The 100 mile Giro di Peninsula is in the books! The last fifty miles made for a tough day in the saddle, but the ride overall was fun. Jorge, Richard, and Stephen are absolute beasts on the bike; they are so fast and have so much endurance. They will have no problems conquering the five passes that make up the Death Ride next month. Her’e’s the KLIMB profile for the route. I made a mistake at the beginning, so there’s a little extra mileage on top of the 100-miles.

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The July meeting for the Camera Owners of the Bay Area (COBA) user group will be held on Wednesday, July 11, 2007, in Cordura Hall 100 at Stanford University from 7:30-10:00 pm.

Agenda

19:00-19:30: Sign-in and mingling period
19:30-20:15: SmugMug
20:15-21:00: Photography with Camera Phones
21:00-21:30: Monthly Assignment: Fourth of July

SmugMug

SmugMug is a popular digital photo sharing website based in the Bay Area. Founded by a father and son duo in 2002, SmugMug has developed quite a rabid following among photographers around the world, thanks in part to excellent features such as unlimited storage, secure backup, no ads, and fantastic customer support.

Markham Bennett, the SmugMug’s Director of Business Development, will present an overview of SmugMug. He will discuss what makes SmugMug different from all of the other photo sharing sites out there, what SmugMug offers to amateur and professional photographers, and what SmugMug sees ahead for its future and the future of digital photography.

Photography with Camera Phones

You might not take your digital SLR everywhere you go, but you certainly take your cellphone. More and more mobile phones today come with built-in cameras. In the meeting, we’ll discuss how camera phones have contributed to citizen journalism and the latest techniques for getting your images out from your camera and onto your computer or the web.

iPhones, Treos, and other camera phones will be on hand at the meeting.

SmugMug Monthly Assignment: Fourth of July

It’s that time of the year again. Crack out the BBQ grill, your fireworks, and your camera! This month’s assignment is the Fourth of July and Parks. Head out to the park or your backyard and take some great photos. We’re looking forward to seeing your best at the meeting!

But wait, there’s even more reason to be participate in this month’s assignment. One lucky COBA member will get a free 1-year Pro account subscription on SmugMug for having the best photo of the group!

Only new photographs taken from the previous meeting date to the next meeting date will be accepted.

Note: If you already created your monthly assignment on the theme PARKS, that’s fine too!

I couldn’t resist. I got an 8GB iPhone today at the Valley Fair Mall. There was still a sizeable line at the store. Man, Apple must be breaking some kind of record for sales of a consumer device today. This reminds me of the Halo 2 launch a few years back or the Wii frenzy just a few months ago.

Time to activate and play a little bit… here are some photos from Valley Fair:

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This from Engadget:

Valley Fair Apple Store, 12:50PM PDT - The line here’s pretty deep — runs around the corner, into a huge area, and then outside into the street, next to where the huge UPS truck is parked. The Woz is here! (Believe it or not, he’s #1 in line.) We’ll be chatting it up with him shortly.

Well, let’s hope that Valley Fair store has a stockpiles of iPhones in the back room! If not, I may be waiting a little longer to get one.

So here we are, less than 8 hours away from the iPhone madness that will descend upon AT&T and Apple Retail stores across the country. No, I’m not standing in line posting this blog entry, nor do I anticipate going to a store until at least 5:00 pm. Members of SNUG and SmugMug, along with blogger Robert Scoble, are camping out at the Palo Alto store. Don and the gang from SmugMug apparently bought pizzas for everyone last night. Diggnation and other media companies are also hanging out at the Palo Alto store, making the Valley Fair Apple Store not the place to be tonight — unless perhaps you actually want to get one!

I read a report saying they will have 1 million iPhones for the launch today. That’s a lot per store, so I don’t anticipate there being any shortages, especially with another 2 million in the wings.

Those free iPhones that Jobs gave to Apple employees yesterday? Very generous and smart of him. A company has to eat its own dog food. Having all employees as iPhone — and AT&T — customers is a perfect example of this.

So, the big question is will I get one today? I have been waiting for this day for a long time, but now that it’s finally here, I ask myself if the urge is still strong? The price of the 8GB iPhone isn’t an issue for me — I paid far more for my Newton MessagePads in the past (and before taking inflation in account). The way that I rationalize not getting it is by telling myself, “It’s not like you don’t have something that can do roughly the same thing as today.” My current phone works now, and it’ll work tomorrow. Then again, if I get close to a real iPhone, the lure of precious might become too much for my rational mind to handle!

Even if I do get one, it’s not like I’ll have a lot of time to use it. I’m off tomorrow morning at 6:00 am for the Giro di Peninsula, a 100-mile ride through the Bay Area. The Death Ride beckons, and it’s its call that I’m answering!

Unlike AT&T stores, Apple Retail stores will allow customers to purchase two iPhones on Friday. The stores will also be open until midnight. Just how many iPhones have been produced for the launch and how many will each store be getting? Staying open until midnight seems to imply that supplies will be plentiful. It would be bad if the store sells out at 7:00 pm and people and employees are left milling around for the next several hours, no?

The original Newton MessagePad came with a getting started VHS videotape. An eight-minute long video, the tape described Newton’s features and functionality and provided some tips and tricks to getting the most out the handwriting recognizer. Watching the iPhone’s keyboard video tutorial on the web made me nostalgic. Thanks to the power of YouTube, I was able to find the complete Newton Getting Started video. Fast-forward to the four-minute mark and compare the differences — and similarities — between iPhone and Newton.

Walt has reviewed the iPhone and gave it a fairly positive rating, calling it a breakthrough handheld computer.

We have been testing the iPhone for two weeks, in multiple usage scenarios, in cities across the country. Our verdict is that, despite some flaws and feature omissions, the iPhone is, on balance, a beautiful and breakthrough handheld computer. Its software, especially, sets a new bar for the smart-phone industry, and its clever finger-touch interface, which dispenses with a stylus and most buttons, works well, though it sometimes adds steps to common functions.

Check out more reviews from David Pogue, Steven Levy, and Edward Baig.

The hype machine continues to reach higher and higher levels as we get closed to the Friday launch. It must be at 12 by now!

There are over 170 Apple Retail stores and 1,800 AT&T stores across the country that will be selling iPhones. Apple’s goal is to sell 10 million iPhones by the end of the year of 2008. With any large-scale introduction of an ultra-hyped product, there’s always a mass frenzy at the start. Let’s assume that Apple wants to sell 1.5 million iPhones on the first day. That translates to over 750 iPhones per store. Granted, all stores are not created equal — some will get more, some will get less. Still, if Apple’s production lines have been pumping out at capacity, that’s a huge number of iPhones that will be available. Even if the total number of units available is cut in half, there’ll be 380 iPhones per store. Any way you cut it, that’s a long line outside an AT&T store or Apple Retail Store on Friday afternoon!

So here we are, just three days away from the iPhone’s release in Apple and AT&T stores across America. People are already starting to line up in New York, and I bet someone will soon be camping out in front of the Palo Alto Apple Store — assuming there’s no one there already. My current plan is to go to the Valley Fair Apple Store in the morning when the mall opens and ask the employees what the line strategy will be throughout the day. If you hadn’t heard, Apple intends to close its retail stores at 2:00 pm (instead of the previously reported 4:30 pm time) to prepare for the 6:00 pm release. Though it would be nice to get the phone on Friday, it’s really no sweat if I have to wait a little while longer.

I’m glad that the price differential between my current plan and the iPhone plan isn’t that great. $20 extra a month is better than the extra $40/month I were to add a data plan to my Blackberry. The iPhone’s better browser and native sync support means I’d get more use out of the phone than I do currently. The free PocketMac software for the Blackberry just blows.

I’ve been getting a lot of questions regarding the iPhone and how it relates to Newton. Is the iPhone the successor to the Newton? Is it the iNewton? I wrote back in January that “if anyone can resurrect the spirit and functionality of Newton, it’s Apple.” That quote might work for Newton-fanatics around the world, but it has no meaning at Apple. Publicly, Apple doesn’t care about resurrecting anything from its past; today, it’s always looking towards the future. For them, the iPhone isn’t the second coming of a product that they canceled nearly ten years ago. Rather, the iPhone represents a historic first stake in the redefinition of the phone.

More thoughts to come as the countdown continues to iPhone mania on Friday!