MSNTV, WebTV, Interactive Television, Set Top Appliance, LBB, Little Black Box, Inexpensive Internet Access, Computer Phobia, Virus Free WWW, Easy To Use 'Net, Table Art, Audioscope Art, Basic HTML, Why Computers Hate Us, Internet For: The Disabled, Elderly, Poor "Just when u think yer life is hard, along comes MSNTV to remind u: it could b WORSE! :)" ~~Rogi
WebTV Only: Copy & Paste Any Amount Of
Text In This Box To Enlarge It For The Vision Impaired. *THIS BOX WILL EXPAND*
If you have a WebTV Plus®, you may have noticed the word Recording onthe left sidebar of your e-mail "Write" screen. If you see "Recording"on the sidebar, you may have a microphone input jack on the back of your unit. This is where you plug in the mic. (My current WebTV unit is the Philips Magnavox® Model MAT972A101. The mic jack is located between the printer port and the double-row of audio/video inputs.)
Note: The original Sony® Plus units do not have the microphone jack. It is possible, however, to use the mic of a camcorder or portable cassette recorder to accomplish audio WAV recordings.
The newer-generation Sony Model No.INT-W250 units do have the mic jack. Any dynamic mic should work, but "computer" mics will not. I do not recommend RadioShack microphone #33-3025A. There is a very noticeable and annoying 'buzz' in the background of a recording made with that mic. Best Buy carries the Sony Dynamic Mic (model FV-100) for around $10. Both the Sony and PM come with a 9'-10' cord. Radio Shack has a very good mic; part #33-2001. It costs $9.95, and comes with a 6-1/2-foot cord.
I strongly recommend that you have the power to your WebTV set disconnected from the wall outlet before plugging the mic or its cord into the back of your unit. (However, once you have it plugged in, you may leave it that way indefinitely!)
Here's how to use the "Recording" feature. With the mic plugged in, go to Write, (an e-mail) and choose Recording on the sidebar. You will get a pop-up screen with the words Play, Stop, and Record. The words Add to Message will be in the upper right hand corner. Choose Record by placing your yellow highlight box over the word "Record". With your mic in hand, tap the Return key once to begin recording. When you are finished recording, you can use the left arrow key to place the yellow box over "Stop", and hit the Return key to stop recording. OR.... I have found that you can leave the yellow box over the word Record and simply hit Return a second time to stop the recording process. (You are allowed 30 seconds of recording time, and a countdown timer is displayed on-screen.)
When you have stopped recording, use the left arrow key to move the yellow box to Play. By tapping the Return key, you can listen to a playback of the recording you just made. If you are not satisfied with it, just go back to "Record" and hit Return key again to begin a new recording! When you are satisfied with your recording, choose Add to Message at the top right corner of the pop-up screen, and your recording will be processed and placed on your outgoing e-mail. You may, at this time, type the text of your e-mail, or you can make the recording after you have written the e-mail. The choice is yours. It will appear as a speaker on your outgoing e-mail, and the person who receives your e-mail can click onto the speaker, and hear the recording you made! In fact,you may click on the speaker and listen to the recording for yourself. One word of caution: most AOL® users and many other computer users cannot receive attachments in e-mail, and therefore, cannot see the speaker or click on to it.
A 30-second recording will take up approximately 7% of a WebTV® recipient's incoming storage capacity. Fourteen such recordings, mailed to one WebTV® user, could fill up their mailbox, even if it was empty to begin with. Use caution, so you don't fill up their mailbox!
These WebTV help pages were created by Texxon on WebTV's Pagebuilder. To preserve them when he left WebTV, They were archived by DJ Mike Hosted by EclecticDJs of Santa Barbara Webtv & Related Items: "FOR SALE". news:alt.discuss.clubs.private.Norvell_MD Questions??? Ask: Norvell_MD
Post to news:alt.discuss.clubs.public.webtv.technical.rick56fla hoping for some help.
Zane said: "Google groups (works on both 'puter and webby), and Outlook Express ('puter only). Both allow you to use a non-webtv addy to escape the spam."
Ok, here's the problem. Google is now requiring a password to logon to Groups & to Blogger. I can't do either from WebTV. I get redirected to some junk about "cookies." They really mean my browser's too old. I've tried every workaround I could. Mobile Google, source viewers to find login links... you name it.
I've written half a dozen emails to both Google AND Blogger about this. I can't write posts to my blog from Webtv and WebTV users can't post comments. We can read the blog, though. But, since it's a blog about MSNTV, it feels like cheating to write from a COMPUTER! LOL
I've made a workaround for posting from WebTV. I went in on the PC and set the email posting device. I now have a blogger address to which I can email posts which appear immediately in my blog.
This saves me a lot of hassle, as I was CCping everything I wrote in alt.discuss & WebTV email and emailing it to my Hotmail account, so I could CCp it again from the PC to post to blogger. See how complicated that was?
But I couldn't have set up the email posting gismo without the pc.
How the heck are you accessing the Google groups from a webtv? or are you?
Burying the lead here: does anybody know how to get past Google's refusal to make login accessible to our dinosaurs? sigh.
Microsoft Updates Internet Appliance MSN Companion 2.0, implemented in Compaq's IPaq, supports up to nine user profiles. Agam Shah, IDG News Service Tuesday, June 05, 2001 03:00 PM PDT
Microsoft has released MSN Companion 2.0, an update to its stand-alone appliance, which can now house Internet access profiles for up to nine users.
Companion 2.0 is a no-frills Internet access appliance, says Cory Curtis, a Microsoft spokesperson. MSN Companion 1.0 allowed the creation of only one profile.
"A user has to just plug the device into a phone line to connect to the Internet," he adds.
Compaq's iPaq appliance family, introduced last summer, is the first implementation of the initial MSN Companion. Compaq is now using MSN Companion technology in two new models--the IA-1 and IA-2. The IA-1 appliance, priced at $399, includes an LCD monitor, while the $299 IA-2 device comes with a CRT monitor. Both appliances have keyboards, a USB port, and modems, says David Albritton, a Compaq spokesperson.
The USB port enables the appliances to connect to secondary devices, which could let users create a home network, connect to external storage devices, or access a broadband Internet connection, Curtis says.
A stripped-down version of Windows CE designed to provide multiuser Internet access is built into the appliances, Curtis adds. Users connecting to the Internet using MSN Companion will get custom access to Microsoft's e-mail service Hotmail, business service Web site MoneyCentral, and instant messaging service MSN Messenger, he says.
File Sharing, Voice Support Added The appliances let users share music files, and support voice communication over the Internet, Curtis says. Periodic software updates for the Companion service are downloaded from the Internet and installed automatically, he says.
MSN Companion was unveiled almost two years ago. MSN Companion 1.0 allowed a single user to connect to the Internet. Declining to give sales figures for the product, Curtis says MSN Companion 2.0 is a service upgrade to Companion 1.0.
The appliance is available directly from Compaq and from retailers nationwide, says Albritton of Compaq.
Also, Microsoft is offering six months of free Internet access through its MSN service as a bundle with new purchases of MSN Companion 2.0. At the end of six months, subscriptions cost $21.95 monthly. Users can cancel MSN's service and use an alternate ISP, but Microsoft will still charge a $9.95 monthly fee. The fee covers upkeep of the MSN Companion service, which includes software upgrades, Curtis says. http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,51810-page,1/article.html
I believe, unless this clears up, we have fourteen days to contact all our friends, save email addresses and move somewhere else.
I'd like any of you who can to try accessing alt.discuss and let me know what happens.
I doubt there will be any change this weekend.
Frankly, I doubt there will be any change.
Customer Service at GOWEBTV knew nothing of this. .config posted nothing; webtv.help posted nothing.
It could be gone, that fast.
If it's a temporary glitch, I think we ought to decide how to preserve some archive, somehow. Because, if not now, someday, they're going to pull the plug
I talk to hundreds of people in alt.discuss every week. No, I haven't saved all those email addresses. Been writing them for years. I'd better start mining email addresses.
My g/f & I are planning a 10-day trip, traveling the Santa Fe Trail from here in Albuquerque all the way to Kansas City and back. We're shooting video for an Independent Study project of hers at college. It'll be a video documentary, based on a radio play she produced several years ago.
So, the truck needs cleaning out; bedding and cooking utensils need washing; goats & chickens need extra feed (so do cats). Clothes need packing; cameras need batteries, film, etc.
It's a lot of work. As usual, she can't help, because she works full time and has other classes, too.
It's her last semester. She'll graduate, with honors, in May. Maybe then I can fall apart! I've never known her without tremendous pressure on her.
Besides all that, Dudette at http://net4tv.com Games has offered me a job, writing about WebTV stuff for her users. I'll have a blog; it'll have a forum, so readers can reply, etc. I'm also helping her set up online greeting cards and email signatures.
So, I've been awful busy!
BTW: I'll be gone from the 9th through the 19th of February. We're taking the WebTV and a small TV set with us. We'll periodically stay in hotels. That way, we can post still photos online, check email, etc. I'll try to post in my newsgroup and blogs then, but who knows?
Mostly, we'll be sleeping in the truck, on an air mattress, in February. We go through Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri and, of course, New Mexico. Nothing like a camping trip, in the DEAD OF WINTER! brrr.
I'm just a regular WebTV subscriber. I'm pretty sure WebTV's days are numbered. So are a number of my acquaintances. We're trying to preserve as much of WebTV's history and, particularly, its culture, as possible.
My primary focus is on culture: the users, who they are, what they've done with the LBB (little, black box), the social connections we've made, the websites we've built.
But I'm also interested in the history of the developers of the user interface. You're one of them.
I stumbled into the underpinnings, behind the firewall at webtv. I discovered CP. It's a website with the WebTV logo, made of claymation modeling clay. It links to a "fortune cookie" website, and to a link with some info about people and projects. I can't access most of it; my browser's too funky on a webtv and I can't see the pages from a PC.
It LOOKS like CP might have been a fun, innovative and creative place to work.
Now, I'm already on shaky ground, as I've been rummaging around in the old WebTV closets, where I don't belong. I'm basically hacking (finding out how stuff works), as opposed to cracking (malicious intent).
MSN won't tell us users anything. We're the most neglected IP subscribers on the 'net.
So, from a Google search of "CP" +WebTV, I've discovered a little of the background behind WebTV development.
And I found your resume`.
I'm building what amounts to a WebTV museum, at my own expense, as a second domain. My primary domain is http://rriverstone.com where you can investigate me in greater detail.
Anything you share with me will be held in strictest confidence. I have a background in freelance journalism; I protect my sources.
I'm just curious about the personal experiences of the "old school" WebTV people.
And I'm VERY curious about CP! It just looks interesting.
Please see http://msntv.blogspot.com for some more background on what I'm collecting for the "museum."
I doubt you ever saw the internet art we've made, utilizing audioscopes and gradtable tags in HTML. We also experiment with PHP, CGI, Perl, DHTML, CSS...whatever we can "tweak" to work on LBBs. It's unique art. I hope to preserve it and exhibit it to the general public.
p.s.: If you're still in touch with any of your colleagues from that period, please tell them about me, and feel free to pass on my info to them, as well.
Date: Thu, 01 Feb 2007 10:23:25 -0800 From: info@google.org To: rriverstone Subject: Re: [#100883167] Other
Hello,
Thank you for your message.
As we continue to explore how google.org can have the greatest positive impact, we'll post new information at www.google.org. Please check this page for updates as our efforts progress.
Regards,
The Google.org Team Original Message Follows: ------------------------ From: rriverstone Subject: Other Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2007 14:22:25 -0800
In your 10 principles, you say the user is important. You also say info should b accessible to all, irregardless of income. I live in poverty.
I'm on a webtv. Google is no longer accessible to me.
Microsoft Updates Internet Appliance
the best
pretty good
ok
pretty bad 
the worst help?
