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Ten reasons to give up on twitter

Byrichard

Once again I have deleted my twitter account. Here are ten reasons to give up on twitter.

  1. Europe is neutral about the site. If you want friendships with people an ocean away join.

  2. Whenever you want to post some technical problem means you have to post five times

  3. If you have a real job, not freelancing, then you can’t afford to check updates all the time.

  4. Lack of user engagement, when less than a tenth of your replies are responded to you know there’s no point staying up to date with those people.

  5. Virtual community, unlike with facebook and other social networks the people you interact with here are strangers.

  6. Spam, as more and more marketers come to the site so the more you use certain words the more unsolicited messages you get.

  7. Veteran community: Aside from Facebook all websites are at their community most interesting when the users are new and passionate about the service. That has faded with twitter.

  8. 140 characters; Although it was great three years ago mobile phones are now far more capable mobile devices. Limiting yourself to 140 characters is no longer an interesting option.

  9. Server downtime. For three years they have been struggling with making the platform stable and for three years they have been failing. If you have to try five times to post 140 characters then something is wrong.

  10. User indifference. They are indifferent about their user base. Just take a look at the FAQ and try to offer them feedback and you will first have to go through an FAQ before being able to explain your views.

Having a full time job means that my free time is more precious than before. As a result I’d rather be out in the real world doing real things. It’s also about how much time you need to invest into such a service before getting anything of any value out of it. As a result a year after I first left twitter I have left again. This time I think it will be for good. I don’t like the way the company is run and I don’t like the way the users are using the site. Goodbye twitter. On to better things.

Podcasts on the Android

Byrichard

For three days now I have been listening to podcasts on the Nexus one using Listen. It is a podcast app that allows you to subscribe to and download podcasts from the comfort of the mobile device.

What I like about this app is the ease with which you can select which podcasts to listen to. If you want to listen to This week in tech for example just type the name of the podcast and it will find those feeds, allow you to subscribe or manually select which podcasts to listen to.

Another aspect of the search feature which I like is the search for keywords function. It displays a number of podcasts according to the keyword.

As an example I typed hike to see which podcasts would be suggested. I found some trailcast podcasts and so downloaded a podcast. It works well. If you enjoy the podcast then you can subscribe to and download the podcasts.

The settings tab has an interesting set of options. You can tell it to download new apps when possible, select whether you want the downloads to occur when you are using wifi or over the air using the data plan. You can set how many podcasts you want to store on the device at any one time.

One of the best features for me is that when you have a few hours to listen to podcasts rather than work by podcast subscription this software allows you to listen to podcasts in queue order. What this means is that I may be listening to This week in tech, then this week in google before moving on to the BBC history podcast and finishing with a trail cast podcast. With this system you do not need to interrupt what you are doing to get to the next podcast.

The benefit of a podcast client that is within the phone is that you can select what to listen to whilst on the move. As a benefit of this you are less likely to download hundreds of podcasts you end up never listening to.

The last feature is that it is synched with Google Reader. This means that you can see those subscriptions from any google reader application. It is stored in the cloud so should work across multiple devices.

This is the future of podcasting, and media consumption. It takes advantage of the power that modern devices can sync from anywherwe at anytime, that your habits and tastes may change and that you actualise it from any machine, computer, or mobile.

Eurovision coverage of the FIFA World Cup

Byrichard

If you are living within the European Broadcasting Union member countries you can access live footage of the FIFA World cup matches as well as highlights by going to EurovisionSports. Highlights are also included at the end of the individual games so that you may relive the highlights.

There is also a Facebook page where you can hear about the games as soon as the streams start.

User feeback so far has been positive so have a look.

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Vericorder and mobile video editing on the iphone

Byrichard

Waiting for the iPhone4 to come out in the hope to do mobile video editing is not necessary. Vericorder have come out with an app for that.

The app is a simple to use video, recording and voice over recording app that allows for video editing and distribution to be possible on the move.

There are three modes, record video, take photographs and record voice. Each of these modes allows you to gather material, name the clip and then record the next shot.

The project tab allows you to add video clips to the sequence, shortening and sorting the videos in the order you want.

After that is done go to the voice ovee app, record the audio, transcribe what you have said before adding the audio track to the timeline. Once that is done save the project.

Export the video, chose send as video and you will have a finished edited news item.

It is intuitive to use. Within ten minutes of use I understood how it works and simplz need to find events furring which to test the applicAtion.

Yesterday evening at the Apple Store

Byrichard

Yesterday after work I was meant to meet a friend in Geneva but after a phone call changed my mind. I decided instead to walk to the apple store. What I saw in the apple store was quite interesting. As you walk in, where you used to have iphones and macbooks on display you now have ipads. Walk into the main hall and you have at least three more tables dedicated to the ipad. There were many more ipads than there were people interested in playing with the devices.

The geniuses were standing around, with nothing to do. Does that mean that everyone who wanted to get an ipad got one, that everyone was tired from work or does that mean I went at the right time to play with a few devices.

Of course I didn’t. I’ve had my own for about a week now so it doesn’t matter. There’s no need to go to the apple store to play with the device as I have mine with me most of the time.

What is interesting is Apple’s current move away from laptops and even more so with desktops. When the macbook air came out everyone said that it was a piece of crap in relation to specifications and they were right.

Steve Jobs and Apple have taken the netbook concep and skipped it. Instead they provide the Ipad, a device which you expect to have limited capabilities but great potential. What other manufacturers have been able to sell a display without a keyboard after all.

You have over two million units sold for over a billion US dollars in spent currency. That’s two million units without a keyboard. That’s a theoretical two million people that are discovering that life without a keyboard works just as well. There’s just one set back ladies. You’ll have to cut your nails if you don’t want the clackety clack as your nails touch the screen.

I love the iPad. I love that it’s light, that it’s versatile and that it’s so flexible. Imagine editorial meetings where you have an iPad and the content you’re discussing is in h.264. Drop into the meeting, say the item is interesting and show the editor in chief.

There is no need to go to the edit suite, there is no need to go to the computer. There is no need for power cords, adaptors and dedicated bags. We’ve come to what I would call the iPad age. This is going to change the way we discuss and share content.

Now what interests me is to see what happens with Apple laptops. Will the touch screen now come as standard and will they release dual screen laptops without a physical keyboards or will they come out with touch screen displays on the screen portion and a keyboard and mouse on the bottom part?

Apple have effectively demonstrated how well touch screens can cope with our current demands. The question is how far will this progress? Will we see applications that are specifically designed for a touch screen interface. If so then we are going to a virtual interface that resembles the paper and scissors of our childhood. The computer itself is becoming transparent. What we do with it is changing.

What we do with it is no longer local, no longer requiring the same type of data storage and sharing. We are no longer working on one machine. We have decentralised everything. Look at what the android platform can do. Look at Mobileme can do.

It’s an interesting time. The computer is the simplest it’s ever been. This means that more and more people, from all ages are able to intuitively interact with the device in front of them. Configuring is as simple as a username and password these days. Everyone understands this method of configuration. It’s a democratisation feature. That’s why two year old children can use the devices as easily as 70 year olds.

When you ask the revolutionary and evolutionary question in relation to technology I would go so far as to say this is a revolutionary device. It’s doing away with the keyboard, the mouse, the idea that things have to be configured. It’s the simplest interface yet. I don’t think everyone can justify getting one but it goes one step further in helping people always be connected, never be offline. It helps make facebook, twitter and e-mail be more pervasive in the way we live our daily lives.