Actually, going off on a tangent here but I joined Toastmasters at work and one of the reasons I have really enjoyed the group is because I have gotten to hear so many stories that I normally would not get to hear about my co-workers. Believe it or not I actually enjoy getting to know the people I work with! But anyhow, I will perhaps talk about my experiences with Toastmaster in another post. I like listening to people talk about topics that they are passionate about.

So back on the topic of TED talks, their repertoire of interesting speeches is amazing. So much to stimulate your brain. I love it (remember how much I love to learn?).

Tonight I watched the TED talk by Simon Sinek about “How great leaders inspire action”. Here is a link to the video and also to a written synopsis (if you would rather read it than listen to it). This was actually recorded in May 2010 so I am surprised I stumbled upon this tonight. I was doing a search on my TED app looking for another talk when I found this pop up in my search results.

I have always found the “law of diffusion of innovation” to be an interesting concept. I recall reading this in Malcolm Gladwell’s book “The Tipping Point”. I also always considered myself to be one of the innovators or early adopters but perhaps I am in reality closer to tail end of the early adopters group. Being a person that is into technology makes me want to try new products all the time. But I only want to try the products that I believe are good. The crappy ones I can forgo and have no desire to waste my time on them. With the good products I will promote and evangelize about them.

Anyhow, great speech.

I have also been talking a lot today (work lunches, meetings, interviewing people, etc.). Many good conversations about motivation and leadership. I really thrive on being around people. So it just seems very suiting that I coincidently found this TED talk tonight.

I signed up for an about.me page a while ago but never got around to updating it. I just updated it this week and I have to admit that I really like the concept. Basically it is tying in all your social media sites together in one page (e.g. Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc.). It’s so simple but yet so clever (why didn’t I think of that?). I’ve actually redirected my website ghislaine.ca to my about.me page now.

If you haven’t signed up yet, you should do so. It’s fun!

(BTW, photo credit for my profile pic goes to Joe from ChicGeekPhoto.ca.)

In other news, my boys are growing up so quickly. Time flies, especially when you are a mother. My little boys aren’t so little anymore. I am trying to enjoy them every day and want to remember them being “small”.

It’s been fun watching the two brothers interact with each other. They bicker but they also know to run to each other when they are in trouble. My mom was telling me that the other day my youngest boy (he’s 1.5 years old now) was being naughty and when my mom was disciplining him, he got angry at her and decided he would run to his big brother (who is 4.5 years old now) and cry to him. His big brother gave him a hug and would pat him on the back. How sweet that they know to depend on each other when they are in trouble! I hope this tendency will continue to stay with them as they mature into men. It’s always been one of my hopes for my two boys to be the best of friends.

Anyhow, I am getting a little sappy now. As mentioned, I hope to enjoy these moments whenever I can. But of course, there are just those days when I feel like God must have had a good sense of humour to think that I can handle raising two highly energetic boys!

Getting late… Goodnight for now.

Anyhow, I thought this was neat and something interesting to share.

Screen shot below.

I think it is awesome that I can use my iPad instead of my laptop most of the time when I am at home with my wifi. I can even connect to my work PC by using VPN on the iPad and then remote desktop. That is just so fantastic that I can just switch on my tablet and be able to connect without starting up my computer with minimal loading time.

Right now I am actually typing this post in the WordPress app on the iPad. I have done this before on the iPhone as well but typing on a larger screen resolution than my phone is just so much better.

I am also really liking some of the photo editing apps on my iPad. I just paid $4.99 for the Snapseed app 2 days ago and I am loving it. If I wanted similar photo software on my PC I would probably have to pay at least $30 for the filters.

Anyhow, I think that the future in computing will be the movement towards tablet devices and less of laptops or PCs. I can even plug in a Bluetooth keyboard with my iPad and use my tablet with a netbook-like feel (without mouse though). I am definitely planning to get an external keyboard sometime.

I wish I could have gotten my hands on one of those $100 discounted HP Touchpad. I would definitely recommend tablets as a productivity tool.

To end off, below are some of the pictures I have edited with Snapseed on the iPad. It may seem like a lot to pay $5 for an app but if you think about that is less than the cost of eating out for lunch. The last picture was taken and edited with the iPad. Not too shabby right?

P.S. It looks like I might stay on WordPress.org for a bit longer. I was seeing ads but I am not anymore.

I have always been careful about not sharing too much information about my children on the internet. I mean, really do I need to explain why? But what I did not realize was that many of the pictures that I was taking on my iPhone was embedding the GPS information in the EXIF information of my photos. Which meant that if people wanted to view the EXIF information on a picture that I took at home, they would be able to locate where I live on Google Maps.

What is EXIF? EXIF stands for “Exchangeable Image File Format”. This is information about the picture that was taken such as which camera was used, what settings where used to take the pictures (what lens, how fast the speed was, aperture setting, etc.), and even location of where the picture was taken. I always knew that EXIF contained a lot of information about the photo but what I did not realize was that it could also store GPS information. And by default, many smartphones out there will store the exact coordinates of where the picture was taken with the phone. With this information you can open up any mapping website on the internet and pinpoint the address that the picture was taken. This, can be VERY dangerous if you post pictures of yourself or of your children that were taken at home or their school or daycare. If somebody out there wants to stalk your kids (or even you) then you can become an easy target if you set the geo-tagging function on for your phone.

How do you view the EXIF details? There are many websites out there that can show EXIF information by simply typing in the URL of a photo. There are also some browser plug-ins that exist that allow the viewing of the EXIF details by a simple right click of a picture in a browser. (e.g. www.findexif.com, EXIF Viewer for Firefox)

So now that you know this, you are probably wondering, “How do I disable this?” Here is a link to another website that shows you how you can disable the geo-tagging option on your iPhone and Android phone (http://icanstalku.com/how.php#disable). On the iPhone iOS4.x, go to Settings, Locations Services and then disable by setting the picture taking apps to “off”.

I suggest that you check your photos online to make sure that you don’t have the EXIF information displaying the GPS details that you probably don’t want to share with the rest of the world, especially if you have children! Please do the safe thing. Don’t make yourself and your family an easy stalking target.

Have a safe and happy new year!

Anyhow, while I am busy with a young infant I still manage to find the time to read a little.

Lately I just finished reading “Superfreakonomics”. I read the first one “Freakonomics” before and therefore it was natural for me to read the follow up. I tend to like reading these books nowadays (also a big fan of Malcolm Gladwell). I don’t want to ruin the book for anyone but if anybody read it did you find the last story about the monkeys and how they learned how to use money pretty fascinating? That is some crazy stuff.

Been also reading this book called “Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger” by Ronald Sider. This book definitely makes me look at my wealth quite differently. I have only read about a quarter of the book and I already feel quite convicted to spend my money differently. I think it is a really hard book to read for many Christians as it digs deep into how we spend money and makes you think about the poverty that exists around the world that most of us try to ignore.

Being a mom of young children now it breaks my heart even more thinking about how there are hungry and starving children out there. I know some people think that there is nothing they can do to help them because in the grand scheme of things the problem is pretty huge however to become ignorant to the rest of the world (and this is the majority of the world that lives in poverty) is pretty irresponsible in my opinion.

My husband and I sponsor 8 kids via different organizations. Our goal is to sponsor 10. Getting close. Some people don’t believe in giving money to the third world but we believe that it helps and that it makes a difference. And just because we sponsor 8 kids doesn’t mean I feel good inside because I did my “good deed” of the day. I don’t think it should be about feeling good to give. We should really do it more often living in such an affluent society.

Anyhow what a contrast it is with those two books that I have mentioned above! I also want to read this book about how the history of “marketing” started (cannot remember the book title now but they are Canadian authors). Feels weird to be mentioning about marketing after writing about poverty. Yes I have a diverse range of interests.

I need to sleep now. Maybe I will post again soon.

P.S. My husband is getting the iPhone 4 soon. I think I am going to be jealous.

I think it is fairly clever of Apple to have these unveiling sessions where all the fans are anticipating the revelation of the latest and greatest enhancements. I know I jump on the bandwagon of reading up on all the live updates from the techie feeds and websites as the new features are announced.

So out of all the features that were announced today, I have to say that I am most impressed with the iAd feature. Getting into advertising is a HUGE thing for Apple in my opinion and which is a direct hit againt Google who has always been the advertising god of the internet. Now Apple wants a chunk of that revenue by introducing ads that flow through the iPhone apps seamlessly (or at least it will appear so without leaving the app and going through Safari which is currently what happens if you click on an ad in an iPhone app). If this business solution works then can you imagine how many companies would be willing to pay for the advertising fees to get their products to sell this way? And then Apple gets 40% of that revenue. Wow. Does anybody else think that is a big deal if Apple pulls this off? I don’t own any Apple shares but I am certainly considering it now.

Anyhow, besides being the iPhone 4.0 OS event today, I also went to see my OB for baby #2. I found out that my doctor uses his iPhone as a medical tool and that apparently many doctors nowadays are using iPhones for professional purposes. I asked him about it and then he kind of got excited and started showing me his medical related apps. Basically said that with an iPhone he can have all the data and information at hand and doesn’t need to lug around 15 textbooks. His paid apps will help do fancy calculations for him, etc. He said many doctors are using the iPhone these days. I was utterly impressed with how technically savvy my doctor is.

Then we had a discussion about how his son now works as an intern for Apple Canada and that his son has been offered another year of working there because they liked him so much (he was definitely a proud dad!). And then went on to mention that the iPhone and iPad are just a scaled down version of Apple’s Mac OS on smaller devices and that multitasking has actually been built into the iPhone and iPad devices but they never enabled it because Apple thought by allowing it, it would slow down the performance of the product by quite a bit. I guess they somehow manage to jump over that performance hurdle because they are allowing multitasking in the upcoming OS. All this information from my OB! We even chatted about the BlackBerry and RIM for a bit and how he had seen one of the first BlackBerry prototypes a year before it had hit the mainstream market. And then prior to being an Apple fan he was totally into Microsoft until Windows Vista came along and made him switch to a Mac. What a tech savvy man! This truly made me feel more comfortable about his competence as a doctor if he can understand technology. I am pretty sure that my family doctor is not this advanced, so this experience was totally enlightening for me. Now I want to get a Mac (if you read one of my previous posts, I just bought another PC this year).

Well, now I am somewhat excited to hear about the iPhone 4.0 hardware that will be coming out in June. I don’t think I will be upgrading my phone (I have the 3GS one) since I just purchased it last year. But I am sure that I will be super tempted to want to upgrade it. At least I will be able to upgrade to the 4.0 OS. I think it kind of sucks that those with an iPhone version 3G will not be able to get the 4.0 OS. It’s like if you want the new features then you are forced to buy a new phone. Perhaps another marketing strategy of Apple. They expect people to buy new phones every 2 years. Kind of evil. Or perhaps that is very clever of them… Maybe it’s time I buy some Apple shares, even if it does cost more than $240 a pop as of closing today.

I just upgraded my other blog at http://blog.gizzypooh.com to version 2.9.2 and I am utterly impressed at the enhanced features and functionality that the latest stable version provides. OK, I didn’t exactly upgrade per se but I created a new DB with MySQL v5 and created another blog on WordPress v2.9.2 and then exported and imported all the data from the other blog so that it looks like an upgrade. I won’t go into he details but that in itself was a big accomplishment as I was using MySQL v4 and WordPress v2.0.1 before (yes, I was really behind!).

Being a developer myself I like how I can customize everything or if I am too lazy to code things manually WP has some dynamic features and plugins built right in. It is just the perfect combination for me. So I can tweak the style sheets if I want or just use the dashboard to add new pages, posts, etc.

I also like how I can just deploy the source code on my own server and not deal with WordPress.com if I don’t want to (the irony here is that this blog post that I am updating is actually hosted on WordPress.com). Open source can be a pretty spectacular concept. Although I have to admit I am one of those takers who never “give” back to the open source community. I am sure open source developers hate people like me.

Anyhow, believe it or not I am typing this entry from my iPhone using the WordPress app. This is something else that I love about WP! I also installed the plugin so that the iPhone theme is used for my blog if somebody visits the site from an iPhone or Android phone. Look at the screen shot at the bottom and tell me is this not the coolest thing? (Or maybe I just get impressed too easily.)

Well, besides the fact that once it is set up and configured almost any dummy could manage a blog, I think that WP really beats the rest of the blogging source code out there. I know that Blogger is owned by Google and they try to add features like a followers list and integration with the Google reader (which I use a lot of and so do many people – now that itself is also another topic I should write about some other time) but still, I have to say that WordPress rocks and I am sticking with my statement until something better comes along. Thank you WP.

P.S. I also realize that there is now a beta version 3.0 available for download. I think if I get bored might just set up another DB and test it out.

I went to a John Mayer concert yesterday night in Vancouver. This was my first live JM concert.

To be quite honest, I think John Mayer is a pretty weird fellow. I followed him on Twitter for a while but then his tweets got way too creepy for me and I unfollowed him. I am not a big fan of his personal life, however I am a big fan of his music. Despite being a very very strange man, I think he is pretty talented by writing his own music and lyrics. In fact, one of my favourite songs is “Daughters” and I find that there seems to be some actual depth to his lyrics. Perhaps he is actually a very lonely man but expresses it with his creepy ways…

Anyhow, back to the topic about the concert. So last night was the Battle Studies tour in Vancouver at GM Place. Michael Franti & Spearhead were the opening act at 8:00 PM. They were OK in my opinion. I am usually never overly excited about the opening acts anyway. (Although in the past, I have seen opening acts like Usher, Lady Gaga, and Natasha Bedingfield – this was however “before” they became big.) John Mayer didn’t show up until 9:30 PM which was rather late in my opinion.

His opening song was “Heartbreak Warfare” which I thought was a good one to open with. Here is the set list below:

Heartbreak Warfare
Good Love is On the Way
Vultures
Perfectly Lonely
Slow Dancing in a Burning Room
Assassin
Waiting on the World to Change
(New Song)
All We Ever Do Is Say Goodbye
No Such Thing
Neon
Ain’t No Sunshine
Why Georgia
Half of My Heart > Don’t Stop Believing

Encore:

Who Says
Gravity

I have to admit that I was VERY disappointed that he did not play Daughters last night. Not just because it is like my favourite song, but because it also happens to be one of his biggest hits. I still remember the radio overplaying this song because it was so popular back then. I was also not very impressed with the segment where his drummer kept playing for a very long time. I realize that he is a pretty good drummer, but no offense I paid to see and hear John Mayer and not his drummer. I was not impressed when the drummer was doing his drumming solo for over 5 minutes.

In terms of merchandise, ended up buying a JM sweatshirt (yup, it was tight on my pregnant belly indeed) and some JM guitar picks. This is probably the most that I have ever spent at a concert (combined with ticket and merchandise cost) and yet this wasn’t exactly my favourite concert either. I am not too sure how the baby inside my belly felt about the loud music. He was definitely “active” throughout the whole night. Either from frustration that the music was too loud or that perhaps he was dancing to it. Who knows.

I brought my crappy point and shoot with me and of course took some pics and videos. Here is the link to my set on Flickr and here is the link to some videos on YouTube.

Overall, it was still a good concert but definitely not the best one I have ever attended. His guitar skills are pretty impressive and I did enjoy those portions where he did his guitar solos. I think I would rate this like a 7 out of 10 (and I think I am actually being fairly generous here) for performance and overall experience. This would probably get bumped to at least a 7.5 if he had played Daughters last night.