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Response: Which iPhone to Get?

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In response to my iPhone musings, I got the following reader email which actually sums up a lot of my second and third thoughts too: You might have a point about the fancier camera, but otherwise I would buy the smaller model. Its screen is about the same size as that of my Nexus 4, and I don't feel at all like it limits me with a too-small screen. But I do sometimes stretch to get my thumb the reach to the other corner of the screen. It is plenty big for a phone. A phone is a pocket thing. (Well, in my case it lives an ancient REI soft sunglasses case that I have on my belt.) Ubiquitous, handy, convenient, almost always with me. Small is crucial for all of that. Certainly a large screen is cool, but you need a place to put it: don't break a fundamental feature of a pocket phone by getting too big. That is what your small tablet is for. I have my phone with me almost always. I have my Nexus 7 tablet with me nearly as much. The bigger screen is great, yet it fits in some...
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Sony GV-D200 review

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Sony GV-D200 I've been using a Sony GV-D200 deck to transfer old Video8 and Hi8 tapes. Some of these tapes are over twenty years old, and no longer having a Hi8 camcorder that worked I was concerned that if I didn't do something about transferring them to a more modern format soon, I might never be able to. While Sony no longer make camcorders that use these tapes - that I know of - Sony does still sell the GV-D200 deck (or Video Walkman, as it's sometimes labelled.) They also offer the GV-D800, which is almost identical but adds a small LCD screen for about $120 more. I didn't think I'd need a screen since I was using this to capture to the computer, but you will need an external monitor when you first set it up. Physically, the device is small. At 5 7/8" wide, 5 3/8" deep and 2" high, it's the smallest video deck I've encountered. I used to have a Video8 deck that I thought was small; and it was twice as deep and twice as high. The t...
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David Mamet: Do one thing for your art every day, and one thing for your business

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For the past few months, ads for MasterClass.com have been following me around the web. Somehow they figured out I might be interested in their content—I must have clicked something—and I've had their ads popping up all over the place on different sites. That's annoying. But... While most ads I tend to be able to ignore, they managed to suck me in. And I'm here to report that some of their stuff is pretty good. For those not familiar, MasterClass offers online "classes" with different prominent people in the arts (and even a fews sports figures and others.) Presenters include: Annie Leibovitz, deadmau5, Aaron Sorkin, Hans Zimmer, Steve Martin and David Mamet. These classes are all in the same format; a series of short video lectures by the presenter, each of the individual lectures being anywhere from about 5 to 15 minutes long. There's also a workbook provided with each course, that includes highlights from each lecture. Though I don't re...
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