August 2012

RIP Brilliant Young Jazz Pianist Shimrit Shoshan at 29

While I always talk about how I love getting to hear so much great music that people share with me, but what is even better is getting to known and chat with so many great artists. People like Jason Parker, Dave Chisholm, and many more are just wonderful people as well as great artists with tremendous creative vision. And so it is with great sadness that I report the passing of one of the kindest and warmest artists I have gotten to know through reviewing music for Gear Diary – Shimrit Shoshan. In terms of music, Shimmy had released a…

eBooks, Reviews

Babbel (and others) and the Advancement of Foreign Language eBooks

A lot has happened in the past few years in foreign language instruction. It’s a global world and thanks to the Internet, you can be taught a foreign language by native speakers from anywhere in the world. You can converse with them and other learners from the comfort of your own home with just a minimal investment in hardware and software. For a number of years there have been computer apps and, more recently, mobile apps that have dramatically improved and enhanced the instructional process, but they don’t necessarily replace the need for good instruction in basic grammar or other…

eBooks, Music Diary, News, Reviews

Abbey Road to Ziggy Stardust, Book Review of Ken Scott’s Memoir

What is it that you want from reading a music industry legend’s memoir? If what you are looking for is basically an expanded Wikipedia entry with a more detailed listing of events and characters … then stop reading now and just stay away from Ken Scott’s Abbey Road to Ziggy Stardust. If on the other hand you are looking for something that has you diving for your vinyl record collection, trolling through your MP3 library, and hitting up places like Slacker and Spotify to provide the musical soundtrack to the stuff you are reading … then check this out. The…

Editorials, Travel

Traveling Light with the Sena Florence Portfolio; I Reviewed It, and I Still Use It

I had a few meetings the other day, and as I was heading out for them, I was struck by how little I was actually bringing with me. I was further struck by the fact that despite how little I was bringing with me for the day, I STILL had everything I needed. Yes, everything I needed for my meetings was held in my Timbuk2 X-small Quickie for Tablets 2011, and I had tons of room left over. (The 2012 version is here.) In fact, there was almost nothing actually IN the bag. So what did I bring with me?…

eBooks, Gear Bits, Outdoors

The Magic Bullet Against Showrooming Is in Running Shoes

Everyone in retail wants to bemoan “show rooming” or the tendency of shoppers to check products out in store, only to buy online. It’s a huge problem, and I am not the only person to point out that customer service can often make the difference between someone shopping in store versus hitting Amazon on their iPhone as they walk out the door. Runner’s World took a closer look at the statistics involved, and came up with some interesting conclusions. First, they looked at a survey that indicated the higher the discount online, the more likely shoppers were to not shop…

Reviews

The Safetag.me Review

Have you ever lost your keys and not found them? How about your cellphone? Safetag.me aims to make it easier for you t connect you back with your misplaced keys or phone or anything else you can attach a tag to. Does it work? Let’s find out. The Safetag.me kit comes in a kit of two decals and one tag you can attach to your keys. When you get your kit in the mail, you go to the Safetag.me web site to register your tags. When you do, you will indicate what the tag is attached to and whether you…

Editorials

iPad for College Instead of Laptop? Bad Advice

You know what they say about free advice… you get what you pay for. And, if you read the site regularly, you know hoe much both Judie and I love and rely upon our iPads. And you likely also know that Mike considers the iPad his “80% computer” while Carly goes as high as it being her 90% computer. That being the case you might be surprised that I find Cult of Macs post entitles Why You Should Buy An iPad Instead Of A MacBook For College [Back To School] to be lousy advice and simply wrong. The author’s points…

Crowdfunding, eBooks, Reviews

Seven Poets and the Assassin’s Secret Is a New Kind of Novel

When I heard about the iOS app Seven Poets and the Assassin’s Secret, I couldn’t help but be intrigued. It is a unique, real-time serialized novel centered around a fictional terrorist attack on the Olympic Stadium in London during the closing ceremony. Content runs from August through October, when real-time serialization will end. Seven Poets tells the story of seven children who are able to escape the terrorists and their struggles to survive in a new and different world. The app, which features in-app purchases for each new portion of the story, went live at the beginning of August and…

Vehicles & Gear

Two Words Came to Mind While Testing the 2013 Acura ILX Hybrid: ‘Why’ and ‘Ouch’

When I first saw the all-new ILX from Acura at the Detroit Auto Show earlier this year, I wondered to myself, “Why?” Acura already had the TSX sedan with premium content and an attractive appearance, so why would the “luxury” division of Honda create what appears to be a competitive model in its own stable? The new ILX is based on the Honda Civic architecture but looks little like its pedestrian counterpart. And short of calling the new Acura a modern Integra, the automaker comes close by choosing “I” for its moniker. Style-wise, the new ILX reminds me of a…

Editorials

OnLive, Moto Mobility and the Harsh Reality of Tech Wars for Real People

Over the weekend we heard about the founder of OnLive basically shuttering the company in order to protect himself and the property by using a California loophole that allowed better creditor repayment than bankruptcy, but for workers … they were totally screwed just as if the company went totally belly-up. But that doesn’t mean all is well for creditors and investors. Today we start to learn about more of the fallout of the OnLive collapse: specifically, that troubled smartphone maker HTC is losing $40 million due to the restructuring. This is the same HTC who recently posted a 58% net…

Health and Fitness

Lose 20lbs and Run Faster with One Easy Step!

I have seen some bizarre iterations of treadmills, but the one I have always wanted to try is the Alter-G. It adjusts how much gravity affects you through air jets, and is used quite a bit by elite athletes and physical therapists assisting people with injuries. Effectively, by floating the runner with air, you reduce the pounding on their joints. You can also “run” much faster on it. Unfortunately, it’s a wee bit pricey, like $25,000 and up pricey. Luckily, someone has invented a more low tech but equally cool solution: the LightSpeed. Instead of crazy air jets, you use…

Gear Bits, Outdoors

Slacklining Courtesy of Volvo and Adrenaline

Volvo cars may be known for being “boxy but good”, but I think their trucks need a better slogan…”boxy but stable enough to slackline across”? It’s a mouthful. Amazing, right? There is balance, grace, athleticism and courage, and then there is the mondo serving of all of the above that you need to walk a rope between two speeding trucks. That are about to go through two tunnels. And that will turn you into roadkill if you aren’t all the way across. Crazy! Via The Clymb

News

The Nokia Lumia 900 Gets Updated in US

This has been a busy and bumpy year for the Nokia Lumia 900. Just released this spring, it was already declared a dead-end device by Microsoft shortly after its arrival as Microsoft announced that Windows Phone 7.5 phones wouldn’t be updated to Windows Phone 8. Although this wasn’t a complete surprise (due to the hardware limitations of the current devices), many of us hoped some of the features of Windows Phone 8 would eventually make it to Windows Phone 7.5 devices. As of this writing thought, it looks like a rather limited set of features will eventually appears in the…

Gear Bits, Music Diary

Pussy Riot Selected Tracks Now on Slacker Radio

If you read Carly’s excellent post about the Russian punk band Pussy Riot and their arrest and sentencing on ‘hooliganism’ charges recently, you might want to hear more from the band. Well, as Carly mentioned Slacker Radio has stepped up and added some songs to their ‘Protest Radio’ station. Slacker has added Pussy Riot tracks to the Slacker “Protest Radio” station. When you first play the station a Pussy Riot song will start things off. Here is the direct link: http://www.Slacker.com/station/Protest We have the tracks: – “Kill the Sexist” – “Putin Wet Himself” – “Kropotkin Vodka” – “Deliver Pavement” Slacker’s…

Reviews

JetPens.com’s Kaweco AC Sport Carbon Fountain Pen Review

In a world obsessed with texting and emails, it’s so very refreshing for me to be able to put away my electronic devices and use something that doesn’t require electricity to convey thought. Oh there are No. 2 pencils, mass-produced and disposable pens galore that I’ve used over the course of my lifetime, but for me the ultimate tool for fine writing is the venerable fountain pen. Directly descended from the first simple cut reed pens and bird feather quills that gave way to metal tipped dip pens, reliable fountain pens began emerging in the mid-nineteenth century and became the…

Reviews, Travel

Think Tank Photo Urban Disguise 35 V2.0 Review

Over the last few months we’ve looked at numerous ways to carry and protect your camera and gear and today we are looking at yet another! This time out we have the Think Tank Photo Urban Disguise 35 V2.0. It has an MSRP of $159.75 and what you get for the money is rather impressive. Yet again the bag “comes in any color you want so long as you want black”. That isn’t an issue to my mind, especially since this is a bag that is intended to carry a ton of gear without calling too much attention to itself….

Health and Fitness

Gear Diary Bragging Rights, Mike’s 1/2 Marathon Edition

Last week we started our new health and fitness series. This weekend Mike put his sneakers where his mouth is. Yes, after months of training he just ran his first half marathon and – as you can see from this picture of him crossing the finish line, he made good time! Congrats Mike!

Gear Bits

Fifty Shades Generator Gives You Filthy Smutty Filler Text (NSFW Obviously)

Aside from being a massively successful entry into the romance sub-genre some refer to as ‘mommy porn’, the book has also spawned a large number of memes and parodies. For example, I love the video of Gilbert Gottfried reading excerpts (video below), and now we have a new one – the 50 Shades Generator. Here is their description: The Fifty Shades Generator is a breakthrough in erotic fiction. At the click of a button, it generates world-class literature based on a pre-defined vocabulary. Traditionally, print and web designers had to make use of placeholder text known as Lorem Ipsum. It…

Game Diary, Reviews

New Super Mario Bros. 2 Review for Nintendo 3DS

Mario has the golden touch among six new main worlds and three special worlds with extra challenges, score sharing, and downloadable course packs as the famous platform video game series continues in New Super Mario Bros. 2.

Editorials

Riot Grrl, Pussy Riot, and the Heartbreak of Seeing Feminism Attacked in Russia

(image courtesy Amnesty International’s Pussy Riot support page) I spent the summer between my sophomore and junior years of high school touring Israel. It was an incredible experience, but the most lasting impression didn’t come from the country. It came from the moment one of my friends on the trip played a Sleater-Kinney song, and my eyes were opened to the world of riotgrrl and women in punk rock. These were bands that sang about feminism, politics and sexuality in a more frank, honest, and direct manner than I had ever heard before. Feminist punk rock is a defining soundtrack…

Music Diary, News

Frank Zappa Now on iTunes, and Coming Soon to Streaming Services!

I have had an affinity for the music of Frank Zappa for as long as I can remember. The combination of humor, advanced compositional techniques, extreme musicianship, apathy towards genre boundaries and more has always caught my ear. I own about 30 CDs of Zappa’s music from the Mothers of Invention right up through some of his final releases. This past week we got word that more than 50 Zappa albums had been added to iTunes, with several of them remastered versions. This goes along with an earlier report of a great remastering effort including a list of the first…

« 1 2 3 4 5 … 8 »