LaLa.com: A Better Alternative to iTunes

Several years ago, I tried out iTunes and really enjoyed the experience. I came from a Winamp background and really liked having a fast loading application. On top of that, I am a computer geek, so I already know where all my files are on the OS filesystem.

Anyway, after using iTunes for a little over a year and hundreds of songs purchased later, it was starting up slower and slower. Updates to Quicktime/iTunes was coming a little too often-- practically every time I started up the program, I had to download an update... which was quite annoying. Overall, the program was getting bloated on my Windows XP machine. So I uninstalled and switched back to using Winamp. It was fast and now also offered a music library for managing songs.

As good as Winamp is, it doesn't solve one problem I as a geek have. I use multiple computers to get my work done. One at work, several at my apartment, and even several at my parents house. I don't want to drag my music/files everywhere I go just to listen to it. (I'm a big enthusiast for Cloud Computing).

So I came across this post on 20somethingfinance.com (one of my favorite financial blogs) on LaLa. I started using it and I'm loving it!

Here are the main highlights/advantages for using LaLa:

• You can play entire songs over the web, free
• It's a social network for music lovers, so you can get recommendations on similar music/artists
• Songs are cheap: 10 cents to add to your playlist, 89 cents to download a DRM free mp3

I have yet to try this, but supposedly if you already have a song on your computer, you can get it on your LaLa playlist for free.



Try out LaLa

Now, I'm not saying this is a complete replacement for iTunes/Winamp. If you are playing music on the go and disconnected from the Internet, you'll still need a music player application. This is just a awesome service for when you are connected. Give it a try, you get 50 free songs to add when you sign-up.

The Future (Calvin and Hobbes)

My sister sent me a link to this picture today.



Links:

• calvinandhobbes.com

Tropicana's New Logo Design

This morning I had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, toasted. It was delicious. Along with it I had some orange juice (OJ), but not just any OJ, Minute Maid OJ.



For years I've been more of a Tropicana OJ kind-of-guy, but with Tropicana's somewhat recent logo switch on their cartons, I just felt compelled to switch.

The reason? I just don't get why they changed their logo.

What they had before made sense (see left carton). An orange with a straw in it. Simple and refreshing. And don't think I didn't notice the green leaf that's still attached to it. If that doesn't convey fresh, I don't know what does.

Their new logo (right carton)... I don't know what that's supposed to be. It doesn't register in my mind as any kind of orange icon or flavor. It's generic and boring looking.



I like my OJ pulp-free. Notice how Tropicana's old logo, the text of "No Pulp" is easy to find, top and middle. Look at Minute Maid's logo, "Pulp Free" is right under it! Both so simple!

When looking at Tropicana's new design, I see their logo running sideways on the right with a lot of white space on the bottom right, not to mention an orange curve running up the left of the carton. "Pulp Free" is located in small text on the top left. My eye is not drawn to it at all.

If I can't easily find out if it's pulp-free or not, why would I spend time looking through a poorly designed carton of orange juice? Hence my switch to Minute Maid.

The Vending Machine at Work

This is my vending machine at work. I happen to like Reeses Peanut Butter Cups. I don't have a sweet tooth, but it's the only snack in the entire machine I would buy.

Can you see what's wrong?



It's behind a 100 Grand, one of the worst pieces of candy in the entire machine. I haven't enjoyed a 100 Grand since I was a kid, which is probably the age of the candy since everybody knows it's stale and gross.

I don't understand why the guy who restocked the machine would do this. WHY? There are other empty lanes. Why mix a different product with another? Especially one that doesn't sell well with one that does (I should know, I polished off the last of the Reeses Pieces earlier this year).

I got a Roomba for Christmas

For Christmas 2008, I got a iRobot 560 Roomba Vacuuming Robot, Black and Silver as a combined gift from my sisters and their boyfriends. I must say, that this is the best Xmas gift I've ever received other than the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), around 1988-1989. Which was 20 years ago... wow.



The Roomba actually does a pretty decent job of cleaning my apartment. My apartment is about 620 sq ft and mostly carpet. It cleans the top layer of dirt pretty well and it removes most visible pieces of dirt. Here are the other things I've noticed with it:

• Battery only strong enough for one round of cleaning before requiring a recharge.
• The room(s) generally needs to be clear of wires and other furniture with any kind of ramp, since the Roomba seems to work best on flat surfaces.
• The dirt container needs to get cleaned out after each cleaning.

Otherwise I'm pretty happy with it. I got rid of my Dirt Devil vacuum as I will no longer vacuum my place by had ever again. Hrm, I just noticed that vacuum is both a noun and verb.