Andrew Orlowski: "Apple's wealthiest and most prominent celebrity cheerleaders have yet to break their silence on the company's culling of its grassroots publishers." [Scripting News]

Man, Apple, you forgot your role. Microsoft is supposed to be the prick, not you. Knock it off and make nice.

10:23:51 PM    

CNet.   China to become manufacturing powerhouse.  They are welcome to it.  Why?  Manufacturing is rapidly declining.  Both the number of people necessary to do it and the percentage  of personal income devoted to manufactured items is falling.  This is very much like what occured in agriculture.  Today only 2% of the population in the US is in agriculture (much less than Europe -- 7% -- and Japan -- 15% -- but that is due to protected inefficiencies).  Agriculture is also a commodity business, highly competitive, and mostly still family farms (90% plus of all farming output is still done by family farms and not agribusiness).   It's a 100 a week business for $50k a year.  Food is now a small portion of the budget of most homes.  Manufacturing is following a similar path.  [John Robb's Radio Weblog]

Well, when they have a large enough manufacturing base, as well as the tools to make cruise missiles (Thanks Bill!), mixed with the rumors that they are getting nuclear subs from the Russians, I start to worry. Plus they have been building dams for power generation, which they can in turn use to drive their manufacturing base. They have no shortage of able bodied young folks to fight for them, the only real problem they have is the logistics of feeding and transporting their soldiers.

Yes, I know full well how paranoid this all sounds, thank you, I've told it to myself many times over the years, and I really and truly hope that I'm wrong here.  But looking at the evidence, looking at past history of nations that build up their forces, I've got a very bad feeling about this.

10:22:14 PM    

Toshiba Is Making A Big Splash This Year.

The Shifted Librarian has links to two new articles about Toshiba Laptops, and I just realized that Macworld is around the corner. Naturally, I just ordered a laptop from Alienware, which means that that march of technology will be trotting on without me.

I know it's a losing game and all, but still, I just ordered the thing, and it's too late to cancel. Of course I do have a 1400x1050 max resolution, so I really don't have too much to complain about, and since it probably won't fit in my existing backpack, I'll have to get a new one (oh darn, luggage junkie that I am.) And the only real difference between my machine and this one is the wireless mouse and keyboard, which I can live without.

9:50:03 PM    

On this day two years ago: "It's the music, dummy." [Scripting News]

Music industry, it's time for you to propose a plan for users of high integrity to get money into the hands of the artists, with you getting a small cut. The users renegotiated. You don't get to keep all the money anymore. I can't believe they're so blind they don't see this.

And unfortunately, in the interim, the record companies shot back, using politicians and lawyers. They are that blind Dave, and they won't change, they'll die first.

5:14:20 PM    

Macromedia gets chatty. Want to talk? Macromedia's Flash Communications Server MX allows Web developers to add chat, interactive video and other communications features to sites. [CNET News.com]

I'm going to have to play with this feature once I start the Flash portion of the MX Studio.  EEP! Nevermid, this is another $499.00 USD to get it, which is money that I don't have to spare right now. This would be a great medium for a Vlog (video log), for an interactive show (web based game show) and as a streaming method as well (I'm thinking of The Screensavers done exclusively over the web, with screened feeds from callers/viewers.)

Team meetings for distributed groups, college classes can have team workshops on different campuses at the same time. I used to work with someone who was managing teams in the Asiatics, South America, and Europe. Being able to see body language would make a huge difference.

Aside: I grew up in New Providence, NJ. That is just down the hill from Murray Hill. As in Bell Labs (That building will never be Lucent to me), birthplace of the transistor, etc. I got to grow up with the children of all kinds of brilliant scientists, and the tours they had were fascinating to me. My favorite was a large table that had two black and white displays on either end of it. Two people could sit at either end of the table and have converstations over the "Video Phone".

While webcams are nothing new, nor is chatting over the net via cams, being able to run your own server in a mass market way like this for some reason brings me back to the the thrill I felt as a kid, seeing that technology and staring in wild wonder and awe at the potential it holds.

8:10:15 AM    

Stretchable Keyboard for Mobile Devices.

The First Truly One-size-fits-all Keyboard?

"RAST Associates recently announced a new keyboard for mobile devices. The Vario Keyboard has five rows of keys arranged in a standard layout. What makes this keyboard different is that it's made mostly of fabric and rubber, and it stretches to different sizes and configurations.

In it's most compact form, the Vario Keyboard is about the size of a postcard, small enough to slip unobtrusively into a pocket. The keyboard weights less than eight ounces, a bit lighter than the popular ThinkOutside Stowaway....

The keyboard is contained in an expandable, spring-loaded case. While RAST Associates plans to license it to device manufacturers, who can then fashion custom connectors or cables for it - again, like ThinkOutside's Stowaway - the keyboard will also communicate with other devices via existing wireless standards. Bluetooth and 802.11b are already supported.

RAST Accociates made no mention of pricing or availability, although they did say that the Vario Keyboard would be 'competitive with other mobile keyboard devices on the market.' " [infoSync]

Come to mama! Now imagine if it also worked with your smartphone, OQO, etc. While I like the idea of integrating the input method into the device itself, this would work with any of your devices which is more efficient in the long run (at least until we have real voice recognition).

[The Shifted Librarian]

Between this and the OQO, you would have the better part of a mobile workstation that you take with you everywhere. Add in a couple of USB keychain drives,  a wireless mouse of some sort, and you could have all your mobile needs met.

What would be great is if the keyboard charged itself while it was plugged in, and ran off the batteries while wireless. Also, having some way to choose which device you were entering data into would be good as well. Cool Tech!

7:44:59 AM