• Unlocked with capability to use both GSM and CDMA networks.
• Supports G3 and G4 Speeds (where available)
• SD Card Slot accepts SD/SDHC/SDXC cards for expansion
• Dual 5 Megapixel cameras (One on rear, one on front)
• Built-in Microphone
• LED LCD replaced with Easier-on-the-eyes active color display
• Multitasking Capability Added 7:11 PM

It’s a shame it took this long for apple to identify the shortcomings of its device, but the iPad G2 is definitely the correct answer to the first generation iPad.

I’m kind of surprised that Apple released what seem like no more than a 9.7 inch iPod touch with such limited expandability. I am looking forward to what other manufacturers come up with to compete with Apple. Hopefully we’ll see some of (or all of) the features I mentioned integrated into a comparably performing low cost tablet. Ironically, I’ve seen $400-500 web/application tablets released 5 or more years in the past and they all seemed to have disappeared. I wonder, If they had Apple’s reputation and marketing strength behind them back then, what would we be seeing today?

Beyond those, other stories and books are a blur. I grew fond of Science Fiction short stories and have read compilations by Isaac Asimov and Arthur C Clarke, among others. But my reading stopped early in High School. I always collected Science Fiction compilations and occasionally thumbed through them. It wasn’t until I read about an offer for a free book to all “Urban Exploration” interested bloggers. I added my name to the list and a book was sent my way. I read, and enjoyed The Unseen.

Since then, I’ve been listening to a few podcasts from the TWiT.TV network. This Week in Tech, This Week in Google, Windows Weekly, Security Now and all the others. One of their sponsors in Audible.com and aside from the commercials, the hosts all rave Audible.com.  I never thought that I would enjoy Audio-books, but I just finished my second. I’ve now read (listened to) more books in the past 6 months than I have in the past 5 years!

The first was “on Intelligence” by Jeff Hawkins. I listened to about 90% of it. Jeff is (or was) a bigwig at Palm and has some interesting theories on Intelligence and how the human brain works (and why Artificial Intelligence is so difficult). He goes on to explain how teh brain’s ability to predict the future defines it’s Intelligence. Not the long term or psychic future, but I’ll leave it to the book to explain his theories which are pretty interesting and with in my scope of knowledge of the subject, plausable.

The second book, I just sat around for 4 hours finishing was Dan Brown’s “Digital Fortress”. a Fiction novel about a cryptographers plot to take down the NSA. Things get out of hand when he turns up dead, after his plans have already been set into motion. It’s a great story that had me hooked early and even had me laughing and shouting at the radio as if I were watching on television.

Utilizing time driving to and from work, and out with friends, to time “on the can”, I made it a point not to go anywhere without my Zune, and it’s really paid off. I have a couple of books that I’m looking forward to. Some on Audio Book and others in hard-copy. Eventually I’ll review them: Larry Niven, Ringworld, Neal Stephenson, Anathem, and a few I can’t think of off the top of my head.

To share my love, and spread support for TWiT and Audible.com, You can take advantage of the deal I used to download the 2 audio books by visiting www.audible.com/twit2. You can cancel if you don’t want any others, or stick with them and get 2 books a month. They have other plans too, so definitely check them out.

After eating, I set out to catch the 1:06 train. Standing in the waiting area was a hefty man carrying a large bag, wearing a red coat, red pants, and even red sneakers. He had a distinguished white beard and was wearing a festive Christmas hat not unlike my own. Okay, Mine had elf-ears and bells, but it was still your typical red/white Christmas hat. As a zombie-caroler, we were handing out candy canes to people, and I made sure to take a handful with me when I left the zombie crew at Bar None. so I approached him, addressing him as Santa and offered him a candy cane and some friendly chatter. He was in the city visiting some friends, though in my mind, he worked at Macy’s or some mall. He was very friendly and really played the part of Santa, so I smiled, wished him a Merry Christmas, and we shook hands as he handed me his business card. Simply a portrait of Santa Claus on one side, and a very well done cartoon of Santa’s workshop on the back. Above the portrait were the words, “I met Santa!”. I laughed and walked away thinking how funny it was that I had just met Santa in the middle of Penn Station. This is where the fun of the evening ended.

I watched eagerly as the clock approached 1:06, however the track number for my train never showed on the large display in the station. It wasn’t until about 20 minutes past the time my train was supposed to arrive that people started to notice the smaller screens reading that due to switch difficulties, there were no trains running between Penn and Woodside. This meant no trains in and out of Penn Station. Announcements were made advising that the subway would honor Long Island Rail Road tickets to Woodside, but there was no mention of trains from Woodside to anywhere else. I waited on line to speak with an MTA agent. At 1AM on a Friday, you can imagine that there are a lot of people, mostly drunk and/or tired standing around Penn. By this time, the departure times for multiple trains had passed, so there were an exorbitant number of people stranded in the station’s waiting areas. To make matters worse, there was one MTA agent working in the office. By the time I got to her, she seemed pretty irritated and gave me an attitude because I didn’t understand her initial answer. Rather than simply stating that there was no way to get to Hicksville via LIRR/MTA, she explained the entire region claiming that all the main lines were out but some of the interconnecting lines were operating. This meant absolutely nothing to me, as I don’t ride the train that often. I don’t know what trains interconnect to what stations. She eventually clarified and basically told me I was S.O.L until the track issues are resolved.

My cell phone was dead, so I ran into Duane Reed and picked up an emergency cell phone charger. As I walked back into the waiting area, I saw that they had announced my train was on track 20. Excited that they actually fixed the train, I bolted across the waiting room to the staircase that descends on the train platform. I took a seat on the train next to a man who with his jacket seemed to take up 2 and a half seats. Perhaps it was his way of trying to discourage others from sitting there, but I refused to stand any longer. My feet were killing me. No sooner had we begun moving, when the train came to an abrupt halt. We were stuck again, and this lasted a while. I tried to sleep, dozing in and out a few times. According to the authorities, the train had somehow managed to jump tracks with some cars on one rail and others on another. It took about an hour, though it seemed like an eternity for them to get the train going again.

I managed to sleep for a better portion of the ride. I woke up amazingly as the train opened its doors at Hicksville Station. I jumped to my feet, grabbed my jacket and bag and ran before the train left and I was stranded again. I had made it. I looked at the clock and it was 4:15am. The 1:06 train got me home 3 hours late! I hate to look back and think that I could have gotten on that first train and made it home hours earlier. But then I wouldn’t have met Santa Claus.

I pull up to work and walked in to see Jaime. I hadn’t seen her in a long time, so it was great to see her, though she’s usually only there during the week when the offices are open (She’s the receptionist.). It felt good, but something was wrong. I realized the lights were on. The lights are rarely on when I am there on the weekends. The morning DJ walked by saying hi to me. I asked Jaime what today was.

She said “Friday”.

Oops!

Don’t worry.  It ends well. I made it to my regular job on time (Thank god!). I wasn’t completely in “work attire” but since I had my station-branded collared shirt on, I was able to get away with it. I can’t believe I did this though!

It’s a relatively simple registry hack to enable Windows 7 to pin Folders (and Libraries) to the start menu:

1. Open the Registry Editor (regedit) *NOTE* Don’t screw up your registry! Mistakes can make your PC inoperable!

2. Navigate to:  HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT \ Folder \ ShellEx \ ContextMenuHandlers

3. Right-click on ContextMenuHandlers and select NEW and then KEY

4. name the key, {a2a9545d-a0c2-42b4-9708-a0b2badd77c8}

That’s it! Now to pin a Folder to the start menu, hold down the SHIFT key while you right-click on the folder and you’ll see the option to Pin to Start Menu available. Note that this will not work for some special or system folders.

My email address is admin[at]jaypoc[dot]com, and has been for close to (if not more than) ten years. I have maintained this address as my personal email address and is the address that friends and colleagues know to contact me and/or search for me on social networking sites. A few weeks ago, I signed on to Facebook and saw a message stating “Our systems have detected that admin@jaypoc.com is no longer a valid email. Facebook requires all users to maintain an active contact email.“.

It asked me to enter a new email address or re-confirm the same one, but would not allow me to reconfirm my valid email. I searched their help for a reason this was happening. It took a while to find it, but I located this absurd statement:

“Unfortunately we do not support email addresses with generic prefixes (e.g. info@, webmaster@ etc.). Since email addresses of this nature are typically used for organizations and businesses, we do not allow them to be used for personal Facebook accounts. You will need to use a personal email address that does not contain this type of prefix. There are no exceptions to this rule.”

Sure, Email addresses of that nature COULD be used for organizations and businesses, but only if the domain name is  owned by an organization or business. I own a PERSONAL WEB-SITE and have a PERSONAL domain name, so it’s only fitting that admin@MyDomainName.com is me. Facebook ignorantly refuses to accept that an individual could have their own domain name or web-site. Unfortunately, Creating a “valid” name according to Facebook’s statement would require me to reconfigure my mail server with additional aliases or email addresses. While a trivial task, none of my colleagues, friends, or family will know this new “facebook-compliant” address. How would they search for me? The simple answer is that they would not be able to. The basic functionality of Facebook, bringing people together, would be lost because of their closed-minded opinion that a domain name can not belong to an individual.

The fact remains that my email address is what it is. I will not change it for Facebook. If they want to kick me off of their system, then that’s what will happen. I will become a victim of discrimination not because of my religion or skin color, but because email address (while valid) doesn’t conform to their standards.

Yesterday, we picked up my new 2005 Scion tC. It’s silver with Carbon Fiber accents and interior. It’s not the huge supercharged monster I was used to driving, but it has a peppy 4 cylinder engine with a manual transmission. I should add, My first manual transmission.

It’s been a real adventure learning to drive it. Don’t get me wrong. I have three people to thank for my ability and confidence: My father, who taught me initially; Dave, who let me try out his souped up Mustang; and Casey, for letting me watch her car for her when she was ill, and even allowed me to drive it around locally. If it weren’t for these three people, I would not have even considered this car. Ironically, I’m told that the tC has the same engine as Casey’s, which I had driven the most recent (with in the past 6 to 12 months).

As most people starting out, I have the most trouble getting into first. Normally, I’m alright, but if I’m even the slightest bit rushed (at a light with people behind me) I tend to either release the clutch too soon, or give it too much gas. It’s a lot of fun trying though. and aside from pissing off a few people at stop signs, I enjoy driving it!

I went into the Sprint store to check out the Palm Pre and ask about the upcoming Android phones (While just rumors now, I do believe they’ll have one with in 2 months). While I was there I found out I was eligible for a replacement phone at the “new contract” price point. I was also told there would be no cost to have my phone replaced as it had a faulty directional-pad on it (not bad if thats all thats wrong after 2 years of use!). It wasn’t a big deal, but who was I to turn down a clean new phone. Especially since I wasn’t ready to drop $100-$200 or so on a new phone at this point.

A week later, the new phone arrived. I opened Pocket Internet Explorer and typed “wwwgooglecom”. After trying again, I realized the period (.) key was sticking and I had to press the key really hard to get it to register. I called sprint and they sent me another refurbished phone.

That phone arrived after a few days, and I was delighted. I activated it and went through the letters. Every one worked! NICE! Now I tried the numbers (you have to press a “Function” button to get the numbers and symbols to work). The Function button had the same issue as the period key on the previous mogul. Annoyed, I decided to bring the phone in to the Sprint Repair Center. This sunday, June 28, 2009, They looked at it and said the keys didn’t line up with the contacts right, but didn’t have a replacement or parts, so they ordered me another phone.

Another Mogul was delivered and I tested the keys.. They ALL worked! The keyboard, Directional Pad, and even the shortcut and side-keys all worked properly. I was so happy the whole ordeal was over, and then I made a call. The speaker crackled and clicked whenever there was any audio playing through it. This time I had one with a blown speaker. I couldn’t believe it. Third time is usually the charm! Not in this case.

I called up and here’s where Customer Service disappointed me. They did get me up to priority service since this was the third replacement. I’d heard that they usually offer the equivalent phone and was shocked to be offered the HTC Touch Diamond. The phone runs Windows Mobile, but it nowhere near the same phone. It does not have a slide-out keyboard, and does not take memory cards as the HTC Mogul (my phone) and HTC Touch Pro (the new equivalent) do. In addition, I would have pay the Shipping and Tax on the new phone which was over $100. I convinced them to upgrade to the Touch Pro, but they would not back off from the $100 fee. When I said I was not paying for an upgrade they told me I would have to file an insurance claim with the warranty service.

The warranty service advised me that there was a $100 deductable that I would be responsible for, and to top it off, there was a chance I would get a refurbished Mogul. I was not about to pay to have another refurbished phone sent to me, so I called Sprint back one last time.

I called Sprint back and the agent got me a supervisor who guaranteed me that I would get a working phone, so I said, bring it on! A few times she kept telling me that she was going to send me a brand new phone, but when I asked what model at the end of the order, she advised me they were sending another refurbished Mogul. I asked that the unit be inspected and tested prior to sending it out so we could avoid repeating this ordeal in another 3 days. She noted the account (which probably means it’s documented that I asked, but nothing will be done about it.)

I wish I could say that I’m happy with this, but i’m not. I have lost all trust and respect for Sprint’s repair department and can’t say that I have any faith that this next phone will work. I’d be happy with a New Mogul or a Touch Pro (the equivalent). Maybe I’ll change my mind… IF the next phone works.

If not, I need to seriously investigate other cell companies and phones, and I encourage others to do so as well.

I reciebe

Around 6:28 PM they announced that they received confirmation that Michael had passed away, but it’s amazing how sites like TMZ can start up such a stir. A handful of other news organizations, including our own local Newsday.com reported the death prior to receiving any confirmation. They cited TMZ as their source long before any confirmation had been received.

Michael Jackson was an incredible performer and artist, but definitely had a quirky sense of being. It seems that we’ll never know for sure if all or any of the allegations against him are true or not, but they’ve certainly lead to tons of celebrity gossip humor. While some of it may be tasteless, I’ve continued to get bombarded with text messages containing Michael Jackson jokes, so rather then sending them all on, I will post them here for those who care to read them to do so.

If you are offended by Michael Jackson jokes, please leave this page now.

• LA County hospital are unsure what to do with Michael Jackson’s remains since plastic recycling isn’t until next Tuesday.
• Rumor has it Michael Jackson wants to be buried at sea and strapped to a couple of buoys…
• Michael jackson hasn’t been this stiff since Macaulay Culkin slept over
• When Farrah Fawcett got to heaven, God granted her one wish. She wished for all the children of the world to be safe. So god killed Michael Jackson.
• In remembrance of the King of Pop, McDonalds is coming out with the McJackson Burger. 50 year old meat between 12 year old buns.
• Due to the fact that Michael Jackson was 99% plastic, instead of being cremated, he is going to be melted into toys so little boys can now play with him.
• Michael Jackson died of food poisoning. They found 9 year old sausage and 11 year old nuts in his stomach.

Thanks to the few of you who sent me the above (or variations of the above) jokes.