Monthly Archives: December 2009

A 5 gigabyte bandwidth limit? Completely unrealistic.

Posted on by

This post is for the wireless division at Verizon, AT&T and Sprint. Specifically, those people in the wireless division who came up with the idea to limit online use to 5gb before charging “extra” for “excessive use”.

I don’t think they’ve used the internet in a long while.

The first thing I’ll start with is system updates. This isn’t an extravagance of any sort. You must update your system to keep your computer safe and secure from new problems and exploits that appear online. I’ll start off with a basic install of Snow Leopard on the Mac as an example.

The current updates for a fresh install of Snow Leopard with iWork and iLife installed are 1.04 GB. This is to update iMovie, iPhoto, Mac OS X, iTunes, iWork, Remote Desktop Client, Xcode and a HP printer. A secondary update of Java, Safari and AirPort Client after the initial upgrade is just 125.7 mb (which using convertunits is .12 gb). Even if we assume only one single system update like this per month, we’ve already blown 1.16 gb out of our 5 gb monthly limit.

Now let’s download some free media. Not much… just what’s available in the “free” section on itunes every week. At this time, there’s a free copy of the TV series “The Cleveland Show” and “Phineas and Ferb” and the free music is from The Bravery, Augusten Burroughs, Zeri, Joe and David Archuleta. The total for two TV shows and five music files is 236.4 mb. Assuming the selections are consistently this size per week, 236.4 mb times four weeks is 945.6 mb, which converts to another .92 gb per month.

.92 gb plus 1.16 gb makes our current total 2.08 gb used.

Now let’s talk about YouTube. You tube videos are fun to watch, and everyone has been on the site a few times a week. So let’s ballpark only three videos per day and we only visit YouTube 5 days out of the week. That’s a perfectly reasonable 15 videos per week. Assuming the videos are around five minutes a piece and are watched in HD, that’s a ballpark of 22.9 MB per video. 22.9 times 15 is 343.5 mb per week. 343.5 mb times four weeks is 1,374 mb, which converts to 1.34 gb.

1.34 gb added to 2.08 gb takes us to 3.42 gb used so far.  Only 1.58 gb remains.

Attachments in email is next up on the list. I’m talking about powerpoint files and slides that are 2 to 5 mb that you need to send to business partners or just friends you would like to see a presentation. Lets say you only send two attachments a day four days out of the week. And that each attachment is 5mb. 8 attachments per week times 5 MB a piece is 40 mb. 40 mb per week times four weeks is 160 mb, which converts to .16 gb.

Add .16 gb to 3.42 gb and we’re at 3.58 gb used.

And finally let’s look at movie previews. Looking at a movie preview in quicktime at 720p (midrange high def) is around 100 mb each. There were around 60 movie previews in November alone on the Apple Movie Preview site, but let’s say I only viewed 1/3 of them: 20 movie previews per month at 100 mb. Thats 2,000 mb which converts to 1.95gb.

1.95gb + 3.58gb = 5.53 gb

And that’s how you can go right through a 5 gb limit.

This isn’t taking into account any antivirus updates, downloading any torrents or posting any twitter, facebook or personal blog entries. This doesn’t take into account reading through and downloading images from any photo-intensive websites or uploading your own videos to YouTube. This doesn’t take into account watching full streaming videos from Netflix or playing online with your Xbox, Wii or PS3.

And this ballpark calculation doesn’t even touch on downloading music or movies that has been purchased from Amazon or iTunes or updating the other applications that are installed on the computer.

Using Email, YouTube, watching movie previews, updating your system software and getting free and legal music may sound like a lot of bandwidth to those companies that grew up in the punchcard era,  but people do a lot more than just send email and SMS texts nowadays.

It’s not constant 24 hour use that chews through 5gb of data. It’s just simple, modern use of the internet.

The problem is that the only way I see this outdated 5 gb cap changing is if one of the big wireless companies realizes there is a big market if they move their baseline upward, and takes a bold move to expand their 5 gb cap to at least 10 gb or more.

Barring that, it’s going to take a company with some very serious capital to push the existing wireless companies aside to start a new high-cap wireless service. That’s pretty much going to have to be Telmex or Google at this point.

In the meantime, the only other option is to hunt down a free wi-fi spot and pull up a chair.

Oh, and before I forget, here’s the current list of updates required for a clean Windows 7 install with Office 2007 also installed. I’m in the process of calculating exactly how big the total download update is, but I’m pretty sure it’s a little less than the 1.04 GB of mac updates but much more than 500 mb.

——————-

Definition Update for Microsoft Security Essentials – KB972696 (Definition 1.71.735.0)
The 2007 Microsoft Office Suite Service Pack 2 (SP2)
Update for Microsoft Search Enhancement Pack
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB969679)
Security Update for Microsoft Office Excel 2007 (KB969682)
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB969613)
Security Update for Microsoft Office Visio Viewer 2007 (KB973709)
Security Update for Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 (KB957789)
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB972581)
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB969559)
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB974234)
Security Update for Microsoft Office Word 2007 (KB969604)
Update for Microsoft Office OneNote 2007 Help (KB963670)
Windows Live Essentials
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB954326)
Security Update for Microsoft Office Word 2007 (KB956358)
Microsoft Silverlight (KB974331)
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB951944)
Update for Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007 Help (KB963669)
Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System Help for Common Features (KB963673)
Spanish Language Pack – Windows 7 (KB972813)
Update for Microsoft Office Word 2007 Help (KB963665)
Security Update for Microsoft Office 2007 (KB951550)
Security Update for Microsoft Office Excel 2007 (KB959997)
Security Update for Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007 (KB951338)
Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB967642)
Update for Microsoft Office Excel 2007 Help (KB963678)
2007 Microsoft Office Suite Service Pack 1 (SP1)
Security Update for Microsoft Office OneNote 2007 (KB950130)
Security Update for 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB960003)
Office Live add-in 1.4
Update for Microsoft Script Editor Help (KB963671)
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB936514)
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB956828)
Definition Update for Microsoft Security Essentials – KB972696 (Definition 1.69.725.0)
Update for Internet Explorer 8 for Windows 7 (KB976749)
Update for Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility View List for Windows 7 (KB975364)
Security Update for Windows 7 (KB975467)
Update for Windows 7 (KB974332)
Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool – October 2009 (KB890830)
Security Update for Windows 7 (KB974571)
Definition Update for Windows Defender – KB915597 (Definition 1.69.725.0)
Update for Windows 7 (KB974431)
Security Update for Internet Explorer 8 for Windows 7 (KB974455)
Security Update for ActiveX Killbits for Windows 7 (KB973525)
Security Update for Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Service Pack 1 Redistributable Package (KB973923)
Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer 8 for Windows 7 (KB976325)
Update for Windows 7 (KB976098)
Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool – December 2009 (KB890830)
Office Genuine Advantage Notifications (KB949810)
Security Update for Microsoft Office Excel 2007 (KB973593)
Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB973704)
Update for Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007 (KB976416)
Update for Microsoft Office Word 2007 (KB974561)

AT&T planning on going after those “unlimited” iPhone users

Posted on by

Ralph de la Vega, head of AT&T’s wireless division, said AT&T is planning on going after the “small percentages” of iPhone users who have the nerve to steam video and music over their piss-poor network to “reduce or modify their usage so they don’t crowd out the other customers in those same cell sites.”

Quoting from an article on Cnet, Ralph says… “what’s driving usage on the network and driving these high usage situations are things like video, or audio that keeps playing around the clock… And so we’ve got to get to those customers and have them recognize that they need to change their pattern, or there will be other things that they are going to have to do to reduce their usage.”

In other words, instead of getting up off their fat greedy butts and actually going out and spending money to improve their busted and topped-off network, they’re going to take the easy way out and charge their customers more. Those same customers who signed up on their unlimited plan because they apparently misunderstood the word “unlimited” and are actually using their iPhones in an unlimited manner!

The Cnet article also says that all the “unlimited” iPhone use is… “clogging the network, causing many iPhone users, especially in large cities such as New York and San Francisco, to experience dropped calls, slow 3G service, and issues connecting to the network at all.”

Small wonder AT&T was named in Consumer Reports magazine as “the worst carrier in the United States.” Far below Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint.

Hey AT&T! Instead of going after us “unlimited” users who like to use our iPhones as they were designed, how about fixing that no good network you have! Then maybe some of your customers won’t leave you when their contract is up and jump to Verizon when they get the iPhone in the third quarter of 2010!

As Craig Ferguson would say… “Ah! ha! ha! I made myself laugh.”

Hey Apple. If you’re paying attention, you really need to put the screws to AT&T for this. When Jim Cicconi, senior executive vice president of external and legislative affairs for AT&T says in a published article that “we will have to start telling wireless customers that they can’t do all the things they want to do with their devices”, you guys need to find a better partner to dance with.

Here’s the link to the CNET article

And here’s the link to the Consumer Reports article

12 things you need to know before your next business pitch

Posted on by

I’ve been pretty lucky in my career to have always been on the executive side of the conference table when it comes to business pitches and presentations. Through the assorted jobs I’ve had, I have seen presenters make the same mistakes over and over and over, regardless of whether it’s in front of a fortune 500 company in a 30 story skyscraper or in front of a fortune 10,000 company in a one story brick building.

So today I thought I would list 12 things (off the top of my head) that I would like every presenter to know about before their next pitch…

* Have a plan B. This, by far, is the biggest problem. What happens if the presentation you burned to DVD gets broken or lost along the way? Or if the special effect filled DVD you have won’t play in the client’s old-as-dirt DVD player? What happens if your $12,000 projector blows a $20 bulb and there’s no replacement store within miles? Have a plan B! Put a copy of the original presentation on a memory stick and save another copy of it in PDF and JPEG format. Have a printout ready for at least half of the attendees (and before the presentation, ask the secretary where the copier is located for emergency purposes). Have a online backup copy saved as a draft in your gmail.com account. And check to see if you have a spare bulb for the projector. Like the old saying goes, plan for the worst, but expect the best.

* Find out what resources are available at the client site before arriving. Take a moment to talk with the tech guy or the secretary of the location you’re going to be presenting in. Just because your company has the newest Blu-Ray DVD HDMI combo players and 10 bazillion lumen projectors in every single room doesn’t mean your client’s conference room will. If you need a projector or laptop, be sure to ask for them a few days before arriving. And get detailed information from the tech people on whether or not their laptop will be able to open your specific file and if the projector is actually visible across the room. Yes, it looks much better for you if if you bring your own laptop and projector for the pitch, but most big businesses (and hotels) are pretty accommodating nowadays. Just make certain what tools you will have to use in the location you are going to be presenting in.

* Don’t present from a laptop screen to a crowd of more than 2. This is one of the biggest mistakes I’ve seen. When a presenter will ask a room full of executives to crowd around their 19 inch (or smaller!) laptop to view their presentation. It’s very uncomfortable and not everyone is going to be able to see the presentation. If you don’t have a projector, put it on a DVD to show on a TV. Or bring handouts. A laptop screen should only be used by the presenter, not the presentees.

* Pitch only to the client you’re visiting right now. I’ve seen this one dozens of times. A laptop is connected to a projector and the laptop’s screen is up on the wall for everyone to see. The problem is that the presenter is still looking for the presentation file to open, and as they’re going through their laptop, everyone in the room will see if a competitor’s name is on a document or folder as the presenter is searching for the file to open. And as soon as the presenter leaves, that’s the first thing everyone talks about. Not the pitch or the material…. just that the presenter is fraternizing with the “enemy”. So before you connect your laptop to the projector, have the presentation up and in full screen mode. Or better yet, keep your folders separate and use your own project number names so you won’t accidentally reveal who else you’re pitching to.

* Rehearse your pitch. Now let me preface this by saying being nervous in a pitch is one thing. As a matter of fact, most companies I worked for thought a nervous presenter was fairly trivial. I’m talking about having no clue what’s about what’s up on the screen. I’m talking about when the transition from one speaker to another, there’s a quick flurry of whispered discussion about who’s doing what. And I’ve even seen live presentations where the presenters themselves will outright argue with each other in front of us. If you can’t get it together for the big show when you’re asking for a paycheck, how will you possibly do any better if we do decide to hire you or do decide to take your product? Rehearse your pitch. Rehearse it with your team members. Get over whatever problems you’re having with each other after the pitch. And be confident in what you’re presenting.

* Put in “real” placeholders. A lot of upper level executives have zero imagination. Zero. As in none. So if you say “well in this area will be a logo that pops” or “your commercial will look like that Doritos one with the lizard”, nobody is going to remember anything but the rough and ugly diagram of what was actually on the screen. This is an in-house presentation, so don’t worry about copywright laws. You say there’s going to be a commercial like the Doritos one with the lizard? Put up that clip of Godzilla munching on Doritos! Grab some media from YouTube or from your own DVDs. Put in real live audio. Anything! Don’t leave a space where you hope your client’s imagination is as good as your own. Show a baseline of what you intend to do and give a visual example. And be sure you can follow up on it. Don’t put up the Godzilla Doritos ad if your company can barely do stop-motion animation. Show examples! And speaking of media…

* Showing poor quality video. There’s really no excuse for this one. If you are using the same video ripped from a copy of a copy of a VHS tape from 1988, that tells everyone at the table a lot about your standards and work ethic. Get a clear and quality copy of any video you plan on presenting, or don’t even bother showing it.

* Copyright your pitch. I’ve worked for some grade-a scumbags before, and these people looooved to steal ideas from presenters. I don’t mean using the occasional quote from a presentation. I mean taking a presenter’s powerpoint, re-branding it with their own company name, and then pitching the re-re-brand to their own prospective clients. Was it wrong? Yes. Was it illegal? Nope! Because the presenters didn’t have any copyright on their work. If it’s a big new idea you have, and you’re relying on that big new idea to make money, head to the online copyright website and make it your own before showing anyone else your idea. And stamp the copyright logo on the bottom of your pitch and any printouts, too.

* Test your VPN connection. More and more presentations are utilizing a company’s VPN network to access video and confidential documents as part of the presentation. That’s fine, but in my experience, about three quarters of the VPN presenters I have seen have either never tested the VPN outside their office or have no clue on how to connect to a VPN in the first place. Either way, it boils down to everyone in the meeting having to wait while the presenter tries to find a tech guy at their company who can walk them through the VPN connection. If you’re going to use a VPN as part of your presentation, test it out before coming in. Make sure you know how to connect to your VPN from a fresh bootup of your laptop. And it wouldn’t hurt to have a tech guy at your company on standby 10 minutes before and 10 minutes after your scheduled presentation in case something goes wrong.

* Plan for a full and complete catastrophe. One of the best presentations I remember seeing was one that everything went horrifically wrong for the presenters. Their projector would not focus, their laptop was stuck on a BIOS screen, and their paper printouts were doused in coffee from their flight over. None of that mattered. Because this team didn’t just have a plan B, they had a plan for a full catastrophe. One person in the team kept us entertained by specifically asking about us, talking with us about news they heard concerning our area, and generally conversing with us in a pleasant, stress free and non-business based manner. While that one person was engaging us, the other two members of the presentation team went and made new copies of the pitch and got the technical pieces up and running. When those two were done, they came up and told everyone they were ready to go. It was a smooth and fluid presentation, and even though we didn’t take their product, we did give them eight local business references for them to follow up on. If you’re presenting in a team, have a charismatic team leader who will take charge if things go horrifically bad, and have other members of the team on very specific repair duty in case things go really wrong (IE: You fix the computer. You make copies. You staple the printouts).

* Keep your email short and professional. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen managers roll their eyes at an email address like bigbusinessbuildingmediamarketingdallas909038@aol.com. Or something silly like honkadonkey9898@yahoo.com. If you can, get your own domain name and email address. Bob@bigbusinessmarketing.com looks much more professional than anything ending in an aol.com or yahoo.com or even a gmail.com account. But if you can’t get your own domain yet, just keep it short. bob@yahoo.com or b90@gmail.com makes it easier to email you, and sometimes, a quick email is what will get you the business.

* Lunch the office. This sounds silly, but it is very effective! Don’t just take the executives out for lunch after your presentation. Ask the boss’ secretary if they want to go to lunch with you all (which I’ve consistently heard is a very smart thing to do). Ask the CFO and the check writers if they would like a free lunch. Expand the net a little further and you’ll get much more positive buzz about your company after you’ve left. And don’t worry about taking everyone to a fancy executive-level restaurant. Ask the workers what their favorite local restaurant is or where they usually go for lunch nearby. Mostly every non-executive will eat at a place that has $5-$10 lunch, so you’ll be better off taking everyone there anyhow. A BBQ place or a nice deli comes to mind. And the extra socialization after the meeting will tell you, the presenter, a lot more about the company you’re pitching to. Just be certain you stay professional and in full information-gathering mode. You’re there to learn more about them, too.

General Mills to cut sugar in children’s cereals coincidentally as sugar prices reach 28 year highs

Posted on by

Better go buy a crate of Lucky Charms right now. General Mills just announced they are “…publicly committed to reducing sugar in cereals advertised to children to single-digit grams of sugar per serving.”

To put this in perspective, Lucky Charms and Trix both currently have 11 grams of sugar per serving. And they want to knock it down from there to a single digit. The article says “to ensure the cereals maintain their taste, the reductions will continue in a series of smaller steps.”

So its going to be a bit like quitting smoking, then. Smaller and smaller doses until the cravings are gone.

A strange coincidence, then, that General Mills decided to be all healthy and concerned for everyone’s welfare right when “tight global supplies sent [sugar’s] world futures prices to at least 28-year highs with bulk refined values jumping more than 10% last week and sugar users pleading for relief in the form of an “immediate” increase in import quantities.”

Uh huh. The 28 year high price of sugar has noooooothing to do with General Mills reducing the sugar in their cereals. Right.

I wonder how many boxes of Cocoa Puffs and Lucky Charms cereal will fit in my garage?

Dragon Mobile Voice iPhone application privacy issue

Posted on by

There’s a semi-new application out for the iPhone called Dragon Dictation. Made by Nuance Communications, it is “an easy to use voice recognition application powered by Dragon Naturally Speaking that allows you to easily speak and instantly see your text or email messages” on your iPhone. You can also “update your facebook status, send notes and reminders to yourself, or Tweet to the world… all using your voice.”

This application is built and backed by a Nuance Communications, a fairly big mainstream company. And Dragon Naturally Speaking’s reputation is pretty legendary in the speech-to-dictation arena.

There’s just one big thing you need to know.

If you download and use Dragon Dictation for the iPhone, you’re legally handing a copy of every name in your address book to Nuance Communications.

In the privacy statement on the bottom of the iTunes download page, their statement says “in order to improve recognition accuracy, Dragon Dictation will only upload names from your address book… no emails, addresses, phone numbers or other personal information are uploaded. This information is not used for any purpose than improving the usability of the application. All data is stored in secure data centers according to stringent privacy and security standards.”

Only? Dragon Dictation will only take a copy of every single name I have in my address book?

What in the name of Stephen F Austin do the names of everyone I know have to do with speech recognition? Their reason given that they need it “in order to improve recognition accuracy” doesn’t ring true with me at all. There’s nothing in their EULA or website about phonetically parsing the names in an address book and re-downloading it to an iPhone when they’re done. So aside from doing that, what can they possibly need a list of everyone in an iPhone address book for?

The worst part in this case is that it’s free. Everyone is going to be clicking to download this application before reading the EULA and privacy statement at the bottom of the page.

You can read their full privacy policy here and you can download the application from the Dragon Mobile Apps website here. Or if you have iTunes, you can click here to jump directly to their download page in iTunes.

The Windows XP and 2000 party is over on July 13, 2010

Posted on by

In the ongoing “upgrade or die” world of publishing software, Microsoft announced that Windows 2000 Server, Windows 2000 Client, and Windows XP with Service Pack 2 support is going to end on July 13, 2010.

What does this mean for everyone still on Windows 2000 and XP Service Pack 2? Pretty much after July 13, 2010 there will no longer be any updates for problems that anyone finds with those systems. There will no longer be any support from Microsoft even if you call them and ask for it (…well, mostly. There will be some limited exceptions to this). And, most important of all, other software publishers will start to end their support for anything they have for Windows 2000 since Microsoft is officially turning off all the lights on the 2000 party.

If you are running XP, all you need to do is go online let software update upgrade your copy of XP to Service Pack 3. Microsoft will still support XP with service pack 3 until 2014!

You don’t have to upgrade to Windows 7 or their 2008 Server despite all the innuendo in Microsoft’s statements. Just be certain you have a backup of your current system in early July 2010. That way if something goes horribly wrong, you can restore that machine to the last “updated” copy without needing to search for any downloads that may no longer be online. You can use DriveImageXML to back up your drive, and best of all, it is free software! Lifehacker has a great writeup on how to use DriveImageXML, too.

Rancho El Charco visit

Posted on by

This weekend my extended family took everyone to a place called Rancho El Charco to celebrate one of my relative’s birthdays. We only went to the restaurant part of the ranch, but I managed to take a few photos with my iPhone while we were there.

Looking over Walker lake, you could see something was burning down in Mexico.

Rancho El Charco 01

Rancho El Charco 01

Between the sunset and the calm lake, I was ready to jump in and go for an extended swim. It’s been awhile since I’ve gone scuba diving, too, and a lake like this would be just the thing to get back into the diving scene.

Rancho El Charco 02

Rancho El Charco 02

There was a waist-high wood fence along the edge of the restaurant to discourage kids (and potential swimmers) from jumping into the lake. Little signs fixed to the fence said for one dollar you could buy a cup of fish food from the bar to feed…

Rancho El Charco 03

Rancho El Charco 03

The catfish! A lake full of catfish! I only had to shake the cup to start the water churning. These fellows quickly filled up under the pier and were ready for any little morsel we would throw them.

Rancho El Charco 04

Rancho El Charco 04

All this violence over two cups of food! My wife and brother in law tried to spread out the food, but wherever the little bits landed, a swarm of catfish would swarm up from under the lake and devour whatever was on the surface.

Rancho El Charco 05

Rancho El Charco 05

As soon as the food supply dried up, the fish took off back into the center of the lake. But knowing there were so many catfish in the lake now, I was ready to go rent a boat and fish for my dinner.

Rancho El Charco 06

Rancho El Charco 06

As the sun set, the outside lights automatically turned on. The outside patio area was still plenty bright with all the lights, but the lake got very very dark pretty quickly.

Rancho El Charco 08

Rancho El Charco 08

On the inside part of the restaurant, several bull heads were mounted on the walls. Little brass plaques were mounted beneath each one of them, with a brief story of how they got there.

Rancho El Charco 10

Rancho El Charco 10

A vicious crockadeer’s head guarded the far end of the bar. (Yes, I just made up the word “crockadeer”. And I just registered crockadeer.com too!)

Rancho El Charco 11

Rancho El Charco 11

Overall, I had a lot of fun with the family and the birthday celebration was great. But next time I’m bringing a real camera to get better photos.