Tired. Dog Tired.

Yes, I am. I have actually wanted to get some posts out here several times already this year. Just too tired to make it happen until now.

However, I'm not nearly as tired as a technology/idea that I realized today I want to see die off much quicker then is currently happening. Voice mail. When I say voice mail, I'm using it as a general term to refer to answering machines, and any kind of voice mail such as those at offices, or used by cell phone providers.

They are all flawed. Steve Jobs obviously (to anybody not hiding under their rock) pointed out in his keynote that navigating in a sequential fashion is horribly outdated. That is just the start though. How much time each day do you waste listening to the following:

"I can't come to the phone right now, please leave your name and number after the beep and I'll get back to you"

Were you really wondering what to do when that person didn't answer and this mystery device started talking to you? Multiply that times each person you can't reach per day and you are just burning away minutes of your life. Put the 2 previous examples together, and now both parties are wasting double the time just trying to achieve asynchronous communication.

Why? We have already defeated this problem. It is called email. While not perfect, it is hands down better than anything voicemail has done.

So, we need smarter phone systems. Do like Vonage and send messages as audio clips via email (or optionally do speech to text as well). Then you don't need Job's iPhone, you simply need a phone that can do IMAP/POP.

Next, the stupid greeting has to go. Let your phone display a status on the screen, just like IM. You can quickly find out that I'm away, busy, screening, running from the plague, etc.

Make it so.

It's Sweeps Week!!!!

Sometimes you come across something on the Internet that just makes you feel dumber, or sorry for all the dumb people in the world after seeing/watching it.

Tonight I was searching for some information on the upcoming Vonage IPO, that will be happening this fall. I ended up finding an article about it on Forbes.com. I expect fairly accurate and informative news out of Forbes (maybe unjustifiably). While there, I notice a little box to the side, and the top link is "Top Topless Beaches" (Here is the link in case the Forbes site changes). This seemed a bit out of place, but of course I had to click on it. For those following along at work don't worry, there is nothing at all here that is NSFW.

Be warned, the first obstacle is that this video is in Real format (as in Real Shitty). I have Firefox tricked out to use Real Alternative, so I was okay there. I then proceeded to watch the video. This is maybe the dumbest, most pointless, least informative thing I have ever watched. The person brought into the clip is more of an airhead than I ever thought possible. I feel dumber now just for watching. To even things out, I wanted to make sure everyone else watches it and sinks down to my new, dumber level.