Author Archives ⇒ Brandon Hann

Apple to ban iPhone cameras at concerts?

· Brandon Hann

There are days when I love technology and then there are days when I hate to see the power that it can have. Apparently, Apple is developing software and hardware that can render an iPhone camera useless in very specific situations. According to them, infrared devices can be used to disable all “capturing” features of the camera and/or any other app that has capture capabilities!

How it works

Apple states that infrared devices could be installed on a stage for example and shoot out infrared signals into the audience. Anytime an iPhone is pointed toward the stage, the signals will tell the device not to allow capturing. Whether it will shut off the camera app completely or simply take a blacked out photo is unknown. However, Apple also states that the technology could be used to allow pictures to be taken, but apply a watermark to it declaring its copyright status.

On the flipside, this technology could be used as a search tool. Say you’re in a museum and you want to know more about a painting or sculpture. Simply take a picture of it and those same infrared signals could be used to send informational data to your device for further research.

I can think of at least two other big industries that might implement image blocking technology.

Concerts

Apple iPhone concert picture
Today, more and more concerts and events are banning the use of cameras and recording devices. Long gone are the days where you went to a concert and you got to see the flashing lights of thousands of little cameras in the audience. In those days, nobody seemed to care because there was never anything on the consumer market that could be of any “print” quality for someone to bootleg. At best, you got a blurry, over-exposed shot of a performer on stage, which made good for your personal photo album, but could never be sold to Rolling Stone magazine.

Nowadays, anyone with a few hundred dollars can get insane quality cameras that fit into your pocket and with the use of sites like Facebook and Twitter, you could capitalize on so many different fronts when it comes to distributing content that you don’t own. While this could pose a negative threat to a musician, does it really warrant the use of device-disabling hardware? I mean seriously—with today’s concerts being so dark and in such large venues, do these artists really care about an iPhone picture floating around the Internet? You can’t zoom (with any usable quality) and you can’t flash adequately from far away, so what kind of pictures are you really going to get? Or maybe video…ok I can kind of see the point here, but how does this shaky, no-zoomed video taken from the top section compete with the official DVD release bound to hit the shelves?

I’d say who cares…let the fans get some memories for their Facebook page, prosecute only serious offenders of your copyrighted work and just sit back and be happy that people are actually buying your overpriced concert tickets. But I’m not a musician, so I guess I can’t relate.

Movie theatres

Now here’s probably the only valid reason I can think of to use this technology. Movie theatres already use night vision cameras to scope the audience looking for people who brought their camcorders into the latest blockbuster, but this new tech would literally put a stop to anyone planning on using an iPhone to record the film. Of course this doesn’t seem to address the issue of using some other video recording device, but if this takes off, I’m sure it’ll open plenty of doors for similar protections across a slew of other devices.

However, who really wants a copy of a movie that is likely to be very shaky, a little out of focus and has sound coming from a tiny tin speaker? Of course the argument could be made that if someone could watch a new release (of any quality), they would probably not spend the money going to the theatre to watch it. While this might be true for a very small number of people, I have to disagree. The way I look at it is if you really want to see a film in all it’s big-screen glory with chest-pounding sound and all, you’re going to buy a ticket. If you’re not, then you probably wouldn’t have watched it anyway, but figured you’d take a gander because you found a free download online. To me, nobody loses here.

Attention movie studios, go after the real threat…people who are making real copies of real DVD and Blu-ray discs because I can completely see people wanting to save 50% off of buying a copied version over the retail version of a movie. In this case, real money is lost.

Movie theatres can then focus on the real crime going on at the movies—patrons trying to sneak in cheaper candy and snacks from outside sources and those people that buy one ticket only to bounce around inside the theatre watching more than one movie on a given day. You know who you are!

My two cents

As a photographer, the thought of my camera being disabled is horrible. I understand where and when I can use a real camera, but I always look to my iPhone in times where I don’t have access to a real camera and as such, I would never expect to take “great” photos with it. What this means is if I’m taking pictures with my iPhone, it’s because I wanted to snap a quick shot of something funny and post it to my Facebook. Or maybe I just wanted to share a memory or two.

While I do understand that piracy and copyright infringement run rampant today, I think this is a bad solution. The day this technology is implemented is the day I no longer own an iPhone.

Don Lapre in hot water for bilking $52 million

· Brandon Hann

Anyone who’s my age probably remembers spending a late night or two watching a funny little man on tv telling us how he was able to make $50,000 a week “placing tiny classified ads in newspapers” from his “one-bedroom apartment”. Right in those two quotes, you have the makings of a very successful infomercial—mention how lots of money can be made with seemingly little work and cater to others who might be living in a one-bedroom apartment as these people are likely to want an opportunity that will change their lives.

If you have no idea who I’m talking about, check out this video…it’s exactly what I remember when I was younger:

First of all, this guy is good and there’s no doubt about it. As a firm believer that hard work pays off and there’s no easy way of making lots of money, I never “fell” for one his claims, but I will admit that there were a few times when it seemed like the plan would work. More importantly, there are many other people out there that are worse off than me financially and just might jump at the chance to make even 100 more dollars a week.

The indictment

Don Lapre has been running infomercials like these for the last 8 years or so selling all sorts of money-making packages that are guaranteed to turn your life around. The two most prominent ones include the one above and another selling the The Greatest Vitamin in the World. This is the one that’s garnered the attention of the Feds and the United States Postal Service.

According to the case, Don Lapre is being indicted on 41 counts of conspiracy, mail fraud, wire fraud and promotional money laundering. It’s being claimed that he bilked over $52 million from some 200,000 unsuspecting consumers. Essentially, he’s being accused of running a nationwide scheme to sell worthless internet businesses.

The program

I don’t want to get into all the details here because the case file says it all in a 28-page PDF document available from Casewatch.org, but I do want to briefly explain what it is that Don Lapre does. Using The Greatest Vitamin in the World program as an example, this is how the program works.

  1. Watch Don’s infomercial and get excited about the potential of making lots of money.
  2. Call the 800 number to order the start-up package and personal website for $35.00 plus $13.65 shipping.
  3. Don’s reps would then call back consumers telling them that there were more fees in running the personal website including a $295 setup fee and $9.95 per month hosting fees.
  4. Don’s reps would try to upsell customers into buying web traffic for their new site guaranteeing them that people would come to the site and buy products or signup as new “investors”.
  5. Customers buy traffic packages ranging in price from $500-2000.
  6. Customers are offered sales incentives: Get 20 new people to sign up for the program and get $1000. Get 100 new vitamin customers in a month and get $10,000. For every 5 $1000 bonuses you earn, you get a 7-day paid vacation for 2.

My two cents

First of all, the vitamins are worthless. To Don, getting new sales people all dropping about $3000 to start their own business is where the money really is. Unfortunately, this is nothing more than a pyramid scheme. The ones at the top who are able to get to everyone who hasn’t joined yet will make all the referral fees. The ones at the bottom will have nobody to recruit because they’ve all been recruited…after some time, the pyramid crumbles because there’s nothing left to do but sell worthless vitamins and the guys at the top take their money and run.

Second, if you really think about it, why would Don Lapre (or any tv pitchman) want to tell you his money-making secrets if what he’s doing already makes him so much money? Do you really believe he’s out there trying to help the community? Do you really think he cares about helping you make more money in life? The answer is no. It’s the tell-tale sign of a scam and it’s no different than all those bloggers out there selling you $47 money-making plans that tell you all the secrets of Internet marketing. Trust me, if I discovered a way to make $50,000 a week, I wouldn’t tell anyone! Not because I’m selfish, but because I wouldn’t want to create thousands of competitors out there. If there’s only $50,000 to be made, that means I’d have to share it with everyone else who copies me. That’s not a good business plan!

I’ll tell you a secret. There are no secret ways to make money! There are however innovative ideas that will make someone millions one day, but those aren’t secrets—sometimes those are flukes or fads or streaks of luck. Facebook is a perfect example—sheer luck. The point is to make real money, you have to put in real work. If you think you’re going to make $50,000 a week with only a few minutes of work, you’re either delusional or you’re the one sitting on top of the pyramid because in any other situation, you’re not going to make anything close to that.

Ok, I’m done venting…the last thing I want to say is that I hope Don Lapre goes away forever! He’s a con artist and a thief. At the same time, I hope none of those people get their money back so maybe they’ll learn from their mistakes.

Apple now sells unlocked iPhones

· Brandon Hann

Today’s post is just a quick blurb about Apple now selling unlocked iPhones. Yesterday, I explained the difference between unlocking and jailbreaking and today I found out that Apple now sells the iPhone already unlocked.

Why would you want an unlocked iPhone? The number one reason is so you don’t have to be locked into any contracts with a cell phone provider. These contracts are designed in such ways that keep you under their thumb so you can’t upgrade whenever you want, you can’t change plans very easily and you can’t cancel without paying a hefty termination fee. Here’s a quick breakdown of the benefits:

  • No contracts
  • No carrier locks – You can swap SIM cards in your iPhone with just about any other SIM card you can get a hold of.
  • No country restrictions – Because you can use SIM cards from other services, you are no longer bound by your country of origin.
  • No roaming – You no longer need to roam when travelling out of your network.
  • Resell value – An unlocked phone will always be worth more than regular phones.

The price of an unlocked phone is basically the retail price. In the case of the iPhone 4, the 16GB model is $649 and the 32GB model is $749. Both of these can be purchased directly from the Apple store.

All of this makes you wonder if it’s possible to simply unlock your own device. I know back in the old days, when Nokia was really big, you could literally unlock your phone by uploading some flashed firmware and you’d be good. Today, things are a bit more complicated due to newer technology and better ways for companies to secure their proprietary software. After searching the Internet for some time, I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s no legitimate way to unlock an iPhone.

Of course there are workarounds and carrier hacks that work after jailbreaking your device, but nothing seems to really stick. Generally, these “fixes” will only last until the next software update—assuming you can even update your device without bricking it.

One such workaround was a service provided by GSM Phone Source that claimed they could issue you a new IMEI number that is not locked to AT&T for a small fee of $180, however, accessing their page in regards to the product simply spits out the following: The product you are trying to view no longer exists. Even if they could “whitelist” your IMEI number or provide you with a new one, who’s to say Apple (or AT&T) couldn’t remove that number just as easily it was added?

I found another interesting product called the Rebel Micro SimCard that apparently enables your phone to work unlocked by using a specially designed SIM card and tray that slips right into your existing slot. From what I’ve read and seen, these cards get the job done. But again, you’re still possibly stuck by not being able to upgrade in the future…unless they release new product updates.

My advice is to just buy the officially unlocked phone if you need one!

Apple Store Unionizing, Common iPhone Passcodes and Verizon iPad Recalled

· Brandon Hann

Today I was reading about some current news coming from Apple Inc. and found three little stories that I thought I’d share with you.

Apple Retail Workers Union

Workers Union
It seems that Apple Store employee Cory Moll isn’t too happy with his $14/hr part-time wage he earns in his San Francisco Apple Store, so what does he do? Well, instead of asking his boss for a raise, working towards a promotion or possibly even finding a better-paying job, he decides to make a go at starting a union! The first argument that comes to mind is how well does $14/hr carry you in San Francisco? As I live in the Los Angeles area, I decided to use a cost of living calculator available at BestPlaces.net to compare salaries between Los Angeles and San Francisco. I was somewhat surprised to learn that the cost of living in San Francisco is about 43% higher than LA with housing being 69% greater.

With this information, I plugged in a salary of $29,000 per year. This is rounded down using $14/hr at 40 hours a week before taxes. The calculator tells me if you were making $29,000 in LA, you should find a job that pays $41,331 in San Francisco in order to maintain the same cost of living. Now, I’m not saying Cory can’t live off of $14/hr in San Francisco because I know plenty of other people are getting by making less (SF minimum wage is $9.92), but these numbers do paint a real picture.

The second argument is about whether a union would actually help retail employees or not. Typically, unions are found in heavy industries where work conditions generally include real-life dangers to health, long-term physical injuries and other ailments that employees must “suffer” while trying earn decent wages. Over the years, unions have helped to keep employees safe and protected against negligent employers. However, some might argue that due to the many changes in employment laws and protections offered to employees by national and state governments, unions are no longer necessary. I won’t get into that here, but the point is, aside from maybe securing higher salaries, what real good will a union of Apple employees do? I can imagine one negative downside to this: higher prices for consumers.

At any rate, Cory has acknowledged the daunting task ahead of him in trying to secure favor from all 325 Apple Stores, but he says his first task is to just get people talking.

The Most Common iPhone Passcodes

iPhone lockscreen
Hackers and wouldbe crazy girl/boyfriends listen up! According to the makers of the Big Brother Camera Security app, the most common passcode used on iPhone and iPod Touch devices is ‘1234’. The next most commonly used passcodes are ‘0000’, ‘2580’ and ‘1111’. The app, by the way, allows you to set your screen to lock like normal, but if someone grabs your phone and makes an attempt at accessing the device, it takes two photos of that person using the front facing camera.

The makers of the Big Brother app, Amitay, collected anonymous information from over 200,000 of its users to compile the list of most-used passcodes. Of course, these passcodes are only used in the app itself and Amitay has no access to find out what passcodes are being used on the iOS screen lock, but the results are still ironic considering these very insecure passcodes are being used by individuals who are also using security software.

All of this goes to show just how insecure our passwords are. This is especially true for those out there that not only use a very simple password, but end up using the same password on many different sites! If one lesson can be learned here, it’s to create a unique passcode, don’t use dates and don’t make it obvious. If all that fails, disable “Simple Passcode” in your iOS device—this allows you to create a real, complex password.

Verizon iPad 2 Recalled

Verizon iPad
Ok, so the headline sounds a bit more alarming than the actual news, but the point is that a small number of Verizon iPad 2 units have been recalled due to problems with them connecting to the 3G network. Apple is claiming that an “extremely small number” of units have a manufacturers defect in them that makes it near impossible to get 3G service on the device.

It seems that the recalled devices suffer from having a duplicate MEID code of another device. This apparently happened during the flashing of the chips inside the device. It’s this MEID code coupled with a mobile equipment identifier that make each iPad unique. When an iPad goes to connect, the network authenticates these numbers with accounting to ensure that the device is authorized to be on the network. However, when two devices have the same MEID number, it’s game over for both of them or at least the one that tried to connect last.

It’s been reported that Apple caught the problem quickly, but not quick enough to keep any flawed units from entering the marketplace. With that said, if you have a Verizon iPad 2 and are having connection problems, head on down to the Apple Store and get yourself a new one.

Apple iTunes Match on iCloud

· Brandon Hann

After reading about iCloud and iOS 5 that are coming out this fall, I found out about a new feature that helps these two integrate with iTunes a lot better. Let’s get right to the point.

iTunes Match

This new service is probably the biggest change since iTunes was created! It’s actually a super cool service that allows you to upload your existing songs (songs not purchased on iTunes) to iCloud. Of course iCloud only gives you 5GB of free storage and your music collection probably far exceeds that, so why is this service so great? Well, iTunes Match only uploads music it doesn’t find in the iTunes library! So the chances that some of your music does not match with something in the 18 million plus songs in iTunes is pretty slim. Anything that does match is instantly available on all of your devices at the iTunes Plus bitrate of 256Kbps.
iTunes Match ServiceHere’s a real world example: Currently, if you bought 100 songs on iTunes, these songs are available for download on all of your devices. With iCloud, these purchases can be set to download automatically on all your devices instantly! Now with iTunes Match, let’s say you have an additional 10,000 songs that you’ve ripped to iTunes over the years or purchased from other music sites. iTunes Match will search the iTunes library for these songs and if it finds them, it will instantly give you access to 256Kbps versions without ever touching your iCloud storage space!! Any songs it doesn’t find will need to be uploaded to iCloud if you want them available on your devices, but this will affect your storage space.

The ONE major downside to all of that great access is that there’s a charge for it! iTunes Match costs $24.99 per year. However, the major benefit is that you no longer have to carry around gigs of music on your laptop nor do you have to wonder if everything on your laptop is the same that’s on your desktop—all of you music will always be available to you through iTunes. I forgot to mention the minor downside: you’re limited to 25,000 songs. Sorry!

My two cents

My personal music collection has topped over 100gigs and I know that’s probably nothing compared to some of you hardcore music lovers/torrenters out there, but it is substantially more than the average user. I honestly haven’t even done a recent count, but I’m sure I’m up in the 15,000-20,000 song range, so that should give you some perspective as to how large that 25,000 song cap is.

At any rate, the service is pretty awesome, but unless you plan on listening to all your music on all your devices everywhere you go all the time…then $25 a year might not be worth it. Then again, paying $2.07 per month for musical convenience just might not be such a bad deal!

June 2011 News

· Brandon Hann
I’m currently investigating some major changes to Ledfrog.com. In an effort to further streamline the content I deliver and maximize efficiency for my users, there are times when changes need to be made. This is a listing for proposed changes to take place on or before July 1st, 2011.

Facebook Comments

I’ve been noticing lately, that a lot of blogs are using Facebook for their post comments. This allows anyone with a Facebook account to leave comments on any applicable blog post. The advantage here is that if you’re logged into Facebook during the time you visit Ledfrog.com, you will automatically have access to leave comments on my posts without having to login to my site or use WordPress in any way. This also makes it much easier to have your comment instantly appear rather than waiting for moderation.

My only concern at this point is how SPAM is managed. If I can integrate Facebook comments with Akismet, then I will most likely have this feature integrated by the end of June.

Link Re-organization

As you may have noticed, I use a lot of forwarding links to 3rd party websites. For example, rather than linking to: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ledfrog/, I can simply link to http://ledfrog.com/flickr. This practice was started a long time ago as an easy way for me to tell people how to find certain content without having to write down long URLs. Of course, this was long before URL shorten services were so prevalent.

However, as time passed, I ended up with a lot more of these links than I prefer and some of them have even been duplicated! I even had an old standard where I used the word “jump” before every URL just to separate these links from standard links. At this time, I plan to consolidate these links, delete unused ones, recreate more simplified versions and basically just keep things organized.

Theme Changes

There are no proposed plans to change the entire theme at this time, but the color scheme might be changing. I’m playing around with this idea to better suit the original theme colors of blue, white and black. There will not be an official notification if or when this happens. The changes will go into effect immediately and without warning.

Apple iOS 5 Features

· Brandon Hann

Apple is really great at giving you things you never thought you needed. I remember thinking with iOS 4 and 4.3 came out with all their new features, that we must have everything now. The phone is awesome and what else could you really want or need?! I guess that’s the way life is with technology—just as you settle in with your new device, along comes another one to make you feel like you’re behind the curve again.

There are over 200 features with the new release of iOS 5 coming out this fall, so I won’t touch on all of them, but here are my top 5 favorites:

iOS 5 Features

iOS 5 Notification CenterNotification Center – As it is right now, whenever you’re using an app or playing a game on your device, you will be rudely interrupted if you get a text message or some other app notification. To retrieve your message, you have to exit the app and then come back to it and some apps might not return you to where you were. With Notification Center, all messages and alerts appear at the top of the app in a little information bar which you can then pull down with one swipe, reply to a text, acknowledge an alert or whatever else you need to do and then make it disappear having never to leave your app or game!

Another great feature of this is that these notifications also appear on the lock screen. They are fully functional too, so you can listen to voicemails or read texts without having to unlock your phone and access them directly. I wonder how it’ll handle privacy for those of us who don’t allow the content of text messages to appear on a locked device.

iOS 5 Quick Access CameraCamera – How can you better a camera that already has physical specs that can’t change? Oh yeah, make it available to use without having to fumble around with passcodes and icons. Such a simple solution to a really annoying problem. There’s an old saying that says “The best camera is the one you have at the moment.” and how true is that when you’re out and about and you see something you really wanted to take a picture of, but you missed it because you took your phone out and you spent 30 seconds trying to enter your passcode and then remember where you put your camera app icon?

No more worries with that one! iOS 5 allows you to access your camera right from the lock screen and what’s even better is the ability to take shots using the volume-up button! Adding to this amazing feature is the ability to use grid lines to compose a shot and then perform basic editing like redeye removal, cropping and autoexposure to clean up your photos. When using iCloud, all the photos you take are instantly sent to all of your other iCloud devices. How much better can this get?!

iOS 5 iMessageiMessage – Text messaging has replaced phone calls, but for those of you who don’t like paying for texts or maybe you’re an iPod Touch user or non-3G iPad user and you can’t use text. Or at least if you wanted to, you had to download an app for it. Well not anymore! With iMessage, you can now send texts from any 3G or wi-fi connection to and from all iOS devices and just about any other 3G text-capable device. Plus, you can now see when the other person is typing. Another neat feature is the ability to start a text conversation on your iPhone and continue it on your iPad—no more fumbling around between devices.

A couple of other cool features are the ability to track sent and received messages through tracking receipts and the universal ability to send group messages as well as photos, locations, contacts and videos to all iOS devices.

iOS 5 NewsstandNewsstand – For those of you that have digital subscriptions to magazines or newspapers, you now have a better place to get the latest issues. Before, you were probably downloading them one by one or having to use the publisher’s app to get the latest edition, but now Newsstand will organize all of you subscriptions in one central location. When a new issue comes out, it’s automatically sent to Newsstand with an image of the newest cover automatically. If you want to manage your subscriptions or purchase new ones, you can do so right from Newsstand or access the new subscription store in iTunes.

I only feel sorry for today’s paperboy!

iOS 5 RemindersReminders – There are literally tons of reminder apps out there—some are free, some you have to pay big bucks for. What I never understood is why didn’t Apple ever make their own a long time ago?? Now, we don’t have to worry about that. Reminders makes creating to–do lists super easy. You can create any number of things you need to do complete with due dates, locations and alerts. What’s really cool about the location feature is let’s say you create a grocery list and you map it to your favorite grocery store. On the off-chance that you forgot you actually made the shopping list, you might have gone shopping and didn’t remember some items, right? Not with Reminders!! With location mapping, as soon as you pull into the parking lot of that store, you are sent an alert that reminds you about your shopping list.

This app appears to be absolutely amazing; especially for someone like me who always forgets the little things.

My two cents

From what I see so far, iOS 5 is just more proof that Apple keeps delivering great features with every new update they put out. I know a lot of Droid owners will probably read this and say they’ve had features like this for a long time now, but what I love about Apple is these features are integrated into more than just one device and the they are created by Apple directly. I for one would prefer not to use third-party apps because sometimes they don’t always play well with devices.

At any rate, I can’t wait for this release and if you’re interested in seeing the complete list of features within iOS 5, check out Apple’s website.

Apple iCloud Features

· Brandon Hann

This fall is going to be a big deal for Apple. Not only will they likely be releasing the iPhone 5, but they are officially launching iOS 5 and another nifty little software suite called iCloud. That’s right folks, MobileMe is out and iCloud is in! Cloud computing has been taking off in the last year or so with what seems to be Facebook leading the pack when it comes to networking your social media presence.

Using Facebook as an example, anyone who has an account can see just how easy it is to connect EVERYTHING about our personal lives to just about almost anything on the Internet. Remember the days when you used to have to create new user accounts at every site you wanted to sign up for? Now, it seems just about every website allows you to sign in using your Facebook account. This is a slight example of cloud computing—being able to connect to everything wherever you’re located. However, even the almighty Facebook has its limitations.

Cloud computing as a whole is much more than connecting your wall to Twitter. It involves the centralized storage of your documents, emails, pictures, videos, etc. while connecting (or syncing) these items to all of your devices. In the old days, you had a computer at home and some sort of sync software that you would use to send documents to each one of your devices one at a time. The problem was that whenever you wanted to update something or make other changes, you had to wait until you got home to re-sync everything again.

While Apple iCloud does not purport itself to be an all-inclusive solution to address everything cloud computing can offer, it does provide a very simple and intuitive way for iOS users to wirelessly sync information to smartphones, laptops, computers and Internet storage. I’m hesitant to use the term “sync” because iCloud actually performs this process live, which means you don’t actually have to do anything for your stuff to appear across all of your toys—except to provide a wi-fi connection to the Internet.

iCloud Features

Likely the biggest feature of iCloud will be the free 5GB of online storage you have alongside the free iCloud software itself. However, this is a far cry from the two MobileMe plans that were available: a 20GB individual plan and a 40GB family plan. But as with any online storage service, this is just the basic offering and we can be sure that for some money, you can add more features and storage to your account.

  • Photo Stream – Photo Stream CloudPhoto Stream is probably the second biggest feature to come from iCloud. To explain it simply, I’ll quote Apple: “With iCloud, when you take a photo on one device, it automatically appears on all your other devices. No syncing. No sending. Your photos are just there. Everywhere you want them.” The best part is that all of this works with PCs as well! If you add an AppleTV to the mix, you can create visual slideshows to display on your tv for all to enjoy!
  • iTunes – iTunes CloudiTunes in iCloud allows you to purchase anything you want from the store and have them appear on all registered devices. So imagine you’re at work and you buy a new song on your iPad. This song gets stored on iCloud and then gets synced automatically to your iPhone, which will come in hand for your ride home when you want to plug the phone into your car.
  • Wi Fi Backup – Now you don’t even have to connect your device to a computer to do your backups! When you go to sleep at night, your device will automatically back itself up over your home wireless network.

My two cents

I love the concept of cloud computing because it’s less hardware for me to own and that means less trouble when it comes to connecting devices and making sure that every computer has all of my updated files. I’m happy to know that iCloud still has many of the features I wanted to use when MobileMe came out, but didn’t want to pay for. We have yet to see what kind of “premium” services iCloud will bring to the table, but as it stands now, I think the free, basic service will be just enough for my usage.

Ford's New Spokesman is An Orange Puppet

· Brandon Hann

When we think of car commercials, we think of sweeping pan shots of a country hillside with winding roads that are always wet, yet the sun is shining brightly without a cloud in the sky. A brand new car then makes its way down the road usually swerving out of the way of random objects to show its excellent handling. I could go on all day with the amount of clichés you find in just about every car commercial, but let’s not. Instead, I want to explore some newer ways of car advertising.

I think one of the funniest car commercials I’d seen in a long time was the Kia Soul commercial where there are all these hamsters are stuck on the road in their running wheels not going anywhere and then out of the blue, a Kia Soul rolls up blasting some music with two hamsters inside dressed down and rockin’ out with sunglasses while tapping their paws on the door frame. Now, although the ad didn’t make me want to go buy a Soul (mainly because I had just bought a new car), it did accomplish something that’s probably more valuable: it made me remember what the product was.

Doug

Now, on to the orange puppet! His name is Doug and the current ad campaign has him hanging out with John, a Ford employee set out in the Los Angeles area to promote the new 2012 Ford Focus. There are two sides to this campaign—the first being the promotional side where they discuss and showcase the car’s features and the second being the comedic banter between the two.

Doug is somewhat obnoxious, egotistical, maniacal and even a bit sexist from time to time, but he’s FREAKIN’ hilarious!! I happened to catch the video on YouTube just off the whim and I immediately subscribed to his channel, focusdoug and proceeded to watch every single video that he has uploaded. Now, I really want more. If you like the sort of dry, dumb humor that you can find on a show like The Office, you’re going to love this! Here is one of my favorites to give you an idea:

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8_2fMw6m4E&hd=1

In today’s world, the younger generation is continuing to drive market places and essentially change the face of advertising. While I grew up watching McDonald’s commercials with perfectly designed food products, today’s kids are growing up with Dominos showing home-grown photos of actual pizzas delivered to their customers—the not-so-great looking ones included. It’s the generation that is Internet-based and socially driven. They practically do everything online from sharing videos, discussing trending topics and communicating in almost every way. It’s no wonder why Ford has chosen this forum to broadcast Doug to the masses.

Social Media Advertising

Just a few years ago, every major company was flashing their “dotCOM” all over the place in hopes that you’d come to their website. Now, everywhere you look is a Facebook or Twitter link with phrases like “Like us on Facebook” and “Follow us on Twitter”. The idea is simple. Rather than try and get people to remember your website, all you need to do is send them to a site they are already on and interact with you there. At this point, you can create fun little games, phone applications, interactive surveys and more.

Users like this because they’re already on Facebook and more importantly, they know how it works.

With new ad campaigns coming out featuring a more toned-down appearance and showing that large companies have a sense of humor about their own products, it’s easy to see who they’re marketing to. Whether you like or not, websites and services like Facebook and Twitter are here to stay and social media will slowly become the new form of advertising and promotions.

My two cents

While some people call these ads gimmicks, I actually find them to be smart. If we look back into history, there have been a lot of “gimmicky” characters out there: Disney has Mickey, Dominos had the Noid, Geico has the Gecko and the Cavemen, McDonald’s has Ronald. No matter what your feelings are on these mascots, the point is that they make you remember the products they’re pushing.

In my opinion, I hope Doug sticks around. Heck, make a TV show with him, sell him to consumers, make t-shirts or as one YouTuber said, “Ford should give away a free Doug with every Focus purchase.” The response to that last one from focusdoug: “We’re working on that.”

Find yourself on ArrestCentral.com

· Brandon Hann

It’s Friday again, so here’s another less-than-ledfrog style article. I was romping around the Internet taking care of some much needed things like bills, eBay auctions, etc. and I decided to see my Google rankings when I typed in my name, Brandon Hann. Under normal circumstances, I usually hold all of the top 10 spots on the first page, but today I found something interesting.

ArrestCentral.com

After typing in my own name into Google, this was the link I found:
Google name search
First, I was amazed that there was such a website that allows you to research police bookings, but what’s worse is that it shows up right on the first page of Google! Now on the surface of things, this site seems like a great idea. I mean, you can look up people that might be in your neighborhood or check up on employees at work or find people that might be working with your children. But I wonder if there might be some type of privacy concerns that come out of this site.

After reading the FAQ on the site, it clearly states that ArrestCentral’s goal is to provide the public with a level of transparency so law-abiding citizens can keep tabs on people in their area who have committed some law, but may have not necessarily be convicted of such a crime.

My two cents

There is of course a way to have your name removed from the database, but naturally, it costs $100. I’m not a criminal myself, but it does perturb me that my name is associated with another individual who is. So now, if someone happens to be searching for me, they’ll see my name and it’s possible that a huge misunderstanding could take place.