Category: Computers, Internet & Technology

The best free iPhone app

LOS ALAMOS, N. M. (KRQE) – The light from a portable music player helped guide airborne rescuers to a lost snowboarder facing a second frigid night on a New Mexico mountain.

Sebastian Gomez disappeared while boarding in falling snow at the Pajarito Mountain Ski Area late Sunday afternoon. He and his best friend, Greg Blea, were on their last run in the mountains above Los Alamos when they became separated.
…

But as Gomez was preparing for another long, cold night shortly after sunset, he found salvation in his pockets. As a Blackhawk rescue helicopter made a pass overhead, he waved his iPod music player and a lighter.

KRQE.com

The Blu-Ray Problem

James Surowiecki takes a look at The Blu-Ray Problem. He begins:

With the Consumer Electronics Show starting this Wednesday in Vegas, we’re seeing another raft of predictions of the inevitable demise of Blu-Ray, Sony’s high-definition video disk technology. The most common prediction is that Blu-Ray is doomed because it will soon be eclipsed by streaming video and downloadable movies.

Surowiecki disagrees, “Blu-Ray’s real problem, it seems to me, is much simpler: it’s too expensive.”

He makes a good case.

iPhone thief thwarted

While at the dry cleaner one day, Rob’s iPhone was stolen. He immediately chalked it up as gone forever, and proceeded to purchase a brand new one that same evening. It was the next day when unfamiliar contacts began to appear on the new phone. The (not-too-bright) thief was unwittingly supplying him with names and phone numbers of his or her closest friends, via the magic of MobileMe synchronization from the stolen phone to the cloud and eventually to his new phone. “It didn’t take long for me to realize that MobileMe was leading me right to the thief!” wrote Rob.

Thanks to the fact that he caught on to it before he’d had time to remotely disconnect his account, MobileMe provided the groundwork for a little social engineering. Rob made quick work of wrangling a name and phone number from the provided contacts, supplying the police with everything they needed to get Rob his phone back. By the end of the night, he had his original iPhone in his possession.

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)

Oops

MyFox Washington got more than they bargained for at the McCain Campaign garage sale:

When we charged them up in the newsroom, we found one of the $20 Blackberry phones contained more than 50 phone numbers for people connected with the McCain-Palin campaign, as well as hundreds of emails from early September until a few days after election night.

Overload!

There are more than 70 million blogs and 150 million Web sites today—a number that is expanding at a rate of approximately ten thousand an hour. Two hundred and ten billion e-mails are sent each day. Say goodbye to the gigabyte and hello to the exabyte, five of which are worth 37,000 Libraries of Congress. In 2006 alone, the world produced 161 exabytes of digital data, the equivalent of three million times the information contained in all the books ever written. By 2010, it is estimated that this number will increase to 988. Pick your metaphor: we’re drowning, buried, snowed under.

From a lengthy piece at Columbia Journalism Review, Overload! Journalism’s battle for relevance in an age of too much information.

Cool new feature

The Google search application for iPhone (and iPod Touch) was updated yesterday. Now you touch the icon to open up the application, hold it up to you ear like you were taking a call, and speak your search request.

I just tried it (with a topic du jour) United Auto Workers. In a few seconds (five) up pops the usual Google list of possible sites.

Recognition isn’t perfect, but it’s a start.

The Bits Blog has some info on why speech recognition is an important breakthrough technology for mobile device manufacturers (because the keyboards are so small and difficult to use).

Computer buying guide

Walt Mossberg’s annual fall PC buyer’s guide. It includes this:

Windows vs. Mac: I consider the Mac operating system, Leopard, to be faster, easier and more stable than Windows XP or Windows Vista. It isn’t susceptible to the vast majority of malicious software that circulates on the Internet. And Macs also include Apple’s superb built-in iLife multimedia suite. Macs can even run Windows, though that costs extra.

However, Apple has consciously chosen not to offer machines in the bargain category. The cheapest Mac desktop, the minimalist Mac Mini, which doesn’t even include a monitor, speakers, keyboard or mouse, costs $650 for a model with a hard disk I consider adequate. The cheapest Mac laptop, the base model of the prior-generation MacBook (which Apple has retained in its lineup) is $999.

Both are good values, mainly due to the software. And Macs can save you money over time. But if the lowest upfront cost is your objective, you can pay hundreds less for desktops and laptops from Windows PC makers.

Mossberg provides PC specs for you to consider.

But if you want an Apple, you can get a perfectly satisfactory desktop Apple iMac with 20-inch monitor for $1144 from Amazon. A better one for $1419. And the awesome 24-inch iMac for $1694.

Internet and customer service update

I tested the download speed just now and recorded 10.19Mbps. That’s with Qwest broadband with optic fiber to the neighborhood. I’m paying for the 12Mbps tier, but I’m reasonably happy.

Apple has extended subscriptions to MobileMe another two months due to the problems we’ve had. Better that there weren’t any hassles, but I admire them for giving their customers an adjustment up front. I have a free 60-day trial that has turned into 150 days and my problems have been minor.

AAA insurance customer service on the other hand sucks. When I called to cancel the policy for my dad’s townhouse, they told me there would be a $40 charge — this on a $200 annual premium. When I grumbled that we’ve sold the property, not just cancelled the policy, I’m told that she (the customer service rep) will waive the charge. So if you don’t complain, you pay $40. Nice.

Then yesterday, after nearly two weeks, I called to ask about the refund. She’ll send out the check today this customer rep tells me. How long do you wait if you don’t ask?

And don’t even get me started on Tucson Electric Power.

To send or not to send, that is the question

James Fallows fears email.

I make my living writing things down, but even I have reached the point where I am not willing to put any sentiment whatsoever into reproducible form — in an email that could be forwarded, in a document that could be cut-and-pasted — without thinking about how it would look if it got into unintended hands.

Brad DeLong does not.

Second, for most of us the big problem has never been that people will repeat what we say, but rather that they will repeat what we did not say–or take what we say out of context.
. . .

In such a world as this one in which we live in, email and other means of communication that automatically create a record that can be used to push back against distortions is a blessing.

NewMexiKen has had to testify in federal court about what I meant in emails I had written, so I know what can happen. The written word is very powerful. It demands thoughtfulness, which is sadly lacking in so many email messages. (And, indeed, some of the informality of email has bled over into more formal documents too.)

Say what you mean, be polite, and don’t write what you don’t want repeated. Read, revise and proofread.

That said, I go along with DeLong.

And you?

Spying on other people’s computer

An interesting article at Slate about Spying on other people’s computers. I was amused by this guy’s solution to inappropriate use of the internets at work:

I stopped “special” surfing at the office when I put a linux box on a hub between the network internet router and the switches. I simply sniffed all traffic for image files and displayed it on a 42″ LCD out in the sales area. Images were displayed of what people were surfing. I also attached the ip address of the user to the image. It stopped inappropriate internet surfing in that office in 3 days. When everyone can see what you are doing, you get back to real work.

Frankly inappropriate internet usage at work is a problem unrelated to the internet. It’s a sign of an office of people without enough to do, or — more likely — without enough of the right things to do.

And, that is an age old problem.

IE be damned

Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of web sites are crashing in Internet Explorer due to something the statistics counter SiteMeter did. I have removed SiteMeter from NewMexiKen, at least for now.

But my question to you is, why are you using Internet Explorer? It’s a non-compliant, crappy piece of software — and unsafe to boot. There are better choices for FREE.

Try Firefox or Safari (including Safari for Windows).

It seems to me

It seems to me that utilities have the most confusing and often faulty websites. Things that do not lead where they say they will, pages that throw you out so you have to log-in all over again, and just generally annoying, user-unfriendly or unclear features.

Anyone else have this sense? Do you think it’s on purpose — something in the DNA of utility companies that causes them to baffle their customers — or is it just a general inability on their part to get it right?

I include, just for conversation, Comcast, Verizon Wireless and Qwest.

(Over the phone, Qwest tells me today that my monthly bill will be about 10% more than the amount on the order confirmation they sent me. Trying to find a place to deal with this online is what lead me to the above confusion. I got cut off trying to handle it on the phone. Imagine that.)

Free at last

No more Comcast at Casa NewMexiKen. I have installed Qwest high-speed internet (fiber optic) and it seems at least as fast, even much faster. (How does one tell for sure? And how much does it matter anyway?)

It’s definitely cheaper!

DirecTV delayed until Wednesday due to installation limitations. (That pesky HOA.) Guess I can continue to blog, as potatoing on the couch not much fun with only 10 channels.

Term-of-the-day

Today’s term-of-the-day is “cloud computing.”

In the geek world, “cloud computing” is a white-hot buzzword these days. It basically means working with files and programs that reside on the Internet, beyond your company’s walls — out there in the “cloud.”

Everyday consumers are doing cloud computing, too, maybe without even realizing it. When you use an Internet-based backup service, or Google’s online word processor or spreadsheet, or a Gmail or Yahoo mail account, you’re working with data on a secure Internet server somewhere — not on your hard drive.

Or so says David Pogue in a review of Apple’s new “cloud” service MobileMe.

NewMexiKen has been experimenting with MobileMe. It’s an improvement over dot Mac despite rough beginnings late last week. The sync function between computers is the biggest benefit — keeping your email, bookmarks, contacts and calendars the same on Macs, PCs and iPhones (and in my case an iPod touch). MobileMe is $100 a year; a 60-day free trial is available. For the $100, you get no ads, and a much cleaner web interface — to my taste Yahoo! is too cluttered, iGoogle too plain-jane.

MobileMe, of course, keeps the master copy in the — all together now class — “cloud.”