Jason Schramm » Conventions

R.I.P. DigitalLife

Jason Schramm — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 02:08:30 +0000

Around this time each year I should be in NYC being accosted by gadget sellers. But unfortunately that is not to be; DigitalLife was canceled for this year. They didn’t think they could put a good show together so they gave up and turned it into a gaming event. I sure will miss it. I will especially miss that Napster booth from either last year or two years ago. The nicest thing was having my very own tech convention on the east coast.

Digital Life 2007: How I met Darryl “D.M.C.” McDaniels

Jason Schramm — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 15:53:20 +0000

The M-Audio booth was kicking with Johnny Juice of Public Enemy DJing and Darryl “D.M.C” McDaniels from Run DMC was there signing autographs and then gave a performance from his upcoming album. It was absolutely great, and while I still don’t know exactly what M-Audio does I did get a picture with D.M.C. and recorded a few videos of the performances. So check it out. And look at the picture of the software Johnny Juice was using to scratch. Very cool.

Update: M-Audio makes computer-to-analog hardware for music producers, USB inputs for microphones, and midi interface devices. Or so I’ve been told.

The audio isn’t the best but it’s very watchable. This is what came from my little Pentax Optio A20. You get to hear one of his new songs, and then one you will definitely remember. It was just amazing. If the camera moves around it’s being my arms were getting tired or I was trying to ignore an excruciating cramp in my foot. The things I do for my audience.

Darryl “D.M.C.” McDaniels: new and old (Walk This Way) music at Digital Life 2007:

Digital Life 2007: the State of Swag

Jason Schramm — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 00:57:38 +0000

So today was the first day I could finally make it out to Digital Life with my press pass. Unfortunately I didn’t wind up with much swag (free stuff). There were some shirts available but I either kept missing out or wasn’t going to spend half an hour waiting on a line when I had meetings to get to. Hopefully I will be getting some things to review shortly. And I did get a full version of MemoryMixer to play with and review (easy digital scrapbook making). So here’s a picture of the sorry state of swag for today. More articles coming tonight about what I saw at Digital Life.

Digital Life 2007 Coverage Coming

Jason Schramm — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 15:43:30 +0000

JasonBlogs.com will be covering Digital Life 2007 this year. And this time I was able to get a press pass. So look for some great coverage next weekend (since that is when I am able to attend).

It looks to be a great show. There are a lot more great presenters this year. And iRobot will be showing off two new home robots. So hopefully I will be able to see it all in two days. It’s a shame I have to miss the press-only stuff.

And if Pentax is reading: I could always use an upgrade from my current Pentax A20 camera. *hint* *hint*

DigitalLife 2006: Pictures

Jason Schramm — Sat, 14 Oct 2006 17:36:38 +0000

I just put up the pictures I took from DigitalLife 2006. There aren’t nearly as many as last year, but there are plenty of pictures of the only Nintendo Wii I could find in a plastic case at the ATI booth. Apparently the only playable Nintendo Wii’s were at the press-only event.

DigitalLife: imeem Wii Contest

Jason Schramm — Sat, 14 Oct 2006 16:56:08 +0000

imeem is a social networking service that combines instant messaging with sharing. You can post videos, music, photos, blog, and more. It’s all about communities or “meems,” and rating what people share. And of course you can embed the content anywhere you want.

imeem is running a contest for the best rated picture taken at their photo booth at DigitalLife. All you need to do is sign-up with imeem and then rate my picture highly. The winner gets a Nintendo Wii and I want it badly.

DigitalLife Here I Come, Again

Jason Schramm — Fri, 13 Oct 2006 02:14:33 +0000

It’s that time of year again. When “consumers” flood the Javits Center in New York City to get a glimpse at the latest gadgets and games. It will be my second time attending the event and I will be blogging about it Friday night into Saturday. A few of the items I am excited to check out: Nintendo’s Wii (I hear Sega has a few playing their new Sonic game), Ask.com’s booth, the newest games, and the new PepperPad. I also plan to hit-up all of the iPod Nano giveaways. Last year I didn’t win a PSP; this time I’m back with a vengeance.

DigitalLife ‘06 Free Tickets

Jason Schramm — Sat, 23 Sep 2006 20:43:14 +0000

Digital Life is a great convention where you can check out the latest technology and games. I went last year and had a blast, and I’m planning on returning this year. Last year I was able to check out the Xbox 360 and their games, along with some cool booths from the likes of NewEgg and PC Magazine. This year looks to be even bigger according to what I have read and the list of exhibitors I have seen.

The event is from October 12-15 in New York City at the Javits Center in New York City. You can get a free ticket online now that is good for all four days. Just go to the ticketing page and enter the code “INSIDER”.

I’m specifically impressed with their marketing efforts, since I had already heard of the “INSIDER” code and used it. I just now found out that it’s all coming from a PayPerPost.com listing intended to promote DigitalLife (which I plan to collect on). Good thing I already know how great it is and planned to go. I will of course be blogging whatever I find out and posting plenty of pictures.

NOTE: this is a paid ad, but I would have been posting about it anyway if I didn’t see this offer. I only post about what interests me and what I have experience with.

Comic-Con: Pictures

Jason Schramm — Sun, 23 Jul 2006 20:25:55 +0000

I put up a web album with pictures from my visit to San Diego and Comic-Con 2006. You can check them out here. Hopefully this will tide you over until I can get a few posts up on Monday detailing Heroes, Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny, Snakes on a Plane, and a generic post or two with everything else I encountered. I have some more pictures that I may put up later on from the trip, but they are of a more personal nature.

Comic-Con: What I Would Have Seen

Jason Schramm — Sun, 23 Jul 2006 02:00:42 +0000

Plans for Saturday have been up in the air for a while, and just when it seemed I would be going it turns out that Comic-Con has closed both onsite and online registration for today. But if I had gone here’s what I would have seen:

Kevin Smith discussing Clerks 2. Although I’ve already seen him before and I plan to see Clerks 2 in a few days anyway. I’m a fan of the original Clerks and other Kevin Smith films, namely Chasing Amy and Dogma, and I will let you know what I think of it when I see it.
Marvel talking about upcoming movies based on their franchises, including Iron Man which I am eagerly anticipating. I would have found out from Jon Favreau that the villain in Iron Man will be Madarin, the man with the powerful rings. So be prepared for May 2, 2008. (Sources: 1, 2, 3) Each source says the same thing and I have no idea which one it came from first, or if it was another source entirely. I try my best folks.
The latest news on The 4400, including Jordan Collier return. And if I could have also gotten a press pass I would have been able to ask them questions for an hour before their public panel. I’ll print up some business cards and rectify that in the future.
Spider-Man 3 news and promos with special guests Tobey Maquire, and Kirsten Dunst. Venom was confirmed as the third villain in Spider-Man 3. Bruce Campbell was also confirmed as having a cameo with a new character (though that character’s name was not released). And check out the two press roundtables online: Tobey, Kirsten and Sam, Topher, Thomas and Bryce.(Source: FirstShowing.net)
Ghost Rider goodness with Nicholas Cage and Eva Mendes. This is something I am upset about missing and a movie I am waiting for. Wizard Universe has some good coverage of the Ghost Rider panel at Comic-Con so check it out here. SuperHeroHype also has this great post that details the two scenes shown to Comic-Con attendees. The movie opens February 16, 2007.
And lastly, but certainly not least, that the voice of Optimus Prime in the forthcoming live-action Transformers movie will indeed be that of the original Optimus Prime voice actor Peter Cullen. (Source)

I will be posting Sunday and Monday like I mentioned before, and I will put up a gallery with my pictures from Comic-Con. The things I do for my adoring public. I couldn’t make it to Comic-Con today but I hunted down the details so you don’t have to, but you can if you want. Peace out.

Comic-Con: Initial Experience

Jason Schramm — Sat, 22 Jul 2006 04:57:18 +0000

As my inaugural Comic-Con experience draws to a close I wanted to recap a bit of what I saw today. The exclusive 72-minute Heroes pilot was amazing. I saw a short clip/trailer for Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny and it was awesome. Attendees were blessed with an exclusive 10-minute clip from Snakes on a Plane that will not be seen anywhere else until the movie comes out. And Samuel L. Jackson is still one bad ass mother f-er.

A few full-er length posts will be coming within the next few days, along with plenty of pictures. Each point I made above will be expanded upon, along with a few other random details from The Con. Oh, and Ali Larter is as hot as ever.

Comic-Con Here I Come

Jason Schramm — Thu, 20 Jul 2006 04:32:17 +0000

It appears that I will be attending Comic-Con in a few days. I plan to take plenty of pictures and notes to write up some posts. The key areas I plan to cover are The 4400, KyleXY, Fallen, Spiderman 3, and finding any celebrities I can. If I am able to make it there on Friday I would also be covering the new show Heroes and possibly Snakes on a Plane with special guest Samuel L. Jackson. It should be very exciting and I hope to have some good stuff to report here.

Feel free to send me any questions to ask or information to find out.

Update (7/20): It looks like Friday is a definite and Saturday is a possibility. I will be attending as many events and booths as I can.

Digital Life: Pepper Pad

Jason Schramm — Mon, 24 Oct 2005 02:57:29 +0000

The Pepper Pad from Pepper Computer is a remarkable portable device designed for the broadband activities you want to do most: browse the web, e-mail, instant messaging, listen to music, watch videos, play games, view slideshows of your photos, and control your TV. It runs on Linux 2.6 and includes a browser that uses the Gecko rendering engine which Firefox is based on. The Pepper Pad has a 20GB hard drive and built-in Wi-Fi support for 802.11b, WEP, and WPA-Personal. It also has Bluetooth device support and Dual IR emitters and IR receiver. The screen is an 8.4″ 800×600 SVGA TFT LCD that is ideal for viewing most webpages, along with 16MB of video RAM and 256MB of SDRAM memory.

User input is done through a resistive touch screen with stylus, a full split QWERTY keypad, a direction-pad, and a scroll wheel. These features combine with a powerful system and an intuitive interface to create a very rewarding experience. The remote control features allow you to pick a room and then choose the device you want to operate. The Pepper Pad can quickly be turned into a digital picture frame and touching the screen brings it back to the regular mode. There is even integration with the Flickr photo sharing service to upload your photos easily to Flickr from the Pepper Photo Library.

This rugged, splash resistant device weighs in at only 2.3 lbs and has a 3.6mAh Lithium ION rechargeable battery. Pepper Computer has created a device that is not just the combination of a PDA and a Tablet PC. It is a carefully designed work of art. They thought of everything when they designed the Pepper Pad; its ease of use and comprehensive feature-list make it an attractive buy for all levels of computer users.

Buy the Pepper Pad Internet Media Player on Amazon.com

Digital Life: Maxtor OneTouch III Turbo

Jason Schramm — Mon, 24 Oct 2005 02:47:58 +0000

The Maxtor OneTouch III Turbo Edition comes in two flavors: a 600GB version and a 1TB version. Both feature RAID 0 right out of the box, with the option of setting up RAID 1. It’s designed for professionals and it has a sleek, industrial design. It supports FireWire 400, FireWire 800, USB 2.0 and USB 1.1 for fast data transfers. The drives are preformatted for Mac and can be easily formatted for Windows. You can even boot Mac OSX directly from the drive.

While the drive may look nice and it has a large capacity, the price-point seems a bit steep. At $899 for the 1TB version it should also do my taxes. But then again, I’m not the professional they are targeting. At least the drives are stackable.

Digital Life: Xbox 360 Wired Controller

Jason Schramm — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 23:48:33 +0000

The Xbox 360 controller is a well-designed and produced item. It’s very similar to the original Xbox controller, but it has a smaller and easier-to-handle design similar to the S-controller for the original Xbox. While visiting Digital Life I found out that the wired Xbox 360 controller has a standard USB connection that can connect to a PC. The photo here is of me holding the Xbox 360 controller before playing the King Kong movie game on a PC. I lost the game, but the experience of both the game and the controller was a win.

The Microsoft rep at Digital Life did not know if there will be a way to connect the wireless controller to a PC. If not then this leads me to wonder why people would want a wireless controller, when the wired controller can connect to a PC. It’s a trade-off between compatibility and freedom of movement. I might want the Xbox 360 controller even if I don’t get an Xbox 360.

Digital Life Tomorrow

Jason Schramm — Sat, 15 Oct 2005 06:42:09 +0000

Tomorrow I will be attending Digital Life, and hopefully I can get some good photos and news to report. I missed out on the first day, but tomorrow should prove to be much of the same. It would have been nice to be at the Xbox 360 keynote, but Nathan should have some reports soon. The Xbox 360 looks like it is shaping up to be a really big deal, as long as they can ship enough on the launch date. No other console developer has attempted to launch globally on the same day.

Digital Life Tomorrow

Jason Schramm — Sat, 15 Oct 2005 00:42:09 +0000