The Brooks Review

Author: Ben Brooks

  • ASUS Working on Netbook Using Plug-in Phone

    James Kendrick:

    The company that kicked off the netbook craze is reported to be working on a netbook that uses a phone plugged into the device for connectivity. ASUS is looking at the modular phone system by Modu to provide connectivity on an as-needed basis by popping the phone into a slot designed for that purpose. This method would allow owners to have mobile connectivity with a single data plan on the phone.

    I think this is a very poor solution, but perhaps the only one we will get in the U.S., whereas in Spain it was announced that their leading mobile carrier will let you share your iPhone data plan with your iPad – no extra cost.

  • Check.in – One Checkin to Rule Them All

    Now open to all, full iPhone/iPad support. I have been waiting to test this for a while.

  • Seagate Plans 3TB Hard Drive

    Sweet.

  • P&G opens online product store

    Dan Sewell:

    P&G insists the venture’s main goal is to learn more about online shopping, and not to compete with stores and online retailers that also sell its products. P&G says it will share the “learning lab” information it gathers.

    Very interesting, the store has all the products you would expect. I highly doubt this is so much a ‘learning lab’ as it is more of a “get your act together” warning to P&G’s retailers.

    Check out the P&G eStore here.

  • Another Apple Leak: iPod Touch with 2-Megapixel Camera

    I understand how the new iPhones get leaked, Apple has to test them all over the place to make sure the cellular antennas are working correctly. However why they would need to test an Pod touch outside of Apple HQ is beyond me. I am not saying this iPod is BS, but I don’t think it is a new model, so much as it is an older prototype.

    I may eat my words later, but I would guess this is not an upcoming model, so much as it was a proof of concept.

  • Hands-On With the First 4G Phone

    This thing is big, and why do you need HDMI on a phone? The kickstand is very clever though, however unsightly it may be.

  • iPhone OS 4.0 Beta Includes AT&T Internet Tethering

    ZOMG!

  • Should Adobe Offer Flash on iPhones with Jailbreak?

    Charles Arthur:

    Because – as @poorlyrendered points out – there is a way for Adobe to show that Apple is wrong, completely wrong, and that Adobe is right, completely right, about how Flash will run so well on the iPhone. Assuming it will.

    It’s this: write a version of Flash Player and offer it to owners of jailbroken iPhones.

    I saw they should do it, show us how good it is.

  • New Addition to Gmail Could Make it the Most Annoying Service on the Net

    Marshall Kirkpatrick:

    AwayFind lets you mark certain contacts or message topics as ‘Urgent’ and then alerts you via phone, SMS or IM when relevant messages arrive.

    That sounds horrid.

  • Google buys Norwegian audio-video tech provider

    Reuters:

    GIPS enables service providers, developers and hardware manufacturers to reduce network impairments such as delay, jitter and echo in real-time audio and video applications.

    Here’s hoping Google can get rid of the YouTube “pause” when playing back video.

  • Second Thoughts About the Autopilot

    Christine Negroni:

    Finding the balance between too much technology and too little is crucial, according to William B. Rouse, an engineering and computing professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology. “Complacency is an issue, but designing the interaction between human and technical so the human has the right level of judgment when you need them is a design task in itself,” Mr. Rouse said. “When the person has no role in the task, there’s a much greater risk of complacency.”

  • Hotmail to Get a Refresh

    Looks like a much needed update. Though one thing that popped out to me is that Yahoo is the largest email provider, yet I can only name one person I know with a Yahoo account and another with a Hotmail account. Everybody else is on Gmail.

    See my disclosure on Microsoft.

  • Kindle for Android

    Pretty sweet that it gets a built in Kindle store, unlike the iPhone version.

    [Updated: 5/20/10 at 2:58 PM]Apparently there is no built in store, works just like on the iPhone. See this video walkthrough for more info.

  • How Close Are We to Real Nanotechnology?

    This article saddens me because a) they don’t give a clear date when Star Trek food replicators will be availible and b) it doesn’t sound like I will see them in my lifetime.

    [via Justin Blanton]

  • Visa Credit Card iPhone Case

    Charlie Sorrel:

    The idea of schemes like In2Pay is to free you from carrying a wallet, allowing you to do everything with your cellphone. But this implementation, which requires carrying a cellphone case, is not much different from just taping your credit card to the back of your phone. (Or slipping it into a credit card-holding iPhone cover.)

    I was thinking the same thing. Also:

    It also requires a compatible card reader. What, the neighborhood restaurant doesn’t accept contactless payments? Sorry, there are only 100,000 merchants in the U.S. that have NFC payment readers, compared to millions that accept old-style credit cards.

    I used to frequent Jack In The Box all the time, in this area they have the card reader things installed in the drive-thrus, and I happen to have an American Express card with one of these chips. I tried it once, just to see, it didn’t work. Subsequently Jack In The Box doesn’t even bother to use these card readers anymore. This is going to need more merchants before anybody cares to use it.

  • iPhone is Old Hat Technology?

    Jessica Mintz:

    Other phones have higher-resolution cameras and can shoot high-definition video. The processor seems faster in new phones such as the Droid Incredible. A more energy-efficient touch-screen technology is eclipsing the one used in the iPhone screen. And competitors are matching features that once set the iPhone apart, including its slim shape and its store with thousands of applications and games.

    “This thing is not state of the art,” says ABI Research analyst Michael Morgan.

    How long will it take journalists to recognize that processor speed doesn’t matter. And matching the look of an iPhone, and it’s App store is hardly the same as matching the iPhone’s features. I could make my own App store, but nobody would buy anything from it – cause nobody wants to develop for it. Still would that mean I have matched the iPhone’s features. The App store is not a feature, the hundreds of thousands of apps in the store, that is the feature.

    And I can’t let this bit go either:

    Carolina Milanesi, who lives in Britain and analyzes the mobile market for Gartner, has tried to switch away from the iPhone but gets hung up on something every time. She spent 20 minutes trying to set up e-mail on an Android phone, only to fail. The iPhone is so simple her 2 1/2-year-old daughter can operate her spelling and animal-noises apps herself.

    The iPhone isn’t as flexible as some others, and Milanesi bristled at things Apple wouldn’t let her do, such as set custom tones for incoming text messages, a common tweak in Europe.

    “But then you kind of get used to it, and you don’t miss it,” she says. “You kind of think that that’s for your own good.”

    Wow, so Android is better, but it is hard to setup email? And she wants custom text message tones, but then she doesn’t really care all that much in the end. This all sounds like grasping at straws.

  • Hulu Subscription Service Delayed

    Could have called that. Though I still feel that $10/mo (depending on features) is not an unreasonable price. Way better than how much money Comcast beats me up for.

  • FBI’s New Tech Delayed – Some Already In Place

    John Foley:

    Fulgham also gave a status report on Sentinel, a $425 million project to replace the agency’s outdated case-management system with a new digital system that incorporates technologies from Adobe, EMC, IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle. In March, the Inspector General for the Department of Justice released a report warning that Sentinel, originally due for completion in 2009 and already behind schedule, was at risk of further delays and cost overruns.

    If you it takes you more than a year to implement something, chances are it will be obsolete by the time you implement it. I know it takes time to create a system such as Sentinel, but guess what, it should not take an extra 2 years. This is design by committee, which means no design, and lots of delays.

  • Soulver – A New Way to Calculate

    Acqualia makes a little program called Soulver that is available for the Mac, iPad and iPhone. It is part spreadsheet, part calculator. It is a program that takes the boring old calculator to new heights, and also one of my favorite little programs out there.

    They just released their iPad app and 2.0 update for the Mac. Check it out, it is worth your time and money.

    [I am in no way being paid to say this.]

  • A Tribute to Mount St. Helens

    30 years ago today, Mount St. Helens erupted. This is a great photo gallery depicting the eruption. I was born after this occurred, but when you drive south on I5 here in Washington you come to a part where huge man-made hills are on either side of the freeway. These hills are ash material that was dredged from the rivers and streams, these hills are huge.