Last night, I attended a “Peace, Tech & Harmony” party for the launch of Cool Mom Tech, a wonderful new site that makes tech simple and relevant for moms. You don’t have to be a mom to appreciate it though. Their posts answer the questions that many people have about tech gadgets in a manner that is easy to understand. In essence, it’s perfect for moms like me. I mean, I can decipher all of the tech jargon on certain hardcore tech sites. I just don’t want to. I’m a mom. I’m busy. (I know…who isn’t busy?!)
I was so busy gabbing with many of my fabulous mom friends, that I didn’t even take a picture of Liz who invited me. (Liz, Kristen – who just had a baby…congrats! – and Beth are the co-founders of this new site.) I also wanted to take a picture of Liz because she had on the cutest dress. I’m such a “girl” sometimes! In the midst of tech talk, I was trading notes about cute fall clothing…I just love cold weather clothing! Anyway, the evening was a lot of fun and I’m excited to add the site to my daily reader. If you are in any way interested in tech, you should too!
I’m not hardcore into technology, but I can appreciate the fun, new devices. In fact, I’m so sad to be returning Verizon’s Motorola Droid X that I have been testing out for the last few weeks. So far, this is the phone that I’m most likely to purchase when my current Verizon phone contract is up. (Unless of course, Verizon is servicing iPhones by then…) You can read detailed reviews about the various specs at sites like gizmodo or engadget. Here are my thoughts:
What I liked:
– It is stylish. (I told you that I was girly.) Practically every time that I pulled it out, someone would comment on how nice and sleek it was…even those who own other versions of the Droid phone!
-The visuals are gorgeous. I surfed the web and interacted on social media (twitter/ facebook/ etc.) with it. My husband watched videos on it. My kids played games on it. (I hope Verizon doesn’t charge me…because we’re sending that phone back with more games downloaded then when we received it. I didn’t purchase them. My sons did. The three year old started it! Kids today are just too clever with technology…) There really was something for everyone in the family
-The 8-megapixel camera on the phone captured really great photos. It was great to have the camera on the phone for unexpected photo moments. For instance, Sean was so amazed at the park one morning because both the sun and the moon were up at the same time. Seeing him experience that for the first time was cool. Being able to capture the photos was even cooler! It was also good to have it around when I simply left my camera at home like at this event:
and this one:
-The video quality is also exceptional for a smartphone. I put a clip of a roundtable luncheon with the co-hosts of The Talk that I captured with the Droid X on YouTube. For the first time ever, YouTube invited me to do a video partnership (?!) It might have been the subject matter, but it also might have been that I shot the video on the Droid X. Either option is possible…
I haven’t found a perfect tech item though, so there were a couple of things that I did not like about the Droid X.
What I didn’t like:
-It randomly says “Droid” at times. My husband thinks that it is cool, but it freaked me out one night when I mistakenly left the phone on.
-It’s not super intuitive. Admittedly, I’m not the most tech savvy person, but I can usually figure things out after fiddling around with a few buttons. For this phone, you actually need to read the manual and/or talk to someone who knows about the phone. Fortunately, several of my blog friends were familiar with it, so they would tell me what I needed to do in order to use various functions. (Once you do something once though, it’s really easy to do it again.)
So, the Droid X is my most recent “cool mom tech” gadget. Now that Verizon is selling and carrying plans for the iPad, perhaps that will be my next venture in tech. We will see.
Going back to the cool mom tech launch party…on the way out, we were gifted with some really cool tech gifts. I’m keeping the Logitech remote. (Logitech was one of the sponsors for the party that was held at their gorgeous loft in downtown Manhattan where they are “showing off the future of tv”.) I already divvied out some of the other items, but I still have a purple PixelSleeve (it’s very stylish, but my laptop and such is just too large for it) and a Jabra Stone (which would be great if I had an iPhone. “Hello Verizon….start servicing iPhones!).
Since many of you are cool moms, one of you will win the PixelSleeve and the Jabra Stone. Simply leave a comment below telling me your favorite current tech item. I’ll pick a random winner at the end of the month. Good luck!