My first week with Palm Pre

This is my first smartphone so I cannot compare to my past experience. I decided to have Palm device cause I wanted two from the same manufacturer after we switched to Verizon due to reception problems in our new apartment. Also I wanted a smaller form factor than most of present smartphones. My wife was not very interested in smartphone so Pixi for her was also kind of compromise.

[caption id="attachment_689" align="aligncenter" width="320" caption="Palm Pre"][/caption]
Pros:

1. It is fast. GUI is really responsive and you only wait if you are connecting to outside world
2. Multitasking. You really can do many thing at once. Did not try if you can make calls while doing other things but music playing with surfing work.
3. Works as USB drive.
4. Syncs with my Gmail address book.
5. Video. Shoots better video than point'n'shooter even if it has less megapixels.

Cons:

1. Keyboard is pretty small or my hands are too big.
2. Entering numbers is a nightmare.
3. Battery life is very short.I would say it is more like 5h instead of advertised 8h. Do I really have to switch everything off?
4. No way to filter out Facebook contacts.
5. Photo. I am not so impressed with still camera. I need to do more test but built-in flash is not very good.

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Shutterstock Raise Confirmation

I have reached $3000 or more in all time Shutterstock earnings and my Standard License payout rate has been increased to $0.36 per download. It took me a little over two years to reach this level despite of global slowdown.

Pay per download is determined by your total lifetime earnings:

Earnings per Download	Lifetime Earnings
$0.25	Less than $500
$0.33	$500 to $3,000
$0.36	$3,000 to $10,000
$0.38	Over $10,000

Extended license sold

It has been a while since my last extended license on Shutterstock. Hopefully it would break a spell and I will have more this month.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="450" caption="Green beans"][/caption]


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Moving to Verizon Wireless

I was tempted to buy new iPhone 4 but I decided to wait till end of July for resolution of all problems reported by early adopters. In meanwhile I moved to Gemello neighborhood in Mountain View just to find out that AT&T got no reception there. We got two phones there and we cannot call each other cause we have zero bars and phones do not even ring. According to AT&T map it should be good reception there but I do not think zero is good.

[caption id="attachment_676" align="aligncenter" width="240" caption="Gemello AT&T Coverage"][/caption]

The only real alternative seems to be Verizon. Their map shows that they have this area covered all in red which should be best reception for voice and digital services. In reality after switch we can talk but 3G is almost not possible to get. It's just pathetic. In the middle of Silicon Valley both major carries got mediocre services.

[caption id="attachment_677" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Gemello Verizon Coverage"][/caption]

If rumors are true Verizon will have iPhone next year but now I am on two years contract and two Palm phones. So until iPhone 6 will be released I will be testing webOS on my Palm Pre phone :-)

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="245" caption="Palm Pre Plus"][/caption]

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June 2010 earnings breakdown

It was bad month overall. I got almost 30% less than in May which was also worse than previous month. Hopefully it is just summer slowdown, otherwise trend does not look good.

Individually SS made worst result this year and could be worse than 123RF. 123RF on the other hand made the second best result this year. I guess January record will be hard to beat. Others, DT and FT are pretty stagnant. I would call their results average, one month they are slightly above next one a little below their own median. Positive surprise in recent months are results from IS. They actually beat FT and grab 4th place this month. I am talking only about results without third parties which are published later. After adding these results they may be third this month. On positive side we got SXP which finally transferred my images to ThinkStock and started posting earning. I have to wait couple days to see how I am doing there. BS got BME which is so low that it was sufficient for 6th place.

June Jun/May
SS 39.54% 62.34%
123RF 34.62% 248.07%
DT 9.01% 82.56%
IS 8.08% 79.15%
FT 5.17% 98.52%
BS 2.52%
SXP 0.69%
CSP 0.27% 40.00%
CS 0.11% 100.00%
Total 89.04%



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Crestock acquired by Masterfile

If you logged in to your Crestock account today you were presented with new contributor agreement. It would not be anything worth mentioning if I would not notice new copyright statement in a footer of the page: "© 2010 Crestock Corporation. A Masterfile company." When does it happen, I asked and looked at About page. Voila, it states that it happened today: "Crestock was purchase on July 1, 2010 by Toronto-based Masterfile Corporation, a premium stock photography agency with over 30 years experience in commercial licensing." There is no official press release on neither of websites but there is an article on Crestock blog. Let's see what other changes new management would bring.

[caption id="attachment_665" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Crestock acquired by Masterfile"][/caption]

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