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I’m a wannabe Gadget Geek

Nudjit, a new South African gadget website, was launched this week by local gadget geeks Gregor Rohrig, Justin Hartman and Nicholas Haralambous, and as many people have pointed out, a much needed niche in the local blogosphere. As other bloggers have mentioned, this is something I have thought of time and time again, but have failed to do anything about it. I have added this one to my reader and can’t wait for many more updates :)

On the Nudgit website, the guys let us into why they claim to be gadget geeks, by sharing a list of the gadgets they use. Interesting additions include a iPhone, many Camera Lenses and even a Gameboy.

Being a self confessed wannabe Gadget Geek, I thought I may as well share mine too :

Laptop
Fijitsu Siemens AmiloD Pentium 4 3.20GHz (Time to Upgrade)
Windows XP
Cellphone
Nokia E50

Camera equipment
Canon 400D
Tamron 70-200mm Lens

Mp3 Player
iPod Nano 8GB

GPS
Garmin Nuvi 200
Garmin eTrex H

Gaming Consoles
Nintendo Wii
Dance Mat for my 3 year old (R149 from Reggies)

Link back to this post and share your list of what classifies you as a Gadget geek.

February 5, 2008
A new kinda fun

I have recentley found myself addicted to a new hobby. Geocaching. After I bought my Garmin Nuvi 200 at the end of last year, I wanted to use it for more than just driving around. So I signed up on Geocaching.com, which is a really great site, that lists all the geocaches around the world.

Well, what is a Geocaching ? Straight from the Geocaching website:

Geocaching is an entertaining adventure game for gps users. Participating in a cache hunt is a good way to take advantage of the wonderful features and capability of a gps unit. The basic idea is to have individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the internet. GPS users can then use the location coordinates to find the caches. Once found, a cache may provide the visitor with a wide variety of rewards. All the visitor is asked to do is if they get something they should try to leave something for the cache.

So armed with my Garmin Nuvi, I have set out and so far found 3 geocaches, hidden in and around my area. The Nuvi 200 isn’t the ideal GPS device for this hobby, but it does work. The Nuvi 200 is an “automotive GSP”, which will direct you to the genral area, but viewing the actual GPS coordinates, is quite tricky. I have put up a post on GPSBlog.co.za on how to use your Nuvi 200 for geocaching.

I have also since managed to get my hands on a Garmin eTrex H, which is a hand held GPS, that allows you to get right to the cache. This really helps when it comes to getting to the actual spot of the cache, and directs you in the correct direction as well as giving the distance to the cache.

This is a really exciting hobby, and with loads of these hidden spots all over, you will be greatly surprised how many are right around you without even knowing. Sign up on the Geocaching website to join the fun.

February 5, 2008
Buy and Sell CO.ZA domain names – www.selldomains.co.za

Christopher Mills from iMod has just released a great new site, called SellDomains.co.za that allows you to Buy & Sell any domains you have lying around not being used.

Given that my recent foray into the world of Domaineering, this site provides a great alternative to parking unused domains, and can make you a few bucks quickly.

The site is really simple to use. Firstly sign up, and it add up to 10 Domains to sell. You can also subscribe to a premium account that will allow you to add more. You can also browse through other users domains that are up for sale. One of the great things is that the actual transaction is not done through the site either, which means there is no 3rd party transactions being handled.

So, if you have any spare domains lying around, go and register and make yourself a little extra pocket money at www.selldomains.co.za

January 25, 2008
Welcome to the Twecosystem

Over the last couple of months, Twitter has grown in leaps and bounds. Even in South Africa, we have had quite a good growth of Tweeters joining the Twecosystem. (OK, excuse the Twit Jargon…Twecosystem ©Rafiq)

But there seems to be a growing trend amongst Tweeters worldwide not using the system as it was intended. People seem to be using it as a chat system to talk between each other. It can sometimes really get annoying when all you see is one worded irrelevant replies being posted.

Darren Prowse from Problogger has written a brilliant post about how to use Twitter and how to promote your blog using Twitter. I highly recommend this article, as it explains Twitter in great detail.

One of his suggestions to curb the noise generated in on Twitter is to use direct messages:

Learn to Use Direct Messages

“If your reply tweet ratio is out of balance in that you ‘reply’ too much a good way to combat the problem is to consider using direct messages. My own approach to this is that I almost always publicly ‘reply’ to something that someone has Tweeted the first time – but if the conversation continues I’ll take the conversation to ‘direct messages’ after the second or third reply unless I think the conversation has something of value to my wider following community.”

To use direct messaging on Twitter you need to do the following:

“d username message” eg. “d marcforrest great post :)”

I’m sure by using this method there will be far less noise in the Twecosystem, and lots more topical conversation

January 24, 2008
Wii Sports Disc Cover

As you may know, with all new Wii consoles you get a free disc called Wii sports. The problem is that the disc is not packaged in a Disc case, and is easily damaged. Solution. Buy a DVD cover box from your local computer or stationary shop, print out the Wii sports cover from CDCovers.cc, and you have a fully packaged Wii Sports Disc Cover.

To download the Disc Cover for Wii Sports click on the image below.

January 21, 2008