Hi, all.
I, like Erik, carry around a dedicated MP3 player, but see the merit
of both that approach and the use of the iPhone. My views may be summed up
as "whatever works best". Having said that, there are a few things in Erik's
message below which aren't disadvantages of the iOS method.
When asked about whether the dedicated player can
Purchase music and download it wirelessly?
Erik writes
No I have to handle music and podcasts on computer before they go to the
player, but I refuse to invest in a DRM and so apple store mp3's and audible
books are no interest to me.
Music from the Apple store has, to the best of my knowledge, no DRM
at all or very minimal DRM. One certainly does not have to authorize devices
for it. Books from the Apple Store and from Audible do have DRM, however.
This is the main reason I don't buy books from the Apple store or Audible
content. If I buy something in accordance with a specific license agreement,
it's mine to use in accordance with that license. The fact that the provider
of the content thinks people will violate the license really isn't my
problem.
Erik, when asked about online streaming of radio stations, says
This is a feature I could actually use if my player had it. Unfortunately
wifi access is still pretty limited here and there's no way even if I had a
data plan, that I could afford to put my ISP to the kind of usage I'd be
looking at. My mp3 player listening time is about 80 to 120 hours a month
and if even 20 or 30 were using streaming audio I'd shortly run into
problems.
I used to be of this opinion as well. However, listening to a 256 K
stream for an hour takes about 113 megabytes. Most radio stations stream in
a lesser quality than that. Given that most providers in Canada at least
offer something around 5-6 gigabytes for $30, streaming radio stations for a
significant amount of time is not impossible to do.
Finally, Erik writes
I'd appreciate some links to resources on how to play ogg or flac on IOS if
you have them.
There are several options. You may want to have a look at
http://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/oplayer/id344784375?mt=8
for example. There are other apps, both official and from Cydia,
which will do the same. I don't read audio books very much, but agree with
Erik that the iPhone's handling of those books is quite bad.
Aman
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of erik burggraaf
Sent: Wednesday, September 28, 2011 8:12 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Money reader in canadian app store
On 2011-09-27, at 8:08 PM, Marc Workman wrote:
Well, we could have a feature off.
Does the mp3 player have a search feature allowing you to search
through thousands of songs?
No, but it does allow you more control over the layout of your music when
you put it on the device and it does allow for much faster scrolling than
IOS. It's a bit of a trade off. I don't have a search feature, but I don't
miss it because I know where stuff is and I can get to it quickly.
Create and edit playlists on the device?
Yep it does that.
Purchase music and download it wirelessly?
No I have to handle music and podcasts on computer before they go to the
player, but I refuse to invest in a DRM and so apple store mp3's and audible
books are no interest to me.
Download audible books and podcasts wirelessly?
Again, DRM no thanks. Not when I can get the same content in better quality
from other sources.
Have access to 15,000 internet radio streams?
This is a feature I could actually use if my player had it. Unfortunately
wifi access is still pretty limited here and there's no way even if I had a
data plan, that I could afford to put my ISP to the kind of usage I'd be
looking at. My mp3 player listening time is about 80 to 120 hours a month
and if even 20 or 30 were using streaming audio I'd shortly run into
problems.
Provide you with music recognition?
You mean like genus? What a ridiculous feature. Don't you know what's in
your music collection? That and the whole social network they are trying to
build around what's on your IPod. Are people really going for this? You
gota be kidding me.
This is of course scratching the surface, and some of what you
mentioned, mp3 audio books, ogg and flac, the iPhone will do.
Fraid not. If I put an mp3 audiobook onto my ITouch it goes into my music
and then I have to playlist it separately at the very least. Plus I can't
have bookmarking in an mp3 audiobook. If I want that I have to make it an
m4B or whatever that proprietary format is. I'd appreciate some links to
resources on how to play ogg or flac on IOS if you have them. I can make it
work on the mac, but not on the ITouch.
An mp3 player blowing the iPhone out of the water on feature sets,
quality, and ease of use seems like less of a "no brainer" than you suggest.
Well it's my brain, and I choose not to hassel it over less than
half the battery life and a lot of features I just don't want when
everything I do want is in a low cost extra built to do the job.
But this is really beside the point. The initial discussion was
sparked by your comment:
It's ten bucks for a money reader?
Why not just get a bank of canada one for free?
If you still don't see why someone would pay the ten bucks, I'm
probably not going to change your mind.
If I suggested that the iPhone competes feature for feature with
things like GPS units, mp3 players, cameras, etc, I didn't intend to. The
point is that, where an app allows you to accomplish what you would normally
accomplish with a stand-alone device, then being willing to pay a small
amount of money for the app even when the device is free doesn't seem that
strange to me.
I think it's a matter of whether you need the feature set or not.
If looktel does UK currency when I go back to bellfast next year I won't
think twice about 10 bucks for the app. But since I'm moldering away at
home and the free reader does all that I need it to , and it's sitting right
here in my living room, I don't see how I can justify the expense.
Cheers,
Marc
On 2011-09-27, at 1:49 PM, erik burggraaf wrote:
Well, the MP3 player is a bit of a no brainer. It's cheep,
less than a hundred bucks. I get 30 hours of listening on a single charge
which is important for me since I'm often on the road for 12 hour days. It
plays ogg which is not so important to me, but it also plays flac which is
crucial. It will let me use SD cards without buying an expensive and
proprietary adapter. it bookmarks up to 10 folders for me on the fly and
can bookmark up to 10 places in each folder. It lets me control settings
like bass, trebble, and gain and it has a limiter preamp and a host of other
settings which I can use to improve the listening experience for various
types of audio. It has a fully adjustable crossfader, All features are
fully self-voicing. I can play audiobooks in standard MP3, and I can copy
and paste files with no benighted piece of bloatware to hoof music and
books from computer to player and back.
The camera I use is ridiculously expensive and there are
lots of things to love or love to hate about it. On the love side, it's on
a monopod so I don't have to worry about holding the camera straight or at
the appropriate height. It auto focusses so I don't have to worry about not
lining up the shot properly. It has a provision for automatically taking
multiple pictures for cases such as scanning books, and it has a motion
sensor to take the new picture when I flip a page. It gives me easy access
to both the image file and the converted OCR and I can convert to mp3 on the
fly if I want.
Barcode reader $300 bucks it's omny directional so I don't
have to know where to point. It comes with several databases onboard. Need
I go on?
it sucks to pay a lot of money for stuff that the IPhone
sorta does for free or very cheep, but honestly it's not really there yet
and I need technology that works. I just don't have the patience anymore to
mess around and force things into line, although I'm very happy for the
people who have persevered and gotten some things to work well for them.
Best,
Erik Burggraaf
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On 2011-09-27, at 3:27 PM, Marc Workman wrote:
I'm curious how your stand alone mp3 player and
camera blow the iPhone's "out of the water" in terms of feature sets,
quality, and ease of use.
It sounds like you agree, though, that where the
equivalent functionality can be gotten out of an app, the app would be
preferable to the stand-alone device. Is there something the stand-alone
money reader does that the app doesn't? I think it's actually the other way
around given the variety of currencies that can be identified.
I think I would prefer fewer stand-alone devices
even at home. It's not just about carrying them, but losing and recharging.
My phone also always tends to be on hand. There's obviously a risk to the
swiss-army-knife approach, eggs, basket, etc, but I do think there are good
reasons for preferring the money reader app over the free stand-alone
device, and so I'm glad the developer listened to my and others' calls for
including Canadian currency rather than thinking it unnecessary, like some
may have implied, given the free stand-alone device.
Regards,
Marc
On 2011-09-27, at 11:57 AM, erik burggraaf wrote:
The problem with my separate mp3 player,
gps, camera OCR, and so on is that they all blow the eyephone out of the
water when it comes to feature sets, quality, and ease of use. So, while I
feel like a dope walking around with my pockets stuffed and bulging with
with kit, not to mention paying for each tool A la Cart, the fact is I'm
more comfortable with the separate tools than the IPhone. Now, if the tools
on the IPhone do what you need and your requirements aren't that steep,
there's nothing at all wrong with buying an IPhone and letting fly.
I don't usually bother carrying the money
reader. If I don't know what my bills are, I sort them before I leave the
house. Anything else can usually be taken care of using the markers on the
money.
Best,
Erik Burggraaf
This month in Ebony Promos: Two new gps
systems for demo. Mac OS Lion When will it be supported? Ebony Consulting
at accessibility Unconference Toronto. To read more and subscribe, Visit:
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Ebony Consulting toll-free: 1-888-255-5194
or on the web at
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On 2011-09-27, at 11:21 AM, Marc Workman
wrote:
Agree with Ricardo.
Why not carry a separate daisy
player, mp3 player, colour identifier, light detector, gps unit, money
identifier, camera, etc. Even if these were all available for free, I would
rather pay a relatively small fee to have them all available on a single
device.
It's also worth noting that Looktel
announced that the price was going up for version 2. So many Canadians,
myself included, were able to pick it up at the version 1 price of either
1.99 or 2.99, I can't recall exactly. Ten dollars is a bit steep, but I
thought that the initial price was less than people would be willing to pay,
and I would still encourage canadians to pick it up, assuming it identifies
our currency as well as it did the US's.
Regards,
Marc
On 2011-09-27, at 5:57 AM, Ricardo
Walker wrote:
Another advantage is is its
1 less thing to carry. A person is more likely to forget their money reader
at home than their phone I would think.
Ricardo Walker
[email protected]
Twitter & Skype: rwalker296
www.mobileaccess.org
<http://www.mobileaccess.org/>
On Sep 27, 2011, at 8:44 AM,
erik burggraaf wrote:
That we do, Have
for over 15 years. Our government had certain accessibility standards back
as early as 1990. Not that all of them were worth the paper they were
printed on, but the money identification one has been taken very seriously
by bank of canada. The old gadget they put out first was a bit lame but the
new one is super. I Told gary at looktel that we already had a free piece
that covered all the bases, but as you say, for some one travelling either
two or from canada the IPhone app is quite useful.
Best,
Erik Burggraaf
This month in Ebony
Promos: Two new gps systems for demo. Mac OS Lion When will it be supported?
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toll-free: 1-888-255-5194
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On 2011-09-27, at
8:25 AM, Ricardo Walker wrote:
IDK,
What if you
do some traveling? BTW, you guys hand out money readers for free?
Ricardo
Walker
[email protected]
Twitter &
Skype: rwalker296
www.mobileaccess.org <http://www.mobileaccess.org/>
On Sep 27,
2011, at 8:24 AM, erik burggraaf wrote:
It's
ten bucks for a money reader? Why not just get a bank of canada one for
free?
Best,
Erik
Burggraaf
This
month in Ebony Promos: Two new gps systems for demo. Mac OS Lion When will
it be supported? Ebony Consulting at accessibility Unconference Toronto. To
read more and subscribe, Visit:
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On
2011-09-27, at 8:07 AM, Garth Humphreys wrote:
I believe that the version will show up as 2. However if everything is as it
normally is, even if you buy now it will be a free update to version 2.
Having said that, I am waiting till I see the correct version before putting
down the money.
On 27/09/2011, at 10:02 PM, Matt Dierckens wrote:
Hi list,
When hearing that the new money reader would support canadian money finally,
I went to the app store to find it, however, the one in the canadian store
says 1.10 or something. I don't want to spend $10 on it if its the wrong
one. Can anyone confirm this?
Thanks.
Matt
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