Yeah, I was one of the many people who was a little upset that Motorola would only say that the 2.1 update for the Droid would be “soon”.  Fortunately, one of my co-workers showed me DroidMod a little less than a month ago and I was able to root my phone and flash it .  The DroidMod version is not the full feature set that is available on the Nexus One, but should be all the features that will be on the official one for the Droid such as live wallpapers, new gallery, new weather/time app, 5 panels, etc.

So, if you are impatient like I am, here are the instructions:

http://forum.droidmod.org/index.php/topic,73.0.html

I’ve downloaded a lot of music over the years but even I get sick of hearing the same songs over and over again on my iPod.  I generally can’t stand morning radio since it’s mostly talk (other than the Eric and Kathy show on 101.9fm from back home in Chicago – but obviously, I can’t listen to that show away from my computer and it’s not on all day).  So how do you get to listen to songs that you actually like, with limited talk and commercials, and that you can listen to while you on the go?  Enter Pandora.

Pandora is a different kind of internet radio.  First off, it’s free to sign up.  Although you can upgrade for a paid version to get rid of commercials (but I find they are few and relatively short so I don’t find them annoying) and a few other perks.  Unlike other internet radio sites, you can create your own personal stations.  You simply start out with choosing an artist or a song that you like.  Pandora then plays that artists and also recommends songs from other artists that are similar.  How does it know what to recommend?  Well, in a recent article I read in WSJ Magazine, Tim Westergren, the founder of Pandora, said, “We try to break down every dimension of a song to its most basic building blocks – like melody, harmony, rhythm, instrumentation, vocal performance.”  Basically they map the DNA of the song and thus can predict what you might like based on the common elements.  Plus, with each song, you can rate it as a thumbs up or thumbs down so that Pandora can continue to learn which songs to play on your station.  Sound cool?  The free version also has a limit though in the case you may not dislike a song but may want to skip it – they only over 6 skips in an hour.

But what about when you’re on the go?  Well, if you have either an iPhone or Android phone at least, you can download their app for free.  As long as you have internet service, you can listen to it just as you were sitting at your computer at home or work (obviously, you are going to need an unlimited data plan since you will be streaming a lot of information).  I’ve found that it doesn’t really drain the battery on my Droid that much either if you keep your screen inactive.

So what stations do I have currently going?  I have one for the Muse (related bands: the Strokes, Coldplay, the White Stripes, Oasis,  Keane, etc), one for Jimmy Eat World  related bands: Smashing Pumpkins, Dashboard Confessional, Incubus, the Killers, etc) and one which I used Madonna’s Like a Prayer as the start (plays a lot of 80′s music).

I don’t know how much of an issue this is for most people but I thought I would write about it anyways since it came up with my sister.  Anyways, netbooks are definitely growing in popularity.  They’re really small, cheap and basically fit the needs of most people.  I, personally, think they are a better purchase then getting the TamPod, I mean, iPad.  One thing about netbooks is that they don’t have a CD/DVD drive.  Don’t think that limits you to do anything.  My sister recently asked me if I could get her a copy of Microsoft Office and save her a couple hundred dollars since her new computer only came with a trial version.  I just happen to have an MSDN subscription so I can download pretty much all the latest and some older stuff from Microsoft for free and with more licenses than I would ever use just for myself.  The only bump was that I had to download the program as an .iso.  If you don’t know, that’s the format of a disc image for a CD/DVD.  Usually, I would burn that image onto a CD and execute from there but I obviously couldn’t since she didn’t have a CD drive.  So what did I do?  First, I downloaded the .iso file onto her USB flash drive.  (It’s amazing how cheap you can get these things now for plenty of space – and they’re so tiny!)  Then, I downloaded a program called PowerISO.  Basically, what this program allows you to do is create a virtual drive on your computer and mount the .iso file to it.  When you go to your “My Computer”, it looks just as if you actually have a CD drive installed and can run the program right from there.  The program is free as a trial which if you’re just extracting and mounting files then it’s fine.  The only thing you would want to purchase the full program for is if you were planning on creating an image over 300 MB which most people aren’t (plus, there are other free programs you can use for that too).

I’m sure many of you have had the situation where you wanted to send something to a friend or family member (such as photos, music files, video,etc.) but couldn’t because most personal and work email systems cap attachments to no larger than 5 MB.  Well, there are a couple solutions available to help you to get around that.  These are the few that I’ve tried so far (and were free).

WeTransfer

This service is web based and allows you to send up to 2 GB.  While it does not require registration, you do need to enter the email address of the person you are sending the file to since that is how they are going to receive the message and instructions to download the file you’ve just sent them.  You also get a confirmation email when the person has successfully downloaded the file.  Files are kept online for 2 weeks and file and email information is supposedly kept private.  You can have up to 20 receivers.  Obviously, the emails kind of limit the range in which you can share a file but will serve most people’s needs.

FileDropper

This was another service that is also web based and does not require registration.  However, it allows you up to transfer files up to 5 GB.  You don’t need your friend’s email address since you just upload your file and it gives you the URL for you to hand out to whoever to download the file.

If you do want some more robust services such as the ability to track your files, password protect them or mark them as private, you can register.  They offer a free 7 day trial and then after that, the prices range from $.99 to $10 a month.

Obviously if you are looking for more security, tracking abilities, or something closer to online storage, there are more free and paid services you can check out.  Alot of them are covered in this recent article from CNET:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-27076_3-20000133-248.htm

I’m sure many of you are already signed up for this, but if you’re not and you live in a [major] city where they offer their services, you should definitely check out Groupon.  So what is Groupon?  This video explains it best.

Learn How Groupon Works! from Brad Chmielewski on Vimeo.

I was surprised when I went to embed this video that I actually know the motion graphics animator who made it.  For those of you who have read some of my earlier posts, you may recognize his name (Brad Chmielewski) because he co-hosts a video podcast with my friend, Ken, called the Hop Cast (yes, this is the specific episode that I got a shout out).

Anyways, back to Groupon.  I’ve seen some pretty cool offers for things like golf lessons, spa deals, restaurants/bars that I already go to, events, etc.  Probably the most interesting thing that came out of signing up for Groupon is that it has introduced places that I didn’t know about or  things that I never thought about doing previously but they seem more appealing to try because the risk has been reduced.

I found this on ESPN.com.  It’s kind of depressing but I found it still pretty interesting.  It not only shows you the amount of time it would take you to earn that athlete’s salary but depending on what sport he/she participates in, what it would mean for them to earn your salary.

ESPN Athlete Salary Crunch