web+log=blog.

BACK UP YOUR DATA. DO IT NOW!!

Please help spread the word. Tell your friends, tell your family, and especially tell your parents. 

Please for the love of all that is holy, back up, back up, BACK UP YOUR DATA!!  Computers crash. Often. Cellphones and smartphones crash more often.  

This is 2012, you have to wake up and smell the burning disk drive.

Storing every contact you’ve ever met in the past 27 years on your Samsung Galaxy Dingus—and nowhere else—is NOT an acceptable backup strategy.  Same goes for pictures of your brand new baby.  Or photos of a dearly departed family member.  Back up your smartphone to a computer.  And back up your smartphone to an SD card (they are not expensive!).  Back up important stuff to a thumb drive (also not expensive!).  Buy an external Hard Drive (they are very affordable these days), and back up your computer’s data to the external HD.  Use the cloud, iCloud, any cloud. Use dropbox (free), use google docs (free), use microsoft skydrive (free), use google drive (free), use Apple iCloud (free), use Amazon.  Use Mozy or Carbonite or backblaze or something similar.  Just use something, so that your data is backed up.  Multiple backups are the key to happiness.  And please please PLEASE record your priceless, precious, irreplaceable voicemail messages onto another device. Make duplicate recordings onto different recorders.  The voicemail servers run by the phone companies and the wireless carriers will eventually fail or they will accidentally delete your voicemail messages.  And you will be sad. #end rant

The new iPad is called…iPad??

What’s in a name, anyway?

OK, Apple, I get it.  You guys are sick of all the speculation on names.  Last year with the iPhone 4S, it was widely assumed it would be called the iPhone 5 or iPhone 4G or iPhone LTE (assuming it had 4G LTE radios, which it didn’t).  This year it was the iPad 3 or the iPad HD or the iPad Supercallifragilisticexpealidocious.  Apple is all about keeping it simple, and usually I like simple.  Calling the new iPad the new iPad is simple , I suppose, but I don’t like it.  

I get it, but I don’t have to like it.  Here is why:  Calling it iPad or “the new iPad” is either confusing or a mouthful.  If you say you have an iPad, now I have to ask, “Is it the original iPad or the “NEW” iPad?”  (I am a geek, so of course I need to know which generation of iPad you have, silly!)  If it was called the iPad HD or iPad 3, you would just say that, and be done with it, much like I can say right now that I have an iPad 2.  

Another reason calling it “the new iPad” isn’t great:  everyone, and I do mean everyone (from tech bloggers, to mainstream journalists, to your elderly mom and dad), will still call it the iPad 3.  I will call it the iPad 3 when talking about it with friends and family.  I bet everyone selling the new iPad will also call it the iPad 3, like AT&T stores, Verizon stores, Best Buy, etc.  And online retailers (Amazon, Ebay, etc.) will pretty much HAVE to call it an iPad 3 to avoid buyer confusion.  The only people that will call it “The New iPad” rather than the iPad 3 will be Apple Store employees…because they will probably be fired if they call it anything else.  

Then there is the issue of the iPad 2 sticking around, at a lower price point, which is awesome, by the way.  Yay for $399 iPads!  But if my buddy buys a new iPad 2 next month, and says to me, “Hey, I just got a new iPad!”  I will have to wonder is it the “new” new iPad or just a new iPad 2 iPad?  So here is what I would probably end up asking him:  ”Did you get the iPad 2 or the iPad 3?”  See?  It really needs to be called the iPad 3.  

P.S.  I will be getting a “New iPad” ASAP.  The Retina Display alone makes it worth the price of upgrading.  I almost made the mistake of not getting an iPad 2 last year, trying to hold out for the iPad 3, er I mean the new iPad.  Boy am I glad I didn’t wait!  That being said, does anybody out there want to buy a slightly used iPad 2?  It is a black 32GB AT&T 3G model, in great shape, the screen is flawless thanks to the smartcover.  I will need the money to purchase my new dream machine:  Black AT&T 4G 32GB iPad.  Hey, I can just say I have a 4G iPad!  I won’t have to say “New iPad” after all!  Why didn’t Apple call it the iPad 4G?  Oh, hell, nevermind….

P.P.S  I guess this means that the new 2012 iPhone, to be released this September, will simply be called “iPhone.”  I’d bet a good amount of money on that prediction.  

Website Double Fail.

The Texas Store.  Located in Colorado!

store.texas.com

CONTACT US - Email us at: customerservice@texas.com.
Or via postal mail at: Texas.Com LLC, PO BOX 2376, Centennial CO 80161 USA.
Phone: 1.800.707.4TEX
customerservice@texas.com

And, this:              

Hey I want to buy this shirt!  Ummmm, wha?  

There’s no “Buy” button.  There’s no “add to cart” button.  

OK, nevermind. 

I won’t even go into how horrible the web design is, and the font choices are terribad.  It looks like something from AOL in the nineties.  

iPad iPad iPad iPad

The iPad 3 will be announced next Wednesday, March 7th.  It will be exciting to see what the event will be like, and to find out all the new goodies the new iPad will have. At this point most of the rumors are old hat, and I believe most of them will turn out to be true:  Retina display (double the pixel density), A6 quad-core processor, 4G LTE capability, maybe iOS 6, but basically the same form factor.  Normally I would say “thinner and lighter” because Apple always, ALWAYS makes things thinner and lighter.  But in this case, I don’t think thinner and lighter is possible, due to the new 4G LTE radio inside, plus the added battery requirements that 4G LTE brings.  I cannot wait to see the video from the event.  

As for other rumors….

I am smart enough to know better than to say “never,” so I won’t.  But I find this article by AppleInsider highly unlikely.  It’s kind of like the “iPhone Nano” rumors.  They come out every year, like it or not, same old story, same old song and dance, every single time.  Last year, there were tons of rumors about a 7-inch iPad.  It never happened.  And the “iPhone Nano” has yet to make an appearance. 

But, if you say a rumor enough times, for enough years, they sometimes come true.  Case in point:  the Verizon iPhone.  A Verizon iPhone was one of the earliest iPhone rumors, dating back to 2006, before the first iPhone was even announced in 2007.  The rumor finally came true in 2011, after countless rumors had promised the Verizon iPhone was right around the corner.  So don’t count out the miniaturized iPhones and iPads just yet.  But at the same time, don’t hold your breath.  It may be several years down the road before it happens….if ever. 

Apple may eventually release a smaller iPhone, and a smaller iPad as well, but I seriously doubt it.  I would be surprised (pleasantly surprised!) if that happened.  The main reason I don’t believe in the “smaller sized iPhone/iPad rumor (other than the fact that we’ve all been hearing these same rumors for four years in a row, yet they never come to pass), is this:  there really isn’t a demand for it, ergo there isn’t a need in the market that requires to be filled.  There is no good reason to make a 7” or 8” iPad, and there isn’t a good reason for a smaller iPhone, either.  

Another reason that Apple won’t make a smaller iPad?  The name.  What would the call it?  The iPad mini?  If so, then that would make all the “normal” sized iPads what, a maxi ‘Pad?

iPhone MuteGate.

I said it here first, all you tech bloggers!  It is another “OFFICIAL APPLE FAUX PAS” and doggone honest-to-goodness APPLE CONTROVERSY!!!!   I will try to be original, so I will officially christen this….wait for it….MuteGate!

We all know from reading tech blogs that Apple’s iPhone 4S was a miserable flop, and a terrible disappointment to all.  Don’t pay attention to those sales figures behind the curtain!  And you can certainly ignore those photos from the Apple Store in Beijing China.  What do those crazy Chinese people know anyhow, right?  Right??  It is so obvious that the iPhone 4S is the new Edsel. 

And I submit to you yet More Evidence (!!!!) that the iPhone 4S (as well as all iPhones) is seriously flawed.  The mute switch is broken….as in it Doesn’t Work!!  This is a huge embarrassment for Apple, the company that now has egg on its face, as well as its retail stores in China. 

Apple, the company who routinely refers to itself as the “Last Bastion of Good Design On The Planet” (never mind the fact that Apple, nor anyone who has ever worked for Apple, has ever made this claim….now keep reading this alarmist call to arms against the Evil Apple Empire and its Walled Garden!), has slipped up worse than AntennaGate with a New Design Failure.   

Here.  Is.  What.  Happened. 

A poor schlub was trying to enjoy a wonderful performance of the New York Philharmonic Symphony, but he had unknowingly become Apple’s Latest Victim of Corporate Snobbery.  You see, this poor man had just gotten an iPhone the day before the concert, and had no idea how poorly designed the iPhone is (it’s a blessing and a wonder the thing didn’t explode and kill off the first three rows of concert-goers!).  Since he didn’t want to interrupt the concert, he had put the iPhone on “Mute” which as we all now know is a recipe for Cataclysmic Disaster.  But the iPhone still made sounds!  (I am fighting the tears as I write this.)  And ironically he did the very thing he was desperately trying to avoid:  interrupt the concert at great embarrassment to himself; causing public shame, humiliation, and a good old-fashioned tarring and feathering.  And the fault, the blame and the shame, all lie at Apple’s feet. 

You see, the Dirty Little Secret that Cupertino doesn’t want you to know (but me, your intrepid Android/Blackberry/Microsoft loving blogger is taking great risks to tell you, the General Public, The Truth) is that the iPhone was intentionally designed to play alarm sounds EVEN IN MUTE MODE!!!!  OMGWTFBBQ???   

Apple, you have failed again, just like you are failing to Android in the marketplace.  Just because your stock price is now over $420 per share, that isn’t fooling anybody.  You are doomed.  The inevitable crash will happen.  Any day now.  

Apple, in Its Infinite Wisdom, decided that alarms set by the end user take priority over possible embarrassing social situations like your phone making noise at a symphony.  So alarms will actually sound while the device is muted.  The Horror.  The Horror.  For some crazy—and elitist, I am sure—reason, Apple thinks that oversleeping in the morning and being late for work and missing a meeting may be of more importance than having strangers think you are a D-Bag at a movie or a concert.  Oh the humanity. 

Shame on you, Apple.  Shame.  On.  You.

Apple, and I am now directly addressing You, the Entire Company of Apple Inc.: 

“Recall your defective product.  Recall it now, before someone really gets hurt.”  

That is all. 

======

Actually that isn’t all.  The above post is my attempt at cheeky humor and satire, trying to poke fun at all the anti-Apple tech bloggers and so-called journalists out there in cyberland.  Link-bait, controversy, Apple, design fail…all these are what makes the world go around.  At least it does for SEO low-lifes.

I read John Gruber’s post yesterday about the iPhone mute switch, and, as a long-time iPhone user, totally agreed with it.  This is not rare; I tend to agree with a lot of his points.  Not because I blindly follow anything and everything he says (which I have been accused of), but because he usually makes sense.  I read stuff, I think about stuff, and in the end, many times my views align with his.  Gruber has reasoned, logical arguments that for the most part make sense to me.  So I usually agree with him.  That being said, I read a great response from Andy Ihnatko today, regarding the iPhone mute switch. 

Now, after thinking quite a bit about it, I am siding with Andy on this one.  Not only does this prove that I don’t blindly follow Gruber’s every whim, but it proves well…it proves that I don’t blindly follow Gruber’s every whim.  And stuff.  I also agree with Andy that this is the type of philosophical debate that fascinates me (but would bore pretty much everybody I know to tears). 

Now that is all.  Really.  Go do something.  Now.