Okay, BLADAM friends, apologies for two rants in a row (in a sadly otherwise dry AdamBloggingSeason), but… why does T-mobile—an international company—charge so much for international calling, roaming, and texting?

And Cingular—the only other American mobile phone company I know of that supports international roaming—has rates that are even worse, from what I gather.

Anyway, on T-Mobile, the rates for me to call from the U.S. overseas are more than triple what I’d pay via a discount calling card or even AT&T Callvantage.  Calling from overseas to *anywhere* ranges from about $1 to $4 a minute for incoming OR outgoing calls.

But what *really* gets my hide is T-Mobile’s charge for text messages sent to and from my friends in Europe.  15 cents each for me to send a handful of text characters, and 35 cents each to receive the same.  What the heck?!  I know, I know, this voluminous amount of data has to potentially pass through companies that aren’t T-Mobile, but still!  And no, T-Mobile’s varied texting-bundle plans do *not* include international SMSes.

I’ve played with various SMS options online, but haven’t found any to be reliable for either sending or receiving text messages internationally.  Oh lazyweb, anyone know of good options? (other than calling up T-Mobile and telling them they’re provincial jerks for their usurious rates, which, I admit, doesn’t exactly qualify as a good option)

I’ll keep this (relatively) short and sweet:

I already use a fine to-do list software application (MyLifeOrganized), but since I’m aiming to move most of my life online, I thought I’d check out various online to-do apps.  I’ve been *shocked* at how every single app I’ve looked at falls into one of two categories:

1) Slower than a dog.
Sure, ajax is trendy and so [gag] Web2.0, but it sure beats the pants off having the damn screen redraw after every task add and edit!

2) No way to specify a start date.
Okay, this has to be the dumbest omission imaginable.  I mean, come on, I can’t work on [x] until my friend so-and-so arrives in three months.  I’m not going to start planning a birthday present for my sister until two weeks before her birthday.  I’m not going to start testing out music notation software packages until after the 2007 NAMM show.  Why on *earth* would I want all my to-do’s showing up as something to work on before I either want to or can work on them?!

This is particularly discouraging to me, because Remember the Milk is clearly a very slick service with passionate and smart developers and an active community and so on.  So why on earth haven’t they implemented start dates for tasks?  This certainly can’t rank up there as one of the tough technical problems of all times.  I don’t see it posing a significant UI challenge, either.  Nor, I’d imagine, is this something that users would be scratching their heads over ("Start date? Hmm… that’s so confusing and overwhelming.  Whatever could it mean?!")

Grrr.

What if you could build a better world, from the ground up?  What if you could even start “yourself” over… You.v2 or even New You; a different hairstyle, thinner, maybe even a different race or gender?  What if you could escape the hellish aspects of our world whenever and for however long you liked?  Glamorous, confident, rich, powerful, whimsical, witty YOU.  What if you could, indeed, have yourself a Second Life?

You can.  Via the amazingly powerful and immersive Second Life world online, you can build or even just experience your own 3D world… with thousands of other people from around the world in real time.  Music, art, religion, geekery (of course!), and (duh!) sex.  It’s all there, and discovering—even participating in it—is practically as easy as pointing and clicking.  When I first tried out Second Life ("SL") years ago after meeting one of the founders of Linden Labs (Second Life’s creator), I was floored by the fluidity of the experience, just how easy it was to join, get around, meet people, and actually have interesting and entertaining conversations.

But after exploring SL for about ten hours over a long weekend, I grew wary… and have infrequently returned.  I’ve thought quite a bit about SL since then, and have been reluctant to voice my thoughts; as a geek who has indeed made some true friends (and, yes, even met stunningly brilliant and beautiful members of the opposite sex) via online interactions even back in the 80s, I worried that I’d seem hypocritical discussing my dismissal of SL.  However, an essay today by Ted—”Second Life? How ‘bout getting a First Life”—has prompted me to blather on a bit about my thoughts on virtual reality.