April, 2008 — Tech News and Analysis

Archive for April 2008

What the Tech Industry Is Doing for Earth Day

Earth Day is starting to feel like just another holiday created to sell a lot of stuff. Our email inboxes have been bombarded over the past month with announcements from traditional tech companies touting their eco moves. As the coordinator of the first Earth Day, Denis … Read More »

Nielsen today released its March VideoCensus numbers, saying it saw a slight decrease in U.S. unique video viewers — to 115.4 million, down from 115.8 million in February and 116.7 million in January. Total video streams, on the other hand, got a healthy boost, rising … Read More »

 
 

I haven’t touched a Microsoft emulator since 2006 when I was playing with the UMPC simulation, so I’m about due for more fun and games. Up on the … Read More »

Streaming Accounts for 40% of Traffic

In researching consumer broadband habits, Om picked up some interesting tidbits from Arbor Networks, which manages traffic flow for ISPs around the planet. While Om had expected to find that peer-to-peer guzzles bandwidth, according to Arbor’s data, P2P applications are responsible for just 20 percent … Read More »

Encrypt Your Communications For Added Security

Information security is a very important consideration when using computer networks (including the Internet).  Security is one of many reasons corporate IS departments exist. However for your own personal and work-related communications, how do you ensure your emails and instant message conversations don’t fall victim to prying … Read More »

Need to send a lengthy URL from a Windows Mobile device? With web addresses getting so long and cumbersome to work with, that simple act can be quite a challenge. From … Read More »

Vid-Biz: MySpace, MediaScrape, BayTSP

MySpace and NBC Join Forces for Campaign Coverage; Decision ’08 to provide daily videos from NBC and MSNBC, as well as user-generated content. (Reuters) MediaScrape Raises $3.16 Million; Montreal-based news video aggregator, syndicator and translator gets money from undisclosed investors. (paidContent) BayTSP and NTT Partner for … Read More »

11 Solar Thermal Companies Powering Up

California’s Mojave desert sure is getting crowded as more and more companies are raising money in an effort to build large solar power plants to harness the sun’s heat. Yesterday, eSolar said it had raised a massive $130 million from the likes of Google and … Read More »

Earth Day for Web Workers

It’s Earth Day again, and as a result plenty of people are thinking about lowering their environmental impact. Web workers are no exception – and depending on just how you work on the web, you may already be helping out. … Read More »

GigaOM Goes Green for Earth Day

In honor of Earth Day, we’re borrowing from our friends over at Earth2Tech in order to celebrate the infrastructure, gadgets and web sites that can help GigaOMers go green. Whether it’s chips that make your servers run cooler or web sites that will help … Read More »

And after last week’s analysis of political rhetoric, we’re back to network comedy. But this time, something fresher in concept than an SNL sketch… Will It Spread? How I Met Your Mother: “Sandcastles in the Sand” What’s It About: If you’re not a fan of the … Read More »

More Must Reads

When I first switched from Windows to OSX one thing that I initially didn’t really understand was how to install/uninstall applications. Obviously it is second nature now, but hopefully the information below will help a new switcher. Installation On Windows when you download an application it is generally … Read More »

Frequent commenter and fellow mobile enthusiast, TaxMan wrote something interesting on his blog and it coincides with something I pointed out earlier today. Namely: we have … Read More »

Not a day goes by without someone bemoaning the evils of peer-to-peer networking. This week, however, we came across a set of numbers that show more traditional video sources (streaming and flash video, for example) are now an increasing component of bandwidth on consumer-focused broadband networks. Read More »

If you’re a user of a high-quality audio program such as Google Talk, Gizmo Project, or Skype, you know the difference these tools produce in audio quality when compared to a normal landline or cell phone call.  The … Read More »

Fellow MobileTechRoundup podcast co-host, Matt Miller, poses a great question. He’s trying to figure out what mobile device meets his needs but costs less than a grand. Just a year or two ago, … Read More »

Today is like the Super Bowl for our greener sister publication, Earth2Tech. And though they glower at us every time we eat a dolphin-unsafe tuna sandwich, Earth Day is the one day on which we happily unite to try and save this rock we all … Read More »

OK, so, I telecommute, although I’ve always thought of it as working from home. I get that I’m lucky, but around Earth Day or every time some corporate entity either offers or rescinds its work-at-home programs, I get frustrated by the environmental pass telecommuting gives … Read More »

Back in 2005, we turned in our gas-guzzling truck and took stock of a 2006 Toyota Highlander Hybrid. We increased our gas mileage from 13 to 30 mpg as a result. Sure … Read More »

Intel’s Mash Maker application, which launches today, isn’t exactly a new idea; Yahoo Pipes and Microsoft’s Popfly are similar. But Mash Maker marks the first time Intel has launched a software effort with no hardware attached. Presumably you can run Mash Maker … Read More »

Here’s a tool that fits one specific niche, but fits it well: GDocsUploader. It only works on Mac OS X, and only helps out if you’ve got documents on your desktop that you want to move to Google … Read More »

AT&T reported solid earnings this morning, with income of $3.5 billion on sales of $30.7 billion for the first quarter. Like last quarter, wireless revenue drove growth, but U-Verse data looked pretty good too. As Om wrote yesterday, AT&T affirmed that it’s on … Read More »

Last Friday, four executives of satellite holding company TerreStar Networks suddenly resigned, leaving just three people behind to fill the void. I don’t expect this lack of management to last for too long, but until TerreStar calls me back with details, I’m betting that … Read More »

I’ve always known there was a good reason why I worked from home in terms of the impact on my quality of life and the impact on my family. But I have to admit, I feel … Read More »

Sony BMG now stands with Universal as the supporting lables behind Nokia’s “Comes with Music” plan. To rehash: the music plan will be a free bundle included with a new Nokia device. I say “free”, but it’s more likely that at least some of … Read More »

It’s odd to think that the genesis of Fisker Automotive, maker of one of the sleekest looking plug-in hybrids around, was a chance meeting in a Range Rover showroom. Alan Niedzwiecki, president and CEO of Fisker partner and drivetrain maker Quantum Technologies, told us … Read More »

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about how you could optimize a Windows Mobile 6 Professional smartphone for web workers. This week I move onto the iPhone, which, according to research firm Canalys, accounted for 28% of the US smartphone market as of Q4 2007. … Read More »

Joey and David of joeyanddavid.com have, by way of original comedy pieces like 14 Days in a Civic and eHarmony’s Minor Matchmaker, already gotten Hollywood’s attention. But does making shorts for the Internet mean Joey and David know anything about making … Read More »

I went to Y Combinator’s Startup School on Saturday (that’s YC-founder Paul Graham, in case you don’t know) even though most people in Silicon Valley see the material there as “too basic.” My goal is to perpetually learn and apply and to … Read More »

There were plenty of yuks today at the AlwaysOn Nordic Green Conference at the expense of reindeer, unpronounceable Scandinavian companies, and the worthless U.S. dollar. Somewhere in that mix were Sand Hill Road VCs looking for new opportunities and Nordic startups looking to defrost with … Read More »

Back in October 2007, we reported that Comcast wasn’t the only broadband service provider messing with P2P traffic by delaying the P2P packets. We got a quasi confirmation from Cox Communications, but others denied doing any such thing. Those denials won’t work for long; soon, there … Read More »

Sony execs have been lining up licensing deals with the other major studios for a video delivery service on the company’s Playstation 3 game console that could launch as early as this summer, the LA Times reports today. This would go head-to-head with … Read More »

Motorola Ventures today put an undisclosed amount of money into Sunnyvale, Calif.-based startup VirtualLogix, which aims to do for communications equipment and mobile devices what VMware has done for the server. I’m pretty leery of companies throwing around the v-word, but with its take … Read More »

Scottish and Southern Energy Makes Another Fuel Cell Play: On the heals of last month’s investment in fuel cell maker Intelligent Energy, SSE has paid £375,000 to acquire a 21 percent stake in the Logan Energy, a fuel cell installation and maintenance company – Read More »

GameRail, a startup purporting to optimize latency for gamers, has closed up shop. An announcement posted on the company web site says that: “[T]he market does not appear to be ready to support a standalone network for gaming at this time.” I never … Read More »

Are you using 802.11n wireless technology to power your home Wi-Fi network? If not, you really should. Recently, I upgraded my home Wi-Fi network and the devices I have attached to it. I bought a Linksys WRT105N router for under $100, and a few inexpensive … Read More »

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said on the company’s earnings call today that it’s “thrilled” with the progress of its online streaming service. He disclosed that in addition to an announced partnership with LG to bring video to the TV, Netflix has signed three additional … Read More »

Shai Agassi, who turned 40 this weekend, gave some new details about his plans to build infrastructure for the world’s electric vehicles at the Fortune Green conference on Monday. He detailed his startup’s subscription plans, which will mirror cell phone services (noting MetroPCS, prepaid … Read More »

As Web Workers, it is easy to become overwhelmed with usernames and passwords for all of the sites and services that we use. While we’ve covered password management in the past, we have come across a new entry … Read More »

For anyone that’s ever dreamed of working long hours for little pay, NBC News and the New York Film Academy have teamed up to offer a program in digital journalism. According to the Film Academy’s web site: NBC NEWS and the New York … Read More »

After last week’s mention of Wirenode we heard from MoFuse, who offer a quite similar service: translating web sites for mobile usage. The quickest way to start (after signing up for a free account) is to give it your site’s … Read More »

UBS’s John Hodulik, one of the best telecom analysts around, has pegged AT&T as his top pick for this earnings seasons. What was especially interesting in the note he sent out this morning was the progress made by AT&T’s IPTV effort, U-Verse. Hodulik says AT&T added … Read More »

Windows has developed what they feel is the next generation of computing, the tablet PC. We’ve seen Bill Gates strongly advocate the tablet as the true “next generation” platform for computing. But I disagree, and here’s why. Handwriting schmandwriting I still argue that writing recognition on a tablet … Read More »

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