Universal Rule

Book Reviews

Tietoyhteys magazine (in Finnish)

CSC News magazine (in English)

Monday, August 11, 2003

-- Comment()
I'm pondering whether to buy the following books:

Uncertain Science... Uncertain World by Henry N. Pollack
Mathematical Diamonds by Ross Honsberger
The Changing Shape of Geometry by Chris Pritchard (Editor)

There are books about mathematics and science for the general audience. All sound promising, but are these any good?

-- Comment()
I found a a page at Macintoush describing iChat AV and iSight experiences. Mine are somewhat similar.

I'm currently writing an article about videoconferencing, which perhaps explains the large number of postings on iChat AV etc.

-- Comment()
More than just talk: "Apple's iChat AV software and iSight Web camera bring trademark style to video chat [...] iChat's quality is remarkable. A variety of factors, such as the speed of each user's Mac and general Internet congestion, can cause some breakup of audio and choppiness of video. Still, its video is crisp and smooth and audio much clearer than that of other video chat software."

-- Comment()
Joe Jenett reviews Blogshares: "I've been spending at least 1-2 hours a day there for the last few months. It's more fun than any other site I've frequented. Did I say fun? Let me rephrase that. Addictive! That's what it is. It's caught on like wildfire with thousands playing the game. I love it and have to recognize it for what it is - a truly unique website."

I agree that Blogshares is fun. Although I have been spending time there less and less, even staying away for a couple of weeks. But every now and then I do return. My all-time best rank is 34 (on the list of the richest players). But I'm sliping, slipping...

-- Comment()
Loebrich.org writes: "We actually had cable in 1981. This meant that, at the perfect age of 13, I was poised to take part in history. Because on August 1, 1981, MTV debuted, shaping a generation & introducing me to what became, & has remained, my all-time favorite band, Styx."

VIdeoconferencing interoperability -- Comment()
I tried to find out where the standards in videoconferencing are evolving. Here are a few pointers.

Polycom Reworks IM, Communications Tool : "many of the vendors working to merge multimedia with IM are supporting interoperable standards. For instance, Microsoft, IBM, Lotus, and a number of others (including Apple) have demonstrated some manner of support for Session Initiation Protocol-based (SIP), the standard growing in the Voice over IP and videoconferencing space."

VoIP and the Phone Companies: "The only important new feature that iChat AV has is that it works relatively well through firewalls and network address translation gateways."

What's happening with videoconferencing: "Will cutbacks in air travel lead to utilization of videoconferencing for corporate training, technology conferences and virtual tradeshows? The technology is ready, but have interoperability standards been achieved?"

-- Comment()
Kyocera Finecam S5R, 3 fps no limit: "Kyocera has today announced the new Finecam S5R. This update to the S5 ultra-compact sees a slightly revised body design and an improvement in performance thanks to a new image processor dubbed 'RTUNE'." [Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)]