In case you weren’t aware, AT&T recently discontinued their “unlimited” data plan and introduced a tiered model.  Under the new model, they’re offering 200MB for $15 a month and 2GB for $25.  People with the existing unlimited plan will be able to keep their unlimited data plan.  The stated reason for this was to require heavy users to pay more for their impact to the network.  According to AT&T the “heavy users” take up around 2% of their customers.

While this sounds like a solid idea in theory, AT&T is facing a pretty substantial backlash.  People see the unlimited option being taken away and instantly cry foul.  Since you can remain grandfathered in on the unlimited plan, the users AT&T are looking to control with this pricing will not be impacted.  They can just continue to use as much data as they like for $30 a month.  So the net-net is AT&T gets negative press AND they don’t fix the problem they were supposedly trying to do.  From a marketing perspective, this was a really bad move.

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I admit, the switch to the iPad 3G data plan a month after release does stink a bit of “bait and switch”.  Part of the draw of the 3G data plan was that you could stop and start it at any time and get unlimited data for $30.  They’ve now changed their pricing.  This seems unethical and leaves a bad taste in my mouth towards AT&T.

Realistically though, I will most likely switch to the $25 a month plan, since according to the usage statistics on my phone, I have used a total of 1.5GB of data in the past year and my on my iPad, 300MB this past month.

I have no problem with the changes they made, it just really should have been handled better.  I expect a little bit more from the marketing department of AT&T.  They’re supposed to be professionals.

I just finished building Maryanne’s new computer.  It has 2 things that Maryanne enjoys…nay, demands in her electronics.  It is little and shiny.

check out the keys on top for scale

I have to hand it to the folks at Shuttle, they make an excellent chassis.  The video card was an extremely tight fit, but managed to fit in.  Now she has a new system that’s much faster than her older system and about 1/4 the size.

I didn’t post the stats of said box (which has been dubbed “Starbuck”) because Maryanne really doesn’t care that it’s an Intel quadcore system with 4GB of RAM and 896MB nVidia GTX260 .

I’ve been trying everything I could do (short of spending $2500 on a new DSLR body) to work around using a flash indoors.  I did learn a lot about experimenting with ISO and exposure as well as some interesting photoshop techniques, but it still wasn’t working out how I wanted. I finally broke down and decided to buy a fairly basic Canon Speedlite.  The difference was instantly noticeable.

Click the picture for more of this series

I was happy with these results since one of my self created rules about learning to be a better photographer was that I would not try to spend my way through it.  So far, so good.

Ok, I couldn’t resist the bad pun. I just finished watching season 2 of Dexter and I have to say I am impressed. For the uninitiated, its a show about a man who works as a blood spatter analyst for the Miami PD. He also happens to be a serial killer whose “victims” are murderers who either “beat the system” or haven’t been investigated yet.  It’s an interesting premise that has the potential to go extremely wrong.

What the show does right is focus on Dexter and his interpersonal relationships and not on the actual killing part.  Sure there are crime scenes that have bloody evidence, but Dexter’s killings get very little camera attention.  The moments of Dexter’s “dirty work” tend to be much more psychological.  Think shower scene in Psycho.

Instead of blood and guts, what the show brings is an interesting insight into this character who is effectively a “wooden boy” (to quote Dexter) as he goes about the day to day routine of trying to fit in to society.  I think that might be part of it’s charm.  I think we all have those moments where we have to put on a public face.  Luckily for most of us it’s just pretending to be interested in inane things at work or “smiling and nodding” at the person behind the counter at the DMV.  The character of Dexter is so expertly played that you find yourself easily empathizing with him.  It’s also an extremely sad part of the show too.  Partially because the entire cast is rock solid.  He is surrounded with funny and endearing people in his life.  To watch him struggle with trying to create feelings for people he knows intellectually he should care about is a little heartbreaking.  Sure we’ve all dated someone in the past a tad longer than we should have and forced ourselves to think we still cared.  Imagine you had to do that with your friends, family, significant other.  It’s fairly sad.

But as we all know, “sad is happy for deep people.”

What I discovered tonight (as I stayed up far too late watching and even further too late writing) is that over the course of the 2 seasons I have watched the show has really shaped up to be an extremely subtle dark comedy.  Sure there is a lot of blatant dark humor in the day to day activities, but the overall story line is a bit on the absurd side.  Absurd and brilliant.  The way season 2 wrapped up had me covering my mouth in order not to wake the house up with my laughter.  I can’t wait to watch season 3.

• A word of warning though…there are some rough parts of the show.  I asked Christy if she had seen it and she informed me that the episode she watched had some really disturbing things going on.  Unfortunately dearest Christy picked the absolutely harshest episode of the 2 seasons I have seen to watch.  Beginner’s luck, I guess.  Folks of a sensitive nature should definitely avoid the show.   It’s probably on par with the more graphic cop shows you get on TV.