N97 Tour: Day 9, Flights to Chicago

Now that I have the proper version of WordMobi installed, I can properly recall the events from yesterday and our flights to Chicago.

Bright and early Thursday morning we jumped on a plane to Minneapolis for a connecting flight to Chicago. It was a very long day and we were all pretty irritable by the time we got to the hotel.

N97 Tour: Day 8, Highest to Lowest

For my second challenge, I took a journey to the tallest point in San Francisco and used Sports Tracker to draw our path down to the lowest point. Matt Bennett and Dan Silvers joined me in taking the 37 bus up the winding roads to Twin Peaks where we climbed the steep stairs to the top.

The plan was to use the incredible view to see Mount Davidson, which is really the highest point in the city (according to Wikipedia), but the intense weather made it impossible to see more than 100 yards in any direction.

From there, Dan and I took the F Market line back up towards the coast (losing rockstar Matt once we neared the hotel) and made our way to the waterline to catch the lowest point. Unfortunately, both of our SportsTracker applications had a hard time dealing with the lack of consistent GPS reception and required a quick reboot to get the data loaded properly. Mine appeared to stop working shortly after we left the mountain peak, but Mobile Dan’s worked a lot better. Check out these links to get to our SportsTracker pages and take a look at the difference in elevation. I didn’t realize it would be so dramatic!

http://sportstracker.nokia.com/nts/user/profile.do?u=jonnybruha

http://sportstracker.nokia.com/nts/user/profile.do?u=dandandan

Also take a look at the video captured from the top of the peak live using Qik.

qik.com/jonnybruha

Once again, we have a lot more media to put up that was captured on our adventure and this post will be updated once all of it has been uploaded properly .

Posted by Wordmobi

N97 Tour: Day 7, Draw by number and Mobile Camp 2

Yesterday we set out to complete our first set of challenges suggested by the folks at WOM World. As the GPS ambassador for the tour, my first challenge was to use Sports Tracker to draw the number “2” on San Francisco using Sports Tracker (ala Stavros). This was the first of a three part challenge to draw “24/7” on our three most recent cities. George Kelly was kind enough to join me and capture some photos and videos along the way, all of which should be uploaded as soon as we can.

Our path took us from North Point St and Van Nesse Ave, followed the coast to the east, southwest on Market St and east on 16th St, ending right under the Embarcadero highway. Check the screenshot below or click here click here to see it all the details on my Sports Tracker page.

Following the completion of the challenge, we made our way to the Swedish American Hall for our second Mobile Camp. We had a larger turnout that the last one and it was excellent meeting so many people. Thanks to everyone that made an appearance!

Just a reminder, if you’re going to be in the Chicago area, PLEASE come to our third and last Mobile Camp at the Illinois Institute of Technology between 10am and 4pm in the Armour Room. It’s free, it’s fun, there’s food, and you get to hang out with new people and devices. Oh, and you get a free T-shirt. Why wouldn’t you go?

Get youself signed up on the official Mobile Camp site (ha) here .

Posted by Wordmobi

N97 Tour: Day(s) 5+6, Big Sur and San Francisco

Sunday was our drive up to San Francisco and thanks to several recommendations, we decided to take the long route through Big Sur. I think this image explains why.

We captured a lot of other content including a 30 minute video recorded through the windshield as we climbed the winding paths and George was able to capture that same path on Sports Tracker. This post will be updated with the links when we have everything collected and online.

Monday we did the tourist thing and took a boat under the Golden Gate bridge and around Alcatraz, taking plenty of photos, videos, and tracking our route with Sports Tracker.

We challenged ourselves by splitting into two teams prior to the tour and agreed to meet each other in a general location at a certain time. Using a combination of Friend View and Google Latitude, we were able to meet up with each other successfully in a specific location without the need to call one another. Friend View didn’t seem to track us as well as we would have liked and it was slower to load the maps, but Google Latitude performed very well and made our final meetup possible in the end.

N97 Tour: Day(s) 3+4, Mountains and Mobile Camps

Friday turned out to be the best and worst time I’ve had on the trip thus far. After food, we made our way to Runyon Canyon and if the steep walk up the mountain wasn’t enough, the climb up the mountain was plenty to kick our asses. Getting to the top made it all worth it though and we have plenty of pictures and videos showcasing our accomplishment.

The next step

I’ve spent a better part of today thinking about what this trip means to me on my journey to remove my addiction to mobile devices. The smartest thing to do would have been to pass on this trip altogether, wouldn’t it? How can two and a half weeks of traveling with the N97 and four brilliant bloggers help me get away from mobile? After today, I realized it can, more than I thought possible.

Without going into too much detail, I realized the person I’m trying to become is the same person Nokia is trying to connect to. I want to be a normal guy with an above-average device that performs how I need, when I need it do, without getting stuck in the habit of exploring every detail because I end up playing with my phone more than I actually need to. Spending all my time with my face buried in the menus and apps on the N97 closes me off to people, which completely defeats the purpose of what the N97 is supposed to be. I realize exactly why Nokia chose us for this trip now. It’s not because of our blogs or our knowledge of mobile tech in general (though I’m sure that helped). They chose us because of our ability to connect to others. We can all easily strike up a conversation with anyone we meet and share very human perspectives, whether they’re mobile oriented or not. And being mindful of that as I make my gradual transition into a normal user helps me to make those connections all the better.

Posted by Wordmobi

N97 Tour: Day 2, the general theme

N97 Tour: Day 1, Success

After spending well over 3 hours and $250 in cabs getting around Los Angeles, the night turned out to be a huge success. We hit up Silver Factory Studios to see George’s incredibly talented friend and artist, Sean Padilla, ate some of the best street tacos I’ve ever eaten, and settled ourselves at the luxurious La Petit hotel for the night.

I’m still amazed that it’s only been one day after everything we’ve been through.

Most of the content we’ve captured thus far can be found on our various Qik sites and I’m hoping to have some time to load up the pictures I’ve taken in an easy way as we go. Everything we’re seeing and doing is going to be compiled for the Grand Finale event in New York and everything I’m going to be posting will be directly from the N97. For this trip so far, it has proven itself to be an adequate blogging solution if you have the right tools, with only a few minor caveats (like this centered text).

If you’re going to be in the Los Angeles area on July 11th between 10am and 4pm, be sure to stop by the Bradley Internatonal Hall at UCLA to hang out with us, meet new people, and engage in mobile-related conversation at the LA Mobile Camp. You can sign up and add your RSVP to the page here: http://barcamp.org/Mobile-Camp-LA The slots are filling up quick, so if you’re interested, get your name down before it’s too late!

Follow us on Twitter and check out our videos!

twitter.com/womworld

twitter.com/jonnybruha

twitter.com/acurrie

twitter.com/allaboutgeorge

twitter.com/norcalbarney

qik.com/womworld

qik.com/jonnybruha

qik.com/acurrie