I’m not going to speculate on Woods’ injuries, the cause of the crash, or rumors of fights and affairs. I don’t care, personally. But how the information proliferated makes for interesting dissection. And the fun part is that there’s something for everybody’s agenda! Many will choose to ignore or emphasize unduly one party’s role in this drama, but the fact is that it very neatly exposes both the strengths and weaknesses of both traditional and so-called new media. I hope you’re sitting comfortably.

First, let’s establish some facts about yesterday’s little fracas. Woods crashed his car at around 2:00AM (all times are Eastern unless otherwise specified). A police report was filed at 2:25AM, and 12 hours later the information was released, probably at 2PM. The Orlando Sentinel reported the information, though it has since revised its story, and the referring links from yesterday now point to one filed early Saturday morning. The original story is nowhere to be found, but it is reasonable to presume that, being a local news outlet, it was the first to report — likely within 15 minutes of the press release being issued. BNO News tweeted at 2:24PM that he was seriously injured, which was a reasonable summary of the police report and likely all that the Sentinel reported. CNN posted a blurb 15 minutes later, at 2:39. Interestingly, Local TV news station WFTV had a team on the scene obtaining truly awful photos of the accident within what must have been an hour or so, since the photos show it is still night and the car was towed away shortly thereafter.

Thus far fact. Now, you recall the headline: real time, real discussion, real reporting — choose two. My idea, which that punchy little epigram roughly approximates, is that there is only so much a given source of information can provide, and that if it has certain attributes, it by definition cannot have certain others (with exceptions, of course). Don’t get me wrong, however: each source is valuable, but we must be careful not to assign one qualities it does not possess.

Since this is a blog ostensibly covering tech and Web 2.0, we should probably talk about Twitter first.

Twitter: real-time discussion

MG has already lionized Twitter in this affair, and rightly so. It deserves a pat on the back for doing admirably what it was made to do: propagate a meme as quickly as possible. However, his stronger assertion that Twitter is the real time web’s Walter Cronkite warrants a dissenting response, though I don’t think it is, as some suggested, an insult to the late, great journalist so much as a mischaracterization of Twitter.

Twitter’s mode of operation is a lot like that of fire. A spark is struck elsewhere; in this case (and, let’s be honest, in many cases) it is a piece of celebrity gossip. Whether it catches and spreads, and how fast it does so depend on the conditions. This particular spark landed in a bed of tinder and flared up almost instantly. The fact that the entire story (such as it was then) could be contained in 140 characters helped, of course. Its spread was practically instantaneous.

But that’s where Twitter’s role ends. Consider that local TV news was on the scene quickly enough to take pictures of the accident site before the car was towed, though these were likely not widely reported because at the time, a statement had yet to be released. This kind of coverage is obviously impossible for a decentralized news mechanism like Twitter or Google News. Yet it is the source for a large proportion of the coverage which spreads via those mechanisms. Before a fire can spread, it must be started. And it is very rare that Twitter starts any fires.

A legitimate objection to this idea is that of citizen journalism. Hasn’t Twitter enabled Iranians to broadcast their discontent? Wouldn’t it be handy in an emergency situation, provided it was accessible? To some extent, yes. But in the first case, what reason is there to think, even taking into account how well it was applied in Iran, that Twitter is somehow immune to censorship or outright ban? It’s new, is all, and once someone in charge takes it seriously enough to decide it must be stifled, you can be sure Twitter will have no further use there. An earthquake situation provides a better opportunity for Twitter to be used by itself to report; tweets from around the city saying “gas main broken at 13th and Pine” or the like could certainly be of use to a fire department. It’s questionable, however, whether a hashtag could reliably be established in good time, whether the authorities would be able or willing to sort through the noise, and whether such content as could be found would be capable of being transmitted to those who need it. Still, I’m happy to admit its possible utility in such a situation.

The question, really, is whether one has valuable information to report. If so, then for a moment, one becomes a reporter. And that information is welcome, if it can get where it needs to be. But the truth is that the bulk of users rarely have content to contribute; their role is promotion and discussion. Compare this to a journalist, who makes it his business to either be present at or go immediately to wherever news occurring, then broadcast it via established methods and outlets. More on them later.

Lastly, it’s troubling that what news is spread depends on the population at large. This is more of a personal objection. I have commented that Twitter is the perfect vessel which which to sate the public’s appetite for sensational minutiae. What spreads on Twitter is what’s popular, not what’s important. The last few years have been calamitous for mainstream news integrity for several reasons, but among them is the increasing emphasis on color stories and special interest news, which Twitter seems tailor-made to propagate.

This is also the reason why Twitter is not Walter Cronkite. Cronkite may have worked in real time, and he may have reported unconfirmed information, but the reason he was trusted to do so was because he was the exact opposite of Twitter. His personal discretion and experience made him a trusted individual. Wisdom is not arrived at by consensus, nor the truth, no matter if ten people weigh in or a thousand. No synthesis of opinion or automated sifting of information is a replacement for a discerning, informed, and familiar human being.

Broadcast media: real time reporting

The mainstream (i.e. broadcast) media is supposed to be formed of such human beings. This is, of course, not the case. However, that does not mean the model is broken. The companies comprising it — that’s another matter. The current deplorable state of mainstream news is more, if I may venture a guess, due to a continued financial investment in an obsolete ratings and advertising structure than any real decay of principle. Or rather, the only principle that is really decayed is the networks’ independence from private money. The BBC presents a partial solution in a state-sponsored network, but private bankrolling is simply replaced by public, but that’s not an ideal solution to say the least. I don’t have a better proposal, but I’m happy to point the finger, and our mainstream journalists aren’t doing a hell of a lot of journalism.

That said, the mainstream media were the first on the scene at Woods’ house, and the fact is they will always be the first on the scene. What would Google News or Twitter aggregate if there was no journalist there in the first place? Citizen reporting can only go so far; the idea of a completely decentralized press is hopelessly naive. Access to the public’s information is increasingly important, but there will always be someone, many people in fact, whose job it is to work at something that, if it’s not a local news station, will look a hell of a lot like one.

What will be the source for firsthand news if we don’t have a journalist class? Local news teams, mainstream media at their most mainstream, are the only ones with the experience, the resources, and the staff to cover anything of magnitude. Doubt that? Don’t confuse the death of traditional media distribution with the death of traditional media. The former is happening; the latter is an illusion.

What the mainstream and local media lack is scope and perspective. Imagine a thousand little rooms, each with its own goings-on and a person broadcasting live from each one. They see what’s around them and report it, but their scope is limited. Their first responsibility is to their “room,” their community — hence their journalistic myopia. They know they can’t cover everything in the world, but they don’t have to. Because the world relies upon them when something like this Woods incident occurs in their vicinity. It’s centralized decentralization.

Print and other delayed media: reporting and discussion

What’s left is the news you read the next day in the newspaper — or, really, the next hour on CNN.com or BBC News. These, the most traditional forms of media of all (essentially newsprint or a virtualized version thereof), provide comparatively complete, one-stop reporting and analysis of the event in question. I don’t mean to suggest that the AP, New York Times, or other article outlets are infallible, far from it. But they provide the perspective and context that Twitter (or your favorite social news aggregator) and broadcast news usually lack — and from individuals that have an interest in accurate reporting. Of course, this comes at a cost of timeliness, which may or may not be critical.

Obviously newspapers are having a lot of trouble, and the herd is being thinned, but delayed media (my term), whether distributed as inky tree pulp or otherwise, will continue to have a place in the party. The skills of newspapermen are still required, whether you like it or not, and will be for a long time to come.

Think of the recent story in which President Obama bowed to the Japanese Emperor when visiting that country. Twitter could alert instantly you to the fact that this event occurred, but little more, and only if you’re glued to it. Mainstream media will be the source for the story and video, but is capable of only basic commentary. Delayed media would give you the event, the reactions, the context, and anything more required to make a complete story — but not for at least a few hours.

Which of these methods you use depends on your profession, location, age, and a hundred other factors. Whether such trade-offs as each offers are welcome to you is a personal decision — but it’s unwise to write off a category altogether (as I catch myself doing with Twitter). To use one and not another may forgo or convey an advantage in some situations, but none embodies every aspect of news — content, promptness, and analysis.

Nor will any of the three worlds of information distribution go down without their essence being absorbed, Mega Man-like, into the being of the others. Will Twitter wither without the substantial content of delayed media? Not likely. Will delayed media croak if it doesn’t learn some lessons from Twitter? A little more likely, but that lesson is being learned. Will mainstream and broadcast media go extinct? Not for decades, though they will certainly have some adaptation to do.

The myth of medium

The truth is that there is no old media. And no new media. There is only the present media, its aspect as confused and shifting as any compound creature from legend. I have to quote Hawthorne here:

According to the best accounts which I have been able to obtain, this Chimaera was nearly, if not quite, the ugliest and most poisonous creature, and the strangest and unaccountablest, and the hardest to fight with, and the most difficult to run away from, that ever came out of the earth’s inside. It had a tail like a boa-constrictor; its body was like I do not care what; and it had three separate heads, one of which was a lion’s, the second a goat’s, and the third an abominably great snake’s. And a hot blast of fire came flaming out of each of its three mouths! Being an earthly monster, I doubt whether it had any wings; but, wings or no, it ran like a goat and a lion, and wriggled along like a serpent, and thus contrived to make about as much speed as all the three together.

That sounds about right! Now, if you can stomach the unbearable pretension of likening of the complex media world to a monster (be grateful I didn’t quote Lovecraft), you can see that it is unlikely that one head will just up and consume the other, though they may quarrel and gnaw on one another frequently. One significant difference: while the creature Hawthorne described combines the speed of all three, the present media finds itself limited by its own strengths. There is no popular discussion that does not cause sensationalism, for instance, and there is no expert inspection that does not cause delay. The nature of the beast, however, does change over time, and you may safely lay your bets on Twitter (social media in general, really — any “real time discussion”) being an important (but limited) part of it.

Finally: blogs are the real wild card here. The issue is that they qualify for each category but aren’t fundamentally limited to any — which makes them both versatile and unreliable. This blog, for example, has pieces that fall under every category: tweet-like posts about some Apple rumor, rehashes of press releases, and interminable editorials like the one you’re just about to finish. Yes, the credibility (and readability) of the blogosphere is still questioned, puzzlingly enough, but who knows — the Chimaera may grow a fourth head yet.

Murder via this ultraviolet light wand that looks like a cross between an oversized Wii remote and some sort of sick, twisted adult novelty item that Biggs has yet to review.

The $70 “H1N1 Destroying UV Wand” from Hammacher Schlemmer promises to choke the life out of “99.98% of the H1N1 virus after a five-second exposure when held 3/4″ above the contaminated surface.” And if you think there won’t be any collateral damage, think again. According to the product page:

“Also capable of killing MRSA, mold, and dust mites, the UV-C light penetrates viral and bacterial membranes and destroys their DNA, rendering the microorganisms incapable of reproduction and survival. Unlike liquid disinfectants, UV-C light can sanitize keyboards, upholstered furniture, cell phones, or any delicate surface that harbors germs.”

Yes, that’s right, it destroys DNA. The building blocks of all life, obliterated. Take that Swine Flu. You take that to hell and you don’t come back.

The H1N1 Destroying UV Wand [Hammacher Schlemmer]

RIM’s newest release brings us BlackBerry OS v5. It has all of the standard features you’ve come to know and love, email, SMS, IM, web browsing, etc. The Bold takes all of that and serves it too you on a 624MHz processor. i would say the only weak spot is the web browser.

The Bold is 4.29″ x 2.36″ x 0.56″ and weighs in at 4.3 ounces. Size wise, it feels about the same as any other BlackBerry, but it was much lighter than I expected. The back has this interesting faux-leather cover for those of you who want to feel like you really got your money’s worth.

The control surface proved a nice improvement. RIM replaced the traditional trackball with an optical trackpad. Personally, I like this interface much better. It feel much smoother and more precise than a ball. The trackpad sits flush with the body of the phone, so it won’t get damaged or worn out nearly as often. The keyboard proved to be easy to type on as well. The keys themselves are a little small, but the sculpted edges prevent you from slipping. Other dedicated buttons include a keypad lock key and a mute key on the top, voice dialing on the left side, and a volume rocker and programmable button on the right (default to opening the camera).

The display is something to behold. Not only can you watch streaming video with the new and improved JavaScript and streaming protocol support, but it all looks absolutely beautiful. The quality of pictures and video playback is pretty damn good. The camera itself isn’t too shabby either. 3.2 Megapixels with image stabilization, a 2x digital zoom, and flash. The onboard mic for video recording isn’t the greatest, but that’s to be expected.

In terms of connecting to the outside world, the Bold has not only 3G and Wi-Fi capability, but UMA support. Meaning you can make calls over a wireless network, without using your plan minutes.

T-Mobile hasn’t given us a firm release date. But you can expect it in time for the holidays for $199.99 with a two-year contract.

Technical Specs

• Memory: 256MB of internal flash memory, with a microSD card slot
• Battery Life: Talktime – 6 hours     Standby Time – 19 days
• Display: 480 x 360 color display, TFT LCD
• Camera: 3.2 MP camera with 2X zoom, flash, and video
• Optical Trackpad
• Keyboard: Full QWERTY keyboard, backlit
• Bluetooth: v2.1
• Headset Jack: 3.5mm stereo headset
• Media Player Supported Audio: 3GP, MP3, WMA9/WMA9 Pro/WMA 10, MIDI, AMR-NB, AAC/AAC+/eAAC+
• Supported Video: DivX 4, DivX 5/6 partially supported, XviD partially supported, H.263, H.264, WMV3, MPEG4, Sorenson Spark and On2 VP6 (Flash support)
• Wi-Fi: 802.11 b/g (w/ UMA support)
• GPS: photo geotagging capability
• BlackBerry OS: v5.0

The dawn of the 21st century brought us a problem: we had lots of data, but no real way to bring that data into the real world. We could feasibly lug laptops and phones around, but did they ever do exactly what we needed them to do? Don’t answer that.

Manufacturers, in their wisdom, decided to do something about it and so devices like the Peek – for email – and the CueCat – for nothing – were born. Here’s a look at ten ‘avatar’ gadgets, gadgets that brought a web service into the real world, for better or worse.

Twitterpeek – We should be nicer to the Twitterpeek. This standalone device, designed specifically for Twittering, mirroring our own obsession with the microblogging service and, if anything, we willed it into existence with our collective desires for always-on Twitter. Does it work? Eh. Is it a good idea? Eh. Is it for us? Probably not, but what do I know?

Peek Pronto – Now this makes a little more sense. The Peek Pronto is an email-only device. It’s great for business owners who want to give on-the-go email access to their employees without spending hundreds on monthly cellphone charges. The company, in fact, is reaching profitability so all our bellyaching isn’t hurting the company’s bottom line. The Peek Pronto costs $299 for unlimited email, a pretty good deal.

Kindle – The one real success story in this list. Kindles bring Amazon’s electronic book store to a hand-held device. It’s so popular, in fact, that everyone and their dog is getting in on the act. It’s an avatar device simply because it enables offline access to Amazon content.

Nook – This is supposed to be the Kindle on steroids. This is odd because B&N isn’t quite the name synonymous with online book-selling so what they’ve done is a double-reverse Lutz avatarization of their product. They created a device to showcase their web offerings and are now tooling up web offerings for the device.

Zipit – I popped over to the Zipit website and discovered that they’re actually still making these things! Zipit is basically an IM/SMS-only device that costs $49 and lets you send IMs, listen to music, and look at pictures over Wi-Fi. It’s for kids, obviously, and after the initial purchase it costs $29 a year for unlimited text messages and IM messaging. Kind of a good idea if you want to keep your wee ones from dumping a few grand on SMS messages.

IMfree – Now this is a blast from the past: the IMFree. It’s basically like the Zipit, but primitive. It is probably one of the first avatar devices out there with an actual useful purpose.

Augmented Reality Toys – Augmented reality creates ‘holograms’ on your PC screen when your webcam sees a special bar code. This is sort of a reverse-avatar situation where the physical device unlocks on-screen content. Expect to see more of these but Avatar seems to be going whole-hog on these.

ASellerTool and other bar code scanners – Devices like this abomination promise to allow offline pricing of various items like wine, books, and media. Useful for flea markets and the obsessive.

Wikireader – Dream: Hey! Why don’t we stuff an ever-changing information source on a device! Let’s call it the Wikireader! We’ll be rich!
Reality: This thing is a waste of plastic.

Cuecat – The winner of the dumbest avatar device is the Cuecat, a silly bar code reader that was supposed to bring online content to magazines. You’d plug in your Cuecat and scan magazines as you read them. Sadly, even back in 1999, reading your magazines by your PC was a bit silly. The company went belly up and now the Cuecat is remembered as one of the most ridiculous examples of dot-com hubris ever.

So the TwitterPeek gives you an always-connected view of Twitter over a nationwide cellular network. You can tweet and twat all you want. The device runs $99 with 6 months of service or $199 with a lifetime of the device service.

I’m sure the TweeterPeek is a wonderful device, but most feature phones now include a Twitter app. So if you’re really getting into Twitter, first reevaluate your life, and then check out your cell phone provider’s offers to make sure you simply can’t upgrade your phone to get access to Twitter. Or you can just drop $200 on the TweeterPeek and call it good. Your call.

Peek Unveils TwitterPeek – Making It Affordable for Millions More to Twitter on the Go

NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Peek, the maker of the award-winning Peek email and texting device, debuts the world’s first Twitter mobile device today exclusively on Amazon.com. TwitterPeek promises to unleash the thrill of Twitter on-the-go by enabling millions to tweet interesting news, stories, and ideas as soon as they happen – in real time – without an expensive smartphone or data plan.

Twitter has become a worldwide phenomenon, but – until now – the millions of Twitter users without a smartphone haven’t been able to fully experience the fun of Twitter on-the-go. “TwitterPeek will make it easy and affordable for everyone who doesn’t have a smartphone to really enjoy Twitter on–the-go,” said Peekster-in-Chief Amol Sarva.

TwitterPeek delivers the world of Twitter in a sleek, palm-sized gadget sure to top this year’s holiday gift list. “Twitter die-hards will appreciate its ‘always-on’ instant tweet delivery and newbies will finally ‘get Twitter’ once they have TwitterPeek in hand,” continued Sarva. “Even businesses that Twitter will dig TwitterPeek as a convenient way to stay connected with their customers.”

At $99 including unlimited nationwide service, TwitterPeek offers affordability no smartphone can match and a user experience far superior to SMS text messaging Twitter with a traditional cell phone.

Key features of TwitterPeek are:

Unlimited tweets and direct messages
Always-on instant tweet delivery
Views links (as plain text) and Twitpic images
Nationwide coverage. No wi-fi signal necessary.
Full QWERTY keyboard, color screen, click scroll wheel
30-day money back guarantee
1-year manufacturers warranty
Availability:

TwitterPeek is available exclusively on Amazon.com and TwitterPeek.com from November 3, 2009.
The original Peek Classic and Peek Pronto email and texting mobile devices are available at Amazon.com, GetPeek.com, Costco.com, and select Blockbuster and RadioShack stores.
Cost: TwitterPeek

$99 includes device plus 6 months of unlimited Twitter service ($7.95 per month for service thereafter)
$199 includes unlimited Twitter service for lifetime of device
No contracts

Now, the point is not that you need a PC to encode heinous old formats, but rather that digital distribution is a weird, complex process that could use a bit of simplification. Sorenson’s Squeeze 6 appears to go to some lengths to make this happen. It’s far from the only encoding platform out there, but I think they’re moving the right direction with this version, which not only integrates tightly with your Mac, but also with SMS, Twitter, and other popular services. After all, there’s no guarantee that you’re going to be working in the same office, or even the same country, as people who need to be informed every step of the way.

Imagine this: You set Squeeze up to watch a folder where master edited files are placed after they’ve been rendered out by FCP. Squeeze grabs the 1.5GB file, re-encodes it for YouTube, DVD, iPhone, and HQ H.264. When it’s done, it places them in a DropBox folder, emails the parties involved, and sends a text to your phone, telling you it’s finished. I may be against connectivity where I feel it’s not useful to me, but damn, if I was a video professional I’d be all over this thing.

The inputs and outputs look pretty comprehensive (though, it is true, Real is not on the list so it would have been useless the other day) — Sorenson is no newcomer to the encoding game, of course — but it’s the fundamentally collaborative nature of the program that makes it interesting to me. I’m not a media pro so I don’t know what tools are already in place for this kind of thing, but I know that the post-production and distribution phase can be a trying time, and this looks like it could streamline and improve the process greatly. Besides, I can see the crop, aspect ratio, and other frequently-adjusted controls right there in the interface, which says to me “user-friendly.”

If you’re in a collaborative video environment (like, I don’t know, College Humor or something), this might be a revelation. Then again, you’re probably also working in an office next to the person who’d be getting your “encode complete” text. At any rate, I think that service integration like this is a great step for a media company to make. It’s for Mac and Windows, but it looks like Macs have the superior version. Since it’s a pro app, however, it comes with the pro price: $500. My budget restricts me to freeware, but maybe yours doesn’t. There’s more info at Sorenson’s site.

This has been confirmed by both employees and witnesses. Microsoft has stated that the machines sold in their stores will be considered to be part of their signature line, and therefore will not include any unnecessary third party software. They will come preloaded with the optional Windows Live Essentials pack, Bing 3D Maps, Security Essentials, and the Zune client. Previously, the only PC manufacturer that has promised ‘craplet’ free systems has been Toshiba, however Sony and Dell have made such configurations available as an option.

[via electronista]

So when word came down that Apple had filed a patent for what appears to be an ad-supported version of OS X, my shock abated almost instantly. In fact, I only felt more justified in backing ad-supported products. There will be objections, some legitimate, some hysterical, but I think it will become increasingly clear over the next few years that this sort of thing is not only unavoidable, but ultimately desirable. As with other major emerging concepts like globalization, peer to peer connectivity, net neutrality, and device convergence, the evolution of advertising will be denied, debated, and championed in a million different ways. And that’s okay. Like those other processes (all of them still ongoing), you don’t have to accept them right away, but it helps if you realize that resistance is futile.

First, though, give yourselves a pat on the back. As a member of the vanguard of new media, next-generation services, and experimental technology, you should feel a certain pride. And I think you’ve also been justified in your various transgressions out here on the frontier — blocking ads, pirating media and software, and misusing or abusing other services (to a point at least) — because you moved faster than the rest of the world and it’s their fault that they didn’t see it coming, or weren’t fast enough to react in time. I don’t want to get all copyfight up in here, but the dinosaurs of media and communications deserve all the flak and failure they’ve piled up. I know it, you know it, they won’t say so but they know it too — but the time for sulking and suing is over. Instead, they’re piling into the wagons and hitting the trail. The latest Wild West on the internet is being clogged with settlers, and, at the risk of allowing this metaphor to overstay its welcome, there’s about to be a new sheriff in town (pictured at right). And the next few years will be the story of how the West was re-won — by corporate interests, as usual. Hey, it had to happen sometime.

Look. The fastest growing mobile platforms in the world are essentially trojan horses for new advertising (Android) and paid content (Apple). DRM is starting, thank god, to assume a form that isn’t instinctively abhorrent to even to the most seasoned of internet users. Digital distribution is no longer looked upon as an aberration, but an opportunity. And this positive change in new advertising is combined with, as Eric Clemons noted back in March, a failure on the part of traditional advertising to engage its audience on any level. Of course, his objections apply equally to a banner ad that’s in your browser as it does to a banner ad that’s on your desktop. Let’s talk about it.

Break yourself

So what can you do? Well, you can change the way you advertise. Ads these days are so bad that anybody who clicks one is guaranteed to be a sucker. And the supply of suckers, birth rates notwithstanding, is decreasing as techsavviness increases (along with AdBlock, torrenting, etc.). Even when you take an ethical stand, like Penny Arcade and others, and only advertise on your site for things you want you readership to support, ads simply won’t do any more. I wonder why? Let’s see. Tell me how most ads these days differ from the following:

(image from here)

Except for the fact that you no longer have to send a piece of mail to a physical address (usually, anyway), it is evident that the bulk of advertising hasn’t changed in 150 years. Interesting, that — and surprising that such a mind-bogglingly backward-looking strategy has survived so long. But luckily for us, advertisers are finally beginning to realize that the internet isn’t just a periodical with infinite pages. Innovators have, over the last four or five years, created a huge, rich playpen for marketers, and unsurprisingly those marketers have largely ignored it. Hence the trouble monetizing such obvious gold mines as Flickr, FaceBook, Twitter, and so on. “How will we make money on Twitter, there’s no place to put our gold-rush-era advertisements for Gammon’s Unctuous Ointment?” Sorry, but change comes from within, people. I don’t want to tell you how to do your job, but if you can’t figure out how to take a hundred million eyeballs a day and turn it into cash, you should reconsider your profession.

That’s why I see all these troublesome embedded ads and sponsored services as non-threatening — even cute in a way. They represent the infancy of new advertising, and stuff like an ad-supported OS or office suite are their first wobbly steps. Photogenic in a way, but be ready to capture the first few falls as well. For instance: Apple’s potential system, while obviously just a rough sketch in more ways than one, has the troubling flowchart box “User pre-buys time?” Yeah, that’s not going to happen. Coin-op computing is not the way to go. Revisit Eric’s article for a few ideas on what is the way to go, but while I have you I’d like to add a few examples I’ve just thought up in the last few minutes, if I may. I doubt I’m the first person to think of these, but I don’t see any of them being implemented widely, so pretend I invented them for the purposes of this post.

Ads that aren’t anachronisms

When you say “ad-supported,” it conjures images of ugly banner ads surrounding the functional portion of the program or service. You and I see it every day in Gmail, after all, and who hasn’t seen worse? Nagware also comes to mind; I used WinRAR for a decade and clicked down its nag screen thousands of times before giving in. But that’s old school. These days, ads are rectangles filled with lies. Nobody clicks on those any more, or if they do, the numbers are decreasing at a rate which must alarm those who fill the rectangles. But what if the ads were to be invisible? Picture this: an OS-wide layer that detects searches, reads text on webpages, and scours all content for products and services. A Snap-esque pop-up or browser bar provides the lowest prices, latest blog posts, and a link to the official site. It provides trackable clickthroughs (bankable) and is, in fact, useful to the user. In a “normal” machine you could turn this off, and in an ad-supported machine you couldn’t (without some work anyway). Sure, it’s not a full solution, but honestly, would you mind having that on your machine if it meant saving a couple hundred bucks up front? Even if you say yes (and I might), I guarantee there are about a hundred million people who would say no. Can you say Wal-Mart? I knew you could. I’d venture to say that this is one of the driving ideas behind Chrome OS.

So that’s a kickoff point for ads in the OS: unavoidable yet unobtrusive, simple yet functional. What about in the browser? It’s more difficult because the user has more control over what they do and don’t see. But the same principles are at work, and at the risk of tooting TechCrunch’s horn, we’re already applying them (and have been before I got here; I’m not claiming any credit). Look down at the bottom of this paragraph. It’s a CrunchBase widget! Useful, embeddable, trackable, and customizable — mark my words, in a year or two these things (not just CrunchBase but similar items) will be everywhere. After all, who says an ad has to be produced by the company making the product? People don’t like those ads anyway. They’re badly designed, and frequently damned lies to boot. But in a CrunchBase or say GDGT embedded widget, you know the source, you don’t have to worry about spin, and it’s no skin off your back if TechCrunch gets a penny whenever you click through to Sony’s site through one. And here’s the fun part: payment, placement, and tracking are virtually identical to traditional ads. Sony doesn’t want to pay a website to advertise for them? Then no links to Sony. Users can figure it out by themselves.

If I’m honest, they should be a bit smaller if they’re to be everywhere. And have more stuff. You get the idea, though. …yeah, it’s me, so what?

But media, Devin, you’re forgetting the media! Billions are spent on television advertising. Or so I’m told — I only see TV ads at the gym and at bars these days, since I download or stream all my media. I’m not boasting of being some elite master pirate and internet jockey; the fact is that tech-savvy people do what I do, or rather I do what they do, because at the moment it’s easier and better. That’s all. And there are more people qualifying as tech-savvy every day. Media companies are realizing that, and TV ads, while not on their way out, are going to have to be heavily augmented with something else. What could it be? What did I say about the other ads — oh yes, unavoidable yet unobtrusive, simple yet functional. Okay, here’s one I just thought up as I typed this sentence. When you stream or download a show, have metadata or an on-screen menu or page (visible during the intro, ads, or whatnot) where you can buy associated items. But not just DVD sets. I mean, if someone’s watching episode 89, they either own episodes 1-60 already or will be buying them sooner or later anyway. You’re trying to sell God to the choir. Why not accessorize? The meta-page I theorize (an enormous advertisement in disguise) can have all manner of things: links to the coffee shop the characters were in. Prices and local availability for the clothes they wore. iTunes link for songs from the soundtrack. Related shows! Related books! Every time you provide an episode for free (if that continues) — with unskippable ad breaks for your regular ads! — you get to expose every viewer to a cornucopia of products that they are probably at least a little interested in. Can you say that about cable? And if you do say it, will people laugh?

How I learned to stop worrying and so on

But I seem to have wandered off from the original topic. Let’s get something straight. The world is already ad-supported. It always was. And it will continue to be. Don’t fight it. It’s like slipping into a warm bath. If Apple puts out an ad-supported version of OS X, or Google Checkout is built into Chrome OS, or Microsoft brings back Clippy to suggest sponsored websites, you can cry all you want, but know that advertising makes the world go round. For a brief, exciting time, you’ve been ahead of the curve, in a land where ad-men feared to tread. You hate advertising, and rightly so, because you’ve been subjected to it in its worst possible guise. For a decade at least, ads have been a lame, decrepit wolf in comically unconvincing sheep’s clothing. That’s changing — and while it’s too little, too late for some (the RIAA and MPAA for two, or their dignity at least), it’s a golden opportunity for others, and it means progress and improvement for the end user.

It’ll take some time, but the coming renaissance in advertising is going to happen whether you like it or not, just as the revolution in communications happened to the advertisers — who decidedly did not like it. They fancied themselves an immovable object, but the truly unstoppable force of progress has since relieved them of that idea. Users have been empowered to choose when, how, and from whom they will accept advertising. The race now is not to the biggest and flashiest ad, as it has been for generations, but to the very opposite end of the spectrum. The winner will be the one who best convinces the user that they are not being advertised to at all. Indeed, we are about to change the very definition of advertisement. Care to help?

The SAFE S3000 FIPS accomplishes this by means of a Gemalto .NET V2.2 FIPS smart card, which provides “tamper-resistant storage, isolation of all security-critical computations, and strong authentication through a stringent PKI-based challenge-response process.”

The metal casing is water proof, and the entire thing is filled with “military-grade epoxy compound” to thwart physical access. This drive has some serious heft to it, compared to other USB sticks. In a pinch, you could probably cause modest pain to someone by throwing it at them. Seriously, this thing is solid.

When you plug this into your Windows or Mac computer, you’ll see a small partition that contains a simple helper program to unlock the drive. If you’re a PC, double click the JumpDriveS3000_PC.exe, and if you’re a Mac, double click the JumpDriveS3000_Mac application.

Upon first use, you’ll be walked through the setup process. You assign a passphrase to unlock the device, and an optional security question to use in case you forget the first passphrase. This security question must be selected from a list of pre-defined questions (mother’s maiden name, name of first pet, etc), which somewhat limits the security of this process. More on this below.

Once configured, you’ll be prompted to type your passphrase to unlock the encrypted partition:

Enter the wrong passphrase too many times and you’ll lock your device. If you provided an optional security question, you can use that to reset a forgotten password:

One unlocked, you get a new USB device attached to your system, named SAFE:

Copy files to this location as needed: everything gets encrypted on the fly. When you’re all done, unmount the drive and remove the USB stick from your computer.

As you can see, once you’ve authenticated to the secured partition, this thing acts like any other USB drive. No problems, no hassles.

The software supplied on the SAFE S3000 is for Windows and Mac only. A Linux machine can see the unencrypted read-only partition just fine, but is unable to access the encrypted partition. Here’s what a Linux system sees when you insert this device:

[1204303.796012] usb 1-8: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 4
[1204311.357306] usb 1-8: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[1204311.357641] scsi7 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
[1204311.357825] usb-storage: device found at 4
[1204311.357827] usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning
[1204311.372595] input: Lexar JumpDrive SAFE S3000 USB Device  as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1d.7/usb1/1-8/1-8:1.1/input/input6
[1204311.393196] generic-usb 0003:05DC:0801.0002: input,hidraw1: USB HID v1.01 Gamepad [Lexar JumpDrive SAFE S3000 USB Device ] on usb-0000:00:1d.7-8/input1
[1204316.356127] usb-storage: device scan complete
[1204316.356484] scsi 7:0:0:0: Direct-Access     LEXAR    JD SAFE S3000    1511 PQ: 0 ANSI: 1 CCS
[1204316.357228] scsi 7:0:0:1: Direct-Access     LEXAR    JD SAFE S3000    1511 PQ: 0 ANSI: 1 CCS
[1204316.358722] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] 61440 512-byte hardware sectors: (31.4 MB/30.0 MiB)
[1204316.360597] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is on
[1204316.360600] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 23 00 80 00
[1204316.360603] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[1204316.363093] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] 61440 512-byte hardware sectors: (31.4 MB/30.0 MiB)
[1204316.363589] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is on
[1204316.363592] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 23 00 80 00
[1204316.363594] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[1204316.363598]  sdb:
[1204316.366016] sd 7:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk
[1204316.366479] sd 7:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0
[1204316.370217] sd 7:0:0:1: [sdc] Attached SCSI removable disk
[1204316.370295] sd 7:0:0:1: Attached scsi generic sg3 type 0
[1205369.339282] usb 1-8: USB disconnect, address 4
[2354955.204015] usb 1-8: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 5

And here’s what happens when I try to access it:

scott@mgr5:~$ sudo mount -t vfat /dev/sdb /mnt
mount: block device /dev/sdb is write-protected, mounting read-only
scott@mgr5:~$ ls /mnt
autorun.inf  doc  JumpDriveS3000_Mac.app  JumpDriveS3000_PC.exe
scott@mgr5:~$ sudo umount /mnt
scott@mgr5:~$ sudo mount -t vfat /dev/sdc /mnt
mount: no medium found on /dev/sdc
scott@mgr5:~$ sudo cat /dev/sdc
cat: /dev/sdc: No medium found

As you can see, I can access the unencrypted /dev/sdb partition just fine; but am unable to access the encrypted /dev/sdc partition. The helper program contained on the unencrypted program works the necessary magic to make the encrypted partition accessible to the computer.

What happens when you enter the wrong password too many times? This is where the issue of the security question becomes important. The product manual does an absolutely terrible job of describing the situation. If you do not set a security question, then after 5 incorrect password attempts you are prompted to “reset” the drive. This purges all the encrypted data, and starts the initialization process.

If you do set a security question, after 5 failed password attempts you are prompted to input the security question answer in order to reset the password used to unlock the device. If you enter an incorrect security question response five times, your S3000 FIPS is permanently locked.

As part of the review process, I intentionally entered the wrong passwords — as would anyone who found one of these drives in a taxi or on a subway — to see how the process worked. I can confirm that I am now the proud owner of a Lexar-branded paperweight. Yay!

I called Lexar to make sure there was no recovery possible. The friendly tech support person I spoke with confirmed that a locked S3000 FIPS is unrecoverable. Jyh Chau, senior product manager with Lexar, provided me with the following response:

By design we enable the owner/end user of the JumpDrive SAFE S3000 FIPS to register a log-in password and a security question and answer (Q&A). The login password is mandatory for accessing the secure storage area.

The security Q&A provides a way for the user to recover from a lost password situation. It is optional but we do recommend users set it up to avoid data loss in a lost password situation.

If the security Q&A is not set, the user has the option to “recycle” the drive. All data will be securely erased, returning the drive to its original state. A new log-in password will need to be registered before the secure storage area can be used.

If the security Q&A is set, the drive is now in a full protect mode. If both log-in and security Q&A attempts are exceeded, the drive will be permanently disabled. In terms of threat model, the design ensures that only the true owner/user is able to use the device after the full protect mode is enabled. In high security computing environments this is a desirable trait (not allowing an unauthorized user to recycle a drive and use it within the environment).

The 8GB model I tested runs $199 direct from Lexar which seems extremely expensive to me. But then again, I’m not dealing with million-dollar research data, so perhaps this is actually a drop in the bucket compared to the cost of losing valuable data.

Bottom Line

If you have government blueprints, or other super-secret data, the JumpDrive SAFE S3000 FIPS is a solid, secure means of transporting that data around. Just don’t forget your password.

Having actually seen this device, let me assure you that what you see here is not a star.

You can see screenshots of the original ads at the original post at Apple Insider, but for simplicity’s sake I’m just going to put the translated text here.

Apple’s Newest MacBook. Thinner, lighter and faster! Free delivery. Order today.
The brand new iMac. Ultra Thin 20 & 24 inch models. From only €1099.
Apple’s New Mac Mini. Faster and more affordable than ever. From only €499. Order immediately.

What strikes you about these ads? They say nothing at all.

Technically, the current MacBook is indeed Apple’s “newest.” Thinner, lighter, and faster than what? These statements are general enough to apply to any Apple product.

The “brand new” iMac poses more of a conundrum. Can they really say brand new when it hasn’t been updated in ages? Why not? Apple said twice as fast, half the price when neither was true. How would you expect them to advertise a current product? “The old standby” isn’t going to sell any units. “Ultra Thin 20 & 24 inch models” could also refer to available iMacs.

The “New Mac Mini” priced at €499 is the only compelling one, really — there is no Mini currently available for that price in the store the ad directs you to, but pricing does vary between countries.

Okay, okay, I’m just poking holes in this just for the fun of it. In all likelihood they are real Apple ads, run a little early. But let’s all calm down because there’s nothing of substance in any of them except for a lowered Mini price. Every Apple product since the dawn of time has gotten thinner and faster with every iteration, and everyone has already speculated on products with those predictable improvements.

The Pixi is a non-slider with touchscreen and full keyboard. It will cost about $149 with two year contract and rebates on Sprint. You have 8GB of on board storage and it takes 2-megapixel pictures – down from the Pre’s 3-megapixels.

There is no Wi-Fi, a dealbreaker for many. The Pixi will be available in multiple “Artist Series” styles and will be available around the holidays.

The Pre costs about $199 – cut to $99 for a bit and then raised back up – so a $50 savings isn’t much when it comes to a device without Wi-Fi. I think the average smartphone buyer is looking for a few things in a device – a touchscreen, 3G networking, and, ideally, some alternative form of transfer. This doesn’t have it.

That said, it’s a fascinating move by Palm. Either they wanted to bury this news in the Apple event today or they foolishly thought this would overshadow the event. I’m betting on the former.

WebOS is a contender but with phones like the Hero and the Tattoo appearing on the horizon and HTC really taking a a hard look at its competitors – and eating them – Palm may be barking up the wrong tree.

We’ll have hands on later today.

Thin Palm Pixi Phone Puts

Fast, Intuitive Communication at Fingertips

Palm’s Thinnest Phone Yet Expands Palm webOS Line with Customizable Style

SUNNYVALE, Calif., Sept. 9, 2009 – Palm, Inc. (NASDAQ: PALM) today introduced the Palm® Pixi™ phone for faster, more intuitive and personal communication in a compact and customizable design.(1) With the instinctively useable Palm webOS™ platform, strikingly thin design, a visible full keyboard and fashionable personalization options, Palm Pixi lets you express yourself in amazingly useful ways. It’s scheduled to be available exclusively from Sprint in time for the holidays.

“With Palm webOS, we’re creating a new, more intuitive smartphone experience defined by unmatched simplicity and usefulness,” said Jon Rubinstein, Palm chairman and chief executive officer. “Palm Pixi brings this unique experience to a broader range of people who want enhanced messaging and social networking in a design that lets them express their personal style.”

In addition to linking your information from Google™, Facebook and Exchange ActiveSync, Palm Pixi adds Yahoo! and LinkedIn integration to Palm Synergy™ and assembles it all in a single view.(2) You can get your Yahoo! contacts, calendar and IM, and access to your LinkedIn contacts, including job titles. Synergy on Palm Pixi makes messaging easier by showing you all your conversations with the same person in one chat-style thread, so you can start a conversation on AIM Instant Messenger, Google Talk™ or Yahoo! Messenger and continue it by text message later.(3)

Complementing the phone’s already rich Facebook integration with the contacts, phone, calendar and photo applications, a new Facebook application will be available with Palm Pixi so you can see and comment on all the latest news from your friends, as well as easily update your status. The phone’s full QWERTY keyboard puts it all at your fingertips, and the multi-touch screen lets you move back and forth between open applications using natural gestures.(4) The unique removable back cover is rubberized, making it scratch-resistant, slip-resistant and durable.

Personalization with Style

For those who want to express themselves with some extra style, Palm is introducing the Palm Pixi Artist Series. Designed by some of today’s most unique and compelling artists, these numbered, limited-edition back covers let you change designs to suit your mood. You can see the first collection in the series, as well as information about the artists, at www.palm.com/artistseries. Palm will be showcasing the fashionable new Palm Pixi with the Artist Series covers this week at the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York (Sept. 10-17).

You can also tailor Palm Pixi to your interests with downloadable applications from the Palm Beta App Catalog, including the latest entertainment and social networking applications such as Local Concerts by iLike, and Yelp™.(5) You can use Palm media sync to customize your phone with music, photos and videos from iTunes (Versions 8.1.1-8.2.1)(6), or use the on-device Amazon MP3 store to purchase individual songs or full albums over-the-air.(3)

“Palm Pixi continues Sprint’s leadership in providing useful and innovative devices on America’s most dependable 3G network,”(7) said Dan Hesse, chief executive officer at Sprint. “We are pleased to be the first carrier to bring this device to market and offer both devices in the growing Palm webOS family. Sprint’s Everything Data plans, which provide unrestricted access to the Internet, mobile content and applications, and our Ready Now retail experience make for a perfect combination with these new Palm products.”

The Sprint Mobile Broadband Network reaches more than 271 million people, 18,652 cities and 1,838 airports, and Sprint’s networks are now performing at best-ever levels.

Customers who purchase Palm Pixi will benefit from Sprint’s Ready Now, which the company pioneered to help customers leave the store educated, comfortable and confident about the phones they’re taking home. It is like having a free personal trainer that educates you on all your phone can do by setting up all the applications you want to use on the device.

Palm Pixi is also the perfect complement to Sprint’s Simply EverythingSM plan, which provides unlimited nationwide calling, texting, email, social networking, web browsing, GPS navigation, Sprint TV, streaming music, NFL Mobile Live, NASCAR Sprint Cup Mobile and much more for only $99.99 per month. It’s a savings of $1,200 over two years versus some comparable competitor plans.

Palm Pixi Features

High-speed connectivity (EVDO Rev. A)
2.63-inch multi-touch screen with a vibrant 18-bit color 320×400 resolution TFT display
Gesture area, which enables simple, intuitive gestures for navigation
Exposed QWERTY keyboard for fast messaging
Robust messaging support (IM, SMS and MMS capabilities), including Google Talk, AIM and Yahoo! IM
High-performance, desktop-class web browser
Integrated GPS(8)
Multimedia options, including pictures, video playback and music, and featuring a 2-megapixel fixed-focus camera with LED flash, and a standard 3.5mm headset jack
Email, including Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) (for access to corporate Microsoft Exchange servers), as well as personal email support (Google push, Yahoo! push, POP3, IMAP)(9)
Bluetooth® 2.1 + EDR with A2DP stereo Bluetooth support
8GB of internal user storage (~7GB user available)(10)
USB mass storage mode
MicroUSB connector with USB 2.0 Hi-Speed
The first handset to launch with Qualcomm’s high-performance MSM7627™ chipset
Proximity sensor, which automatically disables the touch screen and turns off the display whenever you put the phone up to your ear
Light sensor, which dims the display if the ambient light is dark, such as at night or in a movie theater, to reduce power usage
Accelerometer, which automatically orients web pages and photos to your perspective
Ringer switch, which easily silences the device with one touch
Removable, rechargeable 1150 mAh battery
Dimensions: 55mm (W) x 111mm (L) x 10.85mm (D) [2.17 in. (W) x 4.37 in. (L) x 0.43 in. (D)]
Weight: 99.5 grams (3.51 ounces)
Sprint services, including Sprint TV® and Sprint Radio, Sprint Navigation, Sprint’s exclusive NFL Mobile Live and NASCAR Sprint Cup Mobile Live

Availability and Pricing

The Palm Pixi phone is scheduled to be available from Sprint in time for the holidays. Pricing for the phone, as well as the limited-edition Palm Pixi Artist Series covers, will be announced closer to availability. Customers who would like to register to receive additional information about Palm Pixi and be notified when it’s available can register at www.palm.com/pixi.

In addition, effective today the Palm Pre™ phone from Sprint is available for $149.99 with a two-year service agreement and after a $150 instant rebate and $100 mail-in rebate. You can find this great pricing at Sprint stores, on the web (www.sprint.com) and by calling Sprint’s telesales group (1-800-SPRINT1). With the new Palm Pixi phone, and Palm Pre at a lower price, Palm and Sprint are bringing greater choice of Palm webOS phones to a larger audience.

Before you watch this be warned it’s pretty graphic. I’ve seen plenty of people swerving because of texting – one guy I saw was on his old, ratty Nokia rolling from lane to lane as he texted whoever was most important in his life while traveling 75MPH on I75 in Ohio – and this PSA really shows what can, and probably will happen, in a terrible number of texting-while-driving cases.

The PSA was made by the Gwent police department and is part of a 30 minute movie. This 4 minute tidbit is enough to make me rethink checking Google Maps on the iPhone let alone SMSing “WTF LOL” to anyone.

via Giz

As you recall there’s an SMS bug in the iPhone that could allow for SUPER HACKERS TO STEAL YOUR TESTICLES! It will happen when they send you a message with a square in it. If you get this message, remove your pants and disinfect yourself because you have just been OWn3d!

You see, yesterday Forbes’ Andy Greenberg posted a breathless article about it and today – today! – the entire world is trying it out, ensuring that your iPhone will die. Quoth some site called Newser:

“Someone could pretty quickly take over every iPhone in the world with this,” says one of the experts. The bug could let the hacker control all the phone’s functions, including making phone calls and sending texts to other phones. Windows Mobile contains an analogous flaw, researchers say, and both Google’s Android phone and the iPhone had bugs that would allow hackers to disable their network connections—though Google has patched the problem.

Well fluff me with a Dyson Animal! Get out of the way, Martha! I’m throwing my iPhone into the toilet!

Admittedly, I’ve never been in prison (putting technology bloggers in with regular inmates is NOT safe for the inmates) but I’d undoubtedly try to smuggle in a cell phone and, at the very least, a netbook of some type. Apparently cell phones are a big problem in prisons nowadays and body orifice scanners (see previous coverage here) may not have quite caught on yet.

A company called AirPatrol looks to solve illegal cell and wireless devices in prison with “Wireless Locator System” software. It’s basically able to sniff out Wi-Fi and cellular signals in a given area and pinpoint the location of those devices on a map.

“WLS is the best alternative solution to the contraband cell phone problem plaguing correctional facilities across the nation. WLS wirelessly detects and pinpoints contraband cell phones and unlike RF jamming techniques is completely legal and approved for use in the United States and doesn’t interfere with authorized, legitimate cell phone usage. WLS yields 24 x 7, 365 days a year, real-time cell phone and Wi-Fi device location details throughout a correctional facility. WLS includes a forensics database, an essential tool for logging and archiving cell phone event information, including where a phone is detected, allowing prison monitors to see a log of the start and stop times of voice calls, as well as emails, SMS and MMS.”

Apparently jamming cell phone signals is illegal, despite a similar movement by movie theater owners to keep people from using mobile devices. Maybe they could just use this software instead to pinpoint all the cell phone-using tweens. That, or make everyone sit on the body orifice scanner on the way into the theater.

Press Release

Bellevue, Wash., and Waterloo, Ontario –T-Mobile USA, Inc., and Research In Motion (RIM) (Nasdaq: RIMM; TSX: RIM) today announced the new BlackBerry® Curve™ 8520 smartphone, a new addition to the BlackBerry Curve series of smartphones, with availability expected on August 5.

The slim new BlackBerry Curve 8520 is an incredibly approachable smartphone that comes in two attractive colors from T-Mobile – black and frost. For people who like to be connected, it provides easy mobile access to email, messaging (IM, SMS, MMS) and popular social networking sites (including Facebook® and MySpace) and features a highly tactile full-QWERTY keyboard for comfortable, accurate typing. It also features rich multimedia capabilities and access to music, games and other mobile apps for entertainment on the go.

The BlackBerry Curve 8520 smartphone is a world phone, and is also Wi-Fi®-enabled to arm customers with fast Web browsing and Wi-Fi calling. T-Mobile customers can continue to get great mobile coverage and unlimited nationwide Wi-Fi calling with T-Mobile’s Unlimited HotSpot Calling service as well as unlimited nationwide calling to five people with T-Mobile myFaves® service.*

In addition to providing the industry’s leading mobile email and messaging solution, the BlackBerry Curve 8520 smartphone is designed to be efficient and convenient. It introduces an innovative touch-sensitive optical trackpad, which makes scrolling and selection smooth and easy for a great navigation experience. It is also the first BlackBerry smartphone to feature dedicated media keys, smoothly integrated along the top of the handset, giving customers an easy, convenient way to control their music and videos.

“People increasingly expect a rich, diverse experience with their phones because they’re using them in new and different ways,” said Travis Warren, director of product marketing, T-Mobile USA. “Adding the BlackBerry Curve 8520 to the T-Mobile line-up gives our customers a phone capable of helping bring balance to the chaotic demands of a busy professional and personal life.”

“More and more cell phone users are choosing to upgrade to a smartphone and the new BlackBerry Curve 8520 will undoubtedly convince many more people to make the switch. It delivers all the great messaging, social networking and multimedia features that have made BlackBerry the top-selling smartphone brand in the United States,” said Carlo Chiarello, vice president, product management, Research In Motion. “T-Mobile customers are going to love how easy it is to keep in touch on Facebook and MySpace and the full-QWERTY keyboard is amazingly fast and comfortable for typing on the go.”

Key features of the BlackBerry Curve 8520 smartphone include:

· Full-QWERTY keyboard and touch-sensitive optical trackpad for reliable, responsive typing and navigation

· 256MB Flash memory and a 512Mhz next generation processor for enhanced performance
· Premium phone features including voice activated dialing, and Bluetooth (2.0) support for hands-free use with headsets, car kits, stereo headsets and other Bluetooth peripherals
· 2 MP digital camera with zoom and video recording

· Advanced media player for music, pictures and videos, with dedicated media keys and a 3.5 mm stereo headset jack, plus BlackBerry® Media Sync, which makes it easy to quickly sync music from iTunes® or Windows Media® Player with the smartphone**
· Access to BlackBerry App World™, featuring a broad and growing catalog of third-party mobile applications developed specifically for BlackBerry smartphones. Categories include games, entertainment, social networking and sharing, news and weather, productivity and much more

· BlackBerry® Internet Service support for access to up to 10 supported email accounts, including most popular ISP email accounts such as Yahoo!®, Windows Live™ Hotmail®, AOL® and Gmail™; and BlackBerry® Enterprise Server support, which provides advanced security and IT administration features for corporate deployments
· Expandable memory via hot swappable microSD/SDHC memory card slot, supporting cards of up to 16 GB today and expected to support next generation 32GB cards when available; a 1GB card is included
· Built-in Wi-Fi (802.11 b/g) with support for T-Mobile Unlimited Hotspot Calling service

· Quad-band world phone: EGDE/GPRS/GSM (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)

The new BlackBerry Curve 8520 smartphone from T-Mobile will be available on August 5 at T-Mobile retail stores, Wal-Mart Stores, select authorized dealers, and online at http://www.T-Mobile.com.

In their own words:

Archerfish is the first and only mobile video intelligence (MVI) solution available today. Using a
combination of video cameras, intelligent software and the Archerfish SmartPortalTM, it watches
your business or home for events you define as important, such as an expected delivery or an
unwelcome intruder. If and only when these events occur, Archerfish finds you and tells you
what’s going on by sending a notification—along with video of the event—to your mobile device,
email, or personal Archerfish SmartPortal.

Introduction
The Archerfish solution is made of three things: the camera(s), the SmartBox, and the MyArcherfish portal. The cameras send video to the SmartBox, which records the video and sends it all back to the MyArcherfish portal. Each SmartBox can connect to up to four cameras, and you can have multiple SmartBoxes all sending data up to your MyArcherfish portal. When you log in to the portal, you can view your cameras in real time. Below is a screenshot of my driveway, which I watch obsessively:

Setup
The Archerfish system is super easy to set up, and the included documentation is superb. You simply place the cameras where you want them, connect them to the SmartBox with the supplied cables, and then log into the MyArcherfish portal. Once in the portal, you define your SmartBox using the code on the bottom of the unit. Then you define cameras attached to your SmartBox. For each camera, you can define up to three zones:

I defined my driveway as zone one, the neighbor’s lawn as zone two, and the street out front as zone three. Note: you can only define zones using Microsoft Internet Explorer, as it requires the installation of an ActiveX control. I wasn’t entirely thrilled about that, but what can you do. Once you have zones defined, you then define Events.

Archerfish claims to be able to tell the difference between people and vehicles, so you can select to be notified only when vehicles enter a zone, for example. That’s useful if you’re pointing your camera down a hallway: you’re unlikely to expect to ever see a vehicle in said hallway, so tell your Archerfish system to only monitor for people. You can also set thresholds for how long something is detected. You might not care about people walking past an area, but you want to know who’s lingering around for more than 5 or 10 seconds. You can specify windows of time, so that you’re only looking for people in a zone at a specific time.

Finally, you define notification methods for who to contact when an Event is triggered. Right now, the only option is to send an email to someone. You can include in that email a link to the MyArcherfish portal, a still picture from the video, or a short video clip of the Event that was triggered. You can define multiple recipients per event, so that you can have broader coverage in the event a response of some kind is necessary.

If the idea of email being sent seems too sluggish, you could send an email to a mobile phone’s number, such that an MMS will be sent. Future updates to the MyArcherfish portal may allow real SMS messaging for notifications, but don’t hold your breath.

The Good
I elected to have video clips sent to my phone. The videos themselves are MP4 files, and play perfectly fine on my iPhone. I circulated the videos to the CG team and the reports I’ve received are that they play just dandy on the Blackberry Curve 8900 and Storm, as well as the G1. The videos I’ve been sent are all under 200K, so they’re easily downloaded via WiFi or 3G connection. I suppose if you selected a really long interval for your Event — 10 seconds or more — and had that emailed to you it might produce a larger video.

Video quality is good. It’s not so good that I can see the face of a person in my driveway, nor can I read a license plate, but it’s still pretty good. I imagine a better camera would produce even better video, should you need it. I also suspect that better camera placement on my part would produce better video. If you’re looking to discern people’s faces, you’ll need to make sure the camera is suitable close.

Here are a couple of videos for you to enjoy. First, Archerfish correctly recognized me on my bicycle as a person, and not a vehicle:

A car turning into my driveway was correctly triggered by the “vehicle” event I had defined:

Me walking across my living room triggered the “person” event I had defined:

Events are stored on your MyArcherfish portal, too, so you can view them online from any PC. You get 50 megabytes of storage, by default, so that should hold plenty of Events for most users. And, if your Internet connection ever drops, the SmartBox will store Events and send then up to your portal once your connection is restored.

You can also use the SmartBox as a DVR, to locally record all the video it sees. Simply plug in a USB drive to the USB port on the back of the unit and press the DVR button. I didn’t try this, but I imagine it would produce MP4 video of the sort that’s sent with notifications.

The Not So Good
The person/vehicle detection idea is sound: there’s lot of things that can move inside a scene, so simply alerting on any movement is too coarse an approach. You might not care about your cat walking around your house while you’re away for a long weekend, but you’d absolutely want to know if a person were wandering through your home. In my experience, the detection system was really hit or miss. I received more than a few notifications that a vehicle was detected in my driveway. When I watched the video clips sent to me, though, there was no vehicle. I stood just outside the camera’s sight and waved various objects into the Zone — my arms, a broom, my cat — and it did not detect any of these as a Person. I guess I’d rather receive notifications of false positives than miss an actual event.

The marketing material states “Access live video from Archerfish SmartPortal & view from any web-enabled PC, PDA or mobile device”. Yes, you can access the portal from any mobile browser, but you can’t actually watch live video unless your browser has Flash. That rules out my iPhone.

A minor complaint I have is that in order to actually get live video to work outside of the network to which your SmartBox is attached, you need to open a port in your firewall so that you can connect directly to your SmartBox. This isn’t a super big deal, but really: the video is already being sent to the Archerfish mothership, why can’t they rebroadcast it to you in your portal, rather than making you connect directly to your SmartBox?

As a somewhat security-conscious individual, I was disappointed to see that all access to the portal site happens over a plain ol’ HTTP connection. I would greatly prefer to use an HTTPS connection, so that my login credentials are protected and so that none of the Events or live video I watch could be intercepted.

Finally, and this is just me being really picky, it would have been nice if the cameras used either plain ol’ CAT5 cable or were wireless. Using the supplied cables works, but it means your camera placement options are limited. For most businesses, this probably isn’t that big of a deal. Like I said: me being picky.

Conclusion
The Archerfish documentation is much, much better than most consumer electronics documentation. It was clear, concise, and accurate. The setup process was a breeze, and the MyArcherfish portal is supremely easy to use. The entire system works as advertised: it detects motion of the kind you define, and alerts you when something happens. The video is easy to view, plays on most smartphones, and shows you just the events you defined, rather than hours of uninteresting dead space.

Most often used to send brief text messages between cell phones, SMS can also send binary code to an iPhone, which then processes the code without any user interaction. Each SMS message is limited to 140 bytes, but longer sequences can be sent to the phone as multiple messages that are automatically reassembled.

This feature allows larger programs to be delivered to a phone, Miller said.

That’s gotta be a lot of SMSes, right? 140 characters doesn’t hold a lot of logic bomb, let alone do something like this:

EurekaFest is a yearly event held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that showcases the prototype inventions of high school students from around the country. The inventions consist of various gadgets and devices aimed at helping solve real-world problems.

One of the more impressive ideas I saw during the two days I spent covering the event was a prototype “sensing” cane for blind people. The cane features sensors that can detect objects up to eight feet away, at which point the cane’s handle begins buzzing once per second and increases in intensity as objects get closer.

There were actually two separate teams working on sensing canes – one from Harvard, MA and one from Norfolk, VA. I spoke with the team from Norfolk, which you watch in the above video. Their prototype cane cost only about $140 to put together and consists of PVC piping and an Arduino-like logic board that handles all the information from the sensors. Apparently an earlier prototype was made from carbon fiber, but it turned out to be too expensive and not as easy to work with as PVC.

Other interesting concepts included the following:

Pressure-sensitive illuminated computer cable: USB cable that lights up when you squeeze it, allowing you to easily identify a particular cable among other cables plugged into your computer.

Biofilm membrane for oil remediation: A $40 apparatus that attaches to a well in a rural village and filters out oil from water affected by an oil spill. The actual oil is eaten by microorganisms present in one of the filtering sections of the piping.

Alternative energy refrigerator for northern climates: This is basically a $300 attachment that can be easily installed on just about any refrigerator. It hooks up to an outside vent and uses cold winter air to decrease the refrigerator’s energy consumption by up to 50% during the winter.

Assistive mechanics creeper for car repair: An apparatus that allows people with bad backs, bad knees, and the handicapped to easily work underneath cars. “This invention will allow a person to slide from a wheelchair onto the device, lower, and recline backwards to the position of a traditional creeper. This can be done without the person ever having to get up and adjust it. The device will be able to hold a maximum weight of 300 pounds.”

Cooperative cruise control for hybrid commuter cars: A series of sensors attached to multiple cars in the same caravan that allow one lead car to be followed automatically by up to four other cars.

I also got a chance to check out a hybrid electric car developed by a high school in New Hampshire. The vehicle was made out of a motorcycle frame and featured a gasoline generator attachment for extending the mileage. That, plus all of the other inventions can be found in the video at the top of this post. And here’s a list of all the other inventions as well.

Lemelson-MIT Program’s EurekaFest [MIT.edu]

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