History of Immigration in US
Main Source: Backfire at the Border by Douglas S. Massey

Promos: Lip Gloss and Laptops and Derek K. Miller

Immigration Concerns and the Fix
Main Source: Willing Workers by Daniel T. Griswold

I send Trucker Tom some more audio feedback and add on to our online conversation. This time I share my tips for life with the iPod and how to maximize iTunes to its full potential.

While iTunes is extremely simple to use there are a few “hidden” features that you can access if you go beyond the surface a little bit. I cover some of those in depth and try to offer some help for newcomers to the wonderful world of the iPod.

Trucker Tom mentioned me in his podcast — TTP #181 and talked some about how companies want to keep folks on the digital “reservation”. I agree and expand some more on that while going into the challenges of cross-platform use.

On the Quicktime front Apple has always gone above and beyond as proven by releasing the PC version of Quicktime 7 a little over a month after they released it for Mac. However, Windows Media Player for Mac hasn’t been updated in more than two years and more than a year after version 10 came out for PC. For whatever reason Microsoft just doesn’t want to get the Mac Business Unit involved in developing Windows Media Player for Mac. Ummm….Redmond, we have a problem!!

Lake County Podcast provides some feedback for Trucker Tom regarding his Podcast — TTP #174. Includes my analysis regarding codec issues for audio and video and who is pushing their own standard.

I know I make one error on this, it is Thomson SA that owns the licensing on MP3 and not Philips. Also, I think some of my son’s vocabulary rubs off on me given the number of times I say “guess what”. Gonna have to work on that.

One other point that got cut up in editing — WMV and M4V are both MPEG-4 Part 2 codecs, WMV is Microsoft’s proprietary non-standard implementation of the codec and M4V is the open standard implementation which Apple supports on the new iPod.

This starts out with a little background on my computer usage over the years as well as an update on why I haven’t had a Podcast in forever. It’s still not a very good excuse! Cheers and hopefully I’ll have more out soon.

Podcast community’s response to Katrina relief
Illinois Tollway — Competitive bidding or not?

Gene interactions in Autism
News Sun vs. Daily Herald in Cindy Sheehan controversy

Mayors band together to fight traffic problems.
West Nile Virus a threat in Lake County?
Area library works with school district on overlapping services.

Six Flags for sale!
Nuclear power a solution to energy crisis?
Genesee Theater – success or failure?

Rant of the Week: Round Lake Beach Super Wal-Mart

All politics is local! Come get the scoop on suburban Chicago local politics from way up north in Lake County, Illinois.