I WANT an e-book reader and I must have one!  I am tired of all the books I buy and having to keep up with them.  I have broke down my thoughts and would love any comments to help me finally decide.

Kindle 

The kindle with its low price has me wanting to go that direction more than any other.  I know what type of books I like to read and amazon book store has most of the titles available for the Kindle.  The e-ink and battery life of the new generation is very attractive.  The big downside, I don't get all the cool features of the iPad.  Apps, web surfing and so on.

Nook

In my opinion, I feel like this is a very similar product to the Kindle.  Barnes and Nobles saw the success of the Kindle, tweaked and added some features and called in Nook.  To me, there just does not seem to be enough originality to make me want to chose one over the other.  Additionally, when I searched the BN site for books I like to read, less were available for the nook than the Kindle.  I welcome someone to prove me wrong on this one and bring up some points I have missed.

iPad

Total awesomeness.  I want it!  But wait, reports I have read say two things bad.  1. it's not that great of a platform to read books on.  2. because of the light it emits, the iPad is more like watching TV than reading a book.  Meaning that my sure fire way of getting sleepy, reading, now is going to keep me awake.  Apple's selection doesn't seem to be that great right now (at least for the books I like to read).  But it is Apple, that will change.  I can't remember that last time I bought music anywhere but iTunes.  We all know Steve Jobs wish is for the same thing to happen with books and media in general.  We are now saying, "what's a CD?", but Steve Jobs wants us saying "What's a book" or "What's a Magazine".      

Wrapping it up

What's makes this the hardest for me to decide is that I am cheap.  I want to be a cool kid and have an iPad.  But it's the most expensive option. My other issue in general is that a recent report shows that people read much slower on the "ebooks" than real paper.

I have switched all my person email to a Google Apps account.  I wanted the email control and the customized domain.  Only problem was that I couldn't use most of the other Google products.  In particular: blogger, picasa, and voice.

I searched for some time trying to figure out how to do this.  Nothing useful was coming across my screen.  I accidentally discovered how to do what I so desperately wanted Google to do when I was trying to setup adsense.  

Here's how you do it:

Create a new Google account.  Here is the link. 

https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount.  

Use your Google Apps domain email address and follow instructions.  Once complete / confirmed, you can use most of the Google products.

Bonus tip:

If you want to transfer your Google voice account from your Gmail.com account to your Google Apps domain, click this link.  

http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=cjlWRDFTWERkZEIxUzVjSmNsN0ExU1E6MA.  

You must complete the Google account setup first though.

Disclaimer: not every bank has this setup yet, my bank just happens to be leading the pack.  

I got my iPhone 4 about three weeks after it had been released.   I am finally one of the cool kids and I do not have a blackberry or windows phone anymore.  I installed my banking app and remembered someone telling me that their app allowed depositing of checks via the app by taking pictures.  Honestly, I thought this was the most useful thing to do with the camera and the iPhone in general.  

I get expense checks from time to time that are not direct deposited and my bank has no local branches.  Previous to the iPhone app, I had another bank locally, and I had authorized wire transfers between the two.  But this still required me driving a ways, depositing the check and then transfer the funds.  iPhone app comes along and this is not a problem any more.  I choose mobile deposit and take a picture of the front and back (which is signed with and labeled for deposit only into my account).  Funds are available immediately.  

To me, this is a game changer and should send banks into examining why they have so many branches when a smart phone could do a bulk of deposits for individuals.  Commercial deposits, well, not every solution is a good fit to every problem.   

The other night I was up late (imagine that), and I was tinkering with my phone and some possible cool apps.  I came across one of my all time favorite apps, QIK for my Blackberry.  QIK is really a website, www.qik.com, that allows you to stream live video from your video camera enabled cell phone.  I live streemed this video from my Phone and then it was automatically Published to the site.  You can also mark videos as Private, share them with specific people, or publish to several social networking websites. Your Live Streams are also archived.

If you are also interested in finding out more about the RoomAlert, check my blog or subscribe to the RSS feed.  I Should be posting about it soon.

Very Cool!

So okay, I wasn't able to sleep so I started reading some email. You kow trying to catch up on some inbox reading.  I then came across my occasional MCP Flash email that told me about a new online game.  It is a  Microsoft Professional Quiz Show style game!  I know sounds geeky, but I figu re if you are reading my blog you might be into this kind of thing.  Anyways, You can use your passport login on Live ID whatever you have, and give it a go.  If you login it will track your progress so that you can leave and pick up where you left off later.  Also for me it was adictive, and it points out what I need to brush up on (since this is my career I figure I need to stay sharp). 

Questions Range from Easy, Medium, and Hard and it is timed when you see your answer choices.  There are also some lifelines or as they call them, "Vouchers" that you can use.  Questions topics include but are not limited  to: Win 2008, 2003, Exchange 2007, Win 7, XP, and SQL 2005.  There could be more but I didn't play for long.

The name of the game is Are You Certifiable?.  And, here is the link: http://www.microsoft.com/click/areyoucertifiable/default.aspx

If you want add me as a friend in the game, screen name: DRMILES

Happy Gaming!

I was one of THOSE people who held my breath for the new apple tablet dubbed the iPad.  I won't say I was obsessed with it, but I did follow the it awfully closely, devouring any kind of rumor about specs or leaks of its capabilities.  On the day of the launch, I had three tabs of my firefox open to different livebloggers who were at the event and I would cycle through them to see the product pictures or specs.  

In the interest of full disclosure, The Strickland Group is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.  I have worked with and advocated for Microsoft technologies for more than half my life.  I was an early adopter of Windows 95, Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows 7.  I used a Windows Mobile phone for years, though I have an iPhone currently.  I really wanted to love the iPad.

I think the iPad will be a great device for the average well-to-do consumer.  I'd even go so far as to say that when the common home user is looking to replace their XP laptop in a year or two, the iPad might be a good enough choice for them.  And at an entry point price of $499, it's not too shabby.  If you were to buy it as a top of the line e-book reader and that's all you wanted to use it for, it would be a great device.

However, despite all my efforts, I just don't love the iPad. Sure, it's not all bad - at least it's got it's looks.  Also, the websites they demoed rendered beautifully.  I believe it would be a pleasure to read the New York Times on the device.  But it's what the thing won't do that's stands out for me.

• No support for flash.  Are you kidding me Apple?  You're going to release an device that "puts the internet in your hands" that doesn't play flash.  Dumbfounded.
• No camera.  Would have been an amazing video conferencing device.
• No multi-tasking.  I can't listen to pandora while I'm surf?  I can't  pause a game I'm playing and go google something I just saw on TV? I can't keep IM going in the background? 

Oh well.  Holding my breath for iPad 2.0...

With over 100,000 IPhone Apps and more than 300 new apps created every day, it can be impossible to find apps that are worth the download.  Here is a list of my current top 10 favorite FREE iphone apps (in no particular order).

Urban spoon - Shake your phone and this app will suggest a local restaurant to eat at.  Sorted by city, type of food and price, Urban Spoon will serve up a world of choices.

Pandora - free internet radio.  This app will build a custom radio station based on your faviorite artists

Flixster - movie showtimes, previews and reviews

Shazam - need to know what that annoying song playing overhead at the grocery store is?  Shazam will tell you

USA Today - great news app.  Really like the daily pictures

AP Mobile - Another great news source

Kindle - plenty of free content, but great paid content as well

InstaPaper - find an interesting article on your computer?  Hit the Instapaper icon and that article will be formatted for the iphone and synched to your phone for reading at your leisure.

Toobz Free - hours of mindless entertainment

Boxed In - Great puzzle game