Cool Products & Hot Companies

Pandora: The Coolest Music Site Around

My wife recently told me about Pandora, a music site that quite frankly is one of the most interesting sites I've seen in a long time. With Pandora you'll find all kinds of incredible new music, from artists you know and artists that are very similar to the ones you like.

Simply go to their site, type in an artist or song you like, and Pandora streams you songs and artists that are similar. It's like having a smart Itunes playlist that gives you suggestions customized to your personal tastes. Not only have I found some incredible new bands that I like, but I also have heard many of the "B" songs from artists I like that never got radio play and that I never knew existed.

Now if I could just use Pandora on a portable player or on my radio in my car. :-)

Cingular 8525 vs BlackJack vs Treo

I've spent the last two months trying to figure out what to do to replace my old Treo 650. The call quality was horrendously bad and I decided that I had finally had it.

I've been a Palm user for over ten years, including owning several Palm Pilots and Treos. The Treo has met my needs for years, but I haven't been entirely happy. Once when the Treo stopped working it took them 10 business days to get me a replacement (since I run my business on my cell phone this was ridiculous - particularly since the Treo is a premium-priced product).

My wife got a Samsung BlackJack, and I like it. However, I wasn't sure if it would meet my needs and if I would be happy with Windows Mobile. I also started reading about the Cingular 8525, which looked like a pretty good solution.

To compare the phones I used the Product Management concept of use cases. I made a list of the most common things I do with the phone - things that I knew I could do quickly on the Treo. Here's a rough version of the list in no particular order:

1. Turn phone to silent
2. Check Voicemail
3. Add a task and prioritize it
4. Lock and unlock the phone
5. Answer the phone
6. Check email
7. Redial
8. Dial contacts (speed dial and dial others in my 1200 person database)
9. Use the calculator
10. Check the daily calendar
11. Synchronize with Outlook
12. Make a conference call
13. Take a picture
14. Look at a monthly calendar

After doing some reading I decided to try out the Cingular 8525. I knew I could return it within 30 days, so I wanted to run it through the paces and make sure it would be as easy as the Treo and deliver great phone quality.

The end result: the Cingular 8525 is a GREAT phone. The sound quality on calls is excellent - it sounds like I am on a land line. The keyboard and touch screen are excellent (the touch screen is the main reason I chose the 8525 over the BlackJack - I am very used to touching the screen to quickly make choices.) I can dial contacts and launch applications by talking (which is much safer than clicking around buttons when driving). The email and web browsing are quite good on the 3G network (after I set up a Cingular Media Net home page similar to my personal home page on my computer I finally understood why anyone would want to use a cell phone to access the net). The games are great (Solitaire is bundled and I bought Tetris.) The screen is bright, big and beautiful. The battery life seems very good, and the sychronization works well with Outlook 2003. The 2 Megapixel camera takes excellent pictures, and it really feels like you are using a real camera (I am now convinced that in the near future I will never buy a separate camera). And finally, the bluetooth works great (especially with the noise-canceling headset I purchased with it).

Overall I am very satisfied.

Now the caveats:

1. When I first got the phone the battery seemed to drain VERY quickly. I turned of Versamail (automatic email delivery) and that seemed to solve the problem. After a few weeks I turned it back on and the battery life is great (I think maybe the battery had to be broken in - I'm not sure).
2. ActiveSynch did NOT work well for me at first. It would give me errors, sometimes it would access the hard drive for long periods of time and I also got errors when I tried to open Outlook - I had to reboot in order to get to my email. I installed Activesynch 4.5 and also tried a few other things I read on the net. I'm happy to say that it is working extremely well.
3. The 8525 Push to Talk button is VERY annoying. I would always accidentally hit it and then have to exit out of a dialog box saying that the service wasn't available yet. The good news is that I found a patch on the net that disconnects the button, so this isn't any issue.
4. The picture quality on the camera is excellent, though the flash pictures are too dark.

The bottom line?

I remember when I got my first Treo I was able to learn the ENTIRE thing in a few hours. It was slick, did what I wanted and worked great. I have to admit that learning the 8525 and Windows Mobile took FAR longer - after a few weeks I finally had resolved the issues above and felt like I REALLY knew how the software works. It appears to me that Windows Mobile is going to work for me quite well (I know, I know, endorsing Microsoft is politically incorrect), and the features, form factor and sound quality are excellent.

I'm glad I made the switch.

   

Dash - the next big GPS thing

I've been hooked on the GPS in my car since back in 2000 when I bought it as a novelty. After using it for a little while I found that it was no longer a novelty - it was essential. In fact, sometimes I feel crippled if I'm driving a car without it.

So what's next in the GPS world? Dash. Funded by Sequioa, Kleiner-Perkins and several othe prominent VCs, and with a proven "A-List" executive team this company is likely to shake up the GPS market.

What's so different about Dash? Well, their product communicates both to and from the Internet. This allows you to upload your appointments and have the directions waiting for you when you get in your car. Or get real-time traffic information to avoid traffic jams (like the GPS in the Acura RL). Or use Yahoo local search to find a good restaurant.

The possibilities are endless - it's going to be fun to watch this segment evolve.

Promptu: The future of Cell Phone Search

Ever get frustrated trying to use your cell phone to find something? Using a web interface and cell phone keyboard is slow and pretty much of a hit and miss experience. If you want to find a ringtone, songs, wallpaper etc. it can be real pain in the neck.

Enter Promptu, a new spoken search engine. Their whole concept is that using your voice to search is the most natural and logical way to get what you want on a cell phone. If they are able to deliver what they claim (and with a $5.6M round of funding that just closed) this could be the next big thing. Just imagine the boost in revenues the cell carriers will see when it is even easier for my kids to buy new ringtones and games. :-)

Dump Palm Treo for Cingular Blackjack?

I've been a Palm fan for years ever since I bought my first Palm Pilot and it seamless synchronized all of outlook so that I could get rid of my bulky Franklin Planner and always have an up-to-date backup on the computer or the Palm in case anything happened.

I went to the Treo 600 after it had been out a while and had a decent experience. It was certainly better than carrying around a Palm and a phone. And it ended up doing much more for me that I originally expected. I could now leave my laptop behind and still check critical emails on the go. And of course, I could find and access my 1200+ contacts with a few simple clicks.

After the 600 became worn out I switched to the 650. That's when the problems started. The 650 seems to lock up on me - sometimes during critical calls with clients. There are times when it will be sitting on the desk next to me and simply reboot itself for no apparent reason. And there is a bug wher if another Cingular user with a 650 calls you then after the call whatever you do next completely re-boots the phone. To top it all off, the synch cable doesn't fit snugly, so sometimes I can't synchronize. And sometimes the device isn't recognized and I get a message that a new USB device has been connected and needs to be installed. Finally, just yesterday I did a routine synch and all of my appointments in my calendar ended up being duplicated on the Treo, so I had to spend half an hour deleting them. Worst of all, every Treo I have owned has had to be replaced three times under warranty, with the problem being that it takes them 7-10 business days to get you a replacement (can you imagine trying to run a consulting business without a phone for that long?)

The original product promise for the Palm devices was the synch was seamless. Given all of the trouble I'm having I don't believe that promise anymore. Don't get me wrong - it is a great productivity tool, but I'm wondering if the downsides are not outweighing the upsides.

I've heard that the Treo 700 is much more solid and reliable. However, I dropped $400 on the 650 only about a year ago, and given my experienes I'm hesitant to pay yet more money to trade up.

Enter the Samsung Blackjack phone that my wife just purchased. it is slim, has no external atenna, has a crisp and bright screeh and a great keyboard. It runs Windows Mobile which, despite the many things I've heard from Microsoft bashers seems to be pretty darn easy to learn. And it has lot os functionality that the Treo doesn't have - a voice recorder, spoken numbers back to you when dialing so you can be sure you dialed the right number. It has better video capture capabilities, and it works with any standard Bluetooth headset so that have a better selection and can save some money (the only bluetooth headset I could get to work with the treo was Palm's, which was $129 at Fry's.

I've got the Treo mastered and can be very productive. The queston is, should I bit the bullet, get a blackjack and learn all of the shortcuts to get proficient on it. It sure seems a lot more stable than the PalmOS - it has never crashed for my wife. However, we haven't tried the syncing yet. Or should I wait until the 650 completely dies in 6 or 12 months and do the trade up then.

Anyone had a simliar experience or opinions to share?

I can name that tune in... One Website.

Got a song stuck in your head but you can't remember the name of it or who the artist was?

Try midomi out. All you do is go to their site, click on a button and start humming or singing. It then returns a list of songs that match what you are looking for.

My results? It couldn't recognize America Pie, but it did get God Bless America.

Check Out Jaxtr

There's a very interesting new service in beta from a company called Jaxtr. It allows you to link your phone to pages in your social networks, your email signature, your blog etc. so that anyone worldwide can call you with just a click of the mouse. Your phone number is kept private, and you don't need to download or install any client software.

This gives you the ability to have a "virtual" phone number that you can link to your existing phone numbers or future phone numbers when they change. Should be quite interesting if they can pull it off and provide an excellent user experience.

Tivo Problems. Why I will never buy a Tivo again.

Tivo has its problems, unfortunately. I have to wonder where and what the Product Management folks there are doing.

Just like everyone else, I loved my Tivo when I first got it. Skip commercials. Pause the Tivo when the kids are interrupting your favorite show. And of course, I could rely on it to record my favorite shows so that once a week my wife and I could sit down and watch the few decent shows on television these days. And I had so few problems and such benefit that I even bought one for my three year old.

That said, I've decided I won't ever buy another one. Why? Let me count the ways.

Tivo Problem 1: No lifetime subscription. I got both of my Tivos for less than $50 each, and then a lifetime subscription for $299. Tivo ended this program quite some time ago. Like Tivo? How about paying $19.95 per month for the rest of your life to use it. No thanks. The problem is that I already have TOO MANY subscriptions, and I don't want to add to my monthly budget.

Tivo Problem 2: After a little over one year the Tivo remote is falling apart. Tape holds the battery cover on. The buttons are worn so I can't see the functions. No problem, right? Just get a replacement, yet when I contacted Tivo a new remote is $39.95. Gee, my Mitsubishi remote has lasted 10 years, and none of my other remotes have ever fallen apart. But now to replace the remote for my $50 Tivo I have to pay $39.95? I think not.

Tivo Problem 3: One of the MAIN benefits of Tivo is that you can skip commercials. But the only way to do it (other than painfully sitting and watching it fast forward) is to enter the secret hack code that automatically moves it 30 seconds forward. When it works it is great. Unfortunately, Tivo hasn't built this into the system (despite it being OBVIOUS that this is a very valuable feature). So what do you do? You type in the secret code and the Tivo does what you want. Unfortunately every few days (or sometimes weeks) the Tivo upgrades itself and installs a new version of the operating system. So guess what? That's right, your secret code is erased and you have to reprogram it. I can't even tell you how annoying this is.

Tivo Problem 4: Re-record your favorite shows over and over while other shows are being put in the trash. I watch Jim Cramer's Mad Money, Glenn Beck and a few other shows on CNBC and similar cable channels. All of these are one several times a day. Maybe I am just a naïve user (except I've been a Product Manager in the tech industry for 20 years), but what happens is that I get 3 or 4 versions of each of these shows recorded every single day, wiping out my other recorded content. Even Jim Cramer mentioned this Tivo problem on his show. And of course, even thought I've already got a recording of one of these shows from earlier in the day, Tivo continues to interrupt me while I'm viewing a ball game or other show and tells me it is about to change the channel to record a second or third version.

Tivo Problem 5: This one is the one that was the nail in the coffin. A few months ago my Tivo upgraded itself to include some new functionality - a new version of the operating system that included Tivo for kids. Apparently it was supposed to provide parental controls blah blah blah that helped parents stop their kids from watching inappropriate TV. Well, I can tell you as a parent of a three year old that the features it has completely missed the mark. But here is THE WORST PART - now when I flip channels using Tivo and the remote there is a VERY annoying delay of about 2 seconds until it goes to the next channel. Imagine not being able to flip channels on your TV. I guess I could switch to using the standard remote, but then I LOSE ALL OF THE BENEFITS OF TIVO, like being able to pause live tv, etc.

None of these issues are rocket science to solve. But instead the efforts seem at Tivo seem focused on trying to sell me a new $799 HD Tivo. I hope they fix some of these things. Maybe they'll even hire the 280 Group to do some research and write an MRD about how to make Tivo that magic product again that it once was. :-)

The Microsoft Iloo

I had forgetten about this (it appeared a year or so ago in the press).

Blundered Microsoft product, or is this Microsoftian Humor.  You be the judge. :-)

Evernote

Here's a very cool new application for taking and organizing notes. Good search features, fast launch and pretty easy to figure out how to use it. And best of all the basic version is FREE.