Genuine Curiosity

Author Dwayne Melancon is always on the lookout for new things to learn. An ecclectic collection of postings on personal productivity, travel, good books, gadgets, leadership & management, and many other things.

 

UBrand rocks

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about UBrand - a small business that makes semi-permanent markers that you can use to personalize your luggage, electronics, or just about anything you can stick things to. I mentioned that it provides a good way to make your luggage stand out from the crowd so you can spot it easier.

Well, I just got some UBrand letters and an icon and have applied them to some of my stuff, so I thought I'd post a couple of pictures here and let you know what I think. My first impressions were great - the UBrand stickers look like very high quality items, and they come in a professional package. I decided to put them to use right away.

Luggage marking

My first markup was to apply my initials to my suitcase. I picked a spot for the letters, tested the spacing, then peeled the backing from the letters and stuck them on. That's pretty much it - very simple. The letters feel like they are firmly stuck, and they have a nice depth to them. Since I have white letters on a black bag (my tried & true Briggs & Riley 22" Expandable carry-on) I can easily spot my bag. This came in handy this evening when I was trying to help the bellman find my bag in the bag check room - I just told him to look for the bag with the big, white "DAM" blocks on the side, and he found it right away. Click the thumbnail at right for a bigger picture.

Laptop marking

My other label (a cool, stylized icon of the Earth) was destined for my laptop. Just like luggage, many laptops look alike and I want mine to stand out at the security checkpoint to avoid any mixups.

I have been using bumper stickers but they sometimes tear or get worn. I now have the earth icon applied to my laptop and I think it looks pretty cool. I also feel like the UBrand sticker will last longer than a bumper sticker. Click the thumbnail at left for a bigger picture.

Summary

The bottom line? I think these will be great to personalize my stuff. I also think these will make nice gifts for my traveling friends this holiday season. They have an ever-growing selection of emblems in the UBrand store, and can even make custom ones (in quantity) if you want to provide branded stickers to your customer. Way cool.

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Find stuff locally on your Blackberry

I've written about Samecell a few times here. It's a free utility to let you know when your friends are nearby, based on the cell towers your mobile phone signals are bouncing off of. The application will also use your GPS if it's available to provide even more accuracy. After using it for about 9 months, Samecell has been very stable and has helped me connect with friends when we happen to be in the same airport, at the same trade show, etc.

The folks at Samecell continue to improve and expand the functionality of their cool tool - and the latest addition is a local search function.

With this application, Samecell builds on its knowledge of your location to add smart searching capabilities to help you find points of interest that are nearby. If you travel a lot, as I do, you'll understand the difficulty of finding a particular type of restaurant in an unfamiliar town. Samecell Search is a great way to get the job done - you simply choose a category or keyword, send the results to the server, and you get the results back right away. The results are complete with addresses, phone numbers, and clickable web links.

And, yes, it's also free. Go check it out today. I run both the Samecell application, and the Samecell Search application.

Enjoy!

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GTD - Great Scott!

Scott Karstetter is keeping it real for the Getting Things Done (GTD) crowd.  Here are a couple of examples:

GTD all over the wall

Scott has created (like the one at the right) and aggregated a number of good GTD-related desktop wallpapers to help keep you motivated and enthusiastic throughout the day.  My favorite is the one with the clouds and the workflow diagram, which you can see in Scott's post - that's what currently graces my Vista desktop.

Smart To-Do List gets even smarter

Scott also recently updated his free, Smart To-Do List software to version 1.2, adding more features to help you improve your GTD skillz.  Among the new capabilities:

  • Re-ordering project tasks via drag and drop
  • To-Do list items can be moved between projects via drag and drop
  • To-Do list items can be re-ordered alphabetically
  • An additional filter has been added that allows you to sort the current view by priority. This filter will list the high priority items first, followed by the medium, and then the low priority.

For more info and an overview of the functionality, check out Scott's blog post about the new version.

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Make your luggage stand out

My "Make It Great!" pal Phil Gerbyshak pointed out a company called "UBrand" that makes 3D, self-stick decorations to help you customize your luggage, gear, etc. to make it stand out from the crowd.

I think this is a great idea - how many similar pieces of black luggage do you see on the luggage carousel at baggage claim in the airport? How can you tell your laptop, phone, or music player from someone else's? UBrand provides you with a way to personalize your stuff in a way that reflects your personality. They also sell some professional-looking monogram letters if you want a more dignified look.

Sure, you could use regular stickers, but these are designed to be tough and (as they say) "semi-permanent."

Check them out and see what you think - and if you want a chance (through September 25) to win 3 monogram letters, check out this post at the Business Opportunities Weblog.

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BlueAnt Supertooth 3

An increasing number of locales are beginning to require drivers to use hands-free devices while driving, which prompted me to look for a good in-car Bluetooth solution. I tried a few that didn't work very well, and have settled on the BlueAnt Supertooth 3.

This is a compact, Bluetooth-based handsfree device that attaches to your visor. It comes with two visor clips (to which it attaches magnetically) making it easy to move it between a couple of cars. It is also small enough that you can tuck it in your bag and take it along when you travel. I've even taken it out of the car and used it as a speakerphone for a conference call, and it worked great.

Here are some highlights:

  • The sound quality of this device is very good (you can hear a sample of the BlueAnt's voice quality here), and I've been happy with how well it deals with background noise.
  • The pairing process is very simple and, once you've paired it, you simply get in the car and hear the confirming "Connected to phone" statement from the phone so you know you're good to go.
  • You can upload your phone book into the device and it will announce callers in your address book by name when they call (if the caller isn't in the address book, it recites their phone number to you.). If you want to take the call, you can either press the green button to answer or say "Answer" and it will connect the call.
  • The Supertooth 3 has great battery life -- I've had it for a bit over a month and have had to recharge it once after quite a bit of use.
    • There is a nice power-saving feature built into the unit. When it isn't connected to a phone for a while it will go to sleep and save power; it contains some vibration sensors to wake it up when you get into your car, slam a door, etc. I think this contributes to the battery longevity.
  • It integrates with phone voice dialing on many phones. For example, on my phone (Blackberry Curve), there is a convenience key on the side that I have programmed to initiate voice dialing. When I press this, the voice dial prompts are redirected to the BlueAnt and I can conduct voice dialing from there.
  • In addition to the two visor clips, it comes with a car charger.

If you're looking for a good handsfree device for using your Bluetooth phone in your car, I recommend the BlueAnt Supertooth 3.

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