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Current news items regarding technology, tech companies, the Internet, the government, etc.

Jon Stewart asks Apple to be reasonable

1 Comment / Miscellaneous, News, Phones / By /

Just in case you haven’t seen Jon Stewart’s take on Apple’s, let’s say, lack of judgement, then you should take 5 minutes to watch this. It really sums up very well how as companies become larger and more successful, even popular, that they seem to start ‘losing their marbles’. They seem to forget what it was like when they were starting up and competing against the unforgiving giants. Instead, they become them. The group-think becomes stronger and then they make decisions out of misplaced fear. *end soapbox rant*!
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RIP 3.5″ Floppy Disk – Sony says the end is nigh

1 Comment / Computers, News / By /
3.5" Floppy disks
Image courtesy of sundesigns

Having pretty much stopped using 3.5″ floppy disks years ago, I pretty much assumed they had died a quiet death. Not so. Sony sold 12 million floppies in Japan alone last year (2009)!

Sony has decided to end their long life as of March next year (2011).

I still remember going from 5.25″ to 3.5″ floppies – that was really a huge improvement in technology for at least 3 reasons – sturdier case, smaller form factor meant you could slip it into your pocket (and not bend it so easily) , greater storage.

It’s funny that even the introduction of the Zip disks (and associated technologies) did not unseat the floppy, and many software makers still wrote programs and/or installers and/or recovery utilities to fit floppies.

RIP 3.5″ floppy – you served us well.

Palm acquired by HP

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PalmPalm has been saved, purchased by HP for $1.2 billion, which was a premium on the stock price. This is a good deal for both companies. Palm was in serious trouble, with its new Pre and Pixi smartphones not selling very well, and its stock price tanking. HP on the other hand did not have much of a mobile presence, as its last real mobile device, the iPaq has been floundering in the face of iPhones, Android phones, etc.

The other big opportunity for both companies will be the potential for Palm’s new mobile OS, called webOS, to appear on even more devices including ‘slates’ and netbooks.  Perhaps with HP’s much larger market reach and marketing budget, the webOS app market may stand a chance of taking off.

HP Press Release

YouTube launches online video rental store

Books, Music and Movies, News / By /

YouTube LogoYouTube has just rolled out online video rentals similar to Amazon Unboxed. Prices for movies and TV episodes start at $0.99. and go to $3.99 for the most recent/popular movies.

So far, they don’t seem to have that many titles and their interface for browsing their catalog isn’t very good. Instead they depend on the search feature which can be easily confused with the generic search for the entire site.  The ‘rental store’ probably needs some separate branding and/or color scheme.

You can find the new rental site at http://www.youtube.com/store.

The Tweeting Kettle – the Twettle!

Miscellaneous, Networking & Internet, News / By /

UK designers Ben Perman and Murat Mutlu have come up with another tweeting appliance, this time a kettle. They have a pretty fun read of how they came up with the idea and although it started off as just a ‘crazy’ idea, the publicity it has generated has actually landed them the funding they need to make it a reality.

They’re pretty smart though and as they’ve noted in a follow-up post, the crux of this project isn’t about tea, a kettle or Twitter, but rather about WiFi module with an API that you can plug into just about anything. And they’re right, networking (active verb) stuff is the future; it’s what we’re all going to expect gadgets to have by default.

Minority Report-style shopping coming to a phone near you

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Some of the features of the future world pictured in Minority Report may be coming to our present world sooner than we thought. For example, startup company Shopkick has teamed up with Macy’s and Best Buy to launch an iPhone/Android app that uses those phones location-detection capabilities to offer rewards to potential customers when they are near stores.

Other companies getting in the game include other location-sharing apps/companies such as Loopt and FourSquare. As GPS becomes more ubiquitous in mobile devices (we probably shouldn’t call them merely phones any more), applications such as these will also become more common. Of course, the next uproar will be the perceived ‘invasion of privacy’ that these apps bring, but let’s face it – you can choose not to install them.

via WSJ

Apple employee loses next gen iPhone, Gizmodo gets it, dissects it

2 Comments / News, Phones / By /

Image courtesy of Gizmodo

This has to be the story of the week so far – a new prototype Apple iPhone model (let’s say the 4G) was accidentally left in a pub, picked up by a random stranger, who tried to return it to Apple and then eventually sold it to Gizmodo for $5000.

Gizmodo has run a number of stories including: how the phone was lost, details and photos, and even a dissection of the device.

Here are some of the stats on what’s new in this iPhone:

  • front-facing webcame
  • micro-sim slot
  • seems to be a higher-res screen (maybe 960×640)
  • larger battery

GE announces new LED light bulbs that last 17 years

Home Automation, Miscellaneous, News / By /

GE is continuing to push the technological envelope of light bulbs, announcing their next line of LED bulbs which have an even better eco-footprint than CFLs.

The GE Energy Smart LED bulb is a 40-watt (40w) replacement that will consumer 9 watts, produce just as much light as a 40W incandescent and last 17 years @ 4 hours per day (about 25 times as long).

The GE Energy Smart LEDs don’t contain any mercury and are cooler to the touch than either CFLs or incandescent bulbs.

These should be available in early 2011.

Full press release.

Gmail Labs rolls out Message Sneak Peek and Nested Labels

1 Comment / News, Software / By /

gmail nested labelsMore Gmail Labs goodies. First up is the Message Sneak Peek which when enabled, lets you preview a message without having to open them first. There is either a keyboard shortcut (‘h’) or you can right-click. Strangely enough, this only worked in Firefox for me and not Chrome.

Next is the much desired and anticipated Nested Labels which mimics hierarchical folders in traditional e-mail and file systems. Although already offered in extensions like Better Gmail, many folks wanted it built-in and/or offered directly by Google, as the extensions tended to break from time to time when Gmail was updated.

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