As promised the HTC Legend (thank you Meteor) is now up for auction on ebay. Proceeds from this eBay auction will be donated to the Irish Autism Action charity. The reason I choose this charity is because I wanted to highlight the need for the donation and recycling of used iPhones and iPod Touch, for children with Autism, so they can avail of the incredible Grace App – Picture Exchange for Non-Verbal People

A simple picture exchange system developed by and for non-verbal people allowing the user to communicate their needs by building sentences from relevant images. It can be customised by the individual using their picture and photo vocabulary with the user taking photos and saving pictures to the app.

The application works in real time and allows the user to select their preferences, then rotate the device to present a full sized sentence to the listener – who will read it with them and respond to their request.

The beauty of Grace is that it ensures the interaction of the user with the listener, and mutual understanding of the user’s real needs help to increase communication opportunities and build trust.

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I had set myself a challenge to swap my iPhone for a HTC Legend for a whole week and I completely failed. After day 4 struggling with what had evolved into over-complexity I just gave up and happily retreated back to the “evil” non-open source iPhone and heavily policed iTunes.

During this experiment I also had to discontinue using the Meteor network due the 2G to 3G handover problem (there’s a neat little video demonstrating this here) which left with me with no signal far too many times, but the phone worked perfect on O2. Hoping Meteor can fix that issue promptly, as many other HTC users are reporting this issue in the customer forums.

Day 4 With my Android

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eBay has really evolved over the years and has quickly become my favourite place to shop online. It should no longer be considered a place for second hand junk or bidding wars, it’s now a place of true commerce with options to “buy it now” or to even haggle with a seller by “making an offer”.

Instead perhaps consider eBay as a gigantic 24hour outlet mall that’s filled with stores like Schuh, that are just desperate to get rid of last season’s Converse. It’s also populated with independent retailers, that can’t afford the online high street rents but compete with the larger stores like Amazon by offering you brilliant price reductions on new products. Then there are the niche stores/individuals that sell really rare or unique items like the HP battery I got for my 5 year old laptop (€36.99 with free P&P from Hong Kong) or my new Vans with the black soles and purple/black checkered pattern (€45 including P&P from Germany, the same price as the high street but very rare so totally worth it).

However, shopping online isn’t easy. It can be time consuming and frustrating. There are just too many choices, and far too many links to click to get to what you’re really looking for. There are just too many variables involved. So I thought I’d write up a few suggestions on how, as an Irish consumer, you can really utilise eBay.

How To Get The Best Out Of

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Today is another day I breathe a sign of relief that I BACKUP my work. My second USB memory key in the last 6 months has become corrupt. Half of my files either don’t function (if they are media based) or are completely goobildy-gook (if they are text). The first USB key - at least I suspected - had become corrupt due to the plastic housing on the key breaking. Damm you college computers for having USB ports at the exact same height as my KNEES!

The second USB key has become corrupt, but totally out of the blue! That’s what I get for buying cheap (bargain?) memory, from Hong Kong, on eBay. I wonder how long my 2-week-old 2GB of laptop memory is going to last? *cries*