This morning I posted a question on Twitter looking for feedback on an idea I had about providing Senior and Family Portraits for less fortunate people in our community. I was pleased to see some interest, so I wanted to put together a little more information on the idea - and most importantly, gather as much feedback as possible.

Here are some initial thoughts:

Economic problems aside, there are many people in our community who cannot afford the expense of costly senior photos. Additionally, if a family is faced with the choice between buying groceries or paying for a family portrait, they will, without a doubt, choose the food.

High school students make a big deal out of senior photos. It is a way for them to express their individuality and creativity. Some get very extravagant with their portraits - using items that show their interests or past times. Others simply want a beautiful closeup portrait to share with friends and family. In any case, when someone can’t afford a professional photographer, they are left with very few options.

Family portraits are far too often overlooked, incredibly priceless, but often very expensive. Less expensive options are very limiting - completely void of the uniqueness that exists in all families. A family portrait can be cherished eternally. Yet, when bills are never ending, spending money on a portrait is often never even considered.

How can we make a difference in the lives of Omaha families?

I know for a fact that Omaha is FULL of all sorts of creative and talented people.

Lets start by gather as many volunteers and ideas as possible

If we can get a lot of people to each do a little, we can make quite an impact. If you are:

• interested in making a difference in the lives of others in our community, AND
• interested in photography OR
• skilled with photo retouching software OR
• familiar with one or many cool photography spots in Omaha OR
• able to check email and edit a google calendar OR
• a business willing to donate photo prints or money for printing OR
• a PR or Marketing guru with ideas on how to get this idea out there OR
• if you have any other ideas you’d like to share

then I’d love to hear your thoughts on this idea!

Please leave a comment below - or if you’d rather email me, that is perfectly fine.

Remember - many people giving just a little can make a giant impact on our community!

Introducing version 2 of the Google Trends + Twitter iPhone web application! This updated version reads Google’s “hotness” rating (Volcanic, On Fire, Spicy, Medium, Mild, etc.) and colors the links appropriately. Life is so much better in color. Check it out!

This iPhone / iPod touch web app that pulls the top 100 Google Trends and links them with a Twitter search. I gives you a nice way to connect what people are Googling with what people are saying on Twitter. Interestingly, not everything at the top of the Google Trends list seems to be buzzing in Twitter-land, but it is definitely interesting to get some instant human responses to items we are feverishly Googling.

When you click on a link from the main page, you are brought to the iPhone’s built in RSS reader to read the search results from twitter. Twitter search results are provided by search.twitter.com.

Google Trends + Twitter

Could it be better? Let me know in the comments.

Tonight I purchased a Fisher Price Kid Tough Digital Camera as a Christmas present for my 2 1/2 year old daughter. I paid $49 at Wal-Mart. The same camera sells for $59.99 on Amazon. According to the box, this camera is “built to survive drop after drop, after drop!”

The camera has two resolution settings - 640 x 480 and 1280 x 960 (1.3 megapixel). The default setting is the lowest resolution. I first tested on the low setting. The photos were horrible. The higher resolution photos are bigger, but still horrible.

I know this is a toy, but I expected better results. I am glad I opened it up tonight to test it out before giving it to her on Christmas morning. I will be returning it tomorrow.

Here are some more test photos:

My advice: I’m sure you have an old 2 megapixel digital camera in the back of your closet. It may not withstand “drop after drop after drop,” but what else are you ever going to do with it? Instead of wasting $50 on this thing, give your child your old digital camera. That’s what I am going to do this Christmas.

These cities have been added to the Twitter Weather project: New York NY (@bigappleweather), Los Angeles CA (@laxweather), San Francisco CA, (@sanfran_weather), Chicago IL (@chi_weather), Phoenix AZ (@phxweather), Houston TX (@houweather), Minneapolis MN (@mspweather), Madison WI (@madisonweather), Ames IA (@amesweather), Lincoln NE (@lincolnweather), Cedar Rapids, IA (@crweather).

The main project page is here.

If you are interested in working on the code (php) and adding cities and towns in your area, be sure to contact me.

Today I released the first version of get_tweets - a function to very easily retrieve a twitter user’s timeline to use in your php 5 applications.

Instead of returning an already-styled timeline, get_tweets() will return a ready-to-style php array that you can loop through and style however you like. It is a completely customizable solution that is particularly useful to designers who wish to implement tweets in websites or blogs without using a pre-styled solution.

To download get_tweets() or get help, go to the main project page.