Moleskine notebooks

Anyone else but me on this list a lover of Moleskine notebooks? You remember that post below where I advertised the Amazon Kindle e-Book reader? Well the Molekine is like the anti-Kindle. They're a line of notebooks in various sizes and formats that can be used to record dates, notes, opinions, drawings -- whatever you can commit to paper with pen, pencil or crayon -- you can jot it down in your Moleskine. They've been used for years by famous artists and novelists like Ernest Hemingway. (Which reminds me -- it's been too long since I've re-read Hemingway's A Moveable Feast, his famous novel-journal of his life in Paris in the Twenties.) I like the soft-cover, lined version. (See above.) How 'bout y'all? Anyone else a Moleskine fan? Go here for the Moleskine website: http://www.moleskine.com/

Gotta Have it: Kindle2

The Amazon Kindle 2

Okay, so I'd heard about this thing on the various tech blogs and sites I'll admit to reading.

But frankly, it just didn't grab me.

Over the weekend, however, I was searching for a book and came across these videos about the Kindle.

I'm singing a different tune now. 1500 books? Download from anywhere without a computer or WiFi connection? What's not to love?

Check it out:

Say Hello to The New Kindle

Slim: Just over 1/3 of an inch, as thin as most magazines Lightweight: At 10.2 ounces, lighter than a typical paperback Wireless: 3G wireless lets you download books right from your Kindle, anytime, anywhere; no monthly fees, service plans, or hunting for Wi-Fi hotspots Books in Under 60 Seconds: Get books delivered in less than 60 seconds; no PC required Improved Display: Reads like real paper; now boasts 16 shades of gray for clear text and even crisper images Longer Battery Life: 25% longer battery life; read for days without recharging More Storage: Take your library with you; holds over 1,500 books Faster Page Turns: 20% faster page turns Read-to-Me: With the new text-to-speech feature, Kindle can read every newspaper, magazine, blog, and book out loud to you, unless the book is disabled by the rights holder Large Selection: Over 275,000 books plus U.S. and international newspapers, magazines, and blogs available Low Book Prices: New York Times Best Sellers and New Releases $9.99, unless marked otherwise

It's here: My new Macbook!

Oh lovely! Oh marvelous! Your screen is like a limpid pool of video goodness! Ms. Apple Macbook, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

Wow. Just wow.

Got the Macbook yesterday afternoon and have now used it for a little less than 24 hours. In that time, I've learned to love the new multi-touch Trackpad, used the Photo Booth app to make pictures and video with Cam and Maddie, used iMovie to record and edit my first professional video (still in progress) to place as a Welcome on my professional blog (http://tulsabankruptcyandconsumerlaw.blogspot.com, if anyone's checking), and played with the "Cover Flow" method of reviewing my docs.

It is an amazing piece of technology and design. Even the packaging is so unbelievably well thought out, that you stand in awe of Apple and their accomplishments. This is the result of unflinching, unstoppable, unquenchable focus on excellence. I recently put forth a Steve Jobs (co-founder and chairman of Apple Computer) quote to the effect that he simply cannot understand why anyone would want to do anything that was not "insanely great."

Yes, indeed. It shows.

Twittering our brains out

It's approaching a cliche' at this point, but there's a growing consensus that all this electronic communication may be having a deleterious effect on our attention spans. (Gee, ya think?) I know that I have recently discovered Twitter - the microblogging internet app that connects people through text message entries (micro-blog entries) that ostensibly answer the question: "What are you doing right now?" Twitter has rapidly grown from its inception in 2006 to a point where a new Pew Research poll indicates a full 11% of internet users regularly use Twitter, or a similar app. It's much more than merely text messaging, of course, but that's beside the point. Anyway, here's an article from Wired which questions whether or not all this instant communication is having a nasty effect. FBC Digital Overload Is Frying Our Brains By Brandon Keim February 06, 2009 | 5:41:37 PM http://preview.tinyurl.com/dl837w

What's this Twitter thing I keep hearing about?

I've got a new toy: Twitter.com -- go watch the video for an explanation. It's very cool, but it takes a little while to "get it". (From the Common Craft Show, "Twitter in Plain English".)

Reality and the dangers of tech: is the logic inescapable?

One of the things I worry about (fret about, consider -- choose whichever verb you like) is reality. It is one of the hallmarks - or so I'm told - of Thomistic philosophy and Scholasticism, and also that of the late John Senior at Pearson College. (I minored in philosophy long enough to realize that it made my head hurt. Latin and Greek were far easier for me.) Senior -- together with his colleagues Frank Nelick and Dennis Quinn -- was famous for reminding his students, "Water is wet and rocks are hard." In other words, reality is real. As a result Senior was also a great critic of technology and the way in which it removes us from reality. For example, IIRC he disdained recorded music, preferring instead the venue of a live concert -- or even better, self-made music. It should go without saying that he was opposed to television as well -- not merely for its content, either, but rather for the way in which it divorces us from reality by creating this virtual universe of existence. If ever there was a lesson which spoke to my heart, it was this one. A child of television who grew up in the 60's and 70's, I now think of it as "the plug-in drug" as someone else referred to it. And so it is against that constant understanding that I struggle with technology and its appeal. My friends know that I love gadgets, I always have. Some of my earliest memories of my father were the little electronic trinkets he'd bring home from S.H. Kress (the 60's forerunner to K -Mart) which had a store next to his offices downtown. Dad was constantly bringing home transistor radios, walkie-talkies, etc. much to the delight of my brother and myself. And as I've noted recently, I've been playing around with some Web2.0 technologies in order to update my law practice and its marketing efforts. But I worry about it. I worry that I am feeding an unhealthy attachment to virtual (as opposed to actual) reality, in doing so. Is technology taking us to a place we should not be going? Are we Twittering and Facebooking, and GPS-ing ourselves into oblivion? Maybe. Eric Rauch writes about related issues and their treatment in recent movies in The American Vision @ http://www.americanvision.org/article/the-logic-is-inescapable/ Go check it out -- its worth a read.