I read an article recently by Steve Wildstrom about the influence that tech writers have over people based simply on the gadgets that the writer chooses to use.  Steve’s article was addressing Apple products, in particular MacBooks and MacBook’s Pro. Steve’s point was that people in the tech industry (he calls them “tech elites”) overwhelmingly choose to use Apple products and he believes that this has an influence on people that read the post written by these writers.

I know that what tech elites use made a difference in my case.  Three years ago I had never used in Apple Computer product and I was a little bit hesitant to even consider Apple products because of the cost and because of what I consider to be out of the mainstream type products (I recall thinking the Apple section at CompUSA was a waste of space). However, over a period of time I notice that nearly everyone that I listen to in a podcast, followed on twitter or read articles from was using an Apple computer product.  Individuals like Mickey Papillon from The Cell Phone Junkie, Kevin Tofel from JK on the Run and Matt Miller from ZD were using Macs and it intrigued me.

Slowly, I came to the conclusion that it must not be an accident and there must actually be some benefits to using Apple Computer products.  Eventually, I tried one Mac and since then I am using almost all Apple products.  I am not still using Apple products because of “tech elites” but that was my introduction.

How about you, are you influenced by what gadgets tech “elites” are using?

After seeing everyone in my office using dual monitors and never having tried it, I gave in today and added a second monitor to my Apple 21.5″ iMac. I had a 24″ ViewSonic monitor to use and in a few minutes I was up and running. Below is a short video showing the set up.

Do you use dual monitors? What do you think of it?

I asked this question couple of nights ago on Twitter ”

I received a range of interesting answers which are reproduced below as screenshots from Twitter.  What app or apps do you think show off what the iPad can do?

Eric Urbach The Daily

Dan Gordon Tacori

Infinity Blade Flip Board Apple Remote

Chris Poteet Flip Board Reeder 1 password

Donny Benfield ABC News

Jim Calloway iAnnotate

Jordan Patterson Infinity Blade Garage Band

Max Razzini Real Racing

Nichole Moisant Martha Stewart

I posted about my thoughts on switching from the PC to Mac about a month ago.  I made the switch 11 months ago and it has gone well for me.

Recently, PCWorld posted an article that provides some some valuable information on buying a Mac. if you make the decision to do it.  You can find the article here.

n January 2010 I made the switch in my law practice to Apple computers (the “Mac). Currently, I use a 21.5” iMac and a 15” MacBook Pro. Prior to that, we were using Macs at home. For all of my work and personal life I have use PCs running Windows – Windows 95, 98, XP, Vista and 7. I hope to provide some insights that are useful to you in your decision between purchasing another PC or switching to a Mac (my assumption is if you are “switching” it will be to a Mac).

Apple’s AirPort Extreme Base Station: Rock Solid Product or Overpriced Marketing Hype?

This weeks’ TechTipTuesday takes on a minor, but pesky and annoying problem: that album or podcast artwork that is missing from your iTunes library.

I was mulling ideas for this week’s FreeStyleFriday post and realized that the topic has to be iPhone since this week for me has been dominated by the phone which was released yesterday.  My son and I waited 6 hours in line to secure one yesterday and were able to take home the prize.  Below is a test of audio out of the iPhone 4 and a combination of video and audio.

On the road – don’t look down! from Shawn J. Roberts on Vimeo.