Monday, January 23, 2012

If you are not making the progress that you would like to make and are capable of making, it is simply because your goals are not clearly defined.

Last year, no that's not correct, at the end of 2010 I got an iPad. But within a couple of months I forgot it on an airplane and then it was gone.

Some time during 2011, I bought an Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, as the latest fix to my gadget addiction.
Now after using it for, ohh a good chunk of time, I thought about my usage of it and other devices.
During the day, I work with computer networks and for that you need computers. I have been unsuccessful in integrating the tablet into my work.
Its okay for taking notes, reading emails and some internet surfing, but as of yet, it can not replace my laptop. I have to have my laptop to do my job, so why drag along the tablet when my laptop covers all my  needs.

The short version is,

The laptop does it all.

The tablet lets me surf the internet, read emails, read twitter, read books etc, its a device I get information from, but it really slows down my productivity if I try put some information back into the world. Even short 140 chars Twitter posts are cumbersome to write.

The mobile phone is fighting for the same usage space in my daily life, the only thing the tablet does better is, reading books (kindle app) and surfing the web, but just barely.

I came to this realization when we where planning some new webpage at work, I thought about my usage of the internet and wanted the new things we are working on to cater to my usage, ##%# focus groups :)
My usage basically is, I stay updated through my phone and to a degree the tablet, but if I want to contribute anything more than short messages that's comfortable to write on my phone, I need a real keyboard.

Question we are facing, how to get the me to write more on the go or get me to come back and write later. Because I will not comment or write anything more than a tweet size message on my phone or tablet. Is voice input the holy grain, will the voice controlled Star Trek computer be the solution?
And will that make me dump my trusty old battered laptop?

Title is a quote from Paul J. Meyer

The tech Evolution

I've been in the digital computer/telecom "tech" business since I left school. But my attachment to anything tech related goes back to my Atari 2600 and then onto my Commodore 64, the road has personally been interesting and extremely rewarding

With my first exposure to online communities in about 1990 and with that also a beginning interest in anything telecom which had some sort of interaction with computers. During these years you get to see the hype/cool thing that everybody must/should do and of course how/why this is a money maker.
Most of the time things seem to be recycled every so often, one of my favorite ones is the good old "Media Convergence".

To me, Media Convergence goes back to my beloved old Amiga, the Amiga was supposed to be the ultimate multimedia convergence device. It had better sound and graphics than almost anything else in the world at that time, regardless of price, especially in the home segment. Most people today have no clue what an Amiga is or was, but Media Convergence is still flung around like its the newest most creative idea  somebody has had the last 6 months.

So what is the Media Convergence device/thing today, well Sony wants it to be their Playstation 3 or maybe one of their new Bravia's with GoogleTV support. Microsoft got their XBox 360 and Media versions of Windows. Apple looks to be going the other way, iTunes is the converged delivery platform. The iPod, iPad, iPhone and Apple TV devices are just the displays. Google wants to be all over the place, with Chrome, Android and ChromeOS.

But do we really want to do everything with/from the same device?

My phone is for when I am mobile, but it can not replace the experience of watching a movie on my 42" TV nor going to the movies.
The iPad replaces my laptop to some degree in a better way than my phone, but its the semi mobile device, but its not a very mobile device.
The laptop is for "real" work and not just keeping up to date. The iPad for networking debugging or creating documents, don't think so.
Desktop computer is for my office work, it just offer so much bang for the buck that its a better way for me to work in general.

PS3/Xbox360, gaming is great, watching movies etc is also great, but what happens when somebody wants to watch a movie, someone else wants to watch tv and then again others wants to game?