The OptionKey Blog

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Apple Rotten To The Core?

Is a mac the machine to buy? You might want to think twice!

I've been using Apple products since I was 7, so I'm very familiar with the way Apple does things but now I'm calling them out on the lack of a physical recovery disk when you purchase a mac instead opting to go with a recovery partition. Ok so why should you care? Here's why.

If your a geek like me you like to push your hardware to the limits, finding compatible cards, and accessories is fun and getting them to work is even more fun, and you do a lot of reinstalling, and if your not a geek you should also be concerned, because this takes getting your computer fixed out of your control. Now your better off to go with a Windows computer because at least you can make recovery disks.

Here is a copy of a letter I've sent Apple.

Dear Apple Support,

You probably won't care about this email but I'm writing it anyway. I must express my profound disappointment with your decision to go with a recovery partition over a recovery disk. As a tech person I am often helping people with their systems, and as such have the occasional time where a machine is past warranty and they don't have the money to purchase a new one, or they want to do some sort of hardware upgrade where a reinstall of the operating system is required.

Now that you are no longer offering bootable disks with your systems I must now categorize you in the company of HP or Dell, (That is a bad thing). I often recommended Apple Computers for their pick of hardware, but the fact you actually got some sort of other bootable media other then the hard drive if anything were to happen to your computer. Now that is not the case and the fact that you need an internet connection to do a restore will make things take longer and to frank about it is a joke. I know your trying to make the move to cloud computing but there are some things that the cloud can't do well and operating system installs is one of them. Now your going to tell me that I can take my Mac to any apple store and they will do it for me and at no doubt with some sort of charge. When you made this decision did you think everyone was made of money and time?

If you are going to sell computers without a recovery disk you should at least give users an option to guy a bootable flash drive of the OS or some sort of removable media. I've purchased every Apple OS from system 9 to 10.7 and have been a large supporter of apple computers in my social circles but now unless you change your current policy I can no longer do that. I always felt you were trying to do what is right on for the user but in this I can't support and won't support, you are taking away a user's right use their computer as they see fit and if that's your policy that's your policy there is nothing I can do about it but tell you about it and how I don't like it. (Hell at least Microsoft will let you make recovery disks you guys won't even do that; and the thought of that use to suck).

I hope you will reconsider shipping your systems with removable bootable media.

Trevor Tye

------------------UPDATE-----------------------

Apple does offer a USB Flash Drive of Lion for $70.00, which is a little outrageous but it is better then nothing.

http://store.apple.com/us/product/MD256Z/A?

There is also the Lion Recovery Disk Assistant that will let you make a recovery disk to DVD's or a Flash Drive

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1433

Apple getting rotten to the core?

Is a mac the machine to buy? You might want to think twice!

Here is a copy of a letter I've sent Apple.

Dear Apple Support,

I hope you will reconsider shipping your systems with removable bootable media.

Trevor Tye

Monday, January 30, 2012

QR Codes and some good advice on how to use them.

Quick Response codes or otherwise known as QR Codes started showing up in marketing here in Edmonton about 3 years ago. Originally created back in 1997 these were primarily use for tracking parts in vehicle manufacturing but are now used for a wide variety of purposes. Whether or not those purposes are useful to the end user is another question. In my experience, QR Codes are best used to give an end user direct access to something they may be looking for such as information on a product, a form to enter into a contest, or a link to download a newsletter, ebook, audiobook, etc.

QR Codes can also make excellent editions to business cards with information already filled out and added to a client's address book with minimal or no fuss. They are also handy for connecting to an encrypted wifi network (Sorry, Android only). However QR Codes can and have been horrifically misused, such as having a QR Code in an ad that doesn't go to the the product advertised but a cheap useless landing page or the companies website. Another example I've seen are QR Codes on realty signs that go to the realtor’s website instead of the property that is for sale.

The QR Code empowers the user giving them instant access to something that they are doing, wanting to do, or get information on. They can also be used to contain information like your library card number, an address, phone number and event information. It also adds a bit of interactivity between you and the user, getting your proverbial “foot in the door”.

My favourite QR Code Generator is http://www.qrstuff.com and you can customize the colour of your QR Code without using a graphics program like photoshop, it's free and easy to use.

Trevor Tye QR Code

Recommended QR Code Readers:

Android: QR Droid Private
iPhone: QR Reader For iPhone
Windows Phone7: Esponce QR Reader
Blackberry: QR Code Scanner Pro - Free
Other: Neo-Reader

Some other good information on QR Codes:

Mashable Article

What is a QR Code and why do you need one

CNET Video on QR Codes

Posted via email from The OptionKey Blog

QR Codes and some good advice on how to use them

My favourite QR Code Generator is http://www.qrstuff.com and you can customize the colour of your QR Code without using a graphics program like photoshop, it's free and easy to use.

Trevor Tye QR Code

Recommended QR Code Readers:

Android: QR Droid Private
iPhone: QR Reader For iPhone
Windows Phone7: Esponce QR Reader
Blackberry: QR Code Scanner Pro - Free
Other: Neo-Reader

Some other good information on QR Codes:

Mashable Article

What is a QR Code and why do you need one

CNET Video on QR Codes

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Digital Locks, If your MP doesn't get it they can screw us all.

Do you have itunes, or purchase movies, music or tv shows from some sort of online service? If you answered yes, then you should write your MP and get them go change the digital locks provision in Bill C-32. The conservative party with one notable exception in the Industry Minister Tony Clement who seems to be very technically savvy, and has fought for a lot of the fair use provisions in bill C-32. However due to his position as industry minister or other reasons, has been very silent about changing C-32 to include a fair use provision for breaking digital locks. As Bill C-32 is currently written, all fair use exceptions are over ruled by the digital locks provision. (see my previous blog post).

The conservative Member Ed Fast seems more interested in play politics and with our future in regards to "fair use" or "fair dealing" then doing what is best in the interest of all Canadians.

Mr. Fast asked the question how could justify "eliminating digital locks altogether by allowing circumvention for fair dealing purposes?" to the Canadian Federation of Students and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. Both times his response to their answers was "my concern is if you go that extra step and allow circumvention for fair dealing, you've now made it so much more easy to actually allow the cheaters to undermine the system, where digital locks become absolutely meaningless."

He obviously misses the point. Copyright was designed to stop people from making MONEY from other people's work. For example it was designed to stop people from starting selling CD's and DVD's from out of your basement, to people for 5 dollars where Walmart is selling them for 10 dollars; or buying a projector and selling seat tickets to people who go view a movie. A 21st Century example would be to stop someone from ripping a DVD and selling a digital copy of that movie for money.

If you try and stop fair use you will only encourage piracy. Look at what happened in the United States with the DMCA, it has been changed to allow for the ripping and copying of DVD's for personal use and backup.

What's going on and why should I care?

Mr. Fast seems to be having a hard time seeing the light as to why the digital lock circumvention is essential to Canada's new copyright bill. We want artists to be paid fairly, we don't want to be charged $24.99 for each copy of a movie we want to put on our personal devices. Let me see, to put it in money terms, a copy on your computer, copy on your ipod, perhaps your phone, and don't forget a backup copy, that's $24.99 X 4 formats = $99.96 plus tax for 1 movie in 4 different formats. That is ridiculous. Don't even get me started about what happens if you have an itunes account and a 3rd party or non Apple video player. Guess what under C-32 in it's current form it would be illegal for you to circumvent the digital lock on that purchased DVD and rip it to your computer to put on your ipod, android or windows device. That in my opinion is wrong and as someone who has an entertainment server where I put a digital copy of my purchased DVD's and CD's along with the digital copies I've purchased from itunes, and other online stores, to make it easily accessible for my wife and I to watch our shows listen to our music and play our games. I don't know about you but I don't want to be thrown in jail for ripping a DVD.

What can you do.

Email this Ed Fast, the members of the copyright committee and your MP. Tell them why Bill C-32 needs a by pass for consumers to circumvent the digital lock for fair dealing purposes.

Amendment:

Read the transcripts From the Committee meetings here

Red the transcript about by passing digital locks with regard to fair use with Michael Geist.

Trevor Tye

PS. Please feel free to start your letter or email by copy and pasting the following text.

Feb. 16, 2011
First Name, Last Name
Address
City, Province
Postal Code
email

Dear Mr. Ed Fast MP and the copyright committee,

I as a consumer have an answer to your question "Why does Bill C-32 needs a by pass for consumers to circumvent the digital lock for fair dealing purposes?"

{Now put what you do with movies, and music. Also put what you would like to do with all that in the future. Also think about how much money you have invested in the movies and music you purchased and how much you would have to spend if you had to re-purchase everything. Don't you think your entitled to a backup?}

Sincerely,

Your Name

Friday, February 04, 2011

The Usage Based Billing Issue is not over in Canada

The CRTC has recently ruled that they will take 60 days to review the usage based billing decision. According to Konrad Von Finckenstein's speech to MPs - Feb. 3, 2011, he is trying to balance what heavy users pay vs light or low use users. In this respect Usage based billing is the way to go; however we do not have a fair and competitive environment in Canada. We have a an oligopoly; that is why there is no innovation or deals such as price cutting, no heavy use bandwidth plans, nothing. You can argue you get the occasional 4GB XBox by switching but I'm talking about things that matter, like bandwidth caps, reliability, fair pricing on internet use. My situation is unique, If the CRTC wants to treat the internet like water or electricity; as a utility then there should be a way for me to get just a dumb fast pipe to my house, not 3 plans with caps.

Let's say the maintenance cost of running the network is $0.03 / gigabyte, that's what the ISP's need to break even and maintain the network. I would be totally up for paying $0.06 or $0.09 per gigabyte, it would reduce my internet bill to $30 or $45 per month assuming I used 500 GB! Not only that I'm paying 2 to 3 times more then their cost! CRAZY! (They are really making a killing since I have a cap of 125GB and they charge me $70 a month that is $2.10 per gigabyte and an additional $1.00 / GB after I go over the cap)

As a consumer I'm tired of being screwed by the big telcos and cable companies, who are making tones of money hand over fist off the internet. We have no consumer protection here, and as the internet overtakes TV, Radio, and other mediums, It will cost us even more especially with the low bandwidth caps. The best example of this is Telus and their optik tv is tv over the internet, Shaw and their digital phone is simply a type of skype with a phone; which by the way you can do with a Magic Jack and it cost you nothing; (Shaw is making a killing on there phone and they don't have to do real 911 service)

What is_enhanced_911 | Toddler Dies because of Glitch in enhanced 911 Services | Skype VOIP Prices

So in my opinion if your going to have caps then you account for what a family of 4 spending say 3-5 hours at home would use. Assuming there is say 4 people spend at least an hour each on youtube, or watch a movie from netflix, that is 4-6 Gigabytes a day for video, on the minimum, plus any online gaming, surfing and email; I'd say average about 10 GB a day multiply that by 30 days and you have 300GB! It adds up fast. I'm assuming your only spending 3-5 hours a day doing that, imagine if you spent all day watching movies or a marathon on netflix. You will pay and pay big time.

Konrad Von Finckenstein's obviously doesn't understand the technology and Bell, Telus, Shaw and Rogers are trying to protect their old dieing business practices by making the new one unaffordable. So to this I say the CRTC should either get people that understand the technology and are not puppets of these companies or be disbanded. The CRTC has been put on record saying IPTV and VOIP services are NOT internet related. Um? Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm sure they use the internet, um... yep pretty sure that's why IP stands for INTERNET PROTOCOL!!!!
What is IPTV | What is VOIP

So we can't stop, if we want affordable internet access here in Canada we have to keep up the pressure, I for one don't want our internet access to be like our cell phone access "The MOST EXPENSIVE in the world" I do everything on the net, I don't have cable, or subscribe to anything like that, I have a lan line phone that goes to an answering machine, but that's it. Pretty soon in the future everyone will just have a internet line coming into their house for everything, you won't have 3 times anymore you will just have one and you'll either rent or buy the hardware straight out if you want to have TV or Phone in the "Traditional Sense".

What has to happen, is there needs to be 6 tiers of service. Low/Medium/High Speed with support and Low/Medium/High Speed with no support for people like me who want just a dumb pipe with lots of bandwidth.

Let's make Canada a leader in the world, and encourage other companies to come to Canada for true competition, because as it is right now there are 4 companies and they are more then happy to screw us for as long as possible; and will do anything to make sure the status quo doesn't change.

Donate to OpenMedia.ca
Stop The Meter

Read the CRTC Speech by Konrad Von Finckenstein's yourself.

Posted via email from The OptionKey Blog

Tuesday, February 01, 2011

An Internet Charter of Rights and Freedoms

I. We have the right to connect.

No person shall be denied connectivity based on race, religion, economic status or sex. With the following exception of promoting HATE Speech, publishing content that violates the rights and freedoms of others and violating basic human rights and freedoms.

II. We have the right to speak.

No one may abridge our freedom of speech. As users we must acknowledge the limitations on freedom of speech (such as hate speech) but they must defined as narrowly as possible, lest we find ourselves operating under a lowest common denominator of offense. Freedom is our default.

III. We have the right to speak in our languages.

The English language’s domination of the internet has faded as more languages and alphabets have joined the net, which is to be celebrated. We want to build bridges across languages and cultures. We will want to speak in our own languages but also speak with others.

IV. We have the right to peaceful assembly.

The right to peaceful assembly is listed separately from the right to speak. The internet enables us to organize without organizations and collaborate and that now threatens repressive regimes and wrong doing by governments as much as speech.

V. We have the right to act.

We connect to speak and speak to assemble and assemble to act. That is how we can and will change the world, not just putting forth grievances but creating the means to fix them; and putting an end to the institutions that would stop the will of the people.

VI. We have the right to control our data.

We control our own online presence and should be seen as much or as little as we choose. Companies and governments do not own the access to data about you. What’s yours is yours. The internet should operate on a principle of portability, so data cannot and should not be held prisoner by a service or government. The User retains control; but keep in mind that when control is given to one, it is taken from another the devil is in the details. This principle speaks to copyright and its laws, which set the definitions and limits of control or creation. This principle also raises questions about whether the wisdom of the crowd belongs to the crowd.

VII. We have the right to our own identity.

Our online identity is made up of our names, addresses, speech, creations, actions, and connections. Maintaining anonymity — hiding one’s identity — is a necessity; thus anonymity, with all its faults and baggage and trolls, must also be protected; to protect the people who disagree with the status quo; the ones who disagrees in matters of popular opinions, beliefs, social and religious values. Not to mention the ever important whistleblower. Controlling our data and our identities — make up the right to privacy.

VIII. What is public is a public good.

The internet is public; indeed, it is a public place (rather than a medium). In the rush to protect privacy, we must beware the dangers of restricting the definition of public. What’s public is owned by the public. Making the public private or secret serves the corrupt and tyrannical.

IX. The internet shall be built and operated openly.

The internet must continue to be built and operated to open standards. It must not be taken over or controlled by any company or government. It must not be taxed; it must not be limited. It is the internet’s openness and potential that gives it its freedom. It is this freedom that defines the internet.

You can read a similar post on the Buzz Machine

Posted via email from The OptionKey Blog

Monday, January 31, 2011

Metered Internet and the Response from the Industry Minister

We finally have a statement from Industry Minister Tony Clement about the CRTC Ruling on metered internet. As it stands right now ISP companies that have implemented Usage Based Billing (UBB) are permitted to operate that way and charge accordingly. In a post from Tony Clement from http://www.tonyclement.ca/EN/3413/124561 he says that he his have a look at the usage based billing of customers. Now Tony Clement is the minister for allowing an opening of the mobile market (in some what of a limited fashion) but none the less he did open it some what allowing Wind Mobile to operate in Canada mostly backed by an Egyptian Billionaire. For that I give Mr. Clement Credit. However he has moved very slowly, compared to the cell phone portfolio. The internet is the medium that all communications will occur in 21st century. From Shaw's use of Home VOIP Service to Telus Optik TV, companies are finding new ways of using the internet to their advantage.

I am not in favor of UBB and am a big advocate of net neutrality but I do feel that the ISP companies do have the right to manage the traffic on the network to a point. For instance they can prioritize a Voip call or netflix stream over my torrent of the latest version of Ubuntu. The main reason I think the ISP's think they can get away with this is the outrageous fees and bandwidth limits they put on Cell Phone Plans. Think about it, most people are living with 500MB caps, I myself am pushing around 5GB per month. I know on my home internet account I average around 200 - 300 GB / month. The internet is the only thing we have, we don't have cable, nor do we want it with 99% of the shows on TV, I regard to as less then acceptable quality, and the shows I am interested in I get off itunes, netflix, or watch right on the channel's website.

Companies are looking to offset the costs of running their more costly and dieing business plans like conventional cable tv. Programming, good programming costs money, networks like HBO know this and if people like the show or the channel they will pay for it. The advertising model must also change, having companies pay for product placement like in 30 Rock with snapple. Advertisers have been getting a great deal when it comes to advertising on TV and on the internet and that has to change. If companies will not pay to have their product in a show then you need to go to brand X or have a bidding process for product placement. Imagine Tina Fey Drinking Safeway brand cola because Safeway had the highest bid for the advertising on the episode. I sure safeway would see a big spike in sales.

The world is changing, old business models don't work anymore, and the best way to make sure your company survives is to adapt and adapt fast. If this is the way private companies want to proceed then perhaps we need a publicly paid for internet access line, or perhaps we should allow the power companies to be ISPs, you can get 85 Mbps with power line Ethernet; that would make Bell, Rogers Shaw and Telus happy, NOT. I don't know what the answer is, I know the minister must respond. I hope he responds with a unmetered net neutral response but I'm not the one making the call. We will just have to wait and see.

Read my Open Letter On Metered Internet to the Government

Posted via email from The OptionKey Blog

Friday, January 28, 2011

Top 20 Must Have Android Apps

Android Android is the hottest mobile platform on the market and it is also the most affordable. Being able to purchase handsets for as little as $100 it doesn't take much to get you up and going. However Apps are a huge part of the experience, from syncing your itunes library with your Android phone to playing games and remote accessing your computer from your phone.

Android can do it all. With over 200, 000 apps in the apps store it can get a little confusing and dangerous when choosing apps. So here are my top 20 android apps everyone should have; and my top 20 every tech should have.

Lookout mobile security suite is a free smart phone protections system that is an anti-virus, backup and device location software all rolled into one. Get LookOut Mobile Security Suite
App 2 SD Free is an Ad-supported app. New "Clear cache" helps you to get more free space! Need more free space for your internal phone storage? "App 2 SD" helps you to move apps to either external or internal storage. Get App 2 SD Free
AppBrain - a different take on the Android market. Find your next favorite app, live wallpaper or widget. Includes features like App recommendations, Hot apps of the day, Find apps with a price drop, Share apps and more. Get AppBrain
Android Booster - This free app is designed to optimize Android smartphones while minimizing the power consumption, and keeping users in control of the amount of internet usage. Get Android Booster
Rockplayer Lite - An ad supported video player that can play multiple formats. It plays XVid, DivX, MPEG4, MKV and much more. A suitable substitute until VLC Player is released for android. Get RockPlayer Lite
doubleTwist Player finds all the music on your phone and syncs music & video with the free doubleTwist app. Imports iTunes music playlists, ratings & playcounts; sync music, play music & video podcasts! Get DoubleTwist Player
Shazam. Start your music journey now with Shazam to discover, buy & share music. This free app gives you 5 tags each month to identify music anywhere. Get Shazam
Shop Savvy Barcode Scanner is the original barcode scanner on Android. Aim the camera at any product's barcode, wait for the beep and ShopSavvy will provide you with a list of online and local prices. Get Shop Savvy Barcode Scanner
Adobe Reader is a must-have app for high quality PDF viewing on Android. It Opens PDF files as email attachments, on the web or on device and has Text Reflow. You can send PDF files via email and has Multi-touch gestures for Navigation & Zoom. Get Adobe Reader
Color Note is a simple notepad app. It give you a quick and simple notepad editing experience when you write note, email, message, shopping lists and todo lists. Color Note makes taking a note easier than any other notepad apps. Get Color Note
Easy Uninstaller - Easy & fastest uninstall tool.
Advanced Task Killer is a tool to kill applications running.
Fast Reboot - closes/restarting all processes and frees up memory
GDocs is a simple notepad that can view, edit and sync documents from your Google Docs account. It allows you create, import/export and send documents. Get GDocs
File Expert is a Powerful & Leading File Manager for Android; it can do all basic file operations - Copy, Paste, Move, Create and Rename your files and folders FTP/HTTP Server - Web Sharing or WIFI File Explorer and can provide both Web & FTP transferring support. SMB Plugin Available. Get File Expert and File Expert SMB Plugin
CamCard. It can capture business card images with phone-based camera, and recognize the card image content, and the recognized result is automatically organized as a contact and saved into phone address book. Get CamCard lite get the unlocked CamCard - BCR (Western) for $6.99
QR Droid is a complete QR code reader, generator and scanner for your Android. Easily scan QR codes from camera, decode them from images saved in your device or from URL of images stored in Internet. Get QR Droid
TweetDeck is your mobile browser for staying in touch with what's happening on Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare and Buzz. TweetDeck makes it easy to stay up to date and organized no matter where you are. Get TweetDeck
Skype offers free Skype-to-Skype calls over 3G or WiFi. Call landlines or mobile phones at great Skype rates; Instant message one or many friends at the same time. Get Skype
TeamViewer TeamViewer connects to any PC or server around the world within a few seconds. You can remote control your partner's Mac, linux or windows PC as if you were sitting right in front of it. Get TeamViewer
Dropbox Sync your files between your computers and your mobile device; browse the files in your Dropbox folder from anywhere! Share links to files, save photos and video from your camera to your computers, and open files using your favorite Android apps. Get Dropbox
Tricorder A multi-sensor environmental monitor -- turn your Android device into a working tricorder! Get Tricorder