I have finally broken down and gotten my own domain name(s). I registered insert-text-here.com and insert-text-here.net to host my blog and have another site in the works that I'm sure I'll blog about later. With my blogging I have been dedicated to my Blogger account. However, with the new site comes new capabilities. I am now having fun trying my best to create a template for WordPress. It is much more customizable but (at this point) a decent bit beyond my expertise. My slow template work is available here. I'm not sure if I'll stick with Blogger or move to WordPress, but I do enjoy having a choice!

Make sure to update your Bookmarks! Blogger is now posting at insert-text-here.com, but still updates insert-text-here.blogspot.com. However, if I decide to switch to WordPress, you won't see any new posts!

Apple has come out with two new products. First is the new iPhone. This is not your standard phone...in fact is is lightyears beyond anything that is on the market today. It has a wide screen display that displays either tall-ways or wide-ways depending on how you are holding it (yes, it senses it's own position). It has an actually working OS that has full browsing features (not any of that WEP crap, but actual full web browsing) and music playback via the music it pulled when syncing up with your iTunes library. It has video playback, up to 8gb internal memory, and a memory card port for aditional memory. And if this isn't enough, it also has a 2mp digital camera, Blue Tooth capabilities, and auto-senses that it is pressed to your ear to turn on the phone features. The iPhone is scheduled to be released this June.

The second product is the new AppleTV. This unit is designed to wirelessly connect your television to your iTunes library. With the AppleTV box you can play all of your favorite music videos, music, TV shows, and (another new apple feature) movies that you have purchased on iTunes or that you have added via other methods to your iTunes library. Forget the movie store, forget 1-time movie rentals on your digital box, and forget snail mail videos. With iTunes and your AppleTV box you can purchase your movie online and be watching it on your television within minutes. And, yes, it is HDTV compatible.
The AppleTV is available for purchase as of today, starting at $299.

A colleague made a referral to one of my daily obsessions that had me checking out the site sooner then I had planned. Penny Arcade had an interesting topic for it’s latest comic depicting images construed from the video imbedded in this post (entitled “Moral Combat”). While I found the comic (as always) quite hilarious, I was quite disconcerted by the video.



Basically, the premise of video is to display how video games are the cause of everything from the World Trade Center terrorist attacks to the Columbine shootings. It displays children as mindless automatons who have free access to very mature video game content that fills their empty heads with a very numb view of violence, the knowledge of how to utilize weapons for violent behavior, and a desire to use this knowledge on the people around them. I find irony in the absence of any reference to parents, parenting, or parental control.

This, however, is not my primary reason for posting, but is what prompted a conversation that I had later that afternoon with another of my colleagues which focused more on the general affect of Technology on today’s society. While he did not convey any from of agreement for the overbearing, nonfactual Moral Combat video, he did pose a rather convincing argument on the negative affects that technology is having on society.

The basic premise of his argument focused on how, technology has begun to weaken our culture on a physical and social level. Being that I have based a career in Technology this was not an idea that I was going to accept easily. However, brining up legitimate examples such as the growing obesity of our children and a growing trend of people whose primary social experiences are found in online communities, he began to catch my attention a bit. While the ideas he expressed are a far cry from calling video games the bane of our existence, I found myself compelled to agree that today’s generation feels less connected to their local community. The world has grown smaller, making the feeling of anonymity stronger and sense of individualism less distinct. An interesting question was posed: who is the Einstein, Beethoven, Picasso, or Franklin of today? When I try to answer this question, I think of entrepreneurs…the Bill Gates and Donald Trumps, but I cannot think of anyone who has made such an astounding mark on society to be named with those listed above. I do not believe that this is because those great minds don’t exist, but that these individuals have to fight a society that rewards anonymity as the technology that the society survives on works best when things conform to a standard.

Maybe the technology that helps society survive is also a bane. Maybe…but that thought is not going to stop me from expressing it via this technological medium.

If you are an old frequenter to my blog, you may notice some changes in progress. I am working to create a new look and hope to begin posting again soon.

Thanks for checking in!