This comes to you via a wi-fi connection in Detroit airport, where I’m sitting in a lounge waiting for a flight to the CES show in Las Vegas. I’ve just had a long chat with a friend, but it wasn’t in person or on the phone. It was using the audio chat facilities in iChat – we were chatting by instant message and I suddenly thought, “This is ridiculous – why am I typing?” I’ve always been impressed with the sound quality of the built-in microphone on my elderly Powerbook – the only problem is that it’s close to one of the speakers so there tends to be an echo on the line back to the other end. But since I never travel without my iPod, I had some headphones with me, which I plugged in and everything was splendid. If anyone else in the lounge thought that the fellow in the armchair was having a strange conversation with his laptop, they didn’t show it….
Convergence
January 5th, 2004