jeremyvaught

I keep forgetting to post this, but as you can see, I have finally done it. And I stuck the landing.

So this is me when I visited San Francisco and Loic (founder and CEO of Seesmic) interviewed me for the now defunct Seesmic Du Jour. Matt Galligan from SocialThing is in the first part, then I come on at about 2:20. Please ignore my gum chewing.

I originally wrote this to post on blog.seesmic.com, but it was pointed out to me that the mobile client cannot be pushed on the corporate blog. So I’m putting it here. I’m getting questions from people about purchasing an N95 and once there, how to set up the Seesmic client. So this is not Seesmic official, but it’s a little informative post from me. (also, there is a comment I make about Loic, and it’s full intention is to just be funny. Nothing negative about Loic) Here goes…

I’ve recently purchased a Nokia N95, primarily for the purposes of Seesmicing on the move.  I don’t Seesmic as much as I would like to since I haven’t yet found a webcam that is compatible with Flash for my Linux laptop.  When I suggested on Twitter that I need to buy a webcam that works, Loic helpfully suggested that a Mac comes with one preinstalled, however he failed to point out the price difference between a webcam and the Macbook.  I looked it up, the price difference is significant.  As I have pointed out previously, I have been using my digital camera to do all my Seesmicing, a daunting process after a while. 

So I bought this phone.  The first thing I did was check out the new mobile Seesmic application at m.seesmic.com.  It’s in an even more alpha stage than the pre-Alpha Seesmic web app, but I can Seesmic on the move, and straight to Seesmic.  In all honestly, one of the things I have enjoyed pre-N95 is Seesmicing on the move with my digital camera in video mode, but now the rest of the steps are cut out.  Easy peasy.

If you have the N95, and you haven’t tried the mobile Seesmic app, you are so 2007.  So in the interest of sharing knowledge, I’m going to lay down some info about what I have done because I’m getting asked that question regularly on teh interwebs.  Keep in mind I am in the U.S. and I have little idea about how they do these things in Europe and other parts of the world.  If you do, please leave a comment :)

1. First thing I did was go get an AT&T account.  I’ve been a Verizon customer for too many 2 year contracts, so I have just decided to bite the bullet and pay the fee to drop them.  (I could go on about how they canceled my EVDO card because I used my unlimited connection too much, or every time I make a change, it starts my 2 years over, or their phones are lame, and on and on, but I won’t)  I wanted to get the account first in the off chance they wouldn’t let me after I paid for my phone.  They let me have my account.
   1. A point about why AT&T.  They are currently the only provider in North America with 3G for data.  You want 3G.  T-mobile promised 3G, but they don’t have it yet, and it is said that it will be a different band than what the N95 supports.  So sign up for AT&T, and get the unlimited data plan.  My plan, unlimited Data, Txt, & Email (meh, I use gmail) with 900 minutes of talk a month, is US$94.  It was pointed out to me that AT&T has a video plan as well for phones that stream video.  But since the N95 uses the data plan, it doesn’t use the video specific plan.  However, the AT&T clerk pointed out that AT&T may one day take a dim view of all that bandwidth for video being used without paying for a video plan.  FYI.
2. I purchased the phone.  First I purchased it through TigerDirect from a link I found somewhere on Mahalo.  That’s also a long story in that they refused to send it to my mailing address so I canceled the order and they still charged me 4 days later and I had to spend hours on the phone resolving that.  So I ended up ultimately purchasing my phone at Amazon.  But the actual supplier for the phone is DavaVision.  The reason I make this point is that I can’t find the phone on Amazon right now, it says it is not available.
   1. BE VERY CAREFUL ABOUT WHICH N95 YOU GET.  There a several on Amazon that are labeled as the N95-3 (which is the North American Version) but are in fact N95s and N95-2, both of which are the European versions, the dash 2 being 8Gb version.  The N95-3 currently doesn’t come in red, plum or anything else other than black.  Don’t be deceived.  I paid US$610 for my phone, if you are paying only US$300 or US$400, is it probably not the N95-3.  Now the N95-4 is coming out soon, and that will be the 8Gb North American version, but personally, I don’t see the point.  It won’t have a microSD slot like the dash 3, and the 12Gb microSD card was just released, and the 16Gb microSD card was just announced.  Stick with the microSD card IMHO.
3. Now I’m rockin’ and rollin’ on my N95-3 on the AT&T unlimited data plan.  This really is a superior phone that I’ve been amazed with constantly.  The video quality is amazing, even through a live connection on the data network and not wifi (which of course it has also, and is also awesome)

If you have any questions, please comment on this post or email me at vaught@seesmic.com.  I’m here to help :)

I just discovered Mashable Invites. A cute idea. But brings to light a bigger problem. Too many social media startups.

It is great there is so much happening, but how much real innovation is really going on? Not much I’m afraid. But this begs the question, how long will this continue? Will it increase? Will the big sites like Facebook and Myspace start to grab some of the tiny ones and integrate them?

Off the cuff, I can only imagine it will get worse. There will be more and more. And even as I wrote the sentence asking if the big social media platforms will grab up some of the smaller ones, I knew the anwer is no. And the reason it is no is stated above, very little innovation is happening.

Back to the drawing board. Invites anyone?

I’ve been meaning to play around with video for quite some time. But video seemed like such a huge undertaking.

enter seesmic.

Stupidly simple video. Think Twitter video. Doesn’t have to be hight quality. Doesn’t have to be highly produced. Doesn’t have to be highly creative. So what’s left? Well, to the best I can figure it… community. We are all just community, a group of folks that are connecting. Seesmic probably would never have happened without twitter and the community there. So transfer that community to a new platform, a much more personal platform, and you have seesmic.

Seesmic considers itself pre-apha, and therefore leaves a lot to be desired, but I’m sure they are working on.

Well, I figure if I’m making this stuff, I might as well get the most bang for my buck. So here is a sample of seesmic. Prepare for the silly:

I want an iPhone, but I may want a Google Phone even more.

I just read this pretty good roundup of what Google is up to on mashable. I have a Motorola Q from Verizon. I got it because I could get the internet, and my gmail. It is a great phone, I like it. Then I moved back to Ketchikan, Alaska for the summer. Guess what? No Verizon data access up there. Now I have a huge phone with no purpose but to make calls…. how boring is that? Yup, pretty boring.

So recently my aunt and uncle visited up there, she had an iPhone, and it worked in Ketchikan. I was in love. What a sleek machine. Awesome internet capability, in a beautiful package. Not long after that I traveled to Boston for Podcamp, and then to Phoenix for Podcamp. At the Podcamps I learned that indeed, the iPhone is a New Media connection device so far unparalleled. (With the possible exception of the Nokia N95) But the N95 doesn’t have the hype, and frankly, I’ve not seen one in person, so they certainly don’t have the market penetration that the iPhone does.

I say all that to say this. I think I’m going to hold off on the iPhone, and wait and see what Google is going to offer. How long will that take? I have no idea. But the iPhone is surely due for an upgrade after the first of the year… and my Verizon contract will be that much closer to wrapping up. (Right now, if I switch to the iPhone, it will cost me $400 for the phone, and ~$350 to Verizon to cancel my contract. Too rich for my blood at this point in time.

All this is pending of course on someone purchasing an iPhone for me. All bets are off if that were to happen. I’m a cheap date, yeah. :-)

Study shows Google favored over other search engines by webmasters, found via techmeme.

ya think?