I came across a great metaphor for relationships awhile ago - bricks and mortar. Bricks are the “big things” - the events of life that you share with friends. Mortar is the little, everyday stuff, that the people you are closest to just know about, often whether they want to or not.

As Scheherazade wrote in her original blog post that caught my eye, bricks get all the attention. When we think about communication, we think about the bricks. But mortar is what makes it all stick together, and without it there’s no solid foundation.

It’s not exactly that I don’t like iTunes - when I first started using it I was blown away by how great it was. And it just kept getting better until it hit that point. The point where it’s trying to do so many things that it doesn’t do anything right for me.

I admit that I’m not a lover of converged devices - I have a pda, a phone and a music player; they are all separate devices to perform separate functions. I like it that way.

I recently discovered that a lot of visitors find this site searching for information about how to watch podcasts. Obviously, that’s because the name of my podcast is Tech Watch.

However, I can provide the answer to that question. Most video podcasts have a website where you can watch the episodes online in your web browser. If you want to subscribe, though, you’ll need both a podcast aggregator and a video player. This is where it can get tricky.

The nature of communications is changing, and our benchmarks for what’s considered success need to change, too. Popularity just doesn’t cut it any more.

Subscribe [?] to the feed using your podcatcher of choice; see the links in the sidebar.

Combining two of my current obsessions (soccer and technology), I am experimenting with an IPTV provider to get access to my beloved Champions League. Last year, we got our CL action through a subscription to a Real service. We had all the games on demand through streaming, and I just fed the signal through my laptop to the TV.

If you’re a power podcast user like me, you’ve probably found that iTunes doesn’t have the feature set you’re looking for in a podcatching client. That’s why I was thrilled to discover that myPodder, the client that goes with the online site Podcast Ready, now supports iPods. I was less than excited, though, when I discovered that “support” means that the application runs, not that you can actually play the stuff you download directly on your iPod.

I’m not for computers in schools, so why do I support the One Laptop per Child program? More technology is great, it just doesn’t need to be focussed on kids.

Subscribe [?] to the feed using your podcatcher of choice; see the links in the sidebar.

As the internet becomes more of a utility, can it be treated like a commodity or does it need protection? Which freedom is more important - personal freedom or the free market?

If you’re looking for more information on Sen. Ted Stevens’ take on the internet, check out this Wired post.

Stuff about the show.

The Golden Hammer: Tech Watch is a proud member of Techpodcasts.com - if it’s tech, it’s here.

Subscribe [?] to the feed using your podcatcher of choice; see the links in the sidebar.

From each website accoring to its ability, to each website according to its need.

Resources:

• Greasemonkey for Firefox
• Greasemonkey scripts
• Creammonkey for Safari

The Golden Hammer: Tech Watch is a proud member of Techpodcasts.com - if it’s tech, it’s here.

Subscribe [?] to the feed using your podcatcher of choice; see the links in the sidebar.