markpetrowsky.com

Browsercam for Free!

MarkP — Tue, 20 May 2008 02:19:02 +0000

A coworker turned me on today to Browsershots. If you’re familiar with Browsercam you’ll be happy to know that Browsershots is essentially a free version of browsercam minus the remote access and mobile device capture features. Considering Browsercam charges $59 a month this is a pretty big deal even if they don’t have all the features… yet.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…

MarkP — Wed, 14 May 2008 04:08:49 +0000

It’s been quiet around these parts with little action on the ol’ blog the last few months. Why you say? Well in the past few I left my job at G2 Switchworks (who was recently acquired by Travel Port) and took a new position with Duo Consulting. I guess all that shuffling around and getting up to speed in a new environment caused me to neglect things on the site. So far my job switch has been great and I’m really impressed with caliber of people I’m working with. Oh, and now I’ll have a second home online to wax-poetic about design and development.

Oh Bloody My!

MarkP — Wed, 14 May 2008 03:26:17 +0000

My Bloody Valentine is back together and doing a short North American tour this summer. Fortunately for any Chicagoland residents they’re making a stop in our home town September 27th. I just grabbed my tickets and I’m anxious for this show. MBV hasn’t played in the states in 16 years so it’s pretty big deal… well to some. It reminds me of when the Pixies got back together a few years back. If you’re a fan of shoegazer My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless is an essential for your collection.

Photograph Your Polling Place

MarkP — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 22:36:49 +0000

I wish I ran across this project before I headed into vote this morning so I could have participated. The New York times with the AIGA is asking the voters of the United States to snap and upload picts of their voting places. This is a great way for the regular Joe American to document there voting environments and give us online users a way to sneak a peak into the worlds of other voters around the country. It’s kind of interesting seeing schools, public buildings and even firehouses turned into makeshift voting places.

The Missing 1.7 Million Apple iPhones

MarkP — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 19:44:36 +0000

Apparently Apple sold 3.75 million iPhones in 2007 however AT&T has only activated 2 million iPhone accounts. So what happened to that missing 1.75 million? According to Forbes it’s estimated a majority of those unaccounted for iPhones were probably hacked, unlocked and probably in use on some other network. That’s nearly half of all iPhones! Obviously there’s a problem with the one carrier option that Apple and AT&T rolled out with. Apple hopes to reach it’s goal of selling 10 million iPhones in 2008 - a very aggressive goal which they might be able to reach, but losing the extra revenue on the service plans has to be killing them. While AT&T was critical in helping Apple launch the iPhone It’s clear the long term business model is not sustainable and I doubt making users signup for an AT&T plan at point of purchase will go over well with consumers.

Washington, Lincoln, Colbert, John…

MarkP — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 20:55:22 +0000

This cracks me up. Following Stephen Colbert’s attempt at running for president a few months back, I just read today in an article on CNN titled “Colbert earns ‘appropriate place’ at Smithsonian” that his portrait is now actually hanging in the Hall of Presidents. Or maybe I should say it’s hanging close to the Hall of Presidents. Erin M has a nice snapshot of the portrait up on Flickr.

Apple Announces Macbook Air… Ditches Optical Drive?

MarkP — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 19:23:09 +0000

Yesterday was MacWorld Expo 2008 San Francisco and as was speculated by mac rumor specialists Apple released a new notebook called the Macbook Air. It’s a super sleek machine weighing in at 3 pounds. It has a 13.3 inch screen, and it’s 3/4 of an inch thick. It’s so thin folks it even fits into an envelope!

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I.S.P.’s May Start Filtering for Copyright Infringement

MarkP — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 21:07:17 +0000

In the ongoing battle of copyright infringement the New York Times informs that AT&T and a few other I.S.P.’s have started to discuss the possibility of filtering for pirated material. The news comes from a panel at the CES (Consumer Electronics Show) where a few third party filtering companies along with NBC, Microsoft, AT&T and others discussed the minimal success of preventing users from sharing and downloading copyrighted material. Currently, I.S.P.’s act as an open “data highway” allowing users to download and distrubute anything without looking at it’s contents.

From a consumer standpoint this sounds terrible. Just what average joe customer needs, his over priced I.S.P. starting to act like big brother. The real issue that keeps getting swept under the rug is that our concepts of copyrighted material are outdated and need to adjust to reflect the change in technology and world we live in today. Of course the record industry, media conglomerates and general owners of copyrighted material would beg to differ and this will continue to be a bloody fight for years to come.

Barack Obama Launches Slick New Campaign Website

MarkP — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 23:29:08 +0000

For those of you who are familiar with the old Obama site that went up early last year you should check back in because some time around the Iowa caucus it seems they launched a website redesign. For those of you who were not familiar with the first site, check this post out to see screen shots of the nicely designed original and read about it’s deterioration over the year.

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Wicker Park Dancing Machine Dies… or Not?

MarkP — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 21:52:48 +0000

Anyone who lives in Chicago in our around Wicker Park has probably seen Mean Gene the Dancing Machine. Gene Lee was that crazy dancing character often found at the three way intersection of North, Damen and Milwaukee cranking out out some footwork while jamming to his headphones. According to his MySpace page and other rumors on net, he’s passed away. I have to admit every time i’ve seen the guy he’s brought a smile to my face so hopefully his passing is a prank and not reality.