Tough love

Microsoft Word. Nearly everyone knows how to use it but the vast majority of us never paid for it or perhaps we paid for one copy and since then have installed it on a small island nation's worth of computers. This was possible because it was technically difficult to enforce software licenses. Oh no it didn't! Yup it did. The internet went and changed all that.

Later versions(2003 or XP) have this pesky "improvement" that makes it much more difficult for Joe Retail to pirate the software. Microsoft products now require activation, a process that's quickly gaining popularity because it virtually guarantees that people pay for the software they use.

Switch to Open Office now and you'll be thanking yourself later. That goes double for those of you who have kids. Why do I say this? Four reasons. You'll save money now. You'll save money later. You'll demand innovation. Finally, You'll help drive improvements to an already capable replacement.

The four reasons. You'll save money now. This follows directly from free sofware. You don't have to pay for it, but it gets the job done all the same. Voila, you've saved money now.

You'll save money later...if you're no longer locked in to MS Word, you'll start locking in to not having to pay. That means for the rest of your life and for all of your children's lives, they won't have to pay for office productivity software. This is worth on average $800-$2400 for you and $1600-$4800 to them.

You'll demand innovation. As if Microsoft didn't have enough pressure...I'm sure they can handle it. By not selecting to purchase a product that hasn't improved significantly since the last millenium, you'll make vendors like MS work harder to win your business. Better software will then be available and you might even choose then to purchase it.

You'll help to drive improvements to an already capable replacement. Open Office can already do 95% of what Word and Excel can do and lots of people are using it. The number one thing the project needs are more users contributing more feedback on what they'd like improved. If you join in that group, we will all benefit from your suggestions. If you're a programmer or documenter, we may even benefit directly from the improvements you make to the code or the help files.

So many of us are stuck with Microsoft products not because the .doc format is so popular or that we don't know how to open .sxw files, it's because we generally hate to learn and love to do things we already know how to do. In fact, we'll pay from here to eternity just to have our hard-won skills remain useful.

Open Office has been evolving over the past 10 years into a useable program. In 30 minutes or a couple of documents, I'm quite confident that you'll enjoy using it(you can use OO Calc) to keep track of the $200-$400 you save every time you decide to upgrade to a new computer.

Bluetooth better than geckos

My Treo 650 has served me well. I am continually learning to use it's many features and support it with accessories. For the first few months, I struggled with a couple of different earpieces that I used in the car and elsewhere. Recently, I misplaced my wired Jabra and decided to break down and go bluetooth, Motorola H500 style. That was one of the better tech decisions I've made. Here's the lowdown...

First off, it's very small and light. I can carry it comfortably in a shirt pocket and at times I forget I'm wearing it on my ear. That's why you see people wearing them even when they're not talking on the phone. I can also hear environmental sounds easily while wearing it.

Secondly, the sound quality is as good or better than any wired hands-free that I've used. This, I didn't expect. I've heard nary a comment on my sound quality and I can always hear my counterpart quite well, even in noisy environments.

I like that there is one less wire in my life and that keeping it charged isn't as much of a hassle as I thought it would be. I just bundled together the business ends of my phone and earpiece chargers so I plug them both in every night in the same 6-inch square on my desk.

Now for the tricky part of using bluetooth: When you first get the thing and start using it, you have to adjust to there being another piece to the phone. Numerous times I found myself picking up the phone, saying "Hello? Hello?" without a peep from the other end. This is the short training period where you go: Ok, the phone is ringing, I'm going to answer it, but first I'd better get that earpiece so I don't sound like an idiot screaming "Where's that #$#@% earpiece!" from across the room.

One other glitch: the earpiece seems to sleep on me sometimes, like when I charge it. Then when I go to make a call in the morning, I need to double check that indeed the earpiece is connected(either via the Treo's bluetooth icon or beeps from the earpiece itself).

All-in-all, bluetooth earpieces are great with Treo 650's. I can't say how you'll like using it with your phone but I quite enjoy: less wires and good sound quality. Oh and for the time being, wearing a bluetooth earpiece is cooler than geckos that never saved me a ton of money on my car insurance.

It's been a while

since I worked on commentsovernews.com but I'm still getting like 900 hits a day on the site. I think most of that is search engine bots indexing the constantly changing stories there. It's quite easy to go on the site and comment on news and I still think the site has some possibilities. I just need to find a way to make it a little more enticing.

So far my best idea is to make a video and put it up on YouTube. To stay true to the site's spirit, such a video should consist of comments on news. I think we can all agree that video comments would be compelling. If you care to comment on some news, go ahead and put the video up on youtube and comment here with a link or embedded video.