Posts Tagged ‘slots’

Day Off - Sort of
A late Ramblings this week as I decided to stay offline last week. It was a long week and I was playing all weekend. It has been a while since I last took more than 24 hours off a computer, so that is a big feat for me.

HP Tech Forum

I had a fun time talking and working with Andy McCaskey and Kara Karsten with SDRNews. We had such a blast. We also put forward the mobile interview booth rig. We call it the “MacGyver” rig. Nonetheless, it was connected to uStream and we were able to conduct a few interviews for the event. Check out all the info on the Twitter log at #HPTF.

Great to meet some new bloggers: Shane Pitman of Neowin, John Obeto of AbsoluteWindows. We had a great week along with Halley, Tom, Calvin and Rebecca from HP and Buzzcorps.

Fryes at Vegas

Also got to go to Vegas again. While we didn’t run around town as much as with CES (everything was contained in Mandalay Bay), we did venture out to go to Fryes. It’s actually my first time at Fryes and I was pretty impressed. Of course, it was Vegas, so the store has a big slot machine up in it’s store front and stacks of coins as barrier posts. The inside was very big and complete. Andy had to get a new scratch drive since the one he brought died. We got what we needed and headed back to the safe Mandalay Bay

Mandalay Bay

Wow. This is a city contained in a building. That is, if you have the money for it. My room – which I call the “Bob Newhart” room – was decked with all the amenities. TV in the bedroom and the bathroom. You can connect an external device easily and be watching a movie while soaking in the tub.

The casino area was always hoppin. There were bands both on the “Sushi Pop” and “House of Blues” stages. Restaurants all over the building. A small walk and you are at “theHotel”. They even have their own beach – where we watched the Beach Boys play a set. Well, it was a short set for me, since I had a flight to catch.

Podcast on the show floor

I had the unique opportunity to record the show from the HPTF Expo floor. It was great because I didn’t have to set up a rig, do a show, rip it down and go to another area to post. I would also like to thank Simon Calder for helping out with the show notes so I could focus on other things.

What I got out of the show

Of course, there were a lot of things I have learned from this event. I have run server rooms before, but I was a little out of touch with the current technologies. FCoE was the big one I learned about. Also building a server is a lot different than before. Greener, more powerful and reliability were the best parts.

The Keynotes were just amazing. Learning about how these big companies are working on green technologies is amazing. Dr. Michio Kaku and his views for the future were amazing. A “Smart toilet” is definitely something to get excited about.

The Weekend

I got back to Madison at 8 AM on Friday. It was a long trip (5 hours, turned into 7 due to timezone changes). What was worse was on the trip back, I was not really impressed with the airline I flew. The one thing I noticed is they were not really friendly.

An example: We flew through a couple storm fronts during the trip. Most airlines would say “This is the Captain. We are seeing some turbulance, so please remain in your seats and buckle your belts. Thank you.”

The airline I was on? Well: “Please buckle your seatbelts”.

The airline also had screens drop from above. While I would normally invite this, I was in a evening flight. I had difficulties sleeping when something like a video monitor is playing. Of course, I didn’t pack my sleeping mask. Therefore, I was stuck watching “Confessions of a Shopoholic”. While other people loved this movie, I didn’t find it as interesting.

I got home around 9 AM, in which I proceeded to collapse on the bed for a couple hours. Woke up, caught up on some work I missed during the week, then headed off to play a show. Since it was out of town, I had to pack for another night away from home.

Band Gigs

Saturday was a day of playing. We played a friends graduation, then it was up to the Dells for our regular show at the Baja bar. There were 4 different Bachelorette parties that night and they were not in the Baja at the same time. As one party left, the next one showed up. Crazy.

New Guitar

While we were in transit to the Graduation party, we stopped at a local music store. There, I found a used Acoustic / Electric guitar. I picked it up as a spare for future shows. It needs some work to it, but not much to make it ready to play out.

Lazy Sunday? Not.

Of course, the day started out with this post. A quick breakfast, then it’s getting things ready for the week. Have to work on “Week in Tech History”, then I have to figure out how to put together the new video studio. Lots of soundproofing to do.

I suppose I should get to it. Thanks again to everyone for a great week. How do you top that?

Viva Las Vegas

In 36 hours I will be back in a city I said I would never go to. Las Vegas. Years ago, I was opposed to gambling. We had a local casino and every time I would step foot in, I would be barraged with “Ding Ding Ding” noises that would irritate me to no end.

That has changed.

Not that I am an excessive gambler, but I have realized that if you are going to start a new business, you are taking a gamble. You put down more money than you can afford and you let it ride. If you are a smart gambler, you know when to move your chips, but nonetheless, they will still be on the table.

I started pulling the slots on a business model about 10 years ago. Crazy ideas on the web. My first Website was “Toonzed” featuring “Cybeeks” – a daily online comic about 2 IT professionals that lived together. It ran for a year and a half.

I did a whole bunch of music stuff in between 2002-2009, including my other current website – WIBands – a place for musicians to talk shop. It was mostly a forum with aspiration for more, but still in the works.

The big jump was when I started doing Geekazine and the podcasts within. I was podcasting prior with “Independant Music Podcast”. That ran for a small while on a monthly basis. I thought with Geekazine, I could take a better gamble and get more out of it.

So far, it’s been a year and a half and I am happy with the results. I have aligned myself with some great people and we help each other out in many ways. With sites like Dorkazine and TVazine upon the portal, I have been able to really ramp up the viewership. Sportazine will be the next in the portal and will be coming up shortly.

So I have been gambling for a while. So why not go to Vegas?

Understand, the two times I went, it wasn’t to gamble in a literal fashion. It was to gamble in a business fashion. In January I went with Todd Cochrane and Andy McCaskey to cover CES with the Techpodcast network. This time it’s with Andy and Kara Karsten to cover the HP Buzzcorps Expo 2009 -  Soon to be called “Ivy world”. They ran contests like “31 Days of the Dragon”, where they gave away thousands in prizes.

We will be putting down video for the week, along with the infamous Backchannel action. I have the camera all ready to go and can’t wait to get going.

So that is my Gamble. I might just play the tables for a bit, too. You never know…

The New Diggs

As you may have remembered, I was totally under the gun when my last lease was up. I held out a few days and it payed off as I found a new place with some great additions. It has this room in the corner of the basement that will be perfect for the Video production. It’s a bit boomy – 4 walls of concrete do that. But it will also be great for when I set up a green screen and produce some higher quality video.

iPhone App?

I have been talking with a few people about an idea for an iPhone app. I feel it will have a good showing and with 2.1 million opportunities to download it, I think that this app may be on at least 3% of the expected 40 million iPhone sales. That would be a potential of 2 million.

I have a developer in toe, but need an investor to cover costs. It is a low overhead, but one I cannot scrape together. I will post more info on Vator when I get a chance.

Where did that come from?

I found out about some cash I had that I didn’t expect. Only problem is it’s in a 401K from a previous job. If I did move it, it would take 120 days to do. I’ll have to figure out what to do. It would be nice to borrow from it so I can get some new equipment, but I am not sure how to go about doing that.

Congrats Sunspot

Sunspot, the band I have hilighted in my latest videos, just put out a new album called “Singularity” I haven’t heard the whole album yet, but I have heard some songs in live shows. If you get a chance, download it.

Win the Epson Artisan 700

Monday is the Quickcast “Week in Tech History” where we will talk about the third step in the Summer of Geekazine contest #1. Don’t worry. It’s actually really simple. And you can get a great printer with WiFi capabilities.

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That’s all for now. Now it’s time to roll the dice and head out to Vegas. Keep an eye on TVazine for some quick videos next week!