When Real Life and Second Life Collide

Seems in the new techno-world of the 21st century, fidelity isn't just limited to the real world...

Case in point, a British couple are divorcing after 3 years of marriage when the wife repeatedly caught her husband's Second Life avatar having sex with various women (including prostitutes).

My question... in the divorce settlement, who gets the computer?

http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSTRE4AD39U20081114?feedType=nl&feedName=ustechnology&sp=true

Speaking of Podcasts...

I recently stumbled across a new podcast from the Quick and Dirty Now group. Along with shows about grammar (Grammar Girl), personal manners (Modern Manners Guy), and even Second Life (Traveling Avatar), the newest podcast offers great tips and thoughts about one aspect of life (personal and professional) that cause may people a lot of anxiety: Public Speaking.

Take a listen to The Public Speaker... hope you get something out of it (I know I have).

Steve Jobs - Still Alive After All These Years

Contrary to the report, Steve Jobs is not dead!

You can now return to listening to music on your iPod...

Throttled For Throttling...

Seems Comcast got into a little bit of trouble recently with the FCC. Turns out they were arbitrarily disconnecting high-band with BitTorrent uses for no legitimate reason.

They claim they were only trying to "keep the pipes open" for the majority of users. First, this seems to be a violation of terms of service, since they never informed customers that such a practice was in place. Unfortunately, the FCC did not hand down a fine with there order, but it does set a precedent against future such actions.

Now I'll put my conspiracy cap on and wonder... why target just BitTorrent? Because it's the belief that the majority of torrent traffic is illegal music and movies? But at no point did Comcast try to determine if the torrents where transmitting legal or illegal content. Either way, I'm sure the RIAA and MPAA would be giddy to see BitTorrent rendered a useless Internet tool with these heavy handed approaches.

For more details: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/29/AR2008072902077.html?wpisrc=newsletter

For All the Scrabulous Fans Out There

From the Washington Post:

A Few Cross Words

Updated: Seems you can't keep a good game down... Wordscraper is a retooled version of Scrabulous, that is hopefully different enough to keep the wolves at bay.

A Bit of Tech Humor

Here's one you may have seen before, but it's certainly funny enough for a second viewing.

The Web Site Is Down

Note: This is NSFW (you've been warned)

New Music, New Outlet

Years ago (more than I like to admit), I remember when Guns N' Roses released their landmark albums Use Your Illusion 1 & 2. There was a huge fanfare over the whole thing, with record stores opening around midnight so die-hard fans could get the first copies on CD and tape.

Now here we are, 17 years later and news of a new Guns song being released made me think about how much has changed. Music cassettes are virtually gone, with CDs close behind. Many brick and mortar music stores are gone, or diversified to include DVDs and games. Real hardcore fans have heard a bunch of leaked tracks from Guns thanks to YouTube and file sharing.

And now news that their next official release is actually part of a video game... Rock Band 2, to be exact. I'm not sure all of this is what Axel meant when he sang "welcome to the jungle" or "take me down to paradise city", but it's definitely a whole new world.

Not as Many People Going Wii

Recent figures show the Wii's Japan lead on PS3 falling from a 6-to-1 lead, to a 1.7 -to-1 lead in recent months, seems like PS3 is finally putting out enough titles to attract the hardcore gamers that are the base of their market. The Wii on the other hand is more for the "casual gamer" or a second system (to PS3 or Xbox).

While things may be looking up for Playstation, the bigger question is how did you get in to this situation in the first place? And how embarrassing is it to be routinely beat by Wii Sports...

Starbucks' Corporate Skinny Latte

The days of a Starbucks on every corner (literally) may be coming to an end... with the closing of some 600 locations, seems like the economy is not fully in swing with a $4 cup of coffee, especially when said cup of coffee is actually cheaper than a gallon of gas, or should I say the gallon of gas is MORE expensive than a Starbucks coffee! And if Starbucks is having this much trouble, I wounder how the also-rans like Caribou Coffee are doing...

(I know this not a tech-related story, except when you calculate the ratio of the amount of code written to the amount of Starbucks coffee consumed)

This Day in Geek...

What a strange day yesterday turned out to be. I came across the following two articles, both filed yesterday, both tech-related, and worlds apart...

In this corner, we have news concerning Hans Reiser (the murder defendant who used the "geek defense") leading police to the body of his dead wife, while all the way over here, new words in the Merriam-Webster dictionary based on geek culture.

Seems like "geek" is everywhere from TV and movies, music, books and fashion, and, as the above shows, just about anywhere else nowadays!

Watching YouTube Watch You...

Looks like Viacom is getting ready to attack YouTube once again for copyrighted material on the site, or is this just another battle in their drawn out war?

Now, it seems that YouTube viewers (you and me both) may be part of the collateral damage. With a judges ruling to turn over data records, people's viewing habits could be compromised, which it turns out is actually against the law.

The records are only tied to an IP address (and not more detailed user data), which the judge found sufficiently protected users. Clearly he didn't read any coverage of AOL releasing "anonymous" search data a while back.

This time around, it looks like YouTube, Viacom, and a little assistance from the EFF, are looking to insure viewing data can't be reverse engineered to discover a user. With over 12 terabytes of log data, I'm pretty sure one or two clever people could find a few needles in that haystack.

For more on the story, check out the original article here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/03/AR2008070302359_2.html?wpisrc=newsletter&sid=ST2008070304015&pos=

Apple Storm

With the upcoming WWDC, everyone is expecting Apple to announce at least the 3G iPhone that's been talked about since the original iPhone was released without it.

What I find impressive is the amount of press Apple gets for free. Just recently I've heard reports of "mysterious" shipments from oversees for Apple and people trying to decipher the images on the WWDC banners that someone was lucky enough to get pictures of.

While neither news item was really informative, the shear fact that anything uncovered seems noteworthy is staggering. Hundreds of thousands of companies would love half the free press that Apple gets.

Why is everyone (including me) so Apple obsessed?

Second Kid Life?

Seems everyone is getting into social sites and virtual worlds these days... latest among them is Disney.

With the release of DGamer, Disney is entering the mix of virtual worlds along with Nickelodeon, Mattel, and Lego (forthcoming).

The line from the Washington Post article that really jumped out at me was:

"Disney pitches DGamer as part virtual world, part social-networking site."

Social Networking for kids... isn't that called "school" and "the playground"? Do kids as young as 3 really need to network? And what are they going to commiserate about? "Mommy was late again with my morning bottle" or "Mr. Bunnyjumps lost one of his sewed on eyes"?

I secretly wonder if I'm already starting to get crotchity in my old age... but I swear things used to be a lot simpler when I was a kid... and while I had to get up to change the TV channel and only had a few channels to choose from... I think I'm glad I grew up then and not now...

100 Years of Light

In this ever increasing "disposable" world, it's nice to see that some things can last... and much longer than expected in the case of the "Centennial Bulb", a 4 watt lightbulb that's been burning for well over 100 years!

MySpace Suicide Case

I've been following the story of Megan Meier, the Missouri teen who killed herself after a particularly nasty hoax was played on her by a classmate and her mother via MySpace.

Originally when it looked the the law charge the folks involved with anything, the particulars of the case didn't fall under any stalking statute, the hacker community turned it's attention against the perpetrators in a display of cyber-vigilantism, publishing unlisted names and phone numbers.

But it seems that the federal government stepped in and is trying to use current "hacking" laws as the basis for their indictment. It's the first time these laws have been applied in this fashion.

While I'm interested in this case from the technological and legal points of view, a greater part of me wants to see the Meier family gets the justice they deserve.

original article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/09/AR2008010903367.html
latest update:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/15/AR2008051502443.html

Zune TV

Seems as though Microsoft's been doing more than just trying to take over Yahoo.

In another effort to try and dent the market dominance of Apple and the iPod, Zune will begin to playing video content on its portal devices. And one selling point for the Zune is that they will be offering the NBC content (The Office, Heroes, 30 Rock, etc) that Apple no longer has access to since that deal ended a while ago. Pricing will be about the same (though with all things Zune, the cost is in pre-paid "points").

I don't know if being able to see the latest episode of Heroes on a 3 inch screen is enough to get me to switch. I do like the idea that Microsoft is trying to grow the Zune. It may not be an iPod killer, but hopefully the competition will keep Apple on notice to keep improving the iPod or fall behind... and at that point don't we, the consumers, all win!

Dilbert 2.0

Looks like everyone's favorite cubical prisoner Dilbert is about to get a high tech makeover. Since 1989, fans have been able to relate to beleaguered office worker trying to navigate a corporate bureaucracy that seems to make no sense.

But now, fans are not only "in" on the joke, they get to be part of the joke. New web site features will allow folks to add the punch line to an incomplete strip, as well as view and vote on their favorites.

In this world of fan fiction, home made YouTube music videos and song and software mashups, the idea of community created content isn't so surprising, and the social aspect is straight out of the Web 2.0 handbook, but what I find refreshing is that an author, a personality type typically hyper-protective of their intellectual property is being so open and friendly with "his children". It's something I'd like to see other creators adopt...

Let the Music Play

When the music industry recently did an apparent about face and started embracing DRM free music on sites like Amazon and other locations, but NOT Apple's iTunes Store (in most cases), I think I saw a very different picture starting to forming from the one the industry may have wanted to paint.

From an industry that regularly sues children and grandparents thousands of dollars for each illegally downloaded song, to installing rootkit technology without user's knowledge or consent (and then lying about what that technology was doing), I no longer tend to trust anything they say. If they tell me the sky's blue, I'm still going outside to check for myself.

So from my viewpoint this whole move to DRM free music on other sites like Amazon seems less like they are trying to give music fans what they really want (truly portable and device agnostic music) and more like they are just trying to break the monopoly that iTunes has on the market. Once the monopoly is broken, expect those song prices to go up, and maybe even a lag between when full albums are available in digital format as opposed to CD format.

A few years ago when the music publishers wanted to raise the cost of songs on iTunes; the newest hit songs would be around $1.49, while "golden oldies" would be less than 99 cents. Apple fought back and as we can see today, the pricing hasn't changed... but the relationship between Apple and the record companies did.

While this recent article on the roadblocks record labels are erecting against new digital music initiatives doesn't confirm my doom and gloom scenario, it does seem like another brick in the wall, as Pink Floyd might say.

As the World (Wide Web) Turns...

As I'm following the ongoing story Microsoft and Yahoo, the whole thing is starting to feel like one big soap opera.

In one corner is Microsoft, a lumbering giant that seems to be crushing under it's own weight, who is still trying to prove it's still a major player in the Internet market (BTW, it's not, it missed that boat along time ago). Buying Yahoo is seen as a way of consolidating their market shares against "the new Big Blue", Google.

On the other side is Yahoo, who should have been Google before Google was even "Google", and keeps trying to tell it's shareholders and the world at large that they're just five years away from turning it all around... unfortunately, I think they've been in the middle of this five year plan for eight years now?

Now entering into this little drama is Fox News Corp, who in the last few years purchased The Wall Street Journal as well as MySpace. Talk about diversity! Seems Microsoft wants to team up with them so they can both go after Yahoo together. I just wouldn't want to be in the board meetings where these three diverse and philosophically different companies all try to get on the same page.

Last but not least, Yahoo recently announced plans to try to acquire AOL from Time Warner. They would get AOL, and presumable Platform A, the AOL advertising system that consolidates a number of recent acquisitions, as well as cash for 20% in the company.

Sadly this feels like just a play on Yahoo's part to keep Microsoft at bay. With the acquisition, are they hoping to be too large for Microsoft to afford, not to mention the cash that they can use to further fight off Microsoft. I would actually have liked to see Yahoo acquire AOL awhile ago when it wasn't against the wall. I think the merging of the two companies, with Yahoo's extensive email user base, along with AOL's IM client base could all be merged into one happily targeted audience, not to mention consolidating a lot of there content offerings between the two.

Maybe that'll be the sequel, but in the meantime, it doesn't seem like this show is running out of plotlines anytime soon.

A Quick Look at the Vista

Don't blink, you might miss it.

I just read a news report where Bill Gates comments on having a new version of Windows released "sometime in the next year or so."

What the !?!... you mean Windows Vista is doing so well that you're already starting to talk about a new version so soon?

I have two problems with this:

1) Who thinks MicroSoft can actually get a new OS out in such a short time frame? In order to do so, another OS team would have had to be working almost along side the Vista team for such a short gap between the two. For a number of reasons, I doubt that was the case.
On the other hand, if they just include some of those features they talked about for Vista that didn't make it in the final product (like WinFS and virtual folders) that alone might be enough to slap a new name on it for next year

b) Is anyone really going to buy it? So soon after the release of Vista? I don't think there is any real excitement over a new OS as there was a few years ago. With the maturity of Windows (and Mac OS), it feels like they are both trying to throw more bells and whistles at us in the hopes that we don't realize that their respective products are pretty mature, stable, and do 95% of what we need them to do.

Hey guys... take a well deserved coffee break, and spend a little more time figuring out the next new cool thing rather than rush through a new OS, just so we can have "chewy" buttons or some other such nonsense.

Tomorrow's News Today... Thanks Google!

Thanks to Google's new gDay with MATE technology we can all get tomorrow's content today...

Ok, so it's obviously their April Fools joke, but I really like the "one day in advance" radio button.

In an interesting coincidence, I read a legitimate article on Washington Post with the following line:

"...we now belong to a clickocracy -- one nation under Google, with video and e-mail for all."

Now there's "one to grow on".

Apple iPhone: 2G = 3G?

I've been reading a lot of buzz recently surrounding the rumor that Apple will be unveiling a second generation iPhone this summer.

The big enhancement will be the switch from the current EDGE network for internet connectivity to the faster 3G network. Other enhancements for the next generation phone might include new OLED technology that could increase battery life and result in a slimmer phone.

I know I was more than a little surprised that there wasn't any announcement of the second generation iPhone at the most recent MacWorld expo... but if the phone couldn't be ready till June, it makes sense not to make the announcement that would all but halt 1G phone sales.

Firefox Burnout

"Fire"... "Burn"... I'm trying to be cleaver, but I should be quick, since in the last few months, Firefox has gotten more and more unstable and I'm never sure when it's going to bomb out on me.

I understand that all their A-level team is busy working on FF3, but please, throw us folks still on FF2 a bone and let's try to make it a bit more stable.

Now for a bit of nitty-gritty Firefox (actually Firebug) news...

If you use Firebug (and if you do any front end developement, you should be!)... There seems to be an issue when trying to use Firebug to display style information for an "a" tag, nothing is displayed.

Turns out this is a known issue in Firefox 2.0.0.12 and will be fixed in release 2.0.0.13. In the meantime you can roll back to 2.0.0.11, which does work.

Airwave Auction Action

So it turns out that AT&T and Verizon are the winners of the recent FCC airwave auction. And event tought Google lost out, aren't they really the biggest winners here?

When this first started and Google announced their intention to bid, I remember everybody trying to second guess Google's intentions. Most of what I had heard ran along the lines of this being the opening salvo of a full fledged Google phone network.

But is that really the Google way? My personal feeling was that Google was always more interested in the open access provision of the auction above all else. As it stands now, Google can continue to work on Android, it's phone OS, and with this new open space, more companies can make more phones... and in Google's mind, hopefully more of them will be running Android.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see...