Pokemon Go and Cameraphone Zen

You may have noticed that I've been posting images in the last week that I simply label "Cameraphone Zen". The original concept of my Cameraphone Zen is just a slightly interesting image that I saw while out walking or being out in the world that I caught with my phone. My first phone didn't have a camera, so having a camera and being able to take photos with my phone was cool. As a result, most of my Cameraphone Zen in the past has involved me being out for exercise - a nice walk or something.

This past week I started playing Pokemon Go with my new phone, which I got on August 28th. There was a slight kerfuffle figuring out that GSM coverage really sucks in this area, so I switched to a CDMA card that Ting thoughtfully sent with the phone and the GSM card and I have excellent coverage now. Ahem. Anyway, I'm playing Pokemon Go and walking at least a half mile almost every day because the obsession with the game is nicely motivating.

The phone on the left is my new Moto G6, on the right is my faithful old LG.

The Cameraphone Zen photos I have posted so far this year each represent about a half-mile walk. I am proud of getting out and walking, since I was despairing of ever getting the motivation to go out again. I don't know yet if I'll be able to lose weight with Pokemon Go, but I needed something to get me out and walking, and this game has definitely worked that way. It's not even that I "gotta catch 'em all", it's that I'm having fun cursing the ones that get away and visiting the various Pokestops around town, most of which are at statues or memorials or churches.

So, my new phone is basically my new personal trainer, insisting I get more Pokemon and Pokeballs and stuff. It's kind of crazy if you think of it that way, but hey, whatever works to get me moving!

In addition to Pokemon, I'm also getting LOTS of photos of Inkwell, who cannot avoid me having a camera I'm happy to use (the LG's camera was difficult to use). I have been posting them to Facebook, but at some point I'll make a nice compilation post of Inkwell for folks to enjoy here, as well.

Ting Again

Back in November I posted a bunch of posts about looking for a smartphone. I started by looking at traditional services, and I wasn't too impressed. Then I looked into prepaid services and was a little hopeful. Then I suddenly found a spectacular deal and jumped on it even though I wasn't entirely sure it wasn't some sort of trick.

Ting turns out to be a pretty good deal.

We were paying roughly $72 a month (with all taxes and fees) for two Verizon phones with 500 shared minutes (month-to-month). We had no texting and no data. It wasn't a great deal, but I couldn't get a better one from Verizon (I tried) and I was holding out until we could afford smartphones before changing service.

I just completed my second month with Ting and I'm about to prepay for my third. My total, with taxes and fees, is just over $35. That's with up to 500 minutes voice, up to 1,000 text messages, and up to 100 MB of data (enough to check my mail daily from the office if I want to). I wish Ting had been around years ago, I would have saved bundles of money from Verizon.

Anyway, here's why I'm posting again. There are two problems with Ting. One is that you have to buy a phone. You can bring a phone from Sprint, but only Sprint phones work at the moment (this may change in the future). The other problem is that most people are on contracts with cell phone companies with early termination fees if they cancel service.

For the first, I can offer two pieces of help. If you want to buy a phone from Ting, I have a $25 off referral link that will give you $25 off a device and give me a $25 service credit. My sister used it, which made my phone bill in December REALLY low. The other possibility is that Ting now has a partnership with used phone marketplace Glyde. It isn't that difficult to find inexpensive smartphones you can bring to Ting on that service, and a list of ones that will definitely work is available on the Ting site (you can get an LG Optimus S, like I have, for under $50).

For the second problem, the early termination fee, check out this blog post at Ting. Starting Feb. 1 and going to the end of February Ting will give people who switch service credit for their early termination fees. It's not ideal: you still have to pay out the initial fee to terminate out of pocket. But at that point you'll have phone service pre-paid for quite some time.

Ting isn't really for power users, but for most people who just need a good cell phone, it's a great deal. So far I've had excellent interactions with customer support, lower bills and I have a freakin' smartphone for LESS than I was paying for a "feature" phone before. I'm a believer in Ting's model.

Ting!

So I've moved hubby-Eric over to a smartphone as well now. Because Ting didn't have any of the $53 LG Optimus S refurbs left, I found a likely candidate on eBay. Ting allows customers to port some models of Sprint phones to their service, so I looked for a used Sprint phone from a high-rated seller that specifically said "clean ESN" and had a 14 day guarantee. I ordered it right before Thanksgiving, and was surprised when it arrived yesterday (Saturday).

After some initial difficulties with the phone itself, I was again surprised when a Ting customer support person working on Saturday ported the phone to Ting for me so I could activate it same day. Amazing service!

If I'm gushing a bit, that's because I expect to save about $20 off from our previous monthly bills, and over $100 a month from what I would have spent on two Verizon smartphones. That's just happy-inducing.

I made my co-workers mad today

I lieu of thinking about life's problems, I've pretty much immersed myself into my new phone, as I'm sure some people noticed.

I want to share more information about Ting, my new wireless service that runs on the Sprint network (with free roaming for voice and SMS on Verizon's network). I just started it, but I'm already pretty pleased with it. I had a lengthy interaction with customer support on Sunday while porting over my old phone number to my new phone, and it was EXCELLENT. I've rarely had such a great interaction with customer service.

So I was talking about the phone at work with my co-workers, who didn't quite believe what I was saying about the deal. So I pulled up the Plan Page to show them how much they would pay if they were on the plan. One co-worker just dropped her jaw when she saw it. The other said, "That makes me mad." Both of them recently signed up to 2-year contracts that were WAY more expensive.

So for your own edification on whether or not Ting would save you any money, either visit the plan page or use the calculator I'm putting down below the cut.

LG Optimus S from Ting - Rooting Instructions

Most of this post is going to be fairly technical with links to some technical pages, so most of my readers aren't going to be interested. In fact, this information will be out of date soon, so I'm not even entirely sure why I'm writing it, except that I hope to get Eric the same phone which means I'll be going through this process once more.

So, if you want to read about me rooting a phone, read on. Otherwise, you might want to skip this one.

Smartphone Hunting: Laura's got a new phone

I jumped into the smartphone pool with a fairly new service that offers what I think may be the best deal that's available for someone like me. Ask me again in a year if I still think so, but for the moment... I'm impressed.

First, another shout out to Credo Mobile, who surprised me with an offer of a free smartphone and monthly discounts for my earlier mention of them. In the end I decided to go a different way but if I'm not satisfied with my new service, Credo is at the top of my list.

I was reluctantly starting to think Eric and I could do best by "upgrading" at our current carrier Verizon Wireless when I learned two things that changed my mind.

The first is that the local EMS uses the Sprint network when they aren't using short-range radios. That suggests that the coverage is definitely good enough for me.

The second I found on HowardForums. A little background, when I bought the LG VX8300 I checked the reviews on that forum and knew exactly what to expect and how to properly hack my phone. The users there are intelligent and helpful. I was still researching prepaid plans when I found this thread and started to look through the options listed there. I passed over the unfamiliar names at first, then I looked a second time and saw Ting (note: this is a referral link). Ting runs on the Sprint network.

Smartphone Hunting: Prepaid?

My last post focused on the contracts I could get, but most of them require me to buy a phone anyway, so I thought I'd take a look at prepaid plans.

Contract plans require you to commit to two years of service, and generally don't let you change your phone during the duration of the contract. The carrier also tends to put a lot of restrictions on the phone, including slow upgrades, because they want you to have incentive to buy a new phone.

Prepaid plans offer the exact same service, but you can use an unlocked phone on them. So I could go buy a Google phone that has pretty good ratings, and then find a plan that's much more reasonable. And if I don't like my service, I can switch to another immediately.

The thing about prepaid plans, most of them are WAY cheaper than month-to-month. They also require more attention on the part of the user to make sure the bill is paid promptly and on-time. And, of course, they require you to buy your phone at a much higher price.

Just for me, no phone for Eric, I could buy a phone, then get a plan for as low as $50 a month base price. I would have to pay about $300 up front for the phone, but I'd be saving at least $25 a month (more, depending on what plan I would pick), so I'd recover that cost within a year.

If we kept our current phones while I bought a new phone and tried out the whole pre-pay thing, we would actually save money over upgrading through a contract without any chance of losing service.

It's very appealing.

So, anyone out there with experience in this have any thoughts? Warnings? Suggestions?

Smartphone Hunting (advice appreciated)

Ok, I'm looking to get a smartphone. We currently have Verizon Wireless... and my phone is a six-year-old LG VX8300 that I still like. But I need more options. I want to be able to access my Google calendar and send text messages. I also want the ability to pull up a map app if I need it. Or other websites as needed (I'd like to be able to pull up documents from websites during meetings).

So, Verizon Wireless is offering iPhone 4 for "free" with a two year contract. That's tempting, because the iPhone is tested and true. Every other smartphone is either too expensive to get or not of any great interest. I'd prefer an Android phone, but I haven't tried any and the ones getting good reviews tend to be a couple of hundred dollars even with a contract.

Following is my attempt to figure out what to get...

The Cell Phone Downside

Please don't call us.

Hubby-Eric and I went exclusively to cell phones a couple of years ago. I can't remember when exactly, but we worked out the numbers and realized that it was cheaper for both of us to have a cell phone with no landline than for us to have a landline and one cell phone for me. I needed a cell phone due to car troubles at the time (which continued on for quite awhile).

We got a 500 minutes plan after figuring out our usual usage patterns, and weren't surprised that we NEVER used even half of that. We just don't talk on the phone all that much.

Until this month.

Our plan resets on the 16th, and we've currently used 502 minutes of it. Whoops. We're now getting charged 45 cents a minute, and have no recourse except to move "up" to a "better" plan that charges $20 more a month... or just make sure nobody calls us who doesn't have to.

We're going for the latter option, as this month was an aberration for us. I ended up talking with Microsoft tech support entirely too much (and spending a LOT of time on hold with them). We don't expect it to happen ever again.

But it certainly does make me inclined to move to a different cell phone provider if I can find one with the options I need. I don't like Verizon. But then, are any of the others truly any better?

Btw: I looked into Credo, and they seem ok except you MUST buy their phones to get their service (and they aren't very good phones), and I'm very happy with the phone I own now. They also don't offer the "no answer/forward" that Verizon does, which allows Eric to take his phone to work with him and let me get all his calls while he's working, so they are kind of out of the running for us.

Monday Links

I'd say his name ought to be changed to "Unlucky".

Andy of Owly fame has a return visitor.

Which Power Ring would come to You? I'm an Indigo Lantern, because my compassion knows no bounds, apparently.

Ooooooooh, me want.

Cheshire Crossing Issue 4 is out.

I just like this headline: Missing snowmobilers call 911, all OK. I hope they didn't have to pay roaming charges.

Happy Birthday, Schoolhouse Rock. I love these, even now.

Reading this editorial about cell phone spam reminded me that I got an unwanted spam-ish text message near midnight the other night. I promptly called my cell provider and had them completely disable text messaging for my phone, since I never use it anyway.

Cybil Awards Graphic Novel Finalists for 2007.

Tech review of OLPC XO-1. I still gotta visit my brother and see his.

How about a flu vaccine that works to prevent EVERY TYPE of flu? I'd risk another adverse reaction for the benefit of this one.

[citation needed]

Houseplants that even I could grow? I scoff.

A Barbie fishing rod, with a red plastic worm as bait, and the four-year-old catches a 50-pound fish.

Salman Rushdie Film. I almost want to see it to view the sheer badness of it, as conveyed via this snippet.

Oingo Boingo on the Gong Show. Wow.

The final post of mil blogger Andrew Olmsted.

Happy Solstice!

Yes, I'm finally part of the cool kid club! My ComicSpace page.

Speaking of cool, check out never-done.com. I'm intrigued.

Let's Kirbycise!

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

I'm so jealous of Bully. And he even had a good flight. Perhaps I could handle it if I went business class, but I sure couldn't afford it. Bully got lucky, as Heathrow is crowded now that many flights have been canceled due to freezing fog.

Four minutes of the new Doctor Who episode airing on Christmas:

The price of Chocolate. A ten-part story of how a single company "makes" chocolates that sell for far more than their value. I found the article riveting. Your mileage may vary. Via MeFi.

Aaron Williams let's us know that sometimes the angle makes all the difference when taking a picture.

LEGO squid launchers. For the first time ever I'm tempted to get Bionicle just to have a squid launcher. And they aren't just any old squid, either... they're hordes of vampiric sea squid!

Solstice.

Getting rid of microbes will help lose weight. To get rid of them? Lose weight. *sigh*

For the next power outage, I'm sorely tempted to invest in one of these. Enough to run space heater, fridge, freezer(?), and computers... it would keep us home and safe. And they apparently run under $1000. Of course, I don't know where I'm going to get that much money.

I've figured out how to turn my new cellphone into an MP3 player now. I can also access the web with it, but it's a clunky interface so I'll save that for emergencies. I also know how to put video on it, but watching video on that tiny screen seems a bit silly. All in all, it's a cool phone for what we paid for it ($0.00 + the calling plan I would have gotten anyway).

My parents have their power back! I guess we're having Christmas at their house after all! Last night's predicted storm was a bust... lots of rainfall but very little wind in our area. Another series of storms is coming through now, each predicted to be weaker than the previous. *whew* Merry Christmas, Seattle.

Status: We Have Connectivity!

After getting home from the library, I played with the ringtones on my phone for awhile, since I couldn't log on and I really didn't feel up to any more cleaning. Oddly enough, I have no holiday spirit, so I don't even feel like decorating for Christmas. Especially since the party we were having was canceled due to the windstorm.

So I wandered through my mp3 library and found good songs to turn into ringtones. I came up with a few, which is all I really need. There are just a couple more folks who need ringtones on my contacts list, but since people rarely call me, it's not urgent.

I also figured out how to put Aquaman up as my wallpaper on my phone. Heh.

As I was testing my alarm sound ("Vindaloo" by Fat Les) I heard a motor start up in my front yard. Sounded like a chainsaw. So I opened the window shades and turned lights on. Another neighbor, one I haven't met yet. He wanted the firewood. NO PROBLEM. I had a sign out that says "Free Firewood, You Cut, You Haul" on the tree that fell on the car. He was taking us up on the offer. He asked if I wanted to keep any, and I said no thanks, he's welcome to the lot.

I was a little concerned about him cutting the tree in the dark (it was after 7 pm and full night) but he didn't seem worried. If he's willing to take the wood, I'm willing to let him.

Well, time for me to catch up on my 'nettin'. There's a big pile of sites I haven't visited in a few days.

Status: Netless

Still no internet. I drove up to the nearest library that has power and internet to get on-line. The three libraries closest to us don't have internet... the Bothell library still doesn't have power. Hubby-Eric and I have been cleaning up from the outage, but have amazingly little to worry about. We lost almost no food, and what was lost was stuff we were near throwing out anyway. The only exception is our ice cream, which may or may not still be good. We decided to try to eat it and find out. We also got the insurance claim in for the car, and have a dollar estimate. Much more than I expected, but let's hope it covers the repairs.

During the chaos, we also got our new phones. We have a deal for new phones every two years, and they were having a two-for-one on one of the best phones Verizon offers, so we snagged them. We ordered them right before the windstorm, and despite next-day FedEx (free shipping) we got them three days later. FedEx had a few difficulties making deliveries during the storm and aftermath.

My old phone was wonderful. It was a phone and an alarm clock and nothing else. The new phone (LG VX8300) has a camera, camcorder, MP3 player, bluetooth (which I still don't quite understand), custom ringtones, and a number of other features that I probably won't use. My only disappointment with it so far is that it doesn't have a quick alarm (pre-set number of minutes or hours) like my old phone, so I can't just set the alarm to go off in an hour, I have to program the alarm. It's actually annoying, because that was the one non-phone function I used regularly on my old phone. But I think the fact that my new phone has a camera will make up for it. Mostly.

I have been learning how to sync the new phone with my computer, and I'm very pleased that I can use a program called BitPim to create a calendar and upload it to the phone. The only reason I never used the calendar feature on my old phone was because it took me so long to type anything on the phone's keypad. But if I can create it on my computer then upload... well, that takes care of that issue.

So except for no tv and no internet, we're doing well. The water even heated up enough to do laundry and dishes. Yay.

Hopefully the 'net will be back on by the time I get home. Hey, I can dream.