It’s practically a fool-proof program, and they make no apologies for their three-step, elementary approach: “Cimio was [...]]]> The folks over at Scratch DJ Academy hooked me up with a trial of their beginner level beat matching software, Cimio, that allows you to create playlists from songs with similar beats per minute (BPM) and song structure.

It’s practically a fool-proof program, and they make no apologies for their three-step, elementary approach: “Cimio was designed for music fans who want to mix their music like DJs but don’t have the time or the money to invest in professional DJ software.”

I wouldn’t even compare it to mixing like DJs. You know when you want to pull together a playlist in iTunes, you drag all those songs into the playlist to get started, then you just end up leaving them in the order you dragged them in and the mix sucks? This can solve that — sort of.

I mixed disparate tracks from Radiohead, MGMT, Silversun Pickups, Great Northern, Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears, The Dead Weather, Daft Punk and Royksopp in less than 5 minutes with fairly good results.

The interface is terribly basic, which is frustrating when transitions need to be tweaked just slightly for that perfect mix. But for the price and easy user-interface, it’s a great program for your average mix tape enthusiast. I will say I was absolutely thrilled that I can take iTunes playlists or iTunes tracks and drag them straight into Cimeo — a fantastic treat since my source files are saved in random places all over my laptop.

Overall, if you like putting together playlists and aren’t satisfied with the basic fade in/out features of your stock mp3 software, I suggest you check out Cimeo.

Compared to the three headphone options most obvious to me: 1) cheapo headphones, 2) ear buds or 3) expensive and giant Bose headphones, Coosh headsets are a fairly unique design. However, it’s pretty simple — they are essentially buds with a nylon loop that [...]]]> BuzzParadise mailed me a pair of new Coosh headphones to review.

Compared to the three headphone options most obvious to me: 1) cheapo headphones, 2) ear buds or 3) expensive and giant Bose headphones, Coosh headsets are a fairly unique design. However, it’s pretty simple — they are essentially buds with a nylon loop that wraps around your ear.

Here’s Coosh Biz Dev Manager Ken Cooper’s explanation for the redesign, “While everyone was busy making headphones look and feel like something out of STAR TREK, we wanted to make sure ears everywhere would thank us for feeling so good, thanks to the soft flexible earring that you can attach and detach whenever the mood strikes you. We found a cool, new solution to a lame, old problem by creating total earbud comfort and security. And you get pretty good sound quality too. So be it backflips, dancing, running, skating, or sitting on the couch – we made them fit securely and comfortably enough to wear all day long. Oh, and not to even mention the world-class sound that these headphones can blast out as well.”

Here are some guys who definitely need headphones that stay on:

But when it came time for me to roadtest them, it wasn’t doing backflips, dancing, running or skating; it was sitting on a plane. I listen to my mp3 player the majority of the day — but I have a docking station at work, home and the car. The only time I truly use headphones is in airports and on planes about twice a month.

My first memory of the earbud concept was the original Gameboy headphones in the early 1990s. Because my ear holes weren’t perfect circles, I had to jam them into my ears, and after hours of playing, I remember my ears throbbing because of the hard plastic torture I had inflicted on them.

When I bought the first iPod in 2001, I had the same experience with the white earphones (called “earbuds”), although now it wasn’t because my ear canal was too small; they were too big! The earbuds would fall out. Later I bought some silocone earbuds, which fit but also wouldn’t stay on.

When I picked up a Zune last year, I was super impressed with their braided earphones and silicone buds. They stayed on, but didn’t tune out background noise enough I wouldn’t have to crank my mp3 player.

My friend Julio at the Pioneer Press has done lots of research and writing about earbuds that actually fit, including pointing me to a local company who makes customized earbud molds here locally.

But my go-to choice for two years now has been my Bose QuietComfort noise cancelling headset. The pair was super expensive, incredibly bulky and they make me look stupid, but the sound is crisp, the roar of the jet engines disappear, they stay on my head and don’t hurt my ears. So I’m sticking with my Bose.

If your ear holes are normal size (whatever that is), I would definitely recommend Coosh headphones. I love that they have a built-in mobile phone microphone system (including send/end button), the spare wire clip, the fact you can get them in black, and the sharp L, right-angle plug.

But even when I’m not spinning around on my head, they don’t fit my ears, so they’re not for me.

I just today got a note that for a limited time Coosh is offering a free shipping discount code. You can enter COOSH2008 into the discount code box at checkout to receive free shipping and handling.

I kicked off the morning hosting breakfast with Rick Calvert, CEO and Co-Founder of BlogWorld, Jim Turner, Chief Managing Partner of One By One Media and Nathan Wright, Founder of Lava Row. There was some [...]]]> What an insane day at SXSW Interactive Day 1. I honestly could go home happy after just this one day.

I kicked off the morning hosting breakfast with Rick Calvert, CEO and Co-Founder of BlogWorld, Jim Turner, Chief Managing Partner of One By One Media and Nathan Wright, Founder of Lava Row. There was some fantastic discussion about blogs, social media philosophy, the trouble with mainstream media (cough, archaic) thinking and more.

Jim told me about his client, Twitterlights. It works like this: If you find something you want to send to your Twitter followers, you can send it through i-Lighter and on any web page you are reading, Right Click, select “Twitter This!,” type your tweet and your done. Awesome.

Registration was a breeze. A new coworker from Seattle and I ate at Stubbs Bar-BQ for lunch, I wrapped up some work and headed to the first panel: Edit Me! How Gamers are Adopting the Wiki Way. I was most interested in how gamers are using wikis to communicate with each other. Unfortunately, much of the panelists and audience questions were focusing on the need for game developers to include Wiki functionality in new games.

About this time I was checking Twitter, and Hugh MacLeod of Gaping Void was tweeting about a tweet-up down the street at Champions. We ended up at a huge ad-hoc party, where I met Hugh, @pistachio, Steve Hall from Adrants, @trishussey, @jasonfalls, @waderockett, @hansveld, @twalk, @technosailor, @cian, @krista, @jeremywright, @davedelaney, @kristaneher, @scottmonty, @simedia (Utterz) and Jim Long, the NBC cameraman known as @newmediajim. So fantastic to meet so many Twitter friends I’ve been following for months and new tweeple who I’m now following. Video here.

Then Charlie the Unicorn showed up. And I’m not kidding. Charleee!

Then at the Mix at Six party, we met up with @jakekerber and inadvertently bumped into Brian Shaler, whom I immediately asked to do a patented “Shaler Jump.” He refused, I tweeted it, and of course, Anti-Brian Shaler immediately mocked him.

Then later back at the hotel lounge, Robert Scoble stopped by to say hi. He had just checked in to the hotel, and I summoned him via Twitter. We met at CES back in January for a photowalk and breakfast. He and Rocky, his producer, stopped by, said hello and moved on to a bigger and better party.

Then we met this 22 year-old kid named Andrew Lee who co-created Fantasy Congress. He introduced me to a local marketing guy who grew up with one of my clients in Colorado.

Insanity! Now that’s one panel down and plenty of quality networking. And the conference really just starts tomorrow. If you’re in Austin, be sure to add me on Twitter (@perfectporridge).

Although we have a large library of DVDs, I’m still not convinced digital downloads and on-demand streaming isn’t the future — especially given the new high-capacity fiber optic [...]]]> I’m quoted in today’s Pioneer Press about the death of HD DVD. Our DVD/VCR combo crapped out months ago, but we postponed buying anything to avoid a trap.

Although we have a large library of DVDs, I’m still not convinced digital downloads and on-demand streaming isn’t the future — especially given the new high-capacity fiber optic networks being installed in new markets.

My quote:

“Owning a library of discs is not the way of the future…Five years from now, this will seem as archaic as buying music CDs.”

Read the whole thing here.

Thanks Julio!

I owned the first iPod, 3rd generation and 5th generation. Now I own two iPod Touch players.

One is three weeks old. One is one week old.

It’s poor customer relations to release a firmware update with new applications and charge users $20 — let alone a customer who purchased a [...]]]>
This is what I just sent Apple:

I owned the first iPod, 3rd generation and 5th generation. Now I own two iPod Touch players.

One is three weeks old. One is one week old.

It’s poor customer relations to release a firmware update with new applications and charge users $20 — let alone a customer who purchased a Touch less than a month ago.

I refuse to accept that you are going to charge me for firmware that if I had waited a week, I could’ve gotten for free. Terrible way to treat longtime customers and early adopter brand advocates.

What do you intend to do to dissuade my anger and attitude towards Apple and its iPod product?

NOTE: If you are going to go ahead and shell out the cash for the update, be sure to read this forum first. Looks like lots of people are being charged multiple times, and Apple customer service isn’t being responsive.

Also, the update won’t take effect if you have the iPod Touch in manual mode (which is idiotic for those of us with way more than 16 gb on our hard drive [I have a full 160 gb hard drive devoted to music).

Oh yeah, and Steve Jobs forgot to mention the tax…it’s really $21.32.

As if pretending to play the guitar didn’t already make you a lame-o, check this out.

It’s the Guitar Hero brand Air Guitar Rocker from Jada Toys, with a GH-branded belt, wearable amp programmed with 10 songs and special pick you strum in front of the belt. It also has an output for external speakers. Songs [...]]]>

As if pretending to play the guitar didn’t already make you a lame-o, check this out.

It’s the Guitar Hero brand Air Guitar Rocker from Jada Toys, with a GH-branded belt, wearable amp programmed with 10 songs and special pick you strum in front of the belt. It also has an output for external speakers. Songs include 5 originals plus Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water,” Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man,” Motorhead’s “Ace of Spades,” Van Halen’s “You Really Got Me” and Boston’s “More Than a Feeling.”

It’s actually quite harder to play than it looks. This guy was really horrible. But then again, it’s nothing nearly as hard as actually learning to play an instrument.

Air Guitar Rocker will be available this coming March for $29.99 and can be routed through external speakers. Jada has announced plans to release more cartridges for the toy in the months after it launches.

Here’s my YouTube video of this doofus.

It’s a cheap, pocket-sized point and shoot vido camera weighing in at 4.8 ounces. It captures 30 fps VGA video — suitable for YouTube but not full-screen TV.

I wanted one for posting concert and family videos to YouTube. I have [...]]]> In addition to a tony Nikon D40, I bought myself a Flip Video camcorder for Christmas.

It’s a cheap, pocket-sized point and shoot vido camera weighing in at 4.8 ounces. It captures 30 fps VGA video — suitable for YouTube but not full-screen TV.

I wanted one for posting concert and family videos to YouTube. I have a high-end Sony video camera we use for the important stuff. But the ability to conveniently carry a point and shoot video camera that holds 60 minutes and runs on two AA batteries for $100 bucks was too good to pass up.

The Flip Video has a handy, built-in USB stick that plugs directly into a powered USB port. It has built-in software for downloading, viewing, etc., but it also functions like a hard drive (just like other digital cameras).

The first test run pulling videos off the camera was a little rocky. My Windows XP laptop took some time installing the avi/divx codecs for the Flip Video’s on-board program, so I got bored and tried to drag/copy the video files on my desktop. Those timed out. Eventually the program loaded and let me save the files onto my hard drive. Awesome.

But since that first time, unfortunately, I’ve had two days of headaches trying to get my Windows XP laptop and Windows XP desktop to recognize the camera, let alone pull videos off it.

My desktop can’t recognize the camera at all. It says, “One of the USB devices attached to this computer has malfunctioned, and Windows does not recognize it.”

My laptop recognizes the camera, assigns it a drive and even AutoPlays the software, but then the entire process crashes and/or times out. I downloaded the firmware update, but was notified it already has the most up-to-date software.

Flip Videos onsite Q&A isn’t helping much. I submitted a help ticket and will let you know what happens.

You know, Oprah loves the Flip Video, but I bet they made sure her’s worked perfectly.

UPDATE 12/31/07 2:40 PM:

Flip Video customer service are sending me a return shipping label. “We will then make all necessary repairs and return the camcorder to you. We will attempt to recover any videos on the camcorder.” I’ve asked them for an estimate of how long this will take. I’m super bummed. I wanted to take it to Vegas next week. Hope it’s back in time!

I’ll keep updating this post as events unfold.

UPDATE: 1/3/2008:

After three days, I got an e-mail back from customer service with a UPS label attachment stating: “Upon receipt of your camcorder, we will do our utmost to retrieve any videos you may have and make all necessary repairs. If we are unable to repair your camera, we will issue you a replacement. We will return your camera as quickly as possible.”

Unfortunately, that wasn’t the estimate I was looking for, PLUS the label they sent was UPS 3-Day select, which is just poor customer service when your product fails on a customer.

So I took the camera back to Best Buy today and exchanged for a new one. I’ll let you know if that one craps out, too.

UPDATE: 1/5/08:

Here’s the e-mail I wrote Flip Video customer service after getting a brand NEW Flip Video camera and having it crap out again:
“Yesterday I exchanged my defective Flip Video Classic 60 min for a new one at Best Buy. This camera also synced to my computer just once and now is corrupt. I just got off the phone with Robert with your 24/7 customer service who was trying to be helpful but unable to shed any light on why your cameras don’t work on either of my brand new Windows XP machines.

Apparently I’m having the same exact problem as the Ultra Series where the camera’s software times out when copying videos to the hard drive and then cannot be recognized by Windows Explorer. He says he hasn’t heard of this problem with the Classic series, so I obviously am the exception to the rule with two cameras messing up on two machines in less than a week. From reading message boards, I can actually see I’m not the only one.

Robert was unable to help beyond simple troubleshooting problems and said your technical support has been overwhelmed by customers plagued with problems, so I am unable to speak with someone directly.

I would like someone to call me at XXX-XXX-XXXX to discuss what the issues on my two computers could be that the camera will start downloading videos, crash (time out) and then not be able to be recognized. I deleted the divx file starting with the number 3 and was unable to locate the Muvee file he said should be visible within Add/Remove Programs. Perhaps you can tell me where to manually delete the muvee driver. Robert did not know if it was necessary to manually delete the “My Flip Video Prefs” and “My Flip Video Library” folders, but I went ahead and tried it. Robert also told me if I was able to get Windows Explorer to recognize the camera enough to format the drive, it may allow the camera to reinstall itself — albeit erasing all my videos yet again.”

Before I sent the e-mail I booted up a different profile of Windows XP and tried that. I was able to get the Flip drive to come up and copy off two videos (of 25) before it crashed again. Then suddenly I got a strange error to the effect, “This device requires a high-speed USB drive and there are some available but not the one you are using.”

A-ha! Turns out the USB ports on the front of my desktop tower are not high-speed. I unplugged my printer, mouse and other USB cords in the back of my computer to get the Flip to fit nestled amongst the wires.

It worked perfectly! So I never sent the above e-mail, although I do think Flip should have known to offer this as a possible solution to the above issue. Also, their customer service comes across like a teenager sitting in a warehouse getting paid minimum wage to frustrate customers. I’ll see if I can track down Flip Video at CES next week and get a real live human to weigh in on my experience.