After finishing up with Sony Music's Epic records and that unprecedented eight album contract it looks like Jamiroquai might be the next musicians to follow Radiohead and offer their music via the internet. This would put their new music under their direct control while cutting out the record company and making direct contact with their fan base via their own website. Speaking of Jamiroquai's website they've just re-launched sans references to their former record label also stating their plans to make their content available via widgets for people to post on their websites, blogs, and social networking profiles like facebook and myspace classic, effective viral marketing. The relaunched official Jamiroquai band website is currently offering video content via links to and code from YouTube. I applaud their efforts but the video quality needs to be higher quality. I'm sure the video quality will improve. There's no denying the effectiveness of empowering people to place code back on their blog, website or social networking page. This will result in an even more powerful viral marketing effect that will benefit the band and their fans because interesting, quality content always finds an audience even in the vast play pen that is the World Wide Web. The major record labels must be shitting bricks!




I love buying music via the internet. I was an instant, loyal customer of Apple's iTunes and still love buying downloadable media from iTunes. I love downloading music, audiobooks, podcasts and video both movies and TV shows. So, I certainly understand the appeal for musical talent taking control of their work and reinventing the way music is distributed to, in this case eager fans waiting for your next album.




Have you ever checked out the iTunes U area of the iTunes music store the content available there is awe inspiring? Podcasts that you can subscribe to which automatically download right into your iTunes library so you can listen to them whenever you want, sync to your iPod and take them with you for your commute or workout, wherever — whenever. Love my iPod, iTunes, iPhone, MacBook Pro and my Mac mini which is actually setup as our network server and is connected to our Sony 50" HDTV - the mac mini has an external firewire hard drive connected to it, which is where my iTunes library is stored and downloaded to. I stream my music from mac mini to a Sharper Image speaker that is connected to an Apple Airport Express which is controlled (streamed) via iTunes to the self-powered speaker.


Here's a YouTube video clip I pulled from the official Jamiroquai band website. I'm sure the video quality will improve as they develop their website and its content, including video.




Looking for their music on CD, check out what's available at Amazon.com maybe they'll show up in Amazon's recently launched mp3 download music store; that would be cool. For all things Jamiroquai check out Amazon.com -- selection & great prices too!

Tags: Music, DIgital downloads, mps, No DRM, DRM, internet, Jay Kay, SONY, Jamiroquai, itunes, Yahoo Music

Seth Weintraub (computerworld) reports that a survey conducted by Canalys for Symbian “shows that iPhone sales are second only to Blackberry in North America. That means that iPhone has passed Windows Mobile, Palm and Linux in sales in North America.”

Read more…

Source: Apple Hot News RSS feed




Refurbished iPhone, 8GB: only $349!

Tags: iPhone, Apple, Inc., Smart Phones, Windows Mobile, Windows, Microsoft, Blackberry, Palm, Symbian, Treo, Steve Jobs, Steve Ballmer

As blogMerit evolves and grows the tone is taking on natural, added character and this is one of those times. Don't be offended its me but its some of the 'me' that I've been curb checking so as to appeal to the broadest audience. However, I do have some very strong opinions so I will begin sharing those here, and as always all my posts are open to comments. That said is also one of the features that's not back online yet. It's being sorted and will be live again very soon.
Oh, and by the way I want to say I create, upload and manage my websites with this wonderful application from a company called Real Mac Software, its called Rapidweaver. I believe the current version is 3.6 and yes, its "Leopard" ready. I work on a Mac and I have for years. Jumped right into iPod and iTunes when they became available. I always upgrade my OS X I tend to upgrade pretty quickly when the updates come out; they're pretty scheduled about every 18 months there's a system upgrade and unlike Windows there's no confusing upgrade paths to try and figure out. If you have one Mac you'll probably buy the single user license but if you have more Macs say an iMac and MacBook you'd buy the Family Pack license for only a few bucks more then you can legally install it on up to five (5) Mac and all this is $129.00 - $199.00. What's that saying, of that's it, It's a no-brainer. More on these wonderful resources for Mac users later. I'm marking this as one of my Cool beans topic for later followup postings. iPod, iPhone, OS X "Leopard", iMac, iTunes, Safari just to name a few.
iPhone gifts they'll love. Give iPhone with signature gift wrap and free shipping. Maybe's its time you take another look at the Mac. I mean, come on what do have to lose?!

Tags: Apple, Inc., MacBook, Mighty Mouse, Mac, Apple TV, itunes, Final Cut Express, MacBook Pro, iLife '08, iWork '08, iPhone, iPod, iPod nano, iPod Touch

iMac delivering “twice the bang for the buck”
At Iona College in New Rochelle, New York, iMac offers the best of both worlds, allowing students and faculty to “run their Mac-based programs of choice, while still enabling access to the Windows applications they need.” Says Dimitris Hilaris, Iona’s associate vice provost for IT, “Now that we have the versatility of being able to put both operating systems on one computer and the pricing is competitive, it doesn’t make sense not to go with Apple.”

Tags: imac, Apple, Inc., Technology

I'm sitting here watching HDTV and 'stumbling' with Stumbleupon in my Firefox browser and it brought me here. Follow this link to view video of a whole new way of 'interfacing'. Give this video your undivided attention as it's beyond --
-- thought provoking.


Part Two:
One of my readers thinks that the film, "What the Bleep Do We Know" is crap. I find this interesting because it's one, peripheral element of this post, but by no means is it the focal point, I included it to provoke thought and dialog and it worked. I welcome and appreciate comments from my readers. As the writer and publisher of this blog I'm most interested in actually exploring and sharing information, not just opinions this is the core objective of this blog. In that spirit please provide your thoughts along with your resources, links, etc. to further your point when you elect to post a comment; let's really open it up to sharing and on-going, open dialog. Since my use of the tag 'Critical Thinking' also appears to be a sticking point I've taken the opportunity to link to the wikipedia definition of 'Critical Thinking'. I'm linking to wikipedia because m-w.com provided no definition for 'Critical Thinking' at their website.


What the Bleep Do We Know!?


User and Task Analysis for Interface Design (Hardcover)

Tags: interface design, Critical Thinking, Technology, Quantum Physics, Web 2.0, "What the Bleep Do We know?", DVD

Apple unveiled the latest update to their hit digital music player and it's called iPod Touch and it's gorgeous as it's a slightly smaller version of the iPhone so it contains features first seen in Apple's hit cellular phone, the iPhone. One of the coolest features, in my opinion is finally has WI-FI which allow you to purchase via WIWI-FI from Apple's new WI-FI iTunes music store directly to your iPod Touch. I've been waiting for WI-FI to come to the iPod Touch and it's pretty cool now that it's here plus the deal with Starbucks is brilliant for Apple and Starbucks. When you enter a Starbucks with WI-FI your iPod sees the network and you're allowed onto the network at no charge (in other words, no fees to T-mobile to access the WI-FI hotspot). This is of course to facilitate the ability of visitors to purchase music they're hearing in Starbucks in that very moment; purchase it via the Wi-Fi iTunes store as they sell Starbucks music already. Cool beans. The new iPod Touch comes in 8GB and 16GB models beginning at $299.00. As I learn more I'll update this post and include a full review once I've used it. Check out the video demo. at apple.com to see the new iPod Touch. So cool, so Apple.

Tags: iPod Touch, iPod, itunes, iPhone, Apple, Inc., Apple, Mac, mp3, DIgital downloads

I want an Apple iPhone so bad I can barely stand it. Sometimes I'm what the industry calls an 'early adopter' and sometimes I wait, continue my research and purchase later or not at all depending upon how things pan out. It's especially difficult to for me to wait because I'm already an AT&T Wireless customer so it would be a pretty seamless transaction but my purchase trigger finger needs to be told no, wait because my intuition is telling me to hold off on purchasing for now.

[INSERT THE CODE FOR THE IPHONE HERE]

See I think Apple has a trick up their sleeve and we're going to see another iPhone model in times for the 2007 holiday shopping season. I don't know why I think this, but I do. Don't quote me on this because it's pure speculation on my part. Anyway, for those of you who'd like to buy it now or if you'd like more information I've included links throughout this post and the iPhone photograph is a link to more info. or purchase too. Enjoy.

INSERT C.M. CLIP HERE & LINKS

Tags: Mac, Windows, Microsoft, Virtualization

C.M CLIP PASTED IN HERE WITH LINKS

Tags: Apple, Apple, Inc., Mac, Windows

This is a great solution I found to enjoy DVDs on my new SONY HDTV. I'll try to inform here without being boring. Here's the deal I will eventually purchase a HD / Blu-Ray DVD player but I'm not paying a thousand dollars while the two competing Hi-Def. formats battle it out. I'm old enough to remember the VHS versus BETAMAX videotape battle in the early days of video. SONY makes these really cool DVD players that connects via HDMI to my SONY HDTV but it UPCONVERTS the DVD so it takes advantage of the HD wide screen capabilities of the TV. It's not the same as a HD DVD but because it UPCONVERTS the signal it increases the lines of resolution so the picture quality is very good. I bought a 5 disk DVD model because I watch a lot of TV episodes on DVD and it's convenient being able to load 5 DVDs into the player. This works perfect for our needs while HD DVD players come down in price, plus I understand that you'll be able to buy HD DVD players that play both HD DVD and Blu-Ray, that makes the most sense to me so I'll wait for that but I love this slick little SONY Upconverting 5 Disk DVD player.

Tags: HDTV, DVD

So, I'm sitting here ogling photographs of the new iPod nano on the internet and I really love the size and shape of the new design plus the thinness! Last evening I watched the keynote of Steve Jobs unveiling the refreshed and reinvented iPod lineup at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, CA. Well, during his speech he was literally slipping the new iPod nano and the brand new iPod Touch in and out of the front pockets of his signature blue jeans. As it turns out he had the redesigned iPod nano in one front pocket and the brand new, stunning iPod Touch in his other front pocket; the new iPod nano is only 0.3 inches thin. It's all just so fun to think about because he walked us through the history of the iPods and how much thicker they used to be yet some how Apple's designers and engineers continue to innovate and make them even thinner while increasing capacity and battery life; no matter whether you're running music or video so you're getting even more bang for your buck.

Which brings me to how damn cool would it be to have episodes of my new-to-me favorite TV show right in my pocket on my iPod nano or my iPod Classic [new moniker, more on this in a separate post] at least the first two seasons which are available at iTunes. How fun, favorite, hit shows, on the cool new iPods which are hitting stores shelves as I type this. I've owned an iPod going back to the first generation and I was surprised at the quality of the video on what used to be called, iPod Video (it's now called the iPod Classic) and I understand the screen on the new iPod nano is brighter and has the a higher resolution. I have yet to see what video looks like on the iPhone but I understand the color resolution (image quality) are stellar, which is the same on the new iPod Touch. Enjoy.

Hit TV shows, music, iPod nano and iTunes - it doesn't get any better than that now does it!

[insert the sho.com widget here]

I'm thinking the iPod nano would make a great gift along with an iTunes gift card so the recipient can get started downloading music and video right out-of-the-box as the saying goes.


iTunes Gift Certificates – Easy, last-minute Gifts for the Holidays.


Download Weeds on iTunes

Tags: San Francisco, Moscone Center, Steve Jobs, Gift cards, mp3, DIgital Music, Gift Certificates, Blue Jeans, Starbucks, Apple, Apple, Inc., itunes, iPod Touch, iPhone, iTunes wi-fi Store

The ipod lineup received more than a facelift today when Apple, Inc. announced the new iPod Touch (see separate post) and the re-designed iPod nano now with video in a new design. Not having had the opportunity to play with them yet I can't say for certain but at first glance at the photographs it appears to me Apple has done it again and just in time for the holiday season which of course is no accident on Apple's part. Anyway, back to the matter at hand the new nano and the ultra-hip, new iPod Touch make worthy sidekicks to the stunning iPhone. There's something about the size and shape coupled with it playing video that has hit product written all over it. The nano is already the most popular in the iPod lineup and so far, this does not disappoint.

Tags: iPod, iPod nano, mp3, DIgital downloads, Windows & MAC, itunes, iTunes wi-fi Store

“iPhone seduces us with its bells, whistles…and ease of use”
“If lovin’ this phone is wrong,” pines Etan Horowitz (OrlandoSentinel.com), “I don’t want to be right.” He calls iPhone “the most fun and easy to use gadget I’ve ever laid my hands on” and says that “carrying it in my pocket made me feel connected to the world the way I do when I’m surfing the Internet on a high-speed connection.” In fact, “Safari, the iPhone’s Internet browser, lets you display up to eight Web pages at once, and it’s easy to move among them.” Horowitz “was also impressed by the battery life, which gave me nearly six hours of talking, Internet browsing and video watching before I needed to charge it.”

[insert code for apple iphone]


This review excerpt was published by the Orlando Sentinel and was clipped from the Apple website news page on 08/20/07.

Tags: iPhone, Smart Phones, Cell Phones, itunes, Mobile, mp3, Apple, Inc., iPod

I wanted to let my email subscribers know that I'm experiencing technical issues with the email of my RSS feed. We're working to sort it out ASAP. Check back often or use Google or download Shrook in the interim while we wait for this issue to be resolved. Thanks for your patience.

Tags: email, Technology

I have been waiting for these upgrades but I thought I was going to have to wait until Leopard comes out in October but YEAH they're here today along with the sexy, sleek, new iMac, new Mac mini plus major upgrades to iWork '08 and iLife '08. You know, when you compare the features and the cost of Apple's iWork suite Apple's wins hands down, a single license is only $79.00 and if you need a family pack it's only $99.00 for installation on five MACS for $100 and five, registered installations versus $350.00 for the standard version of Microsoft Office for Mac. OK, well that's a no-brainer $80-$100 versus $350+ for MS Office, isn't it obvious. I've been using iWork '06 via PAGES and a little bit of KEYNOTE and I really like what I've created. I've also had a lot of fun creating my documents. I'm a creative writer and I can honestly say opening PAGES and using one of the included templates sparks my creativity and I hit the ground running every time. Plus it's really intuitive and easy to use. Another reason why I love my MAC.

Don't Miss Out on Apple's Education Bonus:

Tags: iWork '08, Pages, Keynote, Mac, Mac mini, iPod nano, iPod Touch, itunes, iLife '08, iPhone, imac

INSERT C.M. CLIP HERE

Tags: News, Clipmarks, Forbes, Web 2.0

It will be interesting to watch this deal as we move forward. The rumor is that it's a five year, exclusive deal for AT&T to sell Apple's iPhone but it's known that Apple extracted unprecedented deal terms from AT&T not the least of which is a revenue share based upon a percentage of the monthly plan fee the iPhone customer signs up for. This will be fun to watch as Apple develops what we know will be a line of iPhones beyond the first model.

[insert code banner for iphone]

Tags: AT&T, Wireless, iPhone, iPod, iPod nano, Apple, Inc., iPod Touch

Buy the new Mac mini (with iLife '08 - PAGES, KEYNOTE & the new spreadsheet application NUMBERS)

Tags: Mac, Mac mini, imac, Apple, Inc.

Metasearch searches multiple engines - this means that instead of getting the best results one search engine has to offer, you'll be getting the best combined results from a variety of engines, and not just any engines, but industry leading engines like Google, Yahoo! Search, Live Search, Ask.com, About, MIVA, LookSmart and more.

Who knew one search engine could do so much? We did. In fact, we just recently published a study about how little search results overlap across the various search engines (less than 1%!) and how metasearch provides a better Web search experience. Click here for full study. Don't take our word for it. Dopgile was recently ranked highest in customer satisfaction by J.D. Powers and Associates *

Metasearch is easy to use - Better results and more coverage of the Web is great - but not if you need an advanced degree to make it work. Dogpile metasearch is easy. All you do is enter your search and click 'Search'. The great results will take care of themselves!

Search more engines, get the best results from more of the Web and do it all easily. That's what metasearch is all about!

Tags: Search, Meta search, Metasearch, Meta-search

...and the response I've received so far is fantastic. Now, I have a question for my readers / subscribers; which do you prefer Feedburner or FeedBlitz for delivering RSS when you subscribe? I'm currently evaluating these two RSS providers and I'd really like to hear from my readers and subscribers. Please post a comment to this post or send me an email telling which one you prefer and why. Your comments are most appreciated. Thank you.

Tags: RSS, Web 2.0, Technology

INSERT CODE FOR APPLE IMAC.

Tags: Apple, Inc., imac, iPod, iLife '08, iWork '08

INSERT AD CODE FOR NEW IMAC & LINK TO APPLE STORE AT LARGE

Tags: imac, Mac mini, iPod, Notebook, Mac, Apple, Inc., Back to School

INSERT C.M. CLIP HERE ABOUT MSFT CUST. SERVICE STORY

Tags: Mac, Windows, Microsoft, Virtualization

INSERT CODE FOR IPHONE

Tags: iPhone, Apple, Inc., AT&T

I just watched "Gordon Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares" on BBC America. Sure he's arrogant and gets in the restaurant owner's face but so what. He's successful as a chef/owner and it makes for great television. I just watched a really great episode about a mother and her two daughters and they all three own and run the restaurant. As usual when Gordon came in the place had it's issues the biggest of which is the mother daughter triad had never defined who's responsible for what management tasks. Suffice it to say he got to the root of the problem. Anyway, it's another fun, informative BBC America show starring successful . Check it out you'll enjoy I'm sure. Happy reading.
I just watched "Gordon Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares" on BBC America. Sure he's arrogant and gets in the restaurant owner's face but so what. He's successful as a chef/owner and it makes for great television. I just watched a really great episode about a mother and her two daughters and they all three own and run the restaurant. As usual when Gordon came in the place had it's issues the biggest of which is the mother daughter triad had never defined who's responsible for what management tasks. Suffice it to say he got to the root of the problem. Anyway, it's another fun, informative BBC America show starring successful . Check it out you'll enjoy I'm sure. Happy reading.

Tags: BBC America, Gordon Ramsey, TV, DISH NETWORK, DIgital TV, BBC

INSERT C.M. CLIP HERE ABOUT PERSONAL TECHNOLOGY

Tags: Apple, Inc., Mac, Windows, Windows & MAC, HDTV, Technology

This is a great solution I found to enjoy DVDs on my new SONY HDTV. I'll try to inform here without being boring. Here's the deal I will eventually purchase a HD / Blu-Ray DVD player but I'm not paying a thousand dollars while the two competing Hi-Def. formats battle it out. I'm old enough to remember the VHS versus BETAMAX videotape battle in the early days of video. SONY makes these really cool DVD players that connects via HDMI to my SONY HDTV but it UPCONVERTS the DVD so it takes advantage of the HD wide screen capabilities of the TV. It's not the same as a HD DVD but because it UPCONVERTS the signal it increases the lines of resolution so the picture quality is very good. I bought a 5 disk DVD model because I watch a lot of TV episodes on DVD and it's convenient being able to load 5 DVDs into the player. This works perfect for our needs while HD DVD players come down in price, plus I understand that you'll be able to buy HD DVD players that play both HD DVD and Blu-Ray, that makes the most sense to me so I'll wait for that but I love this slick little SONY Upconverting 5 Disk DVD player.

Tags: HDTV, DVD

...on a SONY HDTV. We have the 50" SONY SXRD high definition rear projection (not the bulky old style this TV is only 18 inches deep. We purchased it last fall from Amazon.com and they shipped it to our door FREE SHIPPING and their price was incredible. The picture is 1080p, or 1080i the TV switches to whatever setting it reads from the content when you change channels. I really love this HDTV obviously I have a history with SONY TVs, I have owned SONY Trinitrons over the years. Watching native HD programming like the VOOM Network channels or FOOD NETWORK HD the color and detail still stops me in my tracks and I work in Hollywood so I'm used to the best quality audio and video. We're really enjoying having HDTV at home. I dumped our cable company in favor of DISH NETWORK because they have more HD channels than any other provider right now that includes cable tv companies and DirecTV. I love those VOOM Network channels, more on that in a separate post. This signal from DISH NETWORK is so clean and sharp and vibrant compared to the mushy signal from our local cable TV company. Even the standard definition (SD) programming is better from DISH NETWORK and looks amazing on our SONY SXRD HDTV. In a future post I'll tell you about this really cool SONY DVD player I have hooked up to our new HDTV...

Tags: SONY, HDTV, DISH NETWORK, FOOD TV