Graffiti Analysis on the iPhone

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See through OLED laptop screens, the internet on your dashboard, and now tagging on your iPhone. New technology is so panache these days.

Posted via web from LaurenProctor's Thinking Posterous

Tech Talk: Google Voice Debate

Google Voice. In a way it looks like the next big thing in phone technology. It's supposed to become available to the public in a few weeks (you can check updates and progress here) and when it does, you will be able to use it to send SMS messages, record phone calls with the push of a button, read voice mails as text, and save everything forever. It also allows you to forward calls to one phone number, all your phones, or just some of your phone numbers based on who's calling. For now you have to forward your number(s) and deal with having anyone call your new number if you want to use Google Voice, but eventually they hope to allow people to port their numbers in directly if they wish.

It sounds amazing and it's all free, but before we go skipping through the park chewing gummy bears, there's definite conflict. For starters, when Google released a Google Voice iPhone app to Apple and it was rejected (the details here). The FCC is debating over what to do and we have yet to see that play out, but even if Google does win the battle and get to flex its muscles and threaten what profit means for carriers like AT&T, then what will happen to the people who use the program?

This could be one of Google's benevolent loss leaders that lays groundwork for establishing themselves in the mobile sector and helps them become more powerful in the future, but it's quite possible that Google will figure out how to monetize programs like this. One New York Times analyst pointed out that this could mean upselling an advanced version of the product (Chris Anderson's Free, anyone?) or using this as a platform for creating selling, targeting, and monetizing advertisements. Google always says, "Trust us." I hope we can.

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In case your eyes are glazed, here's a solid music recommendation to melt the glaze away. Check out Flunk, a group best enjoyed while relaxing in a dark room. They've been around almost a decade but their Portishead-like sound will probably be worthy of chill Buddha Bar type mixes for decades to come.

Flunk - "Blind My Mind"

173 Billion Chances

I read the most recent New York magazine atop the atmosphere (aka on a plane) yesterday and found myself enamored with Sam Anderson's article "In Defense of Distraction". Anderson acknowledges our crackberry crazed worlds constantly interrupted by Facebook, Twitter, email and everything else, and then makes the case for why all of these new innovations and tendencies for multitasking might not be such a horrible change.

I don't know if Einstein or Lennon would have benefited had they been children of today's technological world as Anderson suggests, but this article is certainly worth the read. A day later I'm still deciding whether or not restlessness will be an advantage in our society of "techno-cognitive nomadism" as Anderson puts it, and I'm still wrestling with the effects of the world we've created for ourselves.

Regardless of whether or not I can completely jump on board with his thesis, Anderson made a point in this article that I hope will stick with me for the rest of my life. In refering to Winifred Gallagher's new book Rapt, he talks about the importance of attention. Gallagher argues in her book that the ability to focus your attention is essentially the secret of life. Whether it's an attentiveness to what you're eating (which can supposedly help you lose seven pounds in a single year) or the fact that you're able to pay attention to your loved ones, attention is Gallagher's Holy Grail.

It seems to me sometimes that distractions don't matter because there's all the time in the world to pay attention to what's important. "I can find peace in Central Park tomorrow or read that literary masterpiece in a year," I often tell myself. But our time, even for the long living, is more limited than we sometimes realize. A person can absorb 110 pieces of information per second. The average person then, is limited to the absorption of 173 billion bits of information in a lifetime (not even three times the amount of dollars Warren Buffett has to his name). Suddenly what I'm reading or the time I spend learning about any given subject is much more significant.

At the end of the day, or at the end or our lives for that matter, we are ultimately made up of the things that snagged our attention. Some, fleeting distractions, others, lasting obsessions and unending dedications. How we leave our mark though, is all about where we focused our attention.

You may not be able to learn everything or see every beauty, but you have 173 billion chances. How will you live with those chances? What will you do with yours?

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Today's music recommendation is Matthew Barber, a singer/songwriter with a knack for a low key sound and breathtaking lyrics. My favorite Barber song is "And You Give." Give it a listen; it's well worth the 25,080 bits of information you could process in the time it takes to drink this song.

Matthew Barber - "And You Give"



Wasn't it worth it, if only for the line "Then came fall, babe, and we fell hard. Bruised our bodies, skinned our knees and our hearts."

Absolutely Incredible, Absolutely Dizzying

I was introduced to this video yesterday. It immediately burned a place in my mind and now it is impacting(and will continue to impact) almost everything I do. Kristen Wiig will make you laugh, Judy Grimes will tell you how to travel cheap, and a Korean baby singing "Hey Jude" will make you melt. But if you watch only one online video this year to date, make it this one:

I won't say much because frankly I'm still speechless, but this video speaks so much to Chris Anderson's recent blog on the power of scale in Wikipedia, the acceleration of our world as spoken by Fortune Mag's article on adaptation in the business environment, the potential of computer power in the future as spoken by Wired, and just about everything else that touches our worlds and my academic studies.

I kind of feel like I just saw the best Apple product to reach stores, read a bunch of incredibly informative journalism, and crashed into a world of amazing uncertainty. I'll admit, I have goosebumps.

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If you weren't blown away, check out Army Navy. They're a happy hardcore pop band. In this day and age who can really get enough uplifting guitar licks and inviting melodies? The band's new album just released so give them a listen and enjoy.

Google Android G-1

Google has done it. Their new Android aka the T-Mobile G1 hit stores October 22nd, but one question remains and it is this. Have they done it well enough to undo the iPhone? Before we proceed I should fully disclose myself as an iPhone owner. But all bias aside, as far as I can tell the answer is no, at least not yet.

The Android device itself seems rugged and isn't nearly as aesthetically pleasing as the iPhone. The user interface is innovative and simple but visually, it appears reminiscent of web 1.0, where clunky blue boxes are the norm. The T-Mobile G1 made the same mistake as Apple did with their first edition iPhone too, and there isn't a standard headjack for audio listening. Over all, the T-Mobile G1 lacks the general suave overtone so typical of Apple, but it's certainly still a threat.

In my opinion it was enough of a threat to pull Steve Jobs out of the woodwork. The night before the release of the Android Jobs made a public statement solidifying Apple's place as the third largest handset supplier. Critics of the iPhone will surely appreciate the T-Mobile G1's tangible QWERTY keyboard, but I can't help but think the G1 seems a little Sidekick-like on the outside.

Apple changed the way we think about mobile devices with their iPhone, but we have Google to thank for changing the way we think about our applications.  Android's open source foundation forced Apple to open up their application building, and now the collective can not only dictate, but also participate in building a customized product that does everything we want it to do.  Steve Jobs is incredible when it comes to predicting what the public wants before they even know they want it, but maybe this massive push from Google will make him more receptive when it comes to listening to the collective.

Now let's get on track to prevent exclusive service provider deals and contract termination fees.  It seems almost every other industry is changing before they can blink.  Perhaps it's only a matter of time before the wireless telecommunications industry finds itself turned inside out as well.

Until then I'll stick with my iPhone, waiting patiently for the rumored 32 GB model to jump into the scene and impatiently for my EDGE network pages to load on my first generation device.  And of course, I'll all always keep track of the game changers, cheering them along for their innovation.

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If you've had enough geek and want to move onto the music candy, here you are.  There's a group called XYZ Affair out there and they've grouped towering choruses, sexy sophisticated lyrics, and a lost adolescent nostalgia reminiscent of the most approachable of Weezer.

If you watched Nickelodeon in the early 90's you'll love that they've chosen to include Marc Summers (Double Dare, Unwrapped), Jason Zimbler (Clarissa Explains It All), Danny Cooksey (Salute Your Shorts, Terminator 2), and Michael Maronna (Pete & Pete, 40 Days and 40 Nights, Slackers) to the cast in one of their more popular videos.  Click on the video below to play "All My Friends."

The XYZ Affair - "All My Friends"