Month: August 2006

That Time of the Year

/ Cole Camplese / Leave a comment

Yep, it is that time of the year again … football is in the air. As we all get ready to answer the bell, I am reminded of getting ready for the season. For me it was always the real football — soccer … 2 a days hurt a lot after a summer of fun, but by mid-October the work put in was well worth it. Figuring out how to create a new team that could go after a huge goal was always a challenge. Winning late in the season always made the effort disappear. I remember going into seasons with big expectations and having to work extra hard to maintain, extend, and realize those exceptions. I sort of feel like I am in the same boat now.

Given WVU’s high hopes you are going to have to put up with me. Trust me, I know it is going to be a long shot, but just to have the Mountaineers in this position is amazing. Madeline has her WVU cheerleading uniform and the forthcoming Max has a jersey waiting for him. It is going to be an amazing fall, not just b/c WVU football could be good, but for a lot of reasons!

Answering the Bell

/ Cole Camplese / 2 Comments

As we approach the Fall semester I am reminded of what it means to answer the school bell … for me it conjures up quite a bit. With the exception of a couple of years after grad school when I was doing the corporate thing I have spent every fall since five getting ready for the start of a new school year. As an aside, it reminds of about three weeks after I graduated from High School in good old Bloomsburg, PA. I was invited to one of my high school teacher’s wedding. As you can imagine most of the high school’s faculty were there enjoying themselves — most of them had been doing a little drinking to celebrate the occasion. I’ll never forget talking to Mr. Bierschmit, my 12th grade English Literature teacher, about his decision to retire that year. He was an amazing teacher — the kind that as you grow up you realize had a profound impact on your life. I can actually count my time in high school as B.B. (Before Bierschmit) and A.B. … as if I would annotate situations like, “that was during my Freshman Year (1991 B.B.).” At any rate he told me the thing he would miss the most during his retirement was “answering the bell in the Fall.” This time of year I really feel the excitement and anxiety of answering the bell. New challenges and lots of deliverables …

That may be a stretch of a lead in on an interesting story over at MSNBC.com titled, “New idea to cut textbook costs — sell ads.” Buying textbooks have become a huge part of getting ready for Fall in higher education for our students. Not only are they paying an extraordinary amount of money for tuition to attend our classes, but are faced with huge costs in the $6 billion college textbook industry. The article discusses a company that is looking to apply the standard web model of selling ads to free up content into the textbook market. This seems like an interesting approach and will surely challenge both the industry’s thinking and higher education in general.

Sounds a lot like the music industry a few years ago … a tightly controlled industry facing major challenges being forced to radically rethink their business model. The price of a textbook versus its perceived value, hmm sounds a lot like buying an album for one song did a few years ago. This is heating up to be a a very interesting space. Something to think about as we head towards Fall. Is that an alarm clock bell going off in the background trying to wake up another sleeping industry?

My Apple WWDC 2006 Thoughts

/ Cole Camplese / 10 Comments

So it is both over and just starting … the week of WWDC was once again kicked off by Steve Jobs in grand fashion — showing off the most drool-worthy new piece of hardware, the MacPro, I have seen in a long time. I am not sure it is enough to pull out of MacBook Pro land, but it is sweet … It was also great that Steve once again decided to give us a taste of what is to come and promise that there is more to Mac OSX.5 than what they are willing to show. For my dollar it was just as interesting for the features of the forthcoming 10.5 release than what they didn’t show. In an interesting twist, Mr. Jobs decided to not show off some of the more advanced features of the next version of the Mac OS … instead saying it was time to let the ever OS-designing folks from Microsoft think different on their own. Jobs actually said, “we don’t want (Microsoft) to start their photocopiers.” Interesting move — but even Apple let the cat out of the bag that their timeline had sliped to Spring 07.

The few 10.5 features that they did show were interesting to say the least — the new iChat capabilities just blew me away! The ability to deliver a Keynote from anywhere was just off the charts … it did leave me wondering though in the age of podcasting if GarageBand or iMovie would be able to capture all that and compress it down to an iTunes (U) capable version — wishful thinking, but if I had any say all these new features would be recordable so we could deliver amazing opportunities. The Time Machine concept is slick, but it left me wondering how some “pro” Mac folks would feel about the overuse of GUI elements. The new Spaces capability is welcomed and will give us on the little MacBook and MBP the needed real estate to do the crazy things we like with our machines. Of them all, Mail seems to be the most geared towards me — the ability to easily flag and notate items will be wonderful (although I am getting by quite nicely with the MailTags plugin installed). All in all it was a good array of features to show off.

There are other consumer level things, but let me talk briefly about the pro line of things — maybe the backoffice. The xServe has been in need of an upgrade and it got it … the killer things from Apple today (in my estimation) are the Mac OSX Server upgrades coming … if you haven’t seen the list you need to check it out … iCal server, Wiki service, and the killer app, the Podcast Producer. Not a whole lot of detail, but if it is the setup I listened to an engineer discuss months ago then this is a real killer edu app. Take a peek for yourself and think about the possibilities. When we get our hands on that, all bets are off for easy classroom capture. This may be a turning point for Mac OSX Server … time will tell.
So it was a good day … I have staff at WWDC preparing for a week long learning experience. I am hoping we get answers to a few questions and are ready to attack new opportunities upon return. Tim, just remember to pick me up some goodies while you are there and come back with some info! It was a good start to another interesting trip down innovation lane.

Finally, the Belkin TuneTalk Stereo Recorder Arrives

/ Cole Camplese / 41 Comments

Quite some time ago I had written about the long wait we were forced to endure with the new iPod voice recorders. I saw a bunch of them on display at MacWorld back in January and kept waiting and waiting for a solid portable recording solution …. well, I’m not sure when it actually got released, but I finally was able to get a new Belkin TuneTalk Stereo (TTS), only down side is that it is black and my iPods are white. The quality is really so much better than the previous versions for older iPods that it isn’t even worth comparing that. Just right out of the box you can make very high quality sounding recordings with your iPod, the TTS, and the goofy little stand it comes with — BTW, that stand must have cost Belkin a whole quarter of a penny.

I spent some time testing the thing — both as a stand-alone and with a couple of lav microphones to see what I could get. Right out of the box the thing sound good plugged into the bottom of an iPod — in some situations you can hear a little hum from the hardrive in the iPod spinning — I noticed it more on my 60 GB than on the 30. There is a little gain switch on the bottom that makes a huge difference in quality.

When I got this thing the thing that got me interested was the line in … it allows you to bypass the internal mic of the TTS and plug in an external setup into the .35mm jack on the bottom. Originally, I thought a wireless mic setup would be ideal for so many situations — walk in, drop an iPod on the podium with the TTS hooked to the bottom, plug in the base unit, and start recording with the freedome to roam. The setup doesn’t seem to work with my Gemini LIX-16 wireless unit as I am only able to get one channel to record audio. I then tried my wired Griffin lav mic and it produces really good sound. It actually got me thinking that the iPod with the TTS and the lav mic plugged into it is actually only a half inch bigger than the wireless unit … the iPod setup is noticably thinner too.

The software on the iPod works the same way as it did before … clip on the TTS and the iPod switches over to voice recorder mode with the option to start recording. You can now also set the recording quality to high or low. I went with high for all my tests. THe one thing the whole thing misses is some sort of user feedback. THe recording click ticks along, but a level meter on either the TTS or, even better, on the iPod screen would make a huge difference — just take the guesswork out of the whole process. At any rate, the included podcast will give you an idea what this thing can do — about half way through the podcast I swtich from the TTS with the lav mic to without. Let me know what you think.

Update: A lot of people have emailed me asking where to find this thing … we found it at the Apple Store … if you are an edu customer, make sure you go into the education store as it is $10 cheaper. Here is the link to the public store.

Enhanced Podcasts in iTunes

/ Cole Camplese / 7 Comments

As things are heating up in the Podcasts at Penn State project more and more faculty are starting to create podcasts for the fall semester.  Chris Millet has been spending an hour with all the faculty who request a consultation and many times these meetings end with a trip to the Faculty Multimedia Center within ETS.  The FMC has already started working with a handful of faculty to create some great content … most of it so far has been created using ProfCast so the audio syncs with the slides from PowerPoint or Keynote.  The faculty are excited and other than a few very small issues with software and hardware the FMC team is happy with the results.

One thing we are really starting to notice as a major drawback to iTunes is its inability to play an enhanced podcast the way we think it should.  Everything plays great on screen, the chapters work, and you can watch the slides update in the tiny little album artwork window.  That last point is the kicker … first of all that window is so small it isn’t worth looking at slides on it … if you do resize it you end up altering the way most people really use iTunes the other 18 hours or so a day.  Apple lets you click the window and get a nice fullsize view … great, other than it does not refresh with the podcast.  This is putting us in a little bit of a bind.

One of our primary goals from the get go was cross platform playback (no iPod required) … we thought iTunes is a cross platform tool so we’d be in great shape … the fact that a student cannot sit down and listen and watch an enhanced podcast on their machine is crazy.  We need to have that artwork refresh.  Chris and I are even discussing what it would take to create our own player … sounds like a real pain.  Has anyone found a work around for this feature?

iTunes Refresh
Notice the little window has moved on …

Treo 650 … I am Already Behind

/ Cole Camplese / 6 Comments

It finally happened … I did what I said I wouldn’t do — I got a Palm-based Treo 650.  I have had it about a week and I actually do like the device for a lot of reasons.  I am already hating it for one BIG reason — size.  The thing is actually almost as much of a pain to carry around as my Newton 2100 (that still works and has 802.11 wireless access).  With that said, I can now wirelessly sync with my Oracle Calendar, IM people anytime, get on the web and make sure stuff is running, and get email.  The last item there, email, is still giving me problems.  I can easily get my .Mac and Gmail but have had a real problem with PSU email.  When I get that worked out I will be set.

Having this much access has actually been a stress reducer.  I get this bad feeling when I am disconnected for any serious period of time.  Not on weekends, or during dinner, or times with the family, but times I should be working but I happen to be traveling or in a meeting … I just feel better knowing that I can do a quick check of stuff.  Having access to mobile information is a good thing.

I am a little pissed at Cingular however that I couldn’t get the newer Treo 700 or my first choice, the Moto Q.  But at the end of the day the 650 is a good device.  So far I have noticed that the voice quality is no where near my Razor and the battery is a mess.  Other than that, Bluetooth works perfectly for syncing with my MacBook — Missing Sync rocks — and for the wireless headset I use with it.  The apps I am using to drive this little guy are:

  • Toccer for AIM — works great, is free, and lets me continue to get messages even when I am not in the app.
  • VersaMail — hmm, can’t get PSU mail to work and that is killing me.  Other than that it works well.
  • The Missing Sync — if you are going to get a Treo and you have a Mac, just buy this.  Everything works so easily, but read the directions on the first install and sync — you’ll thank me.  I can move specific playlists, photo albums, and contact lists to my phone with idiot-proof ease.

Are there other apps out there for this device  Ishould be trying?  I am now wondering how to integrate it into my larger (and ever growing) need for personal content management.  I spend a great deal of time trying to get things organziaed and done — with the amount of information that streams in, I know I could be using this device just a little bit better.  Who else is in the 650 boat and really working this device?

Google does Flickr … sorta

/ Cole Camplese / 1 Comment

In an interesting twist, I got invited to the Picasa Web Album site … sorta like Flickr, but seemingly without the tags and the real social features of the original.  It is nice and they offer (for free) two ways to get pictures to the site — a full fledged iPhoto plugin that makes me miss my Flickr iPhoto plugin and a desktop application.  Seems all you have to do is show up and ask to be included … they’ll give you account until they get too many out there.  It seems to work well … the slideshow feature is killer.

I uploaded a couple of images this morning to see how it all works … Time to wait and see how this plays against the real thing.