Their quality is generally good. I sometimes don't agree with their editorials - but the cost is *WAY* too high. Continuing to access it the way I do - from multiple devices - I would pay $35/month or $420/year. Nearly the cost of a new iPad each year or even a 0.99/app each and every day all year long. Nooo... I don't think so.
Avoiding the whole Amazon universe for the moment.
I admit to using the Starbucks application to purchase coffee. I flash the iPhone app at the register to purchase the beverage thereby *intentionally* bypassing Apple's 30% cut. Starbucks should obviously be their next target.
So what's the extent of the market to which Apple lays claim? Audio purchased through Shazam? Movie tickets? Meals bought through reservations made through OpenTable? Plane tickets? I have an app which is specifically designed only to purchase lodging through a particular hotel chain. Are they also going to be subject to an Apple tax?
The JPEG standard (?) was put at serious risk because one company claimed it had a patent stake in the underlying technology. Turns out they had a bogus claim but not before they collected 105 Million dollars from hardware and software companies. Some 30 companies paid up. Of course when the USPO determined Forgent Networks (during a reexamination) withheld prior art from the application things went downhill. You can read about it in the Wikipedia JPEG entry.
This really *is* useful. (Something for the detector: I read TFA but it's just because I can't resist the elegant typesetting of PDFs.)
In reality though, automated systems that process a large amount of social comments (think Amazon reviews etc.) can be fooled by sarcastic comments. Such a system could result in poor recommendations.
This is not intended to be useful to humor impaired individuals.
The columnist from TFA is not just a columnist but has actual experience. He has been involved in tech for quite some time. Besides writing an early book on JSP in the Enterprise, he was CTO of the street and a tech lead of Time-Warner's Pathfinder site in the 90s.
Interesting you bring that up, you can't use the iPhone, iTouch, or iPad as external hard drives. This is one of those areas where the iPhone (et al) fall short of the basic iPod functionality.
True there are 3rd party tools but none of these fully replace true native support.
1) Some kind of message light. Now I have to pick the thing up and press a button to see if I missed a call. This doesn't have to be fancy. I had a Pink Floyd CD with a blinking light in the spine that ran for, I don't remember exactly, something close to 5 years.
2) Voice dialing. Like it or not, my old $25 cell phone would allow me to record voice tags for a limited number of contacts. My old $50 phone would analyze speech with no training. My new $500 phone does neither and make me press a series of virtual buttons (with no tactile feedback) requiring visual attention. Bah!
I think it's from a troll-bot that uses a search engine without parsing any dates.
A quick stroll down memory lane (thanks Google) yields one date of "November 25, 1998 at 08:25 am" That's nearly 9 years (which is like 2^9 in computer years) but even in 1998 these were old, old systems.
Sure, it's a proven technique to grab headlines for a while.
Remember the Origami effort? It was another 'wishful' non-product. It just recently fizzled quietly away.
This *could* be more useful. Maybe this will have some life as hotel lobby tech. Speaking of which - I wonder what happened to all those hi-def thin panel fishtanks prominent in Japanese hotel lobbies? (They were large LCD or plasma displays behind a thin layer of water and air bubbles.)
When I was there (mid 80's) the rectangular building was the Computer Science building. My advisor's office was just outside the entrance into the tower. It *was* a little unnerving to be kept waiting next to a large radiation detector which was always clicking away.
No sorry, the $20/month plan is not available for PDA's - that a smartphone-only plan. Just ask those who bought Blackjacks or Treos. The fortunate ones have legacy plans but new activations are limited to $40 PDA plans. Why the difference? That's a fantasy of Cingular's accounting department.
Also there is a requirement for these plans to be paired with at least a $40/month voice plan (and not forgetting the $5/month fees that sound like taxes but aren't) that's $85/month - for 2 years that's a minimum of $2540 (including the cheaper phone).
Does this thing have voice dialing? This is one feature I'd need to buy this phone.
Any indication this is built-in? I'm sure Cingular would love to sell their voice-dialing assist for $6/month but my old phone had this built in. Even new high-end phones don't have this available or only for extra cost (Samsung Blackjack, Treo 680, etc).
I'm in strong agreement with some of the other comments in here regarding the screen. This looks too much like the 1st gen nano with it's 10-minute scratch free screen. Still would like to give it a shot;-)
Remember that "Ask Slashdot" question the other day? "Why Does Everyone Hate Microsoft?" Well here's a prime example. Their desire to expand the empire and attempt to patent email-level emoticons is just not for silliness. They will no doubt add these as flags to their email program and use this extension as a weapon to fight off open source competition. Their target market - the great unwashed - doesn't care about any of this - they just want to put a frowny face on an email.
BTW: Daryl Cagle had a particularly poignant Microsoft cartoon back from their anti trust days but I see that archive is now gone! What finally killed it conspiracy or disinterest? (maybe lack of disk space?)
Maybe I'm not seeing this because I added this as a site-wide addin but most plugins add a new entry under preferences dialo. Some (Adblock) add a menu item under tools instead.
I can't find preferences for slashdotter on SeaMonkey although the reply, [CC}, and collapse replies work fine.
Slashdot Mirror
BTW - I had this same problem and discovered that you can make a playlist *of* your podcasts and play that with voice commands.
Apple made it possible entirely from the iPhone when they added playlist editing on the phone.
Their quality is generally good. I sometimes don't agree with their editorials - but the cost is *WAY* too high. Continuing to access it the way I do - from multiple devices - I would pay $35/month or $420/year. Nearly the cost of a new iPad each year or even a 0.99/app each and every day all year long. Nooo... I don't think so.
And you better be able to recharge it. Power is not universally available.
If not, you can't even burn it for fuel...
Avoiding the whole Amazon universe for the moment.
I admit to using the Starbucks application to purchase coffee. I flash the iPhone app at the register to purchase the beverage thereby *intentionally* bypassing Apple's 30% cut. Starbucks should obviously be their next target.
So what's the extent of the market to which Apple lays claim? Audio purchased through Shazam? Movie tickets? Meals bought through reservations made through OpenTable? Plane tickets? I have an app which is specifically designed only to purchase lodging through a particular hotel chain. Are they also going to be subject to an Apple tax?
The JPEG standard (?) was put at serious risk because one company claimed it had a patent stake in the underlying technology. Turns out they had a bogus claim but not before they collected 105 Million dollars from hardware and software companies. Some 30 companies paid up. Of course when the USPO determined Forgent Networks (during a reexamination) withheld prior art from the application things went downhill. You can read about it in the Wikipedia JPEG entry.
This really *is* useful. (Something for the detector: I read TFA but it's just because I can't resist the elegant typesetting of PDFs.)
In reality though, automated systems that process a large amount of social comments (think Amazon reviews etc.) can be fooled by sarcastic comments. Such a system could result in poor recommendations.
This is not intended to be useful to humor impaired individuals.
Actually, not so fast. Roughly 6% of people who ever lived are alive today...
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=how+many+people+ever+lived+on+earth
Leaving 94% dead!
The columnist from TFA is not just a columnist but has actual experience. He has been involved in tech for quite some time. Besides writing an early book on JSP in the Enterprise, he was CTO of the street and a tech lead of Time-Warner's Pathfinder site in the 90s.
http://www.amazon.com/Dan-Woods/e/B001IODE6O/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1271274109&sr=1-1
Interesting you bring that up, you can't use the iPhone, iTouch, or iPad as external hard drives. This is one of those areas where the iPhone (et al) fall short of the basic iPod functionality.
True there are 3rd party tools but none of these fully replace true native support.
I did indeed. Nazi greengrocers.
Ah this brings back memories... baiting the grammar Nazi's. Wonderful fun.
Look closer - it is indeed blurred out. Well... painted out. It's a more effective camouflage.
Zoom all the way in and compare the detail to the cemetery which lies just to the north.
Even my oldest phone had these two features:
1) Some kind of message light. Now I have to pick the thing up and press a button to see if I missed a call. This doesn't have to be fancy. I had a Pink Floyd CD with a blinking light in the spine that ran for, I don't remember exactly, something close to 5 years.
2) Voice dialing. Like it or not, my old $25 cell phone would allow me to record voice tags for a limited number of contacts. My old $50 phone would analyze speech with no training. My new $500 phone does neither and make me press a series of virtual buttons (with no tactile feedback) requiring visual attention. Bah!
I think it's from a troll-bot that uses a search engine without parsing any dates.
A quick stroll down memory lane (thanks Google) yields one date of "November 25, 1998 at 08:25 am" That's nearly 9 years (which is like 2^9 in computer years) but even in 1998 these were old, old systems.
See: http://www.kottke.org/98/11/my-mac-sucks
Sure, it's a proven technique to grab headlines for a while.
Remember the Origami effort? It was another 'wishful'
non-product. It just recently fizzled quietly away.
This *could* be more useful. Maybe this will have some life
as hotel lobby tech. Speaking of which - I wonder what happened
to all those hi-def thin panel fishtanks prominent in Japanese
hotel lobbies? (They were large LCD or plasma displays behind a
thin layer of water and air bubbles.)
Well so is Rudy Giuliani - and it doesn't seem to be slowing him down any...
p lay.php?Entity=KofBE&Start=2002-02-13
http://www.modernhistoryproject.org/mhp/EntityDis
Thank you for visiting our new p2p lawsuit settlement site.
By reading this text you acknowledge your interest which implicates your guilt.
Your ISP has been notified of your crimes - expect a bill.
Love,
RIAA
When I was there (mid 80's) the rectangular building was the Computer Science building. My advisor's office was just outside the entrance into the tower. It *was* a little unnerving to be kept waiting next to a large radiation detector which was always clicking away.
I wonder what ever happened to that advisor...
No sorry, the $20/month plan is not available for PDA's - that a smartphone-only plan. Just ask those who bought Blackjacks or Treos. The fortunate ones have legacy plans but new activations are limited to $40 PDA plans. Why the difference? That's a fantasy of Cingular's accounting department.
e s/serviceDetails.jsp?LOSGId=&skuId=sku1040072 - which, since Apple has made no noise about this being included, may be your only way to get this feature. Yea, I'd say $3000 isn't too far off the mark!
Also there is a requirement for these plans to be paired with at least a $40/month voice plan (and not forgetting the $5/month fees that sound like taxes but aren't) that's $85/month - for 2 years that's a minimum of $2540 (including the cheaper phone).
Want voice dialing? Cingular will sell you one for another $120 ($5/mo)- http://www.cingular.com/cell-phone-service/servic
This device looks great but when they went with Cingular they had to get greedy...
Does this thing have voice dialing? This is one feature I'd need to buy this phone.
;-)
Any indication this is built-in? I'm sure Cingular would love to sell their voice-dialing assist for $6/month but my old phone had this built in. Even new high-end phones don't have this available or only for extra cost (Samsung Blackjack, Treo 680, etc).
I'm in strong agreement with some of the other comments in here regarding the screen. This looks too much like the 1st gen nano with it's 10-minute scratch free screen. Still would like to give it a shot
Remember that "Ask Slashdot" question the other day? "Why Does Everyone Hate Microsoft?" Well here's a prime example. Their desire to expand the empire and attempt to patent email-level emoticons is just not for silliness. They will no doubt add these as flags to their email program and use this extension as a weapon to fight off open source competition. Their target market - the great unwashed - doesn't care about any of this - they just want to put a frowny face on an email.
BTW: Daryl Cagle had a particularly poignant Microsoft cartoon back from their anti trust days but I see that archive is now gone! What finally killed it conspiracy or disinterest? (maybe lack of disk space?)
It really must have been the devil because Gates was born in 1955!
Awesome trick for a '62!
Sure, I could stream all the music I wanted to nearby friends or strangers.
I streamed it to anyone and everyone in that subway car. We called it a boombox and WOW was it annoying!
Now if you'll excuse me I have to go chase the damn kids off the lawn.
Well thats exactly the problem! There is no tools-> extensions in SeaMonkey or Mozilla.
Maybe I'm not seeing this because I added this as a site-wide addin but most plugins add a new entry under preferences dialo. Some (Adblock) add a menu item under tools instead.
I can't find preferences for slashdotter on SeaMonkey although the reply, [CC}, and collapse replies work fine.
?