I am very honored that @CrackBerry highlighted my theme bCard as a free non-Touchscreen theme for this week! Hit up the link for the positive write-up!

I have a new article up at Tech in Hiding, regarding Google Chrome and how I have made it the center of my notebook usage.

via cache.gawker.com

“I am a god.”

Interesting article on Google Wave…

Technology FTW.

Yeah, this is the sort of thing that makes me vaguely weary of Google at times.

Look, I’m a computer guy.  It’s my career, I love gadgets, and I love technology.  So when Google came along and touted Google Wave as “email if email were invented today” (paraphrasing), then I was all kinds of curious and wanted an invite.  Thanks to my boss, I got one, and have dabbled in Google Wave with some co-workers and buddies.  And I keep hearing the same thing:

What do you use Google Wave for?

The longest session that I have had in Wave is with a couple of co-workers, and it became essentially an instant messaging-style chat, just prettier.  My one teammate commented that, because of how you can go back and edit anywhere in a Wave, the conversation would get confusing, and fast.  I agree, and I think that’s one of the reasons the “Playback” feature was implemented, so that you could view the evolution of the conversation like an old-fashioned VCR tape.

There are also a few other items that I feel are quirks in the design:

• Online presence of contacts.  When I’m logged in, I see a green dot in the lower right-hand corner of my icon, which looks like the Google Talk icon for “Available”.  The problem is, I can’t tell if any of my other contacts are available, since they do not have any indicators in their icons.  Odd, and a bit annoying.
• I like the new scrollbar in Wave, with the arrows on the top and bottom, but the implementation is still quirky.  If I click on the scrollbar arrows, a shadow bar rises / lowers and the screen scrolls.  When I let go, the scrollbar will snap into place where the shadow version is.  Actually dragging on the bar up and down is a bit laggy, however.
• Wave is really lacking in a social element.  Sure, it’s backed by Google, but it needs a real social networking piece / design / marketing to get people to really buy into it.  Right now, people I know just don’t know what to use it for.  Wave seems to be trying to invent a market, but isn’t doing a good job with establishing an identity.  All of these things are leading Wave to be a curiosity at this point.

I would like for Wave to grow, but I need to be given a reason to use it.  Right now, it’s kind of a geeky cool thing to do, but in the tech world, that moment is fleeting.  Without proper branding, Wave is in danger of being Google’s biggest flop.

Fantastic article… if you’re a Twitter fiend, it’s a must-read.

Look, it’s easy to just say that Google is king and I’m not switching to anything else.  I tend to look at alternatives and have some unusual tendency to gravitate- or at the very least try- the underdog option.  I use Google Search and Google Maps on my BlackBerry because they are fantastic.  In the past I had used Microsoft’s Live Search application, which combined search, mapping, movie listings, weather, and more into one application, and I really liked it.  That has given way to the new Bing application, since Microsoft likes to change their product name every 18 months or so (I’m looking at you, Live Search, nigh MSN Search).  So I gave it a shot on my BlackBerry.

And it gets one big “meh”.

• The initial search screen looks nice; it reflects the Bing site’s anti-Google aesthetic, with color pictures that change daily.  This is a nice touch, and I don’t mind it at all.  The problem is when you try to find the data you’re looking for.
• Bing search results are not bad but not as accurate as Google’s.  Perhaps it depends on what you’re looking for, but one thing Bing doesn’t match (in the mobile app, at least) is the depth of Google’s searches.  Doing a search for movies in the Google search app will load local movie listings and times, broken out by theater if you’d like.  Bing will show you some theaters and / or movies (oddly enough, missing the theater I usually go to), and only some movies.  When you click deeper to get more information, it tries to take you to an MSN site.  I say “try” because the app would get hung up on connecting to the site.  If you’re used to Google, it makes for a frustrating experience.
• Searching for directions was merely okay.  It got the directions I was looking for it took longer than Google Maps to load (and app / map navigation was not as smooth).  Bear in mind, this is over the 3G connection of my old Storm.
• Using Google to search for “weather” + my zip code brings me a forecast of the next few days of weather.  The same search in Bing only provides links to weather sites, and not even accurate ones at that.

Needless to say, Bing was not long on my BlackBerry, and I can’t recommend unless you’re a hardcore Bing fan.  Now where’s that Cuil mobile app?

This is a great tip that fixed one of the most maddening issues with Google Chrome that I ran into.