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$100 iPod Crank

]]> patents by Creative Labs and providing a recharge interface that works even when the iPod battery completely fails.

MIT $100 Laptop Thoughts

We haven't talked about the MIT $100 laptop. This laptop is interesting technically, but much more interesting from a social perspective. Read on for my thoughts, and please comment with yours.

]]> sour grapes article from the Chairman of Intel on the laptop is pretty rich, given that it contains an AMD chip and undercuts the large profits Intel has made with premium computers, and especially their dominance in the laptop arena. It's frustrating that that basic message of the article is: sure you can probably give people a $100 laptop, but what you really need is a bad ass Centrino® machine with "full desktop capability". Also, derogatorily calling them "gadgets" is pretty funny considering how many "handheld gadgets" including most PocketPCs contain Intel Xscale chips. We won't even get into his comments about how no one will run apps from "a server in the sky" (Hello - Web 2.0? Microsoft Live services, Google apps, Yahoo apps...)

At least Steve Jobs combined his desire for increased market share with some altruism by offering OS X for free on each laptop. Initially I thought the decision to reject the offer was a bad one. But I do feel that a fully open source software solution is the right one for the goals of the project. Maybe they'll also make the hardware "open source" and all the components license free...

Anyway... the article did get me thinking about these laptop a little more. The goal seems a bit lofty given the current state of technology, but it should be lofty if it's going to change the world. I actually have a signed copy of Being Digital and this guy thinks big. My categorized thoughts:

Technical

The specs look fine to run web based applications, although I'm a little worried that browsers (especially FireFox) are becoming a bit too bloated for this speed processor.
The specifications don't specify if it's 1GB of storage, or 1GB of ram. I'm guessing storage, because that seems like a lot of ram, and you'd need 1GB of storage just to hold a standard Linux OS and applications.
The hand crank is awesome.
The screen technology is a great idea if it can be developed cheaply.
The device is actually quite small. The project site shows the keyboard scale with a child's hands, and it's a tight fit.
Obviously Web based apps require connectivity and that will be tricky for where these devices are to be deployed. It's sort of a chicken and egg problem really, so I don't really see a problem with the laptops coming first.
A reliable, rugged keyboard may be difficult to do for so cheap.
I'm not sure where all the software and support will come from. This device will have to be tested incredibly well, and support remote upgrading of all software components. Also, unless the team knows of some web applications that I don't, it will take a while to build the online software infrastructure. Google is on the board of directors though... hmmm.
One huge benefit of a "network computer" is that the required software maintenance is much lower than a standard computer. Remote applications can magically have new features, and Web based apps aren't as risky virus and spyware-wise.
Web based applications would store all data on servers, eliminating backup and equipment failure problems. All data (emails, etc) would be proxied through a provider that could prevent the laptops from becoming millions of zombie spambots.
They have not mentioned it at all, but I actually see a use for a Trusted Computing Module on the device. This basically allows some level of access to the device that the actual owner cannot get. Typically this is to enforce DRM rules, but in this case, it could be used to prevent virus and spyware from getting into the core of the system. A special reset switch could be used to literally hard reset the device to bootstrap a clean copy of the OS off the network. This functionality could also be used as a kill switch for the laptop, essentially preventing the laptop from operating on the network if it was reported stolen.
This is basically the device I want to take when I go traveling. I really don't need much more than email and web (maybe IM and VoIP). The ability to download and touch up images from a digital camera is nice too. That's about it, except maybe a hand-crank so I don't have to worry about finding plugs :-) I've also read reports that this device will work on cell phone networks as well.
Some articles have claimed that people outside the target users will be able to buy the laptop for $200. I don't know the intention of this pricing, but I love the idea of (relatively) wealthy users subsidizing the laptop for others. I think even $300 would work - you get one, and buy 2 for people who couldn't afford them.
How much would Coke subsidize these laptops if their logo was on the back? How about just the desktop background? I joke because:
1. It's ridiculous that carbonated sugar water with artificial stimulant should even be sold in countries so rife with debt, poverty, malnutrition and widespread medical need.
2. It's funny because it's true. It's totally possible a government would use this method to reduce the laptop costs, and it's almost a certainty that the online services will be supported by ads.

Social

The most important impact of the laptop to me isn't in the classroom. It's in the world. Children who never will have the chance to travel will be able to broaden their understanding of the world. Cross cultural education is the most important thing we can do to ease the conflict between people as the world grows together. The increasing amount of damage one person can cause, combined with the growing trend towards fundamentalism must be addressed.
Put another way: it's just as important for a kid in Egypt to know what Jenny in New Jersey ate for breakfast this morning, as it is to read a paragraph of Shakespeare. Understanding and relating to the world at a personal level is absolutely critical.
Programs such as GenYES provide sustainable methods for students and teachers to work together to create curriculum that utilizes computers in the schools, and a forum to share these lesson plans and classes with other schools across the world.
Initiatives like MIT Open Courseware and, uh, the Web are obviously great resources for higher learning.
A Trusted Computing type DRM core on the chip could provide a great benefit if used properly. Google, Amazon and others are scanning in books en-masse. Apple and others have vast online libraries of digital audio and video. If this content could be provided for free only to users of these laptops, it would not impact the bottom line of these companies and provide an incredible service to people who can't afford the content. The primary reason (besides greed) pharmaceutical companies don't provide cheap versions of drugs to 3rd world countries is because it would create a massive black market and impact profits back home (which are to a great extent plowed back into R&D for developing new drugs). Imagine if you could target free drugs only people who could not pay for your drugs anyway. Providing digital content in this way is not as powerful, but much more technically feasible. I'm sure at least U2 would make all their albums available :-)

Overall, I'm so glad to see something like this that's not motivated by greed. I think that content developers and service providers will join the project or be left behind. Imagine, as an open (or closed) source developer, being able to write a Web service that could instantly be deployed to MILLIONS of users. None would pay to use it. Will people still develop these services? You bet. And corporations will rush to scale the hosting and bandwidth if for no other reason than to advertise to an entirely new market.

It may seem a bit techno-centric, wasteful, or mis-prioritized to spend $100 per kid on a laptop when you can keep another alive with food for a couple months, or buy (overpriced) AIDS drugs for those in need. But consider that the biggest threat to world peace now (and probably always) is a lack of understanding and a common base of reference. We can end extreme poverty in Africa, curable diseases can be stopped, and a global community of respect and communication can be created.

Firefox 1.5

I downloaded and installed Firefox 1.5. It's pretty much the same for me. I'm mainly just hoping it solves the memory leak issues. I was a bit worried about losing all my tabs or having incompatible extensions. Luckily, it all worked out. The main extension that wasn't supported was SessionSaver, but I found a link for an updated version of it - sessionsaver-02-dev. SessionSaver automatically remembers the tabs you have open in your browser, so you can close it at any time and when you open it again, all your tabs will pop up (although they'll be reloaded, clearing out any form fields you've entered, and also refreshing any news pages you're on). I was really amazed that after installing the updated SessionSaver, it remembered all my tabs from the previous install! Pretty painless upgrade.

The other extension I have that didn't update was FeedView, which is just a pretty RSS formatter that I don't really need anyway because of the Sage reader extension. Plus I heard FeedView was going to be part of Firefox eventually.

The other extensions I have that do continue to work are: Adblock, IEView, Coralize, Tabbrowser Preferences and Sage.

The only two obvious changes to Firefox from the previous 1.x versions are things I don't like. The layout of the Firefox options dialog has all the categories along the top, rather than on the side. I don't know what UI model this comes from, but it looks pretty horrible to me. To top that, there are multiple tabs under each category. Firefox is only one step away from the nasty configuration UI in Outlook 2003. The other change is that the little RSS broadcast icon is no longer in the bottom bar, but rather in the address bar now. I guess that's OK, but I can't figure out how to choose which feed format I want now. It used to be a menu that let you pick between ATOM, RSS 1 and RSS 2 for example if the sites supported it. Now it just tries to create a bookmark directly. Seems like a step back.

There are, of course other updates to the browser but none that I noticed immedately. I suppose the new "ctrl-shift-del" to remove all personal data is a nice touch after browsing on public computers. It's the kind of privacy touch that MS really should feel more responsible for, given their market position.

Basically, I'm just glad the install went smoothly. Besides that - I don't notice much difference, although I'm secretly hoping that this browser has changes under the hood that make it faster and less of a memory pig-dog.

Predictable Mini Rumors

Well it is that time of year again for more Apple rumors in advance of Macworld Expo. This one is pretty much the exact consolidated Mac mini wish list that was on like a zillion blogs the day the original mini was announced. See Think Secret.

Lets review shall we (before Cringley gets wind of this and somehow bends it into the worlds greatest conspiracy to take over, blah blah blah):

Intel processor (six months sooner than expected)
Front Row 2.0 (more goodies and assuming built in IR for remote)
tuner and DVR functionality
Built in iPod dock
Possibly larger

So is Think Secret right again? (For that matter, are they just Apples stealth marketing arm keeping up the buzz?) Or is it another I wish list? A larger, faster drive and a tuner card would be required adding cost and size. One thing though, if they did manage to pull of a Media Center PC style box for under 800 I think it would really give MS a run for the money. Ahh, how cool would it be if you could actually run MS MCE on it? Hmm. Back to reality. I predict that the next mini will certainly have Front Row 1.x and the IR port on it. But I doubt Apple is ready for full MCE functionality with tuner.

Obligatory Xbox 360 Post

Well this is the week. I don't have much to say on the topic, just adding to the 360 blogging noise.

You can check BestBuy inventories here. 200 premium 360's for launch at the bellevue store. I predict that there will be more than that number who leave the store disappointed after they sell out Tuesday morning.

Intel iBook Rumor

There have been two rumors lately that Apple will announce the Intel Mac this January at MacWorld. Forbes thinks it will be a Mac Mini. ThinkSecret thinks it will be an iBook.

Interesting that they both feel it will be a consumer based mac. This is probably a good bet. Also, January seems feasible. Apple often announces things that are not available for a couple months, and we know that OS X on Intel is at least far enough along to demo. ThinkSecret quotes someone as saying Apple will reduce the iBook prices to around $699 to "be competitive at the entry level." Ridiculous. iPod competes with much cheaper players and still does fine. I'd expect the new laptop to be around $999. In fact, I've commented before that Apple's current laptop prices are much more on par with the market than their desktop prices, which makes mac/windows laptops a great market for them to enter into.

ThinkSecret also mentions the possibility of dual-core mobile Yonah processors. Initially I thought that dual core would be nice, but suck too much power. But why couldn't you turn one core off? How cool would that be to run one core when mobile, and kick the other core on when plugged in. Regardless of what Apple does, I'm looking forward to seeing if this is the direction of laptops in general.

Running an OS per core is also be pretty interesting. You could feasibly run windows/mac in a window a'la VirtualPC, at almost full speed. Would be great for mobile development. I wonder how the virtualization goes about arbitrating the shared peripherals like ethernet.

All I can say is these apple laptops better OFFICIALLY run Windows as well, or they won't grow the market much. Microsoft is beatable now purely on tech (as we've seen with Google) If Windows people can buy a cool computer to match their iPod - they'll definitely boot into Mac to see what it's like. And since Apple bundles a lot more software than MS is allowed to now - they just might end up staying in OS X.

Mezzo UI

Well it has been a while since I blogged about alternate operating systems and UI. In fact I think I've been mostly silent on the topic since I started working on this little project.

Well my curiosity overcame me. I�ve been taking a look at the Mezzo UI Concept by Jason Spisak. After years of using basically every OS out there, he decided to see if he could design something easier to use. The Mezzo concept is what he came up with. It is aimed at the novice user, and looks to be about as easy to use as anything I�ve seen. The Greypaper is a good read (warning pdf file link). Some of his personal pet peeves are scrolling, nested menus, and the file manager type metaphor. There are a few little nits I have with his concept, but overall it does seem quite elegant.

There are at least two OS projects currently underway that are implementing this UI. JDistro has a �mezzo� mode. (JDistro is a pure Java based desktop). And Jason�s own project Symphony OS, operated with Ryan Quinn. Symphony is a Linux distro implementing the Mezzo UI. I don�t see any reason someone couldn�t implement a Mezzo shell on top of Windows � but I don�t see any projects doing this yet.

It might be fun to play with Symphony to see if the UI concept holds up to the real world use test. Sometimes ideas that sound good in theory fall flat in practice. Alas, however, my curiosity is currently not strong enough to overcome my serious lack of time.

Some other Mezzo references:
Usernomics
Tuxmachines
Osnews
Neowin

FolderShare

Recently Microsoft bought foldershare. The assumed goal is to bulk up the folder sharing capabilities of the upcoming Live Messenger. They have now decided to make FolderShare free.

Sony Who?

As if Sony hasn't been acting dumb enough with the recent DRM root kit nonsense. Now they appear to have applied for a patent that will lock a video game to the first console that plays it. This is an attempt to destroy the pre-owned gaming market. There is not specific mention of the PS3 in the patent, but boy I hope they put it in. If that happens the PS3 will be dead from the starting gate. He's dead Jim.

Just another example of how these guys don't get it. This one has nothing to do with controlling piracy - just another example of trying to screw their actual paying customers. (Disclaimer: the timing of this revelation seems a bit fishy, so I won't be too surprised if it turns out to be a hoax).

Furrygoat and USB Keychains

Furrygoat muses on the future of USB keychains. He mentions some strategies for running XP from USB via VM images. This could be done with various VM products including VM Player, which we have mentioned previously.

He has also championed the idea of 'portable CE'. This is running CE apps from a USB keychain via emulation.

There are a lot of resources floating around the web on how to get various apps (like Firefox) to run directly from flash. Many apps however don't lend them selves to this. More work will go on however as this idea becomes more popular. I find the prospect of carrying your favorite data and apps around with you very appealing. Another thing that would be nice would be for all your 'state' to be with you as well. This would be OS and app preferences, desktop settings etc. We are a little bit further away on this one.

Lastly a plug for a related idea that I've been hearing from some of my friends; In the wake of the recent hurricanes and other natural disasters, many people have found themselves not only without their homes and possessions, but without their important identity documents like birth certificates, social security cards, etc. The proposed solution is to scan these documents and store a copy via CD in a safe deposit box or with relatives. A variation is to keep them with you at all times on a USB keychain. I know a few people that do this, including photos of their family members for identification purposes. Of course security of this information would be a concern. To prevent identity theft I would strongly recommend encrypting this personal data somehow.

Trade instead of buy?

Here is something different. It gives the term peer to peer a whole new meaning. Peerflix is an online DVD service that allows you to trade DVDs rather than rent them. The idea is that you list the DVDs you have that you are willing to trade, and the ones that you want and they facilitate the transfer for .99 a trade (mailing envelope included). For each movie you trade out you earn �peerbux� toward incoming movies. You can even buy peerbux if you want to score up more movies than you trade. Their site is setup a lot like netflix. You enter your trading library using the UPC code on the back of the case. Pretty easy.

I�m not sure I would ever use something like this however. I tend to only purchase DVDs that I really, really want to keep, it�s netflix for everything else. But perhaps there are others out there with large collections that are willing to part with flicks they are tired of. Someone out there seems to think so, they just got $8M in funding. What is your opinion? Would you use something like this?

Windows Live

I'm just passing along something I read here, I can't confirm any of this.
It look like MS is working on some new stuff called Windows Live. At first glace it looks like it is using start.com technology. There are some cools things coming from the article; advanced IM features, personalized home page with RSS feeds and sidebar gadgets, new email and more. There is a Live favorites feature I'm interested in. You can see some of the stuff they have planed here.

Watching The Watchers

Check out this article from the excellent SysInternals site on how legitimate companies like Sony install rootkits on your PCs.

When you look at all the effort Mark spent to diagnose and remove the problem, it's no wonder why so many PCs are infected and can't be fixed. There are rootkits that attach themselves to your MBR (master boot record), so even wiping the drive won't make them go away. Hopefully Vista will prevent this sort of abuse from going on, even from companies like Sony.

A book on Windows Rootkits.

Hey, wanna try some iTunes?

That crazy Apple is always trying to trick you into installing iTunes. It reminds me of those car salesmen who are always pushing the undercoating. Uhhh, I just don�t want it, ok?

Last week I installed the new QuickTime because I wanted to view an H264 clip. I tip toed around all the sharp jagged rocks and found the link to install it without the bundled ITunes. I thought I was safe. Now when I start QuickTime I get this start page with ads, music links and trailers and stuff. It reminds me of that annoying MSN start page that messenger defaults to � yuck. Anyway I digress. So today I bring it up and I click on a trailer for a movie I�m interested in� and instead of the movie a web page pops up that reads in large print:

You Need iTunes.
The link you just clicked requires the free iTues jukebox software. �

And then it happily offers to install it for me.

I don�t even want ITunes, and I certainly don�t NEED it. Nothing against it, I�m just happy with my current long distance carrier, err, music solution, thank you very much. I don�t want yet another app competing for ownership of my media file associations � gosh! Besides why would I need iTunes to play a QuickTime movie trailer? They even said �requires� not just �we recommend.� Even as aggravated as this makes me, I still want to see the trailer. So I head over to www.apple.com/trailer and click on the one I want and wouldn�t you know it, it plays just fine in plain ole QuickTime. No iTunes required. Shame on you Apple for trying to trick us.

Fool me twice...

Well my second hitachi microdrive just died today. This one made it less than 6 months. As George pointed out after the death of my last microdrive (read comments), the actual usage specs on these things are pitiful.

]]> In my opinion these things are not actually good for anything but taking occasional photos in a digicam (despite Hitachi's hip claims to the contrary). Unfortunately I didn�t discover the usage rating fine print until after I had purchased my second drive. I changed most of my usage habits though in an attempt to extend its life. I only used players that used large buffers so the drive could spin down. I didn�t use it for any of my high volume content like audio books. In fact my total music use was way down over this period. The one thing that was constant was that I never removed it from my Ipaq. So that means it set in the dock at work with power applied for 8 hours a day. I mean the whole point of adding a ton of storage is that I always have it with me. Why would I remove it, only to have it get lost. These things are supposed to power down on inactivity after all.

The drive had become more and more erratic over the last month � sometimes hanging up my pocket pc for 30 seconds at a time, even though I wasn�t trying to access the drive. The final kiss of death came today when I decided to watch a full length mp4 movie on it. I wanted to try out the new mp4 video codec that comes with Nero 7.0 ultra so I encoded up a flick that�s been kicking around my place for months waiting to be watched. By the way the new betaplayer replacement: �The core pocket media player� works very sweet. It plays nearly everything including quicktime style .mp4 files with aac audio (if you know where to get the aac plug-in that is ;) ). I watched the movie over 4 sessions, the longest being about 45 minutes. The drive stuttered and stalled a few times but made it to the end. But later when I popped the drive in my flash reader to delete the movie it was game over - hello click of death.

For kicks checkout Hitachi�s hard drive hip hop; The hard drive is the new bling. Maybe it�s not a click of death after all, maybe it�s just pumping out a cool groove track and I�m just to square get it.