Believe it or not, I got the above email from Microsoft this week. They emailed me asking me to change my account settings to enable them to send me “promotional information” (aka SPAM). Isn’t that just ridiculous? … And of course, this email had no unsubscribe link.

I submitted my first iPhone application to the iTunes store almost exactly a month ago today. It’s an application called Capital Calls. I wrote it for the Sunlight Labs – Apps for America Contest. While writing it I was of course dreaming of winning first place and the $15k  bounty that came with it. However, that was not meant to be. Instead I recieved an honorable mention and $100. Still, not too shabby for an app written in 2.5 weeks over nights and weekends. I don’t think that the hourly rate translates too well, but I’m proud of the accomplishment none the less.

A few months ago Steve mentioned that he was able to use the Pandora iPhone app without interruption on his commute to work in the morning. I was frankly more surprised that he was using Pandora than I was that he had managed to hold a 3G signal the whole time. So after being semi-convinced by him that Pandora’s suggestion algorithms have improved, I decided to give it another shot.

Sure enough, all the music that is played revolves more closely around the original selection. The downside of this is that it appears to simply generate a static playlist based on what you start with, so in a few hours you start to loop. It’s not ideal for discovering new music,  but It’s not necessarily a bad thing either. After a while you feel like you’re listening to a mix tape.

Additionally you can access a list of the songs you bookmark and thumbs-up on the website, which makes it convenient for tracking all the new songs you’re finding. All in all I give this new and improved Pandora a “thumbs-up”. My only gripe is that their downloadable player is simply the web interface packaged in Adobe Air.

To my dismay, when i finally installed it on my computer i wasn’t greeted with a drastically new OS that was going to change the way I interacted with my computer. It seemed to be pretty much the same. A transparency here, a shadow there, new icons, but more or less the same. Additionally, I was faced with compatibility issues with some of my most used apps (KeepPassX, Adium, and VMWare). This was definitely not what I had envisioned. Luckily a few Google searches and downloads fixed all my issues. Still, issues resolved, this was not the experience I had signed up for.

Fast forwarding 3 days, and having read more blog posts, played around with the functionality, my opinion has changed a bit. While this release isn’t the most amazing thing ever, it’s pretty solid in very subtle ways.

First and most importantly I think that the file-sharing/browsing interface is 1000 times better than before. Second, spotlight seems to be a lot faster than it used to be. Third, I like cover flow; I’m not sure how useful it really is, but I like it.

Here’s in my opinion the best (and most concise) blog posting talking about the noteworthy features of Leopard. And below the link, are my personal favorites:

Engadget: All about Leopard: gallery, apps, impressions

• Launching apps with Spotlight is tremendously easy, they come up instantly, and separately from the rest of the search results. It’ll still try searching the index for matching files, though.
• Use command + y (or just hit space) to Quick Look things. It’s like command + o (which simply opens files) except way faster.
• iChat: Screen sharing works really well. Fighting for the mouse is always fun, too.
• Network settings are much more simply laid out, especially when it comes to managing multiple connections and their settings. Looks like Apple realized that a lot of people have more than two network connections.
• ZOMG: the keyboard manager differentiates between different keyboards’ modifier keys. No longer do you need to swap the option and command keys every time you use an external PC keyboard. This alone is reason enough for us to switch.

These days, obtaining music is far cheaper and simpler than it used to be. You can go to the iTunes store, subscribe to a music service; or if you’re one of those twisted deviants of society, you can pirate it. Regardless access to music and information is easy. I think because of this, many of us put far less thought into our music. It’s easy to just download the hits of the moment and not pay attention to who’s singing them, what else they’ve recorded, or finding lesser known gems. The bad (if that’s not bad enough in itself) is that you’re not really identifying and listening to music that you like; but just choosing between what’s presented to you.

What seems infinitely harder now is figuring out what to listen to and try. There are studies showing that if you give a person too many options, they become riddled with indecision. That’s pretty much how I feel that about music now; too much to choose from and nothing to point you in a direction.

Although, the radio isn’t dead… afternoons at home after high school spent listening are. I find myself relying primarily on sporadic conversations with friends. A testament of the inefficiency of this is the fact that I didn’t know who Coldplay was until maybe 4 months ago… and Radiohead I just discovered 2 months ago. (Don’t worry I haven’t been in THAT thick of a bubble. I’ve ‘heard’ their music… and I’m ‘familiar’ with their names.. .but never made the associations between the bands and their songs… okay maybe I am THAT bad).

As is my first instinct with all that troubles me… I looked to Google for the solution. My goal was/is to find a community to share and learn about music. So far in my quest, I’ve come across a few interesting (and a lot of not so interesting) applications. I haven’t decided yet whether or not any of these are the holy grail I’m looking for; perhaps the solution will be to just make it myself.

If you find yourself suffering from the same malady as me… here are the top contenders:

Mercora – http://search.mercora.com/
This is my top contender so far. You can lookup a band/artist/genre, and it’ll return you whatever others out there are sharing. You can listen to whatever you want or let it stream it’s suggestions to you. You can also add friends and see what they’re listening to.

LastFM – http://www.last.fm
This site installs a plug0in to your music player and tracks your listening habits. It generates reports and makes recommendations based on what you listen to.

Pandora – http://www.pandora.com/
This site creates a custom station for you based on an artist/track/genre you specify.

If anyone has anything else they really like… let me know.

So far I’ve managed to get the main posts and comments moved over w/out too much hassle and will hopefully get the rest of the content as well as some handy-dandy new features in soon enough.

 http://www.free60.org

 I can’t wait to see what ppl will be able to do with this thing.