I can see myself.

There it is. Right up there—first sentence. That’s the biggest reason for the lack of use of iChat videoconferencing (in the workplace, at least). At home its a big hit with the kids. They eat it up. Especially in Leopard, with the addition of cool “Effects” that let you distort your image like a Picasso or have a dynamic background using a poor man’s green screen. There are also developers creating add-on effects for it.

Back to the work issue. I think iChat would be a great tool at work. Especially with increased telecommuting, increasing numbers of permanently remote users, and for groups who need to collaborate, it can be a valuable tool. All of the new MacBook and MacBookPro laptops in our group have the video capability built-in. I can count on one hand the number of times it has been used.

I was wondering why we use it so little, then it hit me. I don’t want to see my ugly mug on screen and if others feel the way I do, that explains it. Its not that I or any of my friends and co-workers look particularly unappealing (People have told me I look a little like Andre Agassi and Uncle Fester, so go figure).

Nobody, wants to see themselves on screen. When you’re speaking to someone, you don’t see yourself. When I’m talking to someone, in my head I look like _______________ (fill-in the name of some Hollywood mega-star), but on iChat, its not that guy.

So rest assured, there is a solution, in Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard), but it is not enabled by default. From Apple.com:

Link: http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/300.html#ichat

So, the challenge for me now is to fix this on every machine in my group. Which I will attempt to do next week. I promise to report back if the use of iChat video increases.

Apple announced the iPod Touch, aka the iPhone, without the phone built-in.  It has comes with more memory and is thinner than the iPhone. But, what does this do to the iPod/iPhone market?

The iPod Touch is now an option for those who don’t need a phone, or can’t get out of a contract, but would like to use it as a wifi PDA + music player. Many people still carry a phone and an organizer. Some due to the “corporate standard” or they may need to use of custom application, built on one of these platforms.

The move to smartphones, like the iPhone, Blackberry, Treo and new devices still in the works is imminent. But there are limitations on the disk size on the phones. Even with news SD cards, they don’t match the 160GB size of the newest iPod, the Classic. For those users who carry their entire digital library with them, Apple kept an iPod close to the original form, but as usual thinner.

I haven’t held the new iPod Nano yet, so I’ll hold judgement on how it fits in a workout routine, now that its bigger and there’s no much to an iPod Shuffle, unless the Nano has become to big for running and gets replaced by the Shuffle.

I’m looking forward to some first hand use with these devices.

MacRumors reports that the first native iPhone game has been released for the iPhone. Its a puzzle game called Lights Off.

First the good news:
It’s an exciting anouncement because the developers created it without much help from Apple. Apple has not provided developers with an SDK (software development kit). This means anyone who wants to make a third party program, has to more work to do to get a game or other program to work with the iPhone interface, etc.

Now the bad news:
I haven’t played or downloaded it myself because it takes hacking the iPhone and installing some extra pieces of software to get it to work. On top of that there is a risk that the iPhone could be permanently damaged by doing this. Here’s their disclaimer text “Disclaimer: Lights Off is provided on an “as is” basis, without warranty of any kind. If your iPhone breaks, don’t cry on our shoulders.”

But this is still exciting news because it indicates that additional software for iPhones, (other than web-based via Safari) is on the horizon.

Prediction:
I expect Apple will do one of two things in the next month or so, release an iPhone patch that makes the game not run, or give in to developers and release an official SDK.

Link to Part 1
One of the best features of the pearl, besides the “pearl (trackball) itself, is that it accepts the MicroSD card. I suggest getting a 2GB card and a full sized SD adapter, in case you want to use it with an external card reader. The only drawback to using it with a card reader is that you’ll have to power down the Blackberry and pop out the battery in order to get to it.

Once you have a multimedia card installed, you can then sync iTunes playlists between the Pearl and your machine. Open up the Missing Sync for Blackberry software. You’ll notice the fourth item down in the window is labelled “Music” Click on it and the row highlights. Then click on the “Settings…”

Another window will drop down and if you’ve set up playlists of music in iTunes, you’ll see them listed there. Simply check those you want copied to the Pearl. I left the default items listed below the playlists as is. You can change how much free space you leave on the media card and how often you want to sync tunes. You may want to turn of syncing music everytime, for sake of speed, if you sync frequently and only want to keep contacts, calendars up to date.

Missed Part 1? Click here

Since the iPhone is so good at trying to find and connect to available WiFi hotspots, it is no wonder that security companies are working hard to come up with solutions to improve on security.

The iPhone’s browser supports SSL websites, but often websites don’t offer SSL on all the pages they should be protecting, or maybe your accessing corporate intranets, etc. that also aren’t as secure as they should be.

I came across a security package from GoTrusted.com. They already make security products for the PC’s and now are offering a 7-day free trial to use their security system on the iPhone platform.

iPhone InvisibleShield Sales - 5% off all ShieldZone product on ifrogz.com