’ve had my Motorola RAZR for over two and a half years now… it’s time for new technology.
I’m strangely intrigued by the Chumby. I was recently reminded of it after reading David Pogue’s review. While I heard about it ages ago, it only recently has gone to regular production.
What is it? Well, it’s essentially a little screen with some speakers and other sensors. Most importantly it has a wireless internet connection so that it is always connected.
What does it do? Whatever you want it to, and a little bit of everything. There are a ton of little “widgets” that have been written for the Chumby. They apparently include alarm clocks, little games, live weather for anywhere in the world, your photos from Flickr, and a bunch more. You can even write your own if you’re so inclined.
It seems like a really neat thing to have on your desk or bedstand. I think you can even program it so that it shows different things at different times of the day. It would be AWESOME if it showed weather and the status of the London Tube lines in the morning and late afternoon. (I hate making my way to the station only to find out there are delays; right now I just have to remember to pay attention to the radio in the morning. Having a bit of warning makes the delays easier to deal with.) During the day it would be great to have a Flickr slide show on the desk.
Anyway, I don’t plan on purchasing one anytime soon, but it seems like a neat little gadget. It will be interesting to see how the company develops.
So I had what was billed as our last 2k test of the season last night. While I think I still can shave a few seconds off, I pulled my best score of the season, and also a new personal best!
For this test our entire VIII (bar one guy) all did it at the same time. It’s so much easier to keep your race pace rhythm when you’re sitting next to your teammates. While it was painful, doing it as a crew really helped.
Our coach may still end up sneaking another one in on us in the last few weeks of this summer, I’m glad to have completed a good solid test before the summer racing season really kicks off.
Jed Christiansen 