So for some unknown reason, my last post about Google’s new +1 service isn’t allowing comments and is throwing a 404 page when you try to post a comment. I have no idea why its doing that. lol Anyway, if you have a gmail account (that is public) and want an invite when they reopen them. Comment here instead since I can’t seem to fix.
Category: tech
+1
I was lucky enough to score a beta invite to Google’s new +1 (plus one) aka Google+. [1]Thanks to several blog buddies who sent me invites I’ve been using it several days now and already I like it way better than Facebook. First and foremost, if and when you ever decided to leave Google+, you can take all your data with you. I’d love to see you try that w/FB. Mind you, some of the features are very similar just with different names. Friend groups are called Circles for example.
Visually, the layout is very user-friendly and easy on the eyes. I found it very simplistic and uncluttered. One might say too uncluttered. Of course, being in beta that is understandable. Anyway, if you’ve ever used Facebook, you’ll find some familiarity to it. Overall, it’s a much nicer interface. Navigation is super easy as well. While everything isn’t 100% integrated, its very easy to bounce around to your gmail, calendar, contacts, youtube, buzz, etc via the ever present in-page toolbar that is common to most Google sites. Your news feed aka Stream is pretty straight-forward and easy to navigate as well.
My personal opinion is that integration is going to be key for Google+. Right off the bat, you get the option to merge your existing picasa account when you sign up. The two services worked seamlessly together. Changes/additions/deletions in picasa showed up immediately in +1. You still have to do most of your editing/organizing thru the picasa site directly. I expect that will change over time. Google has focused on tying a lot of their services together and +1 is obviously going to become the hub of that integration. Not to mention, you have easy access to your main Google dashboard right from the site via the afore mentioned toolbar.
The chat function is called “hangout”. You can chat with up to 10 people at once, with or without video. I encountered one bug while using it but I think it had more to do with my cheesy laptop cam. Otherwise, it worked as expected.
Privacy is much easier to use. For some this will be a big bonus. Beyond the option to take your data with you if you leave, every section can be customized to your liking. It’s a simple right click on the section to customize settings. Some are auto-shared, others are not. I found it very intuitive. You can immediately make changes. It also respects your settings from picasa as well i.e. public vs private albums.
A huge bonus for me was the mobile app. Its currently only available for Android devices but I read an iOS version is coming as well as a mobile website. The mobile app is equally simple and easy to use. It had one feature which I fell in love with immediately. You can set you Android device to automatically upload your pictures and/or videos from your phone directly to the site. You can upload all your existing media as well as auto-upload any new media you acquire. Even better, the upload directly is automatically marked private. This is obvious for so many reasons but I appreciate the fact that they realize every pic I take with my phone isn’t always fit for “public” consumption. heehee Sharing is expected and made easy but it isn’t forced on you like Facebook does.
There is a new feature which I’m still getting used to called Sparks. Its basically like their tag service which lets you set a saved search option that constantly updates. In other words, if you like all things Android, you can set a Spark that updates constantly from across the web with any references to Android. You can set it to be as detailed or vague as you want. Basically, you save a key word or phrase and it will update for you continuously. I currently consume most of my news via my phone’s RSS app but this might be a nifty feature for those who don’t utilize their phone for reading.
People are already incorrectly referring to it as a “Facebook killer.” Hardly. Facebook is firmly entrenched into our way of life. And I don’t think Google is under any illusion it will kill Facebook. That said, this won’t be a failed venture like their Wave Project. Google’s only failure here would be to let the service languish as it has for a variety of other beta projects in the past. Its obvious Google has big plans for this new service and if I’m right in my thinking, it will quickly become a portal for all things Google and social networking. Even in beta, its off to a huge start. Done properly, it will become the competitor that the doomed mySpace used to be. Competition would encourage FB to actually respond to more user feedback/complaints. A good thing in my book. Both FB and Google have huge user bases, of which often overlap, so I can’t either killing off the other.
Of course, being in beta there are a few cons. I think many of these will change over time. The biggest being you can only auto-add friends via your current list of Google users. You can manually add/invite others but that is very time consuming. There is currently no option to add friends directly from your twitter or Facebook accounts. You can search your hotmail or yahoo email, but I don’t use either of those so that didn’t help me at all. There is very little integration outside of other Google services. You also can’t import or export to/from twitter. You can pull an RSS feed of your stream but that’s sort of a workaround.
As mentioned, the service is off to a roaring demand. In fact so much in demand, inviting others has been turned off a couple times already. If you’d like an invite, make sure your email address (preferably a gmail one) is included with any comments below.
PS. I’m sure you noticed, I added the +1 icon to my blog posts as well. click, click, click!
References
| ↑1 | Thanks to several blog buddies who sent me invites |
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2GX
So after 8 fucking days [1]when they promised 2-3. the US Post Office delivered my phone! It’s the LG Optimus with a Tegra dual-core processor rebranded for T-mobile.
I’m liking it so far. Its got a nice big bright screen, hdmi port, 8 megapixel camera, blah blah blah. Its definitely geared for audio/visuals. Bigger speakers, strong graphics support, and not to mention the hdmi. I inherited the Nexus S from Apple guy after he went back to the iphone. I loved the Nexus because its almost pure Android. No tinkering, no blocks, no carrier overlays that often make Android horrible. Overlays that also make it harder to upgrade to newer versions as they come available. Tmo has been pretty consistent about pumping out phones with pure Android. The Nexus S also had the up and coming NFC chip but it was a battery hog so I left it turned off. I used it only 2 or 3 times.
Anyway, the new phone hums along pretty fast. There aren’t many apps/games written to take advantage of the dual-core yet but multitasking is a dream. Even heavy processor games hum. I’m no big on gaming on my phone but its nice knowing it can handle it. I haven’t had a chance to do much more beyond that yet. Being on Tmo’s new HSPA+ network, the data speeds are a lot better. Tmo might be the underdog of the big 4 but it’s been catching up fast. [2]Sadly, innovation will disappear after it gets fully gobbled up by shitty AT&T The phone is currently running Froyo which isn’t quite the newest version of Android but Tmo is promising an update to Gingerbread soon.
My biggest complaint with the new crop of super smart phones has been battery life. Apple gets props for designing theirs with longer batteries. I loved the Nexus S, but as I mentioned, the battery was awful. It got to where I was afraid to leave the damn house w/o the power cord. Even worse, for some unknown reason it took forever to charge the damn thing. My Nexus One (made by HTC, not Samsung) would charge up in just over hour. Thankfully, LG seems to have borrowed this concept as my new battery charges in about the same time frame. Anyway, I surf, listen to music, check email, text, read news/blog feeds, etc all day long on my phone. I’m a heavy user and I know I can’t expect most phones to go all day w/o needing to be charged. That said, I should be able to go more than a few damn hours. Luckily this one seems to be doing ok and its running on a dual-core chip.
I was tempted to wait for the HTC Sensation coming out soon but that’s 2-3 months away and waiting always seems to be a waste. There’s always a new, bigger, better phone on the horizon. lol Hopefully, this one will last me until I figure out if I’m staying with Tmobile as it gets swallowed by shitty AT&T or jumping ship to Sprint.
T-mattle
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve probably heard by now that AT&T [1]formerly Cingular and otherwise known as the company with the absolute worst service in the world has finalized a deal to buy T-mobile. *pause here for really long exasperated sigh* Seriously, I’m totally upset. The title is a spoof on the two names. I joined Tmobile almost 10 years ago and for the most part have been a very happy customer. I will be making the jump to someone else as soon as I can. I’m hoping there will be an out-clause for the merger but even if they don’t, I’ll probably switch.
AT&T’s move was a smart one but not because they were afraid of Tmobile, hardly. But, by buying Tmobile, AT&T gets access to their infrastructure which will boost their coverage significantly, not to mention the extra wireless spectrum. It makes total sense from a purely business point of view. Sadly, I’m not the only Tmo customer who is more than a little upset. Even worse, Sprint was in negotiations with Tmobile to merge when the parent company sold’em to AT&T. *sigh* A Sprint/Tmobile merger would have had its technical challenges as they use different technology to power their networks. But the combined company would have totally given Verizon and AT&T a run for their money. By snatching Tmobile away from Sprint, AT&T effectively bitch-slapped Sprint into remaining the #3 carrier in the US, probably permanently.
For now, I’m stuck with it. I’m hoping for the best but I’m not really expecting it. I’m girding my loins for the worst actually.
References
| ↑1 | formerly Cingular and otherwise known as the company with the absolute worst service in the world |
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Nexus S
I recently acquired the Nexus S phone from Apple guy. He got it as an xmas present from me when he’d reached his limit with the abysmal service from AT&T. Sadly, I couldn’t permanently convert him to the good side of the force. He kept having issues with the phone and made the jump back to an older iphone hacked to work on Tmobile’s network. [1]Apparently, the 3g and the 3gs iphones both work on Tmobile once hacked
Anyway, so the phone has come to me and we sold my beloved Nexus 1. I hated to do it as I loved the N1. The N1, while having plenty of external storage, had very limited internal storage. Only certain app makers have taken the time to allow apps to be moved between internal/external storage. As Android has taken off on a plethora of devices, the problem is fast becoming moot. But, it also means my old N1 was quickly running out of available internal storage.
I’m loving the Nexus S overall. I can’t seem to reproduce all the problems that Apple guy was having save one. [2]I think he just refused to be converted That being the battery life, which is disappointing. I can burn thru the existing battery in about half a day easily with just moderate use. Its apparently something to do with how often the phone reports errors back to Google servers. There is a hack out for it but I don’t wish to wipe the phone again just to test it out.
Everything else is pretty good. The internal storage is more than adequate for my needs. The processor is just as fast, if not faster. The screen is super clear and very responsive. It has more codec support and some of the minor but annoying hardware designs that plagued the N1 have been rectified in Samsung’s version of the Google phone. My one hardware design complaint is the the volume rocker. It sticks out just a tad more than I would like and I often accidentally adjust it just by handling the phone.
This should tied me over for at least another 6 months to a year. lolol
Sa-kur-atee!
I’ve noticed a huge upswing in attempts to crack the admin account for my blog lately. Way more than usual. Its no secret I monitor my log-in records. Its an easy way to spot people up to no good. I use a legacy hack from an old version of WP. It records your key strokes at log-in, your IP, how many times you fail to log in, etc. If I notice someone with too may attempts they get a friendly email (if I recognize them) or their IP blocked (If I don’t).
I can’t help but wonder if my last post might have spurred them on. hehehe I keep a pretty good password on my admin account already. Plus, you only get 5 tries before the system blocks you anyway. [1]courtesy of a little plugin called User Locker If you can crack it in 5 or less tries, I probably deserve to be hacked.
As an extra precaution, I switched over to a different user account. You probably won’t notice anything different on your end. I figured one extra layer of protection wouldn’t hurt. The administrator account with WordPress comes with a default administrator account and you can’t delete it. That said, there is no reason you have to use it either. You can simply set the password to something incredibly complex and create your own account with admin privileges. Tip: If you use the same plugin mentioned above (or a similar one), incorrectly log into your default admin account until it locks up. Now its permanently locked until you reset your password by email or change it from your newer admin account. Most savvy bloggers do this already. [2]Or they should! I confess after I switched over to my new database last year I never got around to it. I know, BAD MOBY! lol
FB Log In
Ok, I think ( I THINK ) I got the damn log in for Facebook to work now. If you are on FB, please click the log-in link in the sidebar on the right, under “universal log-ins”, and attempt to sign into my blog with your FB credentials. Don’t worry, I’m not culling any data. Its strictly to allow FB’ers to log in. I’m not sure if it will post back to your FB page or not. I’m tinkering with code that is beyond my understanding.
Please post your success rate along with any error messages you might encounter in the comments.
Thanks!
**Update – I found an error in some of the code I was using and have changed it. anyone who hasn’t already tried or tried and failed, please try again. **
**Update II – After tons of hours tinkering and no support from the site provider, I’m removing the FB option for universal sign-ins. It only works randomly and with no explanation of why it fails. If you wish to use universal log-ins, you’ll have to use one of the others provided. **
Deleted II
I deleted over 100 user accounts from my blog today. Most were sp*mmers. On the odd chance I deleted a legitimate account in error, you can just re-register. I only block IP’s for known baddies. This is becoming a chore so if things continue on this vein, I’ll have to remove the 3rd-party log-in plugin. I had to adjust the security controls in wordpress for it work properly and now I’m getting a weekly hit of fake accounts.
I’m also taking suggestions/recommendations for a new sp*m blocker plug-in. My beloved SK2 is no longer supported. Its held up for over a year of newer and newer versions of WP with no problems but lately, cracks are showing. The WP code is changing so much I think its time to move on. I have akismet loaded but no running. I’ve read good reviews but I’d love to find another plug-in as good or better than SK2. Suggestions?
FB Fail
If you’ve tried to log-in to my blog via Facebook recently you’ve probably noticed it ain’t working. Apparently, they changed the api for that shit and I don’t have the time or patience to go back and figure it all out again.
All of the other log-ins work though. Amazing how simple of the others were to setup but Facebook’s is a nightmare of BS. Why am I not suprised?
Rant
Considering more and more people are consuming their news, blogs, etc on the go these days, I am irritated at the lack of sites that still haven’t upgraded their sites to include a mobile version.
And considering most platforms already include free templates, not switching is just laziness.
Upgrade your damn sites already!
We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming. . .
/rant