Jonathan Davies

Tomorrow I set out on my holiday to Canada and more specifically Ottawa. The main goals for me in this holiday is that I: one, explore a bit more into photography - I’ve heard that there are some great areas around Ottawa, especially Parliament Hill to take photos. I’ll be armed with a D80 and snapping everything I can. And secondly to relax: I’ve got a load of things planned for when I get back - some I can’t really talk about and some I just don’t want to yet.

One of my deepest regrets is that I am not spending enough time producing content for this blog. I know I keep saying I will be writing more and not much has come of it…

I have been thinking of branching out a bit; maybe talking about things I wouldn’t normally care to mention. However I will not let this blog simply become a news website - frankly I think a lot of you would prefer a no blog posts than repeated ones that you can find anywhere.

What would you like to see from the blog?

On another note I’ve written an article for Desktop Vibes that I’m quite proud of: Five Reasons Why You Should Use Google Docs. I’ll also be having another article of mine published sometime tomorrow.

Even with the release of Firefox 3 I still remain an avid Safari user. Why?

Because when I was using Firefox 2 I was bit two many times with it crashing on me over and over again and it using to much in the way of system resources. I didn’t use any extensions (I don’t feel I found any that I really need to use or enhance my computing experience exponentially).

Yes, I know Firefox 3 has changed all of this, but still. I have no need to. Safari does everything that I need and more. It’s faster, looks better and has better integration with the OS.

It’s a simple reason, but they’re simple problems - sorry Firefox but I’m not about to switch today.

I know a lot of you probably think I’m wrong, why?

Apple as of late have starting working with lots more companies to bring a better experience to its users. They’ve worked with Google on integrating YouTube and Google Maps into the iPhone. Yahoo! have also helped integrate some of their widgets into the iPhone.

There has also been an advent of rumors that Apple is working with Google to add live video streaming to iTunes as well.

An interesting idea which has pushed me to talk about how the tech industry especially, are starting to collaborate a lot of their products. Why would they do this?

Increasing awareness is a major factor. Having that name in the search box every time you want to search is a big selling point. I wonder how much Google pays Mozilla to have their search as the default search in Firefox ?

You’ve also got to think about the people that you are trying to reach, maybe you want to go into a new market where making a brand new product wouldn’t be appropriate. Instead you could confer with another company with a strong product already in that market. Sure, the initial cost might be great but if people start to recognize you as a player then half of the work is already done.

Integration is great for consumers, if they can do something with one app instead of another two others they’re happy. It’s a simple message but can be a lot harder to put into practice.

When you go buy an iPod, do you buy it because it is great at what it does or because its an iPod? Its the same with computers; do you buy a Dell because they’re reliable or because everyone you know has one?

Brand matters.

Consumers rarely care about what they buy because of what it does, you can have something that does more than an iPod for a better price, they don’t care - people will still buy the iPod because everyone has one and they are the cool thing to have. I mean, you don’t pull out your new Zune to show everyone on the school bus do you?

A strong brand means you have a better relationship with the consumer, half the work is you promoting yourself to 50% of the people you encourage. The other 50% of the business you get is because the people you sold to liked your product enough to tell someone else about it. That is how you get a household name.

The hoover, for instance. You might not realize it but the correct term is vacuum-cleaner; the brand hoover has become so recognized that it becomes the name, even if you buy a Dyson.

Unfortunately for most people starting out in the product business; if there is already a massive leader (lets say Microsoft in OS software) there is very little chance that you are going to unseat it in your own life time. To build up your brand you need to innovate and let people know about it! There are probably thousands of great websites and blogs out there that no one knows about but are doing amazing things:

Do them a favor and tell your friends about them, just once.

You’ve got to love them. The day I get on holiday (over 9 weeks!) our home network starts to fail. We have a pretty complicated one which involves several wireless routers and bridges.

It seems that the source of the problem is the BT Home Hub which is failing. Every so often I am able to restore it - bit it is very unreliable.

That is pretty much why there has been a lack of content lately, i have been busy which various projects and things that frankly took precedence over the blog. In the near future I will be talking about some new software I have purchased, The best ways of running Windows on your Mac and a bit about my experiences with web design.

As with the last Apple Event its that time again for another quick round-up of my predictions for what we may, or may not see at Apple’s World Wide Developer’s conference. I’ll be watching Engadget and Macrumors Live’s coverage. And as soon as they open up the store for orders of the 3G iPhone, I’ll be placing mine.

I’ve been pretty tapped into the rumors - mainly because I’m looking at buying an iPhone as soon as they are available, but I am by no means sure as to what they will talk about. it just seems that there are to many things that could happen to fit them into one keynote.

• As I’m on the topic of the iPhone I’ll start there: Slight design changes, nothing to big, I’d be pleased with something like this. 3G (obviously), GPS and more coolness on the whole. I really, really want it to ship within a week of the announcement - if it will is another thing entirely.
• I’m sure there will be a big focus on some on the new iPhone Apps, as neat as they probably are… this will be the time where I go get something to eat, it doesn’t really interest me at all in a keynote speech - I want to hear more Apple stuff.
• Lets talk about Mac OS X. Maybe a preview of “Snow Leopard“, or at least it will get a slide or two. I’m hoping they’ll talk about the future of Mac OS on a whole. Michael has a great post here with what he thinks about that Snow Leopard stuff.
• Mobile Me - sounds cool but I won’t buy it. Or at least until I get a second Mac. Its a long time coming though - but Steve did say that himself.
• New Cinema Displays? Why not? Thinner, faster, bigger(?). They’re only two years due.
• Don’t see anything happening to laptops at this point. I think there are far more important things to talk about this time - how about a special event in Autumn (Fall, for you US folks).

There you have it… There are a couple other things that I could touch upon but most of them I don’t expect to actually flourish. Macrumors has a good summary here.

What would you like to see at WWDC (if it hasn’t already happened)?

I’ve always “wanted” an iPhone, but have never really come up with a reason that is strong enough to over-through what is a very hefty price tag. In fact, over 18 months, with the cheapest contract, costs you £900.

If you hadn’t noticed. That’s a lot of money for a phone.

But now it’s gotten to the point where I think (obviously, when the 3G iPhone is released) I am going to give in and say yes. But why, what has changed since the release of the iPhone to make me realize that I need one.

The biggest reason was the actual iPhone itself, before there was nothing to gauge a good and bad phone, they were all rubbish. But now you can see how good phones could be… It’s a lot harder to put up with them now.

The problem that I currently face is as to whether I am going to end up using the phone enough. Currently I don’t really use my phone very much. It’s a catch twenty-two situation. I want an iPhone because I don’t use my current phone, but I am hesitant in buying a new one because I don’t want to waste money on something that I may find out I don’t need.

But it’s not really the phone functionality that draws my towards it. I like the simplicity, the user interface, the iPod, the web browser. So even if I don’t find myself using the phone functionality, will the unlimited data plan balance things out?

I’m not sure yet, any thoughts?

My previous blog post was about the use of technology in schools at the moment and I didn’t really touch on how school’s could improve learning in the digital age as much as I could have, I had a lot of thoughts, more than what warranted a simple update to the post - so here is a brand new one here for your enjoyment

So we are at this point where there is a gap between accepting computers as a mainstream learning tool and those who still prefer the good old pen and paper. Of course writing is an incredibly important asset, but it is getting to a stage where typing is going to be just as, if not more important. So, I suggest the following pieces of action to be taken:

• Write everything on the computer - by doing this you are forcing kids, from a level where they are (hopefully) all the same. Therefore they can build up there skills and abilities with each other and learn things from each other. Of course, they should be pretty capable in writing before they move solely over to the computer for writing.
• Teaching online - my own school’s site has a source where they can enroll in online courses that work separately, or in union with a scheduled lesson. One of the advantages to this is that students can work at their own pace and don’t have to wait for others to catch up.
• School Bulletins - Imagine logging onto your school computer to find a page telling you your time table, preps that need doing and any other school related notifications. My school has this on a limited basis, but the possibilities that can be gained from this are amazing.
• Homework by email - Now there is no excuse to say you forgot. Send out a mass email to all your students giving them the work that is needed and the course on the learning site that they need to reference. All they simply do is, put the homework into a reply and send it off.

The problem that we have with these is that they require a few other steps that need to be made first before they could reach their potential:

• Educate students and teachers - on day one they should be given a demonstration of how to use everything and have a chance to ask questions. There should always be a support email that people can go and ask questions.
• A standard system - a lot of schools have hobbled together a system that uses a lot of different technologies that haven’t been designed to work with each other. Chose a system and stick to it!
• Make it mandatory - The one thing that is letting down the online learning site at my school is the fact that teachers don’t have to put up content for it - or even use it. Before it can be used properly it needs the whole school community behind it.

This is simply what I think a school would need to put into place before they can expect a fully functional, online learning experience. What would you like your school to do?

Technology plays a large roll in my daily activities at school. For some lessons I write my notes on my MacBook Pro, I do a lot of video recording and editing for school events. In fact I am going to be editing a whole load of footage over the next few weeks.

Why do I write a lot of my notes on my computer? To stay organized really. All my notes are arranged specifically to the subject and lesson that I am studying. Most importantly; I know where everything is. I am not very good at manually organizing things. I tend to loose pieces of paper and it can take a long time for me to find stuff. If I can’t find something on my Mac, then I simply use Spotlight and get to it in seconds.

The problem with schools and technology at the moment is simply that teachers don’t seem to trust them as a learning tool totally yet. In all the lessons that I do - only a handful am I allowed to take notes for on my computer.

Why are they like this? I think it is simply because of the situation that my school’s network used to be in. There was a point where files could go missing or magically become deleted. This caused a lot of mistrust about the school’s network that I believe is still present today.

Luckily, things are changing, slowly, for the better. Teachers are becoming more educated and IT is becoming a bigger part of learning at my school. Interactive white boards are in a lot of classrooms and projects are more commonly requested to be presented on a computer.

They are small steps, but it’s still progress non the least.

How is technology treated in your learning environment?

I have never been very good at making targets, big nor small, I just never seem to be able to accomplish them - or at least as well as I’d like to.

For instance, only spending a limited amount of time “browsing” the internet - a massive time waster, or reading a book for a few minutes a day. I can write them out and plan doing them - but when it comes down to it, all I am really good at is procrastinating.

So I’ve put in a few measures lately to try and curve this problem and so far it seems to be working fairly well. One of the biggest hurdles was admitting that I am not (though some believe me to be) a superhero - who can do anything. Once this boundary is overcome you can just accept that what you have managed to do is enough, and should be enough to satisfy you.

By setting myself, small, doable targets I am able to slowly complete a whole large tasks. Because, after all, one large tasks simply a lot of small ones.

Organizing my life through one quick small step has increased my productivity ten fold.

What do you do to be more productive?