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Apple Expressly Wanted Police Inquiry Into Lost iPhoneApple drove the investigation into the lost iPhone G4. mocoNews.net reports. Apple complained the the device was stolen after it was accidentally forgotten in a by an employee bar not far from Apples...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 4:19 am Sending a Message That You Dont CareChristine Pearson explains her research over more than a decade on text messaging and how it's damaging workplace relationships. In The New York Times. Excerpts. For more than a decade, my colleagues...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 3:48 am Space shuttle Atlantis set to dock with international space station on Sunday - CNN International
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 16 May 2010 | 3:40 am Readings: Volcanoes, Oil, China and Canadian Housing30 years after Mount St. Helens blew, the volcano reveals its secrets (Source) Canada housing price-to-rent ratios (Source) China: The Future That Was? (Source) Oil futures: A comparison...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 3:25 am HTC EVO 4G Vs HTC HD2 Vs Nexus One [Video Illustration] - Gadgets DNA
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 16 May 2010 | 3:02 am Trailer For Blender Open Movie Sintel Readyl_i_g_h_s_p_e_e_d writes "The trailer for Sintel is ready. (We discussed the beginnings of this project in 2007.) 'After many weeks of fighting technology, here's a first glimpse of this wonderful short film that's shaping up here.' Sintel is a Blender Open Movie project created using only FLOSS software 'For the entire creation pipeline in the studio, we will only use free/open source software. We have less than 2 months now to finish this completely... imagine the tension that's building up here to get everything perfect. For today, we'll celebrate a big step forward.' Downolad here."
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Source: Slashdot | 16 May 2010 | 2:52 am Baffling Animal Rediscoveries - The Brazilian Blind Characid Fish is Nearly Extinct (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) One lone Brazilian blind characid fish, part of the family of tetras and piranhas, was first discovered in 1962 in Minas Gerais, Brazil. It was identified by ichthyologists as a new...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 2:30 am Cathay Pacific plane from HK escorted to Vancouver (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 16 May 2010 | 2:10 am Embroidered Bread - Wonder Bread Embroidery Gets the Van Gogh Treatment (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) A very strange but interesting pastime is Wonder Bread Embroidery. This is exactly as it sounds: embroidering slices of white bread. Catherine McEver takes slices of Wonder Bread and...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 2:00 am Solar powered trash cans send text messages when they are fullAfter being written up last year. BigBelly Solar's public trash cans were mentioned on TV's ABCNews10. These solar trash cans that send text messages to city workers when they need to be emptied have been...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 1:44 am An app for divorceA new iPhone app has been created for divorcing couples. Developed by two attorneys from Dallas, DivorceApps helps individuals assess the costs associated with the dissolution of a marriage. [via Wired...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 1:30 am Jobs intervened to get iPhone 4G back - V3.co.uk
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 16 May 2010 | 1:26 am Silicon 'nose' turns cell phones into toxin detectorsAccording to CNet, San Diego's The University of California and a startup called Rhevision, are working a tiny silicon chip that can be embedded in cell phones that will detect and then map the location...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 1:15 am LIZARDS! They're cold-blooded, so no global-warming fears, right? - Detroit Free Press
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 16 May 2010 | 1:06 am Non-Flash video surges onto the web - Register
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 16 May 2010 | 1:03 am Arcade game fontsBitmap fonts derived from classic arcade games, offered without comment at Miffies. [Via NotCot]Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 12:28 am Arcade game fontsBitmap fonts derived from classic arcade games, offered without comment at Miffies. [Via NotCot] Source: Boing Boing | 16 May 2010 | 12:28 am Oil Clean-Up Gadgets - The Bird Washing Machine Allows for an Easier Oil Clean-Up (VIDEO)(TrendHunter.com) Considering how oil spills are a known threat to the environment and its ecosystems, the Bird Washing Machine is an innovative way to clean up the mess. While an oil-soaked bird normally...Source: RSS feed - channel BNBlogTech | 16 May 2010 | 12:26 am How the Amiga's death heralded the PC gaming revolutionOn a story about how a Commodore Amiga demo helped defeat a patent troll, a Slashdot commenter on the story claims refugees from its culture of bare-metal coders kickstarted the PC gaming revolution after Commodore's demise. Follow-ups challenge the truthiness of this hypothesis. HAM sandwiches for all!Source: Boing Boing | 16 May 2010 | 12:13 am Video: WinPho 7 Transitions and 3D prowess shown in emulator
Although we’ve already had a quick peek at the interface, Mobility Digest have chopped out the boring bits from a recent (45 minute) video of a Channel 9 presentation, to present the juicy, 2-minute, emulator-driven, let’s-get-a-quick-taste-of-WinPho-7-apps video, below. The video also demos the 3D power of WinPho 7, but the bit that’s really interesting is the first half, which shows off the transitions used in the Associated Press app. But don’t take my word for it, because if the old cliché (and my calculations) are correct, there are the equivalent of almost a million of my words in the video, below. Look at that. So purdy. [via WM Power User]
Source: MobileCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 11:53 pm Firefox With H.264 HTML 5 Support = Wild FoxElledan writes "Only two countries in the world have software patents which make it impossiblefreely to use video codecs such as AVC (H.264). This has led to projects such as Firefox not including AVC support with the HTML 5 video tag in all their releases, resulting in the rest of the world having to suffer indirectly the effects of software patents as well. To rectify this situation at least somewhat, I have created the Wild Fox project, which aims to release Firefox builds with the features previously excluded due to software patents. This software will be available to those in non-software patent encumbered countries. Any developers who wish to join the project are more than welcome."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 11:36 pm Google to stop selling smartphone online - Reuters
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 15 May 2010 | 10:54 pm Rumour: myTouch 3G Slide available for $149 on June 16th
While the screenies don’t show the release date, Tmo News also claim that it has been pushed back two weeks from the previously thought June 2nd, to June 16th. Tmo News aren’t 100% on that information, though, so take it as you will. The prices seem reasonable for what appears to be a rather solid, mid-range, Android QWERTY device. [via Android and Me]
Source: MobileCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 10:51 pm Google says mistakenly got wireless data (Reuters)Reuters - Google Inc said its fleet of cars responsible for photographing streets around the world have for several years accidentally collected personal information -- which a security expert said could include email messages and passwords -- sent by consumers over wireless networks.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 15 May 2010 | 10:45 pm Google to stop selling smartphone online (Reuters)Reuters - Google Inc is closing its 4-month-old online cell phone store, abandoning an ambitious plan by the Web search leader to redefine wireless retailing.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 15 May 2010 | 10:44 pm Beer, betrayal, a lost iPhone in Apple device tale (Reuters)Reuters - Fearing "huge" losses in sales after pictures leaked of its fourth-generation iPhone, Apple Inc convinced police to launch a felony investigation and Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs contacted the offending Web site himself to try and recover the gadget.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 15 May 2010 | 10:44 pm Ribs in a can (and other delights)
Source: Boing Boing | 15 May 2010 | 10:37 pm India slowly gets to grips with ecommerce (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 15 May 2010 | 10:05 pm AMD's Fusion CPU + GPU Will Ship This Yearmr_sifter writes "Intel might have beaten AMD to the punch with a CPU featuring a built-in GPU, but it relied on a relatively crude process of simply packaging two separate dies together. AMD's long-discussed Fusion product integrates the two key components into one die, and the company is confident it will be out this year — earlier than had been expected."
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Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 9:25 pm Wii Vitality Sensor announcement on Monday?
The announcement that there will be an announcement is really the only information out there right now, so I’ll leave you to your thoughts and your Wiis. [via 1up]
Source: CrunchGear | 15 May 2010 | 8:53 pm 8-bit Starcraft: I would have played this
Whatever, it’s the weekend, you can spare two minutes for some Ataricraft 2600. [via Reddit]
Source: CrunchGear | 15 May 2010 | 8:33 pm Tweets In Buzz: It’s Complicated — Well, Maybe Political
Users of Google Buzz will know that the service is awful at importing tweets. Currently, the import is done in bulk at the end of each day, resulting in a barrage of tweets in streams. It’s so bad, that many users unsubscribe from others who set their Buzz account to auto-import tweets. So why does Google do this? Well, it’s complicated. It seems logical that Google Buzz would do exactly what FriendFeed (prior to its acquisition by Facebook) would do, which is pull in tweets in realtime. After all, from what I’ve heard from multiple sources, Google does have full access to Twitter’s firehose. This makes sense considering that Google uses the Twitter firehose to populate its search results with tweets baked into them. So why the delay for tweets in Buzz? When I asked Horowitz this question, he immediately passed the microphone to Twitter’s director of product, Jason Goldman. Goldman immediately passed the microphone back to Horowitz without saying anything. At this point, the audience was getting into it — what’s the answer? Horowitz would only say that Google is working closely with Twitter to come up with the best solution to import tweets. That, of course, is bullshit. I pressed, but Horowitz wouldn’t give me anything. So all I can do at this point is speculate based on what I know. Twitter is giving Google full access to its firehose per its agreement for search results. But Buzz may not want to use this data presumably because it would overwhelm Buzz — much like tweets overwhelm FriendFeed. If you’re trying to start a service, it makes sense that you wouldn’t want it to be overrun with data from a competing service. But still, tweets in realtime in Buzz would make it much more useful than it currently is. It would make it, well, FriendFeed. In other words, I think this is all political. Google doesn’t want Buzz to become yet another Twitter client. And it’s hard to blame them. Horowitz noted that we’d be hearing more about how Buzz can be used as a platform during Google I/O next week — so hopefully they’ll have more to share about Buzz in general. For now, unfortunately, all of us must suffer through this half-assed approach Buzz takes towards tweets. It makes it the social service that is sort of social.      
Source: TechCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 7:42 pm Google's Wi-Fi Spying: What Were They Thinking? - PC World
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 15 May 2010 | 7:32 pm Steve Jobs Says PC Folks' World Is Slipping Awaytheodp writes "Provoked by an iPad ad promising a 'revolution,' Valleywag's Ryan Tate fired off a late-night missive to Steve Jobs. Jobs responded, and the two engaged in an after-midnight e-mail debate over lockdown, Cocoa vs. Flash, battery life, and whether 'freedom from porn' is a bug or a feature. 'The times they are a changin',' quipped Jobs, 'and some traditional PC folks feel like their world is slipping away. It is.' Tate was unswayed by the Apple CEO's reality distortion field, but did come away impressed by Jobs' willingness to spar one-on-one over his beliefs. At 2:00 in the morning on a weekend."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 7:13 pm Dr. Sketchy's Anti-Art School one-year anniversary in LA, Sunday May 15, 2010, 7:00 PM
Bob Self says: The Los Angeles branch of Dr. Sketchy's Anti-Art School (a figure drawing cabaret for artists and art voyeurs) is celebrating its one-year anniversary under the leadership of the team at Baby Tattoo (an independent art book publishing company) this Sunday at 7:00 PM. There will be three sexy models posing both in and out of costume, a special appearance by magician/mad scientist Rudy Coby, and a whole bunch of prizes to be given away. The venue is one of LA's most unusual theatre spaces -- the sideshow, circus, villain's lair themed California Institute of Abnormalarts in the NoHo Arts District. You've never seen (or drawn) anything like it.Tinky Sparkle ( aka Jessica Whiteside, above right) is an excellent painter. Full details here Microsoft Accuses Google Docs of Data InfidelityHugh Pickens writes "For years Google has been pitching migrations from Microsoft Office to Google Docs, arguing that Docs makes Office 2003 and 2007 better because users can store Microsoft Office documents in Google's cloud and share them in their original format. Now eWeek reports that Alex Payne, director of Microsoft's online product management team, says that moving files created with Office to Google Docs results in the loss of data fidelity including the loss of such data components as charts, styles, watermarks, fonts, tracked changes, and SmartArt. 'They are claiming that an organization can use both seamlessly,' Payne writes. 'This just isn't the case.' Meanwhile, Google defended its original 'Docs makes Office better' in a statement, noting that it has made a lot of improvements to the Web editors in Docs with its recent refresh, and promising that functionality will only get better as Google integrates the DocVerse assets into Docs. 'It says a lot about Microsoft's approach to customer lock-in that the company touts its proprietary document formats, which only Microsoft software can render with true fidelity, as the reason to avoid using other products,' says a Google spokesperson."
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Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 4:58 pm Obama Sends Nuclear Experts To Tackle BP Oil SpillAn anonymous reader writes "The US has sent a team of nuclear physicists to help BP plug the 'catastrophic' flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico from its leaking Deepwater Horizon well, as the Obama administration becomes frustrated with the oil giant's inability to control the situation. The five-man team — which includes a man who helped develop the first hydrogen bomb in the 1950s — is the brainchild of Steven Chu, President Obama's Energy Secretary." Let's hope this doesn't mean they actually try the nuclear option. In other offshore drilling news, reader mygoditsfullofdoom informs us that a Venezuelan gas rig has sunk in the Caribbean (with no loss of life). This one is being laid at the feet of Venezuela's state oil company PDVSA, which hasn't exactly been regarded as uber-competent "after President Hugo Chavez fired half the company's managers and senior engineers following a 2002 strike."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 3:39 pm Central Command Turns To Twitter To Solve The Gulf Oil Spill. Uh Oh.
A group of a dozen or so organizations including BP, the EPA, the U.S. Department of Interior, the Department of Defense, and OSHA have set up Deepwater Horizon Response, a “Unified Command” established to “manage response operations.” Naturally, there’s a website for this effort, but there’s also a Facebook page, a Twitter account, a Flickr account, and a YouTube account. They’re covering all the social media bases (though no Foursquare account just yet). On one hand, this is absolutely great. This site and all of these social accounts are giving users access to a ton of information about the spill, and what’s being done to try and solve it. On the other hand, it’s a little scary to see tweets like this: “Submit alternative tech ideas to stop leaking...” Yes, they apparently must now resort to crowd-sourcing ideas over Twitter for how to stop the spill. Ugh. Let’s hope they’re just tweeting stuff like that to let people know they’re doing all they can, and are willing to explore all ideas. Let’s hope it’s not that they’re completely out of ideas and need Twitter to solve the problem for them. (But tweets like this and this aren’t looking too promising.) Especially since that account only has around 4,000 followers, and that tweet was only retweeted 3 times. Maybe they should enlist Ashton Kutcher, and his nearly 5 million followers to help out if they really want to crowd-source this thing. If you do have an idea for how to solve the spill, submit it using this form. If somehow this crowd-sourcing over Twitter does actually produce a solution, I’ll be all in favor of them winning some sort of Nobel prize at that point.
[photo: flickr/NASA Goddard Photo and Video] Information provided by CrunchBase      
Source: TechCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 2:48 pm Google Stops Selling Its Own PhoneDave Knott notes that Google has announced that it will close its online cell phone store and no longer sell the Nexus One smart phone directly to consumers. "While the global adoption of the Android platform has exceeded our expectations, the web store has not," wrote Andy Rubin a Google VP Engineering, on the official company blog. "It's remained a niche channel for early adopters, but it's clear that many customers like a hands-on experience before buying a phone, and they also want a wide range of service plans to chose from." From the Globe and Mail article: "At least one aspect of Google's attempt to disrupt the world of mobile communications — selling phones directly to customers — has failed. ... [T]he decision to design and sell the Nexus One was perhaps more potentially disruptive for carriers. ... Google plans to continue marketing the Nexus One through 'existing retail channels, essentially partnering with carriers around the world. The Nexus One web store, meanwhile, will essentially become a marketing portal 'to showcase a variety of Android phones available globally.'"
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 2:17 pm Steve Jobs Spars With Gawker Blogger Over Revolutions, Freedom, and Porn
That’s exactly what happened last night, when Gawker writer Ryan Tate got irritated by an Apple ad describing the iPad as “a revolution” and shot off an email to Steve Jobs. Three hours later, at nearly 1AM, Jobs replied, and a passionate email debate ensued. The email exchange is mainly focused on Apple’s stranglehold on the iPhone OS platform, and its decision to force developers to build applications using Apple’s tools. Tate is clearly agitated throughout the exchange (in his blog post he notes a few things he regrets writing in his email responses). For the most part Jobs seems to be level-headed, though he does take a jab at Tate at the end. Through it all, though, one thing is clear: Jobs is on a mission to reinvent computing. He’s well aware of the controversies, and for better or for worse, it sounds like he genuinely believes that what Apple is doing will lead to a better future. You can read the entire exchange on Gawker here, but here are a few interesting responses from Jobs: Tate:
Jobs:
Here’s a later back-and-forth (note the jab Jobs takes at Tate at the end): Tate:
Jobs:
     
Source: TechCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 2:01 pm Weekend Update 05.15.10- The Privacy-Schmivacy Edition [Digital Daily]
BoomTown began this week with a little D-gazing to get us all amped for the coming conference. She posted a video of Steve Jobs from way back in the days of D2 (we are about to enjoy D8 at the end of the month). Jobs has agreed to make an appearance at this year’s D as well, so we can look forward to yet another savory interview. Kara followed things with a post about John Lilly, CEO of Mozilla, leaving the software world for Greylock Partners. Lilly will continue to serve on Mozilla’s board, and is leaving at a time when Firefox, Mozilla’s signature product, is enjoying an all time high market share near 25%. Toward the end of the week, Kara revealed that semi-stealth start up Kakai, which is now called Kno, will debut their student-focused e-reader at the upcoming D Conference. Weekend Update wonders if this one will have legs, as you can basically draw a straight line between the new reader and the web’s largest online textbook renter, Chegg. Early in the week, Digital Daily brought readers another installment from Apple’s (AAPL) “oh brother” file. It seems that yet another prototype iPhone made it our of grand master Steve’s grasp, this time in Vietnam. The identity of this particular phone has not been confirmed, but it sure looks like the real thing, right down to the chips inside. Yep. This one got dismantled too. In other smartphone news, John reported later in the week that Google would be closing their online Nexus One store, in favor of selling the phones through retailers like everyone else. We guess they should have put “Beta” up on that page too. That gets rid of some of the sting. On Friday, John closed things out with another tidbit to throw on the privacy concern pile. It came out that Google’s (GOOG) famous street view cars (yep, the ones that take all the pictures) have been collecting data on all the WiFi networks they drive past. That in itself isn’t news. We knew they were doing that. What came out Friday was that they were inadvertently gathering “payload data,” or the actual data being passed over unsecured networks while they drove past. This puts them in a tough spot of having data they dont wan’t just when everyone is getting up in arms over privacy violations. We’re curious to see what the “un-evil” response to this oversight will be. Media Memo started things off early with coverage of President Obama’s comments on electronic distraction. It seems the Pres. is a little concerned that the prevalence of iThings in the world today is going to distract the attention of the world’s future problem solvers. He might have a point, but isn’t this the President who was so attached to his blackberry that he ordered a special, super-secret encrypted one made so he could keep using it after he’d been given the nuclear launch codes? Just saying. Later on in the week, we all got word that one of TV’s longest running franchises, Law and Order, would be cancelled after 20 years. While it may not mean much to the viewing audience, as we still have seemingly endles spinoffs to hold us (not to mention 20 years of reruns) it is big news for the countless actors who filled their down time playing junkies, murderers and victims. Peter rounded things out by brining a little sense to the convoluted story of the iPhone leak. The much-needed wrap up helped us sort out the whole sordid tale, and make sense of all the finger pointing. Walt covered interesting new ground this week with some digital product to help you organize all the vital data in your life. Both Orggit and InformationSafe aim to help you keep track of important records with cloud and local storage solutions. Walt admitted that it was early days for these types of services, but sees promise in what they offer as life in the cloud gets more complicated. In the Mailbox, Walt demystified the “n” and “g” differences in WiFi tech, and gave some advice on the new line of super-fast laptops on the way from Apple. Weekend Update will admit to being a confused more than once by all the wireless options, but no more, thanks to Walt. Katie rounded out our week of coverage with a review of the new Sony (SNE) “Dash”, a passive counter-top web device that aims to bring another web-connected screen into the room. Katie was a little skeptical of the device, as it seemed to still have more than a few bugs, and even then doesn’t really have a niche to fit in. We’re counting down to D8, and the numbers are getting pretty small now. Weekend Update cant wait to see what Kara and Walt will drag out of the world’s tech leaders. We guess you’ll just have to stay tuned along with us. Source: All Things Digital | 15 May 2010 | 1:46 pm 50 Years of Lasers - FOXNews
Source: Sci/Tech - Google News | 15 May 2010 | 1:17 pm Developer-Friendly Banks?tyen writes "Any suggestions for a 'developer-friendly' bank for small businesses? The banking world is awash in data protocols that business customers who are/have coders would find useful, like BAI to extract all the raw data from an ACH or SWIFT transfer. Unfortunately, the ones I have spoken with about this access are still stuck in the Dark Ages of computing; they price the access like only big companies still have the skills to tap into these interfaces. For example, one of the four US banks with a perfect trading record this past quarter quoted us USD five figures for access to several of our accounts via BAI format. Per year. After waiving sign-up fees. Are there any banks out there that have a more progressive attitude about letting small, entrepreneurial developers work with their business accounts in a more modern, dare we say automated, way? With big businesses demanding EFT integration from small business vendors, and globalization rewarding premiums to nimble, lean businesses that automate wherever possible, automating the retrieval of this information (which is not available in consumer-oriented access like OFX) becomes an increasingly pressing issue for the small guys."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 12:58 pm More Americans Choosing No-Commitment Wireless ServiceThis year, customers of wireless services have been making an increasing shift from long-term contracts to prepaid cell phone service -- which often costs less and does not require contracts -- even though popular phones such as the iPhone and Droid still require contracts.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 15 May 2010 | 12:50 pm Desk Cat Demands PensLink. [Liveleak]Source: Boing Boing | 15 May 2010 | 12:43 pm Scientists Release New Info on Brain DevelopmentMechanism found that prepares the brain of a newborn for information processingWith their French colleagues, researchers at the University of Helsinki have found a mechanism in the memory centre of newborn that adjusts the maturation of the brain for the information processing required later in life.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 15 May 2010 | 12:36 pm Wearable Sensor Benefits AthletesComposite materials generate electricity, reveal impact forcesAs athletes strive for perfection, sports scientists need to exploit every technological advance to help them achieve that goal.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 15 May 2010 | 12:35 pm Study: Bigger Wallet Means Bigger WaistlineUniversite de Montreal study correlates wealth and weight in Canadian menMontreal -- In Canada, in stark contrast with the rest of the world, wealthy men increase their likelihood of being overweight with every extra dollar they make.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 15 May 2010 | 12:30 pm Not everyone wants their hand held when PC gaming
One of the bigger stories this past week was OnLive heading to the UK. The service promises to make PC gaming more accessible by hosting all of the hardware—you simply supply a broadband connection and a Web browser, and you’ll be playing the likes of Mass Effect 2 in no time. If it works as described, great. There’s nothing wrong with exposing PC gaming to more people. What concerns me, and maybe “concerns” isn’t even the right word, is that the art of PC gaming will go away. It’s an art based on choice, a choice that will go away if all we’re required to do is click the OnLive favicon on our bookmark bar. Today’s PC gamer can, if he so desires, spend $700 on a video card in order to eek out a few more frames per second in the latest first-person shooter. Or he can spend half as much and still blast zombies away to his heart’s content. Today’s PC gamer can spend weeks at a time researching processors—Intel or AMD, Core i5 or i7 or Phenom?—for the two-second thrill of setting it on the motherboard. Then there’s overclocking—how far can you push your fancy new processor? Change the voltage here, alter the frequency there, then hope to God that Prime95 doesn’t melt a hole in the floor. Will a hard disk drive suffice, or will I be better off moving up to a solid state drive? All of this sense of adventure disappears when using something like OnLive, and that’s something that matters to plenty of PC gamers. Maybe even more important that any abstract sense of “fun,” there’s something to be said about being totally in control of the hardware being used to grind from level 1 to level 80. So by all means, make PC gaming more accessible, just please recognize that there’s plenty of people who like it because it can be such a commitment.
Source: CrunchGear | 15 May 2010 | 12:30 pm Tablet war: Dell’s entry hitting AT&T mid-summerSection: Communications, Mobile, Computers, Mobile Computers, Wireless
Oh Dell, why do you loathe the US market? First it was launching your new little phone in China, now its launching a cute little table in Europe before heading to US shores. Other companies, start here in the US and then branch out, why the reverse tactic? CEO Michael Dell let loose that the Mini 5, aka “Streak”, will hit the US mid-summer on AT&T. It will feature an optional SIM card so users can access data as well as perhaps make calls from the unit. The Streak will feature Android as the operating system. The Streak looks to handle 2-way video conferencing, 1GHz Qualcomm processor, 3G radio and a decent 5MP camera on the back. All told, a decently spec’d beast. Though at 5” (diagonal) the device is decidedly bigger than say and iPhone, but still dwarfed by the iPad (almost double screen size). Will Dell find a home in the US for this size device? We’ll begin to find out this summer. Read: [Wired]
Full Story » | Written by JG Mason for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article » Source: Gadgetell | 15 May 2010 | 12:08 pm Zelle 1337 Jewelry, For The Lady Who Pwn3d Ur Lyf
All of these handmade pieces are created out of used electronics and are actually quite striking. The best part? Each comes with an offical “Certificate of Autheticity” that looks like the EULA that came with Windows 95.      
Source: TechCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 11:43 am The Laser Turns 50sonicimpulse writes with news that tomorrow is the 50th anniversary of physicist Theodore Maiman's creation of the first operational laser. "Theodore Maiman made the first laser operate on 16 May 1960 at the Hughes Research Laboratory in California, by shining a high-power flash lamp on a ruby rod with silver-coated surfaces. He promptly submitted a short report of the work to the journal Physical Review Letters, but the editors turned it down. Some have thought this was because the Physical Review had announced that it was receiving too many papers on masers — the longer-wavelength predecessors of the laser — and had announced that any further papers would be turned down. But Simon Pasternack, who was an editor of Physical Review Letters at the time, has said that he turned down this historic paper because Maiman had just published, in June 1960, an article on the excitation of ruby with light, with an examination of the relaxation times between quantum states, and that the new work seemed to be simply more of the same. Pasternack's reaction perhaps reflects the limited understanding at the time of the nature of lasers and their significance."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 11:38 am Zelle 1337 jewelry, for the lady who pwn3d ur lyf
I’m not so sure the average non-geek girl would love necklaces and earrings made of resistors, fuses, and floppy disk parts but there’s no harm in trying. Besides, I suspect real geek girls would definitely squeeeeeee at these. All of these handmade pieces are created out of used electronics and are actually quite striking. The best part? Each comes with an offical “Certificate of Autheticity” that looks like the EULA that came with Windows 95.
The smaller pieces cost about $30 while the larger pieces are priced and available by request. While I’m not totally down with some of these pieces, a low-cut dress and maybe that massive diode necklace could get anyone’s Elementals boiling. Obviously you could also make these yourself, but who has that kind of time what with Super Mario Galaxy 2 coming out and Steam on Mac.
Source: CrunchGear | 15 May 2010 | 11:26 am New MacBook specs leak out of VietnamLooks like we get a peek at an unannounced update to the MacBook a little bit early. The update (showing up on the label as MacBook7,1) has the same CPU and GPU as the entry level MacBook Pro, but assuming Apple keeps the pricing the same, it should be available for $999. Check out the unboxing video after the jump. So what’s going on in this update? Well, the MacBook will still be called model A1342, but it’ll have a 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, and the NVIDIA GeForce 320M with 256mb of DDR3. Great news for someone who wants a cheaper MacBook with some horsepower. Of course since it’s a leak, we have no idea for sure when it’ll be announced, how much it will cost, or even if this is a hoax or not.
Source: CrunchGear | 15 May 2010 | 11:22 am Socialwok Adds A Collaboration Platform To Microsoft Outlook
Socialwok, a product that ads a social layer to Gmail and other Google products, is spreading its wings beyond the search giant to Microsoft land. Today, the startup, which launched its Google Apps-focused product at TechCrunch50 last year, is rolling out the Socialwok Social Connector for Microsoft Office Outlook 2010, 2007, 2003. Similar to the layer that Socialwok creates for Google Apps and Gmail, the connector allows Outlook users to create a private social network within the application to share ideas, emails, files, Office documents from Microsoft Word, Google Docs and other rich media using status updates. From inside Microsoft Outlook, users can see the latest activity of their co-workers in the office as well as view what files and emails have been previously shared. Microsoft Office users can also access the Socialwok user profiles of their co-workers from the Microsoft Outlook address book. Of course, the timing of Socialwok’s connector fits with the roll out of the new version of Office 2010 this past week, which brings all of its applications, including Outlook, Word, and PowerPoint, to the PC, phone and browser. Outlook specifically has been revamped to become more social, with integration available for LinkedIn and MySpace But Socialwok’s beauty is that it wraps a collaborative, social network around the most unsocial of email applications, allowing users to never have to leave their email clients. And as Microsoft moves its applications to the cloud and the idea of the social CRM takes off, Socialwok’s plugin could become appealing to business users. Socialwok, which employs a freemium model, has steadily been adding features and improvements to its application, including adding support for Facebook, Twitter and Buzz within its applications and releasing a new version of its HTML 5 mobile version for Android and iPhone browsers. Of course, it’s interesting to see Socialwok playing nice with Microsoft products considering the startup has mainly tied its application to Google products. Not only was Socialwok was chosen as one of the showcase companies for AppEngine technology at this year’s Google IO Developer Sandbox but Socialwok was just integrated as a pilot partner in Google’s recently launched Google Apps Marketplace. The Microsoft integration certainly adds a twist to our theory that Google could buy the startup. It should be interesting to see if Socialwok will face the same fate as Google Docs killer and collaboration platform Etherpad or Microsoft Word collaboration plug-in Docverse.
Information provided by CrunchBase      
Source: TechCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 11:20 am Hands-on with MobileHelp, for when Dad has fallen and he can’t get up
MobileHelp is a small device that works “beyond the home” allowing your loved one to call for help at a press of a button. The device also also tracks your loved one via GPS and, when they sound an alarm, MobileHelp’s staff will contact them directly and call the proper authorities. My mother tried this at home and found the installation to be fairly easy – all she had to do was plug it into the wall and into a phone outlet – and when she pressed the button MobileHelp immediately contacted her. As my parents grow older, stuff like this is going be more and more important. While I’d prefer them just to have cellphones, it may work if you’re dealing with folks who are bordering on senility yet still have the wherewithal to call for help. Obviously a small device around your neck that is always with you may be more useful than a cellphone in an emergency, but you’ll have to make that decision based on price and value. Again, I’d love to hear from some folks who have had to deal with this sort of thing to better understand the value of the device. My Mom got a kick out of it – but she likes new things – so I had a sample size of about one.
Source: CrunchGear | 15 May 2010 | 11:16 am Penumbra: Overture Goes Open SourceAs promised when the Humble Indie Bundle hit $1 million in donations the other day, indie developer Frictional Games has released Penumbra: Overture's source code. "The code for Penumbra: Overture is a continuation of the one used for the tech demo + some addition for the not so long lived Robo Hatch project. It also contains some code from Unbirth, giving it quite some history." The release also includes the HPL1 engine. "This is engine that has powered all of the Penumbra games and it even includes the stuff used to create the 2D platformer Energetic. The engine code was started in December 2004 and was actively developed until early 2008." The repositories are available at github.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 15 May 2010 | 11:01 am Will Facebook Be Tomorrow’s Google, and Google Tomorrow’s Microsoft?
Editor’s note: Can Facebook become the next Google? In this guest post an ex-Googler, Bindu Reddy, persuasively argues the case from the perspective of Facebook’s potential as an online advertising platform. Reddy is the CEO of MyLikes, a word-of-mouth ad network funded by other former Googlers. At Google, she managed a team of product managers in charge of various Google apps including Google Docs, Google Sites, and Blogger. Today, Google is the place to go to if you are looking for information about pretty much anything. By displaying sponsored links that are relevant to what you are looking for, Google showed us that ads are most effective when they are useful. So effective, that Google built a $25 billion search advertising business over the last decade. However, Google’s search advertising business is inherently constrained by the fact that it works only when users are already looking for something. You have to search for makeup before Google can serve an ad for the latest Dior mascara product. Facebook on the other hand has become the world’s identity gatekeeper—your age, sex, location, where you went to school, where you work, who your friends are—all of this personal data is used to serve you tidbits of information that you are likely to be interested in. Want to see pics of your cousin’s wedding? Want to know what movies your co-workers are watching this weekend? What music your friends “like”? You need to go to Facebook. The bottom line is that you are now trained to go to Facebook to discover things. With the growth of the Facebook app platform and support (so far) from apps like Farmville and Mafia Wars, Facebook has also grown into the number one destination on the web for entertainment and spending time. Just like Google introduced sponsored search as an advertising model which fits in seamlessly with search results, it doesn’t take a whole lot of imagination to see how Facebook could build brand and discovery-based advertising into its product which will be useful to members. Like Google’s AdWords, Facebook ads will be most effective when they are integrated into the core product and are very relevant to the user.
Take for example, the sponsored ad from Sony at right. It’s a sponsored poll widget I can actually interact with. Much like a mini Facebook-app it amuses me with a poll while ensuring that I interact with the brand. Innovative ad formats are rapidly evolving on Facebook as marketers figure out smarter and smarter ways to catch our attention. It’s only a matter of time before Facebook figures out how to make brand advertising useful and effective on Facebook. Unlike Google AdWords, this model will not be constrained by the fact that you have to actually look for something. You don’t have to search for makeup, you simply have to log into Facebook, and be a young woman fashionista to discover Dior Mascara. Dior can reach many more potential customers this way than by just advertising on Google Search. With an effective and useful discovery advertising model, Facebook, is the first web company that has a very good chance of getting a significant share of the traditional TV and offline brand advertising market (estimated at about $132 billion). Given than search advertising is still just 6.25% ($25 billion) of all advertising dollars ($458 billion), Facebook may well surpass Google’s advertising revenue, and market cap, in the next decade. Will we see a replay of the early half of the last decade when Google rapidly grew to take over Microsoft’s top spot as the premium technology company? This time around it might be Facebook’s turn to replace Google and it is not clear that there is anything that Google can do about it. Here is why: Google doesn’t get brand / discovery advertising Google’s ad business models are based on intent and relevance and not on discovery. The performance based AdWords and AdSense models are easier to measure and appeals to the logical / analytical minds at Google. The power of influence, discovery and brand advertising needs more right-brain thinking than Google’s left brainers are used to. Also, instead of innovating and exploring new forms of brand advertising, Google’s strategy in that space over the last few years has been to simply buy DoubleClick which is the leader in old-school brand advertising (mostly banner ads). This basically means that there is no fresh thinking in this area at Google compared to Facebook, which understands the power of discovery and recommendation. Google’s is a great technology company and a mediocre product company As Google readily admits, the most powerful people at Google are the engineers. Product management, like other non-engineering organizations at Google is more of a service organization. This essentially translates to Google being good at technology-heavy offerings and mediocre at product-heavy offerings. Give Google a technology challenge—Build the largest search index (Google search), the biggest storage system (Gmail), the fastest browser (Chrome) or the niftiest javascript interface (Maps) and Google excels. Turn around and give it a product challenge—Build a community video site (Google video), a social network (Google Wave, Buzz and Orkut), an e-commerce platform (Google product search) and Google’s offerings are more mediocre than excellent. Google’s technology infrastructure, is optimized for large scale data sets and not rapid iteration. Its engineers like working on better algorithms and large systems and not on understanding the social behavior/economics behind a rapidly-evolving user-generated community site (perhaps with the exception of the folks at YouTube). Google has an incremental product strategy when it comes to its core products. Unlike Facebook, which constantly makes drastic changes to it’s core product, even at the risk of annoying some of it’s users, Google’s strategy on core apps such as Search and Gmail is largely very data driven and incremental. Google cannot leverage it’s core apps to compete against Facebook with this kind of incremental approach. Only recently with the introduction of Buzz as part of GMail and the left-navigation bar as part of Google Search has Google begun to make bolder moves. However as with Buzz, these changes seem to be too little too late and it is not clear if they have the wherewithal to stay the course. Given this, I seriously worry whether there is a good chance Google might lose it’s dominance. What do you think? Will Facebook execute brilliantly and become tomorrow’s Google or will Google wake up and triumph over Facebook much like Microsoft did with Netscape?      
Source: TechCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 11:00 am Free apps roundup for May 14th, 2010FROM APPLETELL - Did you get an iPad 3G? I did. As such, I’ve been looking a bit harder for free iPad apps. But don’t worry, iPhone and iPod touch users, I have a bunch of apps for you guys, too. Full Story » | Written by NEWS for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article » Source: Gadgetell | 15 May 2010 | 10:00 am Google Announces Closing of Nexus One Online StoreGoogle announced Friday it would be closing the online store for its Nexus One smartphone, in a calculated shift that signals failure of its effort to market the device directly to consumers over the Web.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 15 May 2010 | 8:30 am Greenpeace Locates Six Radioactive 'Hot Spots'Greenpeace said Friday that it has detected dangerous levels of radioactivity near a salvage yard in New Delhi where a worker was killed last month from radiation poisonings. Seven others were hospitalized.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 15 May 2010 | 8:25 am Top 10 Gamertell posts for the week of May 2, 2010FROM GAMERTELL - Take a look at Gamertell’s top 10 articles for the week of May 2, 2010 and catch up with this week’s hottest gaming news. Full Story » | Written by NEWS for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article » Source: Gadgetell | 15 May 2010 | 8:00 am Fixing Societal Problems: It Starts With Mom and Dad
There is little doubt that there is a problem, and that it is societal. Women start only around 3% of the nation’s tech firms; they are almost absent in high-level technology positions; they contribute to fewer than 5% of all IT patents and 1.2% of open-source software; and the proportion of women-led companies receiving venture capital has dropped dramatically over the past few years. This is despite the fact that girls now match boys in mathematical achievement; 140 women enroll in higher education for every 100 men; and women earn more than 50 percent of all bachelor’s and master’s degrees and nearly 50 percent of all doctorates (see this white paper by Cindy Padnos). It’s not that women can’t cut it in the rough and tough business world. Women-led companies are more capital-efficient, and venture-backed companies run by a woman have 12% higher revenues, than others. They also have lower failure rates. A new Kauffman Foundation report, which I coauthored with Joanne Cohoon of the National Center for Women & Information Technology, shows that women and men company founders are remarkably similar in their backgrounds, motivations, and success factors. I’ve never suggested that women should receive special treatment. Quite to the contrary, I’ve written that they need to learn from other groups, such as Indians, who achieved extraordinary success by helping each other. What I’m arguing is that if you’re going to fix a problem, you need to start by admitting that it exists and then fix its root causes. Don’t pretend that everything is okay just because you can highlight a few random successes. I realized what the biggest societal problem is, when listening to three great women tell their stories at the Anita Borg Institute Women of Vision Awards Banquet, last Wednesday: Mom and Dad.  Kristina Johnson, Lila Ibrahim, and Kathleen McKeown My former dean and mentor at the Pratt School of Engineering at Duke University, Kristina Johnson, attributed much of her success to her parents. Her father, an electrical engineer, taught her the joy of building things and helped her develop a curiosity for how things work; her mother taught her the importance of education in what Eleanor Roosevelt called “the beauty of our dreams”. Kristina is now working as Under-Secretary of Energy in the Obama administration to “save the planet”. Columbia University Computer Science professor, Kathleen McKeown, has pioneered technologies in text summarization and natural-language generation. Her mother was an applied mathematician who was determined to raise a family and work during the days when women just played the role of housewives. She taught her daughters to be tough and defy society when necessary, to fulfill their dreams. Intel General Manager, Lila Ibrahim, who has been leading Intel’s initiatives to provide education technology to the third world, came from an Arab family, in which, traditionally, few women work. Yet her parents pushed her to pursue higher education and excel. All three of these women said that they wouldn’t have achieved their success without the support of their parents. All were swarmed by students at the end of the evening; like most aspiring women entrepreneurs, all the young students want is some encouragement from their role models. These are the keys to fixing the societal problems: parents need to teach their daughters that they can help change the world by becoming engineers and scientists, and successful women need to provide them with encouragement and coaching. I attended another very interesting event yesterday: TiEcon, which is probably the largest entrepreneurial networking event in Silicon Valley. I moderated a lively debate between Kauffman Foundation VP, Lesa Mitchell; NCWIT CEO, Lucinda Sanders; Polyvore CEO, Sukhinder Singh Cassidy; and Schmoop CEO, Ellen Siminoff, on the missing women entrepreneurs. We debated whether there was a problem and then discussed solutions. Singh and Siminoff also talked about their supportive parents. But they argued that there is no societal problem for women; it is just a matter of women building the confidence to succeed and taking on the world —like they did. Women won’t benefit by “having a chip on their shoulder”. When presented with hard data from Sanders and Mitchell, who have been researching this, they acknowledged that women outside the valley don’t have access to the same networks as they do, and so they are at a disadvantage; as are women who don’t have supportive parents. The panel agreed that women who are at the “tipping point”—who have an interest and motivation in entrepreneurship, but lack the knowledge and support—do need help. Lesa Mitchell said that a few years ago, she had been of the opinion that there were no societal problems and that the Kauffman Foundation shouldn’t provide special treatment to women’s groups—but had completely changed her views after reviewing extensive research and data. Women need encouragement, entrepreneurship education, and access to solid mentor networks—particularly in fields in which the deck is stacked against them The bottom line is that it’s all about encouraging the other half of our population to achieve its potential and thereby boosting innovation and economic growth. Let’s be aware of the issues and work to fix them. By the way, Astia is holding an event called the We Own It Summit, in New York City on June 8, which brings together key groups together to discuss this. I encourage you to attend. I’ll be moderating the keynote panel, and have no doubt it will be interesting. to attend. Editor’s note: Guest writer Vivek Wadhwa      
Source: TechCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 7:52 am Jane Siberry makes entire back-catalog into free downloads
Clifton sez, "Canadian recording artist Jane Siberry has made all of her recordings (16 complete albums) available for free download, with the words:
"DOWNLOAD ALL SIBERRY MUSIC HERE. IT IS FREE, A GIFT FROM JANE. TAKE GOOD CARE OF IT. AND 'PAY IT FORWARD' TO OTHERS."
Siberry has an interesting history: in 2006, she gave away nearly everything she owned, becoming homeless with only one guitar, and she changed her name to "Issa," and declared that she had "decommodified" her life. She's since changed her name back. Jane Siberry (Thanks, Clifton!) (Image: My Favorite Magazine Cover, a Creative Commons Attribution (2.0) image from jurvetson's photostream, photo by Bart Nagel)
Previously:
Source: Boing Boing | 15 May 2010 | 7:19 am The Laser Turns 50 on SundayFifty years ago Sunday, a man named Theodore Maiman built the first working laser. The Hughes Labs researcher built something that colleagues at a number of other companies and institutions had been feverishly trying to do for months, even years.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 15 May 2010 | 7:10 am Headed to Portland and San Francisco -- EFF fundraiser FTW!
Hey, Portlanders! I'm on my way today to the Powell's location in Beaverton at 2PM for the latest stop in my For the Win tour.
After that, I'm off to the Bay Area, where I'll kick off with a signing at Borderlands Books in the Mission on Monday at 7PM. Then it's a stop in Palo Alto at Books Inc for the Not Your Mother's Book Club event on Tuesday at 7PM. It culminates with a kick-ass EFF fundraiser at the 111 Minna Gallery on Wednesday at 7:30PM. After that, the tour goes on, with stops in Austin on May 20, Raleigh on the 22nd, Chapel Hill on the 23d, New York on the 26th, Brooklyn on the 27th, New York again on the 28th, and Toronto on June 4. Hope to see you!
Full tour schedule
Space Invaders toaster Chris Naylor, a student designer in London, designed this jim-dandy Space Invaders toaster that toasts individual invaders into your bread. I would absolutely buy one of these if he went into production. Invader Toaster (via Cribcandy)
Previously:
Source: Boing Boing | 15 May 2010 | 6:43 am Will 3D plans for bongs become illegal, too?Thingiverse -- a repository for user-created 3D meshes that can be fed to a 3D printer -- has just had its first (?) bong design uploaded, raising the question: if it's illegal in some jurisdictions to own or sell a bong, will it become illegal to own or sell the 3D design for printing a bong on your desktop 3D fab?A note on the bong: MakerBong is a modular bong design that allows the smoker to design her own bong out of interlocking pieces, print them, and assemble to her satisfaction. Up Against the Wall and Spread Your Legs! (via Futurismic)
Previously:
Source: Boing Boing | 15 May 2010 | 6:37 am Skype Screen Sharing Is A Huge (And Free) Productivity Tool
The problems with these products are particularly frustrating when we put on a big launch event like TechCrunch Disrupt later this month. We schedule hundreds of live demos in a two week period, stacking them every 20 minutes for days on end. Companies can choose how they want to live screencast their software and demos, and we’ve informally tracked what software they choose and the failure rates. Skype video, which now has screen sharing, now accounts for about 30% of all demos for us. The failure rate is near zero and the lag is acceptable even for calls originating from thousands of miles away. It is hands down the easiest way to connect by screen and voice. And it’s completely free. There are few bells and whistles. It’s only good for one computer to one computer communication, for example, and you can’t view the presenter and the demo at the same time. But the benefits are more than worth it. Just about everyone in the tech community already uses skype for calls and chat anyway. You click to initiate a call and share your entire screen or just a part of it, and you’re off and running. I wish everything on the Internet worked this well. We are probably going to make Skype mandatory for our future events. The time and efficiency savings are substantial. What amazes me most is that screen sharing is just a side feature for Skype. But that side feature is way better than the products released by companies that focus on virtual meetings and nothing more. I like straightforward, reliable and easy to use products. Skype is doing all of that for us right now. Also, I’ve been using Skype video nearly constantly since my move to Seattle for meetings with people in Silicon Valley that I used to do in person. When you go to full screen view it’s the closest thing to them sitting right in front of you that I’ve seen. Well, other than if they were actually sitting right in front of you. That would definitely be more real than Skype Video, I guess. Information provided by CrunchBase      
Source: TechCrunch | 15 May 2010 | 2:50 am
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The final pieces of the myTouch 3G Slide launch puzzle — price and release date — are beginning to come to light, with 
Yesterday, I moderated a panel at 
As you’re probably well aware, there’s a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico right now. When BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded and then sank last month, it began dumping thousands of barrels of oil into the Gulf each day. By the time the oil stops leaking, it’s 
For many years, tech fans have known that Steve Jobs will occasionally respond to messages directed to his well-publicized email address. Most of the time his responses consist of snappy one-liners, often containing a nugget of new information. But it’s rare to hear about a full-on debate, with Jobs offering some rationale behind Apple’s highly controversial decisions.
It’s be a rough week for a few tech companies, and all the hubub seems to be centered around private data in public places. Facebook has taken more than a few on the chin this week, and they weren’t even the only ones who committed privacy missteps. Weekend Update is seriously considering sealing all our personal data in a lead lined jar and burying it in the yard behind AllThingsD HQ. Maybe Kara and the crew can talk a little sense into us. 
I am quite used to controversy—unsurprisingly, given the topics that I have been exploring with my academic research. But what has really been a surprise is the hornet’s nest that I seem to have stirred up with my two 
When we're in a world where we can (relatively) instantly produce any object ourselves, is it the actual object that counts or the design? We like to think that's the case for run-of-the-mill objects, since it's not the printing goop that's important; goop becomes commodity and the design rules.
Over the years we’ve been pitched many thousands of times by startups. Sometimes those pitches are in person. Sometimes it’s over the phone, which works if you have a live website to play with. But all too often we get requests for meetings via WebEx or one of the dozens of competing products. Over the years those products have improved, but the percentage of failures is way too high. It’s always awkward when people are talking about what you would see if the meeting software worked.