Skype USB Phone

 

The Web page for this device leaves leaves one burning question unanswered: why?

Throw the bums out

Link to G.O.P. Aides Knew in Late ’05 of E-Mail - New York Times

Top House Republicans knew for months about e-mail traffic between Representative Mark Foley and a former teenage page, but kept the matter secret and allowed Mr. Foley to remain head of a Congressional caucus on children’s issues, Republican lawmakers said Saturday.

test

Times Reader

I've been testing out The New York Times Reader, an electronic newspaper of sorts created by the newspaper giant and Microsoft. My feelings are mixed so far.

The Reader is very well designed, easy to use and does a good job of bringing the newspaper-reading experience to the computer screen. It's prettier than a regular Web site (it incorporates photos better than any online newspaper I've read) and is easier to use than PDF-based "electronic editions" many newspapers, including mine, sell. I can see it being especially handy for Tablet PC users. The software downloads the entire paper at once, so users don't have to stay connected to the Internet to read. And it's easy to highlight and annotate articles, which users can then send -- with the notes embedded -- to friends and colleagues.

On the other hand, this works only for the New York Times, at least for now. Does this mean Microsoft expects readers to install a standalone reader for every publication they buy? Or is this going to be an semi-open format, like Microsoft's old Reader (not to be confused with this Microsoft co-created NY Times Reader)? Microsoft's original press release doesn't say.

This really should be a browser plug-in of some kind. When users go to NY Times Web site, the plug-in could spring into action and download the site in the Reader format.

You have to hand it to the Times, though. They've been on the cutting edge of this media transition and seem to be willing to experiment with electronic media. It'll be interesting to see if this one goes anywhere.

It's official: Zune to be $249

That's better than being priced higher than iPods of the same capacity. But even with the Zune's added features, I still think Microsoft's smartest move would be undercutting iPods on price.

Link to Zune details unzipped | CNET News.com

Answer the phone, dead man

Oops! Real ‘Itsy Bitsy’ songwriter still alive

The Paul Vance who wrote the songs — and provided proof with royalty payments he is still receiving for the hit — said he has been inundated with calls from people who think he died.

I think the writer means to say calls from people checking in on the death report. I don't know anyone who calls people they think are dead, but that's just me.

Falwell says Hillary would spark base - Yahoo! News

Falwell says Hillary would spark base

The Rev. Jerry Falwell says a White House run by Sen.
Hillary Rodham Clinton would energize his base of religious conservatives even more than if the devil were the Democratic nominee.

'I certainly hope that Hillary is the candidate,' Falwell told a private prayer breakfast. 'Because nothing will energize my (constituency) like
Hillary Clinton.'

Nice to know he has his priorities straight.

Iraq War Has Spread Terror, Agencies Say

Ahem.

So maybe Microsoft isn't so stupid after all

 It looks like my earlier rant was a bit premature. PVRWire reports that the Zune will go for $249 or less, not the $299 that had been reported elsewhere. This will make the device much more competitive.

But I still think the "Plays For Sure" debacle remains a major turn-off. Why shove yet another DRM scheme down consumers' throats and abandon everyone who bought WMP tracks through MSN Music, Urge, Napster, Musicmatch and Yahoo?

 

Update: Looks like the final price will be even less - $230.

Why the Founding Fathers bothered with "speedy and public" trials

Because sometimes the government is wrong. This is just reprehensible:

Canadian intelligence officials passed false warnings and bad information to American agents about a Muslim Canadian citizen, after which U.S. authorities secretly whisked him to Syria, where he was tortured, a judicial report found Monday.

...

Arar, now 36, was detained by U.S. authorities as he changed planes in New York on Sept. 26, 2002. He was held for questioning for 12 days, then flown by jet to Jordan and driven to Syria. He was beaten, forced to confess to having trained in Afghanistan -- where he never has been -- and then kept in a coffin-size dungeon for 10 months before he was released, the Canadian inquiry commission found.

Bush and torture apologists will argue that the U.S. was only following up on some bad information -- blame Canada! But again, this is the perfect example of why a fair trial is so important. What happened to Arar shouldn't happen to anyone. (For the record, he's a Canadian citizen, but was kidnapped on U.S. soil.)

A refresher:

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.

- Amendment VI, U.S. Constitution

Stupid, stupid, stupid

Microsoft's new iPod killer will be priced at $284 at Wal-Mart -- $55 more than a 30 gig iPod -- and won't play Windows Media DRM-protected files.

First, the price: I realize Zune has a bigger screen and more features than the iPod. But if Microsoft really wants to stop iPod's steamroller momentum, the device will have to sell at a lower price -- not a similar price and definitely not at a higher price. The iTunes has a far bigger ecosystem, which makes it a much safer bet for the consumer. Microsoft should appreciate better than anyone and price accordingly.

Now about the DRM: Basically, if you've thrown in your lot with Microsoft and bought music at one of the partner sites, you're out of luck. I'm not sure how Redmond is going to convince anyone to trust Microsoft again with yet another DRM scheme.

Or maybe this is just a clever ploy by Microsoft to convince everyone that digital-rights management technology is hopelessly broken.

Why our policies on terrorism suspects matter

U.S. war prisons legal vacuum for 14,000: "Seventy to 90 percent of the Iraq detentions in 2003 were 'mistakes,' U.S. officers once told the international Red Cross."

Suspects are only suspects until they're convicted in a fair trial. Because sometimes -- indeed, with this administration, most of the time -- the government is wrong.

Steve Jobs: Hypocrite?

A former Microsoftie chides Apple for blatantly copying its Media Center interface. I've criticized Apple for the same thing, though in this case, it seems especially egregious.

In most cases, Apple at least improves the technology -- sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. Not this time.

Boing Boing: Amazon Unbox to customers: Eat **** and die

Nice rant against Amazon's new video download service. I tried it, too, but the software was so buggy I uninstalled it about five minutes later. Cory Doctorow's complaint is much more specific, but he absolutely right.

Windows Live Local

Freaky. You can almost see the ducks at my apartment complex.

Where have all the sound effects gone?

New York Times' David Pogue blogs today about cultural artifacts of obsolete technology, specifically, cartoon sound effects:

What about the needle-scratching-across-the-vinyl-record sound? It’s still used everywhere, in cartoons, movies and so on, to represent a rude awakening, an abrupt interruption of a scene’s mood or the main character’s reverie. But today’s children have never even seen a record player. Isn’t the record-scratch sound totally lost on them?

And what about “ka-CHING!”? Cash registers don’t go ka-CHING anymore–they go beep!

I'd add to that the whole notion of "dialing" someone's phone number on your cell phone.

 

A classic straw-man argument from the Decider-in-Chief

"Whatever mistakes have been made in Iraq, the worst mistake would be to think that if we pulled out, the terrorists would leave us alone," Bush said in an Oval Office address.

Again, completely missing the point. Not a single person has suggested leaving Iraq so the "terrorists would leave us alone." No, critics suggested not invading in the first place because Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and has become a major, intractable distraction in the war on terrorism. Is the president intellectually dishonest or just an idiot?

Heckuva job, Bushie.

Cheney: Govt did "helluva job" since Sept 11 - Yahoo! News: "The government has done 'a helluva job' guarding America, Vice President Dick Cheney said on Sunday, as President George W. Bush prepared to visit Ground Zero amid an election-year debate on whether the country is safer five years after the September 11 attacks.

Yes, even after Katrina, the administration is still tone deaf.

Andrea has a Web site!

It's actually an online version of her portfolio, so if you'd like to see how talented she is, check it out.

Progress

Well, it's getting there. The formatting is slowly getting fixed, though new-and-improved commenting system is still whacked out. So everyone just shut up for a minute and let me think. 

Man at work

I'm performing a long-needed redesign of the site to make it a little fresher and less cluttered. So far, so good, I think. I need to fill up the left side and fix a few nagging style and coding issues, though.

If all goes well, I should have the update done before Andrea gets back tomorrow night.

Couldn't have said it better myself

I was wrong. Rumsfeld's outrageous, insane -- dare I say fascist? -- rhetoric does deserve a response. And MSNBC's Keith Olbermann delivers a doozy:

Mr. Rumsfeld’s remarkable speech to the American Legion yesterday demands the deep analysis—and the sober contemplation—of every American.

For it did not merely serve to impugn the morality or intelligence -- indeed, the loyalty -- of the majority of Americans who oppose the transient occupants of the highest offices in the land. Worse still, it credits those same transient occupants -- our employees -- with a total omniscience; a total omniscience which neither common sense, nor this administration’s track record at home or abroad, suggests they deserve.

Dissent and disagreement with government is the life’s blood of human freedom; and not merely because it is the first roadblock against the kind of tyranny the men Mr. Rumsfeld likes to think of as “his” troops still fight, this very evening, in Iraq.

It is also essential.  Because just every once in awhile it is right, and the power to which it speaks is wrong.

Of course, Olbermann is understating his case. This administration hasn't been occasionally wrong. It's been consistently, spectacularly, tragically wrong.

In the digital age, what does one buy at Barnes & Noble?

An ampersand-shaped bookend, of course! 

Rumsfeld: 63% of Americans morally confused, cowards, fascist appeasers

In unusually explicit terms, Rumsfeld portrayed the administration’s critics as suffering from “moral or intellectual confusion” about what threatens the nation’s security and accused them of lacking the courage to fight back.

In remarks to several thousand veterans at the American Legion’s national convention, Rumsfeld recited what he called the lessons of history, including the failed efforts to appease the Adolf Hitler regime in the 1930s.

This sort of rhetoric kind of speaks for itself.

Planet San Francisco

Your city can be a planet, too!

I've been promoted

This has been in the works for a little while, but I can finally talk about it openly now that it's official. I've been named assistant tech editor here at IBD, which basically means I get a little more money for a lot more work.

It also means I'll be stuck in the office most of the day rather than out doing interviews. I do, however, get a window cubicle. So I have that going for me.

I want, I want

Now this is what I call a monitor. Unfortunately, it looks like it'll cost about a million dollars.

Poor Pluto

It's no longer a planet.

Perhaps the most useless application of Linux, ever

Computer-controlled cat feeder.

The robots are taking over

The Financial Times reports that computers are generating breaking earnings stories for Thompson Financial and Reuters. My gut reaction, of course, is one of pure terror.

But on second thought, I don't know a single reporter who enjoys pounding out these boilerplate pieces. During my first year at IBD, the most mind-numbing part of the job was the quick-turnaround earnings shorts. In fact, my colleague and I used to refer to ourselves as highly trained monkeys every time earnings season rolled around. With standardized earnings reports, there's no reason why this "who" and "what" and "where" aspect to journalism shouldn't be at least partly automated. Reporters' time would be much better spent digging into the financials and asking the all-important "why" and "how" -- much harder questions.

If it's not loud enough, you're too old.

Test your hearing with this range of sampled frequencies.

In praise of South Beach

I was a little skeptical when Andrea and I embarked on the South Beach Diet (or as a colleague likes to call it, the "Pretend You're Diabetic Diet") a few months ago. I figured that the initial weight loss would be mostly water weight and quickly return. But so far, it's been the most successful -- and easiest -- diet for Andrea. She's lost 20 pounds so far. And I'm back to the weight I was before moving to California and discovering Rubio's.

The Amazon review sums it up quite nicely:

While the diet is sound, the book could be better organized. The first half mixes scientific study with anecdote in a seemingly random way, while the mix of meal plans and recipes can be confusing. Still, the recipes are varied and tasty, and you'll never feel deprived, unless you currently happen to live by bread alone.

The other criticism I have is with the author's opening statement that the diet is neither low-carb nor low fat. That's a blatant lie -- it's both of those things.

Still, not a bad return for a $10 investment.

Mac OS X Leopard and Windows Vista side by side

A nice, sober-minded comparison of the looming OS upgrades.

Cupertino, start your copiers

Steve Jobs mocked Microsoft for copying Apple this morning, while announcing some of the new features of the upcoming Mac OS upgrade, including this Spaces feature. He might want to know that this capability, available "only with Mac OS X Leopard," has been around for at least four years as a Windows XP Powertoy called Virtual Desktop Manager.

Sign of the times

Underwhelmed by It All - Los Angeles Times:

A new Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll, the first in a series of annual entertainment surveys, finds that a large majority of the 12- to 24-year-olds surveyed are bored with their entertainment choices some or most of the time, and a substantial minority think that even in a kajillion-channel universe, they don't have nearly enough options. 'I feel bored like all the time, 'cause there is like nothing to do,' said Shannon Carlson, 13, of Warren, Ohio, a respondent who has an array of gadgets, equipment and entertainment options at her disposal but can't ward off ennui.

Official Google Blog: Saved locations on Google Maps

Official Google Blog: Saved locations on Google Maps

Finally.

Civil war in Iraq possible, generals say - Politics - MSNBC.com

Civil war in Iraq possible, generals say:

Under questioning by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Pace said he did not anticipate one year ago that Iraq would now be in danger of descending into civil war.

Funny. Everyone else seemed to anticipate it. Well, almost everyone.

Cooler than Google Earth?

Microsoft Live Labs: Photosynth

Creepy

Sculptor Ron Mueck's Exhibition, Yahoo! News Photos

Passion of the what?

According to the report, in addition to threatening the arresting deputy and trying to escape, Gibson said, "The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world," and asked the officer, James Mee, "Are you a Jew?"

As Mel Gibson's recent meltdown demonstrates, it's probably a bad idea to link Christianity too closely to any particular (non-divine) person, group or political party. (See also Ralph Reed, George W. Bush.)

Did someone order "freedom fries?"

From MSNBC: Iran president bans usage of foreign words

Another similarity between conservative Republicans and fundamentalist Islamists.

Pass Go, get a $200 direct deposit

Looks like Monopoly is going cashless.

Is it me, or is it hot up here?

Nope, it's definitely hot.

With temperatures reaching 104 degrees Fahrenheit today, I had to resort to some Arizona-style cooling techniques, including sealing off the air-conditioned living room from the rest of the apartment and sleeping on the couch, spending the day at an air-conditioned bookstore and the old standby, the cold shower.

Sometimes, the truth hurts

From BuzzMachine:

Then she said that news is “an industry with a lot of oversupply that is now exposed.” I liked that hard economic talk about the business. It reminds us that we are an industry and need to reexamine our business assumptions like every other industry.

So maybe the problem with journalism today isn’t that there are too few reporters and and editors but too many. I’ve talked before about the foolishness of sending 15,000 reporters to the political conventions, about papers sending TV critics to junkets or golf writers to tournaments. Inside the newsroom, too, there are overwrought processes. Meanwhile, of course, revenue is sinking and staff will follow.

Some good points here. As much as I hate to admit it, I think this probably goes for tech writers, too.

A step in the right direction

Buy A Customized Jessica Simpson MP3 At Yahoo! Music

No, I'm not talking about the song itself, but the idea that a major music service is considering selling music not crippled by "digital rights management" software.

Own your own flamethrower!

Brookstone Weed Burner

Product Description
Eliminate weeds quickly and permanently with a propane-fired weed burner. Use this lightweight burner to clear weeds and their roots in driveways or walkways in summer, or to melt dangerous ice patches in winter. Adjustable regulator valve lets you control flame intensity

The real Super Mario Brothers 2

Interesting story about Super Mario Bros. 2, the oddest game in the franchise. As it turns out, Nintendo had created a different Mario sequel but found it too hard for U.S. audiences. So it Mario-ized a completely different game called Doki Doki Panic and sold it as Part Duex.

Personally, I never liked the version they released in the U.S. It felt too different and was just, well, weird -- at least in terms of the Mario universe.

About.com has a long-overdue review of the real Super Mario Bros. 2.

Study Documents ‘Ghetto Tax’ Being Paid by the Urban Poor

From the New York Times:

Study Documents ‘Ghetto Tax’ Being Paid by the Urban Poor - New York Times

Drivers from low-income neighborhoods of New York, Hartford and Baltimore, insuring identical cars and with the same driving records as those from middle-class neighborhoods, paid $400 more on average for a year’s insurance.

The poor are also the main customers for appliances and furniture at “rent to own” stores, where payments are stretched out at very high interest rates; in Wisconsin, a $200 television can end up costing $700.

Those were just two examples among several cited in a report Tuesday showing that poor urban residents frequently pay hundreds if not thousands of dollars a year in extra costs for everyday necessities. The study said some of the disparities were due to real differences in the cost of doing business in poor areas, some to predatory financial practices and some to consumer ignorance.

From Deuteronomy 24:14:

Do not take advantage of a hired man who is poor and needy, whether he is a brother Israelite or an alien living in one of your towns.

And there's plenty more where that came from.

Happy birthday to me

I'm 37 today. That sounds so old...

Science education fails again

Move around and live longer, study says:

CHICAGO - Elderly people who load the dishwasher, climb stairs or just keep moving are bound to live longer than their sedentary counterparts, a study said on Tuesday.

The study of 302 people aged 70 to 82 found those who engaged in more physical activity -- ?not necessarily formal exercise --? were much less likely to die than those who did not move as much.

"The message here is that for older adults, any movement is better than no movement and that this can come from usual daily activities," said study author Todd Manini of the U.S. National Institute on Aging in Bethesda, Maryland.

Actually, the message here is that too many journalists fail to grasp the difference between correlation and causation, and too few educated people understand the scientific method.

An equally valid reading of this study is that people closer to death tend not to move around as much. Perhaps the study did correct for preexisting health differences among the participants. But that's nowhere in the story, and it's a question the reporter (or an editor) should have asked.

Needless to say, I will wait for a more definitive study before loading my dishwasher or climbing the stairs again.

The Ultimate Keyboard

This new keyboard from Microsoft looks promising. It's wireless, recharchable, has a sensor that knows when to backlight the keys (like most Apple laptops) and another sensor that lets it know when you're away so it can save power.

The only thing missing -- and I hate to keep harping on this -- is a volume knob. What could be more intuitive for multimedia keyboards?

I will never, ever again buy DRM-protected music

After reinstalling Windows XP on my home PC, I realized that I'd need to relicense music I bought a couple of years ago from MusicMatch. Problem is, Yahoo bought the company last year and no longer offers the music player I need to retrieve the license. Yahoo's new "Music Engine" won't relicense it either. So through no fault of my own, I need to re-purchase the album. You can bet that it won't be at another online store.

This is why so-called Digital Rights Management absolutely stinks. Where are MY rights to the music?

Vista Build 5456 not so bad?

This is a little reassuring after installing the slow and extremely buggy Beta 2. I understand that it's a beta and all, but the first public release of Windows XP a few years ago (a half-decade, actually) was much more polished and stable than this monstrosity. I hope Microsoft makes build 5456 publicly available soon, because I'm ready to ditch Vista and reinstall XP.

Killing grammar to death

Actual Reuters headline, as posted to MSNBC:

LOS ANGELES - Rock producer Phil Spector will go on trial in January on charges of killing a B-movie actress to death at his home, nearly four years after the fatal shooting took place, a judge said Friday.

I imagine it'll be fixed before most of you read this.

Box.net gets better

Box.net, a slick, free online storage and sharing site, has unofficially added Webdav support. That means you can put online folders right on your desktop, as if they were local files. In other words, downloading and uploading become a simple matter of dragging and dropping.

Box.net gives you a gigabyte for free and 5 gigabytes for $5 a month.

Now the question: why am I still paying $3 per month to MyDocsOnline for 50 megs?

Blogging as work

I just got word from my boss that reporters here may have to start blogging officially for the newspaper. Ugh.

The problem with newspaper blogs -- aside from being totally pointless in a media setting -- is that most aren't really blogs at all. Free of opinion, heavily edited and devoid of all spunk, most end up reading like half-baked news briefs. Let's hope IBD is willing to take some risks and do something really interesting with these.

Why I woke up at 7:30 on a Sunday

Why I woke up at 7:30 on a Sunday

Apparently, there was an important soccer game going on.

Dave Eggers on America and the World Cup. By Dave Eggers

Here's funny and insightful article by Dave Eggers on why soccer is such a popular youth sport in the United States, but not so popular as a professional sport:

The beauty of soccer for very young people is that, to create a simulacrum of the game, it requires very little skill. There is no other sport that can bear such incompetence. With soccer, 22 kids can be running around, most of them aimlessly, or picking weeds by the sidelines, or crying for no apparent reason, and yet the game can have the general appearance of an actual soccer match. If there are three or four coordinated kids among the 22 flailing bodies, there will actually be dribbling, a few legal throw-ins, and a couple of times when the ball stretches the back of the net. It will be soccer, more or less.

Jon Udell: Earth to Google PR

A nice smackdown of a very common PR practice.

SmackBook Pro

This is almost too cool. You have to watch the video to get it.

Why I'm seriously considering a Mac as my next laptop

Here's a YouTube video of someone using a new Intel-based MacBook and two software applications, Parallels and Virtue, to easily switch between MacOS, Windows and Linux at native speeds.

Pretty slick -- and handy, to boot.

ScienceDaily: The Most Realistic Virtual Reality Room In The World

Oh how I would love to play Unreal Tournament 2004 on this thing.

Lose the clown

McDonald's wants to look more like Starbucks, according to this article in BusinessWeek. I went to a McDonald's for the first time in years a few weeks ago, and have to admit that they've really managed to turn things around. Paying with a debit card was quick and painless -- easier than cash, actually -- and they've revamped the menu with somewhat healthier items. (Of course, I still ordered a Big Mac and fries.)

Still, the photos in the article make it clear that they're ripping off Panera Bread, not Starbucks.

Fixed the RSS feed

How embarrasing. My RSS feed had been broken for a year. A longtime friend I hadn't seen in years pointed it out today -- which tells you how many people actually read this blog.

Thanks, Matt.

Gates doesn't want to be world's richest man - U.S. Business - MSNBC.com

Gates doesn't want to be world's richest man - U.S. Business - MSNBC.com

I've got a solution! I'll be happy to take a few billion off his hands.

Awesome

A bunch of pranksters dressed up as Best Buy employees, befuddling workers and management alike. This is their story.

Yahoo Go for TV

This media-PC software looked kind of interesting, but my ultimate reaction is the same as Jupiter analyst Michael Gartenberg:

What I don't understand is why Yahoo is spending the time and effort to do this. Microsoft's already much further ahead (from what I've seen of the download) and offers much better out of the box experience. There's no reason that Yahoo can't offer the unique services it brings to the table, like Yahoo Photos or Music via the MCE interface. This is one of those things where it just doesn't make sense to re-invent the wheel.

I agree. And the same goes for Yahoo's Music Engine. Why couldn't this have been a plug-in to Windows Media Player. Like we need another media manager to install.

More evidence that newspapers are clueless about the future

From Poynter, where a reporter talks about trying to find a story online:

So I went to Philly.com and searched for it.

You guessed it: It's not there. Or at least when I searched for it in their search box, it didn't come up. (You can only search Philly.com articles for the last seven days.)

Next step? Google.

I typed in exactly the same search command, and -- yup, you guessed it again -- up comes the article. From Philly.com.

Is something wrong with this picture? Indeed.

Visual Studio Express free forever!

Microsoft has extended its one-year deal to offer stripped-down versions of its Visual Studio tools, along with some cool code snippets.

San Francisco/Bay Bridge Night

Cool picture.

Google Calendar is live

And it's pretty slick.

Yahoo Maps adds satellite imagery

I wonder where Yahoo got that idea.

Is there anything vinegar can't do?

The Vinegar Institute - Uses & Tips

Freedom is on the march

From today's USA Today:

A man in Afghanistan is being prosecuted in a Kabul court and could be sentenced to death after being charged with converting from Islam to Christianity, a crime under the country's Islamic sharia laws, a judge said Sunday.

More Origami skepticism

From eWeek:
Ultramobile PC Is Already Teetering, Analysts Say

But, being neither a phone or PDA, nor a notebook is exactly the problem, Gartner analysts contend in a new report released on March 14. The first devices' mix of prices and features are not convincing enough to inspire wide adoption among consumers and businesses. Thus, unless changes are made that allow the devices to offer more features for lower prices, UMPCs could be destined for lackluster sales, the analysts wrote.

Light up animated Pac-Man bicycle wheels

Cool.

Origami: Buzz Killer?

Gadget Web site Gizmodo seems to agree with me about the first batch of Origami products.

Intel shows Origami-like device

So this is what all the fuss was about? The leaked promotional videos looked cool, but the reality falls a little flat.

Sure, who wouldn't want a lightweight, all-in-one "lifestyle" computer? I'd sure like a portable device that could do everything from Web-surfing to e-mail to GPS-enabled driving directions to games to music.

Oh wait, I already have that. It's called a Pocket PC. OK, the Origami would have been a full-fledged PC, something my iPaq is definitely not.

But the prototype device mentioned in the Cnet story gets just three hours of battery life, making it not too much more useful than today's Tablet PCs. The coolest Origami device Intel is showing gets just fifteen minutes!

Intel predicts all-day battery life within a couple of years, but lets get real. Laptops haven't increased capacity much in the last 20 years. And for Origami to be a breakthrough device, it would have to last a long time between charges. I mean, mobility is the whole point, right?

Microsoft isn't officially revealing Origami until Thursday, so maybe there's something more to it. Let's hope so.

MercuryNews.com | 03/06/2006 | Searching for an answer to Google Desktop problem

I didn't know this, but here's another reason to pick Windows Desktop Search over Google Desktop. Basically, if you dare move a file that has been indexed, Google Desktop loses track of it.

Google's solution, according to the Merc: uninstall and reinstall the program, then wait a few hours while it re-indexes the data. Despite what the Merc says, I have a feeling that just reindexing the data would do the job. But still -- what a pain. Even then, the time theoretically saved with faster file searches goes right down the drain. As brilliant as they are, it looks like the Google folks need a little more insight into how real people use their computers.

On the other hand, I just noticed that Microsoft is still forcing users to install the worse-than-useless MSN Toolbar with Windows Desktop Search. The "enterprise" version doesn't have this requirement, but it might be complicated to install (no firsthand experience, just looking at the install page).

Skype me

After playing around with the final version of Skype 2.0, I think I'm going to make it my main IM client, at least on my laptop.

First, it seems to manage memory much better than Yahoo At idle, Skype uses 4-5 megs, vs. 19 or more for Yahoo -- and once Yahoo needs more memory for a higher-end feature , it never seems to give it back up when it's done. Adding IM environments, animated gestures, Yahoo Music integration adds up.

Skype's voice calling features are still the best among the IM clients I've tried -- though I haven't played around with Google Talk's voice features yet. Being able to forward calls to regular phones and having a version for Pocket PCs are really handy features. Video conferencing (at least for Windows) just clinches the deal.

The one downside, of course, is that most of my friends are on Yahoo. If only someone made a Yahoo plugin for Skype...

IE 7.0

I finally got around to playing with the new beta for Internet Explorer 7. I'm not quite ready to switch back from Firefox yet, but it's a big improvement. I especially like the slick RSS features, such as on-the-fly keyword filtering.

It can automatically download updates in the background and attach files, even if IE isn't running. Downloaded into the right folder, that means Windows finally might support automated podcasts on Windows media devices. But if this is true, I don't know why Microsoft doesn't come right out and say it. I'll try setting something up tonight to see if it works.

The Web page thumbnails -- which work a little like Apple's Expose feature -- are also nice.

Ten Reasons to Buy Windows Vista

Here's PC World's list. I'm looking forward to the much-needed security overhaul and improved desktop search functions. I'm ambivalent about the Aero interface, because it might mean buying new computers -- not to mention taking another Windows UI programming class. And Firefox made Internet Explorer irrelevant a long time ago.

Dvorak: Will Apple Adopt Windows?

His argument is similar to one I've been making for years. If Apple sold Windows machines, it would become one of the top-selling PC makers overnight.

In rare flop, Starbucks scraps chocolate drink

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Chantico, we hardly knew ye.

Googling

Google has been busy lately.

The search giant has released version 3 of its desktop search software with a couple of intriguing new features:

- Search across computers. Basically, this lets you search for files on multiple computers. Basically, it creates a searchable index that is synchronized among all of your computers, letting you pull up copies of files on another machine. All the computers have to be using the software and signed in with your Google account, but the syncing takes place in the background, and unlike services such as Microsoft's FolderShare, they don't all have to be online at the same time. Privacy issues aside, this would be pretty handy in my line of work, where information is often scattered across multiple PCs.

- Integrated contact info. This integrates the desktop with Gmail and Google Talk instant messenger into the search sidebar, making it easy to share info with your IM buddies. And like the Google Toolbar, desktop search now suggests alternative spellings for your queries.

Speaking of Gmail, desktop search now makes a searchable index of your Gmail messages so you can find old e-mail even when not online. Apparently, this is an older feature I didn't know about until now. At any rate, it eliminates Web-based e-mail's biggest weakness, offline access to your messages. Suddenly, Microsoft Outlook isn't such a must-have.

Another soon-to-be-unveiled Gmail feature will integrate Google Talk with e-mail, letting users strike up IM chats with e-mail contacts and archiving copies of old chats.

Because of these and other nifty features, I would love to use Google Desktop as my main PC search tool. I love the fact that a Google search can pull up info from the Web, my e-mail and past stories I've written -- all on one page.

But alas, I am sticking with Windows Desktop Search. First, the Google version still doesn't index Microsoft OneNote files, which contain much of the information I need access to regularly. It's only second to e-mail in that respect. Second, the new Google Desktop requires 256 megs of RAM, which unfortunately is too much for my ancient laptop. The software is still in beta, so maybe that will change.

On the bright side, looking at Google's new offering did spark me to reexamine the Microsoft product. I'd forgotten how powerful it is, with tons of options to narrow searches. One of my new favorites is real-world terms I can use in queries, such as "sent: last week" or "received: December." Nice.

BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » New News: Deconstructing the newspaper

Intersting crtitique of most daily newspapers and what they need to drop to survive.

Fear of a Skype Planet?

Uh oh. Looks like there might be a possible problem with Skype, the otherwise excellent IM/VoIP service. And it would explain why my router, a normally reliable Linksys unit, keeps crashing.

Gross

Gross
Originally uploaded by ken_brown.

As I suspected!

Missing Netflix? The mailman did it! - Cinematical

I swear this happened to me when I was a Netflix customer. The discs would turn up only when I sent them from Andrea's old neighborhood.

Google Pack

I'm not too impressed with this, especially after the big buildup. One conspicuous absence: OpenOffice, which Google and Sun were touting just a few months ago.

How I spent my weekend

After more than a couple weeks of cramps, lethargy and diarrhea -- with no improvement after a doctor's visit -- Tati finally ended up in the hospital all weekend with an extremely inflamed colon. As it turns out, was caused by an antibiotics-resistant bacteria called Clostridium difficile that's made headlines in recent weeks. Basically, this little bug is usually a normal part of the digestive system. But it can go out of control in people being treated by common antibiotics. The medicines kill off all the competing bacteria, leaving the Clostridium difficile free to thrive uncontested in the gut.

The funny thing is, just a few days ago I was just reading this article to Andrea, wondering aloud whether it's what Tati had. She was already taking antibiotics for other reasons when she arrived here. And her symptoms were almost exactly the same as the woman mentioned in the opening paragraph.

But because Tati wasn't taking the specific antibiotics mentioned in the article (fluoroquinolones), I dismissed it and didn't think to ask the doctor later.

The good news: we now know what it is.
The bad news: this can be very tough to treat.

Moral of the story? Don't be afraid to ask the doctor about something you read on the Internet. Learning about health, disease and medicine doesn't make you a hypochondriac.

New Year's resolution No. 1

Clean my keyboard at work.

Google responds

Along with a few other things, Google says:

Biased results? No way. Providing great search is the core of what we do. Business partnerships will never compromise the integrity or objectivity of our search results. If a partner's page ranks high, it's because they have a good answer to your search, not because of their business relationship with us.

What happens when you try to use laundry soap in the dishwasher

In my future niece's defense, the picture on the container did look sort of like a dishwasher. Sort of.

A in C

I got an "A" in my computer programming class! Of course, it was an introductory-level course at a community college, but still.

NY Times turns to Google Maps

This may be a first: The New York times has created an interactive graphic that ties into Google Maps. I've seen Google Maps mash-ups before, but never from a mainstream media outlet.

Will this be the start of a trend?

It's about time,

Senators members seek spying probe.

Time Warner to Sell 5% AOL Stake to Google for $1 Billion - New York Times

Microsoft more ethical than Google?

From the NY Times:

Google will also make a special effort to incorporate AOL video programming in its expanding video search section and it will feature links to AOL videos on the video search home page. These links will not be marked as advertising.

An executive involved in the talks said Time Warner asked Microsoft to give AOL similar preferred placement in advertising and in its Web index and that Microsoft refused, calling the request unethical.

The article doesn't say whether Google does this in other cases, but if money is being exchanged for links, clearly those links should be labled as advertising. Google is a media company, after all, and transparency with users is a hallmark of media ethics. You'd think that Google would have more appreciation for the value of user trust.

Another sign of the coming apocalypse

There's something seriously unbalanced in the global economy when the U.S. can afford to outsource video game-playing.

Coolest Christmas lights display ever

This guy obviously has a lot of time on his hands and perhaps a very understanding wife.