Category Archives: General

So Microsoft and Palm finally confirmed a relationship of sorts – after a slew of rumors/spec leaks/photos, the existence of a Windows Mobile-powered Treo is official.

Scheduled for release early next year, yesterday’s press release tells us that Palm has licensed Windows Mobile for what will presumably be successive generations of its popular Treo. Aside from the PR-ese beating us over the head with hyper-positive jargon touting the plethora of wonderful features offered by the OS, the more interesting question is this: what’s the plan for the Palm OS?

Family history: back in 2003 Palm split into palmSource (software) and palmOne (hardware). PalmOne then officially became Palm again back in May when it bought the rights to the name from Palm Trademark Holding, created when the companies split. Japanese software company Access acquired palmSource earlier this month…and the future of the OS remains in limbo.

So I guess this announcement means that if/when I buy a smart device, it will likely be running Windows Mobile…I’m salivating at the thought of Sprint’s PPC-6700 (EV-DO!), but if Palm decides to get cozy with anyone besides Verizon, I’ll sit up and pay attention.

I have been following John Battelle’s blog Searchblog for almost a year now. He helped start the Industry Standard and definitly knows what’s going on in the world of search engines. Long story short, the blog is a great resource. But that’s not what turned me into a loyal reader of his blog.

What really did it for me was the fact that he gave updates on the book that he has been researching and writing the last couple years. Every now and then he would even ask for advice from his readers, or suggestions on a possible chapter title.

I feel like I have been a part of the process for this book to come into fruition. It has been out now for less than a month and I think it’s been accepted well into the wide world of reading on paper (something I gave up long ago).

If there is an interesting story to be told about the IT world of the last four years I think it lies in Search Engines. So this should be an interesting read.

Ars Technica hits this one right on the head when they label it as potentially simply fodder for the fanboy forums on a Friday (nice alliteration, eh?).

Han Solo, a G4TV.com poster whose claim to fame apparently includes a remarkably accurate leak of Xbox 360 stats prior to the official announcement, posted (located approx. 2/3 of the way down the page, #3 of the forums) what he claims are the specifications for Nintendo’s upcoming Revolution game console. Some details:

• 1 custom, dual-threaded IBM PowerPC 2.5 GHz processor w/ 256k L1 cache and 1 MB L2 cache (potentially L3 cache as well). 512 MB of 700 MHz system RAM

• ATI custom graphics chip w/ 256 MB RAM and a 600 MHz core supporting 2048×1268 resolution. HD support is still undecided.

• The system will support a PPU (physical processing chip) w/ 32 MB of its own RAM, which links to the CPU, GPU and the controller(s).

Aside from straight out comparisons to the Xbox 360 and PS3 (Solo says the PS3 still has a CPU edge, while the Revolution technically matches the superior GPU performance offered by the Xbox), Ars makes note of the fact that Nintendo may be playing it smart by providing potentially developers with a core system for which it’s easy to write games. Given that the majority of titles end up going cross-platform at some point, if the Revolution forgoes any ridiculously esoteric hardware that provides a novel gaming experience but a headache for developers might be the way to go. I make no pretense about being a game expert, but that’s my $.02.

Yeah, I know – no good eye candy or sweet hardware specs to get you drooling. Just some good, old-fashioned numbers that made me stop and think for a few moments:

According to the Pew Internet Life Project, the rate of growth in home broadband adoption dropped dramatically this year, climbing a measly 3 percentage points between December 2004 and May 2005 – approximately 53% of U.S. households now have broadband internet access. This data seems especially surprising, given the 20% growth rate reported between November 2003 and May 2004.

The report cites the changing demographics as the cause for the slower rate of growth, as the majority of today’s dialup users are “older, less educated and with lower income.” This basically translates into a smaller, less net savvy pool of potentials to graduate to broadband (I can’t help but picture some sort of geek-themed ceremony for this involving cat-5 cable, routers…ok, I’ll stop).

The report doesn’t offer other explanations or theories about whether or not we’ve hit some sort of saturation point (temporary or otherwise), but I find it surprising that we’re slowing down after hitting the halfway mark. Then again, I have a hard time remembering life P.I. (pre-internet). Then again, even my 75 year-old grandparents have broadband, having migrated up from dialup, just as the report says.

Right now I’m sitting on dial up via AOL. I haven’t dialed into an ISP since 1998, and I don’t miss it one bit. The boing beep boing boing sounds don’t bring back happy nostalgic BBS memories either. But the fact of the matter is, I’m connected to the internet. Having a computer that isn’t connected to the net is about as useful as a bike with no seat. Being connected is everything.

Verizon knows this, and has decided to push their 3G network just a bit harder than they have been. They lowered the prices and have helped integrate EV-DO ( a.k.a. 3G) chips into laptops. WiFi used to be an add-on only feature, but is now standard with almost any consumer laptop.

This way we could be connected all the time, Continue reading →

As someone who spends a lot of time online (I’m in love with the internet – what can I say?), I can definitely appreciate those who can critically analyze the system we’re using today and contextualize it with praise and suggestions for improvement.

BusinessWeek has this nice article up that includes a transcript of a discussion with Jakob Nielsen, a web design consultant apparently snazzy enough to earn praise from BW as “the acknowledged leader in making Web sites more usable.” I haven’t heard of him, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything – he makes some good points while talking about today’s ‘net and what we can do to make it better. Some stuff of interest:

• There is a glut of bad content out there, especially at company web sites. I wholeheartedly agree on this point. He accurately refers to many of these fluffy bits of eye candy as “brochureware,” which don’t actually provide information to potential consumers in plain language. Cut the flash crap and the blaring audio and give it to me in a clean package. Less IS more!

• Bad searching. While Google and its kin do a good job on the general web, we again return to company sites and their typically horrific proprietary search algorithms. I don’t know how many times I’ve searched through company web sites and found nothing even closely related to what I wanted.

• E-mail overload and the need for better spam filtering, as well as the rise of phishing (getting credit card and other personal information through illegitimate e-mails).

• Companies need to talk to real customers and find out what they want from the web. Teens and seniors are two important groups.

Ultimately, it all boils down to packaging content in ways that are more accesible to users. Blogs need to be written this way, RSS and its kin need to be de-geeked and podcasts…well…only time will tell on that one. Vodcasts/vidcasts, too – I think mobile video’s success will depend largely on how big of a screen people are willing to tote around – something no bigger than a PSP (such a stunning screen) that’s capable of mobile browsing and/or something like UMD might really push this over the edge.

I’ve fallen in love. Her simple looks yet complex features send tingles from my elbows to my fingertips and then back. She’s slightly on the bigger side, comparably, but she can go for almost 4 solid hours. I’m in love I tell you. The catch here is that I’m a Montague, and she, she’s a Capulet. The oldest story in the book, and I’m here singing the cliché anthem of someone who can’t get what they desire.

“Oh HTC-Apache, a.k.a. the PPC-6700, Oh HTC-Apache, a.k.a. the PPC-6700, where for art thou HTC-Apache, a.k.a. the PPC-6700?”

We’ve never formally met. She only arrived on the scene less than a week ago. She is exclusive to Sprint/Nextel and I’m under a contract signed in blood with T-Mobile. The 416 MHz Intel processor, WiFi, EV-DO, Bluetooth, MiniSD card expandability, Speakerphone, 1.3 megapixel camera/camcorder, and the sliding QWERTY keyboard make her the phone of my dreams. Oh, did I mention that you can make calls on this device as well? The PPC-6700 kicks the Sidekick II, squashes the Blackberry, and is a hatrick compared to the Treo.

I have heard rumors, and pray each night I rest my eyes, that she’ll be available at T-Mobile. Then my only problem will be mustering up the $479.99 to purchase the PPC-6700.

A bit of a ramble today (with a ton of links), but noteworthy in my opinion because it showcases how the desire to do what at first seems like a very simple thing can become a torturous ordeal that never seems to end. Thankfully, I think I might be in the home stretch:

A project I’ve been been doing in small chunks over the past few months is coming to a head, and one of the hurdles I’ve been facing is finding a way to turn a Flash (.swf) file into an MPEG. After a drawn-out process spent searching for an app to create high-quality movies from actions on the screen (I tried out Movie Grab, Ambrosia Software’s Snapz Pro and Screen Movie), I didn’t feel like coughing up the $69 for Ambrosia’s Snapz Pro, despite the fact that it did exactly what I wanted. I appreciate the quality of Ambrosia’s products but couldn’t justify the expense for what was very likely a one-time use. Thankfully, I just found out that QuickTime has the ability to open flash files! While the audio controls are nonexistent, you can export the file as an MPEG, sans audio…leaving me with one more problem: getting that sweet music.

We finally get to the tidbit responsible for the idea of the post in the first place: iPod Linux (also known as Podzilla)! I first heard about it via TUAW and others, in addition to the press generated by DOOM on the iPod. The geniuses behind Tux’s conquest of the pearly-white (and now black) portable media player included a recording function that allows you to sample at rates much higher than the paltry 8 kHz provided by third-party accessories like the iTalk and the phallic TuneTalk. The newest problem? Getting it onto my ‘Pod – I have a fourth-generation player and iPod Linux won’t run on it…yet.

I’ll get the audio from you, dear Flash flies. I SWEAR IT! Thus the race is on to see if iPod Linux for the 4th generation iPod comes out before I find some sort of workaround – I’ve tried recording audio from my speakers using my Skype headset, I’ll try using my roommate’s minidisc player to record sound from my line-out…there are still several options, seeing as how I just need the audio.

I’ll get there…

I think the board game “C-jump” is worth taking note of. It’s a board game like any other. You roll some die, you move some pieces and somebody wins. What’s different about this one, that makes it worthy of inclusion in the LD world; the rules consist of computer codes like Java or C++.

The games creator, Igor, was a computer programmer who wanted to teach his son about what he did. So after several years he developed the game C-jump, which he says is fun and helps kids learn the basics of computer programing.

I think it’s interesting to see where computer related culture spreads. Here we have a board game based on teaching kids computer programing. What’s next, a square night light which gives off the glow of an ever changing screen saver?