Russell Beattie Notebook - Once the shine wears off
Russell and Jason are bang on here. Microsoft has recognized this. Windows mobile already come in two flavors, the Pocket PC Phone (basically a PDA with a phone in it), or the smartphone version which works great in smaller phones such as flip phones.
For general consumers it really comes down to having compelling applications, services and features on a reasonable size phone.
Monday, March 27, 2006
Thursday, March 23, 2006
OpenZaurus 3.5.4 released
Just noticed this happened a few days back. This is what I love about open platforms and open devices (either intentionally or unintentionally). They can be revived and given a new lease of life.
Just installed this on my old Sharp Zaurus Sl-5000D purchased many JavaOne's ago. I chose the GPE install as I hadn't seen it yet and I must admit it looks pretty nice. If you have an old Zaurus you can download it here.
Monday, March 13, 2006
Music Box
Tivo is unquestionably the killer application for TV. But what about music? Your music collection is inherently different to broadcast TV and hence requires a different approach. What do you really want your listening experience to be? Many companies have realized that it is about breadth of access, customization and the key piece for me, recommendations. What I want is to listen to music I love, and hear some new stuff that I have a high probability of liking, but would likely never happen upon otherwise. A music stream just for me that expands with my tastes while also expanding my tastes.
The Music Genome Project has been developing for 6 years now, analyzing music of all kinds and trying to categorize each and every track in a way that allows an application like Pandora to do exactly what I just described. Tell it which artists you like and it will create a personal radio station for you. If you don't like a track, tell. If you do, tell it. You will be amazed how quickly you will hear new music that you really like but have never heard of. You will also get rewarded with old classics. Create a few different stations and you have music for every mood.
Where this becomes the killer application is when it makes it into consumer devices and not just your PC. That just happened with the Squeezebox from Slim Devices. A little pricey right now, but imagine the same functionality embedded in your receiver, stereo or even your TV. Go ahead and do it now as the server software is available under open source.
Satellite radio? Listen to the same tracks as everyone else? Now why would I need that?
Sunday, March 12, 2006
Lost In Translation
Spotted this on a recent trip to Shanghai. I just love finding these bad translations while travelling. As you may have guessed it basically is asking you to keep off the grass.
Saturday, March 04, 2006
The day the laptop died
I have had a few conversations recently in which I found myself arguing how we would do without our laptops in the future. To my surprise I found many people just cannot see life without them. They cannot imagine an alternative that works for them. I am not going to try and convince you here. Just leave a few breadcrumbs.
Projected Keyboards are already commercially available.
Virtual displays are available in many forms and projected displays have been around for a very long time. Todays headsets are clumsy but retinal projection fixes that.
Wi-FI and 3G provide network access.
Fuel cells and other technolgoies in development will make battery life a non-issue.
XML and open standards have made data and services platform agnostic.
A full OS and desktop can be booted from a single USB stick.
There are many projects working on how office productivity will be accomplished on devices, such as the XMerge project at OpenOffice.
Many consumer devices support image viewing and hence can be used for presentations. Just dock your ipod photo and you are set.
If you currently keep all your important data locally on your laptop and you don't mind the fact you cannot access any of this information anywhere else. I also assume you also keep all your money under your bed.
I recently was talking with some university students and I was telling them how great it must be to have your own computer that you can take to lectures, the library, work in coffee shops. When I was at university we had to book time in huge computer labs. I was surprised by their reply. They had laptops but left them in their dorms. They could not understand why they would want to take their laptops with them anywhere. They has USB drives and mp3 players with all their data on and there were computers everywhere they went. They valued their data, not their computers.
If you still believe you will not use an alternative to your laptop in the future I totally understand. My grandfather could never get to grips with my cassette player so I know how you must feel.
Projected Keyboards are already commercially available.
Virtual displays are available in many forms and projected displays have been around for a very long time. Todays headsets are clumsy but retinal projection fixes that.
Wi-FI and 3G provide network access.
Fuel cells and other technolgoies in development will make battery life a non-issue.
XML and open standards have made data and services platform agnostic.
A full OS and desktop can be booted from a single USB stick.
There are many projects working on how office productivity will be accomplished on devices, such as the XMerge project at OpenOffice.
Many consumer devices support image viewing and hence can be used for presentations. Just dock your ipod photo and you are set.
If you currently keep all your important data locally on your laptop and you don't mind the fact you cannot access any of this information anywhere else. I also assume you also keep all your money under your bed.
I recently was talking with some university students and I was telling them how great it must be to have your own computer that you can take to lectures, the library, work in coffee shops. When I was at university we had to book time in huge computer labs. I was surprised by their reply. They had laptops but left them in their dorms. They could not understand why they would want to take their laptops with them anywhere. They has USB drives and mp3 players with all their data on and there were computers everywhere they went. They valued their data, not their computers.
If you still believe you will not use an alternative to your laptop in the future I totally understand. My grandfather could never get to grips with my cassette player so I know how you must feel.
Thursday, March 02, 2006
Virtually There
I have blogged about the evolution of virtual reality before. It is only recently that I have started to realize just how much further along we are than I ever imagined.
The biggest advance has been the virtualization of people themselves. What is a person other than their personality, likes and dislikes, thoughts. What about the things they have done and want to do, or maybe where they have been or want to go. Don't forget what they have listened to, read or watched. Oh, and you also get their opinions on all of that, and all their photos too. Maybe you want to see everyone that has just had the same thought as you. If you want to go the whole way you can create a full online 3D version of yourself and use real money to buy virtual accessories. Of course, there is no reason that the online version of yourself is actually you. It can be the you that you would like to be. There is also online gaming and virtual worlds where you can earn virtual stuff or head over to ebay and buy it from someone that has. Even online muggings. You can have virtual pets, play virtual poker for real money.
And the thing is, even though you don't know it, your kids have done all of this already and take it for granted. You probably have friends who share some of your interests. Maybe that is how you met them. Imagine having friends that you talk to even more often, share 99.9% of your interests, you may never actually meet in person, and number in the hundreds rather than the handful you have today. They give you their opinions on your photos, your life, your shared interests. Your kids are probably already doing this too. They don't need to leave their rooms. They are also less mobile physically, at least until they can drive and you let them go out to more places. As a result they have embraced digital mobility in a way we cannot yet comprehend. Their life is online and they can get to it from anywhere they are.
Its not just people either. Everything now has a virtual presence on line. Many places have their own websites. Every product has a website. Many products even make that link by printing the web address somewhere on the box. Cereal, soda and candy manufacturers have gone a step further by giving your kids codes to use on line, bridging the gap between the physical product and its virtual counterpart.
Out of the BT research labs comes a simple but innovative user interface called the Digital Media Album. Place an object on the pad and it will weigh and scan it. You can then either link that to something on your PC, for example link your wedding ring to your wedding photos, or if it has been prescanned then it could take you to the website. Place an action figure on the pad and you get the Star Wars website.
Add to that RFID and the humble barcode and basically everything you care about has been digitized, metadata created, and placed online.
So what is next? Everything is online but is not really interacting except in a few cases. Services will be what tie these disparate pieces of data together. There are already many examples of webservices mashups and we are only just starting to see the possibilities. XML and RSS will be the vehicles of choice and Google just helped cement that with Google Base.
A good example of bridging the gap between virtuality and reality is GPS gaming or location based gaming. With your mobile in hand you wander the streets looking for virtual goblins to kill, treasures to collect and points to earn. Maybe you get led into shops where you can redeem those points for a discount or a free coffee. KnowledgeWhere and Your World Games have already done this pretty succesfully.
The biggest advance has been the virtualization of people themselves. What is a person other than their personality, likes and dislikes, thoughts. What about the things they have done and want to do, or maybe where they have been or want to go. Don't forget what they have listened to, read or watched. Oh, and you also get their opinions on all of that, and all their photos too. Maybe you want to see everyone that has just had the same thought as you. If you want to go the whole way you can create a full online 3D version of yourself and use real money to buy virtual accessories. Of course, there is no reason that the online version of yourself is actually you. It can be the you that you would like to be. There is also online gaming and virtual worlds where you can earn virtual stuff or head over to ebay and buy it from someone that has. Even online muggings. You can have virtual pets, play virtual poker for real money.
And the thing is, even though you don't know it, your kids have done all of this already and take it for granted. You probably have friends who share some of your interests. Maybe that is how you met them. Imagine having friends that you talk to even more often, share 99.9% of your interests, you may never actually meet in person, and number in the hundreds rather than the handful you have today. They give you their opinions on your photos, your life, your shared interests. Your kids are probably already doing this too. They don't need to leave their rooms. They are also less mobile physically, at least until they can drive and you let them go out to more places. As a result they have embraced digital mobility in a way we cannot yet comprehend. Their life is online and they can get to it from anywhere they are.
Its not just people either. Everything now has a virtual presence on line. Many places have their own websites. Every product has a website. Many products even make that link by printing the web address somewhere on the box. Cereal, soda and candy manufacturers have gone a step further by giving your kids codes to use on line, bridging the gap between the physical product and its virtual counterpart.
Out of the BT research labs comes a simple but innovative user interface called the Digital Media Album. Place an object on the pad and it will weigh and scan it. You can then either link that to something on your PC, for example link your wedding ring to your wedding photos, or if it has been prescanned then it could take you to the website. Place an action figure on the pad and you get the Star Wars website.
Add to that RFID and the humble barcode and basically everything you care about has been digitized, metadata created, and placed online.
So what is next? Everything is online but is not really interacting except in a few cases. Services will be what tie these disparate pieces of data together. There are already many examples of webservices mashups and we are only just starting to see the possibilities. XML and RSS will be the vehicles of choice and Google just helped cement that with Google Base.
A good example of bridging the gap between virtuality and reality is GPS gaming or location based gaming. With your mobile in hand you wander the streets looking for virtual goblins to kill, treasures to collect and points to earn. Maybe you get led into shops where you can redeem those points for a discount or a free coffee. KnowledgeWhere and Your World Games have already done this pretty succesfully.
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