Tech Geek

I like gadgets. Due to a low WAF, I don’t get to have as many new ones as I might like, but I do get to upgrade once in awhile. I also take stuff from other people that has no value to them, but might have some value to me. Then it ends up in the closets, all over the computer table, and in the garage, taking up too much space. But what should I do with it, even once I am convinced that it’s not that likely to be useful in the future?

In honor of last week being Earth Week, I want to lift up one of the easiest recycling options that I have found. It worked great for me when I had to get rid of our deceased 25-inch television, which we had replaced with a very pretty HDTV! I got my exercise by getting the TV from the shed in my backyard all the way to the driveway to load it into my SUV. I drove a couple of miles to Best Buy and grabbed a cart, then I wheeled it into the customer service desk at the store. They charged me $10 to take the TV, but immediately gave me a $10 gift card to the store, so the net cost was nothing. Well, at least if you’re likely to spend money at Best Buy occasionally, like I am. Best Buy’s program has saved over 60 million pounds of consumer electronics from the landfills of our nation.

There may be other programs in your neck of the woods, and I encourage you to use them. I am excited by big retailers getting into the recycling (or E-cycling) game because those are the programs that will be used by the most people and be the easiest to us. Radio Shack’s Trade and Save program will pay you to recycle MP3 Players, Phones, Cameras, Camcorders, GPS Devices, Car Audio, Laptops, Game Media, Game Consoles, HDTVs, Monitors, Desktops, Car Amplifiers, Radar Detectors, Digital SLR, Keyboards, and Mice! They promise free shipping as well. I believe that many Radio Shack locations will also recycle used batteries including standard sizes, laptop, and cell-phone batteries.

Another way to cut down on the electronic waste that you generate is not to buy the physical media in the first place. I just completed my upgrade to Quicken 2010. As many of you probably know, Intuit forces you to upgrade Quicken every three years by removing online support for versions older than three years. I’m not overly fond of that, but I’ll adjust. What I did appreciate was that this year I could download the newest version of Quicken and not need to waste a box and a CD that I would use once to load on to my computer and never bother with again. If I do need to re-load the software, I can visit my account at quicken.com and download it again. No CD, no retail packaging, no shipping! No discount either, but that’s life.

Happy stewardship of the earth!

Is there anyone out there that would be willing to write a Tech Geek post on mini-HD cameras like the Flip Mino HD and on how you’ve used or will be using them in your youth ministry?

I was watching one of the many technology video podcasts that get downloaded each day to my TiVo and they were talking about the, at that time, upcoming iPad from Apple. My wife walked into the room, glanced at the television for a moment or two, and said, "You're not getting one." Ouch! Apparently, the WAF (Wife Acceptance Factor) for this device is quite low. Actually, while they look incredibly cool, I'm not all that convinced I even want an iPad right now! I decided to call upon Justin Snider, our ELCA Youth Ministry Network friend for all things Apple, and ask him to join me in thinking through the pros and cons of the iPad.

There are many places you can find the technical specifics about the iPad, such as Apple's website, so I'm not going to rehash those here. Suffice it to say, it's a blazingly fast, beautiful to look at, touch-screen computer. Or you could think of it as a really big iPhone/iPod Touch or a setup roughly the size of gluing 4 of them together on a piece of cardboard! It features the same touch screen technology and ease of use that have made the iPhone and iPod Touch so popular. The first models to be released only connect via wi-fi (like the iPod Touch) and later models will have wi-fi and 3G connectivity, via the AT&T network.

What's great about the iPad is that it's a really big iPod Touch. What's not great about the iPad is that it's only a really big iPod Touch. It does not include a camera for video chatting. It does have a microphone, but it's really too big to hold up against your face and make a call! The rest of the buttons and features are pretty similar to the iPod Touch, with a really big screen. The speed of the device is quite snappy because Apple is making the hardware and software, and it is not running a desktop operating system, but rather a proven mobile graphical user interface.

Because the iPad is built upon these previous devices, it has access to over 185,000 apps right out of the box with thousands of those designed especially for the larger iPad screen. In addition, Apple has developed iPad iWork apps that allow you to work on presentations, documents, and spreadsheets right on the iPad. If you're doing a lot of typing, you may want to get either an iPad Keyboard Dock or use any bluetooth compatible keyboard with the iPad. Although the iPad doesn't come with a camera, tom Merritt has found a couple of ways to use an iPhone as a camera for an iPad.

The iPad is an excellent e-reader, supporting the formats and bookstores of Amazon's Kindle, Barnes & Noble eReader, Stanza, Marvel Comics, and other common formats like PDF as well as, of course, Apple's new iBook format. It is the one device that will pull together electronic books from a variety of sources and let you read them wherever you are. It's comfortable to hold onto on the couch and the screen-lock feature even lets you read on your side in bed! But the screen is not electronic paper and may cause eye-strain after awhile. The battery life is claimed as ten hours, but many reviewers have said they're getting as much as twelve hours before it's totally drained, which is a nice change of pace from the usual practice of over-estimating battery life.

One significant knock against the iPad is that it is a walled garden device. The only applications you can run on it are the ones that Apple approves and sells through the iTunes store. It may be possible to jailbreak an iPad so that you can run unlicensed applications, but this isn't a process for the feint of heart. There are other devices which run versions of Windows or Android that are, or will be, more open to a wider range of software. One major missing application if Flash. Websites that use Flash for video or game content won't work on an iPad. There will just be a blank square where Farmville is supposed to be!

The iPad uses wi-fi to connect. That, along with going through iTunes, is about the only way of getting data on or off the device. There are no USB ports or card readers built into the iPad, though Apple is selling a $29 Camera Connection Kit that will allow you to connect a camera via USB or SD Card. To get your movies, applications, or anything else onto or off of the device, you have to hook it up with a cable to your computer with iTunes or pull them over wi-fi. Coming later this month will be a version that uses AT&T's 3G network as well as wi-fi, but still no physical media support out of the box.

Then there is also the fact that Apple has a history of releasing second generation products that build very well upon the first version of a product. There are lots of rumors about what the iPad Second Generation will have and how it may be better than the current one. The iPad may end up being a case where the early adopters feel slighted by what the next device has that theirs doesn't. One of those things is a webcamera. Most netbooks let you videochat, but you won't be able to do that on an iPad, at least not without some iPhone magic.

The two of us both love the look and feel of the iPad and, if someone offered, either one of us would love to have one. But we're also recommending that folks proceed with caution if they're thinking about getting one for themselves. Make sure you're happy with what it does and doesn't do before plopping down your cash!

And, for the record, both of us watch Brian Cooley talk about $75,000 cars all the time and we're not all that interested in those either!

Finally, here's a link to a comparison of the iPad and the iPod Touch.

Andy hasn’t gotten to play with one yet, but Justin has! One of my church members pre-ordered one, and brought it to church this last Sunday, and let me play with it for a bit. It is truly a gorgeous device, that is really snappy to use. I currently own an iPhone 3GS, and see many of the same great qualities in the iPad, but with way more screen real estate. My wife actually has been eyeing one simply as a couch device for email, web-surfing, and Facebook, I would love to see what Apple improves in the second generation model, then we may jump at the chance to get one!

I like when people and companies that are part of a problem are also willing to be part of the solution. So I was glad to hear recently of an effort by LG Electronics, the world's third largest mobile phone handset maker, to help adults understand text messaging. Last summer I wrote an article for Lutheran Partners entitled Tech and Youth: Wise as Serpents, Innocent as Doves. In researching that article, I discovered the prevalence of sexting, as well as how, in one case at least, the consequences can be deadly.

LG Electronics has recently unveiled a new site called LG Text Ed, available at www.LGTextEd.com. On it they hope to help parents understand the language of text messaging and also the potential dangers of sexting and other threatening messages. The homeroom of the site links to a ton of good resources, more than I have had time to read or even skim, including Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs), a Library of information, and Facts about phone use. LG has brought together an "advisory council of leading child behavior and health experts who examine important issues related to tweens, teens, and mobile phone use."

Related to that site is another LG site called DTXTR, or de-texter. This site allows you to enter a text messaging term and have it decoded into English! LGDTXTR.com also has links to texting tips, a glossary of commonly (and un-commonly) used terms, and a quiz to see if you're up to snuff on the shorthand codes that teens are using. I only got 5 of 10 right on the quiz!

I'm going to pass these sites along to my parents and continue browse it to educate myself. Texting is the most efficient way I've found to communicate with the people in my youth groups and I have talked to many parents who are discovering that it works well for them and their children. As with any technology, parents need to understand what their children are doing and anything we can do to educate them will certainly help.

(Another resource I haven't explored too much is SextingIsStupid.com )