2013
You set your own limits
Continually push yourself to grow and improved or be pushed out. That is the nature of business.
If you can't then you must
If you feel you absolutely can't so something then you must do it to grow
Is faux skin mini furniture art?
Strange and disturbing was my reaction when I saw pictures of this mini furniture covered in faux (fake) human skin. There is a visceral reaction of fear and disgust when you see something covered in what looks like human skin. To be clean, this is all fake material made to look like skin but still… it is disturbing. Why would anyone consider this art? Source: here.
LinkedIn Buys the Pulse News Reader for $90M
The rumors were true. Pulse is now part of the LinkedIn in family. As part of theblog post confirming the acquisition, we learn that Pulse has 30 million users and 750 publishing partners. LinkedIn has confirmed that it will not shut down Pulse but will use it to pull information into its own site. No word yet on whether LinkedIn intends to continue developing Pulse.
Samsung Galaxy now comes in 5.8 & 6.3 inch Mega size
Samsung recently released the much anticipated Samsung Galaxy SIV (S4) and the market was clamoring to see what Samsung would do with the Samsung Note 3. Imagine our surprise when Sammy announced a brand new line of Galaxy phones called Mega. The Samsung Galaxy Mega will come in 5.8" and 6.3" models but isn't targetting the high end crowd. Based on the released specs, these will be mid level phones (performance wise). As an example, the 5.8" will come with a 189.
Pictures of some entry level iPhone parts
With the increased competition from low cost Android devices, most Wall Street analysts & tech pundits agree that Apple will have to eventually release a more affordable iPhone. Something Apple can sell in developing markets to fight off Google. Until now, this has been all speculation but Japanese Apple blog Macotakara has published pictures of a vibration motor not used in any iPhone. iLab Factory (the source of the photos) believes it is part of the upcoming cheaper iphone.
Samsung Galaxy SIV International faster than US version
We have seen a steady stream of Samsung Galaxy SIV performance benchmarks since it was released. All of the performance benchmarks have been performed with the US version. The US/Canadian version of the Samsung Galaxy SIV will come equipped with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 processor. The global version will come with the gargantuan Samsung Exynos 5 Octa (8 core) processor. We have been wondering how this Samsung processor would compare to the Qualcomm and now we know. SamMobile has performed the benchmark we have all been waiting for and it seems the Exynos 5 is significantly faster.
What is Metal As A Service (MaaS)
Just when you thought companies could create another blah blah as a service acronym, Canonical has thrown a couple of new letters at us: MaaS. MaaS stand for Metal As A Service and is a metal to server management service created by Canonical (the team behind Ubuntu). In the old days (aka last couple of years) companies went crazy buying the biggest meanest servers they could buy to do all they number crunching and big data analysis. The bigger the company the bigger and more expensive the servers they bought.
Desktop As A Service is cheaper and easier to implement
Having worked in the IT field for close to 20 years now, I am constantly surprised that the biggest pain points for most organizations are still the most basic IT components. One such pain point for companies large and small is desktop management. What should be a commodity easy to manage system is still proving to be a big challenge for most organization. I believe over the next 3-5 years, we will see a huge uptake in Desktop As A Service (DAAS).
Google may buy WhatsApp
Digital Trends is reporting that Google is in talks with WhatsApp about a potential acquisition. It seems WhatsApp is pushing for a $1 billion valuation. WhatsApp is a private company and doesn’t share subscriber information but the industry believes they should have about 300 million active users. December 31 2012, they processed 18 billion messages. WhatsApp is one of the most popular platform agnostic messaging systems with deep penetration in Europe and Latin America. Why would WhatsApp consider selling? No one knows for sure but I believe it may be because of strong competition from Asian providers such as WeChat (China) and Kakao Talk (Korea).
Free app to clean junk files from your Android device
I am an iPhone user playing with Android and was surprised when I learned I have to “maintain” my Android devices. One of the main maintenance tasks I do on Windows machines that I also have to do on my Android tablet is “getting rid of junk files”. These files consume precious storage space you definitely want to reclaim. After testing over 20 different apps, I have finally settles on a free software called Clean Master. This app cleans application cache files, orphaned files after uninstalling apps and deletes app histories.
Gunnar Optiks computer glasses Review
Knowledge workers and serious gamers will tell you starring at a bright screen for hours at a time takes its toll (eye strain, headaches, etc.) If you work in an office environment will little natural light and lots of white artificial light then the situation becomes even worse. About 2 months ago, I noticed that my eyes were dry, I was getting more frequent head aches and generally felt worse from wear after spending most of the day starring at a screen.
Outlook coming to Surface RT
Like it or hate it, the Microsoft Surface RT tablet is an original creation forcing us to think differently about the tablet market. As good as some think it is, most users agree it is missing one main tool, Microsoft Outlook. It seems Microsoft may have heard your complaints and may be preparing to release Outlook for Surface RT (according to the Supersite for Windows). The article says a bug in the ARM chipset (the tablets brain) may have caused the delay in the release.
Apple gaining momentum against Android
comScore has published it’s smartphone Subscriber Market Share statistics and it looks like Apple my be heading higher while Android takes a little dip. Google’s dark night (aka Android) dropped 2% in the latest period (51.7%) while Apple’s IOS gained 3.9% (38.9%). Microsoft and Blackberry both lost ground and it’s not even worth mentioning. I think the big test for Apple will be the summer release of IOS 7 and the next iPhone (the iPhone 5s?). If they manage to deliver a compelling product then I think they may manage to win back a big chunk of the market.
Chrome to start using Blink soon
I previously wrote that Google will be using its own rendering engine called Blink "soon". Now we learn that this wi be part of the stable Chrome release of version 28 (gracing us in about 10 weeks). Can't wait to test drive it and see how it performs.
What's new in Google Chrome version 27 beta?
Like most tech savvy computer users, my browser of choice [in the pre-Chrome days] was Firefox. It was the most stable and secure browser around (compared to Internet Explorer, Opera, etc). We all love Chrome because it is a fast browser, has a clean uncluttered interface and is constantly updated. We recently received the stable version of Chrome version 26 and now adventurous users can start playing with the beta version of Chrome version 27. After all the hoopla about Google changing Chrome’s rendering engine to its new in-house Blink product, you may have thought that version 27 may have finally implemented it.
Homeless man wins $50,000 from lotto
Dennis Mahurin. (CINewsNow) Dennis Mahurin has been homeless since 1978, living in a tent and happy about it. He recently won $50,000 from an instant win scratch off lottery but says he doesn’t want to change his lifestyle. Instead of “hording” all the money for himself, he wants to continue being homeless and share his good fortune with other homeless friends. He wants to spread most of his winnings ($35,000 after taxes) in chunks of $100 with his friends.
Government can't intercept Apple's iMessage
It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Apple is very secretive about how its technologies are designed. Case in point, we all knew iMessage had some type of encryption Now we learn that the security is so well designed that even the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) isn’t able to intercept iMessages [according to CNET at least]. This is great news for privacy advocates but a worry for law enforcement.
Test Blackberry Z10 from the comfort of your browser
Interesting in testing out the Blackberry Z10 but don’t know where to take it for a test drive? Blackberry wants to make this easier and has created a special site you access via your IOS or Android browser which replicates some to the key Blackberry Z10 functionality. It is an interesting walk through of some of the key gestures, multitasking functionality, shows the Blackberry hub, BBM and time shift. It isn’t a full emulator but it is enough for you to decide if it is interesting enough to drive to your local mobile phone shop.