don’t panic

Technically, these are earbuds, but Sony, ever ahead of the cultural curve, has labeled them  “headphones.”  Whatever.  I originally went looking for noise canceling headphones to use while walking.  Most of my local streets are fairly busy, making a nice quiet exercise session a little hard to find.  You basically have to go about a half mile down side streets before you can hear the birds.  My requirements were simple.  I wanted something to reduce as much of the street noise as possible without being so obtuse and bulky that I didn’t look like a complete dork.  Sound quality would be nice, but I was willing to sacrifice a bit for the noise cancellation.  Honestly, most of what I listen too while walking is podcasts.  Still, there are some really crappy products out there so I knew to be careful.  For price, I wasn’t about to shell out $400 for a pair of Sennheiser’s, but I also know that when it comes to audio gear, you often get what you pay for.  $100 was my cap, and these fell just under that.

The Good

Sound quality is acceptable, especially for voice use.  Music is a little muddy, but most canceling headphones exhibit this.  It’s the nature of the beast.  If the iPod Touch had better EQ settings you might be able to compensate for this, but alas, that is another post.

The phones come with three different cups to fit your ear, and one thing that really makes a difference is making sure that the cups seal inside you ear canal. If they’re not snug you can forget any real noise cancellation.  They were comfortable enough for me to leave in my ears for at least an hour, which is saying a lot.  Some earbuds (hello Apple) are downright painful to wear for more than ten minutes at a time.  Maybe my ears are just shaped funny.

The bulk of the canceling electronics are held in a small clip-on pack about halfway down the length of cord.  It uses a single AAA battery, has a tiny led light to let you know that the “power” is on, and a “monitor” press button to both mute what you’re listening to and kill the cancellation should you need to speak to someone (or listen for cars as you cross the street).

The noise cancellation itself is pretty decent.  I’m no expert on what else is out there, but for some kinds of sound, the MDR-NC22′s were downright spooky.  I was in my kitchen listening to mild music while making popcorn in an old air popper.  I could only barely hear the appliance, which was about the same volume (or more) than an average hair dryer.

The Bad

Why else would we post these kinds of comments if it were not for the negative, yes?  There are definitely a few things about these earbuds that really irk me.  The first is the cord/wire used.  I’m not sure what happened over at Sony, but about ten years ago someone decided that they needed to stop using whatever it was that they were previously using to make headphone cables (which was great by the way) and start using what must be the most annoying material in the world.  I like Sony.  I like their headphones a lot.  My first pair of studio monitor headphones lasted almost 15 years of rugged use.  When I replaced them with the exact same model, I was having to make repairs to the new ones within six months.  I grew so frustrated with the way the cord tangled itself that I finally castrated the things and cut out all but three feet of straight cable.  The cords on the MDR-NC22′s are no different and seem to be made from Sony’s patented Tanglematic material.  If you simply stuff these puppies into your pocket without carefully winding them around something, expect to waste at least five to ten minutes of your life unknotting them later.

The cord length itself is also frustrating.  Maybe I’m a lot taller than the average user (6′ 1″?), but it’s a little disappointing that Sony (like most hardware manufacturers) isn’t willing to spring for two more inches of cord so that the things don’t pull out of my ears if I turn my head more than 30 degrees.  Sony has also chosen to use an uneven method of distribution so that the left ear takes the full weight of the cord.  I can’t see any advantage in this, but it is what it is.

Something that almost makes the whole point of noise cancellation moot, is that the cords make a lot of scratching/rubbing sound when you walk.  Any rubbing against your skin at all and you will hear it.  Same with wind.  Even the 2-4 mph wind created by walking was enough to make it sound as though I were standing at the top of a mountain.  Not good.

All in all, the MDR-NC22′s are resonable.  But they could have been SO much better with only a few tiny changes.

UPDATE: 6/4/09 – I have decided that the cord-rubbing problem with these earbuds is more than just bad.  It’s appalling. What exactly is the point of noise-cancelling headphones, if the noise that they generate from the slight brushing of the cords on your clothing is far greater than the outside noise they cancel?  SONY, want to know why your previous domanance in the home audio market is slipping away?…  YOU’RE MAKING CRAP.  Good grief!  Do the people producing your products ever even bother to try them out??  Five minutes walking down the street wearing these things and you’d see twenty different ways to make them better.

Every day I take a walk to the local market for a muffin or a pastry of some kind.  It’s something of a reward I give myself for the meager mile or so of exercise.  I won’t debate the hypocrisy of  buying sugar coated goodies as a bribe to stay fit, but I also use the time to catch up on a number of NPR podcasts.  Don’t you just love time-shifting?

Anyway, I was listening to PRI’s The World – Technology Podcast for May 1st, and they had several people discussing the digital book industry and it’s impact on society, when one of the speakers said something that literally caused me to stop in my tracks. It was suggested that paper media as a medium for publishing will be dead in 50 years.

It wasn’t the validity of this possibility that got me, but rather the incredible absurdity of the prediction as a whole.  Technology moves at a blinding pace compared to most advances in culture, and is often measured in weeks, and months instead of years or decades.  Consider…

A mere 559 years ago we printed the very first book on a Gutenberg press.  Before then, everything was by hand, so we had no mass production of information.  This was effectively the birth of the publishing industry.

388 years ago, Galileo invented the telescope.

230 years ago, the world got bifocal lenses.

205 years ago, we got our first steam locomotive.

183 years ago, we invented matches.

172 years ago, Samuel Morse invents the telegraph and sends digital information a mind-numbing 500 yards.  A couple of years later we also saw the first photographs.

165 years ago, the first telegraphed news dispatch, sent from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore, appeared in the Baltimore “Patriot.”  Digital news dissemination is born!

159 years ago, the refrigerator arrives.

141 years ago, Thomas Edison patented his 1st invention, an electric voice machine.

133 years ago, we got an actual “telephone”.  A year later Thomas Edison patents the phonograph and makes the first audio copyright violation by recording “Mary Had a Little Lamb” for later playback.

130 years ago, we were blessed with the first electric light bulb.  It burned for an astounding 13 1/2 hours.

125 years ago, the first “long-distance” telephone call was made, between Boston and New York City.

105 years ago, Wilbur Wright made his 1st airplane flight. There was no in-flight snack.

102 years ago, the automatic washer and dryer was introduced.  Housewives everywhere rejoice.

101 years ago, The US Supreme Court ruled that player-piano rolls based on copyrighted music are not a copyright violation but a piece of machinery.

93 years ago, Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity was presented.

79 years ago, we install the first red and green traffic lights.  8-12% of the male population scratch their heads… being color blind.

71 years ago, television!

62 years ago, the transistor is born.

50 years ago, the integrated circuit is born!

45 years ago, Audio Cassette tapes hit the U.S.

40 years ago, the very first “email” is sent via ARPANET.

30 years ago, Ethernet connects computers together.  Early Ethernet adapters go for $5000.

26 years ago, Compact Disc recordings are introduced in the united states.

25 years ago, Apple puts out the Macintosh.  A year later Windows is born, followed almost immediately by the blue-screen-of-death.

19 years ago, the World Wide Web and it’s protocols become a reality.

14 years ago, DVD’s hit the market.

8 years ago, the iPod is born.  The RIAA blows it off as a passing fad.

And in the last 10 years…

Palm Pilots

Cell Phones

Digital Cameras

Cable Modems

Wi-Fi

Google

Wikipedia

Public GPS

the iPhone!

Good grief! 50 years in technology is an immense amount of time!  Basically all of computer science can be wrapped up in the last 50 years. In just over twice that amount we were still trying to get a man to fly!  And yet, I wonder how many of us have working floppy disc drives at home?  The modern 3.5 inch kind have only been around for less than 30 years.  The discs themselves have maybe a two year safe shelf life.  After that, it’s a crap shoot.  A paper book, on the other hand, could easily last a hundred years if kept safe and dry, and even if it does degrade, most of the information will still be readable.  If your digital file degrades, even a little, the whole thing is likely toast.

But to make ANY claim about where technology will be in 50 years is utter and complete NONSENSE, and a sure sign that you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.  50 years ago, NOBODY would have guessed we’d be where we are today, save for sci-fi writers.  Who knew that the cool little flip-phone that James T. Kirk from Star Trek used to ask for a beam up would seem quaint and clunky compared to today’s modern cell phones?  But I’m willing to bet that 50 years from now, no one will be using CD’s, DVD’s (Blu-ray or otherwise), flash drives, or anything else even remotely similar to what we have now, yet there will undoubtedly still be books on shelves.  They don’t need power, don’t become obsolete, don’t requite a proprietary reader, don’t have moronic DRM, and best of all, passing them to someone else is as easy as placing it in their hands.

Paper as a medium is here to stay.  Oh, we might print on something else, but it will still be printing.  Ebooks are the passing fad.  Put your throw-away reading on a Kindle if you like.  I’ll take my novels on good-old analog paper, thank you very much.

Here we go…

What does it say about a person, when their own political party thinks they would be better represented without you?  And no, I’m not talking about Colin Powell.

I mean, you gotta love this comment:

“He’s just mad at me because I’m the one person in the country who had the guts to explain his endorsement of Obama,” Limbaugh said. “It was purely and solely based on race.”

…unlike his own comments.  Maybe, Rush, you’re the one person in the country who’s a big enough ass to make such pointless and bigoted comments about a former secretary of state.

I can’t get over the fact that you are nothing more than a media fluffer.  You remind me of the old TV show Beverly Hills 90210.  It was sensationally popular when it was on, influencing millions of people with mindless drivel that meant absolutely nothing in the bigger scheme of things.  You’re not running for public office (god forbid!).  You’re not someone with any kind of authority.  You are a jaded talk-radio host who thinks he alone knows what’s best for America and the Republican party.

Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.

But it’s not all bad news…  I hear the White Patriot Party is looking for a new mouthpiece.  You’d be perfect!

So, it looks like Justice Souter will be stepping down in June, leaving an opening for President Obama to fill.  CNN had an interesting article about the good judge in which they mention how the “right” were more than a little let down by the Bush senior’s appointment, saying, “Justice Souter will never escape the label of having been an enormous disappointment, a traitor to the right.”

Wait a second?  A traitor to who?  The right?  Strange, I though Supreme Court Justices were supposed to impartially interpret the law and the Constitution, not the political ideals of one party.  Huh.  Who knew.

Bush himself said when appointing him, “I think that is good news for all of us who are committed to the Constitution of the United States,” said Bush. “He’ll be a superb justice for the Supreme Court.”

All of us who are commited to the Constitution?  As opposed to who, us barbaric liberal lefties?  This kind of statement coming from the mouth of the President of the United States makes me wonder why the hell we even bother teaching government to kids in school.  Screw government, let’s just teach them how to lobby and bribe.  If the only point of a judge is to do what YOU want him or her to do, then why bother?  Why bother with law at all?  Maybe our legal system should just revolve around who you know.  The more connections you have, the more likely you are to get off.

…

Oh.

When we added an Apple iPod Touch to our household gadget collection, we almost brought ourselves up to par with the current Apple Technical Universe.  Other than the iPhone itself, we’re pretty caught up with where technology stands from Steve Job’s perspective.

And so, as with any new toy, there comes a point at which you start to notice a device’s shortcomings.  In the case of the Touch, it was the lack of a microphone that first got me.  Sure, sure, you can use an external mic, but who wants to carry that around?  It’s not a phone, so you’re going to have one of those in your pocket already, and while my nice green LG enV does a swell job at recording basic notes, it’s quite limited as a voice recorder.  Honestly, this would have been SO easy to add to the Touch (it’s there in the iPhone) that you realize it’s only because they don’t want competition via services like Skype to compete with AT&T.  There are other issues, such as the pithy speaker (kudos have to be given for including one at all from the 1st gen version though), but all in all, it’s an exciting device.

So what’s next for Apple?

Rumor has it that they are designing an iPad…  This would be a device that falls somewhere between the iPod Touch and the MacBook.  Sounds interesting, but beyond a glorified media player, what would you be able to do with this device?

To understand what I mean by this, you have to consider for a second that any piece of consumer technology has two possible modes.  The first is for outbound media, and includes music, video, text, web browsing, and any thing else where the data is being delivered TO you.  The other use mode is for inbound media.  This mode includes all the same forms of media, but are coming FROM you, or the world around you.  Take your standard laptop computer.  Aside from being able to play music and videos, if it’s worth anything, it will be able to record audio and video as well.  The iPod Touch on the other hand, is great at outbound media services, but not so hot on the inbound stuff.  Sure, it has a virtual keyboard, but could you really imagine yourself typing in a novel length manuscript?  Not a chance.  But the nice thing about the Touch is that you can drop it into a pocket and surf the web, watch a movie, read a book, or listen to days and days of music anywhere you want.

So I ask again, what would you do with an iPad?  Mind you, it’s not like you can stick it in your pants, and you’re going to look like a real geek carrying around a clipboard-sized media player everywhere you go.  It’s not going to be a phone (unless Apple pulls a fast one and adds in a detachable Bluetooth headset), so who would want something without a keyboard (hidden maybe?… still too slow unless it’s full) and what kinds of inbound media would it be able to handle?

One use might be in the college market.  Consider a device that can clip into a three-ring notebook, records audio and possibly video if they included a swivel-able iSight camera), can record handwritten notes and drawings (stylus anyone, or is that going backwards?), surfs the web via wireless WAN or wifi, and what you have is the perfect companion for your well-decked student.  The lack of the keyboard is a bummer personally, but perhaps they could have a linked “add-on” that would let you type to your heart’s desire… Then again, why not just bring your MacBook to class?

Price?  Sorry, but there’s almost no chance that this thing is going to be LESS expensive than the highest level iPod Touch, which for me at least, means that it had better do significantly more than my Touch for me to ever consider one, and yet be significantly more portable than my MacBook.  That’s a tough challenge.

One thing that could push it over the edge is other possible forms of inbound media.  Consider another, more ruggedized device that has (in addition to audio and video inputs) the ability to record motion, temperature, visual changes to the environment (through the camera), GPS, pressure on the tablet from a stylus (think Wacom tablet), or even a port for other more esoteric forms of incoming data.  Include a flip-cover with solar cells on the inside for remote charging, and suddenly you have a device that would be perfect for scientists in the field.  Lightweight, durable, and capable of sustaining itself in a place where recharging your battery pack could be problematic.

I’m big on gadgets that can DO things for me.  The more things the better.  I want my uber-gadget to replace as many of the other pieces of technology I carry around with me from day to day as possible.  I want it to open my car and link with the sound system automatically.  I want it to remote control my home theater, DVD player, TV and VCR.  It should be able to remote view and control my desktop computers.  It should have ports not only for headphones, but for USB, Firewire (yes indeed, Apple…  You can’t ditch it yet), and at least one major memory card format.  It should have decent speakers up front and the ability to alert me of an event in twelve different ways (and should at LEAST include audio alarm/sound, vibrate, and text message/email options).  It should scream like a banshee if stolen, take a picture of the perp, email it to a remote location, lock out changes and then track it’s own location until the battery is drained.  It should either link with, or completely replace my phone, check my email, alert me to major news, record my position at intervals throught the day and know where it is at any given moment (acts different when at school as opposed to at home).

Of course, such a gadget would have to be completely expandable.  I know, I know.  No such animal exists.  But it COULD.  There are no technologies mentioned that don’t exist today.  So how about it, Apple?  As long as you’re going to rock the market again, how about you do it right.  Give us the MacGyver of portable devices.