There was no show on the 11th. The bike show & Zentech traded broadcast times because of a special event the bike show needed to cover.

How to Lose Identity In No Time!

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.

Paul is back from England. He and Glenn were joined by Adam Brodel of Smarter Broadband. Adam called in to talk about terrestrial wireless.

At the top of the hour, the guys talked briefly about multi-core processors being common in today's computers. Glenn said the extra power allows much better voice recognition by the dictation program Dragon Naturally speaking.
<Dragon Naturally Speaking was discussed in a previous show>

Glenn mentioned that the new iPad is out & doing well and that the last show had some discussion about its battery life and concerns about the extra heat it puts out. <See the last show here>

Glenn also mentioned he got a Vizio tablet a few months ago. It's an Android based unit. After playing with it for a while, he discovered that he doesn't need a tablet because his netbook serves him well.
<The Visio was discussed in the 11-30-11 show>

Paul said there is a lawsuit between HTC & Apple over the look & feel of the HTC phone. Even though the operating system is different and the applications are written differently, Apple thinks the HTC phones are too similar to their own.

He also said the lines between devices are blurring — between laptops & netbooks, smartphones & tablets, etc.

Glenn said he has to hold his digital camera away from his face to frame the image and, he lamented, he'd rather use an old-fashioned viewfinder.
Paul noted that just because a camera has a viewfinder doesn't mean it's a single reflex camera (DSLR). The view isn't necessarily thru the lens — it can be looking at a LCD screen inside of the camera. He also said the SLR, with it's large aperture lens, allows one to control the depth of field unlike the cheaper point-and-shoot cameras, which are more like a pinhole camera.

Glenn mentioned a photographer who recently made a timed exposure of the Bay Bridge being struck by lightening. He gained notoriety within minutes of making the image available.

Paul said there's a line of cameras by Canon (the SureShot series, he thought) that can be hacked in such a way that the electrical impulse of a lightening strike can trigger the shutter quickly enough to capture the image of the strike. It can even capture the lightening bolt breaking up.

Adam Brodel joined the show. He said his company has recently brought wireless internet service into the Chicago Park area <in Nevada County>. The service is what he called "fixed wireless" which entails tranmitting from an elevated antenna to a receiver outside of the customer's house. The signal is then brought inside the house by an Ethernet cable.
– The speed is comparable to DSL and sometimes faster.
– The receiver at the residence is a panel antenna or dish and can be from a few inches up to 18 inches.
– This setup has low latency so you don't get delays like you can with satellite, for instance. It can even be better than DSL.
– The company has about 40 transmission points and covers the area from about 5-Mile House to Auburn and from "the AT" to Penn Valley
– Their internet data comes in by optical fiber into Auburn from 2 providers (for redundancy). The signal is then beamed to 3 towers and eventually to the rest of the network.
– The system is called Canopy. It's a proprietary system from Motorola.
– People are using up bandwidth like never before because of streaming video sites like Netflix & Hulu. The cheapest plan from the company will allow 7 to 10 movies a month. Netflix lets you turn off the HD feature so you can reduce the total amount of data you receive. Netflix, by default, will send the HD version and changing the setting means going from about 5gig per hour to about .5gig per hour and you probably won't notice the change in quality if your TV is less than 47".

The other bit of news is that Smarter Broadband has recently merged with Full Spectrum, which does DSL, dialup, hosting, email and PC repair. Now they can do all of that plus wireless.
You can contact Smarter Broadband at:
sales@smarterbroadband.com
Or call 530-272-4000

Paul said that in England he can get phone service for 10 pounds per month ($15 or $16) that includes 1gig of data, several hundred text messages and about 15min of phone calls. In England there's 98% cell phone coverage, because it's a highly urbanized nation.

For some time now, the FCC has had a requirement that cell phone companies unlock your phone after you've completed the contract but the companies have been reluctant to do that and requirement has not been enforced. In Britain it's been easy to unlock a phone, you just need to give them the IMEI number (like a serial number) of the phone. Some companies in Britain would unlock the phone even before your contact expired, as long as you're paid up.

In the past, the guys had trouble getting AT&T to unlock their phones.
<Related article: AT&T Will Unlock Out-of-Contract iPhones>

Once, Paul unlocked a phone himself but then lost the function of the GPS chip. This type of do-it-yourself unlocking has been a documented cause of similar problems and, on top of that, is not reversible. For instance, Glenn's unlocked phone periodically looses the cell signal and sometimes the wi-fi signal too. If you have the provider unlock your phone, you should not have these problems.

Rumors about the iPhone 5 say…
– It will be in a unibody case, a bit like the MacBooks.
– The screen will encompass the entire front face.
– It will have a retina display.

Glenn mentioned that Nokia came out with a new phone, but it uses the Windows mobile system. Glenn thinks using this operating system is a mistake.

The disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed on this show belong to us only, Glenn & Paul, and not necessarily those of this community radio station, KVMR, not even its board, certainly not its management. And the staff and contributors also are not responsible for anything we're talking about. And we're not really responsible for it either.

Bill called. He has an iPad 1 and said he found 2 big drawbacks — it has no USB port and it will not play Flash content. If he buys another tablet, it won't be an iPad.
– Some sites are now using HTML5 to play content, but lack of Flash is still a problem — e.g. he can't listen to audio samples at Amazon and other places.
– Glenn recommended a work-around program called Download Lite. <I guess this is it.> To use it, you download the video and then use Download Lite to play it. The iPad doesn't have to be jailbroken to use it you can get it from the app store. However, it doesn't work in all situations — not with Youtube videos.
– Even the latest iPad doesn't play Flash content and they probably never will. And Paul experienced Flash problems with MacBooks that use the Lion OS.

Bill said his daughter has the Android-based Motorola Xoom that works well.
– ASUS is now making tablets, Glenn suggest Bill check them out.

Janet called. She'll be getting an iPhone and wondered if there's an app for listening to radio programs, KVMR in particular.
– There is an app for Public Radio but maybe not community radio stations (KVMR).
– There's an app for commercial radio. <They both talked at once so I couldn't make out the name>
– "There is an application that the KVMR stream is linked to, it's simply called Public Radio". It's the Public Radio Player from PRX (Public Radio Exchange). If you have your GPS turned on, the app will even find stations near you.

She noted that the iPod Nano is supposed to have a built-in radio.
– This is a FM receiver and is subject to the limitations of a regular radio.
– Just use a regular FM radio.

KVMR has been putting out podcasts — time-shifted content of its broadcasts. Go to kvmr.org and look for where it says podcasts. You can subscribe to them using iTunes. <or just play them directly, double click where it says "Get mp3"> There are about 20 KVMR broadcasters making their shows available.

Podcasting and archiving are not the same. The podcast is delivered to you, but you have to go get the content from an archive.

Mary called to ask if one could listen to a podcast without any Apple equipment.
– Yes. Get the free iTunes software. There's a version for the PC.
– There's other software that lets you subscribe to a podcast. iTunes is not required.
– Simply click the download link when you're browsing an archive. After downloading you can do anything you like with it.

Next show is a week from now: on Apr 25

Last updated 8:30 PM 4/18/2012

Note: There was no show on 3-14-12

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 comment are delimited with < >

Glenn was in the studio, Paul called in from England

Paul mentioned that England has a version of Daylight Savings Time but they started 2 weeks after we did. So now there is again an 8-hour difference between Pacific & London times and time at Paul's location was 9pm, when he called in.

After some talk about the difference between the Euro Tunnel & Euro Star (don't call it the Chunnel), the guys talked about the new iPad and its retina display. The resolution of the display at arm's length corresponds to what the average eye is capable of discerning. If the points on the screen were any closer, the eye wouldn't be able to tell the difference. The hardware has been improved to provide the extra "horsepower" needed for the display — it now has a "4-brained chip".

And the energy capacity of the battery has been doubled, to keep up. As a consequence, people have noticed, a even alarmed at, the extra heating of the unit — to over 100 degrees F.

Laptop computers, in general, should be kept off of surfaces that don't let the heat dissipate. There's something called a lap pad that can be placed under a laptop to keep it cool. The lap pad has a fan that gets its power from a USB port.

Glenn asked if the iPad has a USB port and Paul said he doesn't think so. Paul went on to say that Apple tends leave out features people expect. The 1st iPad had no camera and people thought the second version would have USB — but no. There is an after-market device that plugs into the docking port of the iPad 2 and allows you to use SD cards.

There are people who tear down iPads to determine the "cost of goods" (COG), which is the cost of parts. They've found that the markup of the latest iPad is less than that of the iPad 1 and 2. This is expected because there is more market competition now, which should intensify considering that the Android tablets are coming out with retina displays, too.

Paul also said that LED lighting back panels (vs. fluorescent types) were introduced over a year ago and have resulted in the increase of battery life by 2 or 3 times.

Glenn thought he saw a 16gig iPad 2 with wi-fi only for $249 and said he may eventually get one. In the mean time he's happy with his 12" netbook.

Paul said he's gotten used to typing on his iPhone and has suggested a helpful trick. If you realize you've pressed the wrong key — say the 's' instead of the 'a' — without lifting your finger just slide it to the 'a' before lifting up.

Joshua called about this MacBook Pro. He upgraded to the Lion operating system and it's running slow now. He thinks it may be because it has only 2gig of RAM.
– Memory is so cheap that it's a good idea to increase it anyway.
– If this laptop is the version that has a removable battery there should be a slot in the battery compartment where you can get to the memory.
– If it's the type without a removable battery, there are instructions on the Apple site for taking it apart — it will require a hex or star screwdriver.
– Or take it to an Apple store to have it done.
– Be sure you dissipate any static electricity before proceeding.

Regarding the Lion operating system, Paul said there is no longer the ability to run software written for the PowerPC. Snow Leopard was able to run such software. He also said Apple dropped support for using dialup modems. However, Lion does allow you to use iCloud, with its free 5gigs of storage, for backups.

Something not well known is, if you login to iCloud.com, you can see your address book, calendar, etc. You can do this using any kind of computer.
<A previous show that talked about iCloud here>

Doug called to say he bought a lap pad 3 or 4 years ago but it broke after a month or two. He cut off the power cord and continued to use it under his laptop. He thinks it has prolonged the life of his computer. Glenn suggested that just keeping a laptop off an insulating surface is a bonus.

Rick called and said he had been keeping his music library on an external hard drive, when he had a PC. He then connected the drive to a Mac and is having trouble accessing the music. He doesn't like how iTunes and Window Media Player work and he's looking for a better way to manage the music.
– Years ago, Paul went thru a similar situation and he said he eventually gave up and surrendered to using iTunes.
– Some people at KVMR are using an open source software that's similar to iTunes but the guys weren't able to recall its name. <I'll update this if I get the info>
– Read the iTunes tutorial. More knowledge may alleviate some of your objections.
– There are third party tools for managing large collections of music. Paul uses the software called mp3tag. It's not just for .mp3 files. It reads the meta information inside music file — artist, album, year, genre, etc. Paul said it also uses Gracenote to identify an album from the runtimes of the songs that are on it.
– Do a Google search for the words: iTunes external drive. You should find info on using the drive with iTunes as well as the pitfalls. You should be aware of not only how your music is stored but also of the iTunes database. Read up on this before doing anything.

There is a project from years ago called MusicDNA that uses 400 attributes of music — rhythm, tempo, genre, age, vocal, instrumental, etc. — to categorize it. Pandora uses it to determine the type of music you like.
<An additional link to MusicDNA here.
Looks like there is another musicDNA and I can't really tell which one Paul was talking about.>

Paul also said he likes the Google Music service. It lets you store music and play it from anywhere.
<A previous show that talked about Google Music here>

Terry called about Maker Space. The local group. The Curious Forge, <> will hopefully have meetings the 1st Thursday of every month. They meet a 520 East Main Str. in Grass Valley till 9pm. The next meeting is Apr 5.
– To get on a mailing list email to spark@thecuriousforge.org
– Their web site is: thecuriousforge.org
Other Zentech shows have mentioned the Curious Forge and Maker Space.
<Curious Forge Facebook page here.>

Doug called again to say that there is software called Audials for $79 that's from of Germany. It lets you capture audio & video that's broadcast over the internet.
– You can get a trial version at download.com. Go there and search for audials to be sure of getting the latest version.
– For additional info and the commercial product see their website audials.com/en

Paul was reminded of the software that he used before he defected to iTunes. He said he liked Winamp. It provides "links from your music out to the companies or the performance videos and reviews and biographies and all the rest…" <It's one of my main apps…indispensable>

Jack called. He's thought about getting a MacBook but they're too pricey. So now he wants suggestions for a netbook.
– Both of the guys have a 12" ASUS. The 10" version is the most common but Glenn likes the 12" for its bigger keyboard & higher resolution screen and better resolution that comes out from the video port.
– They can be had for $300 to $400. Check their website or Best Buy.
– You can sometimes find the ASUS in odd colors for additional savings.
– <Also see Glenn's review of the ASUS here.>

Jack noted that the iPad 2 is also about that price, so would that be a better choice?
– They're 2 different types of devices.
– The iPad has almost no connectivity — no external keyboard or mouse; just a SD card slot.

Glenn acknowledged subscribing KVMR members. To become a member, go to the KVMR website.

Courtney called. He has a Dell Studio 1735 laptop and is getting a crackling noise on his speakers.
– Many laptops end up with malfunctioning sound chip.
– Go to Ebay and search for the words: USB sound. You should find a device that has a mic input and a headphone output. It will bypass the computer's sound system and doesn't require additional drivers if you use XP or newer operating system.

Carmo (or maybe Varmo) called and wanted to know how to download pictures from and SD card to his NextBook (a tablet device which has a SD card slot).
– Tablet usually have limited memory and you don't typically transfer data from the SD card. Just use software to view the pictures directly from the SD card.
– Also, there are probably apps that can catalog your pictures.

Last updated: 11:49 PM 3/28/2012 

strong

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.

Glenn & Paul were both in the studio

On KVMR's front page you can find a link referred to as Earth Wind Fire. It's from a website provided by PG&E showing current weather conditions, CalTrans conditions, various outages, traffic accidents and estimated times to restore services.

Paul said that during emergencies, text (txt) messages are a good way to communicate because cell phone network capacity, which is often over-subscribed, is quickly exceeded.
– Such messages can be quickly composed.
– They queue up in your phone until they can finally be sent.
– You don't need a data plan to use the text service.
– This is a SMS, not a MMS service, with a 161-character message limit.
– You can send a text message to Google, using the number associated with it, telling it where you are, for example text a zipcode: location 95959. All further queries refer to that zipcode. You then text it for example: restaurant, and it will provide a list of restaurants in that area. Or you can text: weather, to get local weather.

The guys talked about the Do Not Call registry, which is a government service to keep telemarketers from calling you.
– Companies that you've dealt with before will still be able to make unsolicited calls. Glenn implied that you could opt-out of these calls too, just check with the particular company.
– If you had signed up when the service first became available, your phone number remained in the registry for 5 years only, and you may need to register again. The 5-year limit has since been eliminated, it's now forever.
– Scammers have been making calls claiming to represent the Do Not Call registry. Do not respond to such calls.
– At donotcall.gov you can register up to 3 phones. They will send confirmation emails, one for each phone. You need to respond to each email.
– Political campaigns, surveyors, certain non-profits will still be able to call you.
– You can include your fax phone number; and even your Google voice number in the registry.
– Though cell phones are not supposed to be subjected to telemarketing calls, it does happen. You may want to add that number to the registry, too.

The NOAA (National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration) now has a new URL — weather.gov.

Another interesting weather site is wunderground.com. Linked to this site are community or individually-run weather stations using Oregon Scientific weather monitoring equipment. <You can get weather data from just down the street. Very local, very cool.>
< Here are some other weather sites I've found useful….
Radar for Sacramento and surrounding counties:
Local citizen-run stations
More citizen-run stations.
…a Sacramento station, CW0443, and stations surrounding it.>

Sharon called. She has a mi-fi device and she suffered loss of her DSL service. Shortly after the service was restored she reached her data cap of 3gig even though she hadn't used any of it. Her cell provider, Verizon, refused to acknowledge a problem and she was stuck with a $30 bill.
– The correct way to contest the charge is to pay the correct portion of the bill and contest the incorrect amount. Then notify your credit card company and send them the relevant information.
– Check with other Verizon users to see if they experienced a similar situation.
– Gather a history of your usage and present it to Verizon to show that this incident is not the norm.

Sharon also mentioned she sometimes exceeds her data cap and has to pay $10 for an additional gig. She thinks that it's the advertising in the webpages that adds to her data usage.
– Try the proxy server called Privoxy.org that blocks banner ads. Paul wasn't sure that if it actually blocks the ads before they get to your phone or just stops them from displaying on the screen.
– Glenn said he recalls a browser that blocks ads but couldn't remember its name. Paul said there is a text-only browser called Lynx that doesn't show any graphics.

Doug called to say the Golden Empire Flying Association has a weather reporting station at the airport (near Nevada City) — go to intellicast.com and look for the identifier KGOO.
<The way I found the KGOO weather report was to use the box labeled "Get the Weather in your city:" I entered: Nevada City California. I suggest you try entering your own city.>

Glenn thanked KVMR membership subscribers.
Support KVMR online or call 530/265-9555 or 800/355-5867

Tom called asking for an affordable internet provided in the Nevada City area.
– Glenn said, if he can see Oregon Hill then Digital Path is a good choice. Their phone # is 1-800-676-PATH. They are a wireless provider and availability is subject to line of sight to their antennas.
– You can also get the internet thru your cell phone provider. That can run from $50 to $70 per month. But be aware of data caps.
– A third option is Hughesnet, which is a satellite provider.

Glenn mentioned that AT&T has expanded its DSL service area near Alta Sierra (near Nevada City). Check with AT&T if you're interested.

On the redesigned KVMR webpage you can find blogs corresponding to some of the shows being broadcast.

Someone called wondering whether it's difficult to learn the 2011 version of Microsoft Word. She has a Mac and has had trouble finding a class for Word. Is it that different from the PC version, she asked?
– There may be minor only differences. A class in the PC version should suffice.
– Note that the equivalent of Word 2011 on the Mac is Word 2010 on the PC. Similarly, you can equate the 2007 PC version with the 2008 Mac version.
– The 2007 (PC version) did away with the menus but the next version is more like the older 2003 version.
– There may be some tutorials on Youtube. Search for: Office 2011 training. You should find a commercial site called Lynda.com that provides video training for all sorts of stuff.

She also asked if anyone in the local area is willing to provide training.
– She was told to write to the guys at zen at kvmr dot org

Ken called saying he had trouble finding Privoxy mentioned above <earlier, Paul didn't mention the domain .org — it's privoxy.org>

Ken also said was considering going to cell phone internet access and he used SurplusMeter to tell him how much data he uses, to see if he'll exceed the data cap.
<SurplusMeter is for the Mac. To get the latest version I suggest do a Google search for: surplusmeter. hen use the link for download.com
Currently you'll find it here>
– This app measures only the data that comes thru the particular Mac that it's on, not the rest of your networked devices. There's a way around it — replace your router's firmware — go dd-wrt.com. This firmware can, by itself, report the data usage.

Ken then suggested Adblock Plus to eliminate ads from webpages <and reduce data usage. But may only "hide" some ads — see here>.

Last updated: 9:44 PM 2/29/12

Additional notes
And at the bottom are more links Coryon sent

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 < >

Glenn started off by reminding people to stay current with their backups because there are a lot of viruses and phishing exploits out there. You may be asked to click on a link to fix a problem you don't really have and you end up with a real problem. E.g. you may get a popup window asking you to update the Adobe Flash player, instead of clicking in the window, seek out the Adobe site and do your update from there.

Repeating what he said on the last show, Paul said, when you bookmark a site use only the base address of the site — i.e. the home or main page. Don't bookmark a page you've come to after you've already clicked thru several pages. For instance, if you're on Paypal at the account page and you decide to bookmark it, the cookie Paypal leaves on your computer may cause problems later, according to Paul. So it's best just to create the bookmark from scratch, using the bookmark manager, by typing in the base URL — paypal.com

Microsoft Security Essentials is the 2nd most widely used security software for Windows. You have to have a legit copy of Windows to use it. AVG <a free version is here> is another popular security program. Both are free and there is a paid version of AVG which does more than the free version but whose features are not always needed. And remember, no anti-malware program is foolproof.

Paul has found a reason to upgrade from Windows XP to Windows 7. XP does not have a well-working version of what's called shadow copy. If 2 programs try to access the same file at the same time, even if it's read-only, the file is forbidden from being copied when it's in use by another program

XP doesn't have an operational version of shadow copy, Win7 and newer does. Win7 allows backup software to properly copy a file even while it's changing. Cobian Backup, which is free, can take advantage of shadow copy but it doesn't warn you that it doesn't work right with XP.

Glenn said you can get reconditioned units with Windows XP from geeks.com, buy.com and overstock.com or Dell units that are coming off lease.

Paul talked about the Speedstep power saving technology from Intel (there's a competing product from AMD <Advanced Micro Devices>). It's especially valuable in a laptop but is useful in a desktop. What it does is slow the speed of the CPU to cut power consumption <I guess, more strictly, power demand or energy consumption> and reduces the heat produced.
– It can reduce the power consumed by about 4/5 when you're not doing anything that requires much from the CPU.
– The user doesn't have direct control over it.
– In Windows it's controlled indirectly by the power management functions. You get there thru system properties — look for the tab dealing with power management. <I think you can get to what he was talking about by going to Startup -> Control Panel -> Performance & Maintenance -> Power Options>
– The point Paul was getting to was that you can control the settings by typing powercfg.exe at the command line <'Command Prompt' selection on the start menu> with the appropriate parameters. See the above link for more info. <That link is actually wrong. Hopefully, Paul will fix it soon. Or you can try this one instead.> http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc748940(v=ws.10).aspx
– For the Mac users there's the link above to CoolBook. Laptops may be throttled back to keep them from overheating and the CoolBook app lets you see what's happening.

Glenn mentioned the membership drive, thanked those who have contributed, and reminded folks that there are thank you gifts available when you become a member. Go to kvmr.org and click on membership.

Coryon Redd was introduced. He talked about some changes at Google in the facilities businesses use to promote themselves. Some of the highlights include:
– Google is the largest search engine and has about 70% of the market.
– Search results have become more personalized. It track how you've search before to tailor subsequent results.
– Google has reduced the amount of info you get about how people used the search to get to your site. This is when you use Google Analytics as a free service. Now, Google wants you to pay to get the full results.
– Google's GoToMeeting service used to be free, it's now a pay service. Coryon said join.me is now his preferred way to share his screen. <join.me was mentioned in the 1-25-12 show>
– There is now 1 privacy policy to cover all of Googles services — gmail, picasa, the Android operating system, their affiliated partners, etc.
– Google keeps your user data anonymous. Their advertisers get only general data but not your identity.
– You can opt out but you won't be able to use Google's services.
– Paul asked about having all of your data deleted if you do opt out. Coryon didn't know if that was an option.
– Paul suggested a way to help protect your private information — to dilute it by giving false information when you fill out a user profile, i.e. a false name, date of birth, current location, etc.
– Related to that, Paul talked about Facebook and said there is a link there to find out what Facebook knows about you. It was put in because European countries required it. Click the link and you can download all the info they have about you. <I've heard that was true at first. Now you only get a subset of the info>

Paul mentioned Sierra Commons where he recently gave a talk about mobile computing. Apparently presentations are given there (in the Nevada City area) regularly on Tuesdays from 12pm to 1pm on topics related to small business. Coryon mentioned a meeting called Nevada County Online comprised of small businesses that meets the 4th Tuesday of the month at 11am in Grass Valley to hear speakers discuss internet marketing. It's free but RSVP. Go to meetup.com search for Nevada County Online <I didn't get any results but try a Google search with these words: site:meetup.com "Nevada County Online" — and get results like this>

A caller said he that when he wants to put on an event, he would post the info on Facebook. Then he'd notify his Facebook friends about the posting by sending out a notice to everyone in a group all at once. Now he has to click on each friend one at a time and he finds that inconvenient.
– Facebook downgraded that feature, you're forced to do that.
– The solution offered: "Post something on that group wall and then share that with a message to whoever your friends are". <Sorry I couldn't make sense of it, not a Facebook user>

Steve called. He's on the fringe of the KVMR signal and has trouble receiving it.
– Go to Radio Shack and get a external antenna. Use a coaxial or balanced feeder cable and have it go to an antenna outside the house.
– Make sure the antenna is for FM radio, not TV
– Put the antenna on the side of the house that faces Banner Mountain.
– KVMR is also on the internet. Click "listen live" on the front page.

Talk about making light sabers <as in Star Wars> led to mention of Sierra Makers aka Curious Forge — a local maker group.

Coryon talked about websites that have little content but a lot of ads <ad farms>. These sites are penalized in the search results at Google, in an effort to keep results relevant for those using Google search.

Google ranks search results using an algorithm that takes into account many factors — the way the copy is written on the page, the way the links are done, how long the page has been around, the last time it was updated and, most importantly, the quantity & quality of the incoming links.

Paul mention a site that test how well a website caters to disabled (blind) users — sco-browser.com. When Google scans a webpage, it's similar to a blind user in that it can't make sense of graphics and such, Testing your site for accessibility may give some indication of the way Google sees it.

Besides an automated algorithm, Google also employs people who help rank sites manually.

Coryon is teaching an introduction to online marketing class in Auburn at the SEDCorp offices. He'll also be teaching other classes, so for more info go to coryon.com/classes.

As Paul talked about before, Google's language translation engine very powerful because it's been fed enormous amounts of human translated documents from the United Nations & the European community.

To contact Coryon:
coryon.com
coryon@gmail.com

Next show is on the Feb 29.

Less keyword info in Analytics
http://www.stateofsearch.com/google-holds-back-organic-keyword-data-in-analytics-lobotomising-the-marketer/

Panda update – Google better at finding pages with paid / spammy links
http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2067687/Google-Panda-Update-Say-Goodbye-to-Low-Quality-Link-Building

Content marketing on the rise – Pages with lots of sponsored ads will rank lower
http://mashable.com/2012/02/08/new-content-marketing-tactics/

Growing importance of Google+ and other social marketing
http://mashable.com/2012/02/10/seo-google-plus/
http://www.blindfiveyearold.com/google-plus-seo

Announcement of upcoming Internet Marketing classes – point people to Coryon.com/classes to learn more.

Announcement of Dave Polivy as speaker for NCO. What is NCO?

Last updated: 11:59pm 2/15/12

iTunes University

Crowdsourced Documentaries– a New Genre?
Full Length 90 min one here and more info HERE

Privacy Linking inside Google — March 01

On Screen Ruler & Implcations

Converting Super-8 cine movies to digital?

More On PC remote Control: JOIN.ME

Somethign on Radio Control: the Chinese FS-CT6B under $50.00

Please check back around the time of the broadcast.

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 < >

Paul was in the studio & Glenn called in

Paul mentioned that podcasts of various KVMR talk shows are accessible from the front page of KVMR <or directly here.>

Paul thought the movie "Life In A Day" was outstanding. It's composed of many video clips sent in to Youtube by people from 190 countries, which show something from their daily lives on one particular day. See the 2 links above where it says Crowdsourced Documentaries.

Apple has introduced iTunes University. It's "everything you need to create & share complete courses all in one place". They're typically free though some may not be. Many are university courses. See the above link. <There's also Open Courseware from MIT, no iTunes required, just stream or download the .mp4 >

For measuring things on your screen there's an on-screen ruler available at iruler.net. It uses facilities like javascript to figure out the your screen resolution & dimensions. It then projects an accurate ruler on your monitor. Paul was not successful in trying to fool the application. <But see Jeff's comments below>

To convert Super-8 movies to digital takes more than just projecting the movie onto a screen and pointing your digital video camera at it. Because the projector & video camera run at a different frames per second rate, you'll get an annoying bar that moves up & down in the resulting digital video.
– The name for the device that converts cinema movies to digital is telecine and you can buy equipment to do this for $1600 to $2500.
– You can have a professional service to do the conversion at a typical rate of $19 for 5 minutes.
– You can do a search for the word telecine and find FAQs for useful tips.
– See Ken's comments below.

Glenn called in to say he's house sitting at a place that's having the Digital Path ISP service installed. They talked about testing the speed of the connection and the site speedtest.phonepower.com was suggested. Paul likes this site because latency and the rate at which the latency changes (jitter) is tested. <There's more about this in the 1-12-11 and 5-31-10 shows.>

Glenn reminded people to do frequent backups because there are a lot of viruses and phishing exploits out there. You may be asked to click on a link to fix a problem you don't really have and you end up with a real problem. Paul said to stop and think before clicking.

Scammers can be very tricky, For instance, if you bought airline tickets you may get what looks like a follow-up message that says something like…to print your tickets click here. Paul said it may not be enough to clear your web cookies to avoid being tracked on the net. Java Virtual Machine, the Flash player and Microsoft's Media Player have their own version of cookies

<There's a little more about this in the 5-11-11 show. You can learn about Flash (or zombie) cookies here.>

Combofix from Bleeping Computer and MalwareBytes were mentioned for getting rid of viruses that extort payment in return for 'fixing' your (unbroken) computer. <See notes for the 8-9-10 show for more about this and smitfraud> The anti-virus program Microsoft Security Essentials was also mentioned.
<See the 5-11-11 show notes for articles about Microsoft Security Essentials.>

More tips to protect yourself against scammers included:
– If you get a message from what seems like your bank that requires your response, call the bank directly but don't use the phone number in the bogus message, find a reliable number in the bank's printed material or phone book.
– When you bookmark a site use only the base address of the site — i.e. the home or main page. Don't bookmark a page you've come to after you've already clicked thru several pages.

Paul talked about remote control software called JOIN.ME. See the above link. The program is easy to initiate and allows a user in one location to control a computer at a remote location. There are versions for both the PC & Mac and even lets a PC control a Mac (& the reverse). Supposedly it allows conference calls, too.

Jeff called & said he tried iruler but had problems getting it to work right. the iruler program determined this monitor is 17" but had to be set to 20.5" to get it to work.
– Paul thought Jeff's LCD monitor was not set at the "optimum drive rate".

When it's not optimum "the pixels transmitted by the video chip are not the same as the number transistors in the screen" and you get a dithering effect. Jeff further complicated matters by sharing 1 monitor between 2 computers.

Paul quickly mentioned some of the things cookies reveal about your computer: the operating system being used, the browser type, size of your display & whether you've been to the site before.

Glenn got a note from Marilyn who is increasingly using hotspots for her internet connection and is worried about viruses, hackers & snoopers.
– Glenn thought it fairly safe to use hotspots though he wouldn't do his banking from there.
– In an environment where you share a network with others, like a hotspot, a firewall lets you connect out but prevents others from "connecting back" without permission.
– If you want to know if your machine is secure from others getting in on such an alien network, you need to do a port scan.
– Do a Google search for "port scanner" and you should find a company called Gibson Research. < think this is it:>
– When you give it permission, it will scan some 65,000 ports while trying to find an open share — that's where you share folders & their contents.
– Glenn's suggestion is to go to Network connections in the Control Panel and right-click on wireless connections, click properties and uncheck the box that says "File & Print sharing for Microsoft networks".
– Win7 & Vista will disable sharing on a public hotspot connection but XP has to be deliberately told not to share.
– Unless you really need to share, there's no reason to have it enabled.
– There is a way to keep your machine from the list of computers on a wireless network. Having your machine on the list "is a open invitation for problems"…"the less information given away the better". Paul didn't go into any details for delisting.

Ken called with more suggestions for super-8 to digital transfer.
– He was able to adjust the frame rate of the projector by trial and error to minimize the problem with the synchronization.
– Use a plain white screen instead of a projector screen, which can introduce some graininess.
– He thought his success was due in part to slowing the frame rate of the camera so it would capture more than one frame of the projected image.
– Paul also suggested turning off the autofocus on the camera.
– Reducing the light from the projector will make the camera increase the exposure time and may improve the results.
– Using a webcam with 640 x 480 resolution is more in line with the resolution of the Super-8. Using a hi-def camera will only produce huge files with little gain in clarity.
– For making the final DVD movies Paul likes Nero 7. And Windows Movie Maker is "not too bad", either. It's included in XP Pro <I see it listed in my XP Home edition too, but I've never used it>.

On Sunday The Curious Forge, a local Nevada County Maker group, will have an open house. These are the sort of people who would experiment with transferring movies to digital. If you're interested, look for The Curious Forge on Facebook for more info. Paul read from the Facebook page that it will be on the 29th at 520 East Main Street in Grass Valley from 3 to 6pm.
<I think this is their Facebook page>

Support KVMR and become a member. 530/265-9555 or 800/355-5867

Finally, Paul said that you can by from China a 6 channel radio controller (link above) for under $50, This is for remote controlled model planes, car, boats, etc.

He went on to say he's see video's of model helicopters doing amazing stunts which were impossible until the use of sensors similar to what you can find in smartphone — thing like magnetometers, accelerometers and inclinometers.
– On Youtube look up "aerobatic radio controlled helicopter".

Last updated: 11:50pm 1/25/12