Another non-mobile related post, but with the lines so long outside the Apple Store, I can't really write about my new iPhone as I don't have one yet, so lets try something a little different
I was in the UK last week for the first time in nearly 3 years and I noticed a number of significant changes while I was there. Firstly, there were tall white elegant windmills dotted around the countryside and I thought they looked great. Wondering how long before they get across here.
Secondly, the weather. It rained the whole time I was there, but I won't bore you with that, but as my dad put it "How miserable is this?"
The third thing I noticed was the proliferation of small city cars. I'm a bit of car nut myself, but I was shocked at the numbers of these things running around (and having seen the price of petrol over there, it makes a lot of sense). The thing that struck me the most was how wonderfully designed they were. We now have the Smart car over here in the US, and there are a few of them running around, but I particularly liked the Citroen and Peugeot small cars. The C1 and C2 from Citroen are wonderful little things. The C1, the Peugeot 107 and a Toyota were all designed jointly, but its a great looking little car. Big wide mouth, cat looking headlights and very vertical rear on the car. It just looked great, and for the price, looks like a good deal. It makes the new Mini Cooper look very over priced.
Then there was the Renault Modus, the Peugeot 1007 with the sliding doors and my favorite of the lot, the new Fiat 500. What a little gem that is. The interior is a thing of beauty. I would love to see one of those on the road over here.
Its about time the US population realized that big cars are not required all the time and that these small city cars are the answer to the short to medium commute to work, where most people spend their time.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
iPhone Video Conferencing
One of the things rumored to be in the new 3G iPhone was a forward facing camera to allow video conferencing.
Alas, it was not to be, and we are left with the sub par camera that is already on the device.
A couple of days ago, I came across a posting on one of the many Mac rumor sites that I read ago that someone had found an entry in the QuickTIme files for an iSight HD camera. I bought the original iSight a long time ago (a beautifully designed slim aluminum tube that sat on top of your monitor) and was a little disappointed that they stopped selling it, but it got me to thinking about a potential solution for the iPhone web conference
If Apple release the new iSight HD with a compatible iPhone dock, you could have a portable iChat compliant web conferencing tool with significantly better video quality without the need to have a camera in the phone, especially if the dock had A/V output capability.
A portable video conferencing solution...
Probably never happen, but it makes you wonder how many crazy things are going to show up on the iPhone 3G when it eventually launches on July 11th
Alas, it was not to be, and we are left with the sub par camera that is already on the device.
A couple of days ago, I came across a posting on one of the many Mac rumor sites that I read ago that someone had found an entry in the QuickTIme files for an iSight HD camera. I bought the original iSight a long time ago (a beautifully designed slim aluminum tube that sat on top of your monitor) and was a little disappointed that they stopped selling it, but it got me to thinking about a potential solution for the iPhone web conference
If Apple release the new iSight HD with a compatible iPhone dock, you could have a portable iChat compliant web conferencing tool with significantly better video quality without the need to have a camera in the phone, especially if the dock had A/V output capability.
A portable video conferencing solution...
Probably never happen, but it makes you wonder how many crazy things are going to show up on the iPhone 3G when it eventually launches on July 11th
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Ahhh..iPhone with 3G
Finally....
This has been enormous news everywhere in this country, and I am sure its been mentioned a few times elsewhere too, but the new iPhone is coming in July. The 11th to be precise.
As a user of iPhone v1 (which I paid almost $600 for a year ago.... now worth about $100 on eBay if I'm lucky), I have to say that the new updated software looks fantastic, and MobileMe will help me out a lot as I have 3 computers that I am constantly trying to keep in sync. I can finally hand back my Windows Mobile brick to IT as I won't need it anymore.
The interesting thing for me on the phone is the GPS functionality. I was in the market for a GPS for the car, and now I don't need one. I can just use the phone. I'm wondering how long it will take for a car manufacturer to incorporate the iPhone into the screen of the car to replace having an in car system. People of Volkswagen..... I mean you. I can have GPS, iPhone and iPod all on the same screen, using a screen layout I am familiar with... Utopia, plus it would be cheaper for the car manufacturer as they wouldn't need the GPS stuff. Just a thought.
In addition to that, I've already seen some interesting news about location aware applications, such as Omnifocus for location aware To Do lists (at the grocery store, list all grocery items), and some of the games that were demo'd looked great. I think I was more impressed by the graphics than the actual games though... I think even though the screen and graphics are streets ahead of other mobile devices, what types of games are going to be the best sellers?
Location aware, community type games have a very interesting platform to come forward and fulfill the promise for the casual gamer. Poker with people in the same city. Meet fellow iPhone Facebook friends who are in the same city.... Interesting applications. I would like to see the phone itself make use of the GPS for things like Weather, Address Book. I land in a new City, weather defaults to new City, address book has a smart list of local contacts, things like that.
Needless to say, I don't really need one, but July 11th, I'll be in line with the rest of the mock turtle neck crew. 16Gb in White is the way to go. Anyone need a v1 phone 8Gb ??
This has been enormous news everywhere in this country, and I am sure its been mentioned a few times elsewhere too, but the new iPhone is coming in July. The 11th to be precise.
As a user of iPhone v1 (which I paid almost $600 for a year ago.... now worth about $100 on eBay if I'm lucky), I have to say that the new updated software looks fantastic, and MobileMe will help me out a lot as I have 3 computers that I am constantly trying to keep in sync. I can finally hand back my Windows Mobile brick to IT as I won't need it anymore.
The interesting thing for me on the phone is the GPS functionality. I was in the market for a GPS for the car, and now I don't need one. I can just use the phone. I'm wondering how long it will take for a car manufacturer to incorporate the iPhone into the screen of the car to replace having an in car system. People of Volkswagen..... I mean you. I can have GPS, iPhone and iPod all on the same screen, using a screen layout I am familiar with... Utopia, plus it would be cheaper for the car manufacturer as they wouldn't need the GPS stuff. Just a thought.
In addition to that, I've already seen some interesting news about location aware applications, such as Omnifocus for location aware To Do lists (at the grocery store, list all grocery items), and some of the games that were demo'd looked great. I think I was more impressed by the graphics than the actual games though... I think even though the screen and graphics are streets ahead of other mobile devices, what types of games are going to be the best sellers?
Location aware, community type games have a very interesting platform to come forward and fulfill the promise for the casual gamer. Poker with people in the same city. Meet fellow iPhone Facebook friends who are in the same city.... Interesting applications. I would like to see the phone itself make use of the GPS for things like Weather, Address Book. I land in a new City, weather defaults to new City, address book has a smart list of local contacts, things like that.
Needless to say, I don't really need one, but July 11th, I'll be in line with the rest of the mock turtle neck crew. 16Gb in White is the way to go. Anyone need a v1 phone 8Gb ??
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Another Italian Masterpiece
Another entrant in the world's most beautiful car contest. Announced today, the Ferrari California.
http://www.autoblog.com/photos/ferrari-california/802546/
Monday, May 12, 2008
My Daughter's Dance Recital
I know this is supposed to be a download of my thoughts, but my daughter had her first dance recital this weekend, and it was tremendous. She is the total ham with the blond hair. If you click through to YouTube, there is a higher quality version if you are interested.
Enjoy
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Social Networks and Mobile
I've been interested in how social networks will impact mobile and vice versa for a while, and in the last few weeks, I've had a little more time to spend playing the LinkedIns, Facebooks and Twitters of the world. We have had a mobile game community product for a while at some of our carrier customers and have done a lot of research into how we take that to the next level.
So the question becomes how will mobile take communities to the next level?
The device is in your pocket.... Twitter and Facebook have lovely iPhone interfaces for the Safari browser, and I assume that there will be applications for this distributed through the Application store in June, but I think a consolidated application that brings together all YOUR communities is the way to go. That way I can look at all the things that matter to me, like Twitter, Facebook, Playstation Game community and, as Jeremy Clarkson so wonderfully called it, MyFace.
I think Twitter is the most interesting of the communities at the moment, and I think when devices get GPS, having your location when you "twit" associated with the post will have great benefits. For example, I post a "twit" when I arrive in Seattle, and any followers on Twitter in the area know I'm there without me having send out 1206 emails telling people I'm there. Tomi Ahonen talks more about this on his blog "Communities Dominate Brands" (always a good read, plus he's a big F1 fan too)
As the devices get more advanced (a combination of the new N95 from Nokia and the iPhone would be mahvellous...), you could have photos uploaded, GPS integration, even put your travels into Google Maps... upload those to your blog etc...
The question for the carriers is how can they take all that user generated content and make additional revenues from it around advertising and cross selling content. An interesting problem to solve...
So the question becomes how will mobile take communities to the next level?
The device is in your pocket.... Twitter and Facebook have lovely iPhone interfaces for the Safari browser, and I assume that there will be applications for this distributed through the Application store in June, but I think a consolidated application that brings together all YOUR communities is the way to go. That way I can look at all the things that matter to me, like Twitter, Facebook, Playstation Game community and, as Jeremy Clarkson so wonderfully called it, MyFace.
I think Twitter is the most interesting of the communities at the moment, and I think when devices get GPS, having your location when you "twit" associated with the post will have great benefits. For example, I post a "twit" when I arrive in Seattle, and any followers on Twitter in the area know I'm there without me having send out 1206 emails telling people I'm there. Tomi Ahonen talks more about this on his blog "Communities Dominate Brands" (always a good read, plus he's a big F1 fan too)
As the devices get more advanced (a combination of the new N95 from Nokia and the iPhone would be mahvellous...), you could have photos uploaded, GPS integration, even put your travels into Google Maps... upload those to your blog etc...
The question for the carriers is how can they take all that user generated content and make additional revenues from it around advertising and cross selling content. An interesting problem to solve...
Sunday, April 6, 2008
Talk about an opposite weekend
A few weekends ago, I was on a high after Wales won the Grand Slam, but this weekend brought me firmly down to earth. My Carolina Hurricanes lost to Florida in the hockey, and we knocked out of the playoffs, and the North Carolina Tarheel basketball team got soundly thumped by Kansas in the Final Four to mean they got eliminated too..
So, to make me feel better, I decided that some retail therapy was in order and I went to the local mall and bought myself a Dualit Chrome 2 slice toaster. It looks pretty good in the kitchen.
I'll get pictures up on the house blog as soon as I do some cleaning up...
On the plus side, Apple has provided an update to the Apple TV and it is now downloading at about 10 times the speed. Its a much better experience. HD trailers are coming in very nicely.
"In Bruges" looks hilarious. If anyone has seen it, let me know
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