Products with a purpose

We are living in a time where a lot of great products are being invented, but perhaps the way the technology is being implemented doesn't strike the demand, or the technology isn't strong enough. I'm trying to talk about smart devices. Fitness trackers, thermostats, online shopping, et cetera. Here are a list of a few items:

1. Vessyl Smart Cup - I wouldn't normally call a thermos cool, but this cup is cool. It advertises the ability to analyze what is in the cup at a molecular level. You put coffee in it, it displays 'coffee' on side of the thermos in led; put beer in it, it displays beer; put a smoothie in it, it reads out 'mix' and then proceeds to display 23g of sugar, et cetera. That's awesome, but I don't know what I would benefit from this. I know I'm drinking coffee, so why I do I need this cup? I think they are trying to achieve ultimate integration with fitness tracking by getting to know what you are putting in your body, tracking it, then doing something with that data in an app that is supposed to inform you to make better decisions.

I predict that in the near future (perhaps 5 years or less from now) that there will be an attempt on a one-stop shop app: a piece of software that is compatible with your fitness tracker, beverage tracker, and some sort of food tracker (either choosing items by choice or eventually taking a photo of your food and having it guess what it is and analyze for you). Then this app will take the data you put in it, such as weight, age, et cetera, hell, maybe there will be something to poke your finger and analyze your blood, and be your personal fitness/health guide. I'm not saying this is a bad idea, it can be hard to be well informed, but with so many ideas on what it means to be healthy, I'm not sure if there ever will be a truly successful attempt at this idea.

I think what this cup is trying to do is cool, I just don't know if it is enough to drive people to seek cup technology.

2. Nest - The Nest thermostat is the best home improvement thing I have ever done...and I got to do it through technology! Every single thermostat is ugly....grey/yellow-beige, with buttons that require to be pushed by extreme force, and shitty menu's that no one knows how to use...seriously, how do you use the scheduling tool on these old thermostats? The thing that caught my attention most on Nest is their freaking installation video. I could watch it multiple times. They made it so easy and they thought of literally everything...even down to telling you to use your personal cell phone to take a photo of your old thermostat configuration before unplugging anything! I purchased one, installed it, and haven't looked back.

The fact that I get monthly reports on my energy usage is a major win. It lets me know how many hours I heated the house, whether that was on average or not compared to the rest of the state country/ and breaks it down to contributing factors: weather & my personal contribution of either keeping the house cooler or hotter. You earn leafs (I know it's leaves but I'm still going to say leafs) based on how energy efficient you are, which makes you really think about how often you need to turn that heat up. The nest also learns about your habits. If you consistently turn the heat up to 68 degrees at 8am, it will start to automatically do that for you.

I can go on, so you seriously should just watch the videos on there...they even have one for smoke detectors so you don't have to flap your arms like an idiot with a towel the next time you fuck up dinner.

3. FitBit/Jawbone/Fuel - There are various fitness bracelet accessories that many people use and swear by, but I can't get behind it yet. I think it's a great start, but I want more than a 3 star review on each band..I want a compelling argument that argues the features of each brands fitness tracker instead of figuring out which is the most accurate. I think we will see some great improvements over the next year or two....so I can hold off until they get it down.

I'm sure there are more smart accessories to talk about....but I will leave it at that. These are creative ways to use technology we have, and I can't wait to see what other creative ways people will come up with. Fitness trackers aren't a new idea, there always have been step counters and heart rate monitors....but now you can have a simple wristband that syncs to your phone/computer and displays the data from that day. These are great examples of significant improvements on existing ideas. What other semi-ancient tech can you think of that could be streamlined? How about scanning items in your pantry that generates a new shopping list? How about an app for your car that integrates the ability to order/renew your tabs ( and gives you notice when they are due), tells you when you are due for an oil change, or that your tire pressure is low?

Lots of great ideas out there!

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FFF - Five Fave's Friday 06/13/14

So I know I didn't post this on Friday...and that's because I just thought of it now. I know a lot of sites do a "link pack" of some sort, and I always enjoy them, so I'm hopping on board!

1. NatureBox - I know, another food subscription. I used to subscribe to Full Circle Farms, however I just didn't move through the product before it expired, so it ended up being a waste (for me). The great thing about NatureBox is these snacks last for a few months and offers gluten free, soy free, gmo free, et cetera snack options, and there are always a lot to choose from! I subscribe to the 5 snack bag box for $19.99/month and the portions/quality are worth it. I have it sent straight to work so I can file my snacks away in my filing cabinet for healthy mid-day snacking. While a candy bar or chips might be enticing from the cafeteria, I'll be snacking on things like carrot strawberry fruit chews or cranberry almond bites.

2. Loot Crate - I purchased one box this month to see the types of items this mystery nerd goody box will yield...but man....dat Adventure Time & Attack on Titan crates (Past Loot Crates)!!! I love my nerd swaggg

3. The Wirecutter - I occasionally visit this site to view the best of tech stuff....and they have fairly thoughtful reviews/write ups and explain their process for arriving at the decision they did.

4. goodreads - If you are an avid reader and aren't using goodreads....get out of here! With Facebook integration, it's a great way to see what your friends are reading, what they thought of the book, and to keep track of what you read! You can even make goals for the year, such as "read 20 books", and goodreads will keep track of your progress as you finish each book! I love it a lot and cannot recommend it enough.

5. newsmap - A co-worker recently showed me newsmap, and it's awesome! It displays the most clicked links on Google by country for news...so no need to receive biased news, see what everyone else reading! (lol)

Hope everyone has a great week! I plan on having another FFF this Friday!

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Free online education

Online education has continued to improve, and I didn't discover just how many great resources were out there until about a year ago. This isn't going to be a long post because I want to encourage you to visit each site and see what they have to offer.

My passion has always been to be a life long learner...a scholar if you will. The world is an interesting place, and I want to know everything about it. That is quite a lofty goal, so of course I am going to focus on the areas that interest me most before branching out to the less desirable fields...

The great thing about the following websites is they are all free to sign up, and they all offer quality free courses.

Coursera (https://www.coursera.org/) allows you to browse/filter by subject and by college it is offered by. If you want to be studious and complete the course in a timely fashion, just as if you were in an actual classroom, you can pay ~$50 bucks for a certificate of completion.

Udemy (https://www.udemy.com/courses/) offers a variety of free courses, and a lot of paid courses. They push ratings as a way of advertising a course, so you can filter out the quality ones from perhaps the not so quality. More of the YouTube of online education, which is definitely not a bad thing.

I haven't used Edx (https://www.edx.org/course-list) much, but this is also an online college-style course site offered by colleges/universities, such as MIT or Harvard.

An honarable mention will be Khan Academy (https://www.khanacademy.org/) which was a vital resource for me when taking my math courses in college. It was started by a guy who made YouTube videos for his niece to help with math. He liked this method of teaching because you could pause and replay a section of the teaching in case you did not understand it the first time. He later developed the site with more teachers and added more categories on top of math (science, economics/finance, arts, et cetera) which I still reference today. The absolute best thing that hooked me on the site was a level up/progressive system. They have a knowledge map (https://www.khanacademy.org/exercisedashboard) where it shows the basics of math flowing into more concepts.....something that I would urge the school systems to adopt instead of integrated math bullshit that jumps around instead of laying building blocks upon a solid foundation.

ANYWAYS!!!!! If you want to be a life long learner but don't want life long debt, check out those sites!

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Need a tidier game room...

It's difficult when you collect something and have no nice system in place to store/display it. For me, it's video games (and books...and music...and computer stuff....). There isn't really one room I can completely take over/dedicate to video games, so there is a bit of spillover spanning two, maybe three rooms. One thing it can come down to is this: simple shelving.



Finding well-built shelves that do not waste real estate (ie deep shelves for dvd sized items) is hard. I did manage to find a few low profile shelves, however they do not stand well on carpet. My frequently used games go out on the main floor to accompany the 'home theater', while the remainder gets filed away into the 'music room'. Currently in here I have a couple of sturdy, deep shelves, and that's okay because they can hold a lot and are fairly tall. Unfortunately, this doesn't maximize the space, and you certainly can't see and get to everything.

I am not the only one who collects and enjoys video games. I recently came across an article where a guy has beautifully decorated and laid out one room. It is the best I have seen! He proves to the masses that you can collect something, display it in an aesthetically pleasing fashion, and have it easily accessible for anyone to use/play.



See more of what I am talking about here: http://imgur.com/gallery/FO9jM/new

And the article/interview here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/18/beautiful-game-collection_n_4808710.html

Now excuse me while I take up woodworking so I can make some of those custom shelves...

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Why you should buy your own cable modem

I recently purchased my own cable modem for a number of reasons, the main one being my Comcast owned modem was dropping packets like it's hot. I also noticed that you are charged $8/month for a rental of a Comcast modem, which adds up to $96/year. This is insane, especially because it doesn't work like purchasing a phone (where you pay it off over time)....you simply keep giving them money. It makes sense from a money-making perspective, but I also would hope they wouldn't essentially charge you 3x over the cost of it...but that's just me.


Anyways, this is a great prompt/push for buying your own! You can even have it "self-installed", up and running within minutes. I purchased the Motorola SurfBoard SB6141 due to it's high rating, DOCSIS 3.0 compatibility, and overall capability of handling an extreme connection I only wish I had. I did a speed test with my old modem (24/25mbps down, 3/4mbps up), and then I made the call. It took me about 5 minutes to navigate/wait on hold through the Comcast phone menus, but then I was connected to tech support who only required three things that are located on your purchased modem:

1. Make/Model
2. Serial Number
3. MAC Address

After I provided this info, they did whatever magical thing they needed to do on their end before giving me the thumbs up to power cycle my modem and test out my connectivity. I ended up need to power cycle both my modem and router 3 times before I saw connectivity, but as soon as I was up I ended the phone call.

Back at my computer, I did another speed test. This time it was 27.5mbps down, and almost 6mbps up. Seeing a 2-3mbps in speed increase is insane! On top of no dropped packets! I should note that I purchased an awesome router a few months ago (Netgear Nighthawk) which also improved my speed. Your internet connection is only as good as your gear (modem/router), so it is wise to invest in these two pieces of equipment, especially if you are a constant streamer of Netflix, Steam, et cetera. If this is something you use everyday, invest in it. You do not need to pay for a higher connection speed when you can get about a 5mbps boost in speed like I saw.

Look at dat Nighthawk

My last note is my modem cost me $80. This costs less than a year of renting a Comcast (or any cable provider) modem. This is a wise move to lower your monthly bill and increase your internet speed. Anyone can do this, and your cable provider can help you over the phone, absolutely NO appointment needed.

Note: Reading Comcast's website, your address has to "qualify" for self-installation....whatever that means. It would be wise to hop on a chat session to ask if you qualify before proceeding.

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E3 Week

It's that time of the year again where gamers gather round their tv's and monitors in anticipation that some game announcement will make them lose. their. shit. (Fun Fact: I'm posting this from my HTC One M8 and I had to add 'shit' to my dictionary. It gave me the confirmation message of 'shit is saved'.)

And I'm one of those gamers! I want at least one game to grab me and make me follow its progress from announcement to release day. Last year, that game was Transistor, and it was beautiful. I am ready for another!

What game(s) are you anticipating, if any?

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