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April 26, 2006

Yahoo! Releases MCE Competitor

 

Just weeks after closing their deal to buy Meedio, a software developer of a 'roll-your-own' digital entertinament solution akin to Microsoft's Windows XP Media Center Edition, Yahoo! has put a branded version of the software out for free download. called Yahoo! Go. Download the software here and give it a spin. It includes features to access video, music and photos on your local PC, as well as TV tuner integration should you have one, including DVR features. I do wish the Flickr piece was a bit more feature-rich; currently there's no way to select your own photos or specify a tag to view, it simply includes a half-dozen or so pre-selected tags/groups to view as slideshows. One nice bit of integration is the 'Video' area - with Yahoo video content presented alongside your own, as well as search features for other video content. Overall, a very nice UI with a ton of features. 

technorati tags: yahoo, mediacenter, mce, meedio

Posted by jetrotz at 03:29 PM | Comments (0)

April 24, 2006

17 inches of goodness - plus ads on your iPod

Two big bits of news today - first that Apple unveiled the new 17" Intel MacBookPro just in time for the kickoff of the NAB show out in Vegas (via TUAW). Along with that, there's an interesting article discussing efforts between ESPN (and most likely other members of the Disney Internet Group) and Apple to integrate advertising in a more significant way  (reg. required at Advertising Age). Two rants as a result - where is my 12" MacBook Pro? My back cannot deal with the 6.8 pounds of computer in that 17-incher. And on the ads front, I'm all for it. With the size of the podcasting audience today, there is a real market for ad-supported content for those of us who just don't want to pay for premium materials. Bring on the tracking and reporting, and Madison Ave will beat a path to your door.

technorati tags: apple, macintosh, macbook, 17, ipod, advertising

Posted by jetrotz at 01:19 PM | Comments (0)

Back to the Botanical Garden

 

As you can see in the photo above, Sam had a fabulous time during our visit yesterday. It was a beautiful sunny Sunday, so we headed out to the Atlanta Botanical Gardens. On display were sculptures by Niki de Saint Phalle, featuring glittering mosaics of glass, stones and mirrors. Sam loved these, and we enjoyed all the flora. See the full gallery here.

technorati tags: botanical_garden, sam, flowers, photography

Posted by jetrotz at 11:39 AM | Comments (0)

Saturday Playgroup

It was time for the dads to attend the monthly Saturday installment of the Grant Park Kangaroos playgroup, held at Joanna, Scott and Amelia's home. In the photo above (a composite of three separate images), all the kids gather on the couch at the same time. More pictures in the photo gallery above.  

technorati tags: playgroup, baby, grantpark

Posted by jetrotz at 11:19 AM | Comments (0)

April 18, 2006

Bad Memories

So this intrepid soul with too much time on his hands recreated the infamous Game Six of the 1986 World Series last inning with the much-loved retro goodness of RBI Baseball from the Super Nintendo. It still pains me to hear the call when Buckner missed Mookie's grounder to first. I had frankly forgotten that Gedman let a wild pitch by to score the tying run. SO he sucks as well!

technorati tags: baseball, nintendo, redsox, mets, rbibaseball, retro

Posted by jetrotz at 01:26 PM | Comments (0)

April 16, 2006

April Showers

The family headed to Rochester for a reminder that Spring has not fully sprung across the entire country - as well as a great visit with Amy's extended family. My mom also joined us for the trip. We've had some rain earlier in the week, and it's been quite chilly - especially today as we prepare to head back to the A-T-L. In the 40s here, expected to hit 85 today at home. Now there's a contrast for ya. Sam had a fab time with all his grandparents in attendance, and thoroughly enjoyed our visit to the Seneca Park Zoo (photo of Amy, Sam and a playful polar bear at right) and the Strong Museum. He also took to singing along with the crowd at both Seders. Zoo gallery here. Passover/Family gallery is here.

technorati tags: passover, zoo, polarbear, sam

Posted by jetrotz at 11:54 AM | Comments (0)

April 09, 2006

One Going on Eighteen

I never really understood what that saying meant, but I'm beginning to comprehend now. Sammy celebrated his first birthday in style yesterday with lots of friends. At Sam's request, we acquired a Sesame Street-themed cake for the adults, and a frosting-filled 'smash cake' for his personal enjoyment. He wasn't that interested in eating it, but did seem to get into the textures of frosting and cake-filled hands. A grand time was had by all. Here is the photo gallery.

technorati tags: sam, baby, birthday, first_time

Posted by jetrotz at 10:34 AM | Comments (0)

April 08, 2006

Kangaroos First Brithday

 

The Grant Park Kangaroos Playgroup gathered at Chez Trotz this past week to celebrate the first birthdays for Sam, Henry and Shoshana. Photos are all by Amy (and they're great!). Click here to check out the gallery. Check here shortly for more pics from Sam's first birthday that we're celebrating today! Amazing to think it was one year ago today that our little guy came into our lives.

technorati tags: sam, grant park, playgroup, birthday, kangaroos, first

Posted by jetrotz at 11:37 AM | Comments (0)

April 05, 2006

Cats and Dogs Living Together?

  What's next, is hell going to freeze over?

Apple will include technology in the next major release of Mac OS X, Leopard, that lets you install and run the Windows XP operating system on your Mac. Called Boot Camp (for now), you can download a public beta today.

Apple - Boot Camp

Apple announced today official support for running WinXP on the Intel Mac. I can't effing believe it. 

technorati tags: winxp, mac, apple, hell freezes over

Posted by jetrotz at 10:14 AM | Comments (0)

April 04, 2006

010203040506 - Singularity Meme

 01:02:03 04/05/06 - a moment that can only happen once every 100 years (assuming a two digit format for the year). It's coming on Wednesday morning. Some have suggested the blogosphere post what they were doing at this auspicious moment. I'll be sleeping, thank you very much.  Thanks to my cousin Herb for emailing me about this. It's apparently all the rage.

technorati tags: singularity, meme, 01:02:03 04/05/06, 010203040506

Posted by jetrotz at 09:32 PM | Comments (0)

April 03, 2006

NYTimes.com Redesigns

Wider format, most popular emailed/blogged/searched feature and a new horizontal drill-down navigation added with more prominent multimedia. Also a very smart 'Today's Paper' feature that let's you find articles as they are organized in the print edition - would like to see more scans of the printed pages there however.  Editor in chief's letter to readers is here. Mytimes.com feature which is supposed to allow users to customize a page with both Times and other web site's content is touted in the letter, but it has a 'coming soon' message when I visited it. Sounds like a custom RSS aggregator to me....

technorati tags: nytimes, redesign, rss

Posted by jetrotz at 11:27 AM | Comments (0)

Digital Movies on Demand

Movielink.com and CinemaNow.com both revealed today that they will now offer movies for download (to own or rent) simultaneously with their DVD release to stores. Reuters story here. The price point is a head-scratcher, though: $20-$30 for the 'own the file' of current DVD releases. With DVDs themselves selling for less than that, and the fact that with DRM in place users will not be able to burn these downloads to removable media, the value here is seriously undercut, IMHO. Unless you happen to have a spiffy Windows MCE or Viiv setup where you can watch these on your TV screen, $30 for a movie I can only watch on my 20" LCD in the home office (or perhaps on my Powerbook Tablet PC (no Mac support, sigh) is not a great value.  I'd much rather get the disc from Netflix or pick it up at BestBuy and watch it with the wife in 50 inches of glorious color.  And given the price point of full-length television shows currently selling on the iTunes store ($1.99), I would like to think that given Apple's history with negotiating their music deals for the ITMS will allow them to cut a better deal on behalf of the consumer - and that their product strategy includes a simpler way of providing hardware that let's us see these downloadable movies in HD-quality on our living room sets. A guy can hope, right?

technorati tags: DVD, ITMS, DRM, Movielink, CinemaNow

Posted by jetrotz at 11:19 AM | Comments (0)