iTablet

The Financial Times is reporting the trillionth rumor of the iTablet http://gizmodo.com/5323446/financial-times-confirms-apple-tablet-features-september-launch


I see a couple of concerns for me personally when it comes to this as an $800 device.

Typing—A 10” width screen is too big a keyboard to thumb type on. However, I can’t see the touch keyboard being easy to set fingers on and type normally as it is, well, touch and you would be pressing multiple keys all the time. And a stylus has got to be out of the question with all the money Apple has invested in capacitive touch. So that leaves me with the impression that if this becomes a true surfer, your emails are likely to be iPhone/Crackberry short.

Specs—Remember, this is an $800 Apple. Not an $800 Acer/Asus. That typically means higher build quality for similar specs and a higher price point. I can’t imagine that they will be able to get a dual core processor, a decent sized hard drive, livable RAM, and a long term battery in a machine that thin that also will have Apple’s beautifully machined aluminum body, glass screen, capacitive touch, etc. and still only charge $800 for it. For comparison, take a look at the iPod Touch 32gb (the iPhone is not a fair comparison as it is subsidized). As a product that shares a great deal of its components with the already subsidized iPhone, the touch is still $400 and that gets you a single core, mobile phone processor, less than a gig of RAM and a lot less component materials. On the other side of the mobile spectrum, we have the Macbook Air starting at $1500. That is essentially a dual core atom with decent specs for a netbook and a good gpu. Having said that, the Mac Mini is only $600 for a core 2 duo, so if they can pull that off with a screen for only $200 more, they really have something.

Function—What is this supposed to be? I get the impression that this is an attempt to define a new niche marketplace. Obviously, as the article states, there isn’t any way that Apple will pitch themselves as another tablet. Just like they didn’t pitch themselves as another mp3 player. My sense is that this will become very popular with the jetsetting crowd as it will be a great movie player, good book reader, and mediocre websurfer/emailer that will be marginally better than just pulling out your iPhone. And if the resolution is the netbook standard of 600 vertical pixels, I'm definitely out.

My guess? For $800, they will deliver a device with similar internal hardware specs as the AppleTV (GPU at least. I think the processor will have to be atom class or better to avoid angering the masses). The OS will be some variant of OSX obviously, though I am guessing a stripped down version close to what is used on the iPhone/iPod Touch. The device will likely run mobile apps to leverage the app store and will end up being a fanboi status symbol for jetsetters who don’t want the limitations of the kindle and the bulk of a laptop, but can’t abide windows/linux. (Speaking of Kindle, my iPhone works quite nicely for reading kindle books, so I can't see this being an important step in that direction either.)

I currently use a (now discontinued) HP2140 as my main computer. It is a slightly upgraded netbook that sports 2gb of RAM, and a 320gb HD in mods since I first got it. It is not a speed demon by any stretch of the imagination and it hates me when I fire up iTunes, but it runs Windows 7 nicely, it was running OSX for a bit, but I couldn't handle the keyboard issues after a while. It has a 1366*768 resolution and it definitely does 90% of what I spend my time on a computer doing with no hiccups whatsoever. When the Broadcomm Crystal HD chip becomes available in the promised expresscard version, I will have everything I need. I think I will wait and see what is actually delivered.

Two Buck Chuck

Is Trader Joe's turning snobby penny pinchers into winos? I begin to wonder. I love Trader Joes, and find that their food is very reasonably priced for what you get. However, I just can't pass up on a two dollar bottle of wine. And I don't feel guilty about drinking a bottle a night, because the cost is so low. My worry is that when all is said and done, I am still drinking a bottle of wine a night, which is not exactly going to cause my liver to jump up and down with joy.

Direct Marketrobbing III

Sephora jumped into her market research and spent the next two days eating rarely and only jumping up from her machine to relieve her caffeine tortured bladder. Sephora had always had an uncanny ability to really delve into an analysis mode. At first, she felt right at home with a lot of the geeks that shared her love of technocracy. But as she got older and dated more and more of them, she found that while many of them were very single minded about programming, the often lacked any kind of ambition. Too many of her boyfriends and even friends were content to go to work and be paid to surf the net and debug their programs. Sephora decided that this was not going to be the rest of her life and quit her short sleever.

After a few months of living off her stock options, Sephora started getting an itch to do something new and exciting. Originally she had planned on going over to the programmer's nefarious nemesis, marketing. After a few classes in the subject, she realized that most of marketing was analyzing research and too many companies ignored good research for gut instincts. So one evening Sephora logged on to her newspaper account and was in the process of choosing new content when she realized how much her paper said about who she was. After a short trip down possibility's lane, she realized that there was a whole lot of information that could be mined from direct content subscriptions.

A month later, Sephora made her first foray into thievery. Two months after that, she had made enough money to live for another year as she had spent the last six months. Soon, the trips to the Carribean and Europe and Asia had become exhorbitant and Sephora scaled back her operations and began looking to her future. Two million and she was out and retired. It wasn't a huge sum of money, but certainly enough to live like a queen for a number of years in the right economy. And Sephora was worried that she had hit enough neighborhoods across the country for piddies to start looking around and figure out that there was a common theme to the thefts. When that happened they would start to look for a gang or group of individuals, assuming that no one person would do that much travelling. Sooner or later, though, they would start narrowing their search and she would be in serious trouble. Better to be a memory before that came to pass.

Direct Marketrobbing II

Sephora checked her email after a bite to eat for dinner. One of the wonderful things about the global marketplace is the exposure to food from all over. Sephora's duck panang was as spicy as she had ever tasted and she loved every second of it. Her face was still flushed from the meal as she sat down and started perusing her email accounts. Some of last weeks auctions were turning out well, she noted. Still, she was thinking of leaving cameras alone from now on. The constant hype and increase in pixels was turning the market value of six month old cameras into little more than postage profit. Why settle for 20 megapixels when you could have a 35 megapixel camera at the same price as the 20 was six months ago? Unfortunately, most of Sephora's "supply chains" were yielding last year's models. Even Ru-bay leeches were starting to get snobby about megapixels. She would have to stick to processors and memory to keep the auctions as profitable as possible.

Sephora opened an email from a potential bidder. Hmm... Normally she stayed away from bidders that were requesting items, but it might be pretty easy to get ahold of the ten terabyte drives he was requesting. And she would make a nice chunk of change based on what he was willing to pay. Of course she would have to format them, load them with garbage and reformat to ensure that they were clean of her "supply chain's" data. Didn't want anyone figuring out where they came from and starting to draw conclusions. The nice thing was that she often learned a thing or two from the drives she did bother to take and it didn't hurt to copy all the latest games. Sephora emailed the bidder back with a promised "I'll see what I can do" and started pulling up some demographic sites to try and spot other cities and neighborhoods that would make good supply chains. The boring tedious part of the job was about to begin as she started her market research analysis.

Direct Marketrobbing

Sephora walked casually down the middle of main street suburbia. Didn't matter which burb, they were all the same. She walked with a purpose in the early morning before dawn. Newspapers. With news getting personal, Sephora had found her niche, technofencing. She stole and fenced technology goods with the best of them. Of course the best technocrats hadn't figured out the easy way to make a mark. After all, suburbia didn't exactly scream which white stucco look alike was the one that housed a technocrat. Of course for the hard core, there were the wireless cameras, the sound activated gates, etc. But they were also the hardest to break into. Sephora had learned long ago that to make it big, you went for the easiest to sell, the easiest to find and the largest quantities. Which is where the news came into play.

Since Reuters had quite selling news to companies and started buying up presses in the late 0's and early teens, they had revolutionized the news industry. Now everyone who was anyone got their news from the Reuters Reader. It had singlehandedly taken over as the only newspaper to have delivered to your doorstep. And the beauty of it was that it was truly your newspaper. Each topic was picked out specifically based on your profile and because of this, the ads were also directly suited to you. What a wonderful blend of marketing, technology and news. Reuters had quickly knocked down the biggies. Gannet, Knight-Ridder, theTimes co. didn't stand a chance when Reuters was able to tailor content to you, get it to your door before 6:00am and still give you access to all the news you wanted on your tv, your desktop, your PDA, your phone. Hell, the paper was just an already printed archive of the day for you.

So Sephora spent a weekend a month picking out a middle class burb to stalk and track. She stole a paper a street for a couple of weeks until she found enough targets that had good technocratic tendencies in their ads and news. Then on the final week of her patrol, she would hit the houses and take all the little goodies and have them on Ru-bay before the owners realized they had been robbed. She had a steady stream of clientelle that knew her to be reliable on the Russian auction site and usually had her stuff sold and shipped before most homeowners were fighting rush hour demons.

The thrill wasn't really in the aquisition, it was in the selling. Sephora knew that the Russian language barrier was enough to thwart most of the local piddies (PDs) and that they wouldn't think to look for fenced items in Russia. Sephora was more worried about constantly having to change shipping carriers and "send from" addresses than any real piddy finding out what she was up to. Some clerk somewhere might take notice of the amount of stuff leaving, alert a customs tool and it would all be over and she would be dealing with much smarter, much more resourcful g-men.

As Sephora's account drew closer and closer to her imposed two million mark, she pondered where to make the most of her retirement. Things could be quite good in Thailand. Cheap and luxurious. If her "supply chains" turned out to be profitable for the next two or three months, she would hit her mark and be on her way. The problem was finding a "retirement home" that was backwater enough to be cheap, but progressive enough to allow a woman to live well without having to wear nine yards of cloth to be seen in public. Perhaps Russia. A destabilized economy that would love to see someone who can spend. Still there was that horrid cold. Why couldn't Russia be located on the equator. All of Africa was out, if they weren't muslim extremists, they were trying to annihilate each other. No way was she headed for most of Europe. The dollar was too weak, and she needed to stretch hers for a couple of decades. Asia didn't jive with a liberated woman, so no go there. Maybe Australia. Not Sydney of course, too much money already there, but perhaps a jaunt over to rural New Zealand might be the trick. Liberated women, not too much technology, but not too little. That was it, she was bound for a land down under.

Sephora had her twenty or so marks figured out by 8:00am. The key was to hit them before lunch, but after the morning rush. That way you missed nosy school moms walking or driving back from dropping the kids off and were gone before the suitboys took their mistresses home for "lunch".

Any papers with feminine ads, diaper ads, toys, etc. were immediately trashed. Too many trophy wifes and mothers at home to take the chance on those. The ones to hit were rife with the latest gadget sales with dating advice colums. These were the geeks that made her rich. Great at making money as a software engineer, but inept socially, so they spend all their money on gadgets and their time at work.

Sephora put on her housewife costume and headed out. The great thing about house wives is that they all had this habit of carrying bags that would make Mary Poppins envious. Perfect for hiding small gadgets, motherboards, processors, etc. She put the floppy hat on her head that hid her face and was supposed to "save" her skin, pulled on the white baggy shorts that came down past the knees, and the Keds tennies and topped it off with the polo shirt. Not exactly the attire of a burglar, but that was the point wasn't it? She jumped into her rented late model cookie cutter and headed for burbia. Of course no one took notice of the champagne Hondyota Accamry or whatever it was. She hopped out at the end a street, looked like she was lost for a second, stared at addresses, then walked right up to her first mark. She rang the bell, waited, then jammed her tumbler into the lock and waited for a click.

Sephora walked right in, took stock of the living room and smiled. The black leather sofa had no coffee table in front of it, rather a game console with controllers snaking their tails all over the stained carpet. Two Mountain Dew bottles lay on the end tables where they were probably knocked over in a moment of geeky triumph by mighty pixel warriors. The beauty of technogeeks is that they were all the same. She scanned the walls and smiled at the posters of Anime women that all technogeeks worshipped. Requisite was some form of body armor, out of proportion racks, and of course, pig tails. These goddesses were almost universally worshipped in her target's homes. The DVDs were piled around the DVD player. Sephora was sure that if she looked behind the mainstream Anime, she would find Manga that served as geekporn.

She went upstairs and checked the spare room for the requisite computer room. Right where it should have been was a norwegian designed particle board desk, leather chair and top of the line superchip II machine. The walls were decked with the slightly more risque posters. The battle armor was in the background and the women were as scantily clad as possible. Of course there was the requisite school girl outfit that seemed ingrained in Japanese culture. In forty seconds, she had the board and chip with memory in her burb bag. Next went the digital camera, the video camera, the graphics card, the mini media player and the laptop. She was soon locking the door with her tumbler and headed back to the car. This was a particularly effective house. The only bummer about hitting in the day is that iPods, phones and PDAs were usually at work with the techies. Next house.

The next house was two streets over and other than layout, it was almost identical to the first. She was able to get in and out with the processor, board, memory, and a mini Raid setup. This guy was obviously a musician as well, so she had scored a sound studio worthy sound card. Normally the sound cards weren't worth much, but musicians dropped a fortune on theirs and they sold easily on Ru-bay. The next two were disappointments, as they were techies in their dreams. Sephora always hated hitting these, as their machines were usually outdated and they had none of the equipment but still appeared to want to stay up on the times. Usually they didn't work in the field, but were like children with their noses pressed to a toy store window. As the time approached 11:00am, Sephora decided it was time to head out of the burbs and back to the real world. Too many people would be heading home for lunch and as Ann Onymous as she looked right now, better safe than sorry.

To Be Continued...

London Calling

Suzanne is going to apply for Central St. Martins in London. If she gets in (I have faith, application is a formality) we will be looking at moving to London. I am pursuing British citizenship, and will become a dual citizen. This has some very cool benefits, for one, I will be eligible to work in the EU and GB. Also, it will certainly make travel outside the U.S. a lot easier as Brits are typically more accepted than Yanks. I am really looking forward to it. I have softened up my work to the idea, so they will not be greatly shocked. Perhaps my Master's degree will mean a bit more there as well and I will be a bit more recruited. One can hope.

A while back, I made a commitment to get in shape, to quit drinking coffee, to quit drinking alcohol, and to write every day. While I am still fat, I am not as fat, I dropped about 10% body fat (only 15% to go). I don't drink coffee anymore, and I write quite a bit more than I used to, so I am making progress. I still have my weaknesses, I spend too much time playing video games, I don't clean enough around the house, but I am definitely making progress.

Good Samaritan

So I did my good samaritin impersonation yesterday. I was just getting home from work when a black guy was walking by. I said hello as he passed and he greeted me in kind. As I was walking up to my apartment building, he turned and asked if I had a gas can by any chance. Interestingly enough, I bought a gas can on Saturday so that I could move one 0f my vehicles that had run out as I was parking it. I told him I did, took him to the gas station and back to his car and we put the gallon in his car. Unfortunately, the car still wouldn't start. So, do I get the Karma for the effort, or does it require success in order to be Karma worthy?

Portable Nuke Power

I loved this article. Can you imagine the implications for cheap power for even huge nations.

PORTABLE POWER PLANTS It's not easy giving away nuclear power stations these days. Lots of countries want them, especially developing nations. But for countries like the U.S. that possess the technology, giving the gift of atomic energy can be a nail-biting experience. There's infrastructure to design, build, transport, and assemble, radioactive fuel to supply and then collect once spent. And, of course, there are pesky customers like North Korea and Iran who sneak uranium and use it to build bombs. But now the U.S. Department of Energy has a solution to the world's power needs: a portable, tamperproof nuclear power plant. The unit--called SSTAR, or small, sealed, transportable, autonomous reactor--will consist of an outer cask, 15 meters high and 3 meters wide, containing all the mechanics and radioactive fuel needed to provide 30 years worth of electricity. A boat or truck drops the unit off, and then purchasers simply hook up a turbine and hit the 'on' switch. This may seem improbable, given the gargantuan size of current nuclear plants in America, but several key factors make it possible. Firstly, most developing countries where SSTAR would be used don't need a lot of power. The units will only generate about 100 megawatts--about one-tenth the output of an average full-size reactor--and a "mini" 10-megawatt version is also envisioned. Less output means smaller size; the 100 MW version would weigh about 500 tons, the 10 MW unit perhaps less then 200 tons. Another space-saving feature of the SSTAR is the use of liquid metal rather than water for cooling. Much of the infrastructure of permanent nuclear plants is composed of steam vessels and piping, and thus the lead-based design is more compact. The fact that SSTAR uses fewer components will also likely mean less maintenance over the reactor's lifespan. In fact, the DOE suggests that the reactors will be able to run for decades on their own, without need even for refueling. An SSTAR would be delivered with enough radioactive material inside to get a nuclear reaction started, and from there the reactors would actually make their own fuel through a process called "breeding". As uranium decays, some of the neutrons given off will convert more uranium into plutonium, which will in turn become new fuel for the reactor. Eliminating the need for refueling will also deter rogue individuals and nations from using SSTAR's nuclear material to make weapons of mass destruction. Theoretically, a host nation will never handle any uranium or plutonium, with this fuel remaining sealed inside the unit. When the fuel is spent, the reactor will simply be returned whole to America for recycling. And if inquisitive souls try to pry open the shell and get hold of plutonium? The SSTAR will transmit an alarm, via secure satellite radio, to its makers, informing them of the break-in. But isn't it dangerous giving nuclear devices to countries that don't have the expertise to respond to malfunctions? DOE says that, in fact, SSTAR will be inherently meltdown-proof. In the event of a hardware or control systems failure, the reactor will automatically shut down and cool itself by way of natural convection. Part of SSTAR's licensing process will involve tests in which various systems are deliberately made to fail, with the reactor being required to demonstrate a safe response. While the DOE believes it can have a prototype ready for 2015, the project still faces several technical and political challenges. There are questions as to what building materials can withstand 30 years of neutron bombardment, and also concerns about how to package and transport the spent reactors back to the U.S. In a recent New Scientist article, nuclear expert Michael Levi also pointed out that SSTAR's "intruder alert" system won't deter terrorists or rogue governments that "don't care about we-think" from stealing fuel out of reactors. By the time an alarm is received and a team dispatched to investigate, the plutonium could be long gone. There has also been speculation that by recovering spent reactors, America could end up being responsible for a pile of the world's nuclear waste. On the other hand, the handy power plants might be the cleanest and best energy solution for many ailing countries. For more info, read the DOE's proposal for portable nuclear energy at http://www.llnl.gov/str/JulAug04/Smith.html.

Glazed Apathetic Leash

Came across this line in a 10,000 Maniacs video the other day. Suddenly a spark went off inside me. I suffer from Glazed Apathetic Leash syndrome. I have a leash that I continually bind myself with. Apathy kills almost everything in the end and I keep binding my soul with it. I just don't care half the time because it is easier not to. And I glaze my bindings with that ease. Isn't it interesting how often we create our own bondage. Like little masochists, we take our lives and bind them in apathy then complain about how mundane they are. After a while, we don't even complain, we program apathy into our world. Whether the glazing on our leashes is the internet, or television, or movies, we slowly begin to pull our choker chain tighter until we sit in an old folks home with a pulse, but not heart, a body, but no soul.

7-Foot Robot Used in Black Sea Expedition

Found this fascinating. A robot with pressure sensitivity, a possible link to Noah, and an underwater mystery. Who could ask for anything more? How long before we are using robots to delve the depths of the Marianas Trench, etc to truly know our world.

Yahoo! News - 7-Foot Robot Used in Black Sea Expedition