Zune pass is Microsoft’s subscription model for streaming music.  It costs $14.99 a month and as long as you have an active subscription you can play (on up to 3 PCs) any songs from their vast library.  You can also download these songs and load them onto a DRM approved device (like the Zune) for the duration of your subscription.  Along with the monthly access to the entire library, Microsoft added a new element that lets you download and keep forever, 10 songs per month.  The biggest gap in this service which I didn’t realize wouldn’t work until I actually tried it, is that you cannot access the Zune Marketplace via the xbox 360 console.  This means that you can’t browse and stream unlimited music directly from the xbox, a huge oversight in my opinion since most people would love to be able to select and play any music in their main entertainment room instead of just the room they have a PC in.  Other than that, there are a lot of nice features about the Zune pass and Zune marketplace (social playlists and channels) that have me debating moving to a subscription based model for my music needs.

With the newest version of the Xbox 360 UI, Xbox Live Gold members and members of certain Netflix subscription plans can now access a large library of streaming content directly on their Xbox consoles.  I have tried this for a few days and it is implemented very well.  On the netflix website you select which movies you want to show up in your “instant queue” on the xbox, and once you navigate to the Netflix section on your console you get a nice interface that lets you play and watch the content you selected.  The standard streaming quality is very acceptable and some features are available in HD which looks very nice.  The best “instant queue” selections are mostly limited to Documentaries, Indie films and TV shows, but there is a large selection of almost anything you could want, and the most basic plan at $8.99 allows for you to have 1 DVD (or BluRay) out at a time to fill the gap.  A couple of improvements I would like to see are allowing you to browse the entire netflix instant library via the xbox console to add films to your queue, more HD content, and also better sound on the higher quality films.  It seems I am only limited to 2 channel audio, which is unfortunate.

With these two media subscriptions, Microsoft and Netflix really have a nice fulfillment of my music and movie needs.  This got me thinking, with a few of the improvements I listed above (most notably the Zune Marketplace accessible on the Xbox 360 console) Microsoft could easily offer a single subscription model that would compete and go beyond anything other media service providers currently offer.  Imagine if you had following options.

• Xbox Media Pass Basic – 1 month xbox live gold, netflix streaming, and zune pass streaming  $20/month
• Xbox Media Pass Mid-range – 1 month xbox live gold, netflix streaming + 1 at a time,  zune pass + 800 MS Points – $30/month
• Xbox Media Pass Deluxe – 1 month xbox live gold, netflix streaming + 3 at a time, zune pass + 1600 MS Points – $50/month

The price points can be adjusted some, but you see where I’m going.  I would be very VERY interested in purchasing one of these plans, and even possibly a yearly subscription if it was given at a discounted rate.  The other adjustment that would have to be made according to how I have the model laid out, is that Microsoft would have to make their point system universal.  800 MS points would be good on the Xbox console or Marketplace for purchasing game or video content and good on the PC or Zune for purchasing individual tracks or whole albums.  I really think if Microsoft was able to combine these services and integrate them well, they would really start to separate themselves from everyone else in both the console and media offerings marketplace.

There are quite a few of these services floating around, that will basically allow you to track your friends activity and sharing around the internet. Two others in specific that have caught my eye are FriendFeed and Pownce.

At first I was a little hesitant about what Twitter’s focus was, but after using it for a while I can see it’s benefits.

On thing I personally don’t see the appeal of is using it for personal messages back and forth between two private parties similar to IM. It’s kind of the same idea as the “Wall” on Facebook. I don’t understand the need to make private messages viewable to the general public. I guess, in some instances it’s useful if you could get additional feedback from other on-lookers, and it’s kind of like everyone hanging out in a room together, commenting on each other’s conversations (some people call twitter a combination of IRC, text messaging, and forums). Just not my flavor. But that’s the great thing about Twitter is it has multiple uses. I prefer to use it as a posting mechanism for momentary thoughts, sights or feelings that I wouldn’t want to type out in a full blog post. I like to follow close friends to see whats up, as well as some internet personalities for their links, insights, humor and just general daily discoveries. I think as soon as some non-internet celebrity joins on, Twitter will go mainstream.

So if you’d like to join “the next facebook” hop on over and start following me at www.twitter.com/timjanderson/

High Quality WMV download link

First a quick note on the song. As soon as I saw the “look” of the video during a test run the night before I knew what song I would use if this was successful. One of my favorite songs from last year is “All Your Friends” by LCD Soundsystem. The rhythm is perfect for the type of video that was produced, and the theme of the song hits home. If you listen to or read the lyrics they might be a little confusing, but what I get from it is that later in life, looking back you’ll mostly remember the good times with your friends and not much else, even if some of the stuff you did with your friends was pretty stupid. It’s a theme that really struck a cord with me.

I wouldn’t trade one stupid decision
For another five years of lies
You drop the first ten years just as fast as you can
And the next ten people who are trying to be polite
When you’re blowing eighty-five days in the middle of France
Yeah, I know it gets tired only where are your friends tonight?

Sorry to get sidetracked on the song. Anyway, I can watch the video a few times and still notice something new that makes me smile since there is so much going on. One thing that might change if I keep doing this, is this no one knew that the camera was recording, so everything goes on unrelated to the camera. We might be able to perform some pretty cool captures if people know its recording every 4 seconds. Also we’ve talked about setting up a second one somewhere else to capture even more, but I think the placement of this one got a much as possibly ( you can even see corn hole action outside at one point). Let me know what you think in the comments.

Here at the Northcrest household, we’ve been running a monthly charge of about $95 for cable and internet since we’ve lived here. Split between four people it’s not a bad deal at all (something I’ll greatly miss moving into a 2 person living situation). We pay to get a 7 MB/sec internet connection, digital cable, HD box, and additional HD channels. When we signed up we were offered HBO and Starz for no additional cost so we’ve had those as well. This month, Time Warner upped their rates to where we’re paying about $101 a month. When I saw the change in billing, I took a look at the breakdown of the bill to see what was increased. Pretty much every charge had a $1 or $2 increase. I then saw that we were being charged about 7 bucks each for HBO and Starz. This was different than our first bills where HBO and Starz did not show up except as a $0 charge. I was glad to have those extra channels, but not for that much of an increase.

I called Time Warner up this afternoon at lunch to get those costs removed. Shockingly I was on and off the phone with my whole request fulfilled in just a few minutes. Our new bill is down to just around $83 now, and they gave us a few months of Showtime free. If I had known that we were getting itemized for HBO and Starz I would have canceled those a while ago. I guess it pays to check. Meanwhile, I guess I’ll have to procure John Adams and other HBO series elsewhere for now.

• Being able to check and perform functions in gmail or any mail account like archive, mark as read, or delete without opening the browser
• Following Facebook and Twitter status in a very simple “mini-feed” layout that again is non-browser (for those of you that don’t know what Twitter is, I plan to make a post on it sometime soon)
• Saving settings and account information to an online profile that you can use at multiple locations

Download Digsby and give it a try. I think it is still in beta right now, but I haven’t noticed any issues, and can’t wait for them to continue to improve it. Some of you I know just use web session IM, so this isn’t really for you, but if you have any IM program installed on your home PC or laptop that use use for any of the major Instant Message platforms, I would fully recommend you switch to Digsby for a bit and see if you don’t prefer it.

Read up.

1. Patch a radiator hose
2. Protect your computer
3. Rescue a boater who has capsized
4. Frame a wall
5. Retouch digital photos
6. Back up a trailer
7. Build a campfire
8. Fix a dead outlet
9. Navigate with a map and compass
10. Use a torque wrench
11. Sharpen a knife
12. Perform CPR
13. Fillet a fish
14. Maneuver a car out of a skid
15. Get a car unstuck
16. Back up data
17. Paint a room
18. Mix concrete
19. Clean a bolt-action rifle
20. Change oil and filter
21. Hook up an HDTV
22. Bleed brakes
23. Paddle a canoe
24. Fix a bike flat
25. Extend your wireless network

Looking through it I knew a lot of them, but not all.  To spare my manliness I won’t specify each one, but I will tell you the following:

•  18 of the 25 I have performed before
• 23 of the 25 I’m pretty sure I know how to do without instruction
• 2 of the 25 I would not know how to do, but being a man would attempt without caution and probably end up either hurting myself or someone, or destroying something.

The article was later updated to describe how to carry out all of the skills listed.  Some of their solutions were more quick fixes and low level skill knowledge, which I guess is all that you would need in most situations.  I found it very interesting (and I guess was kind of the point of the article) that there are at least 5 items on that list that deal with technology.  I guess I never realized all my computer tinkering and tech interest was increasing my manliness.  Now if only blogging was on the list.

How many of these skills do you know how to do?

 Full Article

I’ll be sure to post highlights of the trip when I get back.

First up, google never ceises to amaze.  They have now added a new functionality to their google maps that allows you to view certain cities at street level.  As if you were standing at a specific spot!  Check it out.  It’s pretty neat.  I’ve found myself wandering the streets of NY or San Fransisco, even finding my relatives homes.  Currently it only works in 4 or 5 major cities, but they have contracted out a company to do a lot more.

Everyone remembers some of the cool computer interface stuff that the movie Minority Report displayed, giving us a glimpse at what life would be like 50 years in the future.  Well some of those ideas are already coming to life with Microsoft Surface.  Just look at some of the possibilities that they show in their demo videos.  Unfortunately this technology is still very expensive, but I can see this showing up in the next couple of years in hotels, bars, casinos and restaurants, and then eventually in our homes.  I really like how some of the jukebox and photo manipulation works.  Imagine some of the gaming possibilities!

On a more serious note, it has been a pretty rough month for two of my friends who I’ve known for a long time.  Its kind of weird that 2 very real situations have effected people my age, but it just shows how fragile life really is.

Ben, I’ve known from when I lived in California and we kinda re-met once we discovered the vast world that is the internet.  He has been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer and is currently undergoing chemo treatment.  You can check out his progress and prayer requests over on his blog.  Please keep him in your prayers.

Another friend from High School, Ryan Butcher, was in a very serious ATV accident.  He is doing a lot better than originally expected, but is still in serious care.  Please pray for him as well.

My summer schedule has already started, and I was looking at my calendar the other day and realized I only have 1 weekend where I don’t have anything scheduled all the way through August.  Its going to be a pretty busy summer, but I’ll try to keep posting here at least once a month.

Also 2 weeks ago I made a rather big decision that I somewhat referred to in a previous post. I decided to return my Vizio Plasma TV to Costco. Over the course of its life, the fan noise coming from the back of the television had grown to annoy me quite a bit. Vizio would have sent out a tech to fix it, if I was still within their 1 year warranty (which at this point I was not). I decided it wasn’t worth the agony and I should just return it. Costco’s policy is that if you are not 100% happy with your purchase, they’ll take back the product at any time. No questions asked. They are currently in the process of adjusting that policy so it cannot be abused, but I was able to return mine for a full refund of the price I paid. After I had gotten around the hurdle of finding a method of transportation for the TV (Thanks Matt’s parents) I took it to Costco and had a check made out to me in just 15 minutes. I was amazed how easy it was. Props to Costco.

So next came the task of figuring out a replacement. I could have bought the same thing for significantly less, but Costco did not carry it anymore. Actually Costco carried very few options that I was interested in. So after doing much research earlier in the week, I made my way to BestBuy to purchase a much nicer than my Vizio, Pioneer 5070HD. In the end, I didn’t pay any more than I did for the Vizio that I had bought 18 months prior, and I ended up with a top o the line Plasma with a ton of new features. Unfortunately I don’t have the great guarantee that Costco offers, but since I could now make the purchase on my credit card, Visa will extend the manufactures warranty up to 2 years which suits me fine. The last nice thing that fell into place was that a week after I purchased my TV from BestBuy, the price dropped by a few hundred dollars and I was able to take my receipt in and get a price match. Sweet!

For those of you who have never been to our sweet guy pad and seen my setup, I’ve been using a modded Xbox for over 2 years to serve as a media center in my living room. It has been an awesome little device and I love it. The one downside that is becoming more and more apparent is that it is limited by the weak 733MHz processor that resides within the Xbox itself. With such little power, HD content does not play nice. So, I’ve been seeking an alternative. Up until recently I only had a few options. I could install/build a HomeTheaterPC that would sit in my living room. That was too expensive and time consuming. I could extend my current personal PC setup to the living room using very long cables, which I’m still looking into, but the architecture for such a project leaves me a little baffled still. Or the simplest solution (which I’m currently using) is to sync my Xbox360 with my Media Center PC. This is working OK for now, but I’m limited on the types of content I can play (wmv, dvrms or mpeg). I can’t play x264, xvid, avi or mkv like the XBMC can. So I’ve always wanted more. After reading some recent news, I’m hoping my thirst for complete HD content may soon be quenched. Rumors are floating around that the AppleTV is easily hackable and can play HD content with no problem. This would totally rock. A lot of people are wondering if Apple did this intentionally, basically create a geek box that easily hackable (you can’t do it outright or else risk pissing off the RIAA and MPAA). I don’t know if this is the case or not, but if the community is able to do what some people are hoping, this could be very cool news. The other idea is that the PS3 might be able to run some flavor of Linux that could allow for a decent media center frontend. We’ll see where all this goes. But I am very excited that something new will be taking the place of streaming my HD content to the living room in the next few months.

Tonight, Nick, Newbs and I are driving up to Detroit to see one of my favorite band Explosions in the Sky. I think I’ve mentioned them a few times on here, but if you still haven’t given them a listen, you NEED to.

Oh yea,  Go BUCKS!  Final Four baby!!