ShadowBlog

I started this blog primarily to keep track of interesting media I find all across the interwebs. Then I realized that other people might be interested, as well. Occasionally I provide interesting insight and commentary on topics that interest me.

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

My experience so far with the iPhone 3G

So recently (as of the day the iPhone 3G went on sale) I have been in the possession of my new iPhone 3G.  Those that know me know that I am an Apple fanatic and that you should never bring the topic up in conversation with me unless you REALLY want to talk about Apple.  I held off on the prior iPhone and I’m glad I did even though my old cell (A simple, no frills Motorola V180) was like torture to use, especially in the last year or so.
So now I have a phone that has music, awesome contact list capabilities (as in: if you are someone I know with a myspace or a band website and I’ve put that in my contact list then I can pull up your myspace or band website from my phone.), a calendar (which I’ve started to find indispensable, since I’m so scatterbrained at times), email, an SMS text interface (that doesn’t make me want to plunge my fingers into burning coals), an easy method of developing custom ringtones (thank you, Garageband!), Google Maps with GPS, and other various goodies.
Recently a former coworker of mine asked me my opinion of the iPhone so far and I decided that my extensive response to him deserved it’s own blog post.

I keep a charging cable in my laptop case for my iPhone and also bought a car charger. I haven’t drained the battery too bad except the day after I got it when I went to the Domain and was fiddling with the GPS and some apps. Some of the bugs I’ve come across are irritating but as it’s a new product I was prepared for that. I have a MobileMe (formerly .Mac) account and have had some syncing issues. I also discovered (the hard way) that iTunes ignored the shopping cart preference in the App Store and downloaded items immediately. I noticed yesterday there is at least a popup when you select a priced item warning you it will download immediately. Aside from that initial accidental purpose, I’ve only purchased one app, Beatmaker (initial verdict:  very classy and smooth for an initial iPhone music app). I’ve mainly stuck to the free apps to check them out, waiting to see what will pop up in the next few weeks. I noticed a telnet app showed up today, I’m still waiting on an ssh terminal like Putty to show up. But what I like that I’ve tried so far is:
Urbanspoon (restaurant finder)

Twinkle (Twitter client. a bit buggy but I just got a Twitter account to see how I like it.  If you use twitter, my username is shadowzen)

Evernote (this app is pretty cool, lets you save entire webpages for later reference but to be fair, I’ve only started using on desktop and not yet added anything from my iphone yet. But I’ve heard you can upload a pic of some text and it will make the text within the pic searchable. Good for keeping track of license plates, bill account numbers and stuff like that. Maybe even serial numbers on hardware?)

Remote (iTunes remote developed by Apple)

Pandora (web radio client)

Tiptap (tipping calculator, looks like the best of the free ones, there’s like 20 of this type of app)

Mocha VNC Lite (when it works, it’s a great VNC client. might purchase the pay version after a few bug fixes come out.)

Labryrinth LE (game…VERY responsive to accelerometer, only a few levels but fun)

Aurora Feint (probably the best free game out right now, similar to puzzle quest but has a nice use of the accelerometer)

Moonlight Mahjhong Lite (I’m a mahjhong fanatic, I think I’ve put a mahjong game on every device I can get one for, from my PC to my old iPod to my DS Lite)

PhoneSaber (also something I’ve put one my mac and also set up with my Wii remote. I feel the least retarded swinging around my iPhone like a lightsaber as opposed to the other two devices.)

Stanza (ebook reader, get public domain books: L Frank Baum, Lovecraft, Paradise Lost, etc. I keep telling myself that I need to read the other Oz books someday and keep downloading them over and over again from public domain sources but I can’t bring myself to read a novel length story on an electronic device.  I’m still too fond of the smell and texture paper.)

Aside from the Putty-like ssh/terminal app I’m waiting for that will make my life Complete™ , I’m also on the lookout for other music apps (editing, synth, etc), a decent news app (would love to have the Statesman for local in an easy to read format on there and then CNN as primary national coverage. I can’t stand the NY Times and the MobileNewsNetwork app doesn’t provide local Austin coverage, more like the entire state of Texas.
I’ve heard a lot of buzz about Midori, but it refused to recognize Lita Ford’s Kiss Me Deadly so I’m not impressed.
I haven’t yet used Jott, I’m kind of worried that any of those spur of the moment, great, burst-of-inspiration, better-write-it-down-or-lose-it-forever ideas I might use it for would then be at risk of being stolen.  But then again, I think at times I’m way too paranoid about that sort of thing.  I have great ideas, sure, but I’ve read too many stories about how a song was stolen or a script was pitched in Hollywood and turned down but two years later the studio churns out a hit movie that incorporates most of the plot from the declined script. So my 2-3 Vampire ideas will probably never get made and neither will my re-invisioning of Alice in Wonderland.  It’s a good thing Burton is doing his and case Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter.
Speaking of my Alice in Wonderland idea, I made the effort to record audio of this idea using VoiceNotes, which worked out pretty well except for the lack of an export feature and the fact that shortly after I did it, I restored my iPhone to original settings.  I still have a backup of my iPhone, so I’ll have to see if I can crack that open and find the audio files somewhere.
So, also on my need to have list:  an audio recorder with export functionality and a functional to-do list that I can sync with iCal and also Thunderbird’s Lightning extension.  On a side note, why doesn’t Google Calendar have to-do functionality?  Guess I’ll have to add Remember The Milk as a service to register for, along with Flickr.
posted by Shadow at 12:38 am  

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