Category Archives: Thoughts

What a lousy move, Netflix

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We’ve been using Netflix for about two years now and come to really like the service. One of the better features is the ability to have different profiles each with their own queues of movies you’d like to watch. Our membership allows us to have three DVDs borrowed at a time. We set up a queue for Becky and me (for two DVDs) and one for the kids (with one DVD).

How all this works in practice is that when we return a movie from our queue, the next one in line get sent to us. Likewise, when we return a movie from the kids’ queue, it takes the top of theirs. All-in-all it is very convenient and keeps things quite organized.

Unfortunately, Netflix has announced that they will be doing away with profiles at the beginning of September. Any profile other than our main will get merged in to the main and then removed. We’ll have to make sure that one of our kids’ selections is at the top when we return theirs. What if the top one isn’t available (which happens sometimes)? I guess they lose out.

I personally don’t see why they need to do it. Perhaps they figure they’re moving through too many exchanges per subscriber each month. As many are considering (as am I) to drop their membership from 3 to 2, there’ll be some impact on their revenues. It’s already been a hit to their public image.

I know the question you’re asking

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If you’re even half-way plugged into things, you’ve most likely heard that Apple announced the next version of their iPhone. Now called the iPhone 3G, they have revised it in some pretty decent ways. They’ve made it a full “3G” phone using AT&T’s HSDPA for downloading email and web pages at about twice the speed as the original EDGE. They’ve also added GPS support. The one thing they’ve taken away is $200. It now costs $199 in exchange for a two year service contact commitment.

Am I going to get one? Not likely. Surfing at twice the speed is nice, but considering the higher-speed data plan is $10 more per month ($40 versus the current $30) I don’t see enough value in the upgrade.

There is the new 2.0 upgrade of the OS which is standard on the 3G but will also be made available for free to existing phones. They have focused quite a bit on main aspects of the OS which are enterprise support and 3rd party application support. I’m interested in that and will have it with the phone I have now when the upgrade is released next month. They haven’t listed completely what is included with the upgrade, but here are the things I either know they aren’t doing or aren’t sure:

  • Video support for the camera
  • Wireless podcast downloads
  • Wireless syncing (iTunes)
  • Document storage (I want to store and read PDFs)
  • Flash support (kinda don’t care)
  • Keychain support (partially resolved with the excellent 1Password)

I’m just glad that Omni Group has committed to producing an iPhone version of OmniFocus. That I will buy.

Go Speed Go

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Part of this weekend’s 8th birthday festivities for my son Brian included a “friend party” on Friday. We took him, and five of his friends (all boys, unsurprisingly) to go see Speed Racer and then go for pizza afterwards. In short, the movie was a blast and the boys were a handful.

Disclosure: I am a Speed Racer fan. In fact, one of my earliest memories is seeing part of an episode when I lived in Chicago (about 2.5-3 years old). I have also wanted a Mach 5 since before I could drive.

Having disclosed that, I think that is why I liked it. I had heard and it is quite obvious that the Wachowski brothers also love Speed Racer. They produced a live action movie that has all the styling and impact of the animated series. The story is thin but any more “meat” would have felt strange. Emile Hirsch did a nice job as Speed and the rest of the characters were well cast (it doesn’t hurt that I like Christina Ricci).

I may have to go see it again when it hits our budget theater and will most definitely pick it up when it is released on Blu-ray probably around Christmas.

Am I ready for this?

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Monday is the beginning of a transition for me at work. I’ve mentioned previously the group I work in which is called SAS-DEV. That particular group is made up of myself, three colleagues and our manager (who is also the manager of the larger SAS group). Monday, a fifth team member joins us and I start the process in becoming the SAS-DEV manager. I’m not sure how long it will take but the “official” (e.g., HR) designation won’t change until I am doing at least 51% of the work of a manager.

The whole thing is going to be a bit odd for me. I’m generally o.k. with the manager thing as I used to have two direct reports when I was at RedZone. The strange part, initially, is the fact that I’m going to be the manager for what up until now have been my peers. Ultimately, I feel this will work out for the best as I already know them, they know me, and we get along quite well both personally and professionally. If there was one time in my life where I can start this next step and not stress about it, it’s here with these folks. Yes, I know that each of them generally follow my blog but I am honestly not trying to suck up.

The other part that has me wondering is how things will look when everything is said and done. I don’t believe there is enough “managing” to be done to fill a whole workweek so it’ll probably be a half manager, half sys admin kinda thing. One of my friends referred to it as being a Sergeant which sounds about right. I’ve never stressed about my career and we’ll all feel our way through things as the weeks and months come.

To give you and idea of the support, Kristin was kind enough to put the following comic up in the window of my new office:


From Johnnie Moore’s Weblog

It hasn’t been the first ribbing since all this came up and I’m sure it won’t be the last. That’s just how we roll.

Why didn’t anyone tell me?

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I discovered the magic of Google Analytics over the weekend. I had heard of it many times, but never got around to setting it up. Phssh, a click or two and a small piece of javascript to add to your site and you start getting some really nice site tracking. It’s generally intended to be used for determining advertising rates, but I just like the idea of know who is visiting my site and what they’re looking at.

The coolest feature is an overlay display which they’ll show  your site and put the percentage of click-through for each link. With that you can get a good idea of what is getting people’s attention.

I’m using the Google Analytics for WordPress plugin by Joost de Valk which automatically takes care of things for a WordPress blog. I’ve added it to all the sites I administer (including this one, of course).

For those of you that knew about it but didn’t suggest it to me, harrumph. I could have had so much data by now and you know it’s all about the metadata.

Twitter Plugin working again

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I’ve been using the Twitter Tools plugin by Alex King and have really enjoyed the features and functionality. Unfortunately, for quite a while, it hadn’t been working. I thought it was due to me upgrading to Worpdress 2.5 but I was able to get it working again simply by re-entering my login information for Twitter.

Maybe I reset my Twitter password? I forget.

I can’t say I’m surprised

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In How Grand Theft Auto IV Threatens the Wii by Forbes, Brian Caufiled points out that while Grand Theft Auto IV is available for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360, no version will be released for the Nintendo Wii and how Nintendo may be the loser in the equation. As the “3rd generation” consoles were being developed, Nintendo decided to emphasize the social aspects rather than raw power leaving that arms race for Sony and Microsoft. As a result, Nintendo has a unique platform in the market and is doing quite well. I don’t doubt continued success but I do question the long-term viability of unique gameplay when you don’t have much else to back it up.

Lastly, it’s worth disclosing that I work for Sony Computer Entertainment America. Does that make me biased, possibly, but I try very hard to be impartial and have been into technology for over twenty years and know how fast trends come and go.

Time will tell.

It’s kinda like Zeitgeist, only smaller and with more style

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If you’ve been part of this whole Internet thing for a bit, you’ve probably heard and/or seen Google’s Zeitgeist which provides an interesting snapshot of the culture based on the searching trends.

I ran across something similar called twistori. It follows all the Twitter traffic, matches based on some simple emotional keywords (e.g., love, hate, think, believe, etc.) and displays it in a nice scrolling display. I ran across it a few days ago and have been enjoying dropping in and watching it for a minute or two.

A quote on arrogance

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I subscribe to the GodThoughts Wired! mail list written by Brad Reiches and it’s been a good daily devotional. In one of the most recent ones, he had a really good quote on arrogance:

ARROGANCE IS FOR THOSE WHO

HAVE NOT EXPERIENCED ENOUGH

CONSEQUENCES.

I may come off as too conservative, but, in my opinion, in this day where parents want to be their kids’ friends and most everyone not wanting to offend people, there are far too many people who have not experienced enough consequences for their actions.