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Fun with Google Voice

By Cody | Published: November 3, 2009

This was a message I received from a good friend of mine who heard about Google Voice transcribing my voicemails. He thought it would be funny to put it to the test.

Here is the transcription:

“What are these the metal. How are you and the running around a little bit of the house. I don’t know we get there is going, going, going.”

And here is the message he left:

Posted in Google Voice, Tech | Leave a comment

Cardboard Twin Lens Reflex Camera

By Cody | Published: October 20, 2009

Time Lapse Video of Kiel Johnson’s Cardboard Sculpture of a Twin Lens Reflex Camera made strictly from cardboard, hot glue, and tape.

They went on to make this into a pinhole camera and actually took pictures with it.
See some of those photos at flickr.com/photos/theophoto/

See more of Kiel Johnson’s work at hyperbolestudios.com

Excellent photography by: Theo Jemison
theojemison.com

Edited By: Arthur Mor arthurmor.com

Music By: Sixto Rodriguez lightintheattic.net/releases/rodriguez/

Shot with the Canon 5D Mark II, and other Canon SLR cameras.

Posted in Photography | Tagged Cardboard Sculpture, Pinhole Camera, Time Lapse, Twin Reflex Camera, Video | Leave a comment

I recently purchased this device from B&H Photo hoping to solve my messy media dilemma. Before this, I had 4 or 5 separate external hard drives holding all of my media, applications & backups which I quickly realized needed to change after accidentally deleting a whole photo shoot because “I was sure” it was backed up on another disk.

The LaCie Network space proved to be a great purchase. It’s packed full of useful features combined with lots of storage and a slick design that I’m not afraid to have out on display for all to see.

The Pros:

UPnP AV Certification (This means just plug it in and it works)
Remote FTP Access (This is especially cool, I can access files from anywhere in the world with FTP. I can also give a login to my friends and share large files with them.)
5 Simultaneous Users Supported (I’m calling this a “Pro” for home use because I only need 3 to 4 max. But this could easily be a “Con” if the device were used on a large network in a place of business where multiple users need to access files simultaneously.)
Streams media files through devices such as Xbox 360™ and Sony Playstation® 3, or acts as an iTunes music server. (This feature is very nice to have. I share an iTunes music library with my spouse and never have to worry about duplicates or consolidating on our laptops or desktops. Also, when I’m in the bedroom, on the laptop or at the TV, I never have to worry about where that movie is saved.)
Wireless Time Machine Backups (With a bit of fiddling you can use this to wirelessly backup your Mac in Time Machine anytime you are on the network. No more excuses for why you didn’t do a backup) *You can find the instructions for this at the bottom of the post. ** For you Windows users, LaCie offers the Genie Backup Assistant for free available on their website.
A two year manufacture warranty (That’s always nice. You never know with hard drives.)
It looks sweet (Has a blue LED ground light that flickers with data access, also you have the option of turning this light off.)
USB 2.0 port on the front of the device (This is used to connect an external USB hard drive or USB key. Using admin page, you can to back
up files on your LaCie Network Space to the external disk or import data to the LaCie Network Space.)

And the Cons:

Expensive (It is priced a bit higher than most network hard drives, but if you find a sale like I did, you won’t be wallowing over your empty wallet.)
Slow data transfers (Even though it’s 10/100/1000 it only transfers files at a painful 6.6 megabytes per second which is crippled even further when accessing VIA wireless network so transferring large files is restricted to LAN only.)
Non removable storage (This can be considered a major flaw. You’re limited to the 1tb disk that’s and if you want more you’ll have to either use up the front USB port, or buy another network drive which can be bad for the wallet.
Web administration interface (The aesthetics of the device certainly don’t carry over to the web administration. The control panel’s user interface is a joke, and it’s user management and security section needs a serious rethinking. This of course can be fixed with a simple firmware update, so hope is not entirely lost.)

Overall the LaCie Network Space is a simple and attractive solution to your home media needs. If you’re looking for something to permanently hold all of your movies, photos & music, this is the drive for you. If you’re looking for a high performance drive to use for lots of transferring and portability, you’ll want to keep looking.

*Setting up the network drive as a wireless Time Machine backup drive on a Mac will require you to jump through a few flaming hoops. Thankfully there is a thoroughly detailed tutorial over at Expanding Horizons on how to set it up properly.

Posted in Design, Products, Reviews | Tagged FTP at home, iTunes Server, LaCie Network Space, Network Hard Drive, Network Storage, Wireless Time Machine | Leave a comment

My $23/month iPhone (updated)

By Cody | Published: April 23, 2009

calling-with-skype1

Acquiring the iPhone

So a while back I was lucky enough to acquire an unlocked iPhone 2g for a killer deal from a good friend who upgraded to the 3g. I decided there was no way I was going to pay the $65/month voice & data + 2yr contract service plan just to have and use the world’s best phone. So naturally, I started searching for alternative ways around this awful money-pit.

Jailbreak + Unlocking the iPhone

I first jailbroke my iPhone using Quickpwn, the popular DIY easy jailbreaking application. But I soon found the mac version of Quickpwn doesn’t incorporate the steps to unlock the phone. I instead needed to use iPhonePWN (for mac) to unlock the baseband on my iPhone. Unlocking the baseband enables me to use virtually any GSM enabled SIM card in my iPhone to send & receive calls.

The GoPhone®

Once my baseband was unlocked, I promptly drove down to the local AT&T store, and bought a $25 Pay-as-you-go GoPhone card (which comes with a new SIM card) and had them port my previous Verizon phone number to the newly acquired GoPhone account.

To be safe, before activating my GoPhone account, I downloaded the iPhone app Boss Prefs in order to disable the Edge capabilities of my phone. We don’t want it pulling data down for 1¢/kb and sucking up my $25 card. I popped in the new SIM card, then activated my account and VOILA! Sending & receiving calls on my iPhone with a pay-as-you go card! The one catch – no visual voicemail. That is activated through AT&T’s iPhone only service plans.

The Skype Plan

In order to take this one step further, I decided to see if my GoPhone – iPhone GoPwn could use the Medianet® service offered to regular GoPhone customers. Hoo boy! Full internet access for $20 per 100mb – not bad. Now I can use my edge again… This would never be sufficient for tethering to my laptop, but just enough to browse the web and reap the many benefits of an edge/3g enabled iPhone.

SKYPE!! So next I downloaded the newly released Skype app. It works brilliantly! Skype to Skype calls with the iPhone are no problem! There was one catch… Skype app is limited to WIFI networks only. So I downloaded the jailbreak app VOIPover3G and this tricks Skype into thinking the phone is always on WIFI. I bought a Skype number for 9 bucks and an unlimited Skype callilng plan to get inbound and outbound calls to any phone for $3/month.

Skype calls on the Edge data network are just fine and use hardly any bandwidth. I also downloaded the jailbreak app Backgrounder so I can keep my Skype app running while the phone is locked & in my pocket.

Conclusion

That’s my story! I will keep some credit on my GoPhone account for emergencies, or occasional lazy moments, but besides that just a $20 refill for the data plan, with a little extra work using the Skype app, and I save myself a bundle using mobile VOIP!

++Extra Bonus – No contract, I can just stop paying if I need to!

My next goal is to somehow tie this in with my Google.com/voice account!

iphone-screenshot

Update… April 23rd 2009

After about a month of using this setup and the enormous popularity of this post, I decided to follow-up and address some of the questions that have been asked.

Does this really work?

Yes, this works. That’s why I wrote about my experience.

Is this for me? Can I do this to my iphone?

No. This is not for everyone. It is certainly not a fully functional, flawless method of using an iphone for $23/mo. If you are however somewhat tech savvy and willing to take some extra steps to save some money and you happened to get a contract-free iphone like I did for $80, then go for it.

What about Skype how well does that work?

Skype works as it should (over WIFI). I have heard stories of it crashing frequently on jailbroken iphones. This has not been the case for me. I am on iPhone software 2.2 (5G77) and it has worked fine. However, Skype over Edge has been a different story. While it does work, it has it’s issues. For instance: Connecting a call can take anywhere from 10 to 20 seconds. 1 out of 5 or 6 times the call is disconnected. There is a little lag between calls from VOIP to Voice and sometimes application lag. Also, Skype will not continue working when changing networks. For example, when leaving a WIFI and switching to Edge the Skype application must be relaunched in order to send or receive calls.

What about battery life with Skype running 24/7?

The battery life has been fine for me so-far. This is likely due to the fact that I’m a graphic designer and I have the luxury of leaving my phone plugged in for at least 4-6 hrs a day.

Is the 100mb/mo sufficient?

The 100mb MediaNet is a service from goPhone for the price of $20. This data expires after 30 days. I am around a WIFI probably 80% of my day. So the other 20% of my life I’m not on WIFI, I regularly checked my email, looked up maps, made calls and watched the occasional video. I used about 65mb in 30 days of usage. This 100mb would never be sufficient for tethering, but it works just fine for all the iphone apps which call for internet usage.

What about SMS?

If your feeling ambitious, there are several iPhone apps that let you send free text messages VIA data. They have their drawbacks (unable to reply sometimes, and having to check a webpage for incoming messages… The other solution is to use Skype’s SMS service, but they have their own fees which aren’t much better than AT&T’s SMS plans. I am not a huge texter so I have just been buying blocks of SMS messages on my GoPhone account – $4.99 for 200 messages.

Posted in iPhone, iPhone apps | 163 Comments