A Ring Tone Meant to Fall on Deaf Ears | NYT 11/24/2009
Posted by thaadsma in mobile web.1 comment so far
My daughter and I were talking Friday night and she clued me in on the latest cellphone secret in her high school… Teenagers have started to use a high-frequency ringtone that, apparently, adults are unable to hear:
“In settings where cellphone use is forbidden — in class, for example — it is perfect for signaling the arrival of a text message without being detected by an elder of the species.
“When I heard about it I didnt believe it at first,” said Donna Lewis, a technology teacher at the Trinity School in Manhattan. “But one of the kids gave me a copy, and I sent it to a colleague. She played it for her first graders. All of them could hear it, and neither she nor I could.”
The technology, which relies on the fact that most adults gradually lose the ability to hear high-pitched sounds, was developed in Britain but has only recently spread to America — by Internet, of course.”
Click here for a recording of the sound. I’m way over the hill, cause I can’t hear a dang thing.
COMMENT if you can hear anything!
via A Ring Tone Meant to Fall on Deaf Ears – New York Times.
Andy Kaiser gives two thumbs up to new Motorola Droid | Digital Bits 10/31/2009
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Andy Kaiser and I and a few more of us at i3 Business Solutions have been patiently waiting for the first smartphone based on the Google “Android” platform to hit the streets, and compete head-on with Apple’s excellent iPhone.
Andy likes the iPhone. Andy really likes the new Droid from Motorola.
Read his excellent review written at his Digital Bits technology column. Here’s an excerpt:
“The Droid is an excellent phone. Google, Motorola and Verizon really knocked this one out of the park. I don’t even like baseball, and I’m using a baseball euphemism. That’s how impressed I am.
As of this writing, you can visit “DroidDoes”, Verizon’s promotional site for the Droid. The site starts you off with a few blurbs about all the things the Droid does that the iPhone can’t do or doesn’t have like having a removable battery, physical keyboard, multitasking, and open app store, etc. To my knowledge, this is the first cellphone that has had the guts to directly criticize the mighty Apple iPhone.
It can criticize Apple all it wants. The Droid holds its own. Easily.”
Find out why Andy likes this phone so much, as he fully describes its features and capabilities at his website AndyBrain.com.
Reshaping Cisco: The world according to Chambers | The Economist 09/08/2009
Posted by thaadsma in Linux, broadband, infrastructure, managed services, microsoft, mobile web, virtualization, web, web services.add a comment
In case you missed this article on Cisco before you headed out for your Labor Day weekend, There’s a wealth of information on where Cisco’s been and where John Chambers intends to take them. Of particular interest is their foucs on virtualization:
“In the case of servers, souped-up computers that dish up data, the market shift Cisco intends to ride is virtualisation. In essence this means that the servers in a data centre are turned into a pool of computing power to be tapped into as needed rather than being used individually. Virtualisation creates a lot of complexity, to which Cisco has found an answer, says Robert Lloyd, who heads the group that has developed what Cisco calls the “unified computing system”. Its parts—servers, storage disks, memory—are held together and managed by a powerful switch running Nx-OS, one of Cisco’s operating systems.”
As a Cisco Select Partner here at i3 Business Solutions, we see their products as essential to “making things really work.” As more and more of our business systems– and personal networks of devices– get interwoven and integrated, I can only think that Cisco ultimately will be in the middle of it, making them all work together.
via Reshaping Cisco: The world according to Chambers | The Economist.
Microsoft 2019 scenario: everything I want except the flying car | The Industry Standard 03/04/2009
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Now this is more like it!
The five punchy two-minute video excerpt says a lot about where we are going:
“The super-slim and easy-to-use handheld gadgets and wall-sized transparent displays handled by the video’s shoppers, students and office workers make Tom Cruise’s setup in Minority Report seem obsolete. More important than whizzy interfaces, the videos promise much more extensive collaboration, instant information retrieval, and multimedia communication.”
via Microsoft’s 2019 scenario has everything but Windows | The Industry Standard.
NOTE: The original five-minute version (much higher quality) can be viewed at Microsoft Office Labs.
Will the Google revolution engulf IT departments? | Tech Sanity Check | TechRepublic.com 04/14/2008
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“Gartner has embarked on a wide-reaching new study of Google and its potential impact on IT, enterprise businesses, and society in general in the coming years. On April 10 at the Gartner Symposium ITxpo 2008 in Las Vegas, Gartner Vice President Richard Hunter revealed some of the first data points from this study.
The two most interesting points were:
1.) The best way to think of Google is as a disruptive technology.
2.) Disruptive technologies create big losers and big winners, and one of the biggest losers in the Google disruption could be traditional IT departments.This new study is being conducted by a team of 15 Gartner researchers, led by Hunter, and the full report will be published in mid-2008. The title of Hunter’s presentation at ITxpo was “What Does Google Know?” The answer to that question was even more sobering than I expected, as the slide below demonstrates.
FORTUNE Techland | Battle over next-generation cellular networks 12/19/2007
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FORTUNE: Techland The battle over next-generation cellular networks «
Faster, Sprint, faster! I’d put down money today to be the first on my block with WiMAX, if it’d help.
“Half the world doesn’t even own a mobile phone but wireless carriers are already fighting over the next-generation cellular network.
Consumers may care less about whether they’ll be using WiMAX, LTE or UMB to download video to their phones or browse the Web faster than ever before. But one by one, mobile operators are aligning themselves with one of these competing next-generation, or 4G, technologies, placing billion-dollar bets on the horse they hope will win the race.”
Google Has Even Bigger Plans for Mobile Phones – WSJ.com 12/02/2007
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Google Has Even Bigger Plans for Mobile Phones – WSJ.com
“The company is gearing up to make a serious run at buying wireless spectrum, a chunk of the airwaves that can be used to provide mobile phone and Internet services, in a Federal Communications Commission auction in January. Google is prepared to bid on its own without any partners, say people familiar with the matter. It is working out a plan to finance its bid, which could run $4.6 billion or higher, that would rely on its own cash and possibly some borrowed money.”
.NET Web Product Roadmap ASP.NET, Silverlight, IIS7 – ScottGus Blog 11/29/2007
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.NET Web Product Roadmap ASP.NET, Silverlight, IIS7 – ScottGus Blog
ScottGu’s blog has a nice n’ tidy overview of all the new development goodness coming out of Redmond. Be sure to click the link above to read the whole thing:
“Over the next few months well be delivering a series of additional products that build on top of this VS 2008 and .NET 3.5 foundation, and make .NET development even better. Below is a road-map of some of the upcoming initiatives and releases for .NET web development that my team is currently working on for the months ahead”
Could Google’s Android Be the Cell Phone Savior? 11/08/2007
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Could Google’s Android Be the Cell Phone Savior?
And now for a completely different opinion:
“The U.S. mobile market today gives companies two less-than-ideal alternatives when trying to create mobile functionality. It can either go the app approach or the browser approach.
The app approach forces the consumer to download—or to have pre-installed—a small applet onto the phone. The chief pro: The final result should look exactly as the designers intended. The chief con: It limits the audience size to those whose OS and platform are compatible with the applet.
The browser approach is almost the opposite….”
inCode Releases Top 10 Wireless Predictions for 2007 02/01/2007
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inCode Releases Top 10 Wireless Predictions for 2007: “Here are inCode’s predictions:
1. Social networking goes mobile. Sites such as MySpace and Facebook will add mobile users to their business model, and similar services will gain popularity with professionals and older users.
2. Mobile TV. It’s just now making its first entries into the mobile device market, but it will become a primary driver of revenues.
3. Cheaper and more flexible multifunction devices. Look for 3G devices but with more functionality, higher speeds, and prices below $99.
4. GPS will become the location technology that the wireless industry actually uses in 2007. While many phones already have GPS support, applications that use that capability will blossom.
5. Internet Big Names will play a major role in IP Multimedia Services for mobile devices. An inCode study found that while these services haven’t taken off as expected, this may be because users don’t understand what they do. Expect to see names like Yahoo and Google on your mobile device.
6. China and India will become the hot mobile device markets, and as a result, mobile devices and services will focus on those markets first, rather than the United States and Europe as in the past.
7. Mobile advertising will boom. Be prepared for ads with your text messages and elsewhere on your 3G phone, targeted just for you.
8. Home entertainment will become part of the wireless world. This will include music and video downloads over both high-speed data connections and Wi-Fi. You will be able to play music, watch television or meet other data communications needs with your wireless device. This will be especially important in emerging markets, according to inCode.
9. Users realize that security is important. 2007 may be the year that hackers really make a move on the mobile device universe.
and …
10. Enterprises will embrace mobility. Companies will incorporate mobile devices throughout the corporation and will start to depend on wireless access to data as a routine practice. Some companies may completely replace their wired telephone infrastructure with wireless devices.
Sprint Takes Broadband Data Service Nationwide 12/18/2006
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Sprint Takes Broadband Data Service Nationwide: “Sprint Nextel announced Dec. 12 that it has launched 10 new markets for its high-speed EVDO Rev. A broadband data service.
Previously, the Sprint Power Vision service had been available in 10 markets; however, the added markets are the largest in the United States and include New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Philadelphia and Washington. Previous markets included Milwaukee, San Diego, Las Vegas and Boston. “
Has the notebook-to-handheld conversion begun? 08/03/2005
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Has the notebook-to-handheld conversion begun? | CNET News.com: “‘I don’t carry a laptop anymore because my phone is sophisticated enough,’ said David Kelley, one of the founders of the design firm Ideo and a professor at the Stanford University Institute of Design.
Then there’s the cost side of the equation. Corporate laptops generally run about $1,000 to $1,500, that’s higher than a desktop ($700) or a handheld ($300 to $500), particularly if the carrier subsidizes the handheld. Support and management costs can be less for laptops, but ‘the notebooks get beat up a lot,’ said Roger Kay, president of Endpoint Technologies Associates, who says Wall Street traders have already begun to convert. ‘As a usage model, it makes a lot of sense. For certain kinds of users–power users–they want the best PC experience, which is a desktop. And they want mobility.’ “
Great experiment in modeling based on mobile data … 07/26/2005
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Great experiment in modeling based on mobile data collection:
MIT Media Lab | Reality Mining: “The original Reality Mining experiment is one of the largest mobile phone projects attempted in academia. Our research agenda takes advantage of the increasingly widespread use of mobile phones to provide insight into the dynamics of both individual and group behavior. By leveraging recent advances in machine learning we are building generative models that can be used to predict what a single user will do next, as well as model behavior of large organizations.”
Good scores deals with Sprint, Microsoft | CNET Ne… 07/11/2005
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Good scores deals with Sprint, Microsoft | CNET News.com: “In the most significant of several announcements, Good said it will now work with directly with telecommunications provider Sprint. Good’s services were previously available to Sprint business customers only through third-party suppliers.
Devices now available through Sprint for use with the Good service include its Sprint PCS Smart Device Treo 650, made by PalmOne, and the Sprint PCS Smart Device PPC 6600/6601, made by Audiovox.
A $1,500 starter package includes one year of support from Good, which can also be broken down into smaller plans. The Sprint partnership means Good now has contracts with the five major carriers in the United States. The deal is similar to one that Good unveiled back in May with Cingular Wireless, a joint venture between SBC Communications and BellSouth.”
Expert Columns: Staying Ahead of the Curve with Windows Mobile 07/11/2005
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Expert Columns: Staying Ahead of the Curv – Ride the Perfect Storm with Windows Mobile: “The improvements in Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 will provide sufficient motivation for partners to either consider an initial investment or extend their existing investment in Windows Mobile-based development. The announcement of Windows Mobile 5.0 provides the third element of this perfect storm. “
Commentary 4Mobility: "…talking about location-based services…” 07/03/2005
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Commentary 4Mobility: “Over the past few years, the wireless industry and those close to it have been talking a lot about location-based services. LBS has been coming Real Soon Now (RSN) for a fairly long time, but recent announcements indicate that we will see some real LBS applications and services this year.
Yes, Nextel, Sprint and others have been offering LBS for corporate accounts but not for general public use. This is about to change.”
Microsoft aims to be cell phone ‘Survivor’ | CNET … 05/06/2005
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Microsoft aims to be cell phone ‘Survivor’ | CNET News.com: “The software maker is expected next week to introduce Windows Mobile 5, the next version of its operating system for cell phones and handhelds. The OS, code-named Magneto, is the latest in a string of software releases that highlight Microsoft’s attempts to take on rivals including PalmSource and Nokia. “
