I checked on the Targus website and they do have some pretty nice feminine designs but the bags in the new range were all masculine models. No market for feminine designs? I wonder. Are women not concerned about the bags they carry their laptops in? I asked on twitter and Eevon responded, “the bags either make us (women) look like a messenger or a turtle.” LOL. I do have “turtle” bags and I agree that they will destroy any business image we try to maintain.

Anyways, I had an upcoming trip overseas and I chose one with a simple top-load design to take with me. Actually, I chose the one that looked least masculine. Function-wise, it passes. My laptop and all the other gadgets came home safely. It went through getting tossed around in the overhead compartment and kicked under the seat on a plane. The ergonomically designed strap padding was very comfortable. I have no idea what material was used to make it but it felt like shock absorbers which was great. This is important because a lousy strap padding can make a bag feel twice as heavy. The bag’s material is  soft to the touch and the inside is well padded. So cushy that when I laid it on the floor, my cat hopped on and went to sleep.

Targus didn’t disappoint in quality but maybe one day we will see more stylish and feminine looking bags in various colours other than black.

Hear it from the ladies, do any of you wish there were more feminine laptop bag designs? Example here: http://goo.gl/SKvw (Targus for her).

What you need:
1. A PC (not on Mac yet) or an Apple iPhone/iPod Touch.
2. A credit card
3. An Amazon account. If you don’t have one, register for one. Some Amazon shopping experience will help too. Now who hasn’t shopped at Amazon.com these days?
4. A US address

1. INSTALL THE KINDLE READER SOFTWARE/APP

Installing for the PC:
Download and install the Kindle for PC software.

Installing for the iPhone/iPod Touch:
This is a little trickier. You can only download the Kindle for iPhone app from the US app store. Don’t mess with the account you have right now. Set up another app store account with a different email, a US address and don’t enter your credit card info.

If your app store is in the Malaysian app store, you can easily change that by clicking on the Malaysian flag icon at the bottom right and change it to “United States”.

Now, download Kindle for iPhone app and sync. You shouldn’t lose your information. Once you see the app on your phone, you can log out of the US app store and login to your usual one.

2. Set up your Amazon account to go shopping.

First, use your credit card to buy a gift card that you will send to yourself. The books I buy usually cost around $10-15 so I bought a $50 gift card which should get me 3-4 Kindle books. Don’t log out yet, wait for email. Once the email with the gift card claim code arrives, click on “Start shopping”. This will credit the amount into your Amazon account.

Remain logged in. Go into your account and remove all credit card information. This is what’s making Amazon stop you from getting into the Kindle store. Also change the region or country of origin to the US. If you’re asked to enter a US address, you can use the one above.

Now you’re all set. Click on “Kindle Store” and go shopping.

3. When you’re ready to buy.

Click on “Buy now with 1-click” and tell Amazon where you want the book sent – to your iPhone/iPod Touch or to your PC.

It will come with instructions on how to retrieve the book from the app on your PC / iPhone / iPod Touch.

Enjoy!

BTW, you can leave your second App Store account alone, it may come in handy in the future. I use mine to download other apps that are not available to Malaysians just so I can drool at what I can’t have.

Since my last article on Foursquare vs. Gowalla, I’ve been seeing more folks get on Foursquare.

If you are now wondering what this foursquare thing is all about, here’s the pitch. More info at http://foursquare.com/businesses/

All of you who tweeted with the #yorais hashtag will be sent to prison (including those innocently asking “what is #yorais ah?”) and put on the receiving end of hard labour and a few strokes of the cane, one stroke for each tweet. That will teach you to drag Rais’ reputation through the twitter mud.

Wonder if the PM is in on it or is he having a word with Rais about thinking before talking.

One can only wonder if they had a chat or what in the world possessed Rais Yatim to make a statement like this. In any case, welcome to Malaysia. Hope your stay is a pleasant one. If you need room service, please send a smoke signal.

I’ll admit, I haven’t been a big fan of Foursquare.

I used to like Foursquare until I found out how easy it was to game the system and check-in to places without having to be there physically. In less than an hour I could get 300+ points to put me on top of the leaderboard. The game turned me off instantly.

Another thing that turned me off Foursquare was how long it took to check-in or create a new place as compared to Gowalla which picks up your location automatically so you don’t need to enter the venue’s address. People don’t always give a friend the address to a restaurant, we say it’s behind KLCC or between this place and that place. Who remembers the address anyways. So you take more time creating places in Foursquare than in Gowalla. Foursquare is also quite new in KL so a LOT of places are not on the map.

Talking about map – here’s another problem I have with Foursquare. Even with the address entered, the map can go wrong – placing  the pin in an area you haven’t even heard of or a place you’ll never go to like in the middle of a lake. Unlike Gowalla, you cannot edit the map at all in Foursquare which is really frustrating. I thought the Superuser status would let me fix the map but I still couldn’t do it. Gee, how hard is it to implement this feature? What I can do as a Level 1 Superuser is limited to merging duplicates and closing rubbish venues like “I hate my boss”.

Duplicate venues was the other reason why I found Foursquare messed up. This is also another way to game the system, you can create 5 different Mid Valleys, spelling it slightly different, check-in to all 5 and get extra points to get you closer to the lead in the game. Some guys love that and would often proudly announce on twitter when they become a mayor and what new badges they got. Maybe some of them deserve it.

It’s actually not all bad, there are cool things about Foursquare like its community of people who take the time to leave tips that pop-up when you’re near a venue. The number of people who are doing this to help others however, are still very small. When I see a really useful tip pop up from someone in Foursquare, I always say a silent thank you to the person who left it. This is what makes Foursquare useful. I hope this community of tip contributors will grow.

flickr machine tag

The integration of Foursquare into other services is something I find very exciting. It is integrated into Flickr so you can add machine tags to pictures taken at venues listed in Foursquare. Folks looking at your flickr picture can click on it and be taken to the venue page to read your review/tip or get the address to visit the place themselves. The map can’t be trusted yet and I would also sometimes add “Don’t trust the map” into my Foursquare tips. Foursquare venues and tips are also integrated into Layar as an AR layer. When you pan your phone around you’ll see venues and tips popping into your screen which is pretty cool. I can see my own tips and other people’s tips on what’s interesting nearby. Again, please note that the location map in Foursquare cannot be trusted which means that the locations in Layar are also dodgy. The integration (idea) into other services that I use regularly is what’s making Foursquare engaging to me. So I am taking a second look and going to use it a bit more, together with Gowalla.

I’m not about to forget Gowalla yet but Foursquare is close to making me give it up. Foursquare just needs to improve the venue creation process and make the map editable, not just for superusers but for everyone.  The game is fun for awhile (pretend you’re not hacking it) so it’s nice but not important. Game-wise, I like Gowalla’s better because it’s harder to exploit. The idea of picking up items and leaving something behind for others to pick up is a nice touch. In Gowalla, when you create a spot, you can become a founder by dropping an item. But it also gets very frustrating when you have run out of items to drop, it is a total killjoy. I want to like Gowalla and I’ve given a lot of feedback but it seems to have fallen on deaf ears. I’m now hoping Foursquare can improve further and make it the one and only location based check-in game on my iPhone.

Add me:

On Foursquare: http://foursquare.com/user/thechannelc
On Gowalla: http://gowalla.com/users/thechannelc

9 out of 10 location maps of places I create in Foursquare are off. Here's one example.

Jan 10 Update: There was apparently a January 8 update at the Foursquare blog that I missed. The location finder has improved and I tested it with a location I created this evening and I left the address field empty just to see if the app can track down my GPS location. It did, yay. But it still won’t let me edit the map and fix all the previous venues that have their pins someplace other than where it should be. Give us editable maps, Foursquare.