Rick Gregory

Rick Gregory

36p

22 comments posted · 0 followers · following 0

13 years ago @ Feld Thoughts - Trying Gmail For A Week · 0 replies · +2 points

Totally agree. Rapportive is insanely cool.

Brad - learn the mail specific search operators. Things like 'is:starred' etc. There are a couple of odd ones, for example is:unread will work, but is:unstarred will not (you need to do -is:starred). It might not matter for a week, but over time it's useful. If you end up using labels to tag things, you can do a search like 'label:foo' to return all things with the foo label.

13 years ago @ Feld Thoughts - What Do You Hate The M... · 3 replies · +1 points

Um... CMD+SHIFT+3 for full screen or 4 for a selection is hard?

13 years ago @ Feld Thoughts - A Month of Mac · 0 replies · +1 points

Transmit 4 for FTP if Brad needs it... you can mount remote servers on the desktop as volumes (it uses MacFuse). $35.

Oh and Brad - Exchange - kill it. No, really. :) (I know, you can't really... )

13 years ago @ Feld Thoughts - A Month of Mac · 3 replies · +2 points

Actually I'd have dumped Outlook... :)

But since you're on a Mac, try...

1) Chat client - Adium (http://adium.im/)
2) WP client - Marsedit (http://www.red-sweater.com/marsedit/)

13 years ago @ TechCrunch - Facebook For iPhone Up... · 0 replies · +4 points

nice troll. Almost got me.

13 years ago @ TechCrunch - Facebook For iPhone Up... · 2 replies · +4 points

hmmm 70 million iPhone users. 400 million FB users. Do the math.

13 years ago @ Feld Thoughts - Rethinking The Laptop · 0 replies · +1 points

However the difference between a 60 second wait to access email and what Brad describes here is significant. That's my basic point re the post - Brad's chosen to use Exchange etc for functional reasons and is suffering operational pain because of that. At some point the functional reasons no longer justify the operational pain. Where that point is will be different for different companies.

"A much bigger reason is the fact that you can easily find and install applications without constantly worrying that they're infecting their computer with something horrible by doing so. That's a big deal for the less computer-savvy members of my family. "

THIS is a point we agree on 100%. A lot of the appeal of tablets will be to Windows users who can shed things like that. It won't be a strong selling point to Mac users simply because we don't have a history of viruses etc on the Mac. I also think that a lot of people will start picking up iPads and their Android equivalents because they'll be CHEAP. $500 now isn't cheap... but in 2-3 years entry price will be $250-$300 and they'll become gifts at birthdays, the holidays, or spur of the moment buys for a set of people.

I hope (and believe) that we'll see a plethora of computing devices. We started off the PC revolution in the 70s with a desktop. Moving computing out of the IT room onto a desktop was radical then. We're poised to decentralize again with computing moving off the desktop and even off the laptop to phones, tablets and consumer devices like the TV BUT people will still continue to use desktops and laptops for somethings because of things like screen size. However, people will expect things that CAN have computing intelligence to have it. Witness Chris Brogan's 4 yo kid who went up to the new HDTV and tried swiping on the screen... after all, Dad's phone does that, the TV should too....

"Do you see an advantage of the macbook-running-OSX over the Macbook-plus-touchscreen-running-iOS we'll likely see come out in a year or two. "
I don't see iOS migrating to the desktop or laptop. That move would be a poor one for Apple as a touch based UI doesn't make sense in those environments. Certainly they might add touch features here and there, but diversity is a good thing, unification isn't

13 years ago @ Feld Thoughts - Rethinking The Laptop · 3 replies · +6 points

"And for those with OSX laptops it's going to eliminate OSX for them. "

Nope. Because I don't start my Macbook up, I sleep it by closing the top and when i open the top it's ready to go, network connection live in 2-3 seconds. I don't sync Outlook, because I use GMail and assorted calendars and task lists that live in the cloud.

Honestly, nothing Brad talks about here has anything to do with the laptop - it's his software choices and the way he shuts his laptop down vs letting it sleep.

". If you can do everything you need on the iPad, why even carry the laptop?"
But I can't right now and even if the software was available to enable me to replicate tasks th iPad's screen is smaller than i'd want to work on regularly. And, frankly, if i"m going to do a lot of work that needs a keyboard I don't see the advantage of an iPad + keyboard over the macbook I'm typing this on (no, battery doesn't count - this thing lasts 10 hours).

I do think phones and tablets will become important, but we need to stop doing the "A is going to kill B" dance in tech analysis. It's an unsophisticated way to look at things and is almost never actually true.

13 years ago @ Feld Thoughts - Open Android vs. Close... · 4 replies · +2 points

Brad -

I don't see anything in your post that indicates you moved to Android because of openness. You moved because of features. That's fine, but let's face it, had Android not solved any of the issues you had with the iPhone you would not have switched, open source OS or not. If the iPhone is released at WWDC and eliminates each of the issues you had, is launched on multiple carriers and has awesome features you'd love, would you move back? If not, why not? Don't give me the "Apple's closed, Google's open" line because, frankly that had zero to do with your decision as you explain it here.

The open vs closed debate is as silly and meaningless as 'what's better, black or white" - both have points and reality just isn't that simple. It's very disappointing to see you fall into this simplistic trap and it's tiring to see tech commentators mindlessly spew "Apple's closed! Google's open!!" They each make products and do what they feel will serve their company best. Neither is perfect, but don't start off a post telling me that Google being open was compelling and then list off a bunch of product features. From what this post says, you'd have switched had Android been closed source and the Android market had the same policies as Apples' App Store as long as the new version of Android and the EVO given you the features you outline. Oh and if you're going to argue that being open somehow led to those features... no. Just no. What led to those features as a good product team.

13 years ago @ Feld Thoughts - Hint To Startups &ndas... · 2 replies · +1 points

Heck, if you want to use the Gmail interface, you can get Google Apps Standard for FREE and have joe@coolthing.com & the GMail UI. Register the domain, get GA Standard, update a couple of settings, and boom, you're good to go.

The only time I can see this being acceptable is if the founder's VERY early on and hasn't chosen a company name or setup a company yet. Other than that.... Brad, is this a red flag for you on an investment? Because this seems incredibly basic.