Post-hoc SXSW 2010

So this is is a week late, pardon the delay I’m trying my best to catch up…

The title doesn’t fit quite right but it does explain this post quite well. I am writing this after SXSW and cleaning had been a chore. Time to take a break and download everything thing into a small boiled down post for my sanity and work inspiration you (the reader) and myself.

First off the 3 biggest things I learned:

1.    Building a community and doing social good allows your company to sustain itself even through the recession we are going through right now. Things are looking better only because we are looking at home to do things rather than spending the money on something else. 

Take the DIY movement right now, I’ve started getting back into building things for my craft more than I have spending money on the big things around me. We are all giving a little more to those less fortunate around us only because we know that will come back one day to us when we are a little less fortunate.

2.    Bootstrapping your business is better in the long run than getting money from a venture or angel investor. We can get the quick money now but a flame that is hot and fast as we all know can’t sustain itself for very long. There are those examples for both that do have the ability to. The majority of the time, however; don’t have the ability to sustain themselves for very long with large capitol creating large returns. A flame that is stoked and carefully watched over can grow and grow and grow and can run for a very long time. Eventually like the flame your business will take care of itself. Yes, you’ll still have to run it but less is needed to run as you move forward.
3.    Finally, concentrate on doing things for your own and start working on small projects on your own time and get those done. As you do those sharpen your skills and you get to learn how to problem solve. We all have the same ability blog, take pictures, video or even code. The thing that makes us each valuable is the ability to problem solve and work things differently. Make your self the one thing that no one else has, you. (Thank you to @makecoolshit for this advice)

On to the rest of the Film and Interactive parts of the week;

for those of you who come here from my twitter feed please know that this is more of a personal blog and yes I do rant on and on but do understand I am a person who believes in transparency on things I do. In an age of everything being on the internet it is very hard to have everything split apart as it should be.

The interactive festival was well worth the price of admission alone and I do have every intention of going again next year. It will be hopefully the last year I will have during a week of spring break. I am planning for a May 2011 graduation. I only hold one contention and that is all the best panels were at the same time of another interesting panel and that they were all towards the end. The few beginning ones left me with a wondering of weather I was paying for taking classes that I am already enrolled in for my graduate degree.

As the second day rolled around it became apparent that, in fact no, they weren’t. The panels were an in depth discussion I am lacking from the over populated classroom I sit in where there are too many students and too few professors available for a discussion at this moment. I wonder if I have made the right choice often for my degree.  Don’t get me wrong I wouldn’t be where I was today if I weren’t there I wouldn’t have the thoughts of interactivity on a level past the general population.

I wish I could take some of the panelists and put them in to a less bureaucratic environment that @academicdave champions over and over again. The more I think lately the more self taught people I know and realize the only reason I go to a school to learn is sheer motivation. I can either self motivated and learn everything on my own, of which I try my best to keep on trends and learn, or learn through an antiquated environment something new.

The films were good from what i heard, I only saw the one, Tony. The movie was one that gave hope to the film makers who were told they were crazy and told not to even try such a risky way of telling a simple story. There is no true end to the story, life just goes on just like we march forward and a chapter of our life closes and we open a new one weather it be a mile stone or some or a change of career or a change in life.

That is all I have for now so I close with Later Days,

P.S. Pictures from the week are available on my Flickr SXSW Set.
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iPad and More

Timing could not be better, nor worse, today the new Apple tablet came out the iPad. So I’ve been meaning to write, update and catch up everything on this blog clean up some things and various other things.

So on to matters, first off, the iPad. I think it is a start but for right now, it’s just a kindle with more functions. There are lacking features and then there are some ground breaking ones. Let’s start with the good go to the bad and then move on.

The good:
The iPad’s user interaction with the device allows the use of already stock apps available from the iPhone and iPod Touch line and now there are more with the new sdk and larger screen. The large high resolution screen is very nice and the update to connect the device to use for presentations is going to make it a breeze to use. I’m not so sure what else to say to that though.

The bad:
Like the first iPhone there is not GPS so where is the next generation use of location? We are in an era of mobile computing and this is supposed to be our next step? Why can we have a simple GPS chip in the computer? Where is the use of apps that rely on location? As our esteemed professors @academicdave and @therefore are always pushing the limits on and asking the question of location. This is the perfect device right? It really doesn’t feel as such that I would want this.

Also where are USB ports or various other ports I don’t want to use a dock connector to be able to access the device especially if I am needing to do various other things. I don’t want to have to go through the mystery app store process for simple interface things and then be rejected etc. I’m not so sure what to take on only having a wireless gimped bluetooth and no real hard ports.

I don’t agree with everything entirely being up to one manufacturer. We have run into many problems before with Apple and their problems this is one of their many products we are starting to see have an effect with consumer funding the second and third generation of products. Looking at where the iPad sits now I can see in a year a GPS chip being added, a couple of external ports or adaptor ports being added just like what was done with the iPhone becoming the iPhone 3G and 3Gs.

As much as I love Apple I don’t think we should have to deal with everything they put out as great. Much greater dissension is coming from loyal followers (of which I am one) and I feel the curse of Microsoft coming. I sometimes look at a Windows feature and wonder why; and then I wonder if Apple had taken that idea and added their polish to it wouldn’t it be great. Why can’t the iPad have handwriting input? I know there is a cool brushes app, and I’m sure some developer is going to come along and make something cool; but why can’t I get it out of the box as that?

Finally, I would have liked the tablet really to have run multiple applications at once. I don’t like having to work in JUST Pages or JUST Numbers I would rather switch between the two; especially if this is going to replace my laptop. I would still rather get a small netbook and give up screen size for a keyboard ports and various other things than a glorified large iPod Touch.
This is not the device that is going to change everything really but only be the pixel to point what is next. I think we are going to see the rise in Android and HTC’s devices next and see Apple grasping its breath to catch up in the mobile device market. At least that is what I can see from glimpses of CES and HTC’s misdirection campaign going awry.

Let’s see what time hold and we’ll see what happens next.

On to other stuff:

I’m also in the process of building a robot for fun and we’ll see what it does if you have any suggestions of what it should do we’ll take a look and see if it is something worth us doing. It is a project I’ve been needing to get around for a very long time and well let’s see how it goes. I hope you like what we’ve got so far. I’ll have more pictures
up as we go and thanks also to help from @johntron who is helping very much in teaching and learning with me.

Finally the big project of the year and I hope to continue with. We have high hopes to take this big prize at the first North Dallas Hooptie event for the 24 Hours of LeMons race. We are team Grassy Knoll Society. More information about the team the event and everything else is available on that blog. I will say that we are looking for sponsors and are willing to entertain almost anything at this moment.

I hope that catches you up and later days.