To many average citizens Obama has yet to bring hope and change but to UCF Fans, the NCAA conference shake up has. UCF fans should be excited that change means getting into a BCS AQ Conference – which could happen as soon as today. And with that change UCF should reach higher, ‘reach for the stars’ if you will. UCF is the 2^nd largest school in the nation, has arguably the 3^rd best sports facilities in the state behind UF and FSU, has the 2^nd best public school academics in the state behind UF and most of this growth has happened in less than a decade. Back in the early 2000s state education leaders realized UF and FSU were not going to be able to grow much bigger. They were landlocked and there were tens of thousands of smart students graduating high schools that needed higher education. They decided then UCF would take a bulk of that increase with USF taking the next tier of overflow. This state has talent. Talent that has helped UCF grow and land it on the big stage. UCF will continue to grow, its stature nationally is growing, and with it it’s time for UCF to think bigger.

Imagine UCF in another decade. It’s hard to imagine given the torrid pace of the last decade. It’s akin to how Americans felt in the 1950s before we landed a man on the moon.  Perhaps UCF’s first logo, the Citronaut, is more appropriate for the mission were are undertaking now. UCF has taken a formerly sleepy Citrus town to the moon and now it’s shooting for Mars. With that momentum, we should create more traditions, think like one of the big boys, and bring a new coach into town to lead our program to the top of the Big East. With today’s hopeful bid UCF will join Houston, SMU, Boise State, Air Force and Navy as new members. Even without Pittsburgh, Syracuse, and West Virginia, the Big East is strong. It has some of the largest TV markets and with the new additions is adding the 19^th biggest (UCF), 5^th (Dallas), and 10th (Houston) largest television markets. UCF will finally be playing a full schedule with teams we have heard of.  And, after this season, it’s time for us to get a coach we don’t mind hearing about.

Our other goal while we reach for the stars should be growing our traditions. Where is our Gator Growl? We have Spirit Splash- the best student homecoming experience in the state. But, it’s not realistic to think many 50+ year old alumni are going to be jumping in the reflection pond. It’s not going to happen and besides the reflection pond is beginning to look a little small compared to our student population. It’s time for a tradition that will fill Bright House Networks Stadium or at least the UCF Arena. It’s time for an event like Gator Growl. UCF is in the big leagues now, an AQ conference, it’s time for us to create a big league tradition.  Our time is now. GO KNIGHTS!

A lot of pundits from East Carolina and elsewhere have been trying to voice their opinion on Big East expansion. ECU has fans trying to get them back in the picture. Denny O’ Brien posted this scathing article about why ECU is better than UCF and Memphis. I won’t argue with Memphis, that’s the Big East’s call but I will defend the honor of my chivalrous Knights. I’m not sure if Denny’s still upset that Skip Holtz also thought Florida was better than ECU when he left the Carolinas for USF or if he simply is looking at it from a Pirate-centric point of view. Let’s also not forget their own Athletic Director, Terry Holland, essentially took them out of the running with his public rant about the Big East’s “bunker mentality”.

There are many reasons that UCF is attractive to a BCS-AQ Conference. UCF has had success in Conference USA, arguably more success than ECU given its relatively short time in the league in comparison to ECU. Denny references head-to-head records but UCF has had the better success overall in the conference. Skip Holtz was the Pirates shining light on the football field. Now he is gone. I won’t go into the talent that UCF has produced including Dante Culpepper, Asante Samuel, Brandon Marshall, Kevin Smith, Mike Sims-Walker (Ok, I will go into that). I’d rather focus on what’s important to the Big East and for that perhaps Mike Bianchi, an Orlando Sentinel sports writer who has not always been kind to the black and gold makes the best case. In October, he stated that with UCF “the Big East would be getting the biggest public university located right in middle of a football-fanatical state that is considered one of the foremost recruiting hotbeds in the nation. It would be getting a school that is clearly investing big money in its football and basketball programs and plays in the 19th-ranked television market in the country.” That’s not to mention that Florida is the fourth-largest state in the country. The Big East already has USF and by adding UCF it strengthens its foothold in a hotbed of football talent and with a large and growing fan base that is ready to devour Big East football.

Central Floridians aren’t the only ones who realize the advantage of UCF in the Big East. Another Big East school, UCONN, had some positive reasons why UCF should be in the Big East- 13 Reasons UCF should be in the Big East. Two of the big points to highlight-

UCF could be the largest school in the nation and has more room to expand beyond that if it wanted to. It is extremely hard to get accepted into UCF. It is the second hardest public university to get into in the state of Florida behind the University of Florida. I’m not sure ECU can make that same claim in North Carolina. Academics should be a big part of this equation and UCF has focused first and foremost on its academic reputation. UCF just happens to be good in sports too. With the growing fan base and interest in UCF sports, we have seen the facilities grow as well with the new UCF Arena, the new 45,000 seat Bright House Networks Stadium, a new softball complex, and the only Division I indoor football practice facility in the state, etc etc. As the alumni base gets older and wealthier and increases interest in the Central Florida area this growth will increase. This would benefit the Big East.

A point that Denny O’ Brien makes in his piece would carry some weight if it didn’t strengthen UCF’s case. He stated “consider the number of eyeballs that pay attention to East Carolina in the Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham, and Tidewater Virginia markets.” Last time I checked, Orlando didn’t have a local NFL team like Carolina does with the Carolina Panthers that play their football in Charlotte. That leaves the weekends primarily to college football in the 19th largest television market. Orlando will watch UCF football. Especially UCF football and basketball in the Big East. UCF could also lay claim to interest in adjacent areas in Florida. Not only will Orlando watch UCF but alumni in Tampa, southwest, and southeast Florida- where many of the 53,000 students come from- will as well. I have previously served as UCF’s Southeast Florida Alumni Chapter Chairman and I know from personal experience that South Florida is home to one of the the largest and most committed UCF alumni networks outside of Central Florida. There is a market there for UCF football. By having both UCF and USF in the conference, a strong rivalry will be built that will be watched nationwide and the Big East will strengthen its brand and reputation all across Florida.

UCF is poised to be in a BCS-AQ conference. ECU may be too. That’s not my call and based on my points above they are not positioned ahead of UCF. Maybe Memphis but I’ll leave ECU and Memphis alone to debate that.

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I was a buyer for Target Corporation and I know a good business deal when I see it. Panasonic has been able to secure Avatar 3D as an exclusive with their blu-ray hardware. A great idea for Panasonic but a bad outcome for consumers. They will not be able to get their hands on the 3D version of Avatar unless they buy a Panasonic Blu-ray player or pay a premium on ebay for it. I’m not for this type of manuever when it comes to movies. I’m a huge movie fan. I want access to Avatar 3D. In fact, I’ve been putting off purchasing the regular Avatar blu-ray disc (affiliate link) because I want the 3D version. I don’t think this is a good movie for consumers or home theater enthusiats. I don’t think this helps build consumers affinity for Panasonic. If anything, they feel resentment towards that brand. One movie is not going to make me purchase Panasonic products. I’m a Panasonic fan. My home theater projector is a 720p Panasonic Projector. My television is a 50″ Panasonic PZ800u plasma. I have 2 Panasonic blu-ray players. However, I didn’t purchase any of them because they had an exclusive disc bundled with them. I purchased them because they had great reviews and they were supposed to be good quality. I think this ploy by Panasonic will backfire and I hope other brands don’t try the same thing in the digital age. I believe those tactics may have succeeded in the past but are failing in the new 2-way assymetrical communications world of today.

Google is trying to be the first company to go mainstream in tying the internet and tv together. Others like boxee, Apple TV, Roku, etc, have tried but have not gained mainstream acceptance. This could be revolutionary, bigger than the iPad. This could connect the internet with people’s home theaters alonging revolutionary advances in consuming media on HDTVs.

However, I see a potentially huge stumbling block. The old institutions that won’t want to be usurped by Google. The big networks- ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, etc- and electronics hardware manufacturers who have already invested heavily in their own propietary video streaming devices. The google system, based off android, will probably not be compatible with many of those devices. Google will be able to get some of them onboard but like we saw with blu-ray, its a fragmented industry with old alligiances and rivals.

I have already started to stream media throughout my house using Windows Media Center, a Windows Home Server, and mControl. I’ll do a follow-up post on that in the future. But, its not easy to setup and high-quality live streaming TV is not its strong suit. Hopefully, Google will be able to make huge inroads in both regards. I wish Google the best because I have been waiting for the day when getting media from the internet becomes easier and better quality.

According to engadget, movie studios are looking to raise prices on movie rentals to $20-$30 per new release when they are purchased online. I have a question for the movie studios, how many customers do you think you will get at that price? That’s fine if you are going to display the movies online and don’t expect big usage numbers. However, if you try to take up a channel on Directv or cable channel with movies at that price point, you will fail. You will alienate customers and movies will go the way of the CD. How many people are buying those now?

I read this scary article today about the unhealthy U.S. banking sector and it got me thinking back to the bailouts which I vehemently opposed.. Consider the housing bubble & credit crisis in the U.S. as a giant balloon. The balloon was about to lose all its air but the U.S. government and banks worldwide pumped more air into the balloon so it wouldn’t lose all its air. Now, will we find out that that air is too much and the balloon is really going to burst this time? The real question is, though, is the U.S. govt powerful enough to keep the balloon from bursting and can it slowly let the air out in time for other pillars of the economy to take hold and reform the new world economy?

I am of the school that you don’t artificially inflate the economy like the U.S. and world leaders did with their series of bailouts. Essentially you are playing a shell game moving money around or printing more of it. The best case is that the excess money will slowly trickle out of the economy or new innovation can pick the economy it up. Otherwise, a more devastating financial disaster will come along b/c you pumped artificial money into the economy. I would argue it would be better to have let the economy deflate back in 2008 and let it pick itself back up instead of a patchwork set of bailouts that have yet to show that they are working.

I read a report from engadget today that said Best Buy was putting items in their weekly circular advertising that were higher than regular prices. Why are you surprised? I used to be a buyer for large retailers and we knew for years Best Buy advertised non-sale prices with good success. I imagine they are having even better success since Circuit City is no longer in the picture. I am a silver rewards member at Best Buy (I buy a lot of tech products, what can I say) but I prefer to buy using online sites where you can find better deals. I especially like Amazon (affiliate link), Tiger Direct, Newegg, and Ebay. Those are the first sites I check when looking for a tech item at a good price. I’m also a big fan of slickdeals.net and fatwallet.com when searching for deals. I encourage you to check those sites when looking for online technology deals.

The Apple iPad has become part of my mobile life and my prime tool for media consumption (except for movie watching, I still use the home theater big screen primarily for that) and web browsing as I am sure it has been for the legions of early adopters that have purchased their iPads. CNET recently wrote an article about iPad app fatigue. I, too, am disappoined by the lack of apps. It was actually the #4 thing on my list of what the iPad was missing. Many bloggers have already mentioned the lack of flash on the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch. I’ve previously mentioned my stance on that. Lack of flash is not my #1 gripe. My #1 gripe is the lack of Facebook chat. The iPad offers a great Facebook browsing experience using the “full” Facebook site using Safari. Where I disagree with the CNET article is that the safari browsing experience on the iPad lacks the ability to chat. A major miss.

Now there are workarounds. The pixelated iPhone facebook app can be used. However, it doesn’t take advantage of the iPad screen real estate. Users can use this link to access chat only. Make sure to have another window open with Facebook for it to be used. However, you can’t see the rest of the Facebook site. It’s only good for chat. facebook desperately needs to come up with an app that takes advantage of the iPad.

As I said, the iPad has become my gadget of choice for web browsing and unfortunately I haven’t used Facebook chat very much since I purchased it. Friends, my apologies. I will find a way to work in more Facebook chat to connect with you. And, I’ll be lobbying in the blogosphere for a better solution.

iPad, margaritas, and sun tans. Who would have thought those three would have gone together well? I’ve tried out a lot of mobile devices outside in the past few years so that I can enjoy the outdoors while satisfying my appepitie for technology. Until the iPad, I hadn’t found a good solution. Most mobile phones are not optimized for outdoor use. Ever try looking up a phone number in your car in the summer? If so, you know what I mean. I’ve used my iPod Touch with marginal success but the small screen size isn’t my favorite screen to use when I am home. I’ve tried using multiple laptops outside and they also don’t work well. The ones that have worked better get extremely hot quickly. That can’t be good for their techno health. Now, we have a solution. The Apple iPad. I can say it’s the best solution I’ve found. And, I’m writing this post while sipping on a margarita, watching my dogs run around, and catching a tan. After a couple hours outside, the iPad is as cool as ever. It doesn’t heat up much and nowhere near how much my Gateway laptop would heat up outside. I have the iPad on my lap and I can’t notice any extra heat coming from it. I would never attempt to have any laptop on my lap outside. The heat would have been too much for me. To add to the list of titles that I have already bestowed on the iPad, it is the ultimate outdoor enjoyment device.

Andy Ihnhatko is reporting that the Apple iPad Camera Connection kit will allow you to hook up USB microphones and USB headsets to it. This will turn your iPads into road warrior tools that will allow users to podcast, and post multimedia (video, audio, etc) while on the road. This kit works with cameras and digital camcorders like the Flip. I’m excited about the possibilities with this kit. I’ve been googling and so far only a few items have been tested. We may find out in the weeks ahead that other USB items will work with it. If you have heard of other items that work with this please comment below and share the news.

I plan on using my iPad for podcasting on the road. I have been trying to get my hands on one of these kits but they have been sold out at all of the Apple stores I have been to to pick one up. I stopped by the Mall of America Apple store today to pick one up and they said they sold out of their last one yesterday! I’ll report back once I get to try it out.