Yesterday's Best April Fool's Pranks Wired News has a great round-up of the best pranks online, including the PC EZ Bake Oven (see below), the RC Gasteron Hunger Eliminator and many more. # Permalink
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THE LATEST NEWS
Thursday, April 01, 2004
Gateway to Close Its 188 Retail Stores We Saw It Coming Dept: Besieged Gateway Inc. announced that it was closing all 188 retail stores. Personal Aside: I have to say I am not surprised. I went into the flagship store in Union Square to buy an external hard drive and a keychain flash drive. I waited in line even though the store had one other person. No one ever approached me or asked if I needed help. The clerk could not run my credit card for some reason, even though it works perfectly everywhere else. And I literally gave up and left the merchandise behind and went to CompUSA on the next corner. That said it all for me. # Permalink
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EZ-Bake Oven for Your PC Now We've Seen it All Dept: Have an extra 5 1/4 inch drive bay collecting dust? Why not turn your PC into an EZ Bake oven and cook tiny little cakes like the original. Comes with EZ Cook open source software (of course) and a bunch of recipies.
Who said geeks don't cook? (PS -April Fools!) # Permalink
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Google's Multiple April Fool's Jokes "Google Copernicus Center is hiring" said the crafty online search company on its site today. "Google is interviewing candidates for engineering positions at our lunar hosting and research center, opening late in the spring of 2007. This unique opportunity is available only to highly-qualified individuals who are willing to relocate for an extended period of time, are in top physical condition and are capable of surviving with limited access to such modern conveniences as soy low-fat lattes, The Sopranos and a steady supply of oxygen." Wonder how many hapless rubes sent in resumes.
Meanwhile, Google's other potentially fake announcement of a new free email service called GMail, was taken as the real thing by the NY Times, Wall Street Journal and others. There is a huge debate online on what is real since the press release read like a joke, but it sounds like they are serious....
RSI Mice from Sony Ok, so maybe these odd gumdrop-shaped mice won't give you a Repetitive Stress Injury, but they sure don't look like anything comfortable to use all day.
The real question is: Are you supposed to drop a quarter in the slot?
Xbox 2 Prototype Microsoft is gearing up to give Sony another run for the gaming console crown with the upcoming XBox 2. First it lowered the price of the current XBox and someday soon, you may see one of these on a store shelf.
Only problem, it don't mean a thing if it ain't got the games. # Permalink
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THE LATEST NEWS
Tuesday, March 30, 2004
Vonage Sues AT&T The VoIP wars are just beginning and Vonage has fired the first shot at AT&T. AT&T is rolling out its own VoIP phone service called "CallVantage" which Vonage finds sounds a little too close to its own brand name. To really slap the point across, AT&T is starting service right in Vonage's home state of New Jersey. # Permalink
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Squishy, Wearable Cell Phones NEC is rolling out some high concept mobile phones under the unpronounceable and completely forgettable name, Reasonantware. (Who names these things?!)
The phone will wrap around you, other objects and then the material memorizes its shape and stays that way until you wrap into some other form. Weird, interesting, wow.
Innovative New MP3 Players Some cool new MP3 players are coming from virtual unknown MSI. The Mega Player 515 boasts a 14 hour battery life and has an integrated FM tuner. And the design is eye catching enough to make me re-think the flash device as music player dilemma.
The Mega Cache 15 (not shown) is a small hard drive (1.5GBs) for file ferrying, and even Flash Mail and file backup. You can do better on small portable drives (like my beloved Archos) but the flash based MP3 player is sweet. # Permalink
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Fantastic Underwater Motorcycle The Scubadoo Underwater Motorcycle is about to go on sale in Australia for AUD $17,500. All we can say, is "We want it!"
Of course, the design makes it look like the thing could tip over and have you literally riding down under, but we love this futuristic vehicle.
Google Gets Personal Google rolled out some new features including a new Personalized Search. You fill out a profile and specifiy what categories interest you, such as technology (what, who me?) or science and then when you search you can adjust a slider to make the answers more relavant to you. I did a search on "Alice Hill" and with the slider set to low it showed links to this site, but when it was set to high, the link disappeared and showed old press releases. Uh...thanks? # Permalink
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THE LATEST NEWS
Monday, March 29, 2004
Computer for the Poor Launches Indian scientists have launched the first ever computer for the poor. Called the Simputer, it goes on sale this week with a $240 price tag. According to BBC News, "The handheld comes in three versions. The basic model has a monochrome screen, a 206Mhz processor and 64MB of memory. It also has an internal microphone, speakers and a battery that lasts for six hours. People can use the Simputer to surf the net, send e-mails or organise their finances, using a stylus to write on screen. It also comes with software to let users type notes and letters in Hindi and Kannada." Seems pricey to us. # Permalink
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Digital Paper Is Here According to BBC News, "Sony, Philips and digital paper pioneer E-Ink have announced an electronic book reader that is due to go on sale in Japan in late April for $375. Called Librie, the device will be the size of a paperback book and can hold 500 texts in its onboard memory." The main selling point is that it can be read in bright sunlight, but at nearly $400 for basically a black and white handheld, I say, stick to your laptop or handheld.
HP Sues Gateway? This is one of those news stories that you'll find over there on the right side of the page and this one in particular has caused my mind to wander. (And Alice's chin to drop at the thought that I actually read those things.)
Here's the deal... For years it's been sort of an assumed, if not exactly known factoid that Gateway arrives at its lower price structure by cutting some corners it considers irrelevant. What does that mean? Well, if you notice, Gateway doesn't always call its component parts by the same name as the folks who ostensibly make those component parts. That's because they're not exactly like them and in many, if not most cases, drivers from a board's purported creator will not work correctly for the Gateway version of that board. Eliminating some of the features cuts Gateway's component costs.
Although it can be annoying if you don't know what's going on (and if all the world about you is getting the latest driver for something while you wait for the Gateway version), it's not necessarily a bad thing. I mean, I once wanted to buy a 1986 Dodge Daytona Turbo CS with T-tops and Chrysler insisted I also get air conditioning if I wanted the T's. See, sometimes a combination of features, although flashy, just doesn't make sense.
Which brings me back to the main topic: Just how much patent infringement could Gateway be involved in if its modus operandi over the years has been to change everything not copy it? More as things unfold, I'm sure. # Permalink
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The World Phone Motorola announced that it will have a 'world phone' real soon now. Well, almost a world phone. Okay, at least a dual-standard phone that will operate on GSM and CDMA networks --standards that are typically incompatible with each other. On the other hand, Verizon (CDMA) and the UK's Vodafone (GSM) say they'll have one by April. (That's Thursday, for those of you living in Davis, Ca.).
April 1st... Isn't that April Fools Day? I mean, isn't it great these guys want to do so much for you? It wouldn't be that moving from a voice-centric modality to a data-centric modality might generate more income for the companies, would it? Or that anything promoting more cell phone use in general is going to help rake in bigger bucks. Nah... These guys are just good, wholesome folk with only the benefit of the people in mind. # Permalink
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Newsflash! Here I sit with almost 3,000 comics, wrapped in plastic, with cardboard spines, sitting in sealed boxes, and Superman #1 isn't in any of them!! Just goes to prove that, no matter how old you get, there always are those times at which you're proven not to be old enough!
Oh, and for those of you really not so old, that's not a drawing of a Volkswagon Beetle on the Superman #1 cover.... # Permalink
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The RealTechNews Official Collection of Interesting
Technical Websites (In Alphabetical Order)
Now We've Seen it All Dept: Have an extra 5 1/4 inch drive bay collecting dust? Why not turn your PC into an EZ Bake oven and cook tiny little cakes like the original. Comes with EZ Cook open source software (of course) and a bunch of recipies.
"Google Copernicus Center is hiring" said the crafty online search company on its site today. "Google is interviewing candidates for engineering positions at our lunar hosting and research center, opening late in the spring of 2007. This unique opportunity is available only to highly-qualified individuals who are willing to relocate for an extended period of time, are in top physical condition and are capable of surviving with limited access to such modern conveniences as soy low-fat lattes, The Sopranos and a steady supply of oxygen." Wonder how many hapless rubes sent in resumes. 
Ok, so maybe these odd gumdrop-shaped mice won't give you a Repetitive Stress Injury, but they sure don't look like anything comfortable to use all day.
Microsoft is gearing up to give Sony another run for the gaming console crown with the upcoming XBox 2. First it lowered the price of the current XBox and someday soon, you may see one of these on a store shelf. 
NEC is rolling out some high concept mobile phones under the unpronounceable and completely forgettable name, Reasonantware. (Who names these things?!)
Some cool new MP3 players are coming from virtual unknown 
The Scubadoo Underwater Motorcycle is about to go on sale in Australia for AUD $17,500. All we can say, is "We want it!" 
Google rolled out some new features including a new Personalized Search. You fill out a profile and specifiy what categories interest you, such as technology (what, who me?) or science and then when you search you can adjust a slider to make the answers more relavant to you. I did a search on "Alice Hill" and with the slider set to low it showed links to this site, but when it was set to high, the link disappeared and showed old press releases. Uh...thanks?
Indian scientists have launched the first ever computer for the poor. Called the Simputer, it goes on sale this week with a $240 price tag. According to BBC News, "The handheld comes in three versions. The basic model has a monochrome screen, a 206Mhz processor and 64MB of memory. It also has an internal microphone, speakers and a battery that lasts for six hours. People can use the Simputer to surf the net, send e-mails or organise their finances, using a stylus to write on screen. It also comes with software to let users type notes and letters in Hindi and Kannada." Seems pricey to us. 
According to BBC News, "Sony, Philips and digital paper pioneer E-Ink have announced an electronic book reader that is due to go on sale in Japan in late April for $375. Called Librie, the device will be the size of a paperback book and can hold 500 texts in its onboard memory." The main selling point is that it can be read in bright sunlight, but at nearly $400 for basically a black and white handheld, I say, stick to your laptop or handheld.
This is one of those news stories that you'll find over there on the right side of the page and this one in particular has caused my mind to wander. (And Alice's chin to drop at the thought that I actually read those things.)