Category: Tech

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Google’s Superphone is Super Surprising

Last week, I ordered the Nexus One during Google’s event, before the invited attendees got their free review units. Google shipped the phone by free FedEx overnight, so I began using the so-called “superphone” on Wednesday (January 6). Google impressed with the simple ordering process and prompt delivery.

I would recommend the Nexus One over iPhone to most anyone. While I’m no fan of Nexus One’s industrial design, the phone satisfies in most of the important ways: Call quality, user interface responsiveness, overall speed of the device, 3G telephony and data reception, ease of typing on touchscreen, and applications availability. Google and HTC have put together a simply satisfying smartphone. 

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Nexus One Foreshadows Google Mobility That Could Get Ugly for Apple and Microsoft

Microsoft and Apple underestimate how quickly Google is consolidating its mobile platform—clearly so do geeks reviewing Nexus One. Google isn’t just going for one piece of mobility but the whole shebang. Google is putting together the pieces to offer a single mobile lifestyle, with no PC required, supported by search and other Google informational services. Like everything else the company does, free is the glue sticking everything together.

Google’s decision to sell Nexus One direct, even the carrier subsidized model, is part of the strategy. Open-source licensing has its limitations and risks fragmenting Android. As I explained in March 2009 post “There’s an App for That,” Apple changed the rules for mobile operating systems by breaking carrier control over updates. Apple distributes iPhone OS updates, preventing the kind of fragmentation typically caused by carrier distribution. By selling a handset direct, Google takes control of Android updates for a flagship phone that also acts like a baseline design model for handset manufacturers licensing the mobile operating system. 

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There can't be a Free Web if No One Pays

Paywall is suddenly a hot topic as free content turns many longstanding businesses—news among—to apparent ruin. News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch is mad as hell, and he’s not going to take this anymore. This week Murdoch repeats his call for paid services during a U.S. Federal Trade Commission public workshop.

“We need to do a better job of persuading consumers that high-quality, reliable news and information does not come free,” he says. “Good journalism is an expensive commodity.”

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Two Stories of Smartphones Stolen

Yesterday someone stole my daughter’s new smartphone from a school locker. On Friday, a good friend’s iPhone 3GS disappeared from a car dealership, while he was talking on it. Both stories, which go oddly together, are cautionary tales about social media, cloud computing and the risks of identities stolen with the hardware.

Stolen phones used to conjure fears of minutes usage overages or big bills from calls placed to faraway places. Now the cost could be  you.

The Story Carl Rytterfalk’s Camera Tells

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-W2Ia9tar8]

 

Before there was Twitter or before Facebook gained popularity, I followed people online directly through their Websites or RSS feeds. I’ve long favored personal blogs over professional news sites. The best stories are told by and are about people.

Fast forward five years, people are what make the social Web work so well, and why my profession, journalism, is in state of chaos. Why read something filtered by a reporter/editor when the single, or even crowd, source is available? Interaction is more personal and direct.

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iPhone’s Chinese Disconnection?

Yesterday, several Wall Street analysts swallowed their pride and iPhone sales projections after the first four days of official iPhone sales in China amounted to 5,000 units. Whoa, 5,000? I’m stunned China Unicom sold that many. At $730 to over $1,000 price range, iPhone goes oddly—seemingly quite badly—together with average Chinese incomes. Apple’s mobile costs way too much for the market—or does it?

Several blogs, including All Things Digital, described iPhone’s China debut as a failure, feeding off analysts’ glum reaction. Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster, one of Apple’s biggest cheerleaders on Wall Street, described sales as “soft.”