Are you having problems with AT&T again? You remember our multi-day outage from a few months ago?

It appears problems have hit the region again as of 4:45PM Today. Are you having problems?

Popularity: 12% [?]

I’m feeling more and more cool that I don’t have an iPhone, because apparently, AT&T is now having problems with iPhone users all over the East Coast.  Are you having issues?

Check out this twitter post:

I am really surprised that bloggers and MSM are not covering the AT&T outage. Affects iPhones only (EDGE and 3G) up and down east coast

If you recall, we had major AT&T outages in Central Virginia in early July and the AT&T didn’t formally acknowledge it.  Now, let’s run a little poll for Charlottesville iPhone users…

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Popularity: 17% [?]

Anoop Eats a Chocolate Covered Key Lime Pie Ice Cream Bar

Apple recently selected Anoop Ranganath’s Graffitio service as one of 500 applications to be included in the launch of the iTunes application store for the iPhone.  Over 4,000 pre-screened developers had the opportunity to get their applications in the store.  They choose Anoop as one of the 500 elite; Anoop is also a cVillain and a big foodie.  You may have visited his not-so-recently updated blog, “Stay in the Shallow End.”

On Thursday, Anoop let me play with Graffitio before you could download it officially (you can now download the free application if you have an iPhone).  It’s pretty neat because you can easily have a conversation about any nearby place without all the annoying registration requirements.  Importantly, you can’t talk about a place unless you are physically in that location.

Anoop and I had a tough time brainstorming how to describe Graffitio.  We ended up thinking that “Around Places” was a good catch phrase.  Is it? 

Social networks typically use people as the focus of a conversation, but Graffitio centers around unique places and events, created by you based on the location data on the iPhone. Instead of registering for a profile, just simply be in the right place and the relevant places automatically appear on the Graffitio walls. When you write on the wall, the app records your thoughts and adds it to that specific converstaion stream.  Graffitio intelligently organizes locations based on number of items and by dynamically evaluating the number of walls, so you always see the right number of relevant things.

Here is a screen shot of the application:

Anoop told me there have been over 1,000 3,000 walls created in less than 24 hours and that he expects that number to grow quickly.  If you have any suggestions for the application or get a chance to play with it, let Anoop know! He’ll be watching!

P.S. if you comment on the Spicy Bear HQ wall, I’ll give you brownie points.

Popularity: 51% [?]

Today you can buy (if you can find it) the iPhone 3G from AT&T, the hottest thing to hit the market since sliced bread.  You may recall one of our own being one of those trendy types who is probably waiting in line as we speak. According to a poll in that same thread, 25% of you will be getting the iPhone 3G.

On the flipside, that hunk of metal, glass, plastic and electronics creates more buzz than starving babies.  No, I’m serious.  On this website Engadget, they field questions from eager morons about meaningless things, like the following:

Santz24: How wildly does it dance on the table compared to the first iPhone?
If you’re asking how the vibrate function compares to the original, we got the two buzzing side by side and they feel pretty much identical.

If you’re asking whether it wobbles on the table as you use it, yes, it does — but the amount of wobble depends on the type of surface. But even on a hard, flat surface it’s not really that bad, and we’re usually sticklers for that kind of thing.

My wobble has always depended on the surface.  Do you think they will start including it as a phone feature?  Seriously, if people care this much about a phone, then I consider my existence no longer meaningless.

Looking for an iPhone in Charlottesville? »Read More

Popularity: 61% [?]