March 2011

Skooba Design Launches Harmony Women’s Bag Collection

Skooba Design makes some great bags for carrying your gear. Actually, that’s not quite right. They make great bags for carrying just about anything you need to carry with you. And now there is a whole new way that Skooba is making it possible for women to carry their stuff in style! Skooba’s new Harmony collection “blend the look, fashion and quality of a high-end tote or handbag with the capacity and protection of a laptop bag”. Sure they are designed with laptops in mind but they will work well for just about anything you need to take with you….

Editorials

In the Sea of Sameness- Sony Seeks to Swim to the Top

The consumer electronics world is a “sea of sameness”, and that’s not a good thing if you are an electronics company. “Sea of sameness” is the term that was used numerous times during a private briefing with the number of Sony’s executives. The issue is this: You walk into a box store such as Best Buy, and you go to the back of the store. There on the wall you find high-definition television, after high-definition television, after high-definition television. They all look pretty much the same, and they all pretty much have the same price points. Some are a little…

eBooks, Editorials

Is Apple Going to Boot eBook Apps? My Conspiracy Theory…

I might be seeing conspiracies where there aren’t any, but I think I see a pattern in many business decisions going on in the eBook market lately. We’re all sitting on the edge of our seats waiting for the outcome of the in-app purchasing drama, and so far no one’s (overtly) talking. But reading between the lines tells a very different story… 1) Apple can’t be happy with how iBooks has performed so far. 100 million books downloads is an empty number, especially since everyone who downloads iBooks gets one download to go with it. With a very low number…

News

Nanodots Adds Even More Fun to the Cool Magnetic Dots of Fun

Nanodots are fun all by themselves. I love playing with these. It’s almost relaxing. It’s hard to believe that they have figured out yet another way to make them fun with a new product that makes it more fun to build with Nanodots. The Nanopad with FeWeave technology is a nice pad to use when you are building with Nanodots that also let’s you play a game with your Nanodots. Available in 16 inch for $19.99 and 26 inch for $29.99. For more on the Nanopad, head over to the product page on thenanodots.com. They are expected to show up…

Gear Bits

Runners World Interviews Robot Marathon Champ!

You may or may not have followed the robot marathon that went on in Japan, but over at Runners World, they took it very seriously. After all, if we’re going to be racing robots soon, it’s important to stay on top of the competition! I followed it too, and have to say I was pretty thrilled to see that robots are slower than me. I’m not that slow, but I’m solidly middle of the pack, and have had a few smaller races where my goal was “don’t be last”. Now I know I just need to convince a robot to…

Music Diary

Music Diary Songs of Note: Lady Day & Prez are ‘Fine and Mellow’

Billie Holiday is famous for two things: her amazing vocal talents, and her tragic downward spiral due to drugs and alcohol. Lester Young was a famous swing-era tenor saxophone player who never quite adapted to the new bebop and other post-war jazz stylings, yet had his best commercial successes in the late 1940’s before beginning his own alcohol fueled spiral in the 50’s. Billie & Lester began working together in 1939 and made a series of wonderful recordings together before all recording was stopped for a number of reasons for a few years. Those records are at the pinnacle of…

Gear Bits

The Swingline Stack-and-Shred Has Arrived!

Not that you needed any further proof that I was a dork, I mean geek, but I found myself unnaturally excited when FedEx dropped off this package earlier today. Inside is the SwingLine Stack & Shred, a crosscut shredder that allows you to feed up to 100 sheets of paper at a time by lifting the lid on the front and laying the items to shred inside the tray. Stack, Shut and Go. The Swingline Stack-and-Shred technology is built for busy executives, small and home office users and anyone who wants an easy and efficient way to personally shred. It…

Gear Bits

GD Quickie: Charlie Sheen Quotes As New Yorker Cartoons

My favorite thing about the Oscars on Sunday was the auto-tune mashup they did of Harry Potter and other films. At the same time, the last couple of days of Charlie Sheen talking to anyone with a microphone and/or camera and airtime has been much more entertaining than the soporific dirge of the Oscar show. I have no interest in discussing any of the specifics, but have found it simply amazing and hilarious the things he has said in such a short time! Today BuzzFeed featured a string of New York Times cartoons redone with Charlie Sheen Quotes as the…

News

SPICE: 40 Years of Open-Source, Circuit Simulation Goodness

If you ever designed a circuit you used SPICE … or you never really designed a circuit. When we think ‘open source’ we think Linux or Android or some other recent operating system endeavors. But imagine for a second that not just these systems but the hardware used to run them is all derived from circuits designed and analysed using an open source program created as a student project back in 1969! Here is a quick summary showing why SPICE is so important to electrical engineers, which is inscribed on a plaque at UC Berkeley’s Corey Hall which was dedicated…

Reviews

Android Mobile Phone Review: T-Mobile MyTouch 4G

I have wanted to like Android for quite some time. I really did. I kept trying device after device hoping that the next device would be “the one”. Sadly, that never seemed to happen. Even with those devices that I initially liked I found myself growing tired of both the device and the operating system within a relatively short period of time. As a result, the Android handsets I purchased ended up on eBay within a relatively short period, and those that I had received as loaner review units went back without any remorse on my part. Yes, I wanted…

News, Vehicles & Gear

CNN and Cadillac Introduce ‘Cadillac Business Unusual’

Innovation can lead to great things. That is the concept behind a new series from CNN and Cadillac called “Cadillac Business Unusual” that debuted Feb. 28. Fearlessly individual.?Unfazed by risk.?Relentlessly Optimistic. Cadillac salutes business visionaries who are using their passion, ingenuity and drive to set new standards of success. Chris Hardwick hosts a road trip across America as he meets entrepreneurs who’ve turned bold dreams into business triumphs. Cadillac Business Unusual uncovers unique stories of entrepreneurial spirit, and the risk and passion that accompanies them. Host Chris Hardwick (Nerdist.com) also writes for Wired Magazine and acts for film and television….

eBooks

State of the eBook: Good News/Bad News

It’s that time again! There’s a whole slew of exciting and disappointing news in the ebook world, so let’s jump right in and take a look! The exciting news: -Asus is rumored to be releasing the EEE Note reader soon, for a very reasonable $200. The biggest thing about the EEE Note isn’t the ebook reading, but that it will include a Wacom digitizer for note-taking. Ebooks and digital textbooks have had an uphill battle in academics in large part due to the difficulty in taking notes while reading. No guarantees the EEE Note has cracked this, but the price…

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