Additional notes:

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart.
– They're tagged with #Zentech.
– When what's said is unclear to me (or I'm unfamiliar with a topic) I tend to quote (" ") verbatim.
|- Editor's comments are delimited by < >

 

Both Glenn & Paul were in the studio with guests Molly Fisk, Jeffrey Hein and Kirsten (a chicken)

Jeffery's store is located at 138 Idaho Marylin Road. The hours are Monday thru Saturday 10am to 6pm.
Phone: 530-802-0767
Website (much info here): www.thecellphoneguru.com
email: guru@thecellphoneguru.com

Molly's email: molly@mollyfisk.com
Websites: mollyfisk.com & poetrybootcamp.com
<There's a little more about Molly in the 6-14-10 show notes
And she has a Wikipedia page>

 

Jeffrey recently opened up a cell phone shop in Grass Valley

Jeffrey also runs a website hosting business and works with local web designers to host their clients' content. He has previously worked with Joomla, a content management system, but now prefers to use WordPress. Jeffrey is Molly's webmaster
<More about WordPress in the 8-22-12 show notes>

The last time Molly was on the show, several years ago, she was celebrating her 2000th Facebook friend. She now has 4822 friends. She said Facebook allows you to have up to 5000 friends. Having more than 5000 friends requires they be moved over to a business page, or else you can delete some of your current friends to make room. For some 20 years she's been running the websites mollyfisk.com & poetrybootcamp.com, and a more recent site is called voiceofyourown.com. Her latest site is called blowdryingachicken.com. All of her sites are now running on WordPress.

Jeffrey maintains the servers on which Molly's websites are hosted, making sure they are secure and backedup. Jeffrey's sister Shawna Heins does the actual design of the websites and trains people in using WordPress. She runs bluegraniteweb.com.

Jeffrey talked a bit about the difference between content and presentation. Content management systems, like WordPress, allow you update your site by adding articles, pictures, etc. But if you want that procedure to be easy and intuitive, it's best to hire a web designer. The presentation of the website includes such things as colors, fonts, layout, etc.

It's the 25 anniversary of the World Wide Web. What made it the defacto standard was its free distribution. It shouldn't be confused with the internet, which has been around much longer.
<The www is 25 years old today
Tim Berners-Lee put up a website marking the anniversary at www.webat25.org>

Molly explained how she named the blowdryingachicken.com website. She was teaching a class at Davis Extension and a student wrote a poem that included the phrase "blow drying a chicken". The student was asked what that meant and she explained that children in 4H don't want to take a filthy chicken to display at a fair — hence the need to wash and blow dry. The chickens look much nicer blow dried than air dried. Chickens seem to like the blow-drying and sometimes fall asleep during the process.

Paul asked Jeffrey what one needs to do to promote themself on the web.
– Professionals like Jeffrey can help people with free software and services. Website hosting is one thing that's not free.

Paul asked Jeffrey how his phone service, and others like Metro PCS, differs from the major carriers like AT&T, Sprint, Verizon & T-Mobile.
– By law the major carriers are required to allow other companies to use their infrastructure to sell phone service.
– There are about 100 "virtual providers" <second tier providers> that use the major carriers.
– When you shop for a virtual provider, it's important to know which major carriers the provider depends on. Often the choice is based on the specific phone you're using. <Some phones work only with AT&T, for example>
– Some virtual providers contract with all 4 major carriers to carry the phone calls.
– Jeffrey's business will also repair, refurbish, buy and sell phones. It's a reduce & reuse philosophy.

Molly asked Paul about his chicken, Kirsten:
– It's a Rock Island chicken with black & white speckles.
– She's 1 of 4 he has at home.
– She came from the "animal recovery place".

Molly asked Jeffrey if he uses rice to dry out a phone after it's fallen into water.
– He doesn't use that trick.
– The first thing to do in that situation is take the battery out to prevent corrosion and shorting of the main board, Jeffrey said.
– Then take it to a repair shop. Jeffrey charges $10 to diagnose the problem.
– You can try compressed air to blow out the moisture, if you want to try something before taking it to a shop.
– Paul said most phones have a spot of a chemical in a hidden location that will change color if the phone gets wet. A manufacture's warranty doesn't usually cover water damage or even dropping the phone.
– Paul also suggested that people carefully check their phone's performance before its warranty expires. If something isn't working quite right, contact the manufacturer and get a 'trouble ticket' so, when the warranty finally expires, the phone will still be covered.

Paul asked Molly about her business history and she recounted some of that.
<There's more about her on Wikipedia>

Paul noted that some people are paid, but not by Wikipedia, to post articles there. Wikipedia wants them to disclose that fact but enforcement is difficult. You can, at least, check to see the history of changes made to a Wikipedia article by using the "edits tab".

Molly asked Jeffrey what a typical phone repair would cost. He said the bench fee is $80 for 1 hour of labor. Parts are charged at wholesale plus sales tax. Any shipping fees are also passed to the customer. Easy repairs that take no more than half an hour are $40 minimum, but most phones take a lot of time for disassembly and reassembly. Jeffrey said he typically gets 1 to 5 customers per day. Many come just for the diagnostic to see if the phone is worth repairing.

Paul noted that some phone can run for a very long time at low power and that some people haven't turned theirs off for a very very long time. A friend of his had an iPod Touch that had an "up time" of 2 years.
– Jeffrey said it's not always obvious how to completely shut down a phone (not just suspend it). With iDevices you have to do something special.
– To shut down an iPad or iPhone, hold down the sleep button for a very long time. That will bring up a prompt asking you if you really want to shut it off.
– The other way is to hold the home button and sleep button at the same time for quite a while. That will either shut it off or reset it, depending on the model.

Molly complained that cell phones are frustrating because connections are often dropped. So, Paul asked Jeffrey which phones are better, which have better antennas.
– Every phone has different strengths and weaknesses.
– Many of the later smartphones don't have antennas as good as the older flip phones, Jeffrey said.

Molly is currently using an iPhone 4 on the Verizon network and would like to lower her phone bill. Jeffrey said Molly could switch to the Page Plus cellular provider, which is a Verizon virtual reseller. They have both non-contract monthly plans as well as pay-as-you-go plans that are quite reasonable. The Page Plus $30 per month plan gives you 1200 minutes of talk, 3000 texts and 500 megabits of data. The pay-as-you-go plans range from $10 to $80.

David called wanting to know if Jeffrey works on iPods. He has a "white screen" on his.
– Yes, Parts may take 2 to 3 days to receive.
– With the cost of the part and labor of $80, it should come to about $110.

Also, David just switched to Uverse, an AT&T product.
– Jeffrey said Uverse is a travesty and recommended that people not switch to it.
– Paul said Uverse is a purely digital connection and the dialtone originates in your router not the phone company. He thinks the dependability is lower.
– Being digital, Uverse is easier to trouble shoot, change and for selling more services.

The Disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed on this show are those of the speakers only and not necessarily those of KVMR, its board, the management, staff or contributors.

Last updated 10:55 PM 3/12/2014