The wireless industry's insistence on bringing the wrong media to our cell phones may cost us - and them - the whole game. 3:45:30 PM ![]() |
Fast Company: 5 Tech Innovators. Scott Kirsner. They work in fields as diverse as portable power, biotechnology, and information visualization. Who's working on something really new? Here are five compelling answers. [Tomalak's Realm] 3:39:25 PM ![]() |
Novel Semiconductor Could Soup Up Solar Cells [Scientific American] 3:37:52 PM ![]() |
Powerful Plastic Memory Device On the Cheap [Scientific American] 3:33:56 PM ![]() |
Fast and Furious: The Race to Wire America. The wiring of America for high-speed Internet access represents huge opportunities and risks for companies large and small. By Matt Richtel. [New York Times: Technology] 3:32:55 PM ![]() |
When the House Starts Talking to Itself. The complications of home ownership in the digital age. By James Gleick. [New York Times: Technology] 3:32:05 PM ![]() |
PDA market suffers at hand of feature-packed phones. Handheld shipments slipped for an eighth consecutive quarter. [Computerworld Mobile/Wireless News] 3:31:36 PM ![]() |
Biosciences: High risk, high reward. Knowledge@Wharton examines how researchers and venture capitalists are applying lessons learned from the history of earlier technologies to biotechnology. [CNET News.com - Front Door] 3:30:51 PM ![]() |
Technology Review: The Web's New Currency. These companies' founders are well aware of the string of defunct e-payment companies whose virtual currencies have gone the way of the Confederate dollar. But they've got something new up their sleeves: easier-to-use technology that allows Web sites to accept tiny payments by effectively processing them in batches, thereby cutting down on bank fees. [Tomalak's Realm] 3:30:16 PM ![]() |
Report: Intel, NTT DoCoMo team up on phone chips. TOKYO -- Intel Corp., the world's biggest chip maker, and NTT DoCoMo Inc., Japan's largest cellular carrier, have formed an alliance to jointly develop next-generation chips for cellular telephones, according to a report in the Saturday morning edition of Japanese newspaper Nihon Keizai Shimbun. [InfoWorld: Top News] 3:29:50 PM ![]() |
Handset makers look to over-the-air software upgrades. Cellular telephone carriers in Japan and South Korea have just begun offering their users the ability to upgrade the firmware of their handsets over the air. The services, being offered by NTT DoCoMo Inc. and SK Telecom Co. Ltd., are believed to be the first of their kind. [InfoWorld: Top News] 3:29:21 PM ![]() |
Reactions to MobiTV. We didn't mention Sprint's new MobiTV television service for cellphones last week, mainly because we're completely underwhelmed by the prospect of paying ten bucks a month to watch choppy, one frame per second video on a cellphone. Douglas Rushkoff's column in The Feature this week echoes our sentiments, writing that the carriers are wasting their time trying to foist this on the public. On the other hand, the first few reviews of MobiTV that have trickled in have been generally enthusiastic, so maybe it's a bit too soon to write this whole thing off. Read - The Feature - My Cell Phone is Not a TV Read - Russell Beattie - MobiTV: Ooh yeah Read - Niel Eyde - Watching TV on SprintPCS Phone with MobiTV Read - Reiter's Camera Phone Report - Would you watch TV on your phone?... [Gizmodo] 3:28:40 PM ![]() |
SPOT on, but not until next year. Microsoft is now saying that the first wristwatches featuring its new Smart Personal Object Technology, which uses FM radio subcarrier frequencies to wirelessly deliver information like the weather, news, and stock quotes, is officially delayed for further testing and won't be ready until the first quarter of next year. The first SPOT watches were supposed to have been out this week, but apparently the situation is so bad now that Citizen, one of the companies making the watches, is saying that they might be cancelling their plans to sell a SPOT watch. Read... [Gizmodo] 3:23:35 PM ![]() |
The Gametrac. The Tapwave Zodiac and the N-Gage might be getting some competition. A company called Tiger Telematics is coming out with portable game console called the Gametrac that runs on Windows CE .NET and can play MP3s and MPEG-4 video files, send and receive text messages, and will have a built-in digital camera, an MMC memory card slot, Bluetooth for wireless multi-player gaming, and GPS so that parents can keep tabs on where their kids are (something that will be a major downside to any kid who wants one of these). All of this sounds like a mighty tall order for one handheld device, so we'll see if the Gametrac sports all of these features when it actually comes out. Read [Thanks, Naser]... [Gizmodo] 3:17:27 PM ![]() |
Sprint debuts 'walkie-talkie' phone service [IDG InfoWorld] 3:07:40 PM ![]() |