post

Fake Steve Jobs’s Split Personality

Posted on May 21, 2010 ·

fake-steveIt’s tough to be Fake Steve Jobs nowadays.

Continuing in his role as FSJ, he has to defend all-things-Apple, especially from ruthless attackers like Google. (As a sidenote, did Vic Gundotra just have a Steve Jobs moment yesterday?)

On the other hand Fake Steve is also the Real Daniel Lyons.  One who actually uses smartphones, wants to pick what he really likes and is sick of his alter ego’s “censoring content, ruling out material that he deems to be offensive”.  To the point that he ditched the iPhone and switched to Android.

Now, which Steve / Daniel should we believe?  🙂

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)

Filed Under: Humor, Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , , , ,
post

On Those Android Superphones Again

Posted on May 21, 2010 ·

vic gundotra Wow, for not being a gadget-blog, we’re spending quite a bit of attention on Smartphones @ CloudAve. Are we turning into gadget-freaks? 🙂

Like Ben, I’ve also received an Android-powered Sprint HTC EVO at the Google I/O Conference, and unlike him, I will be able to use it on Sprint, if I so chose.  As a New Zealander, Ben is out of luck – the Sprint CDMA phone does not work there, so I understand his rant, but let’s make it clear: Google did not ignore international attendees.  All paid participants (we we, bloggers, were not)  had received a phone weeks prior to the conference: US attendees a Motorola Droid, International ones an unlocked Nexus One.

Which is why I was shocked to hear Vic Gundotra’s announcement on the second day that all attendees would receive the next HTC wonderphone (hey, was that Vic’s Steve Jobs-like “One More Thing” moment?).   Since this somewhat invalidates the previous phone giveaway, I can’t help but think that it was a last-minute addition to Google’s original game plan – and that leaves me wondering about the reasons.

I can only speculate, but perhaps Google and Sprint wanted to have a few thousand “testers” for the phone before it’s official launch on June 4th?  In fact not just any users, but developers – but that would make even more sense if they had early access to Froyo (Android 2.2) which is announced, but not yet available.  Both new HTC phones – Incredible on Verizon and EVO on Sprint  came with the HTC Sense flavor of Android, but the EVO will allow turning this off, switching back to vanilla Android.  I will turn it off today and keep an eye for a magic OTA upgrade to Froyo:-)

(Again, this is pure speculation, I have no official or leaked info on the matter whatsoever)

Now, a bit of follow-up on my previous rant regarding coverage.  Phone companies must have decided I live in a corner of the world  – home to PeopleSoft, Commerce One,  Oracle, Workday, Safeway, Kaiser Permanente – that does not deserve good coverage (OK, the surrounding mountains may have to do with that, too) . Getting sick of reading all the coverage map and the surrounding spin, I actually fell victim to the most dishonest map from the carrier with the best coverage, Verizon.  Unlike the others, they don’t indicate signal quality at all.   So now I am the proud (?) owner of both the HTC Incredible (purchased myself) and the HTC EVO (Google gift) and get to compare Sprint vs Verizon in my area – one weaker than the other:-(

And with all that said, my favorite phone is one I can not get my hands on: the Samsung Galaxy S. No writeup or video can do it justice.  You have to hold it in your hands.  I did.  It was hard to let go.

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)

Filed Under: Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , ,
post

OpenDNS? Google DNS? Comcast? Surprising Results.

Posted on May 15, 2010 ·

I’ve been a long time OpenDNS user (hardcoded in my router), but after installing a new router, I decided to run some tests before reconfiguring its DNS settings.  The results – using Google’s own Namebench tool – were surprising.

DNS benchmarks

Comcast wins!  (note: 68.87.76.182 resolves to cns.sanjose.ca.sanfran.comcast.net).  It is faster than UltraDNS, OpenDNS or Google Public DNS.   Surprise, surprise … I guess I don’t have to reconfigure my router after all.

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)

Filed Under: Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , ,
post

US Air Force Forced to Play – by Sony

Posted on May 13, 2010 ·

HTC Incredible My new HTC Incredible phone has a 1Ghz Snapdragon processor in it.  That’s faster than laptop computers were just a few years ago.  That, and reading the US Air Force story (you have to wait for that a little longer…) reminded me of an interesting conversation with Zoho CEO Sridhar Vembu two years ago:

Given how mobile phones pack a whole lot of functionality in a tiny package, I have wondered if the ideal server farm is just tens of thousands of mobile phones packed together. It seems to me that the semiconductor technology behind mobile devices is far, far more power efficient than the stuff that goes in servers. Partly it is a backwards compatibility issue, with servers having to run code written all the way back to 1980s, while mobile phones simply didn’t exist that far back. Partly, it is also a function of how traditional client-server applications were architectural monoliths, compared to the deeply distributed “service-oriented architecture” that is common in web applications today.

With mobile phones approaching very respectable CPU & memory capacity, packaging them together as a server cluster makes a lot of sense. Linux can run on almost all of the modern CPUs common in cell-phones, and the mobile version of Java seems actually well-suited for server use, particularly for deeply partitioned, distributed applications. Lightweightness is actually an advantage in server software, just as it is in mobile software.

While I don’t know if anyone has implemented the idea, there are other experiments with using cheap but powerful hardware in non-traditional ways – most notably the US Air Force which concluded that Sony PS3 consoles running Linux provide powerful and dirt cheap computing power.

air-force-ps3-cluster

The above cluster contains 1,700 160GB PS3 units, and is a great example of cheap computing – except for a small glitch.  A few month later Sony issued a firmware update that kills the ability to install Linux on the PS3.  This won’t immediately turn the cluster into dumb game consoles, since the Air Force is not hooked into Sony’s network.  Isolated from further patches the machines can still work as Linux computers – but swapping them out and repairs become increasingly difficult. Unless Sony reverses the decision (which is not out of question, given there are several lawsuits on the matter), the Air Force eventually ends up with a bunch of Game Consoles.

Which is not the end of the world – there’s an abundance of Flight Simulators for the PS3 🙂

flight silmulator

(Full story @ Ars Technica)

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)

Filed Under: Humor, Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , ,
post

iPhone? Android? It’s All Irrelevant when you Can’t Get a Signal

Posted on May 6, 2010 ·

Will iPhone users move to Verizon? – goes the speculation, based on a study published @ Fortune showing AT&T drop calls 3 times as frequently as Verizon.

From my vantage point even dropped calls would be a luxury – meaning you can get a strong enough signal to place calls in the first place.  Apparently I live at the end of the World.  Sometimes I tell friends if Friedman is right and the World is really flat, this is where you fall off the edge. 🙂

But it’s not really the “end of the world” – Pleasanton is (was) was hometown to software giants like  PeopleSoft, Commerce One,  Oracle, Workday, or to name a few more traditional businesses, grocery chain giant Safeway, or mega-HMO Kaiser Permanente.  Yet this is what AT&T’s coverage map looks like:

at&t coverage map

Ad no, we’re not even talking about 3G data, this is for voice calls.  Now, being in the “good” (on the boundary of moderate) zone may not look so bad, until we look at how At&T defines good voice coverage:

Should be sufficient for on-street or in-the-open coverage, most in-vehicle coverage and possibly some in-building coverage. This AT&T owned network provides GSM, GPRS, and EDGE service

Possibly some in-building coverage?  Calling that good?  How pathetic.  But let’s look at other carriers’ definition of “Good”.  T-Mobile:

You will likely be able to place calls outdoors, in a car, and occasionally indoors.

Occasionally?  What are they smoking calling this “good” coverage?  Hm, let’s check Sprint, home to the uber-super HTC EVO 4GS and the superfast Overdrive 4G hotspot:

You should generally receive a signal strength sufficient to make calls outdoors, in a car and in some buildings.

How Pathetic.  All these companies must speak a different version of English, where “good” means “no can do” in most buildings.  Insanity.

That only leaves Verizon, which has solid red (best coverage) in my entire area.  Which makes my choice easy: all those comparative reviews of the iPhone 3G and 4G, HTC Incredible, Nexus One, HTC EVO 4G are so irrelevant, if I can’t get a signal.  HTC Incredible (Android) and Verizon, here I come.  By default.

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)

Filed Under: Bay Area, Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , ,
post

Courier & Foldable Tablets are Neither Innovative Nor “Different”

Posted on April 30, 2010 ·

courier This is a sad “I’ve told you” moment, as I predicted the death of dual-screen tablets, be it the one by MSI or Microsoft’s Courier, which has just been canceled.  Says Frank Shaw, Microsoft’s VP of corporate communications:

At any given time, across any of our business groups, there are new ideas being investigated, tested, and incubated. It’s in Microsoft’s DNA to continually develop and incubate new technologies to foster productivity and creativity. The “Courier” project is an example of this type of effort and its technologies will be evaluated for use in future Microsoft offerings, but we have no plans to build such a device at this time.

Tech blogs are mourning the innovative, “different” device:

Courier was one of the most innovative concepts out of Redmond in quite some time.

I think dual-screen, foldable tablets are neither innovative nor different.  Well, different from other, truly innovative devices, like the iPad, but not different from good old books.  And therein lies the rub.  Hardware manufacturers rushing to the opportunity to follow Apple thought these tablets are mostly reading devices, so they imitated what we’re all used to: books.

Having two small pages side-by-side is not necessarily the ideal format for reading, it’s just the one we got stuck with for centuries when bound paper was the only way we could record / consume textual information. When we liberate information from paper, there’s no point in replicating the poor paper (book) experience. True innovation means embracing the paradigm-shift, rethinking the basics and maximizing readability, comfort, ability to interact as enabled by the new technology.

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)

Filed Under: Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , ,
post

I Stole the HTC Incredible for $99. OMG.

Posted on April 30, 2010 ·

Wow, talk about luck, apparently I caught a discount that barely existed for hours.  I’ve long waited for a decent smartphone available @ Verizon, be it the iPhone, Nexus One or whatever else … so raving reviews of the HTC Incredible certainly did not leave me cold. Still somewhat hesitating, I started to look for deals.  Verizon offers the new superphone for $199 with a two-year contract, but I’ve quickly quickly found some outlets selling it for $149. Then it occurred to me I should check my new default shopping destination, Amazon.  Bingo!

htc 99

I could not resist the $99 price, so I quickly ordered it.  This morning I wondered why people are saying Amazon sells it for $149 … a quick check on the pricing:

htc 149

Wow – was the $99 an introductory promotion ( not that they needed it, the first shipment sold out in hours), or an honest mistake by Amazon?  I don’t know, but am certainly happy that I grabbed it while it lasted 🙂

Now, if only HTC had a better name for it: saying HTC Droid Incredible is quite a mouthful – compared to the elegant simplicity (simple elegance?) of just saying iPHone.  Perhaps they should follow this advice:

If you have the audacity to name your new smartphone Incredible, it had darn well better live up to its name. Based on the reviews from CNET, LAPTOP magazine, PC Magazine, and PC World, the new HTC Droid Incredible does just that. In fact, the Android 2.1-based Verizon phone ($200 with two-year contract) could just as well be named Awesome. Stupefying. Maybe even OMG.

OMG.  I like it.  Now, please, Holy Amazon, just ship it soon.

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)

Filed Under: Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , ,
post

Your Old Copy Machine a Security Risk?

Posted on April 21, 2010 ·

If this is true (and it appears so, I’m just using conditional since it’s so insane .. beyond insane) discarded old photocopiers may represent a huge security / privacy risk.

Nearly every digital copier built since 2002 contains a hard drive – like the one on your personal computer – storing an image of every document copied, scanned, or emailed by the machine.

Used, discarded copiers then get sold without the previous owners having a clue about all the data they just let go of. In a way it’s worse then disposing an old computer with a “live” hard disk – at least in the case of the computer, you know what information may still reside in it…

A random pick of 3 units from a warehouse showed data from sex crime and drug related police investigations, building designs, payment records with names and social security numbers, and detailed medical records from drug prescriptions, to blood test results, to a cancer diagnosis – with names of the patients.

A huge, huge timebomb.

Read the full story on CBS News


Watch CBS News Videos Online

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)

Filed Under: 1, Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
post

Hacker Disables Cars via the Web – Our Remote Controlled Life

Posted on March 17, 2010 ·

vw-remote This is what remote controlled toy cars looked like when I was a kid.  Yes, the control box was connected to the car with a 3-4feet cable… not exactly the level of freedom you get with today’s wireless models.

But it was fun, nevertheless.  I wonder if 20-year-old Omar Ramos-Lopez had a toy car when he was a kid.  He seems to have found one now.. let me correct that: he seems to have found over 100 remote controlled cars to play with.

The laid-off employee of Texas Auto Center sought revenge and he found it in the Webtech Plus system, which allows dealers to remotely switch off ignition, sound the honk …etc. in the cars of non-paying customers.  Our hacker immobilized over 100 cars and triggered their honks in the middle of the night… probably almost as much fun as a crazy SXSW party 🙂

On second thought, it probably wasn’t fun for the drivers whose cars would not start going to work, or whose only remedy against a shrieking honk at midnight was to remove the car battery.  But at least they were aware of the presence of the remote device… unlike students and families of Lower Merion School District in Pennsylvania (has Lower Merion just become the most famous school district in the US?).  The Spy Cam District’s victims had no idea their homes could be monitored using the school issued laptops.  (And the school district blew their chances of becoming a hit Reality TV show…)

pge-smart-meterTalk about remote sensors: I had no idea of the extended capabilities of the smart meter PG&E, the local utility has installed recently.  These smart meters were all about remote reporting of consumption, and somehow the utility company forgot to tell us they came equipped with a wireless switch to shut off electricity supply.

Shall I go on?   I’m not sure I even want to know how many aspects of our lives can be digitally controlled… all in the name of progress, but dangerous when falling in the wrong hands. 🙁

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve )

Filed Under: Technology · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , ,
post

Laser Friday

Posted on February 12, 2010 ·

News on lasers of all sizes hitting targets of all sizes…  let’s start small – hey, small is beautiful, after all.  Besides, this is one laser you could own at a reasonable size one day.

Small Gun, Lots of Small Targets

Former Microsoft CTO Nathan Myhrvold currently runs aptly named Intellectual Ventures.  At TED (not to be confused with Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure) he presented a laser system that can shoot down mosquitoes at a rate of 50-100 mosquitoes per second (!).  Here’s a demo video – obviously in slow motion:

The best part: he assembled this system from commercially available parts, in fact some components were acquired on eBay.  The guiding software is said to be refined enough to not only find the target, but determine their size, speed, sound characteristics, in fact separating females (the gender that bytes humans) from males, and only hit the real enemies.  So your birds, pets and neighbors are safe. That is, until a hacker decides to experiment 🙂

If this sounds like mini Star Wars, here’s the real thing:

The Big Bang.  Big Gun, Big Target

The US Airforce’s he Airborne Laser Testbed system had a successful test off the California coast this week, when an airborne laser successfully  destroyed a missile minutes after it’s launch, while it was still in boost phase:

Not sure if the youtube version of the video will be allowed to stay on, but here’s a link to another version. While the experiment was technically successful, the future of the program is in doubt: there is only one system on one single airplane.

Well, let’s see, I promised all sizes: we’ve had the Big One, and a small laser against lots of tiny targets.  Let’s see what happens when lots of small lasers target on tiny target.

192 Lasers Hitting One Little Target

A research team at Livermore National Laboratory successfully fired a focuses array of 192 laser beams at a helium-filled target no larger than a BB shot and instantly heated it to 6 million degrees Fahrenheit. The gas vanished in a tiny explosion.   Wow… I wonder how they measured 6 million degrees?  But it’s nothing, the objective is to reach 200 million degrees.

Heartwarming news… especially that I live a mere 10 miles from that Lab.  But not all is lost, I got some assurances from Charlie 🙂

@ZoliErdos we’ll try to remember you after the The Ignition

Thanks.  Forever 🙂

(Cross-posted @ CloudAve )

Filed Under: Technology · Tagged: , , , ,
« Previous Page
Next Page »