Why I’m about to toss my iPhone in the trash

I simply can’t believe the total disservice Apple bestowed on the American public by locking the iPhone down to the AT&T network. There’s been rumblings about the AT&T network from many iPhone users, but personally, I’ve not experienced problems until 4 days ago. Over the past 4 days I’ve had all sorts of problems with the crappy freaking AT&T service!

Text messages won’t send. I have to retry sending them 5 or 6 times before they finally send, if they send at all! Receiving text messages isn’t much better either. Someone sent me a message… I didn’t get it until an hour later… AN HOUR???!!! What the hell am I paying $20 a month for texting for if the damn message doesn’t go through immediately?!

Today, I was trying to make a call, and even though the phone showed 5 bars 3G, I couldn’t make the call at all. It totally failed to connect. The same thing with people trying to call me. Their calls would go straight to voicemail… if they get through at all… what a crock!!!

Of course 611 is totally freaking useless too! Tech support at AT&T blows and the best I got was the two towers in Indiana was down and that was what was causing problems. Whatever! Don’t you do proper capacity planning? And two towers down for 4 days?!!! What the hell?!!!

So, as I sit here and write this, my phone at least now shows “No Service” which is about what I’m having anyway… I’m traveling to Vegas tomorrow and will see if service is better outside of Indianapolis. If it is, AT&T better have their service fixed by the time I get back because the Blackberry Storm is starting to look mighty attractive right now.

Make no mistake, the iPhone is the best damn phone I’ve ever owned. As far as I’m concerned, it’s the best damn phone on the market today. Problem is… what good is the best damn phone to me when the network sucks? Answers: NOTHING!!! So, if AT&T can’t get their act together, I’ll be abandoning the iPhone shortly. Thank you Steve Jobs for screwing the American public with AT&T… thanks for nothing!

Cheers
C

Yeehaa! MVP for a fourth year running…

I’d like to thank the Academy… no, seriously though… I’m thankful for being honored with MVP honors for a fourth year running. I’m super excited because we’ll be in the beta phase for SharePoint vNext in the next year and I can’t wait for that. In the same sense though, I’m thankful that I’m able to donate time to the SharePoint community at large and serve in some small way to make others’ journey easier.

Cheers
C

Spend some time in your War Room

OK, so it’s been a while since I last blogged. Things have been very busy and hectic on my side, but amidst all this, I have found my ideal form of meditation, my zen if you will. Our story begins some months ago though…

To begin with, having done body building in my past life, I have a very dense body mass. As a result, I weigh more than most people my height does, or are supposed to. Duh, muscle is heavier than fat right? J Because of this little fact, I was never really surprised to find myself falling into the “Overweight” category on Body/Mass charts. True, I had gained a few pounds over the years, but I never really considered myself badly overweight. Of course it so happens that I was putting on my jeans one morning and found that I had… um… shall we just say “outgrown” them. Mmm… time to go and buy jeans another size bigger I thought to myself. That was the plan, but then I weighed myself and happen to cross reference my weight to my height on one of those charts again. The result shocked me to my core. I was right on the line between “Overweight” and “Obese”. What the hell?! No way! There is no way on God’s green earth that I allow myself to fall into the “Obese” classification. That’s when “the plan” changed. I decided that instead of buying a size bigger jeans, I was going to lose weight and fit my butt pack into my existing jeans. That was the “new plan”. Along the way of this new plan though, I discovered so much more…

So like any person determined on shedding some pounds, I jumped on the treadmill right away. At first I thought I’d do it three times a week, but then I’m much too impatient for that to take effect, so I just did it every day. I was up a 04h30 each day anyway so I might as well sneak a 30 minute treadmill walk in there somewhere I thought. Just like any other over eager person starting out, I made the mistake of not stretching before I started on the treadmill. On top of that I didn’t do a warm up walk or a cool down walk either. So it was not surprising that within three days, I pulled a muscle in my right knee. Now this is where those self doubts come into play. Actually, this is where the lazy ass version of self comes to the fore. You begin to think. Mmm. I pulled a muscle. I better lay off the treadmill for a couple of weeks to allow it to recover and heal. Thankfully, my logical mind took over and drove such thoughts out. I assessed the pain and decided it wasn’t anything major. Putting on my military toughness hat, I decided I was simply going to push through the pain. If the knee hurts, I will keep exercising until it stops hurting. So that’s what I did. Religiously every morning, I did my 30 minute walk. I also decided that I wasn’t sweating enough on the treadmill so I upped my walking speed for 3 mph to 3.5 mph and then eventually to 4 mph.

Now I burn about 350 calories in 30 minutes at 4 mph. One day I got to 30 minutes and thought I’d push for 500 calories instead and so 500 became my new daily goal. Before long I was doing an hour and 700 calories and then one day I thought it would be cool to push for 1000 calories, so I did. Given that my weight was only starting to come off at about one pound per week, the 1000 calories became my new daily goal. That was how I got into my current routine of 90 minutes per day in the morning on the treadmill.

You’ll be amazed at just how “loose” you are after that. Stress truly just burns off and I found that I have so much more energy during the day. I don’t like to exercise at night because if you have a long or bad day, then you don’t feel like it and end up not doing it at all. Nope, I exercise in the mornings. You always feel about the same in the mornings so there aren’t many excuses to not do it and besides, the 90 minutes fits perfectly between 04h30 and 06h00. J After that first muscle injury, I started spending a couple of minutes stretching before I start, 3 minutes working up to my speed and 3 minutes cooling down from my speed. I would start at 3 mph for a minute, then 3.5 mph for the next minute, then 3.8 mph for the third minute and finally bump up to my normal 4 mph speed. When I’m done, I would slow down to 3 mph for 2 minutes and then finally 2 mph for a minute. Then I’d do some more stretches just to keep everything good and limber and then it’s shower time.

OK, so I exercise. Big deal. What’s this “War Room” I’m talking about?

I discovered the War Room quite by accident. I found that staying on the treadmill for 90 minutes every day was hard. About half way through, you start thinking about stopping. Not good. So like every other person with an exercise regiment, I looked to music to keep me going through those halfway blues phases. It worked too, but I found that not just any type of music worked right. For me it was better if the music I was listening to had a good beat that I could “march” to on the treadmill. I guess it’s a holdover from my Air Force days when we marched in pace. Anyway, I began scouring my music collection for songs that actually had the right beat. Believe me, it wasn’t easy to narrow down the list, but I managed to do it. That beat is different for everyone because it depends on your leg length and your walking speed. With my shorter, stronger Afrikaner legs and walking at 4 mph, I found my ideal backbeat to be about 150 bpm. Not all my songs are at that beat. Some are faster and some are slower which actually forces me to adjust my walking pace sometimes taking faster, smaller steps and sometimes taking longer, slower steps. This is a great change of pace, but the secret was that I was able to adjust to the backbeat of any song in my special playlist, well, automatically… without really thinking about it. And that’s when I discovered the War Room.

When I’m on the treadmill, my mind begins to wander. Now you might think that you should contemplate “important” issues and think about your day etc. during such a time of meditation. Don’t be tempted! Simply get into step with the beat and let your mind wander. Let your mind lead you, not the other way around. You’ll be amazed what your mind begins to think about. Now my mind changes direction quickly and frequently as well, so it was really interesting to see what happens when I just let it go. In the process, I discovered that my mind was dealing with things I wasn’t even aware of, thinking of things I didn’t even consider. This helped me get crystal clear clarity in my life. It helped me determine and work out exactly what it was that I wanted from life. Well, maybe not exactly as that changes all the time, but I began to get a very clear picture of me, my life and my future.

The mind’s ability to work things out by itself without you actually having to direct it or “think” about it, is what I discovered. The answer to every problem is already in you. All you have to do is find it. By tasking the body with rigorous exercise, yet giving it a backbeat it can harmonize to, the body’s too busy working to interfere with the process. That frees the mind and I find that I just pick a spot on the treadmill or the wall and stare at it. Just a blank, 1000 yard stare like we had in the military. Before long, the process ignites and wonderful things happen.

It’s this whole ritual, which I adhere to religiously every single day, that I call my War Room. That’s where my subconscious mind comes into touch with my conscious mind and together they hash out and resolve any and all problems in my life. You should try it some time. If nothing else, just discovering what your mind wonders to is pretty exciting. You might be surprised at the outcome! J So here’s my regiment.

1. Stretches to loosen the leg muscles.
2. 1 minute @ 3.0 mph for warm up.
3. 1 minute @ 3.5 mph for warm up.
4. 1 minute @ 3.8 mph for warm up.
5. 84 minutes @ 4.0 mph for zen time.
6. 2 minutes @ 3.0 mph for cool down.
7. 1 minute @ 2.0 mph for cool down.
8. Stretches to keep the muscles loose.

My song list is a really mixed batch and looks like this:

• Always on my mind – Pet Shop Boys
• Bad case of lovin’ you – Robert Palmer
• Breakdance – Irene Cara
• Dirty deeds done dirt cheap – AC/DC
• Edge of a broken heart – Vixen
• Everybody have fun tonight – Wang Chung
• Fame – Irene Cara
• Fight for your right – Beasty Boys
• Get ready for this – 2 Unlimited
• Gloria – Laura Branigan
• Good girls go to heaven – Pandora’s Box
• Hit me with your best shot – Pat Benetar
• Hungry like a wolf – Duran Duran
• I’m gonna getcha good – Shania Twain
• I’m too sexy – Right Said Fred
• I drove all night – Cyndi Lauper
• I hate myself for loving you – Joan Jet
• I need love – N’Sync
• I think we’re alone now – Tiffany
• I was made for lovin’ you – Kiss
• If you love somebody set them free – Sting
• Invisible touch – Genesis
• Jump – Van Halen
• Just can’t get enough – Depeche Mode
• Just like paradise – David Lee Roth
• Lay all your love on me – Abba
• The lion sleeps tonight – Robert John
• Losing my religion – R.E.M.
• Missionary man – Eurythmics
• Mister big time – Jon Bon Jovi
• Money – Beatles
• Money for nothing – Dire Straits
• Nothin’ but a good time – Poison
• Oh yeah – Yellow
• One vision – Queen
• Physical – Olivia Newton-John
• Rhythm is gonna get you – Gloria Estefan
• Rock this country – Shania Twain
• Sex as a weapon – Pat Benetar
• Since u been gone – Kelly Clarkson
• Strong enough – Cher
• The sun always shines on TV – A-ha
• T.N.T. – AC/DC
• Thunderstruck – AC/DC
• Up – Shania Twain
• Venus – Bananarama
• We got it going on – Bon Jovi/Big & Rich
• Welcome to the jungle – Guns n’ Roses
• When the going gets tough – Billy Ocean
• Y.M.C.A. – Village People
• You shook me all night long – AC/DC

So now, I just turn on my music in shuffle mode every morning, do my stretches and warm ups and then I just put my body on cruise control and let my conscious mind connect with my sub conscious mind and start solving my problems. Of course, the little side benefit (I now consider it a side benefit even though it was the inspiring factor to begin this in the first place) is that my weight has come off in chunks.
Alas, it seems I might not be able to escape the need to buy new jeans after all… only thing is… having just lost 28 lbs in 10 weeks, I’m going to have to buy jeans a size SMALLER instead. 

Cheers
C

A moment of silence please…

We take a moment to mourn the loss of one of our own. Patrick Tisseghem passed away this week unexpectedly from heart failure. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family… Patrick was only 39 years old. Life is too short…

Cheers
C

What a WONDERFUL 20th Anniversary gift EA Sports is giving us…

OK, I have to get this off my chest…

WHAT A CROCK OF …!!!

EA Sports, in all their glorious wisdom has decided to drop, that’s right, DROP support for Madden NFL on the PC platform! Never mind that they built their empire on the backs of PC gamers. Never mind that we carried them through some years back when other PC Football games emerged to challenge Madden. Never mind that EA has an EXCLUSIVE license from the NFL to use its logos and player names etc. Never mind that we’re now left without any game options on the PC platform. What a crock!

Thank you very much EA Sports. Thank you and goodbye. I’m boycotting your Madden series now. If you’re not going to support my PC platform, I won’t support you either. I know I’m a lone voice and you probably don’t even care but I’m disgusted that you would do this.

I’m just wondering… what does John Madden think about all this?

I’ve played Madden since the 99 version and yes, I’ve only spent 9 of the 19 season following the game, but now 2008 is my final version. I spent many, many, MANY hours playing Madden. Oh well… now I’ll have a LOT more time for other things…

Cheers
C

I have crossed over to the dark side

OK. Hold on to your seats… yes… it's true… I have bought an iPhone

OK so I can no longer make fun of the Apple nerds that stood outside the Apple store for hours just to get an iPhone. Yes, I have succumbed to my unquenchable curiosity for gadgets and am now the proud owner of my very own iPhone 3G. I digress though. My story starts a long, long time ago… in a galaxy far, far… er… wrong reality… a long time ago…

Many years ago, Amy and I was using Sprint as our wireless provider. This was OK while we were living in the apartment, but when we moved to our home, we found that we were living in a dead zone for Sprint. We decided to change our service provider. I borrowed a bunch of cell phones, each with a different provider, from my coworkers and tested them from home. At the time, T-Mobile had the best reception at our home. As a result, we switched to T-Mobile. Of course T-Mobile's reception anywhere else in Indy was pretty useless. Without fail, driving down Meridian Street while on the phone was guaranteed to drop your call when you crossed 71st Street heading south towards downtown. Still, we remained faithful to T-Mobile for THREE years!

The straw that eventually broke the camel's back was when we received one of our bills. We had a $50 plan for two phones and 500 shared minutes. The bill came and was for $160! Upon closer inspection, it turned out that the majority of our calls were to just a few numbers. I was calling my buddy in Michigan, Amy's cell, Amy's work number and our home number. Amy was calling my cell, her parents' cells, my work, her friend in Lafayette and our home number. Surely we could save somehow?!

Since Alltel was advertising like crazy on TV in Indy, and because they had the "My Circle" where we could call unlimited to any ten numbers, I decided to give them a call. I was told they didn't provide any service in Indy. So if they're not providing any service, why are they wasting money on advertising? But, I digress... Then I decided to try the T-Mobile "My Faves" which would let us each have five numbers we could call unlimited. The phone call went like this:

Operator: T-Mobile customer service, how may I help you?
C: Hi. I'd like to upgrade our phone plan to include "My Faves".
Operator: Certainly sir. Can I get your wireless number?

Let me see... since I'm calling from my cell phone, don't you think their caller ID should already answer that question? The question should instead be something like "please confirm this request applies to phone number 555-555-5555". I won't even go into the fact that the computer had already asked me for my number even BEFORE I got to speak to the operator.

I grudgingly give them my number... Again...

Operator: Just a minute while I check your account... I show that you are using some older phones.
C: Yes, they're three years old.
Operator: Your phones are not "My Faves" compatible.
C: Huh? I'm not sure I understand what you mean.
Operator: Well sir, you need a phone that is "My Faves" compatible.
C: Are you saying that you need a special phone to use "My Faves"?
Operator: Yes sir.
C: But it's just a software setting in your system.
Operator: Without the new phone you cannot set your faves up.
C: I don't care that I won't be able to change the faves on the fly. I'm willing to set it through the internet.
Operator: But you cannot change your faves from the old phones.
C: I don't want to change it. I'll set it though the web site and be done with it.
Operator: You cannot do that.
C: So if I had a compatible phone, could I change my faves through the web site?
Operator: Yes sir.
C: Then why not with the old phones? It's just a software setting in your system for crying out loud!
Operator: I'm sorry sir, you have to have the new phones. I see that you're not currently under contract. If you sign a new 2 year contract, we can make you some very good deals on phones.
C: Fine. Whatever.
Operator: Please hold while I get the someone from hardware on the line.

Of course, just at that point, I was crossing 71st Street on Meridian Street, heading south. You know what that means, right? Tada! My call got dropped. I decided that was a sign. We just weren't meant to be on T-Mobile. Of course, the most amazing thing happens. They called me back! Have you EVER heard a thing like that?! Me neither. Just the same, I decided, since they called me back, that I would hear their proposal out. The conversation picks up with the hardware operator.

Operator: We can make some good deals for you with a 2 year contract.
C: OK, what can you do for us?
Operator: I see your wife is using one of our standard phones.
C: Yes, it's an old crappy phone.
Operator: With a 2 year contract, we can get her a new RAZR for free!
C: (Interested) OK, that sounds good.
Operator: I see you're using a Blackberry. (I had to use an old Blackberry because my other standard phone went on the fritz. Of course I just HATED that Blackberry)
C: Yes.
Operator: Well, with a 2 year contract, we can get you a Blackberry Perl for only $80!
C: OK, can you please make a note of these offers on my account. I will think about it and decide later.
Operator: Certainly sir.

When I got home, I decided to just check T-Mobile's web site to see what kind of deals I would be able to get as a new customer signing a 2 year deal because, well, essentially, that's what I would be right? I logged on and found:

•I could get a RAZR for free.

•I could get a Pearl for $90.

Mmm… so our 3 years of loyalty to T-Mobile was worth a whopping $10 to them! I have a word of advice for T-Mobile and any other company making "special offers" for their customers…

IF YOU'RE GOING TO MAKE AN OFFER TO KEEP A CUSTOMER, MAKE A REAL OFFER. DON'T TRY AND INSULT OUR INTELIGENCE!!!

It wasn't hard to convince Amy either. She was pretty fed up with T-Mobile too so it was an easy sell. We had a choice of either AT&T or Verizon. The next day, Saturday, we were out and about doing shopping when, lo and behold, we drove right by an AT&T store. We decided to stop and check out their phones. We got into the store and Amy started looking at phones. I was planning on just getting a standard phone. The sales guy came over and asked me if he could help…

Salesman: Can I help you find a phone today?
C: Nope. My wife's getting a phone. I'm just getting a standard phone.
Salesman: Not even one of our smart phones?
C: I have a Blackberry and I HATE it. Besides, the phone I really want, hasn't been invented yet.
Salesman: So tell me about your dream phone.
C: OK, my dream phone would include:

1. 3G wireless internet for best speed.
2. GPS for location tracking and mapping.
3. Exchange sync for my corporate email.
4. Internet access.
5. The ability to play my MP3s.
6. Camera.
7. Video camera.
8. Slide out full keyboard.
9. Navigation capabilities.

Salesman: Have you looked at our Tilt yet?
C: (Curious) OK… show me.

The salesman proceeded to show me the Tilt. I was very impressed with the Tilt. It had all 9 of my required features. I had looked at the iPhone earlier, but it didn't have #s 1, 2, 3, 7 or 8. The first 3 are pretty huge in my book, so I didn't give the iPhone another thought. I walked out of that store, a proud Tilt owner.

And then it started… Even though I installed a 4 GB memory expander card and even though I installed all my apps on the card and not the main memory, the phone began giving me messages about low memory… and the biggest frustration was constantly having to reboot the phone. Call me old fashioned, but I don't believe you should have to reboot your darn phone!

Over time, I fought against the need to reboot the Tilt by systematically uninstalling my apps from the phone. This continued until I could not uninstall any other needed apps at which point, I would reset the phone to factory defaults and start the process all over again. Needless to say, this got old… VERY quickly.

Then I was in Raleigh with Dustin and he started showing me what he does with his iPhone. That's something the sales guys at Apple and AT&T just don't have. The ability to truly relate what the phone can do to the person buying it. Of course, right at that time, the 2.0 firmware for the iPhone came out. Naturally, Dustin upgraded his iPhone as soon as possible. He was very excited about what the new firmware could do. I was sold after the following dialog took place…

C: So tell me. How often do you have to reboot your iPhone?
Dustin: (chuckle) Reboot my phone? I don't have to reboot my phone.

That alone was enough for me to take a new look at the iPhone. Of course, the new iPhone 3G provides the #1, 2 and 3 features that I wanted in a phone. There's no Video Camera, but that's not a really big loss. I'd miss it from the Tilt, but I didn't use it that much anyway. The iPhone 3G also doesn't have a Slide Out Full Keyboard, but honestly, I can count on one hand the number of times that I actually used that keyboard on my Tilt. So again, not that big a deal anymore.

Two weeks later, I was in Boston with Dustin and got to play with the iPhone 3G. I was sold. Then it was the mission of trying to find stock anywhere. I finally found an Apple store that had stock. After class, we went there and wouldn't you know it… I was the FIRST customer that got turned away! Bummer! The next day, the store had more stock. No 16 GB Black, but white for sure. Again, we went there after class. This time, I was Mr. Irrelevant. No matter. Even though I was the very LAST customer to get an iPhone 3G, I did get one!

I can happily say that I've had the phone for almost a week now and have needed to reboot it exactly ZERO times!

I'll say this. The more I use the phone, the more impressed I am with the attention to little details that Apple has put into the phone. It's amazing that little details make such a big difference in perception. Like I always say… PERCEPTION IS REALITY! All I know is, the more I use the phone, the more I'm pleasantly surprised… and the more I love it! I'll be posting my observations about the phone in weeks to come, including the apps I like. To be sure, the phone is not perfect, but it's hands down the best phone I've ever had.

Later
C

I have crossed over to the dark side

OK. Hold on to your seats… yes… it’s true… <SHOCK>I have bought an iPhone</SHOCK>

OK so I can no longer make fun of the Apple nerds that stood outside the Apple store for hours just to get an iPhone. Yes, I have succumbed to my unquenchable curiosity for gadgets and am now the proud owner of my very own iPhone 3G.  I digress though.  My story starts a long, long time ago… in a galaxy far, far… er… wrong reality… a long time ago…

Many years ago, Amy and I was using Sprint as our wireless provider.  This was OK while we were living in the apartment, but when we moved to our home, we found that we were living in a dead zone for Sprint. We decided to change our service provider.  I borrowed a bunch of cell phones, each with a different provider, from my coworkers and tested them from home.  At the time, T-Mobile had the best reception at our home.  As a result, we switched to T-Mobile.  Of course T-Mobile’s reception anywhere else in Indy was pretty useless. Without fail, driving down Meridian Street while on the phone was guaranteed to drop your call when you crossed 71^st Street heading south towards downtown.  Still, we remained faithful to T-Mobile for THREE years!

The straw that eventually broke the camel’s back was when we received one of our bills.  We had a $50 plan for two phones and 500 shared minutes.  The bill came and was for $160!  Upon closer inspection, it turned out that the majority of our calls were to just a few numbers.  I was calling my buddy in Michigan, Amy’s cell, Amy’s work number and our home number.  Amy was calling my cell, her parents’ cells, my work, her friend in Lafayette and our home number.  Surely we could save somehow?!

Since Alltel was advertising like crazy on TV in Indy, and because they had the “My Circle” where we could call unlimited to any ten numbers, I decided to give them a call.  I was told they didn’t provide any service in Indy.  So if they’re not providing any service, why are they wasting money on advertising?  But, I digress… Then I decided to try the T-Mobile “My Faves” which would let us each have five numbers we could call unlimited.  The phone call went like this:

Operator:  T-Mobile customer service, how may I help you?
C:  Hi.  I’d like to upgrade our phone plan to include “My Faves”.
Operator:  Certainly sir.  Can I get your wireless number?
<Rant>Let me see… since I’m calling from my cell phone, don’t you think their caller ID should already answer that question?  The question should instead be something like “please confirm this request applies to phone number 555-555-5555”.  I won’t even go into the fact that the computer had already asked me for my number even BEFORE I got to speak to the operator.</Rant>
I grudgingly give them my number… Again…
Operator:  Just a minute while I check your account… I show that you are using some older phones.
C:  Yes, they’re three years old.
Operator:  Your phones are not “My Faves” compatible.
C: Huh? I’m not sure I understand what you mean.
Operator: Well sir, you need a phone that is “My Faves” compatible.
C: Are you saying that you need a special phone to use “My Faves”?
Operator: Yes sir.
C: But it’s just a software setting in your system.
Operator: Without the new phone you cannot set your faves up.
C: I don’t care that I won’t be able to change the faves on the fly. I’m willing to set it through the internet.
Operator: But you cannot change your faves from the old phones.
C: I don’t want to change it. I’ll set it though the web site and be done with it.
Operator: You cannot do that.
C: So if I had a compatible phone, could I change my faves through the web site?
Operator: Yes sir.
C: Then why not with the old phones? It’s just a software setting in your system for crying out loud!
Operator: I’m sorry sir, you have to have the new phones. I see that you’re not currently under contract. If you sign a new 2 year contract, we can make you some very good deals on phones.
C: Fine. Whatever.
Operator: Please hold while I get the someone from hardware on the line.

Of course, just at that point, I was crossing 71^st Street on Meridian Street, heading south. You know what that means, right? Tada! My call got dropped. I decided that was a sign. We just weren’t meant to be on T-Mobile. Of course, the most amazing thing happens. They called me back! Have you EVER heard a thing like that?! Me neither. Just the same, I decided, since they called me back, that I would hear their proposal out. The conversation picks up with the hardware operator.

Operator: We can make some good deals for you with a 2 year contract.
C: OK, what can you do for us?
Operator: I see your wife is using one of our standard phones.
C: Yes, it’s an old crappy phone.
Operator: With a 2 year contract, we can get her a new RAZR for free!
C: (Interested) OK, that sounds good.
Operator: I see you’re using a Blackberry. (I had to use an old Blackberry because my other standard phone went on the fritz. Of course I just HATED that Blackberry)
C: Yes.
Operator: Well, with a 2 year contract, we can get you a Blackberry Perl for only $80!
C: OK, can you please make a note of these offers on my account. I will think about it and decide later.
Operator: Certainly sir.

When I got home, I decided to just check T-Mobile’s web site to see what kind of deals I would be able to get as a new customer signing a 2 year deal because, well, essentially, that’s what I would be right? I logged on and found:

• I could get a RAZR for free.
• I could get a Pearl for $90.

Mmm… so our 3 years of loyalty to T-Mobile was worth a whopping $10 to them! I have a word of advice for T-Mobile and any other company making “special offers” for their customers…

IF YOU’RE GOING TO MAKE AN OFFER TO KEEP A CUSTOMER, MAKE A REAL OFFER. DON’T TRY AND INSULT OUR INTELIGENCE!!!

It wasn’t hard to convince Amy either. She was pretty fed up with T-Mobile too so it was an easy sell. We had a choice of eitherAT&T or Verizon. The next day, Saturday, we were out and about doing shopping when, lo and behold, we drove right by an AT&T store. We decided to stop and check out their phones. We got into the store and Amy started looking at phones. I was planning on just getting a standard phone. The sales guy came over and asked me if he could help…

Salesman: Can I help you find a phone today?
C: Nope. My wife’s getting a phone. I’m just getting a standard phone.
Salesman: Not even one of our smart phones?
C: I have a Blackberry and I HATE it. Besides, the phone I really want, hasn’t been invented yet.
Salesman: So tell me about your dream phone.
C: OK, my dream phone would include:

1. 3G wireless internet for best speed.
2. GPS for location tracking and mapping.
3. Exchange sync for my corporate email.
4. Internet access.
5. The ability to play my MP3s.
6. Camera.
7. Video camera.
8. Slide out full keyboard.
9. Navigation capabilities.

Salesman: Have you looked at our Tilt yet?
C: (Curious) OK… show me.

The salesman proceeded to show me the Tilt. I was very impressed with the Tilt. It had all 9 of my required features. I had looked at the iPhone earlier, but it didn’t have #s 1, 2, 3, 7 or 8. The first 3 are pretty huge in my book, so I didn’t give the iPhone another thought. I walked out of that store, a proud Tilt owner.

And then it started… Even though I installed a 4 GB memory expander card and even though I installed all my apps on the card and not the main memory, the phone began giving me messages about low memory… and the biggest frustration was constantly having to reboot the phone. Call me old fashioned, but I don’t believe you should have to reboot your darn phone!

Over time, I fought against the need to reboot the Tilt by systematically uninstalling my apps from the phone. This continued until I could not uninstall any other needed apps at which point, I would reset the phone to factory defaults and start the process all over again. Needless to say, this gold old… VERY quickly.

Then I was in Raleigh with Dustin and he started showing me what he does with his iPhone. That’s something the sales guys at Apple and AT&T just don’t have. The ability to truly relate what the phone can do to the person buying it. Of course, right at that time, the 2.0 firmware for the iPhone came out. Naturally, Dustin upgraded his iPhone as soon as possible. He was very excited about what the new firmware could do. I was sold after the following dialog took place…

C: So tell me. How often do you have to reboot your iPhone?
Dustin: (chuckle) Reboot my phone? I don’t have to reboot my phone.

That alone was enough for me to take a new look at the iPhone. Of course, the new iPhone 3G provides the #1, 2 and 3 features that I wanted in a phone. There’s no Video Camera, but that’s not a really big loss. I’d miss it from the Tilt, but I didn’t use it that much anyway. The iPhone 3G also doesn’t have a Slide Out Full Keyboard, but honestly, I can count on one hand the number of times that I actually used that keyboard on my Tilt. So again, not that big a deal anymore.

Two weeks later, I was in Boston with Dustin and got to play with the iPhone 3G. I was sold. Then it was the mission of trying to find stock anywhere. I finally found an Apple store that had stock. After class, we went there and wouldn’t you know it… I was the FIRST customer that turned away. Bummer! The next day, the store had more stock. No 16 GB Black, but white for sure. Again, we went there after class. This time, I was Mr. Irrelevant. No matter. Even though I was the very LADST customer to get an iPhone 3G, I did get one!

I can happily say that I’ve had the phone for almost a week now and have needed to reboot it exactly ZERO times! J

I’ll say this. The more I use the phone, the more impressed I am with the attention to little details that Apple has put into the phone. It’s amazing that little details make such a big difference in perception. Like I always say… PERCEPTION IS REALITY! All I know is, the more I use the phone, the more I’m pleasantly surprised… and the more I love it! I’ll be posting my observations about the phone in weeks to come, including the apps I like. To be sure, the phone is not perfect, but it’s hands down the best phone I’ve ever had.

Cheers
C

Microsoft offering FREE Support for users of Windows Vista SP1

For the next 8 months, Microsoft is offering FREE support to all users on Windows Vista SP1. If you’ve been thinking of moving to Vista, but you’ve been reluctant to make the jump, this could help make the transition easier.

Cheers
C

The International SharePoint Professionals Association (ISPA) is founded!

OK all you SharePoint pro’s out there. SQL Server has PASS and now the SharePoint world has ISPA! Bob Fox announced the formation of ISPA on his blog today. Please support our community efforts with ISPA.

Cheers
C

It’s here! The new Infrastructure Updates for SharePoint now available

Come and get it! http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2008/07/15/announcing-availability-of-infrastructure-updates.aspx These updates fix a LOT of issues so get them installed and validated in your TEST environments ASAP so you can start the process of moving them to production. 

Cheers
C

HELP!!! My list is broken! Where did my list menu go?

This week, we encountered an interesting situation dealing with lists and list views. At first glance, looking at the list, we saw the following:

This is supposed to be the list view of the PMA Contacts list, but as you can see, nothing really shows up. The next step was to place the page into Edit mode through “Site Actions/Edit Page”.

Once the page was in edit mode, we could see the web part zones as shown below.
 Can you see what is wrong here?

If you said that the web part was missing, give yourself 5 points!  In order to restore the view properly, we need to add the list view web part back to the page. We start by clicking the “Add a Web Part” area.

Once the web part list page opens, we want to take a look at the closed web parts so we click the “Advanced Web Part gallery and options” link at the bottom right of the window.

In the web part gallery browser window, you can see the “Closed Web Parts” gallery noting one web part. That means that on this page, there is a web part that was closed. Select the “Closed Web Parts” gallery.

As you can see in the above screen shot, the PMA Contact list view web part shows up in the closed list. Select the “PMA Contacts” web part and drag it over the page.

As you can see, the PMA Contact list view is now restored again. Simply click “Exit Edit Mode” in the top right under “Site Actions” to return to the regular list view as seen below.

Now that we fixed the problem, the question arises… just how did the list get to that state in the first place? It’s actually much simpler than you would imagine and it probably happened with just a single missed click. To re-break the list view, click “Site Actions/Edit Page”.

With the page in edit mode, simply click the closing “X” button on the top right of PMA Contacts.

You should now have the same broken view that we started with, so as you can see, just one simple click on an “X” can cause some faster heart beats. 

Cheers
C

My ONE character email address

This one always cracks me up. I’ve owned my email domain, dtdn.com, for about 11 years now and for as long a period, I’ve had my email address the same. My email alias is a single character… C… just C… nothing else…

Through the years, I’ve had many an encounter where supposedly intelligent web applications simply refused to accept my email address, claiming it was somehow… invalid?! What???!!! For one, I was forced to stay with a single web hosting company for a very, very, very long time because most other hosts would not allow me to create an email alias that was just a single character. Now I know that I fly unconventionally sometimes, but I have one question about that?

WHY???

Just why in all heck is it that a single character email address is considered “invalid”? I certainly don’t get it. Who made that stupid decision? If I want my email alias to just be “C”, why can’t it be? As long as nobody else already has it reserved, why can’t I have it? It’s my domain after all right? Just doesn’t make any sense to me.

I was reminded of this “short sighted” nuance of systems when I went online this morning to Delta.com to check in for my flight to Raleigh, NC this morning. I wanted to forward a copy of my itinerary to my wife and Delta’s super intelligent system told me that my email address is… wait for it… INVALID… Supposedly, if I had an email address such as CV@dtdn.com, now THEN it would be valid. I don’t know who comes up with these idiotic ideas for what is a valid email address and what it not, but I would think, given the vast amount of domain extensions out there that if the address has at least ONE character before the @ sign, and at least one character AFTER the @ sign and before the dot (.) and then again at least one character after the dot, that should qualify as valid, don’t you?

Here’s a screen shot of the Delta message:

OK, so if you ever happen to be in a position to write a part of a web application that validates email addresses, please take notice… there ARE actually some people out there that use a single character as their email address and yes, these are indeed VALID email addresses… 

Cheers
C

Get your facts straight

Nothing irks me more than when some talking heads on TV is spouting off some opinions and then NOT using the right facts! A good example is California Congressman Adam Schiff who was on Fox and Friends (DirecTV channel 360) this morning. The topic up for debate was… of course… OIL. Anyway, the discussion was about the ban on offshore drilling for oil. Congressman Schiff was against offshore drilling and he noted, correctly I might add, that the US only has 1% to 3% of world oil reserve while we consume 25% of the world’s oil. Sneaky slight of hand there Congressman, but that’s not the question here, now is it? First the facts. Per the CIA World Fact Book:

	World Total	United States
Proven Oil Reserves	1,331,000 million bbl	21,760 million bbl (1.64%)
Oil Production	78.9 million bbl/day	8.322 million bbl/day (10.55%)
Oil Consumption	80.29 million bbl/day	20.8 million bbl/day (25.91%)

The real question is not related to oil reserves, but production instead. See, you cannot contrast reserves against consumption just to make a point when the question on the table is about production. What Congressman Schiff should have done was to use our production figures i.e. 10.55% instead. Instead, by contrasting reserves to consumption, it makes the cause look so much more hopeless and daunting. In his words “even IF we do this, we still only have 1 to 3 percent of the world’s oil.” True, but producing an addition 1 million bbl/day would reduce our reliance on foreign oil by no less than 8.01%. Now I agree that we consume way, way more oil than we produce. I agree we should reduce our dependence on foreign oil. I agree we can and should reduce our consumption, so please, no hate mail OK?  But reducing consumption AND increasing production together should be used to address the current energy crisis.

There are always three sides to every story. Your side, my side and the truth. In a society where most people take what they see on TV as truth and/or fact, all I ask is that if you’re going to be quoting numbers and figures, for Pete’s sake! Get your facts straight!!! 

Cheers
C

What the hell is going on with Google today?!

At first I thought it was just me having some WTF moments. I thought it could be my network… or my laptop… or a million other things… SURELY the great Google can’t be DOWN!!! Can it?

Apparently it seems that it can… at least from my perspective. As of about 8:30 EST this morning, I’ve been unable to reach www.google.com consistently and conducting any Google searches from the search toolbar has been spotty at best. Shoot, I can’t even do a Google search to see what the problem with Google might be!  This is now the 2^ndtime that I have personally experienced outages with Google’s services. The 1^st time was when the Google IMAP Server Cloud went down in April. I don’t mean to criticize, but when your product is depended on by millions around the world, it MUST be dependable! That means ZERO outage… EVER!!!

LIVE TO THE RESCUE!!! Luckily, Microsoft’s Live (www.live.com) search is still fully functional! Don’t you just LOVE having choices? Google down… no problem, just use Live!

As Raiders own put it (if he were in my shoes right now)… just Live baby! 

Cheers
C

Rating System for SharePoint documents

This is one of the most asked about questions that I get in the forums/newsgroups… how do I rate content within SharePoint? Now, Stephane Eyskens came up with a solution to this challenge. Check out his SharePoint Document Rating System project on Codeplex.

Cheers
C

How do I? – Change the Site Template of a root site collection that has sub sites

I was asked the following question in the support forums and thought it would be useful to blog about for others to use in the future.

Question: I created a new root site (site collection) and selected the wrong site template during the site creation process or I changed my mind and want to use a different site template than the one used during site creation. The problem is that sub sites have been created since then. How do I change the site template used for the root site of a site collection with sub sites?

Fellow MVP Shane Young blogged an article that comes closest to addressing this scenario here:http://msmvps.com/blogs/shane/archive/2006/02/15/83787.aspx Unfortunately, the scenario is based on WSS 2.0 and if you’re working with WSS 3.0, this might not work. So you are left having to either adapt Shane’s article to 3.0 or go with the simplest way possible which is the recreation of the site.  Microsoft’s conservative recommendation would be, as you already noted, to delete the site and then recreate it using the correct template. Since you have sub sites in this site collection, you will need to backup the sub sites BEFORE you can do this.  Of course, in the process of templatizing/backing up sub site, you could run into problems if you’re trying to save a site as a template and it exceeds the 10 MB limit.  Given that, I would recommend that you increase your site template site limit before templatizing sub sites.  Here are the steps I would recommend to resolve your issue:

1. Schedule an outage of the sites and conduct this process off hours in order to ensure that nobody is making changes to the sites while you’re doing this.  COMMUNICATE this with your users clearly.  Users can get very testy about these things.  
2. BACKUP YOUR DATABASE BEFORE YOU START!!!
3. Increase your site template size limit.  Follow the instructions from this article: http://www.cjvandyk.com/blog/Lists/Posts/ViewPost.aspx?ID=111
4. Templatize each sub site by using the “Save as Template” option on the Site Administration page.
5. Clearly record the permissions for each sub site.
6. Go to the site collection Site Template Gallery and download a local copy of all the site templates (.stp) to your computer.
7. Delete each sub site.
8. Delete the root site of the site collection.
9. Create a new site collection, this time selecting the RIGHT template!  
10. Go to the Site Template Gallery of the new site collection.
11. Upload all the .stp files you downloaded in step 4.
12. Each of the uploaded templates should now show up as options in the Create menu.  Recreate each site using its template in turn.
13. Recreate the permissions for each site using the information captured in step 5.
14. Navigate back to the site collection’s Site Template Gallery and delete all the .stp templates you uploaded in step 11.  This is to remove the sites as create options and is done for security reasons.

And that should do it! The hardest part of this process is capturing and re-establishing permissions on the sites, especially if your site administrators use fine grained permissions i.e. grant library, folder or item level permissions.  In such cases, it might not be possible to fully capture the complete permissions set without expending massive amounts of time. In cases where granular permissions are in play, I recommend leveraging an automated tool to backup the sites. AvePoint has a good tool that does a nice job of this called DocAve. You can download a 30 day trial of DocAve and use it if this is a onetime occurrence. Of course DocAve has many more features that might well make it worth owning for your environment. Luckily this kind of scenario doesn’t happen too often… right? 

Cheers
C

Been quiet for a while…

OK, so I’ve not posted for a while… well, since I went solo really. There are a lot more little time consuming overhead items involved in starting your own company. This has kept me busy for the past couple of weeks. Of course, a lot of my time has been consumed by my registrar consolidation…

Stay tuned… much more useful and original content coming to this blog in the future… 

Cheers
C

You’ve got to be kidding me! Moving to a new domain Registrar should NOT be this difficult!

OK, so I own about a dozen or so domains. As a big batch of my domain started coming up for renewal, this batch being under Network Solutions, I began to think that domain registrar fees simply should not be as expensive as they are with Network Solutions. So I began to evaluate all the registrars in an effort to consolidate my domain under one roof. I ended up selecting GoDaddy as my registrar of choice. Their costs are much more reasonable than Network Solutions and their control panel is much more straight forward and clear… and then my woes began…

I started by logging into my Network Solution, 1and1 and M6.net accounts and setting my domains to “Unlocked” status so that transfer can occur. I then requested and got a confirmation key code for each domain, except M6.net who is STILL holding my domains hostage. Then I signed up for a GoDaddy account and requested my domains be transferred, using the confirmation keys that I had previously received. True to the process, I received an email from my current registrars asking me to confirm that I’m moving my domains to another registrar. I clicked on the links provided and logged into the confirmation pages where I then confirmed that I was making the transfer.

OK, that should be it right? That should be all that’s required to allow my domains to switch to the new registrar. I even configured GoDaddy to keep the existing domain settings from the original registrar so that services would not be interrupted. That should be it right? WRONG!!!

I will say that 1and1 released and relinquished their domains without hassle or fuss and the transfer was pretty seamless. Unfortunately the same cannot be said of Network Solutions. If it wasn’t for the fact that M6.net was holding my domains hostage, I would say that Network Solutions was the worst registrar in my book. As it is, they are only slightly better than M6.net. Why do I say that? Where do I begin? OK, here goes…

To start, Network Solutions noted that the transfer could take up to 4 days to complete. Up to? It DID take 4 days to complete! Even after I logged into their confirmation page and explicitly confirmed that I wanted to transfer my domains, it still took 4 days after that! Why? I just don’t get it. Alas, that’s not the worst of it. In what I can only think is sheer spitefulness, Network Solutions moved my domain settings from their DNS pointers that point to my blog, email and other locations, to the default parked domain settings. Then they stonewalled the transfer for 4 days before finally handing it over to GoDaddy. Besides the fact that this action dumped my online activities such as my blog, email etc. into darkness for 4 days, I had to reconfigure all my settings from scratch once I got the domain to GoDaddy! There must be something illegal about what Network Solutions did…

Given my 4 days of darkness, you may have noticed my blog disappearing. At least I have it back up and running again and everything at GoDaddy works really great. No if I can just get M6.net to respond to my email, since they do NOT provide a phone number. Actually, I lie. They DO provide a phone number to contact for support. Of course when you dial it, you simply get a fax tone!

And so the trials and tribulations of domain consolidation continues…

Cheers
C

You’ve got to be kidding me! Moving to a new domain Registrar should NOT be this difficult

OK, so I own about a dozen or so domains. As a big batch of my domain started coming up for renewal, this batch being under Network Solutions, I began to think that domain registrar fees simply should not be as expensive as they are with Network Solutions. So I began to evaluate all the registrars in an effort to consolidate my domain under one roof. I ended up selecting GoDaddy as my registrar of choice. Their costs are much more reasonable than Network Solutions and their control panel is much more straight forward and clear… and then my woes began…

I started by logging into my Network Solution, 1and1 and M6.net accounts and setting my domains to “Unlocked” status so that transfer can occur. I then requested and got a confirmation key code for each domain, except M6.net who is STILL holding my domains hostage. Then I signed up for a GoDaddy account and requested my domains be transferred, using the confirmation keys that I had previously received. True to the process, I received an email from my current registrars asking me to confirm that I’m moving my domains to another registrar. I clicked on the links provided and logged into the confirmation pages where I then confirmed that I was making the transfer.

OK, that should be it right? That should be all that’s required to allow my domains to switch to the new registrar. I even configured GoDaddy to keep the existing domain settings from the original registrar so that services would not be interrupted. That should be it right? WRONG!!!

I will say that 1and1 released and relinquished their domains without hassle or fuss and the transfer was pretty seamless. Unfortunately the same cannot be said of Network Solutions. If it wasn’t for the fact that M6.net was holding my domains hostage, I would say that Network Solutions was the worst registrar in my book. As it is, they are only slightly better than M6.net. Why do I say that? Where do I begin? OK, here goes…

To start, Network Solutions noted that the transfer could take up to 4 days to complete. Up to? It DID take 4 days to complete! Even after I logged into their confirmation page and explicitly confirmed that I wanted to transfer my domains, it still took 4 days after that! Why? I just don’t get it. Alas, that’s not the worst of it. In what I can only think is sheer spitefulness, Network Solutions moved my domain settings from their DNS pointers that point to my blog, email and other locations, to the default parked domain settings. Then they stonewalled the transfer for 4 days before finally handing it over to GoDaddy. Besides the fact that this action dumped my online activities such as my blog, email etc. into darkness for 4 days, I had to reconfigure all my settings from scratch once I got the domain to GoDaddy! There must be something illegal about what Network Solutions did…

Given my 4 days of darkness, you may have noticed my blog disappearing. At least I have it back up and running again and everything at GoDaddy works really great. No if I can just get M6.net to respond to my email, since they do NOT provide a phone number. Actually, I lie. They DO provide a phone number to contact for support. Of course when you dial it, you simply get a fax tone!

And so the trials and tribulations of domain consolidation continues…

Cheers
C

I am leaving Crowe

After 4 years with Crowe Chizek, I’ve decided to go out on my own. I really enjoyed my time with the firm and my role as the SharePoint Architect. I’ve built some lasting friendships while there and wish them well on their future endeavors.

Cheers
C

Number 41… yeehaa!

K, so a LOT of new things are happening in my world, but more on that in a day or so… In the mean time, I my blog has been rated by Joel Oleson’s Top 100 SharePoint Blogs as #41. See the complete list here. As of late, I’ve not had much time to publish a lot of fresh new content, but that’s all about to change. Stay tuned as I build my blog to the Top 5 on Joel’s list. Of course I’d like to aim for #1, but the SharePoint Team Blog pretty much has that spot locked up… still, one can aim high… especially an ex Air Force pilot… 

Cheers
C

Office Open XML is now an ISO standard!

after an initial false start in the attempt to get the Office Open XML standard recognized internationally, the final hurdles have been cleared and Microsoft’s Office Open XML is now and international standard as defined by the ISO.

Cheers
C

If you like Twitter, you’re going to LOVE Jott!

OK, so I’m testing the waters with all this new micro-blogging technology. The question is this… just what benefit, other than being able to spout off something random that comes to mind for your Twitter minions to see, does something like a Twitter have for a professional user. This is what I’m trying to figure out. There are many ways people suggest using it and probably the most notable would be to have private networks that function conversationally. But then again I’m left wondering… what about IM? To really be useful to the mobile workforce, a technology must be on the mobile phone. With the use of tools such as TinyTwitter, you can get your tweets on your mobile phone, but in the private network context, how is that any different from email? Mmm…

Anyway, so as I’m left pondering the value of Twitter, I started working on a pet project for the mobile phone. My endeavor led me to search for a speech recognition SDK for Windows Mobile. Alas, there is no such thing, at least not one that includes recognition components, at the present time. Anyway, my search for the SDK led me to the Windows Mobile Speech newsgroups where I found a reference to a new service called Jott. I checked it out and was immediately intrigued by the possibilities.

What does Jott do?

In short, they provide a service for taking voice and converting it into text as well as the ability to pass said text on to any other service out there.

OK, so that’s very nebulous right? So consider this. Almost anything that is done in text today, can be handled through voice with Jott. Having just found it, I can already identify several time saving options:

1. Twitter plugin. Jott already has a Twitter plugin so you can tweet to your heart’s content simply by leaving a voicemail. No more typing while driving. Talking on the phone, while still not recommended, it much, much safer and can at least be done hands free and more importantly, heads up and looking outside.
2. Google calendar plugin. I know, I know. I’m a Microsoft guy and I live in the SharePoint world. Unfortunately, I have not found a good way to keep my personal Outlook calendar and my wife’s personal Outlook calendar in synch. We are rarely if ever on the same network and I don’t have an Exchange server. So I used the Google Calendar Synch plugin to bi-directionally synch her calendar with my Google Calendar and then using the same plugin on my machine, can get updates made between my personal Outlook calendar and the Google Calendar. I never put anything personally into my Google Calendar but always via Outlook which makes it a disconnected solution. So now anytime I make an Outlook calendar entry, it pushes (when connected) to the Google Calendar and then down to my wife’s calendar. The reverse also applies to her making appointments. No more trying to synch calendars manually. Well Jott just took that to a whole new level because its Google calendar plugin allows me to call and setup an appointment via the phone and have it push to both Outlook calendars. I hate typing on my mobile phone, even with the QWERTY keyboard of the Tilt… and now I don’t have to.
3. Notification groups. OK, so let’s say you have a large group of people that need to be notified of a certain event, such as the birth of a baby or something. In the past, you’d have to spend quite a bit of time notifying everyone individually. With Jott, you can import all your contact and then simply create a group. Then when you call in, you just send the Jott to the group and Jott will automatically notify everyone through either email or text messaging. Pretty sweet and a real time saver.
4. Replying to text messages or email. OK, all mobile professionals read email on the go right? But if you’re running to make your connecting flight, you don’t have time to stop and send an email or text message. WithJott, simply call and leave a voicemail to take care of it.

Like I said, these are just the first thoughts I have for my own personal use. The service’s voice recognition is pretty darn good too! Even though the text messages could be better, the email even allows you to playback the voice recording and they don’t have any adds cluttering up and slowing down their site or email.

This seems like a good service to me. I’m certainly going to play with it in more depth. I would put them in the same space as Grand Central who, as you know, got bought out by Google recently. The technologies are not competing, but complimentary so I would not be surprised if either Google or Microsoft targets Jott in the near future for a buyout.

OK, so are you ready to check it out? You guessed it… http://jott.com

Enjoy…

Cheers
C