Review of How to Do Everything with Windows(r) XP, Second Edition (Paperback)

Now in an updated and expanded second edition, Curt Simon's How to Do Everything with Windows XP ably helps its readers to expertly explore all the great XP features, tapping into its power, stability, and user-friendliness. Especially recommended for the novice, How to Do Everything with Windows XP shows how to use new software such as Power Toys, Media Player 9, and Movie Maker 2.

Product Description
Take advantage of the power, stability, and user-friendliness of one of the most popular operating systems ever. Learn about basic system features that will enable you to use your computer effectively and efficiently. Access the Control Panel and customize settings, use mouse and keyboard buttons, operate and maintain hardware, use all the software properly.

From the Back Cover

Take advantage of the power, stability, and user-friendliness of one of the most popular operating systems ever. Learn about basic system features that will enable you to use your computer effectively and efficiently--access the Control Panel and customize settings, use mouse and keyboard buttons, operate and maintain hardware, use all the software properly. Step-by-step coverage will help you conduct office or home tasks more smoothly, but there's also plenty of coverage of XP's many fun features. Create movies, manage digital photos, explore XP Plus! packs and PowerToys, play games, and have a wonderful time learning to get the most from this versatile operating system.

• Get to know your XP desktop
• Install, manage, and remove programs
• Run networks and manage Internet groups
• Play games and use XP Plus! packs and PowerToys
• Create movies with Windows Movie Maker 2
• Play music and videos with Windows Media Player 9
• Use digital photography support and printing features
• Establish a home network
• Optimize, troubleshoot, and find quick solutions

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Review of Podcast Solutions: The Complete Guide to Podcasting (Paperback)

Of particular interest to me were the production and post-production chapters, but if you're interested in starting your own podcast and want to learn the smallest of details without being or feeling bogged down with a lot of information this book is for you.

Geoghegan and Klass are two experienced podcasters who put out high quality podcasts. They take you pretty much step-by-step on how to obtain third-party podcasts (which they rightly suggest you should listen to to learn how others do it), from downloading tools and Web sites of interest. They provide detailed information on the types of equipment you need, from a simple mic plugged into your computer to mixers and other hardware you may wish to have, and how to use them effectively for your podcast. They go into great depth into how to record your podcast effectively by setting levels and using your equipment properly, and how to edit and improve your sound quality, all the while warning you on the little pitfalls that can make your podcast difficult to listen to. They also tell you how to get your podcast on the Net, from registering your own domain and finding hosting (or using services such as Blogger), as well as how to set up the extremely important (to podcasting, at least), RSS feed. You are even given advice on how to make money as a podcaster.

There is also a CD included with a number of excellent trial versions of a variety of software for both Mac (OS X) and Windows which can help you get started in your podcasting venture.

The material plus the CD really make this an excellent, insightful purchase well worth the price of the book. Kudos for Geoghegan and Klass for crafting a wonderful book that will aid the novice (and slightly experienced podcasters like myself) into making well-produced podcasts.

Product Description
Are you the kind of person who's got a lot to say? Have you ever wanted to share your talents, thoughts, and opinions with others, but have lacked the broadcasting knowledge and contacts to achieve such a goal?Well, today it's well within your grasp, thanks to Podcasting - using only some simple recording equipment, a computer, and the Internet, you can record and distribute your own audio shows, including anything you want - comedy, debate, news, reviews, interviews, music - the only limit is your imagination.Of course, you'll need a guide to tell you what you need to know, which is where this indispensable book comes in. Written by two of the best and brightest podcasting pioneers, Podcast Solutions is a shrewd and comprehensive guide to podcasting. From downloading podcasts to producing your own for fun or profit, Podcast Solutions covers the entire world of podcasting with insight, humor, and the unmatched wisdom of experience. In it's 200 pages, you'll learn:

* How to receive podcasts - everything you need to know to find, subscribe to and receive quality shows on your iPod, computer or any other mp3 player.

* How podcasting is being applied in many different industries - entertainment, education, sales and marketing, religious study, intra-corporate communications, and more.

* How to plan and design your own top quality podcast, including expert advice on designing a show built for success.

* How to Set up your "podcast studio," whether you're a casual hobbyist or a committed professional. Includes insights and buying advice on finding the right microphones, mixers, software, hardware, and more to meet your needs and fit your budget.

* The secrets to achieving "broadcast quality" audio for your show.

* How to include music, phone calls and audio feedback into your podcast inexpensively and legally.

* The techniques needed to turn your podcasts into Internet-ready audio files and get them out there ready to be received by your anxiously-waiting listeners, using simple hardware and software tools.

* The meaning of RSS, XML, mp3, LAME, and several other acronyms you thought you'd never understand.

* Insider's tips on creating a web presence that will enhance the popularity and professionalism of your show.

* Secrets of attracting listeners through the creative use of directories, user groups, mailing lists and more.

* How to make money with your podcast by attracting sponsors, advertisers, and other revenue sources.The book contains all this and more. This is the guide to podcasting you're been looking for, and the only one you'll need. It even comes with a CD containing all the software you could need to get started, as well as some professional samples to show you how it's done.

About the Author
Michael W. Geoghegan

Michael is a well know figure among podcasters and has been involved in podcasting since it earliest days. Because he started early, he has developed personal friendships with most of the key figures in podcasting. Michael is scheduled to speak and lead sessions at the upcoming Podcast and Portable Media Expo. He was also the first person to lead introductory podcasting classes entitled "Podcasting 101". Michael is frequently sought for comment on podcasting by media sources such as CNN, Wired magazine, The New York Times and USA Today among many others.

Michael currently produces his own show Reel Reviews - Film Worth Watching which has consistently scored in the top ten among podcast listeners. He recently syndicated Reel Reviews content to DVDtalk.com, the Internet's largest DVD movie review and discussion site. Reel Reviews also currently has paid sponsors. Michael's sponsorship deals represent some of the first for mainstream companies outside the podcasting industry.

In addition to Reel Reviews, Michael is executive producer of Grape Radio, a show about wine that in less than 8 weeks time places in the top ten out of over 4000 available podcast shows. Grape Radio has experienced phenomenal growth and features interviews with leading experts in the wine industry. Michael continues to develop and produce shows aimed at the lifestyle and technology markets. He also offers his services as a consultant to business developing podcasting and portable media strategies.

Michael is widely regarded as a leader in producing quality podcast audio. Many of his online articles on how-to podcast remain some of the most popular and widely linked to.

Michael lives in Newport Beach, CA with his wife and two young sons.

Dan Klass

Klass has worked professionally as an actor and comedian for more than fifteen years, appearing in sitcoms, TV dramas and feature films while performing in venues throughout Los Angeles, including appearing regularly at the world famous The Comedy Store. Recently was the creator/writer/producer/star of NewsPop, an animated series for a joint internet venture between Steven Speilberg's DreamWorks SKG and Ron Howard's Imagine Entertainment.

Throughout his career, Dan Klass has worked as an advertising copywriter, written magazine articles, and worked with developers of interactive video systems for the toy industry.

Klass is currently devoting most of his time to his podcasts, the weekly Old Wave Radio, a retro-80's music show, and the much acclaimed twice-weekly The Bitterest Pill, a comedy/talk show that revolves around his musings as a stay-at-home dad on the outskirts of the entertainment industry. The Bitterest Pill has been featured on NBC, NPR and in USAToday.com and the Christian Science Monitor.

Klass lives in Los Angeles with his wife, two kids and two Macs.

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Review of Everything Is Miscellaneous: The Power of the New Digital Disorder (Paperback)

One of the central ironies of David Weinberger's new book, "Everything is Miscellaneous", is that a book about classification is bound to suffer from classification problems. Reviewers and bookstore owners are inclined to think of David as a business writer because his previous books - The Cluetrain Manifesto and Small Pieces Loosely Joined - were profoundly useful in helping businesspeople understand what this World Wide Web thing was really all about. But it's a mistake to consider David's new book solely as a business book.

Which isn't to say that reading Everything is Miscellaneous won't help you make a buck in world of Web 2.0. It probably will, as the issues Weinberger explores are core to any business that deals with information and knowledge... which is to say, virtually every industry you can think of. But "Everything is Miscellaneous" is also a philosophy book. It's about the shape of knowledge, and how moving information from paper to the web changes how we organize and how we think. And this means that Weinberger's book crosses from territory like Wikipedia and Flickr into Aristotle and Wittgenstein.

This would be a dangerous path for a lesser author to take, but David grounds his explorations in examples and interviews that are, as Cory Doctorow puts it, wonderfully miscellaneous. We bounce between the lives and ideas of taxonomers past - Linneaus, S.R. Ranganathan, and the wonderfully strange Melvil Dewi - and the librarians and software developers who are making sense of today's digital disorder.

At its heart, the book is about what happens when we liberate knowledge from the world of atoms. In the physical world, we can only organize books on a shelf in one way or another - books can't be in multiple places at once. Frequently we find ourselves reduced to ordering information in arbitrary ways as a result - AAAAA Towing Service gets more business through the phonebook than Mike's Wreckers through the unfairness of alphabetization.

Adding a layer of metadata to the physical world helps somewhat - card catalogs allow us to put multiple pointers to a single physical location so we can file a single book on Military Music under both "Music" and "Military". But card catalogs pale in comparison to the wonders of "third-order" metadata, the sorts of organization we're capable of in a digital age. A book listed by Amazon can be filed in any number of categories. It can be annotated with reader reviews, added to reading lists, enhanced with tags or statistically improbable phrases. The "card" in the card catalog can be larger than the book itself, and the full text of the book serves as metadata, as the book itself is searchable.

Weinberger argues that the fact that we tend to organize data in terms of its physical placement has consequences for how knowledge works. We tend to think in Aristotelian terms - objects are members of a categories, and share the same traits as other members of that category. We can organize these categories into trees: a robin is a bird, which is an animal. We can expect the leaves of trees to share the attributes of their branches, and we expect each leaf to fit onto only one, specific branch.

But that's not knowledge works in a digital age. When I bookmark a [...] it's to my benefit to add many tags to it, both because it makes it easier for me to find it again, and because it helps other people find it as well. Weinberger advises us to "put each leaf on as many branches as possible", building a tree that looks more like a hyperlinked pile of leaves.

This suggestion, along with advice to use everything as a label, to filter only when we need outputs, and to give up the idea that there's a "right way" to order things, serve as a roadmap for how to build tools and services in a digital age. But the magic of Weinberger's book is that this practical advice is also an invitation to explore categorization, language and knowledge itself. If knowledge is a pile of leaves instead of a tree, how does the shape of our knowledge change?

It's questions like this that make "Everything is Miscellaneous" deceptively deep. One moment, we're thinking about how we organize photographs in shoeboxes or on our hard drives, and a moment later we're asking whether we understand "shoebox" in terms of definitions, family resemblances or exemplars. It's a little like drinking a mojito - smooth going down, but deceptively powerful, and slightly staggering when you get up to buy the next round.

I've read the book twice now, and am looking to my third pass through it. Weinberger has done something rare and admirable here - he's written about a world I thought I knew well in a way that makes me realize that there are innumerable depths and implications left to explore.



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