Sep 29

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att-mms-logo1Let the future tell the truth, and evaluate each one according to his work and accomplishments. The present is theirs; the future, for which I have really worked, is mine.”  - Nikola Tesla 1856 – 1943

This week I was bemoaning the ruining of my Netnewswire experience. its all new on the desktop, iPhone and syncing by Google reader. But its not working for me, and others by the sound of the forums. Gareth’s experience has been better, but he got the paid app. Maybe I shouldn’t be so cheap.

Anyway on to the stories…

iPhone MMS now live – If you’re on AT&T in the states anyway. The rest of us have had it since the 3.0 firmware came out. AT&T are relived it didn’t bring their network down. Apple, are probably relived that AT&T didn’t drop the ball, again. And you, long suffering iPhone user, can now use up your bundled texts four times as quick.

Palm ticked off by USB Implementors forum – If you go crying to Mom, you better have the best story, when she asks for answers. Unfortunately for Palm, Mom or the USB-IF in this case, is unhappy with the explanation given. I think an ass whooping is coming.

New iMacs on the way? – Rumours abound, and inventory is tight. Are new iMacs on the horizon? Of course they are. I just can’t wait to tell my new switcher friend, that his week old baby, is gonna be outdated so soon.

Intel’s Light Peak dictated by Apple? – Intel’s new super fast optical interconnect standard was proposed by Apple, according to Engadget. Claiming to have seen documents, including a roadmap to when it’ll be included in Macs. So having adopted and made defacto the USB standard, now its made over and up to version 3.0, Apple’s preparing to dump it and move on. Its not you USB, Apple’s like that, just ask the floppy disk.

AT&T and Google squabbling again - AT&T has gone crying to Mom (FCC), that Google isn’t playing nice. Google voice won’t pick up the tab for expensive interconnect charges to rural providers. But AT&T have to, poor baby. There, there let Mommy make it all better.

Microsoft doesn’t like Google’s Chrome Frame for IE – Duh, big surprise. But they’re at it again with the FUD. “Its a security hole, its a potential problem, don’t do it.” They’re advising their friends and family to stay away. But still want their friends and family to use IE. Luckily the rest of us can dump it, come on people.

Sep 22

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ZuneThere is a fifth dimension, beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition.” – Rod Serling 1928 – 1975

After a brief, technology related, hiatus we are back this week. And we began with a chat about the newly released iPods. How they stack up, and whats with the missing camera from the iPod Touch. Then on to my tech mishap, Snow Leopards minor disagreement with my router.  Damn BT’s Home hub rubbish.

Then back into the swing of things…

BeOS reborn as Haiku – The compact, fast and elegant OS from the 90’s is back and it’s open source. Its the OS us Mac users could be using today. If Gil Amelio hadn’t bought NeXT from Steve Jobs instead. Thereby ensuring his own demise, and Apple’s rejuvenation.

Pigeon beats broadband – In Durban, South Africa, they’ve gone back to the future, and ‘re’-introduced a novel data delivery system. Got some big files that need transferring, don’t bother with your ADSL connection, that’ll only get 4% of 4GB done in two hours. Call on Winston the carrier pigeon, and he’ll get all of that data 60 miles. As long as Dick Dastardly doesn’t get him first.

Google or Apple, which one’s lying over the Google Voice App? – Well, I’m not generally a betting man, but if I had to put money on it…. I’m afraid I’d have to go for Apple. Dialers we got hundreds, SMS programs, no problem. Google Voice there was an app for that.

A Mac with an illustrious past – A chance to own Gene Roddenberry’s 128k Mac. The first one off the production lines at that. Okay, given its not going to be the speediest computer, but who knows what stories were produced on this Mac. But unfortunately you can’t interface with it by talking into the mouse.

Zune HD is out – Wow it doesn’t suck. Generally positive reviews all round for Redmond’s new media player. Could be a real contender in the MP3 player market. Some good competition is what’s needed to spur on Apple, they’ve had it to easy for too long. I can’t believe I wrote ‘it doesn’t suck’ in a story about a Zune.

Ballmer’s at it again – Monkeyboy is at it again. Now, its okay to trash the competition in interviews. I’m not sure if its okay to ban your family from superior products, just because you don’t make them. But trashing an employees iPhone at a corporate event? Thats it Monkeyboy one down 40 million to go.

FCC comes out for ‘Net neutrality’ – The FCC’s Julius Genachowski has announced that he will ask the commission to start the formal rule making process, to enforce ‘net neutrality’. A spokesman for the industry said. “We believe that this kind of regulation is unnecessary in the competitive wireless space as it would prevent carriers from managing their networks — such as curtailing viruses and other harmful content — to the benefit of their consumers.” Right…. like that’s what you were using traffic shaping for.

A rather British apology – The British Prime Minister has apologized for the treatment of the mathematician and so called ‘father of modern computing‘ Alan Turing. Turing, who successfully broke the German Enigma code thereby shortening the war and saving a considerable number of lives, was persecuted for his homosexuality. He committed suicide in 1954. Although his name lives on in the AI computing field.

Sep 05

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google-unexplained_1476049c“If it’s a penny for your thoughts and you put in your two cents worth, then someone, somewhere is making a penny.”  – Steven Wright

This weeks chat touched on quite a few subjects, news readers, Gareth’s experiences with Snow Leopard, and the reason I haven’t had any yet. We even had a chance to have a dig at Windows, all in all we could have left it there. But we’d made all the effort to get together.

So it was on to the stories…

Rumour: Apple TV news at iPod event - Is Apple going to put some effort into their hobby. Or is the promising media hub being forgotten about in Cupertino. Maybe Steve has put some time into the ’summer project’, recovering from his recent bout of illness. Or he could have been playing ‘paper toss’ the whole time, that shit’s really addictive.

Britains oldest working computer roars to back to life – The Harwell computer the world’s oldest working ’stored program computer’, will be restored If the National Museum of Computing in Bletchley Park can raise the funds. It has 112.5 bytes of memory, and could take up to ten seconds to complete a single multiplication. It was designed around 900 noen-filled valves, called dekatrons. I love that name dekatron. I want a dekatron, purely because the name sounds so cool. Sounds like the baddest Transformer ever built.

Japan to spend $21BN on a power station in space – In about four years, Japan intends to have a solar array in space, using a microwave beam to send the juice back to earth. Sounds like something that’s waiting to be hijacked by a Bond villain. Or it might just be to warm up Godzilla’s movie snacks.

Top 10 gadgets for social media addicts – Us geeks like lists, comparison charts, and specifications. And a top ten of gadgets is practically geek porn, so Gareth pounced on this with relish. Shall I tell you the number one….. No, you’ll have to listen to the show, I’m such a tease.

eBay reaches deal to sell off Skype – What do you do when you have something you no longer need, or know what to do with. That’s right you put on eBay. You know your not going to get what you paid for it, but it is second hand after all. Impulse buys are a bitch, aren’t they.

Unexplained phenomenon Google logo: Can you explain it? – Strange happenings in the Google logo on the search page. Normally there’s a reason for a change to the logo, a holiday or anniversary of a famous event. But this time just a animation of a UFO, tractor beaming an ‘O’ away, which linked to an apparently random page on strange phenomena. Just Google messing with us. Or, has an engineer seen through Eric Schmidt’s disguise, and is trying to warn us.

Sony signs Google browser deal – Mountain View again in this story. In a deal talked about as, the first of many, Sony is making Chrome the default browser in all new PCs. I wonder which manufacturer will be the first to ship Chrome as the default OS in their new PCs. Can’t wait for that one, ‘cos its a small step from there to Ballmer selling Windows licenses at a yard sale.

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