The XM satellite radio in my car is usually tuned to the decade specific “70s on 7″ channel. It isn’t because the 1970s are the greatest musical decade ever or anything of that sort, but rather just the music I grew up with and played on the radio for much of those years.
That channel has a great feature called “The 70s Jukebox of Cheese” which plays those really obscure tunes of the decade that you might have heard once upon a time (assuming you were born in or before the decade) and completely forgotten about. Such was the case rolling over to the pharmacy yesterday to pick up some meds to help deal with the never-ending bout of congestion and coughing that I have been in the midst of for the past two weeks.
The song that popped up was a 1976 one from Larry Groce called “Junk Food Junkie.” While not a mega hit, it was a catchy little song that reflected the first era of humiliating those of us who prefer Hostess Twinkies to anything with the word “Organic” in the title.
After laughing a bit and reminiscing in my head about my glory days of spinning tunes on the radio, which was only deepened by the fact that we watched the movie “Pirate Radio” a few nights back (it was pretty good), it just got me to thinking about how that time was some of my absolute best years ever.
All of which got me to musing about what I am a “junkie” about in my life these days.
Because lets face it, we are all creatures that have a particular “jones” or two about something.
Aside from my lifelong love of carbonated sugar water beverages of near every stripe (except the diet varieties), I have come to the conclusion that the only thing I am into that probably rises to that level of obsession to truly be defined as being a “junkie” for, would be… computer software.
There isn’t anything else (aside from the love of family and friends) that I get as reliable a buzz from, as using some new whiz-bang computer software that has the potential to change some aspect of my life.
Oddly that aspect of life is usually quite trivial in nature to anyone else.
It has been this way since I got my first personal computer back in 1977 (about a year after the song “Junk Food Junkie” hit the charts, in an odd bit of near-synchroncity).
Back then on the groundbreaking Radio Shack TRS-80 Model 1, software came on audio cassette tapes. They were unreliable and usually uncooperative as hell in giving up the software contained within. Now, of course, you can click a mouse and download software packages off websites in less than a minute. I remember the first time I bought and downloaded some software on the internet, and thinking two things immediately–First off that this was very, very cool and would likely lead to the end of the dedicated computer software stores that were popping up then as a retail business (“Egghead Software” being the most prominent of these) and second, that the credit card information I had just sent over the internet was immediately being hacked by somebody working out of a back room somewhere, and I would be bankrupt in a matter of minutes.
No, I did not end up bankrupt…at least not from credit card hackers. Whether or not I might be much poorer from software purchases over the years would be a little less clear.
This overly long preamble is a mere attempt to cement my credentials as a guy who has seen, bought and used an awful lot of computer software. A good deal of it is, just that–awful. And looking back at much of it I have used over the past 30 years, it is fascinating to see how we learned to have machines do more and more for us–while at the same time learning how to adapt ourselves more and more to what the machines could and could not do.
But I still pursue my quest for the holy grail of software discovery. Those programs that truly become everyday tools to help with some aspect of my digital life. Because it never gets boring to make a really cool discovery of any size.
In that quest, particularly for the Macintosh platform that is my personal preference to work with, whenever I have a choice, are two great resources called MacUpdate and MacZot. Both offer up a software pick of the day, usually at a deeply discounted price for the 24 hours that particular program is featured. MacUpdate also has a great service of tracking the daily updates to all the existing software titles that are on the market and a system by where you can inventory all the software on your computer and automatically update those (thus their clever name). I highly recommend a MacUpdate membership to all of my Mac using friends.
MacZot is a little less ambitious, just sticking with the core mission of a cool software deal each day. This weekend, MacZot has turned me on to one of those true software gems that falls into the “how did I ever live without this” category. It is a bit of software magic called “WhoPaste” and it is the very essence of how a one person software company can turn out a truly great product.
What WhoPaste does is allow you to select and copy any text to your clipboard (that special bit of computer memory accessed by hitting the control or command keys and the letter c for copy, x for cut and v for paste). Then WhoPaste can automatically discover the details of name, address, phone numbers, email and web addresses, and then format that automatically to your computer’s address book as well as to popular programs like Microsoft’s Entourage and Daylight, as well as to your Google address book.
If you’ve struggled with retyping address information from websites, email signatures, or any other bit of digital scraps from the internet and wherever else–then you’ll come to love WhoPaste in about thirty seconds flat. And at only ten bucks from this weekend’s MacZot special deal (which is 50% off its regular price) it is something that if you know you might use it more than once, is well worth the price.
When I downloaded and installed WhoPaste, I realized–as I was scrolling down the long list of titles in my Applications folder on my MacBook Pro–that “I have a crapload of software here.”
This is the sure sign of a Software Junkie who is just realizing the depth of his problem. Hopefully my problem can lead to something helpful for you.
At least that is my rationalization for today. And why my bank account is a usually a little lower than I think it should be.