iPhone Updates

 

Update 

Apple recently released their TV ad for the new iPhone which is coming this summer from Cingular (or, uh the "new" AT&T).  The ad first aired during the Oscars and is now available online.  The add uses a fun trip through phone use in movie-making history.

Meanwhile, much to the chagrin of Apple fan boys, David Haskin from ComputerWorld says the iPhone may meet the fate of the Apple Newton Messagepad. You can read his comments here.

My current thoughts on iPhone: without Outlook integration (did I mention that Office 2007 is sweet), with a huge price tag, Cingular only, slow GSM data connection, I am down on the iPhone and will probably look elsewhere.  Don't get me wrong, the device is very cool.  I will probably just wait until the touch interface is on a high capacity iPod and then look at the smartphone market for PDA/phone integration. 

EMI mulling no DRM?

If one company removes Digital Rights Management systems from its music content I believe their stuff will sell like crazy...this is interesting stuff and something to watch.  The first huge company to do this will either end up a long run hero or the goat who gave away the farm.

EMI mulls unprotected Web Song Sales 

Cool - Just Cool

If you love the ESV and computer geeky stuff then you have to check this out.  It is a social map of New Testament Relationships using a new data visualization tool from IBM. Here is a direct link for you to play with it - you'll need to have a Java Virtual Machine installed to use it (most do). 

This is a static picture of it...the link above takes you to the site where you can pull things around, zoom, etc.

 

(HT - Houston Slatton) 

Next Computer Inc

This is an interesting read on Steve Job's wilderness years (A heads up: There is very  strong (foul) language in the 4th paragraph - a direction quotation from Jobs) between his first run with Apple and his return in the late 90s.  I actually remember the NextStation and NextStep Operating System that Jobs and company were trying to sell in the early 90s while I was at UNC Chapel Hill.

Basically, Jobs is a fantastic and persuasive salesman, and that is rewarded by our world.  It is amazing to read what this guy has been about, how he has treated people and how worshiped he is today.  The values of our culture clearly seen. 

Geeks and those who like tech history will enjoy the article. 

A Few More Articles on the iPhone

Note - I use a PC and I am not currently a MAC addict.  But here are a bunch of iPhone articles out there on the net:

• iPhone Blows Away Expectations by Ed Burnette
• Nice pics from the Keynote at Engadget
• An inconsistent but helpful critique over at PalmInfocenter.
• A funny catalogue of iPhone fakes by speculators over the last few years - courtesy Gizmodo.
• A good hands on report from David Pogue of the NYTimes.
  

Also, Engadget has a good wrap up of MacWorld here.

iPhone

 

OK, I just finished watching the keynote from Jobs.  The iPhone is one of the coolest, technologically sophisticated devices I think I have seen.

If:

• The finger interface proves accurate and the service durable
  
• If it actually syncs well w/Exchange/Outlook contacts and calendar and doesn’t take 10 min to do so on Windows.

I will have to pray with vigilance against the temptation of coveting when I see them out on the street later in 08.

Question: Does Cingular suck as a mobile provider? They have a 2 yr. exclusive on this.  I am guessing many will move on over and "raise the bar."

The only drawbacks I see:

• Only up to 8GB with no expansion…
• The price is high but does not seem too high for all that is packed in there…the user interface looks incredible. But it may be too high for some non geeky geeks.
  
• Only on GSM/Cingular/Edge. Sprint and Verizon's mobile broadband technology is much faster with data than edge.  I think this is a GSM issue, but I need to check on that.
• No GPS - I imagine for 499 or 599 folks would expect to see that - live driving directions, positioning etc.
  

Anyway, it makes the Palm OS and Windows mobile look a bit childish. I have used mobile computing devices since the first US Robotics Palm Pilot back in 1996 (see this wiki).  This indeed was the coolest device I have seen and looks to get convergence right. 

Classic MacWorld Expo Keynote

This was awkward stuff - the day Microsoft bailed out Apple as Steve Jobs took back over the reigns of the troubled company.  Many think these "friends" are about to go to war again over getting digital media in the living room.

Don't people love to booooooooo things they don't like. Classic human nature on display here.

Big Day for apple.

For those who are interested, MacWorld is giving live updates from the Steve Jobs Keynote this morning at MacWorld Expo.  There is likely to be much Apple/Mac hype today when the man in the black shirt speaketh.  These keynote presentations are usually available in Quicktime from apple.com. From the graphic on their homepage, they seem to have something big to share.

 

Here is the Macworld link 

I am in the market for a new home PC this spring - Cool new Vista machine? Or make the treasonous switch? 

Technology that just sucked...

PC World has a fun look through some of the worst technology bungles in the last several decades.  Though if you are an AOL fan you might be a bit hot under the collar.

My personal favorite that made the list was Microsoft Bob (pic to the left) which made #7 on the list.  Why one earth they thought anyone would want this I'm not sure.  They even had a goofy dog that would greet you when you came "home" to your computer.

Some of these are pretty funny.  Like the iSmell (great name huh?). This little device was supposed to give you certain scents when you visited certain web sites.  I wonder what smell you should get when you read about the iSmell? 

I'm glad OS/2 did not make it - I used to like OS/2. 

The Complete listing is here

A Great Holiday Blog Idea!

I ran across the following video from Six Apart, the creators of several blogging platforms, one of which is MovableType, which powers the pages of Power of Change.

I can just see my Mom getting a phone call over the holidays reading Part II on the New Atheism...

One of the persistent moves you will find in the New Atheism is a constant dethroning of human beings from any place of prominence in the universe.  There are several paths which are taken to accomplish this feat: anthropological, elevation of animals, astrological... 

What a phone call that will be! 

Why you should use Firefox 2.0

Much talk in the tech world has been of the release of IE 7 and Firefox 2.0.  The two giants of the browser world just were updated and released in the past few weeks. I have IE7 on my home computer and will say that it is a great leap forward for the Mikeysoft crew.  I could use it now if Firefox 2.0 didn't have such a cool new feature that really ain't new.  What is this indispensable feature? Inline spell checking for forms.  ALL bloggers will greatly appreciate this. 

For instance, I currently use Movable Type with Ajaxify which gives me a WYSIWYG interface for my blog entries (with round trip into the HTML code for when I need/want that).  Now with Firefox 2.0 I get inline spell checking in the entries by default, just from the browser. When misspelled words are recognized (real-time as you type), they are immediately underlined with the familiar red squiggle...If you right click on the underlined words, you will get a list of spelling suggestions in the pop-up menu.

This feature alone is such an aid to blogging that Firefox 2.0 is staying my default browser.  

Get it today.  It is free...

How does this make you feel?

POCBlog has just passed the 700 entry mark.  I thought of what I would want to use for entry 701.  I have a book review percolating...and some more Philippians stuff to put up later in the week...but I thought this would be an interesting conversation starter.

Not many of you know but I have a very big interest in Artificial intelligence, human nature, the doctrine of the soul, and many related subjects.  Philosophically, I find it quite interesting to discuss issues of what make us human and how we are infinitely differentiated from machines which simulate intelligence.

So, to that end, I wanted to share this YouTube video with all of you and ask a simple question: How does this make you feel?

Take me to your leader...

iWoz - Curiosity, Pranks, and the Making of the Computer

iWoz: From Computer Geek to Cult Icon: How I Invented the Personal Computer, Co-Founded Apple, and Had Fun Doing It
W. W. Norton - September 25, 2006

I just finished reading the new autobiography of Steve Wozniak, the man who is credited with launching the personal computer revolution in the mid 1970s.  The book was a fun read which flowed pretty fast.  Seeing the early days of a huge cultural story develop is very interesting to me.  Normal people, who dream, care, try, and develop their God given abilities (even if they deny God gave them) are always those who change the world.  The very fact that I sit here typing on a keyboard, looking at characters on a screen is due to this man's labor to understand how electrons move through logic gates to make calculations.  Reading this book brought me back to my undergraduate days where I took digital electronics, laid out cricuit boards, created finite state machines, and even dabbled a bit in Motorolla assembler.  It reminds me that large problems, broken down into their smallest parts, and then executed at incredible speeds can simulate all matter of things.  Most people see computers as exceedingly complex.  The men who invented them saw them as very simple.  Simple in that if you got one part of a system to work logically, knowing its inputs and outputs, you could add complexity to do amazing things. 

To put into perspective some of the things "Woz" did is pretty amazing. 

• First, he was able to create video games in hardware - to wire up electronics to create arcade games which would play on your TV. 
  
• He was the first ever to have add a typewriting keyboard to a computer and have its input reflected on a monitor.
• He created the code to operate these devices
• He created the version of the Basic programming language to run on the first Apple PCs
• He designed a system to integrate the newly invented "floppy disk" drive into PCs allowing them to store programs to run again at a later time.  This may not sound huge, but many of us do not realize the way it used to be.  You would turn on your computer and have to type in the entire program (could take an hour or so) before running it.  After turning it off...it was gone and you would have to type it all in again to run it the next day.
• He added comptuer graphics to the PC with the Apple II - a run away success in the early 1980s
  

Woz is shown as a playful man with a heart for humanity - always thinking technology is there to help humanity.  He is a bit too optomistic perhaps about technology, saying early in the book that he thinks technology is "always good" for people.  I would want to qualify that statement quite a bit in light of some of the technological tragedies and atrocities (chernobyl and the atomic bomb come to mind).  He is the consumate prankster always desiring to make others laugh. I have heard him a few times on TWIT finding him to be very fun to listen to.

His highest pursuit in life seems to be "being happy" with true happiness being doing what you love to do - no more, no less. This seemed a bit simple in light of the fact that most people in the world  just try to eat each day...to say nothing of "doing what you love."  Themes of religion and meaning to life are touched periodically yet superficially, but the big questions of life and the universe are skimmed over.  

All facets of his life are covered.  School days, science fair rock star acclaim at a very young age, high school ingenuity and electronics guru, forrays in and out of college, marriages and divorces, Apple successes and failures, a plane crash, the creation of large concert events, early ideas on a universal remote control for media devices, and time as a school teacher.  As much as happiness is exalted in this book, I always sensed that it was eluding Steve Wozniak.  It always seemed to be something external to him causing him problems.  Decisions at Apple, wives who don't get him, and relationships which don't resolve. 

Overall Wozniak did see his work as having a huge significance, as one who understood he was changing our world.  There is almost a tone of providential leading under the surface, though I do not know if he would acknowledge as such.  The sheer wonder of all that has happened in the world of computers is due in part to a community of curious American kids.  I do pray that the youth of our country would find science, knowledge, and learning interesting once again; I was attracted by his voracious desire to understand how certain things work. 

During his college days he mentioned his association with a guy who was a Christian; he seemed attracted to how this guy lived the gospel.  My prayer for Woz is that he would again look at Jesus, the one who created the electrons which conduct and tunnel around the circuit boards, and see that there is much more going on under the surface of this universe and have the desire to ask some probing existential questions about the nature of his own soul.

I highly recommend it - especially if you have any background in computers.

God's Computer Program - This is weird, but creative...

Found this on the web tonight - this took some thought, and probably motivated by unbelief, but I enjoyed the creativity...I would add a few more programs to the file to complete the story:

C:\RUN DECREE
Covenant Program initiated
C:\SEND JESUS
Parameter Missing
C:\SEND JESUS, t=FULLNESS OF TIME
Command Successful
C:\RUN REDEMPTION
Command successful
C:\RUN JUDGE_EVIL
Command successful
C:\RUN KINGDOM
infinite loop...
no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King,, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King, no sin, no death, no disease, no suffering, glory, love, joy, peace, Christ is King

Hispace

No, that is not the title for a goofy Christian knockoff of MySpace - though there is not doubt one of those in the making.  Rather, VoxPop, a communication ministry of Mars Hill Church in Seattle has a helpful entry on representing Christ in digital spaces in our culture (blogs, wikis, myspace, facebooks, etc)

If you blog, have a space, etc. There is wise counsel found in this short post. 

Godsmac.com

 

A friend of mine is working on putting together a regular podcast called Godsmac (not to be confused with Godsmack) featuring talk about technology, features on various ministries, as well as offering reflections on spiritual things.  It is fresh out the gate, finding its flavor, and beginning to get a little traction.  I did an interview with Gabe (the man running his mac) last night that will soon be up on the site.

You can check it out at www.godsmac.com -Although the name has to do with a "Mac" I think it is fun to think of it as talkin some GodSmack.

iTunes 7, Zune, and Unboxing in the Amazon

        

This week was a big week for announcements...especially in the area of handheld devices that kick tunes, tv, and movies.  First up Apple announced the new shuffle, nano, and iPod along with a major iTunes upgrade.  And yes, you can now do movies through the iTunes store.  At leas movies from the studios of which Steve Jobs is a board member. The webcast of the Steve Jobs show can be found here.

 

Also, Microsoft's annoucnement of the Zune and its specs have peaked some interest.  Especially the added WiFi and the ability to swap songs wirelessly with other Zuners.  Remember the division who produced the populary Xbox 360 are working on this thing, so don't write it off too quickly.

The final bit of buzz is from Amazon, they too have launched a movie download component, but with many more studios on board that just Disney. Unbox does TV, anime, movie purchase and rental...with tons of content.  Looks robust.

 

Unbox + ZuneMarketplace?  Does apple finally have some real competition in this space?  

Chrysostom on Philippians and the New CCEL

Tonight I was looking online to read some Chrysostom's ancient homilies on Philippians and I was treated to a great surprise. As I went over to the Christian Classics Ethereal Library I found quite a web re-design treat. A brand new version of the CCEL has been developed. It is a nice new site design which has drupal as its content management system.

If you are new to CCEL or have never read Chrysostom's straight forward exposition, it may be time for a venture into some of the old classics of the faith.  Read old dead guys - they have quite a bit to say to us in our times. 

If you are not sure what to read, their short list is a fantastic starter. I always find the beginning of St. Anselm's Proslogion to be a delight...

Enjoy! 

POC Tech Bundle - 7.25.06

Some fun little Tech News out there today...

• Audio/Video - Microsoft recently announced their Zune project designed to take on the iPod/iTunes Juggernaut.  Their viral marketing site - Coming Zune is just weird.
  
• Just Video - It seems Amazon is getting into the mix on the video side of things.  It don't need any more reason to give Amazon any more money that I already do.
• Still the A/V King - And Getting Better - News out on the next generation of the audio/video butt kickin iPod.  A quick quote:
  
• "Apple is aiming to increase both the screen size and improve the battery life - two conflicting attributes that are difficult to improve simultaneously and require significant engineering," he writes. It may be worth the wait, however. The new video-iPod will feature a host of new features and advancements over its predecessor, including an advanced graphics processor supplied by Nvidia adding "3D graphics functionality", and possibly wireless capabilities.
• Cool New Motorola Phones - Why does Verizon get cool phones and Sprint gets all the mediocrity?
  

ToiletPod

We have some speakers in our kitchen for our iPod - we love to put on classical music, hip hop, or whatever the kiddos are into and spend time goofing off and dancing as a family.  But you know, I just can't stand it when I have to go the john and my tunes get interupted.  But now, I have no worries - I can get a toilet paper roll mount for the iPod so I can keep the tunes rolling at all times. 

Question - Who would use this thing?  I guess it can take a while for some of you out there - but if you really needed to have the iPod playing, couldn't you use the headphones?