GeekBrief.TV | Video Podcast (iPod)

Drobo released an SDK today. Developers can build apps to make Drobo do more after joining the Drobo Developer Community. Fontstruct is a free, Web-based app for future typography rock stars. I want the creator of the next Helvetica to be a GeekBrief.TV viewer. GoLive2 is releasing a Wiimote inspired series of controllers for PC gaming and they're calling them Stix. Philippe Starck designed a small wind turbine that might generate 20% to 60% of the energy needed to power a home. I skeptical, but definitely interested. 149 Series Mitsubishi HDTVs will include 16-point speaker systems that simulate 5.1 surround sound.

After trying multiple iPhone cases, I finally found one that I'm happy with. It's called the Naked Case. The Dock Extender from SendStation is a universal dock extension kit that lets you plug your iPhone in a dock without removing the case. RuinediPhone.com has a petition to try and get Apple to intervene for Canadians and make Rogers offer a more acceptable rate plan. The PlantSense GardenGro offers a more high tech approach to growing plants. Neal is finally starting to use Firefox 3 as his main browser, thanks to extensions like Gspace. Gspace makes it easy to use Gmail for storage. You can download the extension here.

Bill Gates says goodbye. Rogers Wireless is still crap. Princeton is making textbooks available on Kindle. The Monsterpod, apparently, sticks anywhere. The Super Side Bar is a Liquor faucet. VidBlaster is working with Ustream. Test tomorrow at 4:00 PM Central time at www.CaliLIVE.tv.

We're on our way back home from the Bus inspection and this is one last show show in a hotel room. ICANN will begin allowing vanity domain name extensions next year for a hefty fee. NeoCubes are now shipping. Bluraymods.com announced the first region-free Blu-ray DVD player. HP Labs has a new idea in private Beta. MagCloud is a print-on-demand magazine service that makes it possible for anyone to become a magazine publisher. Yes! I've seen the Terra Wind Amphibious RV! :) Uncrate featured it today.

Today's Brief comes to you from a hotel room that looks like a grandma's house. Tnkgrl solved the problem of why MacBook Air super drives only work with MBAs and she explains how to get one working with any Mac or PC on her blog, tankgrl.wordpress.com. SmugMug has a new service for unlimited storage of any type of file. The service is called SmugVault and it's built on Amazon Web Services. Storage costs pennies per GB. D-Link dropped an update for their DNS-323 NAS. The update turns it into a PC-free BitTorrent machine. They also released a new router, the DIR-628, that is dual-band. The 2.4GHz channel is for regular network traffic and the 5.4GHz channel is for media distribution. The Boy Genius Report got a tip that the iPhone will go on sale at 8AM on July 11th. SlashGear says JVC will release the world's thinnest 1080p LCD HDTV in July. Tomorrow we're having a bus inspected. I'll be providing updates on Twitter and live video from Qik.

Based on what I've seen so far, Spy Pens haven't surpassed novelty quality. OhGizmo.com pointed us toward a new one called the DVR Pen Recorder that stores up 30 hours of audio and video, but only at a resolution of 352x288. Sony's HDR-CX12 Memory Stick Handycam camcorder uses smile shutter technology to automatically take photos of people when they smile. SpotCrime recently got TechCrunched. It's a google map mashup that gives you a graphical representation of crime activity in a particular area on the map. Psystar is tempting fate again by selling an OSX rack server. iRetroPhone is a rotary dial for iPhone. PortableApps.com is a source for downloading small applications that run from a flash drive, including Firefox 3.

Kaleidescape released two new movie players. The 1080p upscales stand definition DVDs to deliver a viewing experience that rivals Blu-ray. Information about the Kaleidescape court case is here and a review of the player is here. The Aztech WL850MS HD Media Streamer uses wireless N to stream 1080p video wirelessly over your home network. The Cuisipro Ice Cream Scoop & Stack produces 3.75 oz., perfectly cylindrical scoops. Rogers Wireless may match AT&T pricing for the iPhone, including the data plan. Popgadget has a tip for skipping voice mail greatings when you call mobile phones. XBMC is a cross-platform media center application that works on OSX, Windows, Linux and Xbox. It's my favorite application for the Mac that I've come across this year. Thanks to everyone who recommended it.

Mozilla surpassed the goal. They got more than 8 Million downloads of Firefox 3. 15% of visitors to GeekBrief.TV have upgraded. 30% are still using Firefox 2. 22% are using Safari and 20% are using IE. The rest are using much, much older browsers. Optoma is the first company to release a projector based on the Texas Instruments DLP Pico chipset. Their project is smaller than the average smartphone, but it won't be available in the U.S. until next year. Texas Intruments is also working on an lamp-free projector. It combines a PhlatLight LED with a BrilliantColor chipset that will use 30 percent less power and deliever a much better picture. The Panasonic HDC-HS100 is an HD consumer camera with 3 CMOS sensors the yeld unprecedented low-light performance. Rick MacMerc alerted us to an amazing array of Bacon goods from Archie McPhee. Apple is opening the first Australian Apple store Thursday. It's at 367 George Street, one block North of the Queen Victoria Building, if you're looking for directions. Thanks to Beck's for taking a chance on a little show called GeekBrief.TV. On the rare occasions I have a beer, it will be a Beck's.

Today was Download Day and at the time I'm posting this episode, Firefox 3 has been downloaded 2,205,910 times. It was also the release date of the Spore Creature Creator, the heavily anticipated precursor to Spore the game. Sony Ericsson's C905 is mostly a 8.1 Megapixel Cybershot camera and a little bit a phone. It's beautifully designed and is probably following the best anti-iPhone stratagey a phone maker could. If the camera is the most important part of the phone to you, the C905 is probably a great choice. Dexrex is an online backup system for your IM sessions. It works with most major IM services to create a searchable archive of all your chat sessions. LS9, Inc. is a Silicon Valley company that just may have solved the crude oil problem. They've genetically modified bacteria to feed on woodchips or wheat straw and excrete crude oil. The process is similar to Ethenol production, but it isn't energy intensive. They expect to fuel the first car with gas produced from the bio-petrolium within a month.

I put up a survey earlier this week asking GeekBrief.TV viewers to help me narrow down the best gadgets stores to a top 10. Just before we shot the show, I tweeted asking if anyone else wanted to chime in. By the time we finished shooting, the results had changed somewhat. On the show the list is as follows: #10: A tie between ShopFosters.com and Tigerdirect.com #09: A tie between Newegg.com and Perpetualkid.com #08: SharperImage.com #07: Brookstone.com #06: Hammacher.com #05: Firebox.com #04: iwantoneofthose.com #03: ACgears.com #02: Red5.co.uk #01: ThinkGeek.com

People have been asking for it, and now it's inevitable. Qik will be available for the iPhone. HP released v2 of their TouchSmart all-in-one computer. Through their Voodoo line, they also announced the Envy, a MacBook Air competitor, and the ever-so-expensive and sexy Omen Gaming PC. The Microsoft Surface has been installed at the iBar at the Rio in Vegas. I don't think I'm cool enough to really understand if this is going to work out for the club crowd, but I am interested in watching drunk people use it. It's very important for you to watch the HD version of the show if you want to read the closed captioning during the Surface video.

Producing a technically good streaming show isn't something we need to do for any reason beyond the difficulty of making it work without spending thousands of dollars on equipment. The challenge has driven us to distraction. We've spent days researching options and talking to developers. We've spent nights dreaming about possible solutions. Streaming doesn't scale like podcasting, but it's a lot of fun to go live whether it's on QIK or On Location or in the studio. Leo Laporte is doing the best job of anyone. He's got the talent to keep viewers interested for a long period of time and/or keep checking in throughout the day. He also has the foresight to invest in equipment to make his stream look better than any other live show I've seen. That's why he is and pretty much always has been a role model. TWiT is a leader because of talent plus Leo's commitment to making it sound great. TWiT Live will be a leader in streaming for the same reasons. Leo is using a $10,000 TriCaster for switching and lower thirds. We considered investing in one, but we aren't going to be live every day. We've researched alternatives and there aren't that many. Sony has it's AnyCast, but it's about $20,000. The Datavideo SE-800 sells for about $5000, but it doesn't really fit the mission. We started looking into software solutions too. Mike Versteeg's VidBlaster is awesome. He's now working to make it work with streaming services like Ustream.TV, but it's going to take some time. Wirecast would be a great solution too, if it worked with the streaming services. Ustream tells me it will by August. Tonight we're testing CamTwist Studio on CaliLive.TV at 8PM CDT. It's almost like this quest has become a massive mountain we have to conquer before we can move on and get back to normal. We want to get to the point where we can produce a live streaming show that looks as good as TV. This Brief is about our streaming quest, but I hope it can result in motivating some hardware developers to consider the emerging demand for an even less expensive solution than Tricaster. Tricaster is awesome and the price is low for what it accomplishes, but churches, community groups and people like me are looking for something that isn't being sold yet. Hopefully someone who watches Geek Brief will take on the challenge and meet the need. I opened up a topic on GBTVTalk.com to discuss the need

This is our recap of WWDC08. What can I say? Monkey Balls, but that could be perceived as inappropriate. I could say Cromag Rally, but then people may think I'm pro-caveman. I'm ambivalent about cavemen, so ladies and gentleman, Steve Jobs and the 3G iPhone.

QIK.com, the camera streaming service announce support for two Windows Mobile phones. Sanyo upgraded the Xacti to include a 300fps Slow-motion feature. The HDD Stage Rack now supports two SATA drives and connects via eSATA or USB 2.0. LocatePC phones home when a PC is stolen. Superlame is a free Web app that lets you add cartoon balloons to your photos. I'll be live with Woopra President, John P. Saturday, June 7th at 12 PM Pacific time on CaliLIVE.tv.

It's not usually my nature to be snarky about a person, but on Brief 372, I make an exception. Yesterday, Peter Ha from CruchGear posted a video from TheStreet.com, and I had to bring it to your attention. In the video, Gary Krakow, apparently an old-school tech journalist, is asked what Steve Jobs needs to do to get the iPhone competitive in a corporate environment. His answer is crazier than anything my favorite Mr. Cranky Pants, John C. Dvorak has ever said about Apple.