Choosing The Right iPod

In the beginning (OK, in 2001), there was the original 5GB iPod—and we were lucky to have it. But in the past four years, Apple has made things a bit more complicated, adding several new members to the iPod family. Not too long ago, making an iPod-buying decision boiled down to exactly one factor: whether you had the money to pay for it.

Now that Apple offers three versions of its diminutive music player—the iPod shuffle, the iPod mini, and the color iPod (including the iPod U2 Special Edition and most HP-branded models)—at prices ranging from $99 to $400, there’s far more to consider. Will a small iPod or a large iPod serve you better? And is there any advantage to owning Apple’s iPod instead of one branded with the HP logo? I’ve had my hands on every iPod model Apple has released, so I’m in a unique position to give advice on finding the iPod that’ll be the best fit for you.

iPod with color display
Not long ago Apple offered the fourth-generation iPod—a model with monochrome display—and a separate iPod photo, an iPod that could not only play music, but display color pictures on the iPod’s screen as well as project those pictures to an attached television or projector. In June 2005, Apple brought color to all its full-sized iPods (the iPod U2 Special Edition included) and dropped the “photo” appendage from the iPod’s name.

The name change doesn’t mean that the iPod has lost any of its photo capabilities. As with the earlier iPod photo, you can use Apple’s $30 iPod Camera Connector accessory to load pictures from a digital camera onto the iPod without having to first process them in iTunes. (Normally, you need to load your pictures onto your Mac or PC, where iTunes processes them for iPod compatibility, and then run a sync to download them to your iPod.) The iPod with color display can also take advantage of the Apple iPod AV Cable (now a $19 accessory) to connect the iPod to a television or projector.

People who don’t need this iPod’s photo features shouldn’t dismiss it too quickly. Even though its photo capabilities are its most glamorous feature, the addition of color improves everything about the iPod’s interface. Calendar events are far easier to differentiate, Solitaire is finally playable (because with color you can tell one suit from another more easily), and color album art is just cool no matter how you look at it.

While the iPod with color display offers more storage than the iPod mini (offering capacities of 20- and 60GB versus the mini’s 4- and 6GB hard drive capacity), it takes an hour longer to fully charge than the mini (five hours versus four for the mini) and offers less skip-protection—providing up to 17 minutes of protection versus up to 25 minutes for the mini. It also offers less playtime-per-charge (Apple rates the iPod’s playtime at up to 15 hours of music playback and up to 5 hours of slideshow playtime though we’ve managed over 17 hours of playtime on a color iPod when pressing play and walking away). But this iPod boasts a larger display, which allows you to view three lines of text on the Now Playing screen as compared to the two lines displayed by the mini (and zero lines of text shown on the display-less iPod shuffle).

These iPods have all the music and storage features switched on—unlike the mini and the shuffle, this iPod allows you to record voice memos with a third-party voice recorder such as Griffin Technology’s $40 iTalk or Belkin’s $50 Voice Recorder for iPod with Dock Connector. You can also store and view digital pictures on the iPod with Belkin’s $50 Media Reader for iPod with Dock Connector (Belkin’s $40 Digital Camera Link for iPod with Dock Connector will download pictures to the iPod but you can’t view them without first processing them through iTunes).

The HP iPod models—called Apple iPod + HP—differ slightly from Apple’s offerings. As I write this, HP still offers a 20GB monochrome iPod priced at $300. It will also sell you a 30GB color model for $350 plus its own 60GB color iPod that’s identical to Apple’s offering except for the two companies’ warranty support.

Specifically, Apple provides a one-year warranty but only 90 days of free phone support; it further restricts those terms in that all repairs after the first six months require a $30 shipping and handling fee, and the free phone support applies to only one incident within the first 90 days after purchase. HP, on the other hand, provides a full year of both hardware warranty and phone support, with toll-free technical support available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. HP also provides out-of-warranty support via e-mail. HP provides support only for Windows-formatted iPods, however.

If history tells us anything, HP’s models will soon match Apple’s lineup.

Capacity and Price 20GB (approximately 5,000 songs), $299; 60GB (approximately 15,000 songs), $399; iPod U2 Special Edition 20GB (approximately 5,000 songs), $329.

Ideal Usage and User If you’re looking for the ultimate in an iPod—a color display, the ability to view and project pictures, a decent amount of playing time, and enough storage for a very large music library—you and the iPod with color display were meant for each other.


iPod mini (second generation)
When Apple first released the iPod mini, the company positioned it as a competitor to other manufacturers’ high-end flash memory-based music players. But it wasn’t long before people forgot all about how the iPod mini compared to the competition and simply thought of it as a great way to shove a thousand tunes into the coolest looking music player on the market. The iPod mini has nearly the same functionality as the original fourth-generation iPod. Its screen is smaller, so it doesn’t display as much information as the larger iPods (the mini’s Now Playing screen, for example, doesn’t display the title of the currently playing album). The screen remains monochrome. And these iPods don’t support voice recording and media storage via third-party peripherals.

When you consider the price-to-storage ratio, the mini isn’t as good a deal as the iPod with color display. Cost per megabyte for the $199 4GB iPod mini is around 5 cents. And a megabyte on a $249 6GB mini costs about 4 cents. Compare this with about 2 cents per megabyte on a $299 20GB iPod, and you see that people who want the most for their money may pass on the mini’s cool exterior and handy size in favor of the higher-capacity iPod.

If you intend to put a lot of hours on your iPod, you’ll find the mini’s playing-time capabilities very attractive. Though Apple suggests that the 2G mini can play for up to 18 hours, I’ve been able to play nonstop music on a 6GB mini for more than 26 hours on a single charge. As I mentioned earlier, the best I’ve done with a color iPod is just over 17 hours.

Capacity and Price 4GB (approximately 1,000 songs), $199; 6GB (approximately 1,500 songs), $249.

Ideal Usage and User The mini, with its vibrant green, blue, pink, or silver case, is Apple’s most fashionable iPod. If you have a sense of style and want to store a goodly number of songs on a small, portable music player, you may just find it hard to resist.


iPod shuffle
Apple’s least-expensive iPod offers a host of advantages: it’s affordable enough to be an impulse buy, it sounds as good as any other iPod, it never skips (because it stores music on solid-state flash memory rather than a moving hard drive), it’s highly portable, and it holds more than enough music to get you through a long drive or a marathon run (though rated at up to 12 hours of play time, it can get much more). It doesn’t, however, include a screen for navigating to specific songs. And its capacity is limited enough that only people with very small music collections will be able to store an entire library on it.

Capacity and Price 512MB (approximately 120 songs), $99; 1GB (approximately 240 songs), $129.

Ideal Usage and User The shuffle’s non-skip nature and small size make it the perfect companion for exercising. And it’s easily cheap enough to become your second, “just kickin’ around” iPod. It’s also a good choice for kids (or adults) who tend to misplace their valuables. (Losing a $99 shuffle is a lot easier to swallow than misplacing a $400 iPod.)

With Thanks to Apple & Christopher Breen

Tre Bon!

Congratulations to Kaye and Ed on finally closing the deal on their groovy new place south of Paris in the west of France!

Braceology

A who's who and what's what of sports bracelets. What started as a yellow 'LIVE STRONG' bracelet message through Lance Armstrong's foundation has grown into a rainbow of support through various colors, messages and materials. From baseball to diabetes research, the below guide decodes what your subway seat-partner may be supporting on his or her wrist.

MLB

Houston Astros— At the April 9 game, the first 20,000 fans were given a Believe bracelet, geared toward stroke awareness and sponsored by The Methodist Hospital. Astros outfielder Lance Berkman is a hospital spokesperson and not only helped endorse the bands but also wears one frequently. The bracelets, which are red or black, can also be purchased, with the proceeds earmarked for stroke research at the Methodist Neurological Institute.

Minnesota Twins— The club and the Twins Community Fund are selling red/blue rubber bracelets stamped with the words Go Twins! on one side and For The Twins Community Fund on the other. The Twins have sold 20,000 bands, raising almost $30,000 for the Twins Community Fund, the team's charity. The Twins' cost on each bracelet is $2, with approximately $1.50 going to the Fund to support youth baseball/softball programs initiatives.

NBA

Boston Celtics— I Am A Celtic green bracelet, along with donations at regular-season home games in April, raised more than $50,000 to donate to the family of Hector Paniagua, a Lawrence, Mass., high school basketball star who was shot outside a nightclub March 27th and left paralyzed. The rest of the proceeds go to the Boston Celtics Shamrock Foundation, which assists children in need in New England. About 36,000 have been sold.

San Antonio Spurs— Have sold 100,000 Spurs black bracelets, raising more than $139,000 for the Spurs Foundation, which supports physically, emotionally and economically underserved youth.

Washington Wizards— Their Pure Energy black bracelet raised more than $64,000, going to UNICEF for Tsunami relief.

WNBA

Houston Comets — The Comets will give away a pink bracelet to the first 5,000 fans at their Breast Health Awareness game on July 30. To raise money for the Pink Ribbon Fund, the Comets will do an auction on the concourse.

New York Liberty— Have sold 5,000 Liberty Cheering For Children sea-foam green bracelets at home games. The money goes to the Madison Square Garden Cheering for Children Foundation, which has committed to build 10 playgrounds throughout the New York metropolitan area.

NHL

Atlanta Thrashers— About 80,000 True Blue blue bracelets have been distributed over the last year, largely tied to community development programs. They were given out free at school assemblies, reading events and fan development functions.

Detroit Red Wings— The Believe red bracelet was produced by the Red Wings and Ilitch Charities for Children, with proceeds earmarked for children with cancer and AIDS. More than 50,000 have been sold. "Believe" was the Red Wings slogan following the 1997 Stanley Cup and the subsequent limousine accident that left player Vladimir Konstantinov and masseuse Sergei Mnatsakanov seriously and permanently injured.

College sports

Bowling Green— Two bracelets are the rage on campus: orange BGSU Falcons bracelets, $1.99 at the campus bookstore, and red Multiple Sclerosis Society bracelets, at $5, which were passed out by former BGSU hockey goalie Jordan Sigalet, who announced this past year he had MS.

Colorado— Head football coach Gary Barnett designed 250 black woven bracelets with DTRT (Do The Right Thing) stitched in white. He presented them to coaches, players and staff — after they had read a mission statement Barnett had written and agreed to honor the principles set forth.

Duke— About 33,000 Duke For Life blue bracelets have been sold, with the proceeds ($48,000) going to the Emily Krzyzewski Family Life Center. The mission of the Center is to create an environment that fosters the development of life skills that are fundamental to reaching one's highest potential. Coach K, who started the center in his mother's name, the Blue Devils coaching staff and the players all wear the bracelets.

Florida — Head football coach Urban Meyer worked closely with several student leaders on campus on a community service initiative and fundraiser surrounding the Spring Game (the Orange and Blue Debut). Student leaders sold orange and blue spirit bracelets, with proceeds benefiting the Children's Miracle Network. Fans could pick a color, then cheer for that respective team in the April 9 game. Fans who purchased the bands of the losing team (blue) were then asked to assist members of the UF coaching staff and football team in planting more than 400 crepe myrtle trees on Radio Road on campus.

Fresno State— The Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) produced Fresno State Bulldogs red bracelets to raise money (as they had no budget) so they could provide more opportunities in terms of teambuilding and social activities for student-athletes. They have sold 3,500 at $2 each.

Michigan— The athletic department and C.S. Mott Children's Hospital have teamed up to sell blue M Go Blue for Mott bracelets to raise money for a new children's and women's hospital at the university. Football coach Lloyd Carr is co-chair of the Champions for Children campaign, with University Regent David Brandon, a former Wolverine football player.

Minnesota— Head basketball coach Dan Monson, a big admirer of the Live Strong bracelet, designed a special band for his team. The maroon bracelet, which was not available to the general public, was stamped with Mindset, and every letter stood for something. It became the credo for the basketball team.

M-Minnesota

I-Indivisible

N-Not about me

D-Discipline

S-Serve the Program and each other

E-Excellence

T-Thankfulness

Meanwhile, Minnesota's women's ice hockey team created their own blue Unbreakable bracelets, in honor of long-time equipment manager Bonnie Olein, who was diagnosed with colon cancer at the end of February. With the bracelets on their wrists, the Gophers won their second in a row NCAA championship. On July 12, the team will be honored at the White House, and Olein will be there with them.

Ohio State— The Buckeyes have jumped on the wristband wagon with numerous designs. The first bracelet, introduced last football season, is stamped with Tradition, People, Excellence, with more than 150,000 sold. Proceeds go to the Student Athlete Scholarship Fund. The latest bracelet projects include a "fan pack" band (You Win With People) and a three-pack (Go Bucks, Buckeyes, Hangonsloopy). Projected sales: 150,000 units, $250,000 in proceeds.

St. John's— When the St. John's baseball team played Notre Dame in a three-game series shown on ESPN and CSTV, the players wore purple Got Guts bracelets to honor a teammate, Matt Tosoni, who is redshirting this year. Tosoni was a starter in 2004 and had to sit out because of ulcerative colitis. The bracelets were purchased through a foundation that does work for people who have colitis.

Virginia— The athletic department's marketing and promotions office created two bracelets in the school colors — an orange Orange Fever bracelet and a blue Uncompromised Excellence bracelet. More than 15,000 have been sold at $2 each. The purpose was to continue to develop the Orange Fever brand and to participate in a national fundraising phenomenon on behalf of the United Way.

Washington State— The Cougars generated increased attendance at a men's and a women's basketball game by giving away 5,000 crimson bracelets stamped with Go Cougs. Says Leslie Cox, director of athletic marketing, via email: "We were very strict about the fact that going to the game was the only way to get a bracelet. Our attendance for both of those games increased significantly. Our fans still wear them, and we get requests all the time to do the bracelets again next year."

Western Michigan— Two years ago, as a sign of unity, the men's hockey team started wearing bracelets made from ice skate laces, an idea of Andrew Dwyer, now a senior defenseman. They fused together the ends of the laces by burning them with a match. When the team got knocked out of the playoffs, coach Jim Culhane proclaimed he would not take off his bracelet until Western Michigan advanced to the Super Sox Championships. Culhane and several players are still wearing their skate lace bracelets.

Individuals

Andy Baskin, one of the Fox Sports Net Ohio broadcasters, who works Cleveland Indians games, wears a blue bracelet for Cystic Fibrosis. His brother Bruce recently died from the disease.

"My brother bought 500 of them about two weeks before he went in the hospital," Baskin writes in an e-mail. "It was cool over the last four months to see all of the nurses at the clinic wear them. My family still wears it. For me, it's a constant reminder of what is important in life, and that every breath counts."

Angela Glazer, the wife of Tampa Bay Buccaneers executive vice president Joel Glazer, designed a blue bracelet to create awareness and educate people about endometriosis, a painful disease that affects 5 1/2 million women and girls in the USA and Canada and millions more worldwide. It occurs when tissue, like that which lines the uterus, is found outside the uterus, usually in the abdomen. The wording on the bracelets is Endrometriosis-Live Life-Think Positive.

Former NCAA champion breaststroker Dave Denniston wears his white Send It Forward bracelet to empower himself to walk again. He was paralyzed from the waist down in a sledding accident last February. The motto comes from a drill in a breaststroke training DVD he produced a few years ago. "The idea is to take all your energy and send it forward," explains says Denniston, who has sold 2,800 bracelets at $5 each and raised $15,000. That, with other fundraisers, will help pay for his rehabilitation at Project Walk in Carlsbad, Calif.

Jerome Bettis, Pro Bowl running back for the Pittsburgh Steelers, created a yellow and black tie-dyed bracelet, stamped with Bus & 'Burg Caring For Kids on the front and Bus36 on the back. A portion of the proceeds go to Bettis' "The Bus Stops Here Foundation," which funds programs that foster self-esteem and educational success in children.

Jason Taylor, Pro Bowl defensive end for the Miami Dolphins, created a red bracelet stamped with Jason Taylor Foundation. More than 7,000 bracelets have been given out, in exchange for a $1 donation per bracelet to the Foundation, which supports and creates programs for South Florida's children in need. The Foundation used the bracelets in conjunction with its "Big Screens-Big Dreams" program, inviting nine high school basketball teams to an advance screening of the movie Coach Carter. Each athlete was given a bracelet as their "ticket" into the theater.

Arizona Diamondbacks manager Bob Melvin wears a blue bracelet to create awareness for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. His 16-year-old daughter Alexi has juvenile diabetes. He and Alexi are spokespeople for the disease, and he's never seen without the bracelet.

Thanks to Jill Lieber, USA TODAY

Bitchin' Projector

optoma
Originally uploaded by H. Michael karshis.

This is really sweet. A totally self-contained home theater solution. The DV10, from Optoma, integrates a DVD player, a set of speakers (two 5-watt stereo) and a projector. Next time you're ready to kick back and watch a movie, surf or game, place this puppy 5ft away from a white wall, and dig "Jaws" on your 50inch screen, right then and there. Dude, it’s even HDTV compatible! That's right, "Go Spurs Go!

Of course, you can use it like a standard projector as well. It comes with a bunch of I/O connections (Composite (RCA), D-sub 15 VGA (analog RGB/component/HDTV), S-Video, RS-232 communication, Stereo audio in, Stereo audio out, Optical audio out), so you can game, connect your satellite, hook up your real sound system, etc.

It features brightness of 1,000 lumens, a contrast ratio of 4,000:1 and a bulb life of 2,000 hours.

Damage? $1500.

That's Right. Bitchin' Projector

Beijing Clinic Ministers To Online Addicts

BEIJING, China (AP) -- The 12 teenagers and young adults, some in ripped jeans and baggy T-shirts, sit in a circle, chewing gum and fidgeting as they shyly introduce themselves.

"I'm 12 years old," one boy announces with a smile. "I love playing computer games. That's it."

"It's been good to sleep" says another, a 17-year-old with spiky hair, now that he's no longer on the computer all day.

The youths are patients at China's first officially licensed clinic for Internet addiction, a downside of the online frenzy that has accompanied the nation's breathtaking economic boom.

"All the children here have left school because they are playing games or in chat rooms everyday," says the clinic's director, Dr. Tao Ran. "They are suffering from depression, nervousness, fear and unwillingness to interact with others, panic and agitation. They also have sleep disorders, the shakes and numbness in their hands."

According to government figures, China has the world's second-largest online population -- 94 million -- after the United States.

While China promotes Internet use for business and education, government officials also say Internet cafes are eroding public morality. Authorities regularly shut down Internet cafes -- many illegally operated -- in crackdowns that also include huge fines for their operators.

State media has also highlighted cases of obsessed Internet gamers, some of whom have flunked out of school, committed suicide or murder. Nonetheless, Internet cafes continue to thrive, with outlets found in even the smallest and poorest of villages. Most are usually packed late into the night.

Dr. Kimberly Young, a Bradford, Pennsylvania, clinical psychologist whose 1998 book on Internet addiction has been translated into Chinese, says she's not surprised the Chinese would face problems with Internet overuse.

"They are catching up with a lot of our technology, and certainly at that juncture, are now able to run into some of the same difficulties," Young said.

While treatment programs were virtually nonexistent in the United States a decade ago, she said, dozens of clinics and countless individual therapists such as herself offer counseling and treatment in her country.

Various fixations

Programs are growing elsewhere, too.

Just a few years ago, Young says, she attended a conference in Switzerland where she was the only American out of some 200 academics and clinicians who gathered to address Internet addiction.

Tao's government-owned clinic, which began taking patients in March, occupies the top floor of a two-story building on a quiet, tree-lined street on the sprawling campus of the Beijing Military Region Central Hospital in the heart of the Chinese capital.

A dozen nurses and 11 doctors care for the patients, mostly youths aged 14 to 24 who have lost sleep, weight and friends after countless hours in front of the computer, often playing video games with others online.

Some come voluntarily, while others are checked in by their parents. Many say their online obsessions helped them escape day-to-day stress, especially pressure from parents to excel in school.

Some can't stop playing games, while the older ones tend to be addicted to online chats with the opposite sex, Tao says. Others are fixated on designing violent games.

Tao, a psychiatrist for 20 years who specializes in treating addiction, estimates that up to 2.5 million Chinese suffer from Internet addiction, though others are skeptical.

"As the number of the Netizens grows, the number of the addicted people will grow as well, but we should not worry about the issue too much," says Kuang Wenbo, a professor of mass media at Beijing's Renmin University. "The young men at the age of growing up have their own problems. Even if there was no Internet they will get addicted to other things."

A reporter was allowed to talk to patients at the clinic on condition they not be identified by name.

"I wasn't normal," said a 20-year-old man from Beijing who used to spend at least 10 hours a day in front of the screen playing hack-and-slash games like Diablo.

"In school I didn't pay attention when teachers were talking," he said. "All I could do was think about playing the next game. Playing made me happy, I forgot my problems."

The 12-year-old, a new arrival, spent four days in an Internet cafe, barely eating or sleeping.

A soft-spoken 21-year-old man from northeastern Heilongjiang province who had been in the clinic for 10 days said his addiction had helped him escape from family pressures about his studies.

"I would stay up for 24 hours. I would eat only in front of the computer," he said.

Step-by-step

Tao's team has put together a standard diagnostic test to determine whether someone is addicted, then uses a combination of therapy sessions, medication, acupuncture and sports like swimming and basketball to ease patients back into normal lives.

They usually stay 10 to 15 days, at $48 a day -- a high price in China, where the average city dweller's weekly income is just $20.

The routine begins around 6 a.m. and includes sessions on a machine that stimulates nerve impulses with 30-volt charges to pressure points.

Some patients receive a clear fluid through intravenous drips said to "adjust the unbalanced status of brain secretions," according to one nurse. Officials would not give any other details about the medication.

Patients also nap, write diary entries or play cards. Their rooms are sunny, each decorated with artificial flowers, Winnie the Pooh comforters and a 17-inch television.

Tao says the long-term effects of treatment are generally successful, but it's not easy to keep patients from again giving themselves over to Internet temptation.

"It would be hard to give it up completely," said the 20-year-old from Beijing. "I'll take it step-by-step."

CNN Tecnology Report from The Associated Press

Front Page

Front Page
Originally uploaded by H. Michael karshis.

Ramiro "Ram" Ayala
1933-2005

Rest In Peace Ram

Click to see the Front Page

Rest In Peace Ram 1933-2005

Miguel & Ram
Originally uploaded by H. Michael karshis.

My friend of 20+ years, owner of world famous Tacoland and favorite bartender was shot and killed early this morning, June 24, 2005.

Here's the latest:

 
Taco Land Owner Fatally Shot
Web Posted: 06/24/2005 05:38 AM CDT

Vianna Davila
Express-News Staff Writer

The owner of Taco Land, a landmark San Antonio night club once immortalized in song, was fatally shot at the bar around 1:21 this morning in an incident that sent two other people to the hospital in critical condition, police said.

Ramiro Albert Ayala, 72, was pronounced dead at 2:25 a.m., according to the Bexar County Medical Examiner's Office. Ayala is listed as the bar's owner, the medical examiner said.

Details of the shooting were sketchy, but San Antonio Police Department Sgt. Matt Podwika said two men were inside the bar when words were exchanged and at least one of the men opened fire.

"We don't know exactly what was said between (the victims) and the suspects," he said.

Ayala was taken to Brooke Army Medical Center with a wound to the left side of the chest. A 40-year-old woman who was shot in her abdomen, and a 54-year-old man shot in the side, were taken to University Hospital, according to Podwika.

It appears the two suspects fled in an unknown vehicle with the money in the bar's cash register, the sergeant said.

A Dec. 12, 2000, article in the San Antonio Express-News said Ayala opened his business, at 103 W. Grayson, in 1965, selling food to workers from the soda bottling plants that once operated in the area. He turned the business into a bar in 1969.





Lyrics to The Dead Milkmen song they wrote after playing Taco Land on February 19, 1986


TACOLAND

There's a place
In San Antone
Where I can go
And not feel alone!

Tacoland
It's a panacea
Tacoland
They're always glad to see ya

You'll understand
When you go
On Down to Tacoland

When I feel
My world is lost
I go to Tacoland
And I get really tossed!

I wish my band would always pla-a-ay
Tacoland, I want to sta-a-ay

You'll understand
When you go
On Down to Tacoland

There's a girl with dirty hair
She's got her dress up in the air
She tells a lot of jokes
Hell, she's got a lot to share

Tacoland
We ate a lot of figs
They passed around a bottle
And we took a lot of swigs

It's nature's plan
To go On
Down to Tacoland

That's Right.

We miss you already Ram!

Birthday Party Spot

Tarzan's Patio
Originally uploaded by H. Michael karshis.

This groovy hotel is the official site for my birthday bash October 2, 2006 - so start planning now! Built by Johnny Weissmuller, the original Tarzan, back in the thirties while filming in and around Acapulco, this place is the perfect self contained place to hang in Acapulco. The hotel, now called Los Flamingos, is located on top of the highest cliffs of Acapulco, 450 feet high, with awesome views of the Pacific Ocean and "La Roqueta" island. It's a killer unique location, providing not only perfect sunset views, but there's also a continuous ocean breeze to keep you nice and comfortable. There's a bitchin' pool smack dab between a cool outdoor bar and the restaurant. Couple that with wicked cheap tequila and rum brought in from town and we've got ourselves a Tiki Room on the cliffs!
The hotel is situated very close to "La Quebrada" where the famous high cliff divers perform daily. It is also five minutes away from "Caleta" and "Caletilla" beaches, La Roqueta island, the bullring and the main square. And dig this, off season rates are only 500 pesos per night! That's $50 bux for all you gringos...

Av. López Mateos No. Fracc. las Playas Acapulco, Guerrero, México
Apdo. Postal No. 70
Tels. (744) 482 0690 al 92
E-mail: flamingo@acabtu.com.mx

Be Cool to the Pizza Dude

If I have one operating philosophy about life it is this: "Be cool to the pizza delivery dude; it's good luck." Four principles guide the pizza dude philosophy.

Principle 1: Coolness to the pizza delivery dude is a practice in humility and forgiveness. I let him cut me off in traffic, let him safely hit the exit ramp from the left lane, let him forget to use his blinker without extending any of my digits out the window or towards my horn because there should be one moment in my harried life when a car may encroach or cut off or pass and I let it go. Sometimes when I have become so certain of my ownership of my lane, daring anyone to challenge me, the pizza dude speeds by me in his rusted Chevette. His pizza light atop his car glowing like a beacon reminds me to check myself as I flow through the world. After all, the dude is delivering pizza to young and old, families and singletons, gays and straights, blacks, whites and browns, rich and poor, vegetarians and meat lovers alike. As he journeys, I give safe passage, practice restraint, show courtesy, and contain my anger.

Principle 2: Coolness to the pizza delivery dude is a practice in empathy. Let's face it: We've all taken jobs just to have a job because some money is better than none. I've held an assortment of these jobs and was grateful for the paycheck that meant I didn't have to share my Cheerios with my cats. In the big pizza wheel of life, sometimes you're the hot bubbly cheese and sometimes you're the burnt crust. It's good to remember the fickle spinning of that wheel.

Principle 3: Coolness to the pizza delivery dude is a practice in honor and it reminds me to honor honest work. Let me tell you something about these dudes: They never took over a company and, as CEO, artificially inflated the value of the stock and cashed out their own shares, bringing the company to the brink of bankruptcy, resulting in 20,000 people losing their jobs while the CEO builds a home the size of a luxury hotel. Rather, the dudes sleep the sleep of the just.

Principle 4: Coolness to the pizza delivery dude is a practice in equality. My measurement as a human being, my worth, is the pride I take in performing my job -- any job -- and the respect with which I treat others. I am the equal of the world not because of the car I drive, the size of the TV I own, the weight I can bench press, or the calculus equations I can solve. I am the equal to all I meet because of the kindness in my heart. And it all starts here -- with the pizza delivery dude.

Tip him well, friends and brethren, for that which you bestow freely and willingly will bring you all the happy luck that a grateful universe knows how to return.

Courtesy of Sarah Adams
Sarah Adams has held many jobs in her life, including telemarketer, factory worker, hotel clerk and flower shop cashier, but has never delivered pizzas. Raised in Wisconsin, Adams is now an English professor at Olympic Community College in Washington.

Thanks to Sarah, NPR and All Things Considered

That's Right,

HMK

Genius.

Genius.
Originally uploaded by H. Michael karshis.

iPodlounger Ata Oz provided us with a screenshot from the 350th episode of The Simpsons titled "Future-Drama." In the episode, which aired last month, an iPod was used as the only DJ at Bart and Lisa's Prom, 8 years into their future.

Thanks to Larry Angell at ipodlounge.com for the hook up!

This Is The Life

The world's greatest experiences begin with you and can now be shared at This Is The Life

That's Right,

HMK

God Only Knows...

PopeBrackets
Originally uploaded by H. Michael karshis.

...who's going to be next Pope.

I Love L.A.!

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- "Star Wars" fans will have to find the right theater before they can leave for the dark side.

Seven weeks before its release, "Star Wars" fanatics started lining up outside Grauman's Chinese Theater for the sixth installment of the popular George Lucas movie series. The vigil began Saturday.

But there's a problem: "Star Wars: Episode III -- Revenge of the Sith" won't be showing at the Hollywood landmark when the movie is released May 19. The studio, 20th Century Fox, opted instead to open the film a mile away at the ArcLight theater.

Still, the resolute "Star Wars" die-hards aren't moving on. Beneath a makeshift awning, 11 people refused to relinquish their spots in line.

"We've heard all this before," fan Sarah Sprague said, noting there were plenty of rumors in 1999 and 2002 that previous "Star Wars" movies weren't opening at the Chinese Theater. The rumors were false and the films were shown there.

Fox and the ArcLight haven't completed their "Star Wars" deal, but executives on both sides told Daily Variety "Revenge of the Sith" will play at the ArcLight, not the Chinese.

Yet Sprague was adamant the line wouldn't be moving to the ArcLight.

"This is still the epicenter for 'Star Wars' fans. For the big iconic pictures of the 1970s, people lining up were here. They weren't at the Cinerama Dome (at the ArcLight)," Sprague said.

Lucas' final "Star Wars" chapter spells out the last dark steps the once goodhearted young Anakin Skywalker takes to become the villain Darth Vader.

May The Farce Be With You,

Tha's Right,

HMK

Show Me The Funny!

The Found Footage Festival is a live comedy event and screening featuring odd and hilarious clips from videotapes found at thrift stores and garage sales and in warehouses and Dumpsters throughout the country. Curators Geoff Haas, Joe Pickett and/or Nick Prueher host each screening and provide their unique observations and commentary on these found video obscurities. From the curiously-produced industrial training video to the forsaken home movie donated to Goodwill, the Found Footage Festival resurrects these forgotten treasures and serves them up in an entertaining 90-minute celebration of all things found.

The preview simply says it all!

Show Me The Funny!

That's Right,

HMK


The FFF is a non-profit arts group which holds no rights or permissions to the material screened. The presentation of the FFF is for the purposes of entertainment only!

Apple Adopts Windows Media for iTunes, iPod

In a surprise move, Apple Computer announced Friday, April 1st, that it was licensing Microsoft's Windows Media platform for use with both the iTunes Music Store and the company's market-leading iPod music player. Apple will be replacing its proprietary FairPlay DRM scheme and AAC codec with Microsoft's Janus platform, allowing the company to leverage the more open nature of Microsoft's Windows Media platform across its burgeoning consumer electronics product line.

In addition to managing a la carte downloads from online music stores, Janus has the added bonus of allowing music lovers to take rented music with them in Windows Media-supported devices, something that has helped Napster become the #2 online music service. By licensing Windows Media and Janus, Apple will be able to follow in Napster's footsteps, and the company plans to open a rental section in the iTunes Music Store.

iTunes users will have the option of converting all of their songs to Windows Media in an upcoming update to iTunes, and iPods will be converted to Windows Media players in a firmware update due later today.

More Choice, and changing momentum
One factor in bringing Apple to Microsoft's trough has been the changing landscape in the online music industry. Apple's iTunes Music Store has, by some estimates, some 90% of the market in legal music downloads, but replacing AAC and FairPlay with Windows Media and Janus gives Apple access to 100% of the market.

Microsoft has worked hard to show customers that having access to more choices in digital media devices and online music stores is better than having access to many consider to be the best music player, the iPod, and the top online music store, the iTunes Music Store.
Microsoft's 'More Choice' campaign has had an impact on Apple's sales, and Apple wanted to jump on the Microsoft bandwagon in order to keep pace with these changing tides.

"Microsoft has scored a success with consumers with its 'More Choice' campaign," Apple vice president Phil Schiller said in a statement. "Our customers have been letting us know that they expect that choice from Apple, and partnering with Microsoft seemed the best way to achieve that."

Six ways to punch you below the belt
Sources close to the company admitted to TMO that Microsoft had also hit Apple where it hurt with its "Six Tips for Buying an MP3 Player with Flash Memory" tip sheet for consumers. The Six Tips offered consumers a guide to selecting a music player that meets their needs, and emphasized some of the many features and benefits found only in non-iPod, Windows Media devices.

"That was just genius," said one source, who requested anonymity. "You'll notice that they didn't even mention the iPod once. Once a potential customer sees that, they're sold on an iRiver, a Dell DJ, or whatever. We couldn't compete with that, but thankfully Microsoft was willing to help us out."

In an interview with The Mac Observer, Apple CEO Steve Jobs pointed out that Apple was doomed as long as it tried to go-it-alone, and that the time had come for Apple "to do the right thing" for its customers and shareholders.

"We've had a pretty good run so far, you'll have to admit," said Mr. Jobs, "but let's face it: This is Microsoft we're talking about. Everyone knows they get it right by the time version 3.0 rolls around, and it was only a matter of when before our time in the limelight of success was merely dust in the wind."

He continued, "Why take chances? This way we can keep our customers while letting Microsoft have all the headaches of managing customer expectations and problems. That stuff was killing our margins."

When asked if Apple had always intended to adopt Windows Media as the platform controlling iTunes and iPod, Mr. Jobs declined to comment.

Thanks to Bryan Chaffin

Read. Digest. And Pass On.

 
iPod Therefore iAm

Ordinary people narrowcast; always have, always will. It's human nature to want to surround ourselves with like-minded people, familiar music, comfortable art, and unchallenging surroundings. Who can be surprised that our technology reflects this basic impulse?       
Andrew Sullivan, that's who. In his recent essay, "iPod World: The End of Society?" Sullivan broods over the popularity of America's new favorite gizmo, the iPod:
 
"Americans are beginning to narrowcast their own lives. Technology has given us finally a universe entirely for ourselves -- where the serendipity of meeting a new stranger, or hearing a piece of music we would never choose for ourselves, or an opinion that might actually force us to change our mind about something are all effectively banished. Atomization by little white boxes and cell-phones. Society without the social. Others who are chosen -- not met at random.
"Human beings have never lived like this before."
 
On the contrary: human beings have always lived this way. Until very recently, most people lived their lives -- culturally and otherwise -- within the confines of small homes, small towns, and small places. Geography dictated your language, religion, political beliefs, cultural preferences, and artistic tastes. You didn't need a cell phone or an iPod or an Internet connection to link up with your tiny little subculture -- you just needed to get out of bed in the morning. To be sure, there was room for variety within geographical areas -- but for most of human history, location was destiny. Cultural jostling was largely restricted to merchants, soldiers, peripatetic clergymen, and perhaps the very rich. And while the constriction of cultural experience was hardly ennobling or intellectually fulfilling, it doesn't appear to have made most people miserable.
 
The history of the modern world is the history of culture transforming from a geographical phenomenon into an ideological phenomenon. As information technology has blossomed, ideas no longer rely upon locations for transmission. But while the unit of atomization in the bad old days was the small community, the unit of atomization in the present is the individual. Either way, the constant is atomization.
 
Human beings are parochial animals; in the modern age, we dwell in parishes of the mind. Sooner or later, one form of homogeneity replaces another. The old differences -- North vs. South, city vs. country, black vs. white -- give way to the new: Red America vs. Blue America, investor vs. consumer, new wave vs. old school. We select our style of narrowness, but the narrowness never changes.
 
And what's wrong with a little narrowcasting, anyway? Social life is a difficult thing -- fraught with awkwardness, quirky taboos, the fear of rejection, and the discomfort of confrontation. The unfamiliar and the unexpected can stimulate but they can also exasperate -- and exacerbate ill will. We surround ourselves with the familiar and unthreatening precisely because ordinary life is threatening enough, even within the confines of the familiar. To be sure, a select few will always strive to broaden their cultural horizons -- but then, a belief in the value of broadened cultural horizons is itself a cultural position, and a surprisingly comfortable one at that.
 
The question is not whether we will narrowcast our lives. The question is how to create a broadcast society out of narrowcast people.
 
Our true concern is not cocooning, but rather the intellectual indolence that it permits. It's fine to surround ourselves with the familiar and unobtrusive, provided that we use that comfort to create a mental space for reasoned, virtuous reflection. If every New York iPod zombie engaged his or her chosen style of music in a focused, intelligent way, we wouldn't mind the rise of the iPod a bit. But it seems likely that the familiarity of our favorite iPod tunes isn't making civilized thought easier -- it's allowing civilized thought to be avoided altogether. How many iPod-heads poison their brains with soulless pop drivel because it's the same crap to which they've always listened? As Christine Rosen warns in her New Atlantis article, "The Age of Egocasting:"
 
"TiVo is God's machine, the iPod plays our own personal symphonies, and each device brings with it its own series of individualized rituals. What we don't seem to realize is that ritual thoroughly personalized is no longer religion or art. It is fetish. And unlike religion and art, which encourage us to transcend our own experience, fetish urges us to return obsessively to the sounds and images of an arrested stage of development."
 
But fetish is an old enemy. Since time out of mind, most people stayed in the village because it was easier than venturing out into the city. Most people thoughtlessly accepted whatever music the cultural elites presented at the orchestral performances, or whatever art the smart-set displayed at the museums. Even today, most people accept the religion, culture, and mores of their upbringing without question. Do iPods encourage fetishes, or simply transform them?
 
Perhaps the new and the unfamiliar are just as likely to close the indifferent mind as to open it. Perhaps iPods are merely symbols of the insularity that characterizes the average intellect.
 
Sullivan identifies the real problem later in his essay:
 
"But what are we missing? That hilarious shard of an over-heard conversation that stays with you all day; the child whose chatter on the sidewalk takes you back to your own early memories; birdsong; weather; accents; the laughter of others; and those thoughts that come not by filling your head with selected diversion, but by allowing your mind to wander aimlessly through the regular background noise of human and mechanical life."
 
The iPod is a tool of choice. With it, we can download exactly the music that we choose, and play it when we choose, and where we choose. And ours is a nation swooning over the joys of choice. We learn the lesson over and over, in movies and TV shows and commercials: be yourself. Do what you want. Don't live by the rules and expectations of others. Pursue your own destiny. What we forget -- but what Sullivan remembers -- are the joys of not choosing. To accept what life offers, not numbly but deliberately, placing our beloved autonomy into abeyance, is to open the door to unforeseen surprises, happy coincidences, and profound affirmations. Good as it is to choose who we love, it is even more intoxicating to be chosen. Good as it is to seek out what we like, it is just as pleasant for what we like to seek us. And given our society's endless fascination with questions of identity, it seems that we are desperate to find those qualities of ourselves that are unchosen, unchanging, and fundamental. As our tools for choosing grow ever more powerful, our hunger for the unchosen can only increase.
 
I am not afraid of iPod nation. I am not so naïve as to think that good music will triumph over awful music. I am not so optimistic as to forget that we lose something vital when choice barricades the walls of our minds against the adventure of the unknown and unselected. And I accept that every iPod-like innovation tips the scales a little further in the direction of the chosen over the unchosen -- a dangerous trend in an era when choice always seems to win. But like everything else in modernity, iPods have increased our capacity to take pleasure in our unique pursuits, even as they have increased our responsibility to choose our pursuits wisely. Will we live up to that responsibility? Maybe so, maybe not; either way, the fault, dear Andrew, dear Christine, lies not within our iPods, but within ourselves.

As far as music goes, there are entire galaxies of music beyond planet Clear Channel. Do yourself a favor and sample some home grown antigravity by simply going left of your radio dial and tuning into your local college or NPR station. I like to refer to it as What's Left of The Dial.

Listen. Digest. And Pass On.

That's Right.

Thanks to Douglas Kern

Your Music Collection: Rent or Own?

The latest NAPSTER commercial offers the following comparison. On top, there is a single iPod. The cost to fill it, Napster says, is $10,000. Beneath it are three MP3 players: the Dell Pocket DJ, the Creative Zen Micro and iRiver's new H10. With Napster to Go, the commercial says, you can fill all three with almost any song you can think of and you're out only $15.

Next to that, in tiny print, are the words "per month."

Ordinarily such a lopsided comparison would make me cringe and conclude that it was aimed at the gullible. But this one made me re-examine my life.

Napster to Go is the latest edition of Napster's legal download service. (Although it was previewed to the public last fall, the software allowing small portable music players to work with it has become available only in the last few weeks.) A vast majority of the available tracks - Napster says 1.3 million - can be downloaded by subscribers without paying additional fees.

What makes Napster to Go different from other subscription services, like Rhapsody ($10 a month) from Real Networks, is that you can load these tracks onto a compatible player and hit the road. As long as the player reconnects to the PC every month to verify your subscription, it feels just like the more common alternative, the one-time à la carte cost of $1 per track or $10 per album.

Of course, the commercial doesn't say you will lose access to music if you stop paying. And Napster's $10,000 reckoning also assumes that everything on an iPod is purchased at the iTunes Music Store. In reality, you could have plenty of MP3's already, from ripping CD's and dredging the Internet.

But the commercial raises a good question: Will you rent albums the way you rent TV programming? If it makes financial sense - and if, armed with that knowledge, you can avoid the competing allure of iPod style and the Apple brand - you just might.

Since Apple opened its iTunes store at the end of 2003, I've purchased 504 songs - that's 21 albums and 224 loose tracks. That means my music diet, excluding a dwindling number of old-timey CD purchases, comes to roughly $30 a month.

Most of my spending has been satisfying: new releases from U2 and Jack Johnson are simply essential, and impulse buys like the Postal Service's "Give Up" and Better Than Ezra's "How Does Your Garden Grow?" have become staples of my week. But many hunches and recommendations got old fast.

More frustrating still, there are hundreds of tracks I've just been too cheap to check out. Even though I have a permanent collection of about 7,000 MP3's - compatible with any service and player - $15 a month is still less than what I spend discovering new music.

Parents with children ages 10 to 20 know how costly the digital music revolution can be. If you look the other way as they download music using ... let's call them gray-market techniques, your PC becomes irreversibly crippled by spyware. But when you try to encourage them to pay for music instead of stealing it, you quickly discover that even a two-album-a-month allowance adds up.

When used to its fullest extent, Napster to Go lays iTunes flat, financially speaking. For the $15 monthly fee, you're allowed unlimited downloads. You can put them on up to three compatible portable players, and log in and listen on up to three PC's. (Napster to Go does charge by the song, however, to burn music to a CD.) Sure, there's an initial investment, and in homes with more than three listeners they'll have to share, but for a low fixed price they can all download as many songs as they want, most of which they will soon forget about anyway.

The value proposition is in place. I know I can get tons of music, but can I get tons of good music? There are bands not yet online at all, like the Beatles, Led Zeppelin and AC/DC. But with Napster to Go there is a new discrepancy: songs you must purchase outright, ones that aren't part of the all-you-can-have subscription deal.

I hit Napster thinking that maybe half of the tracks I'd want would be "buy only." To my amazement, it was less than a tenth. Heavies like Paul Simon, Pink Floyd, Prince, Bruce Springsteen and even, yes, Metallica have made their entire catalogs available for subscription download. The subscription service makes sense for Pearl Jam, which has posted over 80 separate live recordings. Sure, some people bought them before, but now even those without Eddie Vedder tattoos will have a chance to check them out.

I'm not saying that you won't stub your toe against tracks that don't budge until paid for individually. But between your own music collection and what is available, it's easy to see how to build up your core library.

The magic of the subscription plan is that music you don't know is also covered. I got to see if I liked new cuts from the Killers (yep) and Gwen Stefani (nope). Sitting in judgment didn't mean sitting in front of a computer screen, either; I could do it in the driver's seat of my car.

The trouble is, that thing next to me wasn't my trusty iPod. A switch to Napster means kissing your iPod, or any prospect of getting one, goodbye. The Napster-compatible players, at the moment, are the ones from Creative, iRiver and Dell that I tested, as well as others from Samsung, Gateway and Audiovox, ranging in price from $180 to $500. What they have in common is a piece of hardware allowing this sort of subscription content to be used under a Microsoft-powered secure-content system.

I could easily dismiss the players friendly with Napster to Go, but most of my gripes merely translate into this boilerplate: They're not iPods.

More substantial are my complaints with Napster's PC software, which tends to jerk the user around in a very unstable fashion. It takes its sweet time reacting to mouse clicks, and mundane maneuvers make it freeze for minutes. Players often ominously "stop responding" in the middle of something important. It's possible to load the same tracks onto a player twice (an act iTunes most sensibly prohibits). Once you get the hang of the Napster service, a smart move is to use the more stable Windows Media Player 10 as your music manager instead.

For the most part, however, the software and the players do their jobs. So let me ask a question that some may consider heresy: How necessary is the iPod?

I recently discovered (with some horror) that I could live without TiVo. Time Warner Cable offered a box with better picture quality at a better price - about $9 a month with nothing up front. Compared with TiVo, the new box's interface is medieval dentist painful to use, but I use it and I don't look back.

If I could jump from TiVo to Time Warner, a switch from the iPod to the Creative Zen Micro ought to be easy by comparison. Yes, the iPod is a beautiful symbol of how cool I am, but an iPodectomy is scientifically possible.

Thankfully, an iPodectomy may not be necessary. Buzz on the Internet and in the industry suggests that Apple may be planning a retaliatory move, an iTunes to go. There are also good odds that Yahoo and Real Networks will soon join the melee.

Though it seems like a lopsided deal - paying less than what Target charges for a CD and getting almost any musical wish granted instantly - the record industry is lobbying hard to make subscription services the next phase in the digital revolution. The labels are using them to get the attention of 15- to 25-year-olds, the group most responsible for the sharp decline in CD sales over the last few years (not to mention the rise of illegal file sharing).

"We are very pleased to welcome this group into paying for music again," says Adam Klein, executive vice president for strategy and business development at EMI. Mr. Klein also tipped me off to another source of industry optimism: early research has shown that people who pay monthly to sample all music are still likely to pay extra to own some of it outright.

At the moment, that makes sense. Pay a nominal fee to taste everything, then spring for the stuff you can't live without. But in a future in which renting music is standard practice, this concept of ownership may become silly.

And though you may not be able to switch cable operators, you will be able to switch subscription music plans when a better price or a cooler program comes along. Switching may require a new player, and an afternoon to redownload the content you still want. The remaining question is, who will get your $15 a month? Let the real contest begin.


Thanks to Wilson Rothman and David Pogue.

The SegueVox Shuffle Project

Hey y'all I've got a brand new little site, the SegueVox: (Click here to go straight to SegueVox!) It's dedicated to my collection of transitions and segues for all you Shuffle freaks to add some meaning to your so called random lives. Add these groovy little audio gems to your iPod Shuffle and experience the true meaning of random yet inspirational wisdom. Get ready to fire your shrink and 86 your Fortune Teller. With the addition of these SegueVox transitions to either your Shuffle or your iPod your life is guaranteed to be more interesting and you're certain to surprise everyone (including yourself) with these dead-on perfect little transitions. You'll truly be amazed at the 8-Ball like accuracy of these seemingly random transitions - because, as we all know - everything happens for a reason, and the SegueVox collection is no exception.

To date, The SegueVox Vault contains 1500+ audio segues complied over the past 25 years from various audio fanatics, speakers of Truth and yes, Guardian Angles! (More on these folks later). These audio gems range from chants, forgotten and rescued vintage thrift store vinyl, subliminal messages and prayers, shortwave grabs, old answering machine junk to radio grabs from foreign lands, alien transmissions, vintage radio commercials, tags and jingles, drunk people reading quotes of inspiration, hidden microphone gaga to a bunch of other impossible to categorize little treasures.

SegueVox!

We'll be uploading files almost daily so feel free check back whenever you need a fresh random hit of subliminal inspiration.

If you simply can't wait, you can PayPal 6 Bux U.S. to kahuna@grandecom.net and we'll hook you up lickety-split. Volume One release date is May 09, 2005.

SegueVox is a subsidiary of Totally Bitchin' Recording and The Tiki Room Experiment

Revenge of the Right Brain

Logical and precise, left-brain thinking gave us the Information Age. Now comes the Conceptual Age - ruled by artistry, empathy, and emotion.

When I was a kid - growing up in a middle-class family, in the middle of America, in the middle of the 1970s - parents dished out a familiar plate of advice to their children: Get good grades, go to college, and pursue a profession that offers a decent standard of living and perhaps a dollop of prestige. If you were good at math and science, become a doctor. If you were better at English and history, become a lawyer. If blood grossed you out and your verbal skills needed work, become an accountant. Later, as computers appeared on desktops and CEOs on magazine covers, the youngsters who were really good at math and science chose high tech, while others flocked to business school, thinking that success was spelled MBA.

Tax attorneys. Radiologists. Financial analysts. Software engineers. Management guru Peter Drucker gave this cadre of professionals an enduring, if somewhat wonky, name: knowledge workers. These are, he wrote, "people who get paid for putting to work what one learns in school rather than for their physical strength or manual skill." What distinguished members of this group and enabled them to reap society's greatest rewards, was their "ability to acquire and to apply theoretical and analytic knowledge." And any of us could join their ranks. All we had to do was study hard and play by the rules of the meritocratic regime. That was the path to professional success and personal fulfillment.

But a funny thing happened while we were pressing our noses to the grindstone: The world changed. The future no longer belongs to people who can reason with computer-like logic, speed, and precision. It belongs to a different kind of person with a different kind of mind. Today - amid the uncertainties of an economy that has gone from boom to bust to blah - there's a metaphor that explains what's going on. And it's right inside our heads.

Scientists have long known that a neurological Mason-Dixon line cleaves our brains into two regions - the left and right hemispheres. But in the last 10 years, thanks in part to advances in functional magnetic resonance imaging, researchers have begun to identify more precisely how the two sides divide responsibilities. The left hemisphere handles sequence, literalness, and analysis. The right hemisphere, meanwhile, takes care of context, emotional expression, and synthesis. Of course, the human brain, with its 100 billion cells forging 1 quadrillion connections, is breathtakingly complex. The two hemispheres work in concert, and we enlist both sides for nearly everything we do. But the structure of our brains can help explain the contours of our times.

Until recently, the abilities that led to success in school, work, and business were characteristic of the left hemisphere. They were the sorts of linear, logical, analytical talents measured by SATs and deployed by CPAs. Today, those capabilities are still necessary. But they're no longer sufficient. In a world upended by outsourcing, deluged with data, and choked with choices, the abilities that matter most are now closer in spirit to the specialties of the right hemisphere - artistry, empathy, seeing the big picture, and pursuing the transcendent.

Beneath the nervous clatter of our half-completed decade stirs a slow but seismic shift. The Information Age we all prepared for is ending. Rising in its place is what I call the Conceptual Age, an era in which mastery of abilities that we've often overlooked and undervalued marks the fault line between who gets ahead and who falls behind.

To some of you, this shift - from an economy built on the logical, sequential abilities of the Information Age to an economy built on the inventive, empathic abilities of the Conceptual Age - sounds delightful. "You had me at hello!" I can hear the painters and nurses exulting. But to others, this sounds like a crock. "Prove it!" I hear the programmers and lawyers demanding.

OK. To convince you, I'll explain the reasons for this shift, using the mechanistic language of cause and effect.

The effect: the scales tilting in favor of right brain-style thinking. The causes: Asia, automation, and abundance.

Asia

Few issues today spark more controversy than outsourcing. Those squadrons of white-collar workers in India, the Philippines, and China are scaring the bejesus out of software jockeys across North America and Europe. According to Forrester Research, 1 in 9 jobs in the US information technology industry will move overseas by 2010. And it's not just tech work. Visit India's office parks and you'll see chartered accountants preparing American tax returns, lawyers researching American lawsuits, and radiologists reading CAT scans for US hospitals.

The reality behind the alarm is this: Outsourcing to Asia is overhyped in the short term, but underhyped in the long term. We're not all going to lose our jobs tomorrow. (The total number of jobs lost to offshoring so far represents less than 1 percent of the US labor force.) But as the cost of communicating with the other side of the globe falls essentially to zero, as India becomes (by 2010) the country with the most English speakers in the world, and as developing nations continue to mint millions of extremely capable knowledge workers, the professional lives of people in the West will change dramatically. If number crunching, chart reading, and code writing can be done for a lot less overseas and delivered to clients instantly via fiber-optic cable, that's where the work will go.

But these gusts of comparative advantage are blowing away only certain kinds of white-collar jobs - those that can be reduced to a set of rules, routines, and instructions. That's why narrow left-brain work such as basic computer coding, accounting, legal research, and financial analysis is migrating across the oceans. But that's also why plenty of opportunities remain for people and companies doing less routine work - programmers who can design entire systems, accountants who serve as life planners, and bankers expert less in the intricacies of Excel than in the art of the deal. Now that foreigners can do left-brain work cheaper, we in the US must do right-brain work better.

Automation

Last century, machines proved they could replace human muscle. This century, technologies are proving they can outperform human left brains - they can execute sequential, reductive, computational work better, faster, and more accurately than even those with the highest IQs. (Just ask chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov.)

Consider jobs in financial services. Stockbrokers who merely execute transactions are history. Online trading services and market makers do such work far more efficiently. The brokers who survived have morphed from routine order-takers to less easily replicated advisers, who can understand a client's broader financial objectives and even the client's emotions and dreams.

Or take lawyers. Dozens of inexpensive information and advice services are reshaping law practice. At CompleteCase.com, you can get an uncontested divorce for $249, less than a 10th of the cost of a divorce lawyer. Meanwhile, the Web is cracking the information monopoly that has long been the source of many lawyers' high incomes and professional mystique. Go to USlegalforms.com and you can download - for the price of two movie tickets - fill-in-the-blank wills, contracts, and articles of incorporation that used to reside exclusively on lawyers' hard drives. Instead of hiring a lawyer for 10 hours to craft a contract, consumers can fill out the form themselves and hire a lawyer for one hour to look it over. Consequently, legal abilities that can't be digitized - convincing a jury or understanding the subtleties of a negotiation - become more valuable.

Even computer programmers may feel the pinch. "In the old days," legendary computer scientist Vernor Vinge has said, "anybody with even routine skills could get a job as a programmer. That isn't true anymore. The routine functions are increasingly being turned over to machines." The result: As the scut work gets offloaded, engineers will have to master different aptitudes, relying more on creativity than competence.

Any job that can be reduced to a set of rules is at risk. If a $500-a-month accountant in India doesn't swipe your accounting job, TurboTax will. Now that computers can emulate left-hemisphere skills, we'll have to rely ever more on our right hemispheres.

Abundance

Our left brains have made us rich. Powered by armies of Drucker's knowledge workers, the information economy has produced a standard of living that would have been unfathomable in our grandparents' youth. Their lives were defined by scarcity. Ours are shaped by abundance. Want evidence? Spend five minutes at Best Buy. Or look in your garage. Owning a car used to be a grand American aspiration. Today, there are more automobiles in the US than there are licensed drivers - which means that, on average, everybody who can drive has a car of their own. And if your garage is also piled with excess consumer goods, you're not alone. Self-storage - a business devoted to housing our extra crap - is now a $17 billion annual industry in the US, nearly double Hollywood's yearly box office take.

But abundance has produced an ironic result. The Information Age has unleashed a prosperity that in turn places a premium on less rational sensibilities - beauty, spirituality, emotion. For companies and entrepreneurs, it's no longer enough to create a product, a service, or an experience that's reasonably priced and adequately functional. In an age of abundance, consumers demand something more. Check out your bathroom. If you're like a few million Americans, you've got a Michael Graves toilet brush or a Karim Rashid trash can that you bought at Target. Try explaining a designer garbage pail to the left side of your brain! Or consider illumination. Electric lighting was rare a century ago, but now it's commonplace. Yet in the US, candles are a $2 billion a year business - for reasons that stretch beyond the logical need for luminosity to a prosperous country's more inchoate desire for pleasure and transcendence.

Liberated by this prosperity but not fulfilled by it, more people are searching for meaning. From the mainstream embrace of such once-exotic practices as yoga and meditation to the rise of spirituality in the workplace to the influence of evangelism in pop culture and politics, the quest for meaning and purpose has become an integral part of everyday life. And that will only intensify as the first children of abundance, the baby boomers, realize that they have more of their lives behind them than ahead. In both business and personal life, now that our left-brain needs have largely been sated, our right-brain yearnings will demand to be fed.

As the forces of Asia, automation, and abundance strengthen and accelerate, the curtain is rising on a new era, the Conceptual Age. If the Industrial Age was built on people's backs, and the Information Age on people's left hemispheres, the Conceptual Age is being built on people's right hemispheres. We've progressed from a society of farmers to a society of factory workers to a society of knowledge workers. And now we're progressing yet again - to a society of creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers, and meaning makers.

But let me be clear: The future is not some Manichaean landscape in which individuals are either left-brained and extinct or right-brained and ecstatic - a land in which millionaire yoga instructors drive BMWs and programmers scrub counters at Chick-fil-A. Logical, linear, analytic thinking remains indispensable. But it's no longer enough.

To flourish in this age, we'll need to supplement our well-developed high tech abilities with aptitudes that are "high concept" and "high touch." High concept involves the ability to create artistic and emotional beauty, to detect patterns and opportunities, to craft a satisfying narrative, and to come up with inventions the world didn't know it was missing. High touch involves the capacity to empathize, to understand the subtleties of human interaction, to find joy in one's self and to elicit it in others, and to stretch beyond the quotidian in pursuit of purpose and meaning.

Developing these high concept, high touch abilities won't be easy for everyone. For some, the prospect seems unattainable. Fear not (or at least fear less). The sorts of abilities that now matter most are fundamentally human attributes. After all, back on the savannah, our caveperson ancestors weren't plugging numbers into spreadsheets or debugging code. But they were telling stories, demonstrating empathy, and designing innovations. These abilities have always been part of what it means to be human. It's just that after a few generations in the Information Age, many of our high concept, high touch muscles have atrophied. The challenge is to work them back into shape.

Want to get ahead today? Forget what your parents told you. Instead, do something foreigners can't do cheaper. Something computers can't do faster. And something that fills one of the nonmaterial, transcendent desires of an abundant age. In other words, go right, young man and woman, go right.

Adapted from A Whole New Mind: Moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age, copyright © by Daniel H. Pink, to be published in March by Riverhead Books. Thanks to wired.com

Charlie Does Surf

 

Yo. Check out Charlie Does Surf from rickshawrecords.com. It's a surf Clash tribute that truly rocks. Click the above graphic to check out "Straight To Hell" by CHUM.

Thinking May Not Be All It's Thought to Be

In 1962 Albert von Szent-Gyorgyi, stated in Irving Good, The Scientist Speculates that "Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought." Which to me, puts into words the secret formula for innovation and fresh ideas in general. It's the justification for a nice long walk instead of a forced brainstorming session, the long weekend at the beach instead of the office and simply taking a left where you generally take a right. It's up to you. Why, as the Material girl put it, "Strike a Pose." when you know deep down that it's much more interesting to Juxtapose? John Schwarts focuses on two recent entries to the cultural fold and came up with this nice little chunk of food for thought...

Feel the ripple in the zeitgeist? Two new slogans are busily burrowing their way into popular culture.

Steven P. Jobs introduced one last week: "Life is random." It's attached to the iPod Shuffle, Apple's teeny new music player. The second comes from Malcolm Gladwell, a writer known for seeing revolutions in small things. The slogan is "Blink, don't think," and goes with his new book, "Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking," which argues that our instant decisions can be better than those born of long contemplation.

These two marketing aphorisms - ad-phorisms, if you will - pull so insistently at the brain that they feel more like an affirmation than a pitch, and bear a slight tang of wisdom.

The iPod Shuffle is, like other Apple products, sleek and inviting - that characteristic yin/yang blend of hot and cool. Smaller than a pack of gum, the $99 version stores just 120 songs, a fraction of the capacity of a full-fledged iPod. But that's part of the point.

Sure, you can program the Shuffle intricately via the computer, your inner disk jockey drawing up precise playlists so that, say, if you are suffering a happiness drought, you can tell the little stick to play Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World," and then the even sweeter version by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole, the enormous Hawaiian ukulele legend - who blended it with "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" - and then demolish those remaining blues with the punk-rock version by Joey Ramone. (It's like downing a shot of serotonin with a Dexedrine chaser.) But clever Apple knows that most users will simply want the gadget to grab songs out of the main computer's library and then play them in an order of its choosing. Random. Like life.

Apple, with the attitude of an artist and the eye of an anthropologist, has asked: How do we listen to music? What do we want from it? A response from the company, and its millions of customers, is that music is a kind of ambient grace, which blocks out the cellphone jabber on the train, the honking horn on the walk to the grocery store. And the result is that little white earbuds have become ubiquitous around the country.

"Blink" is also a creature of the moment. It says that a snap judgment is often smarter than a considered one. Mr. Gladwell speaks of a "second mind" that "sends its messages through weirdly indirect channels, like the sweat glands on the palms of our hands." He adds: "It's a system in which our brain reaches conclusions without immediately telling us that it's reaching conclusions."

Both slogans speak to the feeling that there's too much data and not enough knowledge, too many choices and not enough good ones, says Seth Godin, an author who focuses on marketing issues. "This desire to completely control the environment has started to unravel in the past five years," he said.

The shock from the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in part explains that development, he said, but so do the billion Web sites and millions of blogs, tens of thousands of books in the store and hundreds of television channels. This cacophony, he said, has led the culture to the belief that, "You couldn't control all the choices; you couldn't control all the noise."

The alternative offered by Mr. Jobs and Mr. Gladwell, is not quite, "Don't worry, be happy," but a slightly more nuanced: Relax. Yes, life is random. But you can enjoy the ride.

These two products come from different eras - the book from the prehistoric world before silicon, and the music player from five minutes ago - but both suggest to consumers that there is a way to remain thinking, feeling people in a world overgrown with data, options and demands, said David Bennahum, who writes about technology issues for the online magazine Slate and for Wired magazine.

"They are two things that say your rational process of making sense of things is a model that may be obsolete," he said. " 'Life is random' is a really great way of shrugging your shoulders in a Buddhist way of nonattachment."


Intuitive improvisation is the secret of genius.
Unknown

Ob La Di Ob La Da.
Well Known: Lennon McCartney

That's Right,

HMK


Thanks to John Schwarts at The New York Times

IPod Shuffle Sparks Stampede

Well, It's official. As of January 11, 2005 about 10:43 CMT Steve Job's uttered his trademark "And there's one more thing..." The new flash iPod from Apple! After some uncharacteristic delays on the Apple site, I finally confirmed my order for my 1GB iPod Shuffle literaly 9 minutes after it was anounced to the world. So did Reagan, my business partner. (For the record, I ordered mine a few minutes before he did. That's Right!) Delivery date is set for no later that 01.28.05. It seems that I wasn't the only one ready to jump on the latest must have from the company that truly knows what we all really want in regard to technology, funtionality, elegance and stuff that simply works. Here's the latest from Wired at Macworld.

SAN FRANCISCO -- To see the mob at the San Francisco Apple Store late Tuesday morning, you might have thought U2 was in the house. But the actual star of the day was the brand new iPod shuffle, a $100, 512-MB music player and Apple Computer's shot across the bow of its competitors in the low-end MP3 player category.

Just minutes earlier, at the close of his Macworld keynote address at Moscone Center, Apple CEO Steve Jobs had said he'd "heard a rumor" that the iPod shuffle was available at the nearby Apple Store, two blocks north. That set off a rush of more than 100 people who couldn't wait to get their hands on the new product.

"I'm here because I'm scared that they'll be sold out if I wait until tomorrow," said Steve Salos, an employee at the nearby CompUSA store. "At CompUSA, I get my (employee discount, but the Apple Store is) the only place you can get" the iPod shuffle.

In recent years, keynote attendees were treated to wireless internet connections and were able to order whatever product Jobs had just announced online. But this year, there was no working Wi-Fi in the auditorium, and so, perhaps by design, frantic would-be iPod shuffle buyers had little choice but to try to beat the crowd to the Apple Store.
"It was mass hysteria," said Paul Spalek, who was canvassing outside the Apple Store for the Fund for Public Interest. "There were pretty much people from every depth of the street who were taking pictures.... Everyone was in their own little head because of this."

Anthony Kolb, an Apple Store employee, said he was just returning from his lunch break when he saw the mass of people descending on the store. "It was pretty insane," Kolb said. "I had to swim through people to the back. It was a lot of fun."
Kolb also said that, due to the secrecy that always surrounds new Apple product launches, he and other store employees had not known what the big Macworld launch would be. Thus, he said, he had no advance sales training.
"You're going to know when the customer knows," he said he was told. "So you're going to have to learn (how to sell it) as fast as possible."

Meanwhile, inside the store, employee Michael Lyen was handing out iPod shuffles as fast as he could pull them out of boxes. Many people were taking two and three at a time. It had the feel of someone handing out freebies on the street. Such is the lure of being one of the first to shell out $100 for a music player that is shorter than a pen. Stefano Scalia, who was standing in line to buy one, said the whole experience was an exercise in being a part of what he called "Steve Jobs' reality-distortion field."

"Anything he says, everybody buys it," Scalia said. "I just wanted to run out and get one even though I'm on a tight budget.... I'm a die-hard Mac user, and basically, everyone's going to have one. I need to have one." It's not just Mac users who are buying iPod shuffles. Like the rest of the iPod family, the new devices work with either Macs or PCs, making it clear that Apple intends to take over what little of the music player market it doesn't already control.

Given the iPod shuffle's placement as the final announcement at Jobs' keynote, it is becoming apparent that, regardless of the name of the show, the iPod is Apple's standard-bearer. That doesn't necessarily sit well with everyone. "I like the Mac for the operating system and the computer," said Kolb. "The iPod is cool, but the Mac is cooler. I would hate to see the iPod take over the company."

Kolb shouldn't worry. On Jan. 22, Apple will begin selling its new Mac mini, Jobs' other big announcement of the day. With the Mac mini priced at $500, Kolb will probably have to swim his way through a sea of Mac buyers.

Thanks to Daniel Terdiman @ Wired

Podcasting: Finally!

I've been recording my favorite NPR segments for 14+ years. (And i've been grabbing stuff from the radio waves with reel to reels, 8 Tracks and cassettes since the early 70's). Needless to say, the idea of recording stuff to later compile for future listining and share with others has been with me for as long as I can remember, and now that we're officially in the Wired Age it's got a name: Podcasting.

The Podcastings formula takes us one step closer to an idea that's been bouncing around in my head since my first reel to reel recorder I got back in 3rd grade, 1969. My version of Podcasting, or the way I like to think of it - is a subscription based programable satelite radio that offers an ala-carte style menu of all things audio. The cool part would be the fact that it would not be a stream but a daily, selfcontained program. So, instead of me having to go to the NPR web site and hit the various featured programs, (This American Life, Morning Edition, Selected Shorts, The World, Fresh Air, just to name a few of my favorites), the daily Stardate segment or today's forecats, I'd have all of my favorites in my own custom radio program automatically downloaded to my iPod each morning and ready to play before I've even had my first cup of coffee. That's right, no commercials, no daily body count from Iraq, just the positive stuff that makes me happy to be alive. (I save the the real world perspective for Sundays NY Times.) Now that's something I'm willing and ready to pay for.

Here's Wired Magazine's take on one of Podcastings forefathers, Adam Curry:

Although he’s famous for having been an MTV VJ, Adam Curry is better known these days as one of the fathers of podcasting, a rapidly growing technology that allows anyone to subscribe to and automatically download audio content feeds to an MP3 player.

Curry's own podcast, Daily Source Code, is one of the better known shows in the young genre and is often cited by aficionados as an example of everything that's great about the technology.

Yet on his show, Curry is known for occasional fumbles with the microphone, pregnant pauses and sundry hiccups in what is otherwise seen as a valuable daily look at the latest and greatest in podcasting. The question is, if he's having a bad-equipment day, could he lose his audience?

"Everyone has a different level of karma," said podcaster Dave Slusher of the dangers of producing imperfect podcasts. "He has a lot banked up, but most people don't. In fact, as we started (Evil Genius Chronicles), the whole reason that I edited out the stuff he leaves in was because I figured that while people would listen to him do it, no one would when I did."

In October, a Google search would have returned fewer than 6,000 results for "podcasting." Today, that number is 744,000, and it seems nearly that many podcasts are available. But as with blogs, a sharp divide exists between the relatively small number of good podcasts and the vast number of bad ones, or at least ones that weren't around long enough, or don't update often enough, to attract an audience.

To some, podcasting is too new to judge, especially in the context of a medium that could be attractive to the mainstream. "To me, it's sort of like evaluating an ecosystem when there are three blades of grass pushing up through the dirt," said Doc Searls, a popular blogger and podcasting evangelist. "I think it's the future of whatever the people will replace radio with.... It's a way for the demand side to supply itself."

The medium's nascence contributes to the feeling that in order to get an audience, podcasters almost have to be one of the cool kids. "Content-wise, it tends to be very cliquey and cultish," said Carl Franklin, co-producer of the widely listened-to podcast DotNetRocks. "There's a huge underground feeling to the shows that are popular right now."

Still, while the bulk of podcasts focus on technology or politics, a growing number cover other worthwhile topics, even as the roster of bad ones grows exponentially.

"The things that grab me," said Slusher, "are some combination of interesting subject, amusing delivery and voice, uniqueness and candor or honesty in emotion." He said he enjoys The Rock and Roll Geek Show, produced by San Francisco musician Michael Butler, in which Butler talks about the life of bands and other music topics.
Slusher also said he regularly listens to Reel Reviews, Mike Geoghegan's podcast about movies. "Every so often, he picks a movie, announces it upfront and gives people time to re-watch it," Slusher said. "He does a super in-depth show."

Andrew Leyden, president of PenguinRadio, which maintains PodcastDirectory.com, said he particularly likes Whole Wheat Radio, a Northern Exposure-esque show produced by a married couple who talk about life in their small Alaskan town, as well as play and review music.

Leyden also touted the comedy talk show The Dawn and Drew Show. "They're definitely outrageous," he said. "They definitely show you why the FCC does not regulate podcasting. They sometimes go over the top a little bit."
Corie Schlegel, who writes PodcastReviews under the name Kirowan, said he enjoys Indie Feed, which has two hosts who intersperse songs from independent bands with brief commentary.

For core podcasting fans, the most recommended podcasts include the full complement of IT Conversations, Curry's Daily Source Code, Slusher's Evil Genius Chronicles and Kevin Devin's In the Trenches.
Searls said In the Trenches is "down in the bowels of some IT organization, and he talks about his racks and servers, and it's great. All the interesting (IT) stuff is being done by the rank and file. It's not being done at the top of the company."

In any case, podcasting still has a long way to go, given how many of its practitioners fumble with their equipment, bore their audiences and fail to produce regularly. Yet many of those interviewed for this story think podcasting is at the heart of audio broadcasting's future, especially given that recording technology is getting cheaper and podcasting technology will only continue to get easier to use.

"It's a matter of time before it ... changes the nature of speech," Searls said, "because everything (can) become a poddable cast." Franklin agreed, and said given how young podcasting is, it's important to look beyond what's available today to see a day when it will be widely used by public radio, churches, universities, families and anyone else with a microphone.

"Most people misjudge the usefulness of the technology by judging the content," said Franklin. "(They) say, 'Why would I want to listen to this audio blog?' When in fact, the future of the technology has nothing to do with audio blogs."

Thanks to Daniel Terdiman at Wired

iPod Beats Satellite Any Day

Ok - it's cold and almost raining and I'm getting in my car and on my way into the studio. This kind of weather always reminds me of my art school days in Boston where I'd have my Walkman qued for my brisk 20 minute walk to class from Park Drive to Mass Art. I still have the two cassettes I made specifically for walking around Bean Town - one for nice days, the other for not so nice days. Nice day toons are mostly songs from my younger, late 70's Spring Break compilations that range from Joe King Carrasco's "Baby Let's Go To Mexico", The Beach Boys "Surfin'" to Van Halen's "Beautiful Girls." The not so nice day mix consist of the new stuff, 1987 and beyond stuff I discovered via WFNX, WBCN, friends I met while working on Lansdowne Street and in the know school chums - Pixie's "Gouge Away", The Wedding Present's "Brass Neck", Treat Her Right's 'I Think She Likes Me", and some Sleep Chamber stuff I'm dying to get in digital form, among others. Today, those tapes are in the form of Playlists on my iPod and they still serve the exact same purpose of being the on-demand soundtrack to my so called life. Meanwhile, I've got a few friends that are all over this new portible satellite radio idea. The same freinds that tell me "I used to have that album..." (Of course, they sold all those albums long ago). While it is a cool idea and a nice change from the bland Clear Channel broadcasts, for anal music freaks like me, it's got a long way to go before it'll replace my iPod. It would be rather sweet if I could access my 200 GB+ Audio Vault with one of these new radios, but I really don't see that happening any time soon. Anyway - Eliot Van Buskirk, CNET's mp3 insider seems to be on the same, Close, but no cigar, page:


In the early days of digital music, we optimists looked forward to the day when we'd have instant access to every song ever recorded from a wireless, portable device--called the "celestial jukebox."

Since then, just about every step forward in digital music--MP3 players, online music stores, P2P, ring tones and so on--has led us toward this vision.

Last month, XM and Delphi took us even closer to the celestial jukebox with the release of the Delphi XM MyFi, the world's first handheld satellite radio receiver.

The phrase "never say never" became a cliche because it's often good advice. But when you're talking about technology, it's practically an axiom, especially if you're a tech executive addressing the press.
There is one place satellite radio makes sense to me: the car.

To wit: I attended the first XM announcement at the 2001 Consumer Electronics Show, where the company unveiled the Delphi XM SkyFi Radio. It consists of a small receiver module that can be swapped between a boom box, home and car kit but can't be used on its own.

As CNET's portable-audio guy, I had only one question for the XM official who made the announcement: When would they make one small enough to fit in my pocket?

The XM exec told everyone at the press conference that handheld satellite radio was impossible, because pulling in the signal took more power than a portable could ever supply. Less than four years later, I have the Delphi XM MyFi sitting right here on my desk. Like they say, never say never.

We are all narrow
Granted, you can't pick any song you want using the MyFi, but the "celestial" part of "celestial jukebox" is in full effect, since the MyFi broadcasts music that's bounced off satellites. But although our national waistline is off the charts, we are all still very narrow in terms of our musical taste. Broadcasting music doesn't work anymore; narrowcasting does.
How am I supposed to know what Ethel sounds like?

I tried time and time again to find something I wanted to listen to on XM's 68 music channels but never found "my" channel. Instead, I ended up listening to stand-up comedy and news. One reason for this is that XM's music channels have names like "Fred" and "Ethel" (seriously). How am I supposed to know what Ethel sounds like?

Another reason I didn't rely on the MyFi for music is that, like most people, I have fairly specific taste in music. Not even the most ingenious programmer could come up with a station that's perfect for me.

Actually, I take that back--I can and have programmed such a station. It's called my iPod, and it has exactly what I want to hear on it.

More like 'WhyFi'
I took the MyFi around San Francisco for a day, testing various environments to see how the reception stacked up. Not so good, it turns out. Here are a few of the places XM's channels turned into a moment of white noise, followed by more than a moment silence (digital signals are either 100 percent there or 100 percent gone):

• The subway

• My living room

• Parts of my hallway

• Most of the CNET Networks headquarters

In addition, it appeared to interfere with my cell phone, so every time I wanted to make a call, I had to turn off the MyFi (this happened only a couple of times, so it admittedly wasn't the most scientific test in the world).

Either the dodgy reception or broad programming would have been enough to make me prefer my MP3 player, but once you add the fact that XM's compression sounds worse than a 128kbps MP3, there's no way I'd switch to XM.

There is one place satellite radio makes sense to me: the car. Highways have an unobstructed line toward the sky, so the reception's perfect. Plus, I'm in more of a mood to troll around programmed channels on a long road trip than I am on a short commute.

I know this for a fact, because I've rented cars with satellite receivers, and it's always worked out great. Factor in Howard Stern's switch to Sirius in 2006, and there's a good chance I'll opt for a satellite receiver in my next car.

As for the portable MyFi receiver, perhaps that XM executive should have stuck with his original thinking and stayed out of the portable market entirely.