L.A. Conspicuously Absent from PCWorld’s Cell Data Performance Test
Where's Los Angeles? They're also missing Detroit, Miami, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Philadelphia.
How is this impartial when the second most-populous metro area in the country is absent?
How about a latency test? And what good is the backbone's bandwidth if its radio signal can't penetrate a single office building wall?
via AT&T Roars Back in PCWorld’s Second 3G Wireless Performance Test - PCWorld.
Sagem Orga outs SIMFi, a SIM card/WiFi router hybrid
Sagem’s SIMFi is one of those ideas that you wish you had come up with yourself. The concept is pretty straightforward: they’ve created a SIM card with an embedded WiFi radio, so provided you have a suitable data plan, the card itself puts out a WiFi signal instead of relying on the phone. For anyone who’s ever needed internet access on a laptop, with no other tools besides the phone in their pocket, this is a potential godsend.
Holy wow! AT&T admits NYC/San Fran 3G service sucked
A recent AT&T earnings call consisted of a lot of talk talk talk but one slide stands out: it essentially admits that 3G in San Francisco and New York sucked ween AKA were both far below their official performance objective.
Kohjinsha’s dual-screen DZ Series laptop now for sale — Engadget
Do want.
Remember IBM's ThinkPad 701 with the butterfly keyboard? This isn't it, it's better... conceptually anyway. Instead of two halves of a keyboard magically jigsawing themselves together, Kohjinsha achieves a similar result with its DZ-series using a pair of 10.1-inch TFT displays with 1,024 x 600 pixel resolution (each) packed into an otherwise svelte 1.02 x 8.26 x 0.74~1.65 inches / 4.09 pounds (1.84 kg) portable. Best of all it's on sale now for ¥95,800 (about $1,110) with a Linux pre-load -- add another ¥5,000 (about $58) for 32-bit Windows 7 Home Premium.
via Kohjinsha's dual-screen DZ Series laptop now for sale -- Engadget.
AppleInsider | Piper: Apple’s next big iPhone feature is likely Verizon
Well, there you go. Apple's next big iPhone feature is likely Verizon.
So much for the "But GSM sucks here" argument. I thought Apple was tied to AT&T until 2011.
Shorting T anyone?
Official Google Blog: Explore a whole new way to window shop, with Google and your mobile phone
Official Google Blog: Explore a whole new way to window shop, with Google and your mobile phone.
I *HEART* Android
BTW, I got an Android device (CDMA HTC Hero on Sprint) and I'm in love. This thing is easily as good as an iPhone and I'm seeing a lot more wow factor when people play with it. It's got all the usual goodie apps (haven't found a SlingPlayer Mobile, yet), most of which are free.
Major Selling Points
Reliable cell service (on Sprint and Verizon)
Support of Net Neutrality (on Sprint)
Open app distribution (no app censorship)
Open source development
DRM-free
Unlocking doesn't brick the handset
Rising above the herd mentality of "The Apple Set"
Also, linking your contacts with your Facebook friends profile photos and birthdays (and Flickr, too)
LEAK: The Google Phone “Is a Certainty” – google phone – Gizmodo
LEAK: The Google Phone "Is a Certainty" - google phone - Gizmodo.
Fox and Microsoft are up to Something
It was interesting last night to notice the Microsoft product placement in Family Guy. For those of you who didn't see it, the show entered its first commercial break with a Mac OS X-esque spinning beach ball - followed by Peter Griffin leading into a Vist- ahem. Excuse me. A Windows 7 commercial where he endorsed the product's ease-of use. (For those of you who don't know, Win 7 is re-packaged Vista. And you doubted the power of marketing!).
My first thought was immediately of the network's political leaning's. They are known neither for their populism, nor for their subtlety. Then this morning, I read that FT is reporting of a Murdoch-Microsoft deal in the works. Despite it being Family Guy, it had the smack of Microsoft's always-contrived advertising humor.
Animators, animators, animators...
"Peter, hold my ears so I can euuuuuuglabalacagh..."
I immediately laughed because the PHP community has a long tradition of using the characters and storyline of Family Guy when illustrating examples of programming concepts.
My next thought was of the way this is going to hurt News Corp. If this is accurate, there is going to be an even larger divide between the segments of the English speaking world vis-a-vis their attitude towards News Corp publications. If Murdoch pulls all his sites from Google, it may lose what little credibility it still has; insofar as the fox can blend in with the hounds as long as it doesn't leave the pack.
Now see here, I own 30% of this network!
But once they leave the universe of Google indexing, and enter the unholy alliance with Microsoft, people will no longer be confused that what they are reading from News Corp via Google is actually news.
Net effect on Microsoft? Not sure about this one. They are paying News Corp to do this, so there's that. But other than it being a waste of money, I'm not sure how is really going to make Bing much more of a competitor than it is now. Especially if Google keeps acting like a benevolent public utility co-op that makes money for everyone.
Another question -- albeit one of lesser significance -- is that of the weird vertical relationships of MySpace and Facebook. Myspace is a property of Fox Interactive Media and Facebook (incidentally a PHP-based site) had a large infusion of cash from Microsoft back in its earlier days (mostly a symbolic one).
No one is talking merger or anything, but it is interesting to see how ever-changing technology is driving the marketplace now more than ever.
