SplaTT's Blog

Podcasting on the Today Show...my 300 seconds of fame...

I just got of the phone with The Today Show, a morning show on channel 9, not the one from Microsoft with Scoble...but the one that is a public TV network in Australia and is owned by Kerry Packer's PBL corporation.

Tomorrow morning, somewhere around 7.20am, i'll be spending 5 minutes being interviewed on live TV about the joys of podcasting and The Podcast Network.

It will be our first piece of TV coverage so the Media Center will be set to record and hopefully i will have a copy of it up online later in the day. :)

Off to the US of A

Heading of to Seattle today for just over a week to take part in Search Champs v2 and a to have a couple of days worth of meetings with various people and teams at Microsoft.

Its all good...see you on the flip-side... :)

The inkernet opens at channel 9

Over at the Channel 9 MSDN site, Charles and the team have opened up the ability to do "ink" comments to forum posts if you have a Tablet PC (or another device that lets you write...like a Wacom tablet or a mouse...hmmm)

I remember playing around with an application that let me post "ink" entries to this blog during the middle of last year and thought that was soooo cool...and i haven't used it since :)

Note to self...use Tablet PC functionality more...seems a pity to waste the beautiful Toshiba M200...

The NBA Show

If shooting hoops is an important part of your favourite game, then our latest channel over at The Podcast Network...The NBA Show is for you.

Listen in as we provide weekly coverage direct from the US with Adam and Steve about the NCAA tournament, the teams and the players that you all love.

Working EPG for Windows Media Center in Australia

Yeehaa....a huge thank you to Mark Baartse for pointing me in the direction of this forum posting and the associated site. When i combined the info on those pages with some of the fine points from this forum thread which focussed on the Sydney setings...i now have a fully working EPG on my Windows Media Center Edition PC.

The EPG functionality rocks...this is the "killer" component that the Media Center is lacking in Australia, and with the help of the above mentioned threads from the Australian XP Media Center Community website, its now a reality in my lounge room.

A huge thanks to Mark for pointing it out, to Ben Pettit for putting together the "oh so simple instructions", to specks90 (who ever you are) for providing the changes required for the Sydney setup and the people over at The Green Button and the Australian XP Media Center Community for finding ways around the bizarre reasoning that stopped the EPG being available in the first place.

I have said it before...and i will say it again...the Windows XP Media Center is an amazing tool that has changed how i live in my loungeroom, and whoever is stopping the "real/official" EPG from being released by Microsoft needs to be dragged aside and {insert favoured form of punishment here}.

MSN Messenger 7 is out of beta

After what has seemed like an eternity, MSN Messenger 7.0 is finally out of beta and is available to the public.

I have been using the beta for ages now, but the final release does appear to have some new bits in it, so check out this page for a list of features.

I can't wait to try out the new video and audio structure...hopefully it wil be better than it has been. The Messenger backend has always "just" handled audio and video and never really done it well. They may have got it right this time as Microsoft have been doing a lot of work on the enterprise and business side of things with the as yet to released Communicator product.

The other interesting feature is the tight integration with MSN Search...the shared search feature is an interesting one...nice touch..and i'm starting to see its uses after only playing with it for a few hours.

Well done guys...

PS. I'll be doing a marketing/communications blog post about the new messenger over at the Principius blog later today.

Segway in Sydney

It looks like Segway opened up shop (well...not literally) in Sydney recently...i'll need to check with Segway Sydney and see if the have any info on the future availability of the Segway XT in Australia.

:)

Note: If you haven't actually seen a real Segway and you are in Sydney, go down to the QANTAS domestic terminal in Sydney and they have them in the gadget store in the actual lounge area once you have gone through security.

The Microsoft Developer Show...otherwise known as The MS Dev Show

Do you do .Net??? Do you live and breath MS SQL statements??? Do you use the word "Interoperability" in your daily conversations (and mean it) ??? Do you like to drink the Koolaid???

Because if you do, "The Microsoft Developer Show" (or "The MS Dev Show" as we like to call it) over at The Podcast Network is for you.

Tune in as your host Dr Pete not only talks about .Net, Microsoft and other cool technologies, but as he also chats to some great people along the way. Hey...anyone know how to get BillG on the show??? ;)

TechEd video 3 from Rory and Scott

Its been a while...but the 3rd TechEd video installment from Rory and Scott has arrived.

Here are my posts about the 1st and 2nd videos.

MSN Search Spoof

Th April fools day joke sites are starting to appear..and one of the better ones is the MSN Search Spoof...well worth checking out...

The AFL Show on The Podcast Network

Just in time to report on the start of the footy (Australian Rules Footbal) season, today at The Podcast Network we are launching our first sports related show...The AFL Show hosted by Pete Lazer.

If your a fan of aussie rules footy, then this show is a must...and if you don't know a thing about the sport, then tune and learn from Pete and his team of friends as they present this weekly round-up of the hottest news and going-ons from the land downunder.

And grab a meat pie with sauce while your at it :)

Nintendo President is a geek.... :)

I love it that companies are putting audio files up on the web...and this mp3 of Nintendo President Satoru Iwata's keynote at the Game Developers conference in San Fransicso in early March is brilliant. He comes over as a good corporate President and as an old school game developer but more importantly...he comes over as a really passionate "gamer" and a "geek".

But please..someone tell them that this not a podcast...where is the RSS feed??? I think we can now say that the word "podcast" is now officialy a "buzzword".

Its worth listening to though.. :)