My 7 Christmas discoveries: books, gadgets and iPhone Apps

1. New Software: Evernote. A great place to store notes (privately and public to share to collaborate with your Team members – another great feature), whether text, photo, file or Audio. It works on my iPhone and syncs everywhere. It will even search the text (typed or handwritten) on images. I haven’t got the scanner that syncs with it yet – but it is a strong possibility as I head down the paperless route!
2. New gadget: Amazon Kindle – it has to be. What a great thing this is! Love it! Love it! Love it! Saves carrying loads of books – all in one place. Easy to ready, search, highlight and make notes (all of which sync with your PC for more editing). I love reading (and note taking when reading) and this makes the whole process so easy and paperless! There is even a free app for the iPhone that will sync the books, so if I don’t have the kindle, I can carry on reading on my phone from where I left off, and pick up at the right place on my Kindle later.
3. Favourite Pressie: has to be my Gerber CLUTCH Multi Tool for my key ring (I have a normal sized one like a leatherman, but that is bulky to carry every where). Comes with Pliers, knife blade, tweezers and screwdrivers. It also came with a powerful torch. Very cool indeed.
4. New iPhone Apps: Some great apps to try on your iPhone that I have been playing with over Christmas: Evernote (see above), Kindle, Xpense Trkr, Sky TV (you get 3 months free!), Photoshop (great for creating online photo and video galleries – although you can’t send video from your iPhone yet, you have to do that through the website), CoPilot UK sat nav – although don’t reckon much to the traffic update services as it missed a major traffic delay on the M6), WordPress 2, RadioBox (you can listen to your favourite radio station on the iPhone using Wi-Fi or 3G, awesome!).
5. New business book: Mastering the Rockefeller Habits by Verne Harnish. He has a great website too and seems to be connected to some interesting people. I’m a third of the way through the book – and it is a great read, full of practical and helpful stuff for running a business. Got some interesting ideas (and confirmation that I am on the right track with some that we are doing now).
6. New non-business book: The Voice New Testament (Thomas Nelson) and Seth Godin’s free eBook: What Matters Now.
7. Latest productivity time: RescueTime. Will let you know how this goes – but interested to see if this actually works for me.