I'd like to thank a couple of my friends for getting me started on Audible. I've never had any real addiction, until now. Oh, yes, I've resurfaced from a rather formidable absence from blogging.

So, Mark, thanks for getting me started. And also, thanks for sparking my interest in the history surrounding the American Revolution. Without your inspiration I might not have spent a ton of money on audiobooks and I probably wouldn't have purchased "Washington's Crossing." It was a great "read."

And, Coy, thanks for seeing me teetering on the Audible.com cliff and giving me a shove. I gave the shuffle, offered for a six month subscription, to my Dad. He's really loving it. And thanks for your insight into "The World is Flat." That was another great "read" that nearly scared the H E double toothpicks out of me. I'll need to listen to that one again, but not for a couple of weeks, at least.

Audible.com did it's part, first in offering the shuffle, and second, in providing a September promotion offering every audiobook for a low $10.95 each. I started my subscription on the 22nd, plenty of time to take ownership of 8 (or was that nine, I may be in denial) audiobooks. Yes, I've been completely out of touch, enjoying every minute.

For the first week or so I was trying to listen on my own personal (not the one I gave away) shuffle. It didn't work out so well. I nearly had to compound all of this mess with a Nano purchase. Fortunately Audible.com has a scrap of human decency. I found a great little utility on the audible site that is made specifically for my Treo. Actually, it's two separate utilities. One is a player that works nicely. I can see the pointer, indicating my bookmark, and it stays were my listening ends each and every time. Something the shuffle struggles with.

The second utility allows me to download audiobooks wirelessly right from my Audible library. I can also, using a cord, see my Treo in the Source list of iTunes and drag my audiobooks onto my storage card. All of my books took up little more than a quarter of available storage space using format 2 (the smallest file format.)

Well, I'm done with all of my books. Most of them are related to business. I found "The Fifth Discipline" and "The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook" and really enjoyed getting back in touch with Peter Senge and his ideas. On Saturday I will renew my Audible account and get two more audiobook selections. I may just disappear again. Until then I have a bunch of great thoughts bouncing through my cranium and a lot of pent up energy that I plan to direct at my blog.............
9:10:31 PM    comment []