November 2008 Archives

Texting (SMS) is certainly popular, especially amongst the younger crowd. In fact, one teenaged girl sends more than 600 text messages in a day -- almost double what an average American sends/receives in a month. A 29-year-old man travelled from San Francisco to Green Bay to meet a woman he met via text message. It was love at first texting.

We've all heard of the term "speed dating", which allows you to meet many people on several mini-dates usually lasting from 3 to 8 minutes. Well, how bout speed SMS dating, where you meet other texters with common interests simply using your mobile phone and Bouncephone. Bouncephone is free (standard carrier texting rates apply) and it's accessible entirely from your mobile phone.


Here's how it works.

  National Geographic Ventures is working with video game makers on branded games for PCs, consoles and handhelds, with such forthcoming titles as National Geographic: Panda for the Nintendo DS and Sony will have National Geographic: Africa.

For the Panda title, look what you will be able to do!

• Interact with pandas - play with, help, teach and nurture your very own cute panda bear
• Learn about pandas - view pictures and read stories about real-life pandas from the National Geographic archives
• Nurture your panda - your panda's habits change with how you treat and play with it
• More pandas - as your panda develops, new baby pandas will join him in Panda Park
• Play in real time - graphics and sounds change according to the time of day
• Fun playground toys - have fun playing with familiar playground equipment like a tire swing, a see-saw, slides, and more
• Advanced shopping features - let your daily allowance grow and go on a shopping spree, buy panda food and toys immediately or order items by mail via Panda Delivery
• Simple UI - interact with your panda with a single touch of the stylus pen, simple controls allows you to focus on interacting with your panda

Almost like Panda Tycoon!

More at Bandai Namco Games.

• Interact with pandas - play with, help, teach and nurture your very own cute panda bear
• Learn about pandas - view pictures and read stories about real-life pandas from the National Geographic archives
• Nurture your panda - your panda's habits change with how you treat and play with it
• More pandas - as your panda develops, new baby pandas will join him in Panda Park
• Play in real time - graphics and sounds change according to the time of day
• Fun playground toys  - have fun playing with familiar playground equipment like a tire swing, a see-saw, slides, and more
• Advanced shopping features - let your daily allowance grow and go on a shopping spree, buy panda food and toys immediately or order items by mail via Panda Delivery
• Simple UI - interact with your panda with a single touch of the stylus pen, simple controls allows you to focus on interacting with your pandaInteract with pandas - play with, help, teach and nurture your very own cute panda bear
• Learn about pandas - view pictures and read stories about real-life pandas from the National Geographic archives
• Nurture your panda - your panda's habits change with how you treat and play with it
• More pandas - as your panda develops, new baby pandas will join him in Panda Park
• Play in real time - graphics and sounds change according to the time of day
• Fun playground toys - have fun playing with familiar playground equipment like a tire swing, a see-saw, slides, and more
• Advanced shopping features - let your daily allowance grow and go on a shopping spree, buy panda food and toys immediately or order items by mail via Panda Delivery
• Simple UI - interact with your panda with a single touch of the stylus pen, simple controls allows you to focus on interacting with your panda

The Washington Post/The Associated Press (11/18)  

I was on the phone with TMC's Verizon representative to discuss changing our mobile phone plans. The Verizon rep told me it was bad timing since their entire intranet ordering system had completely crashed as a result of the Blackberry Storm launch. TMC's business Verizon rep couldn't even make changes to our account as a result. Well, it certainly looks like the Storm is having a tremendously successful launch. Should the iPhone be worried?

Heck, hundreds of people lined up at Verizon Wireless stores today across the U.S. to buy the BlackBerry Storm, the first touch-screen phone from Research In Motion.




According to Reuters, more than 200 people had waited at a Verizon store in mid-town Manhattan but were turned away after it ran out of the new phones less than an hour after opening. The angry customers were seen wielding pitchforks and torches until the police came to restore order. No really...

The Napoleon Dynamite problem is driving Len Bertoni crazy.

Bertoni is a 51-year-old "semiretired" computer scientist who lives an hour outside Pittsburgh. In the spring of 2007, his sister-in-law e-mailed him an intriguing bit of news: Netflix, the Web-based DVD-rental company, was holding a contest to try to improve Cinematch, its "recommendation engine." The prize: $1 million. 

Cinematch is the bit of software embedded in the Netflix Web site that analyzes each customer's movie-viewing habits and recommends other movies that the customer might enjoy.

Did you like the legal thriller The Firm? Well, maybe you'd like Michael Clayton. Or perhaps A Few Good Men.

The Netflix Prize goes to anyone who can make Cinematch's predictions 10% more accurate. That sounds like an awfully big prize for such a small improvement. But, in fact, Netflix's founders have tried for years to improve Cinematch, with only incremental results, and they knew that a 10% bump would be a challenge for even the most deft programmer.

They also knew that getting to 10% would certainly be worth well in excess of $1 million to the company.

The competition was announced in October 2006, and no one has won yet, although 30,000 hackers worldwide are hard at work on the problem. Each day, teams submit their updated solutions to the Netflix Prize Web page, and Netflix instantly calculates how much better than Cinematch they are. (There's even a live "leader board" ranking the top contestants.)

More at the New York TImes.

A report from research consultancy TDG predicts that portals like Microsoft's Xbox Live and Sony's PlayStation Network will soon become formidable competitors to incumbent Pay TV services.

Leveraging broadband-enabled game consoles as the next-generation video platforms -- and bypassing cable and satellite TV operators, these companies will offer a compelling alternative to traditional TV programming by providing a more immersive, interactive video experience.

The launch of Microsoft's Experience and the Xbox Live Netflix streaming video service is a perfect example of how potent these services will soon become. There is little doubt these services are finally ready for prime time.

Even before the launch of Experience, Microsoft's Xbox Live had amassed some 15,000 movies (1,000 of which are HD) and some 13,000 TV shows for download-to-own. The Netflix partnership adds 12,000 movies and TV programs to the mix, all for free streaming to Netflix subscribers.

Sony's PlayStation Network has collected close to 1,000 movies and hundreds of TV programs for download-to-own. It has also announced plans to expand dramatically its video library in the next few months in order to compete with Xbox Live. 

Many thanks to Advanced-Television.

Pantel debuts the latest in waterproof TVs!

Pantel is preparing updated versions of its waterproof Mirror TV line: LCD TV sets that are mirrors when not in use and can go in wet environments such as outdoors, a shower or a sauna.

The new offerings will come in four screen sizes ranging from 17 to 32 inches and are expected to begin shipping to retailers by the end of the year.

Now what will they think of next!

More at TWICE.

Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Commissioner Robert McDowell recently fielded questions from the public about the DTV transition in Philadelphia, including this one:

"I thought I lost my converter coupons I received in the mail, but later found them in my desk drawer at work, the coupons had expired and I was told I could not get replacement, even though I told them I could send back the coupons I received. Is there a way to receive another coupon or am I just out of luck? Thanks for your help."

McDowell: "Great question. Congress mandated that the coupons expire within 90 days. So your best recourse is to find a friend, neighbor or relative who does not need a coupon to order one for you and give it to you. Of course, if you don't need the coupon to be able to purchase the box, you can just buy one outright. They cost as little as $40."

Less than 100 days remain before the nation's analog broadcast television system is shut down for good. Thus far, the federal government has mailed nearly 32 million $40 coupons for the digital-to-analog converter boxes necessary to keep old TV sets working without cable or satellite. Of that 32 million, nearly a third have expired; 13.5 million have been redeemed, and the rest are floating around or sitting at the bottom of a drawer.

Stations have been doing dry runs for months to get folks prepared for the transition, and one of the most prevalent issues involves reception. The antennas that pulled in mostly low-VHF channels don't necessarily do the trick for digital signals, many of which will be UHF. 

Where will you be when they pull the plug?

More at Television Broadcast.

See -- as if we needed confirmation -- gadgetry is good for you.
Well, maybe I'm taking a small step here, but a new study from the MacArthur Foundation has found that all those hours that teenagers spend socializing on the Internet are not a bad thing.

(And how to they get access to the Internet? Gadgets, of course!)

"It may look as though kids are wasting a lot of time hanging out with new media, whether it's on MySpace or sending instant messages," said Mizuko Ito, lead researcher on the study, Living and Learning With New Media. "But their participation is giving them the technological skills and literacy they need to succeed in the contemporary world. They're learning how to get along with others, how to manage a public identity, how to create a home page." 

See?

More at the New York Times or go directly to the MacArthur Foundation.

Vudu, a startup that sells and rents movies via its Internet-connected set-top box, has boosted High-Definition library to 1,100 on-demand titles -- for now, outdistancing any cable operator's HD video-on-demand service.

To build what it claimed is the largest library of HD content available to consumers, Vudu added on average of 150 HD titles per week in October.

The service requires a minimum 4-Mbps connection for instant playback of HD titles.

Vudu is attempting to sell its $300 set-top to home-theater buffs by emphasizing the service's broad content selection and navigation features. Movies on the service are available for 24-hour rental for between 99 cents and $3.99, and $9.99 to $19.99 for download-to-own.

As part of its strategy to target high-end consumers, Vudu last month began offering 65 feature movie titles for rental in 1080p high-definition video format, the highest HD format currently defined. 

More at Multichannel News.

From the first time Steve Jobs demonstrated "the pinch" -- the two-finger gesture used to zoom in and out of photos and Web pages on the iPhone -- some Apple observers assumed it was just a matter of time before a multitouch-enabled screen showed up on the Mac.

That hasn't happened yet. But now Hewlett-Packard has beaten Apple to the punch, announcing the first multitouch-enabled notebook PC, the tx2.

We are all wondering -- aren't we -- why Apple couldn't get this out to market first?

The tx2 is a convertible notebook, meaning its screen can pivot 180 degrees to show someone else what's on it or lie flat and act like a tablet PC.

The first convertible notebook aimed directly at consumers, the tx2 sports HP's version of multitouch technology, which lets you use two fingers at once to manipulate images on the screen or make on-screen gestures that signify specific commands.

A pinch motion works just like it does on an iPhone or MacBook, for example, letting you rotate pictures or press and drag files around.

Pricing? $1,150 or only $151 more than the starter MacBook.

More at BusinessWeek.

I grew up reading PC Magazine and I looked forward each couple weeks to picking up my copy of PC Magazine at the local grocery store. But today, Ziff Davis has announced that the legendary PC Magazine print publication is shutting down its print publication and focusing exclusively on online content. This is truly a sad day... Hold on while I grab some tissues...

PC Magazine started the whole in-depth comparative reviews of PCs and Microsoft software. They expanded later to including gadgets, MP3 players, mobile phones, GPS, and other technology. PC Magazine offered insightful tech tips and great columnists like John C. Dvorak. Back in the 80s and 90s the print publication was 400-500 pages, making for hours of tech- reading pleasure. Today, it's down to 150 pages and soon to be 0 (January 2009).

Well, I guess it's "greener" that way. But I for one will miss my print copy of PC Magazine.

The new Xbox Live look is supposed to kick off today so be sure to take a peek.

The gaming platform now includes customizable avatars, an iPod-like display and easier viewing of Netflix downloads.

It's got to be an improvement over what was there before ... or at least we hope so!

Let's hear the feedback!

Louder!

The new BK-UNV01 module from startup BlueKey Wireless can turn most Bluetooth-enabled phones into home controllers.

Despite the prevalence of Bluetooth solutions on the market, the company believes this product is unique because of the company's robust on-screen programming interface.

The module and companion software debuted at the Electronic House Expo Fall 2008 in Long Beach, Calif.

The BK-UNV01 receives Bluetooth commands from compatible phones and other devices -- up to 300 feet away for Class 1 Bluetooth products -- and can trigger virtually any low-voltage device via seven onboard programmable relays.

The unit also has a serial interface for controlling more advanced control systems (one-way). Out of the box, it supports the Powerlinc serial-to-powerline module for controlling Insteon and X10 devices over the home's existing AC wiring.

Up to 16 mobile devices can be tied into the system.

BlueKey's Java-based application software loads onto a Bluetooth phone like any other application. It allows users to configure (with delays, if desired) each relay and label each command (up to 82) via an onscreen wizard.

Optional cellular and landline interfaces enable the BK-UNV01 to deliver status reports to the customer's phone when out of range. Eventually, BluKey will provide Internet connectivity as well.

BlueKey sells the BK-UNV01 module and software for $499 (including a license for one mobile device), but the company is focused mainly on OEM business.

More at CEPro.

Didn't I just blog yesterday about the wisdom of Pioneer opening its second U.S. retail store?

Well, I guess these companies have a better bead on what's going on the minds of their consumers because now HP is planning to launch 7,500 stores across Asia.

(That is a serious amount of stores!)

Hewlett-Packard plans to focus on China and India when it establishes these stores in 1,000 Asia-Pacific cities.

One of the largest computer companies in the world, HP is striving to offer an enhanced retail experience as well as improved customer support.

As well as appeal to nearly one-third of the world's population -- much of it moving steadily upward.

More at The Economic Times (India). 

Hoping to provide viewers with an easy way to move Internet-based video onto TV screens, GridNetworks has announced a new service that would do just that by routing the content through an Xbox 360 gaming console.

The service is designed to work with any device that uses Universal Plug and Play protocols and, in the future, GridNetworks wants to be able to use Sony's PlayStation 3 as the conduit as well.

More at Multichannel News.