The Glee iPhone app

April 16th, 2010
glee_cast_fox-1

We love our iPhones…we LOVE Glee, so imagine how ridiculously happy I was this morning to discover the new Glee app.

Charlie had hardly finished telling me about the app and I was off downloading it and warming up my shaky vocal chords whilst practically cartwheeling into the meeting room to try it out.

The application allows you to sing along with the poptastic stars, share your songs on facebook, Email, Twitter and Myspace, listen to other hopeful/hopeless singers from around the world and link up with other Gleeks (Glee geeks for those of you who don’t know).

I’ve just listened back to my rather shocking version of ‘somebody to love’ that I sang with Rachel from Glee…I should be mortified that the rest of the office turned off the radio to listen to me do my best Mariah Carey impression, but I’m not, because I know that as soon as they have a go, they’ll be just as hooked as I am.

Thanks Apple, I didn’t think it was possible..but you’ve made me love my iPhone even more.

Right, enough of this, I’m off to practice my rendition of ‘Don’t stop believing!’

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The new Glee iPhone app

April 16th, 2010
Glee

We love our iPhones.

We love Glee.

That is all.

(review from Hannah to follow, she’s singing in the board room right now)

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The iPad, what else?

January 28th, 2010
Steve Jobs

It would seem rather against the grain to talk about anything that isn’t the iPad today, even though I’ve spent most of my day talking about anything but. (That’s jam sandwiches, pelvic toners, entrepreneurs, baby food menus, hall tests and grapefruit if you were wondering)

Anyway onto the iPad, after reading the announcement via twitter during ‘The Derby’ last night and reading the opinions of tech journalists in the papers this morning I’ve just managed to watch the video on Apple’s site and I have to say, that, just like everyone else, I think it looks like a big iPhone.

I am convinced that, like all Apple products, you won’t realise you need one until you get one (or all your friends do first) and I really like the name; it’s like an iPod, it’s like a pad, geddit? Best use of the name so far in a blog from Stephen Fry today entitled “iPad About”.

So if we’re all reserving judgement on the product, which seems to be the general consensus, the thing we can marvel at instead is Apple’s PR skills. When was the last time someone launched a laptop and the world’s media gave it this amount of attention?

By keeping everything about their product a secret Apple created the ultimate crescendo of excitement around the launch event. Rather than leaking specs or samples to favoured journalists or bloggers, Apple kept the tech community holding their breath and they passed their excitement on to their readers, friends and followers.

If only Apple didn’t seem to enjoy making such beautiful adverts they wouldn’t need to advertise at all.

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Learn to build an iPhone app

May 19th, 2009

If you want to be at the forefront of any subject there is no better way than to check it out online.

This week, I’ve been swotting up with Stanford University, who have utilised iTunes-U (a learning focused section on iTunes) to go one step further and produce a series of free public lectures. They focus on how to build iPhone applications and have proved incredibly popular with over one million downloads in only seven weeks.

The lectures are recorded from live classroom teachings delivered by Apple engineers. Apple currently has around 40,000 iPhone applications with new and amusing ‘apps’ being created daily.

With applications being touted as the new brand advertising – it’s no wonder the lectures have been so well received.

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Money Money Money; it’s a Twitter world

March 31st, 2009

People are following me on Twitter. This in itself seems rather odd to me, even odder that it’s usually American evangelical Christians.

Today though upon checking my emails I discovered that one of my new followers is Trafford Centre Shop which is quite possibly the first viable business use of Twitter I’ve seen.

It’s a simple concept: if you follow them they will send you updates on what’s on offer in what shops in the Trafford Centre. Today HMV’s Easter Sale has started.

To my mind this is the perfect way for Twitter to make someone some money. If I live in Manchester knowing what’s on sale at the Trafford Centre might make me pop out and buy it.

Following Apple and The Guardian is interesting but it’s not about to make me head out for today’s paper and another mac.

Perhaps teaming up is the way forward. If all the sandwich shops in Manchester were telling me their daily special in one feed I’d be truly realising the potential of Twitter.

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iPod’s first words

March 12th, 2009

Yesterday Apple released a new iPod shuffle, and it talks.

No really, apparently it’s just too little to have a screen (it’s smaller than an AA battery), and this is why rather than showing you what’s playing, it tells you.

How clever is that? What I’m coming to learn though, as I become acquainted with my new MacBook, is that the whole damn operation is just clever. Not in a geeky showy-offy way either, in an actual, practical useful clever way.

Why trawl through loads of windows on your desktop when you could swing the cursor into the corner and get them to line up neatly? Why change all the settings on each of your iPhone functions separately when you could have them gathered together under one button?

When I read the stories about the new shuffle though it dawned on me that perhaps Apple are too clever for their own good. A couple of years ago I got a lovely shiny 80GB iPod classic as a present and it’s still going strong. So I’m reluctant to get an iPhone (I have a phone too you see) and I definitely don’t need a shuffle.

I’m sure there are a few people who’ll throw their old non-talking shuffle aside and rush out to buy the new one, but to the rest of us the old one’s still working fine thanks very much.

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TV Update

February 27th, 2008

The continuing saga of my TV-less world continues (new readers start here) as the nice man from DHL has just delivered my Elgato Hybrid, turning my 20″ iMac into, well, a tele.

Set-up took all of three minutes – gotta love Macs – and I’m now watching BBC News 24 from my Virgin Media box on my “new” flat screen TV (with built-in computer).

(The set-up is this: VM box, Wii, PS2, turntable and DVD player all go into an amp/receiver. Sound goes to the 6 speakers, video signal now goes to the iMac).

So – two vital questions: is the picture good? Oh, yes. Not as sharp as my old CRT perhaps but better than many LCDs I’ve seen. And – possibly more importantly – is everything in sync? So far, so good. There appears to be no timing issues with the tele, the PS2 works (on a quick test) and I now have the advantage of being able to watch all my media (online, offline, disc and download) through one device.

Ok, I’ve admitted it before, I am a geek but, ignoring that for a second, what’s not to like about this arrangement? Was it hard to set-up? No. Is it easy to use? Most definitely. Can I seamlessly switch between BBC News 24, YouTube and a video podcast I just downloaded? Yes – and so can my five year-old daughter.

The lines between delivery mechanisms are already starting to blur – look at the BBC’s iPlayer as one example – and the tipping point for this stuff to move from geeks to “Joe Public” isn’t too far.

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Quick thought.

February 15th, 2008

So, about two weeks ago my TV stopped working. It switched on, well the button moved, but then there was just a clicking noise deep inside its bowels somewhere.

Deep inside? Yes, I still have an old-fashioned CRT TV. 32 inches of widescreen pleasure with a picture sharper than any LCD or plasma screen I’ve ever seen.

Yes it’s a big so ‘n’ so but such is the layout of my house that it fits nicely into one of the alcoves next to the chimney breast. Anyway, I digress.

So, the tele packed up and, being a busy chap, I needed something to use in its place whilst it got fixed – or condemned. Step forward my trusty 20″ iMac .

What’s not to like? 20″ crystal clear widescreen, the audio goes straight into my surround sound amplifier, it plays DVDs through the built in drive, it plays any video file I throw at it through software, it controls my enormous iTunes library, I can connect to Internet TV stations…. etc. The only downside is there’s no way of playing my PS2 or Wii (for the kids you understand) and my Virgin TV subscription is a waste.

Well, I thought it was anyway. Then I did some digging – and found the Elgato Hybrid. The USB connector connects to the iMac, the video from the PS2, Wii, Virgin set-top box etc. connect via composite (the yellow cable in the picture), turning the iMac into a very fancy flatscreen TV. It costs £70.

I know I’m a geek, I embrace my geek status but this could be a perfect example of what I always say about technology: that I don’t love it for its own sake but for what can be done with it. What’s not to like about a TV screen that plays anything and everything you throw at it – and for £70 that could be what I have.

Mmmm…. I wonder.

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