Scroogled
Image via CrunchBase
Hmm. First I read that Andy Rubin, the creator and lead of the Android project, is leaving the Android team at Google. Then I read that Google Reader will be shuttered July 1st – leaving a ton of apps and podcasters stranded. Then I read that Google is puling nearly all the ad-blocking apps from the play store so you wont be able to run an ad blocker in Chrome. Something foul is going on over at Google and it’s stinking up the web.
And so begins another chapter…
Image by Freedom To Marry via Flickr
Apparently I was a bit premature in posting my 2011…A Year of Tech Mayhem article yesterday as we’ve got a bit of somber news to report. Legendary tech visionary Steve Jobs announced his resignation as the CEO of Apple effective immediately. While he has struggled with cancer for the last several years he, and scores of Jobs followers, remained hopeful that he would pull through and come back healthy, renewed, and of course ever more focused than before.
We thought that day had come, but in 2009 Steve took a leave of absence for an undisclosed issue with his health. It was clear something was wrong as each appearance showed his body getting thinner and frailer as the months went on. It was revealed later that Jobs had to receive a liver transplant–a typical side effect of the type of pancreatic cancer he was diagnosed with before. Within six months however, Steve was back in the saddle, but many wondered for how long he would remain there.
In January of 2011 we got an answer to that question creeping in the dark corner of our collective minds when Steve announced he would be taking yet another leave of absence for an undisclosed health issue for an undetermined amount of time. Even those that had never doubted Steve’s return began to wonder if this was it. Wonder no more as Steve sent the following to the community and board of Apple Wednesday evening:
To the Apple Board of Directors and the Apple Community:
I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.
I hereby resign as CEO of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the Board, director and Apple employee.
As far as my successor goes, I strongly recommend that we execute our succession plan and name Tim Cook as CEO of Apple.
I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role.
I have made some of the best friends of my life at Apple, and I thank you all for the many years of being able to work alongside you.
Steve
So now another chapter begins. As Steve co-founded Apple in 1976, was forced out in 1985, and returned in 1997 to save his ailing company, we now see him step down as CEO, and leader, of Apple Inc for the last time. Tim Cook, long time COO of Apple, will assume the full-time roll of CEO–a position he has been temporarily assuming in Steve’s absence. Steve has asked the board if he can be the chairman of the board to oversee certain aspects of the company still, so he is not completely gone. This will hopefully quell fears of a stock dump by jittery stock holders.
While many have lauded Steve Jobs for is uncanny vision and influence in the tech world, and still others jeered him for the same reasons, one thing is for sure among all the Technorati, we all owe a bit of gratitude to him and the work his has done over the last 35 years. Though Jobs is not completely gone, he will be missed as the face of Apple Inc.
2011…A Year of Tech Mayhem
Image by iCrossing via Flickr
2011 has turned out to be a very interesting year in the tech industry. Major releases, lawsuits, and huge shake ups. It will definitely be a year to look back on and be thankful we made it through to 2012. Let’s look at some of the highlights we’ve seen so far.
Carrying over from 2010 we have volleys of lawsuits between Apple and HTC, Apple and Motorola, and Apple and Samsung. In July, the International Trade Commission determined that HTC, a major player in the Android handset business, violated two patents held by Apple. One of these patents, 5,946,647, deals with the underlying Android OS itself which could have implications within Google’s entire mobile OS business. HTC still remains confident that they can have the ruling overturned, but there is a possibility that the ITC could ban the sale of HTC Android phones in the US if they are not successful in overturning it or removing the offending code. A similar suits are underway with Motorola and Samsung over Android as well, but they aren’t the only ones that want a piece of the Android pie. Still trying to establish a foothold, Microsoft has already rattled their saber about Android and persuaded HTC to license technology that they supposedly own within the Android OS as well. Microsoft pursued the same licensing agreement with Motorola, but they declined. So it wasn’t that big of a surprise to hear the Redmond company file a suit against Motorola over patent violations within Android as well.
It seems that there was a concerted effort by many of the major players in IT to litigate Android into a niche mobile platform by encumbering it with costly licensing fees. Even Oracle got in on the action when they sued Google over Java patents they gained from the Sun Microsystems acquisition – a suit Google settled by agreeing to pay Oracle damages and licensing fees. A consortium of IT companies, lead by Apple, Microsoft, RIM, Ericsson, and Sony joined together to buy up 6,000 patents held by the now bankrupt Nortel Networks. Google, it was later revealed, was offered to join the same group but declined when Microsoft required Google to agree to items regarding Android that would have left it at a disadvantage to their competition. That didn’t stop Google from placing bids for the same patents, but they knew they stood little chance against so many other companies. This is perhaps the reason why they didn’t fight hard to place a winning bid though they really could have used those patents to help defend Android suits against themselves and their partners.
Meanwhile the first major shocker of the year was about to unfold. While Google was doing their best to fend against lawsuits, they were already working on a backup plan using their hidden ace up the sleeve. A month after loosing their bid for Nortel patents, Google announced that they would be buying Motorola’s mobile division for 12.5 billion – a purchase that gives them access to over 14,000 patents with several thousand patents pending. No longer would competitors to Android be able to skirt Google and sue their partners and now Google has sizable war chest of patents to counter any suits by the competition. The announcement of the purchase sent ripples throughout the entire tech industry. The question was how will this effect Google’s other Android partners? HTC and Samsung both expressed their support, but it will be interesting to see how it all plays out in the Android universe over time. In the meantime, there were other fronts still actively under contention.
Around the same time that Google announced the acquisition of Motorola, a German court ruled that Samsung’s Galaxy line of tablets violated the look and feel, as well as other patents, held by Apple with their hugely popular iPad. As a result of the ruling, Samsung was barred from selling their tablet in the EU. Fanbois everywhere rejoiced while Samsung themselves stated that they were never served with notice of a violation until the ban was ordered – a fact that remains to be verified. Another unverified claim was the recent surfacing of court documents that may indicate that Apple altered documents used to persuade the German court to ban Galaxy tablets. We’ll have to wait until the smoke clears to see how this pans out. In the meantime Samsung isl appealing the ruling have been successful in having the ban partially lifted in many of the participating EU countries effected by the ban. The eventual result of the suit and banishment could be used to influence the status of both tablets here in the US as well.
While Android was circling the wagons to defend against the multiple fronts of attack, another Linux-based OS was attempting to raise from the ashes of the once great Palm. Agreed by many in the tech industry to have the best mobile operating system to compete with the polish of Apples iOS, WebOS was due to make a major comeback, thanks to their acquisition by HP. While it was disappointing for HP to make a paper launch of new WebOS phones and tablets, those that followed the little OS that could were excited and waited anxiously for new products to arrive. First out of the chute was the Veer, HP’s miniature Pre. While the industry was going to bigger handsets, HP went the opposite direction. While many cheered for the smaller form-factor, others balked at it. Those waiting for a larger handset waited to see what the Pre3 was going to offer. Others waited for the highly anticipated Touchpad-HP’s WebOS tablet. While lacking some features that the iPad2 and many Android tablets offered, the Touchpad was still a great product. The lack of a rear facing camera and little in the way of apps made the price tag hard to swallow. In response, HP lowered the price and saw a modest increase in the Touchpad’s sales. To everyone’s surprise, HP declared that the price cut would be permanent. In the meantime, Germans were first in line to start pre-ordering the Pre3. Other countries were waiting for their turn. All of the excitement generated by these new WebOS devices came crashing down when HP pulled the plug on the entire line of devices during their quarterly stock announcement. It was a huge blow to WebOS fans everywhere. Even those not firmly in the WebOS camp felt like they were betrayed by HP and their sudden departure from the old Palm product. On top of that HP indicated that Apple’s iPad was eating their lunch and they may be looking to bail out of the PC business as well. Both announcements lead many to question whether HP had lost it’s way. How could the worlds largest PC maker just simply walk away from their PC business and walk away from a 1 2 billion dollar purchase of Palm in less than two years? Meanwhile Samsung has expressed some interest in buying HP’s PC business if it goes up for sale. Could this be similar to Google/Motorola patent pool purchase? Perhaps Samsung could use some of the patents from HP to defend against claims made by Apple that Samsung copies its products and violates their patents, etc.
While all the major activity was surrounding the mobile industry, three major changes happened in the traditional desktop computing industry. While Microsoft was still riding the Windows 7 wave and hoping to supplant their aging XP platform as the most used OS in the world, both Apple and several GNU/Linux vendors were hard at work on their own improvements. First came the release of two new desktop environments to replace the aging Gnome 2.x desktop on many Linux distros – Canonical’s Unity Desktop and the Gnome Projects own Gnome 3 Desktop.
Canonical tried to get Unity included in upstream Gnome, but were rejected. Now that we see both products in full production, it was apparent the reasons why Unity was rejected. Not that Gnome3 was that much better, but they are very similar to each other and the developers from both groups viewed their product as being better than the other. Developers and end users from both sides lauded their new desktop environments as fresh, clean, modern, and much needed. Not everyone was happy with the changes however. Many users, including the father of Linux, Linus Torvalds, were dismayed that both desktop environments, as well as the more established KDE4 desktop, were a hot mess of eye candy and lacked flexibility. They lamented the days they could customize their desktops to their liking and without the performance hits they were seeing with all of the major desktop environments now available. A similar situation was developing at Apple as well with their newly released OS – OS X 10.7 Lion.
OS X Snow Leopard was really just an over-glorified point release as it fixed mostly under the hood items in Leopard. Lion proved to be more ambitious as Apple sought to include more of the touch functionality they implemented in iOS into OS X. Launchpad was implemented as a new way of seeing all your apps similar to iOS does on the iPhone and iPad. Those familiar with Ubuntu wondered if Canonical would seek to block the use of the name Launchpad since they already had a service called Launchpad used to host new OSS projects. Being a bit more civilized that most, Mark Shuttleworth, founder of Canonical and Ubuntu decided that they were not similar products and they would not seek to block Apple’s use of the name. It is presumed that Apple made a similar deal with Canonical as they did with Cisco with the use of the iOS name. Though there were no fireworks among companies in regards to Lion, end users were not as thrilled by the changes.
While any company is subject to technical issues with new products and updates, Apple has generally pretty good in pushing out a nearly flawless product. This time around reports of performance hits, crashes, and counter-intuitive changes have some Lion users wishing they stayed with Snow Leopard. Others just wished that they could have gotten backup media in the event they had to re-image their machine to Lion again without having to load Snow Leopard first. While there is some small evidence of undocumented features in Lion, I personally am very satisfied with it. As one test developer indicated, to get the most out of Lion you really need a touch interface. Heeding that advice, I picked up a Magic Trackpad. While Lion seemed cool without a multi-touch interface on an aging Macbook, it didn’t really impress that much until I paired my Trackpad. Wow, what a difference it makes! While I’m confident that Apple will address stability issues, the decision to move dashboard to its own space has many people irked–including myself. Perhaps Apple will move that back to an overlay on a future release. We’ll have to see. Without turning the remainder of this post into a review of Lion, let me say that it is a big improvement over Leopard and Snow Leopard in my opinion. I just wonder how many more upgrades will be available for my trusty Macbook before it is left behind. Perhaps the rumor of Apple’s completely new line of devices or their eventual merger of iOS and OS X will prolong my machine’s demise.
The future promises some exciting times and some interesting news to come. How will the mobile world shape up in the coming year? Will we see any more shake ups? Will any forks of Gnome 2.x gain traction to attract enough users and become another option for desktop environments? Will HP completely loose it’s collective mind? Who will be left standing after the dust has settled between Apple, Microsoft, Google, and Android partners? One thing is for sure, it’s been a wild ride this year and there’s lots of time left in 2011. Stay tuned.
Windows users–Keep your head on a swivel
Image via Wikipedia
I thought about this long and hard. Should I post about this or not? With nearly 90% of the planet using Windows (and an even greater percentage of my friends and family), I feel like I would be neglecting my duties if I didn’t mention it. No doubt some of you have noticed, and perhaps have fallen victim to, the fake anti-virus scams on some nefarious websites floating around. I’ve personally dealt with at least two machines that had been compromised by such dubious programs. They use common social engineering tactics to trick users into thinking they have a virus (or series of them) with a legitimate looking program that generally says something to the effect of OMG! You’re infested! (OK. Not really, but you get the drift). Not one to ever leave things be, virus writers are always trying to find new more effective ways to infect a victims computer. The scammers behind these nasty programs are not much different. The devil has been busy as noted by Microsoft‘s own tech blog entry on the very subject. If you’re a Windows users, it would behoove you to be familiar with the warning signs of these fake programs.
It use to be somewhat easy to identify a fake because the window that would appear would be in another browsers, or operating systems, graphical user interface (GUI). Now, however, vx (virus) writers are getting smarter and using common user agent detection to ascertain which browser you’re using and quickly render an on-the-fly window with your current browsers interface making detection more difficult. Perhaps a user agent switcher, available on most browsers, would help by fooling the program into thinking you’re using one browser over another and thus tricking the fake program into rendering the wrong interface. This idea has it’s limits. Unfortunately, there are ways to detect your true browser by the way it talks to a server and thus reducing the effectiveness of an agent switcher.
Though we are beginning to see fake anti-virus programs that mimic your current OS and browser, most of this is possible by means of javascript. Fortunately there is a program that can help, if you use FireFox as your browser of choice. That program is NoScript. NoScript will disable javascript that you have not given explicit permission to run on your browser from a website. Internet Explorer, Chrome, Safari, Opera, etc may have similar programs available as an add-on. Without the use of a javascript blocker, like no script, it becomes very difficult to exit out of the pop up that appears without giving your browser, or your computer, the three-fingered salute. In some occasions, force closing your browser or shutting down is too little too late and you are already owned.
Thanks to arstechnica for the original article that spurred me into action.
UPDATE: Big thanks to Mister Reiner for providing the following additional Microsoft site with more information about fake anti-virus programs.
Related Articles
- New malware detects browser, shows fake malware warning page (arstechnica.com)
- Fake Anti-Virus Launches Legit AV Uninstalls (informationweek.com)
I see a video card upgrade in my future
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a Linux game that piqued my interest. Most good Linux games are already available on Windows and often don’t include the bells and whistles that the Windows flavor comes packed with. Unigine is about to change all that with their upcoming Oilrush game for Windows, Linux, and Playstation 3. Check out the article over at Phoronix for some great looking shots of the game and check out the short teaser on youtube.
Check out the official website for the game at OilRush and more about the developer at Unigine.
Related Articles
- Graphically Slick: OilRush (rockpapershotgun.com)
- Valve: no plans to bring Steam to Linux (arstechnica.com)
Apple announces new thneeds!
Cover of The Lorax (Classic Seuss)
Oh Steve Jobs, that old Once-ler, is at it again with several new thneeds surrounding multimedia entertainment. New for 2010 is an all new version of iOS (dont get me started on that one Cisco fans), an all new revamped lineup of iPods (sans the classic), an all new iTunes 10, and a revamped Apple TV. It seems that even the lowly Lorax wants one of these thneeds. Let’s have a look.
First up is iOS 4.1 featuring Game Center, Ping, and HDR (High Dynamic Range) photos.
Game Center allows iphone, ipod, and ipad users to play online games even with friends and not just farmville games. We’re talking Unreal and other first person shooter style games.
Next there’s the new iTunes add on called Ping. Think of it as a music focused version of Facebook and you’ll be on the right track. You can share what kind of music you’re listening to with your friends, keep up with their music tastes as well, and even follow your favorite artists feeds. Ping will be available in the all new iTunes 10 for Mac and PC as well as any new iOS devices running 4.1
With the introduction of front and rear facing cameras on the iPhone 4, and the new retinal display, Apple wanted to make sure that pictures taken on an iOS device looked their best as well and introduced a new way of taking photos called HDR photos. HDR is short for High Dynamic Range. This is fancy talk for taking three photos simultaneously–one under exposed, one normal, and one over exposed–and combining them into one richly colored image. This reduces the effects of bad lighting when you take photos with your Apple mobile devices.
To rev up the excitement a bit for those iPad owners that are feeling a bit left out, the Once-ler gave everyone a sneak peek at the upcoming iOS 4.2–due in November. It will add wireless printing to the iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch.
Speaking of iPod Touch, Apple has also announced a complete overhaul of the iPod lineup starting with the shuffle.
That Once-ler, that clever old Once-ler, is well known for his distaste of buttons. This is perhaps the biggest reason for the minimal set of buttons on all the designs of iPhones made to date. This may also be the biggest reason why there were no buttons on the iPod shuffle. It literally looked like a Bic lighter without a striker wheel. Well, apparently people like buttons, and the Once-ler even conceded that people wanted buttons. So the new iPod shuffle brings back the click wheel that was present on the original iPod shuffle, but it also keeps voice over function of the buttonless model. This all mushed into the form factor that we saw the 2nd gen Shuffle in previously. Available in 4 colors and in one capacity of 2GB for $49.
Next we have the Nano. Next to the Touch, it was the most popular model of iPod, and in my opinion, the most feature rich music player of the bunch. (Hey, let’s face it the Touch does more than just play music). The Nano too has received a mushing and has been squished down to nearly the same size as the shuffle, only with a full color, multi-touch screen. It will be available in 5 colors and in 8GB or 16GB capacities for $149 and $179 respectively.
Last, but not least, is the Touch. It looses a bit of weight, though not as much as the Nano or Shuffle. It gets the retinal display, front facing and rear facing cameras, and all the gooness that made the iPhone 4 so popular without the cellular service or a contract, as the Once-ler points out.
But what good are these new iPods with out some great software to allow you to sync them to your computer right? That’s where iTunes 10 comes in.
That boastful old Once-ler proudly announced that iTunes is on the verge of selling more music from their store than has been sold on CD, so Apple is dropping the current logo with the music note over the CD in favor of a blue circle with the same note inside. Earth shattering I know. But iTunes does come with Ping, as stated before. It also does away with one annoyance of mine with most music players. When you have an album of songs from the same artist and it lists the album again and again down the list of songs, it’s annoying and a waste. Apple has fixed that by removing the multiple entries and adding in the album cover art. It only does this with 5 or more of the same album name entries however, so if you have a stockpile of singles, you’re out of luck. The most bizarre thing of note for iTunes is the close, minimize, and maximize buttons. Rather than a horizontal configuration that we see with all Mac OS X interfaces, they are positioned vertical. Don’t ask me why. I have no clue.
Then there’s one more thing: Apple TV
Yes, that largely unsuccessful, over priced boat anchor that only the die hard fanbois purchased and continue to use. It seems that Apple has not given up on their flop. (Hey, if Microsoft gets multiple do overs, so can Apple. Right?). It appears that this time, they may have gotten it right however. First off, it’s tiny. It’s less than a forth the size of the original. The power supply is built into the unit (think the new mac mini as an example), has a HDMI port that can push 1080p and 5.1 surround, a 1 gigabit Ethernet port, and 802.11 N wireless.
With the smaller package, you would expect a smaller price. Am I right? The Once-ler, never one to shy away from a sale has heard your request and has lowered the price from $229 to the low price of $99. Content is cheap too. First run HD movies are $4.99 to rent, HD TV programing from ABC and Fox is $.99 to rent, and it can stream Netflix content as well. In addition to this, you can stream Youtube, Flickr, and mobile me content. With the newly renamed Airplay (formally Airtunes) you can even play a movie from your iPad/iPhone/iPod device and pick up where you left off on your TV with the Apple TV box.
Enough of this typing though. I’m off to the Apple store to pick up my thneeds before that pesky Lorax beats me to it.
Chris
UPDATED: Corrected Oncler to Once-ler
Business license for Philly bloggers? Huh?
Image via Wikipedia
According to a Washington Examiner article, cash strapped cities are turning to bloggers for cash. Philadelphia is demanding any blogger, that had registered even a small profit from their blogs, to register their site as a business and apply for a $300 business license. Is this just another form of internet tax only for the producers rather than the purchasers? My opinion is this will cost more to administer and maintain than it brings in as revenue. Will this have a chilling effect on for profit bloggers? Will this be forced on non-profit bloggers too? Or will this spur a new round of creative commons blogs? Time will tell. In the mean time, it would be a great opportunity as a blogger in a surrounding city or state to carry the torch for the monetarily bound Philly bloggers.
Related Articles
- Philly Requiring Bloggers To Pay For Business Licenses (blogs.forbes.com)
- Philly demands bloggers get business licenses (hotair.com)
- Philly Wants Bloggers to Pay $300 Tax (chicagonow.com)
- Philadelphia’s Blogger License: $300 (buzzfeed.com)
- Philly Is Not the “City of Blogger-ly Love” (marketingpilgrim.com)
What a Wicked Web We Weave
Image via Wikipedia
While working on reviving a downed server, I needed to access the out-of-band console connection to see what the machine was doing. The product I use requires Java in order to display the CLI prompt for the server over the network. As it happens from time to time, some programs will notify you that there are updates available. In this case, it was Java that happily notified me that there was an update. So, I clicked through to download the needed updates. To my surprise, I was greeted with a screen to also download the Bing toolbar. Normally I wouldn’t have thought anything of it. In fact, I dismissed the offer and proceeded without first grabbing a screen capture. Then it struck me.
Java is now an Oracle product, thanks to their recent acquisition of Sun Microsystems. Anyone that has used a recent build of OpenOffice will undoubtedly know that Oracle has wasted no time re-branding all the products that use to bare the Sun Microsystems logo. The Java installer before me was no exception. Open source advocates also know that Oracle is also the same company that has recently killed off the OpenSolaris project, is suing Google over Java within the Linux-based Android operating system, and is mulling the future of MySQL. This speaks nothing to the concerns that some may have for OpenOffice, which sits clearly in the path of Oracle’s budding partnership with Microsoft. How ironic that Oracle would have a Bing offer on the Java installer given the similarities to Microsoft’s stance against open source products in their recent behavior.
This begs the question: Which came first, the Bing partnership, or the lawsuit against Google? Actions speak louder than words, and despite the praise for open source from the halls of Redwood Shores, I suspect the former over the latter. Could this be yet another Microsoft proxy fight with open source? Who knows. It’s certainly a concern and one that Google, Red Hat, Novell, and others should keep a very close eye on.
Update: Apparently others are beginning to put the same dots together and come to the same conclusions, like Alistair Otter who writes for South African website MyBroadband.co.za News: Oracles-anti-OSS-Stance
Too little too late for Nexus One
Google just announced they are making the Nexus One superphone compatible with AT&T’s 3G service if you buy an unlocked phone for $529. That’s great news for N1 fans that can not or will not use T-Mobile’s service. But is it too little too late?
According to a recent study by Flurry of the first 74 days of sales of the latest popular smartphones, the N1 is soundly trounced by the iPhone and Motorola Droid in sales. In an effort to boost their paltry numbers, Google has made the N1 compatible with the only other GSM carrier in the US–AT&T–where before it was only compatible with the nations number four carrier T-Mobile.
This brings the number of US carriers to be able to use the N1 to two, with Verizon support in route. That will be three out of the four carriers you can use the N1 on, but with HTC developing new phones–based on the specs of the N1–like the Desire, Incredible, and Supersonic, could it mean that HTC will cannibalize their own sales or will it drive the N1 back to T-Mobile where it will quickly be overshadowed by it’s newer siblings?
Mozilla Labs Ubiquity plug-in for Firefox
This should be the trend of all internet technology. Rather than fragmenting we see each piece becoming an important part of the overall user experience. Ubiquity is an excellent example of what can be done if interoperability is allowed to thrive.
Ubiquity for Firefox from Aza Raskin on Vimeo.
