Podcamp AZ is (one of) the best social media conferences on the planet and this weekend is PCAZ Number 3! I can’t even express how amazing this event is and if you have any possible way to attend, you NEED to come! Don’t worry though, I know this is short notice and if you are not going to be in AZ, you can watch the live show featuring most, if not all of the speakers, their topics and some great virtual communication. Please join us this weekend and expand your knowledge, share some ideas and engage in the awesome that is Podcamp AZ! It’s gonna blow your mind!

One of the great examples is Picturesque. Picturesque is a great application that does simple editing of pictures, without any advanced knowledge, such as that required to run Photoshop, while still enhancing your photographs at a near professional level.

Another offering is Wiretap Studio. WireTap Studio is a fantastic application if you would like to create a podcast. With wiretap it is possible to capture a skype call in order to do interviews without needing a massive setup. I could go on and on about all of the apps offered, but I think you need to see them for yourself. Simply go to and check out all the applications you get for $39.00. Just remember that there is a time limit, as of this writing there are only 12 days left, as an additional incentive, 25% of the price goes to charity. Now you can’t beat that, you get some great software at a great price, while contributing to charity.

Did I mention that all the applications are FULL versions, not trial or shareware. I can’t stress what a good deal this is, so hurry over to macheist.com and get yours, but remember only 12 days left.

It’s the day after Thanksgiving here in the United States, do you know where the deals are?

The Big Deals

• Apple – Apple’s kept the word mum on their Black Friday sale so far, but you can see Apple’s past Black Friday deals via MacRumors. Apple discounted the iMac, Macbook, iPod Nano, iPod Classic, iPod Touch, and AppleTV modestly.  It’s expected that the macs will recieve discounts up to $100, and iPods & accessories will see some discounts as well. If you’re shopping for the best deal at the Apple Store, be sure to check out the Refurb/Special Deals section, which provides deals year-round.
• Amazon – Amazon has a whole section of their site devoted to the Black Friday sales, including 50 MP3 Albums at $5 each, a $47 Logitech MX Revolution, a 30 1TB Western Digital Internal HD30 1TB Western Digital Internal HD, and of course the whole line of Apple Products.
• MacMall – This authorized Apple re-seller is selling macs at great deals, where you have up to $994 off Macbook Airs, and $1094 on Macbook Pros – not all of the deals apply to the current line of Macs, so be sure to check out what you’re buying!
• Drobo – Drobo’s got a holiday promotion going on,  where you can get a 4TB Drobo bundle for $949, or a 2TB Bundle for $699.

More Coverage:

• CNET Holiday Help Desk – Live Call-In show for Holiday Shopping questions from 8AM – 6PM PST

Hey all… I’m going to the New Media Expo with the Viddler crew. We’re going to be handing out a bunch of t-shirts with our logos to promote Viddler’s new “brand yourself)” campaign. I will also have a few regular iBAM tees with me to give away as well.

I will have a very limited supply of iBoughtAMac/Viddler (brand yourself) tees and a few regular iBAM tees… So if you want one and you’re gonna be there at NME, be sure to let me know (via the comments) and I’ll be sure to hold one aside for you.

Be on the lookout for my “as random as always” NME videos over at the NME Videos site. You can post videos there as well if you tag your Viddler videos with “newmediaexpo2008″ or “newmediaexpo”.

See you at NME!

It’s official! The iBAM Book site is up and running and the project is in full swing. What is it, you ask? Well… the idea is to put together a cool coffee table “type” book featuring picture after creative picture of “you and your Mac”. We all love our juicy little bundles of joy so why don’t we show it off to the whole world in our true creative style? If you are a photographer, this is a great way to promote yourself by creating a collection for inside the book. If you’re an individual with a picture of you and your Mac, it’s a great way to promote yourself or whatever you want. Meet new people, be creative and all in all, just have some fun with some of the coolness that we can do with the Internet today. Photo submission deadline is October 1st, 2008 so stop by the site, take some pics and get your Mac on!

This is all for community and fun so if you don’t mind, help me spread the word. Blog it, tweet it, pownce it, digg it, scream it or do whatever you can to help make this little book idea into something great. it’s all about YOU!

Thanks in advance!

Brent

DIGG THIS POST

There’s a new Twitter app on the streets, it’s called TwitterFone! It’s pretty simple but it’s backed up by some freaking awesome technology. In a nutshell, TwitterFone makes it possible to “tweet” through Twitter without having to type or text anything. You just talk and it transcribes it for you and posts it to your Twitter account.

TwitterFone launched this last week (May 6th to be exact) and has had over 15,000 signups in the last 4 days thanks to some really cool people helping promote the new service. I caught Pat Phelan (the idea guy) on the road and even got a chance to ask him a few super quick questions about the new startup. Here’s how our little convo went:

A little about the team/service from you.

Four board members Pat Phelan, Florian Seroussi CEO Celtrek, David Marcus CEO Zong/VOX telecom, Ivan MacDonald and Sean O Sullivan founders of Dial2DO

How did you guys come up with the idea?

I came up with it for a safety reason, texting is insanely dangerous whilst driving or even walking, speaking a tweek is so much more comfortable.

It hasn’t even been a week, are you surprised with the boom?

Blown away, 15,000 sign ups, it’s been perfect!

Have you had any challenges?

Obviously the translation engine has been difficult to get right, we scraped the top 1000 words every day for a month and this has been extremely helpful.

What are your plans for the future?

More countries… We own the TwitterFone urls for Japan and are closely examining that option, for the close future, add more countries, that’s it.

I have been playing with TwitterFone a little bit today and I’m really impressed so far with it’s mad voice recognition ’skills’. It got my name, punctuation and only missed one word (that I kinda slurred a little anyway.” Check out my tweet here.

TwitterFone is currently in private beta (invite only) so if you’re not in, you have to stand in line. However, Pat was very gracious to grant me 2 invite codes to jump 2 lucky readers to the front of the line and get them in. So here’s what we’ll do…

All you gotta do is comment on this post and I’ll draw two email addresses at random from the comments and send them the invites. I will announce the winners in 48 hours, that’s Monday night (May 12th) at 5pm PST. Then I’ll send out the invites and we can move on with our lives. So, on your mark, get set, go!

Thanks again Pat for taking the time while traveling, iBAM is eternally grateful! (maybe we can get some more invites later if we’re nice or something?)

What are Pixel Pals? We’re glad you asked…

Pixel Pals are those bold, brave and beautiful individuals that have joined the ever coveted ranks of the iBAM support staff. Through their simple donation they have earned a spot in the Pixel Pal Hall of Fame conveniently located to the left in the sidebar of iboughtamac.com. This prestigious placement has given them a right to hold their chin high, shout aloud to the world “I Bought a Mac!” and have a deeper sense of self worth and personal satisfaction.

Are you one of the elite few that dare to grace the depths of the sacred sidebar? If you dare to dream the extreme, then all you need to do to be a part, is pop on over to PayPal and add your name to the list (with your $15/month donation – It’s how we pay for hosting of this colossal beast we call iBAM). All that’s left at that point is to send us your 16×16 favicon image (PNG, JPG & GIF only please) and we’ll put you in the ranks to the left. Just remember, we reserve the right to accept or deny who we choose as well as limit the ranks to as many as we see fit.

Still have the courage? Then you may proceed and our sincere thanks will be eternally yours!

I’m in the mood to meet more friends on Twitter. So, I decided to make it a little more fun. Here’s how it works: Everyone who adds me or promotes my page somehow via Twitter today (November 19th, 2007 *see update below, we’re doing it again today – the 20th) will get dropped in to a random drawing for a $25 iTunes Gift Card. I’m more curious than anything as to how fast information can travel through Twitter and what-not. Call it a social media experiment or something. I have no idea what will happen, but… BRING IT ON! (haha)

Here’s a tip: Want to meet new Twitter friends too? “track iboughtamac” and see what I see today.

Another tip: Use TwitterSearch to find the tweets if you can’t use “track”

*Update: I pulled Justine’s tweet out of the hat this morning so she won. Let’s do it all again today!

A couple months ago I was conversing via Twitter about having another contest for a .Mac account I have just sitting here. Tonight, I was playing around in Photoshop again and started making some wallpapers. I put the two ideas together and thought, “how about a wallpaper design contest for this .Mac account?” Now, I’m a sucker for a great wallpaper and I’m pretty sure I share that feeling with just about every other Mac user on the planet. I know I’d love to have some spiffy new wallpapers and I’m sure you would as well. So I’m thinking this would be a great excuse to get our greasy mitts on some fresh, new eye candy. The I thought, to make it more fun, I’d open up the judging to everyone this time. Here’s how the contest will work:

Design a wallpaper (at least 1680×1050 for MBP’s) with any theme/style/color/etc at all. We’re looking for ultra cool and creative here so have fun! Here’s a couple suggestions, but you don’t have to adhere to them at all, just consider them ideas:

• Apple Theme
• Use the iBAM Logo
• 3D is always cool
• Stunning Photography is nice
• Put “iboughtamac.com” somewhere (sweet!)

Zip up your submission and email it to me: hello [at] iboughtamac.com and I’ll post it here on iBAM with a vote box in the post so everyone can rate it on a scale of 1 to 5. The winner will be based on the number of votes as well as the highest ratings. (We’ll come up with some nifty calculation thingie if we have to.)

We’ll close this contest off in 2 weeks (October 5th, 2007)

Okay, now remember… YOU are all the judges on this one so when I post a new wallpaper, help spread the word so we can get the most votes possible. I’m really excited to see what you come up with so, bring it on!

I’ll also make some calls over the next couple weeks to see if I can sweeten the winnings pot a little too (no promises though). Also, I’m not sure, but since this .Mac account is still in the box and shrink wrapped, if you don’t want it, I’m pretty sure you can exchange it for store credit (that’s $99), but don’t quote me on that, I’m not sure of the Apple policy on this sort of stuff.

Okay, I’m done! Happy wallpapering!

I heard this from several sources today and confirmed it myself. For some reason DivX Pro is free for Mac today. One of the most popular video codecs out there and free! Had to spread the word, so get on over there and get your plugin!

Other Resources
Not every cheap web hosting service offers dedicated servers on their dsl line, and startlogic is one of the very few that does.