As more wireless carriers adopt Google Android, many new consumers ask frequently how to do common tasks on their Android phone. This section is dedicated to offering Android Advice to new and experienced Android consumers. There will be more to come, however here are the top 6 frequently asked questions by new Android users:

1. What Android apps should I download?

There are many list all over the web, even many on our website (coming from Blackberry to Android see this list). We'll list a few must have best Android apps to get you started:

• Must Have: Astro File Manager, use this app to browse files on your SD card. Bar Code Scanner, use this app to scan the QR bard codes with all of our reviews to quick link you to apps in the Android Market!
• Task Management: TasKiller
• Battery/Power Management: Power Manager or Screebl
• Email: K9 Mail or Exchange by Touchdown
• Music: Pandora or Meridian Player
• Home Screen Customization: aHome or SlideScreen
• Productivity & Note-Taking: Astrid or Evernote

Keep visiting www.AndroidTapp.com for the best Android app recommendations.

2. How do I setup email accounts?

First gather your POP3 or IMAP protocol access information. Launch Email > type email address and password > Choose either POP3 or IMAP account > enter Incoming POP3 or IMAP protocol information > enter Outgoing information > choose whether email account is default.

3. How do I save battery power?

Try turning off Bluetooth, Wifi and GPS when not needed. Try to minimize update intervals of some apps such as Facebook and Twitter from the settings menu. There are apps to help manage battery power for you such as Power Manager.

4. How do I Customize my phone?

There are many home screen customization apps to give a completely different experience; popular apps include aHome, Open Home and SlideScreen.

5. How do I set Ringtones?

Either purchase them from sources like Amazon MP3 or download free with Mabilo Ringtones.

To place your own MP3 songs as ringtones go to the Android Market to download Rings Extended. Plug your phone to computer via USB cable. An icon will appear in the top left notification bar, slide the bar down (this is called the window shade). Tap USB connected > Mount > on your computer a new drive will appear > drag your own MP3 files to the drive > tap home button > Menu button > Settings > Sound & display > Phone ringtone > choose Rings Extended to browse your MP3 files on the phone.

6. How do I import my Contacts from SIM card?

From home screen tap Menu > Contacts > Menu > Import contacts > Import All (Import allows for single imports)

Have more questions? Feel free to ask in the comments below or Contact Us!

By Senior Editor Kris Smith (@croncast)

The world was shown a lot of new electronic products this year at CES.

This is a list of the top 5 products that are actually usable or will be in the near future when they are released.

These are what we wish we could pick up at the store today.

Enjoy the videos as well.

5. Sprint Overdrive

This is MiFi on steroids with 3G and 4G coverage. This beast is ready today. However, it is limited to certain cities and metro areas in the states. See if you're on the list and if you are, drop that cable company or DSL provider like they're hot.

This video was embedded using the YouTuber plugin by Roy Tanck. Adobe Flash Player is required to view the video.

4. MSI Android slate

This was the closest I found to a slate that was responsive and accurate even for a dude with fat fingers. Maybe the others aren't up to production mode yet but they lacked the same experience, until the MSI would freeze.

This video was embedded using the YouTuber plugin by Roy Tanck. Adobe Flash Player is required to view the video.

3. Vizio wifi TV's

This iteration of 3D is a huge fail. Like bad movies this should have seen limited release or straight to DVD, if you know what I mean. What is awesome are the Vizio wifi TV's that will be hitting the shelves. They've embraced almost every type of TV widget that can be made and I would expect to see some brilliant hacks coming our way.

This video was embedded using the YouTuber plugin by Roy Tanck. Adobe Flash Player is required to view the video.

2. Asus T101MT

There isn't a whole lot to say that I haven't said already. This is going to be a great, usable device that I wish was running Mac OS. I used a Toshiba tablet PC back in 2006 for my job and loved it. This size would be incredibly useful and mobile.

This video was embedded using the YouTuber plugin by Roy Tanck. Adobe Flash Player is required to view the video.

1. Intel Infoscape

Only exists for trade show purposes but will soon be finding its way into other displays. Look out hotels, shopping malls and people with money to burn.

This video was embedded using the YouTuber plugin by Roy Tanck. Adobe Flash Player is required to view the video.

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Our CES 2010 Top Picks is a post from: TechStartups.com

Chinese computer maker Coship wasn't turning heads with its netbook specs at CES.

However, with a sexy body like the beauty on the left, they're moving in the right direction to delight in the future. Other low cost netbook manufacturers like MSI and Asus should keep an eye on this competitor.

The Coship ZCULV30 is a shining example of taking the gloves off and following a design vision. In a world filled with bland silicon and plastic slices this netbook is a delightful departure.

The body is slick plastic that gave it a unique feel, it is light weight and is way hotter than the Monster Ferrari.

Limited specs below.

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Coship Netbook #CES Sexy MF ZCULV30 is a post from: TechStartups.com

I'm not one to post often about gadgets or their pricing. But this is a really good deal for a pre-order phone from Nokia that can fill the iPhone void for AT&T haters.

I've had my eye on the N900 since the N97 arrived and fell flat on its screen. I've seen prices go below $500 for the device unlocked on Amazon but they are not back up over $700. Dell has the Nokia N900 for $489 until Dec. 10th.

That at price comes from a 10% discount (not an affiliate link) on the $599 price tag and a $50 mail-in-rebate. The phone specs and video after the jump.

Nokia is calling this thing an internet tablet, but that is going to be short lived, I hope. The rumor mill is producing much talk of larger devices that should start arriving in the next few months. I'll post on this later. The N900 is really a smart phone (with out of the box tethering!).

Let's roll this is what this Nokia smartphone is packing:

• Up to 32 GB internal storage
• Total available application memory up to 1 GB (256 MB RAM, 768 MB virtual memory)
• Supported protocols: Mail for Exchange, IMAP, POP3, SMTP
• SMS and instant messages organized as conversations
• Multiple number, email and Instant Messaging details per contact, contacts with images
• Integrated hands-free stereo speakers
• Logging of dialed, received and missed calls
• Ring tones: .wav, .mp3, .AAC, .eAAC, .wma
• Wi-Fi networking (802.11b/g) with WEP, WPA, WPA2 security; designed for continuous TCP/IP connectivity
• Capability to serve as data modem via USB connection
• Music playback file formats: .mp3, .wma, .aac, .m4a, .wav
• Video playback file formats: .mp4, .avi, .wmv, .3gp; codecs: H.264, MPEG-4, Xvid, WMV, H.263
• Video streaming: H.264, MPEG-4, Xvid, WMV, H.263 in .avi, .mp4, .wmv, .asf and .3gp containers
• TV out (NTSC/PAL) with Nokia Video Connectivity Cable (CA-75U, included)
• FM radio (requires headset to be attached) and FM transmitter

This video was embedded using the YouTuber plugin by Roy Tanck. Adobe Flash Player is required to view the video.

As for size this thing weighs 6.38 ounces and measures 4.37 x 2.35 x 0.77 inches. Which comes in 1.5 ounces heavier than an iPhone. Height and width differences are negligible but depth is not at a difference of at a skosh over a quarter of an inch.

For this price and the ability to shoot video, tether, take photos with a Flash and carry it as an FM boombox on your shoulder as you walk down the street it is a no brainer if you've got the loot.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/0

Nokia N900 Cheap at $489 from Dell is a post from: TechStartups.com

If you're a Flickr user and not a Flickr Desktop Uploadr user, you should be. It is the hidden gem of the heavily trafficked site and best friend of frequent uploaders.

The Flickr Uploadr for desktop use have gone through changes over the years. It's reached its current maturity at 3.2.1 after being plagued with upload crashes, double uploads and copy loss for images. This version doesn't suffer likes its predecessors . . . well, not as much.

There still are occasional crashes but the Uploadr handles restarting better and will load up the last batch of photos for upload with their copy intact on restart. I've found this to be a more frequent issue if I am trying to upload photos to Flickr from a throttled internet connection with slow speeds. Cough, Time-Warner Road Runner, cough.

With that said, I've found the Uploadr the easiest way to get batch photos online with titles, descriptions, tags and grouped the way the I want them with privacy settings. Here's a peek for the uninitiated:

With the ability to create groups like this and see them in left hand column I am able to more effectivley tell a story about each image as it relates to one another. To be honest, it is kind of fun to be able to create a narrative about a photo set that can be shared with viewers.

You'll also notice in the Description' box that the copy begins with two characters *^'. Well, as an added bonus of using the Flickr Uploadr to get photos on Flickr, I also use it as a front-end to insert photos on my own blog and to also send links to them on Twitter.

With the use of the magic API, RSS, I have two separate crontab scripts running that read my personal Flickr RSS feed and look for these two characters. The * tells the script to take the title and description and add them as posts to my personal blog. The ^ tells the script to grab the title and URL of the image on Flickr (shorten it), then send it on to Twitter in my personal Twitter account. The special characters are a control mechanism that allow me to filter or choose additional syndication for my photos.

I'm going down a geeky path here and will pull back a bit. The Flickr Desktop Uploadr isnt' something that is brand new or undergone a massive revision lately. What it is to me an many others is a powerful tool built as an add-on to a service to make it more valuable.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/0

Flickr Desktop Uploadr for Photos is a post from: TechStartups.com

Are you a VIP? Did you pay for access?

These are the questions that will drive the next web, the version beyond 2.0. A trend towards exclusivity is one that appears to be gaining momentum as business models are coming apart at the seams.

The most prominent of these business models, revenue by CPM from advertising dollars, was the first to begin unraveling over last few years. As the economy tanked many sites relying on this revenue stream couldn't afford to keep the lights on.

Those that have survived are looking to premium content to supplement their income or even stay afloat. Premium meaning exclusive pay for content. And as the great Janis Joplin sang, Exclusive's just another word for nothing left to lose.

That's close right?

Don't take my tone the wrong way. I am bullish about the next web and view exclusivity as a viable method to generate revenue that can sustain a business. Many publishers, for years, played the hunch that simply building audience would lead to revenue. Much in the form of advertising dollars and we can see where that has put them. They're ready to earn.

I recently spoke with Tim Bourquin, the founder of New Media Expo. Tim was a leader in creating a community from the diaspora of global podcasters. But as Tim found out, along with others, there was no sustainable revenue stream to produce your own content. If someone wanted to make money in the medium they would need to produce shows for other people.

This is the category that I fall into. For the last 5 years I have been podcasting a free show at the rate on average of 2 episodes a week. We've done over 500 episodes and are the proud owners of an artist page in iTunes. Over that time, all but one month, I paid $200 for the server to host the show. Simple math will put my costs of production over $10,000. And that doesn't include the time to produce the shows, gear or facility (though it was my home).

We were never able to monetize our show with an audience of over 2,500 regular listeners. We looked at advertising, sponsorships and pitching our show for television. None of them were viable as our audience was too small. It was filled with the right people, just not enough of them. The only money that I have made from podcasting came from performing contract work for advertising agencies.

Bourquin is now charging for his content and building a community from and exclusive set listeners that are paying him with their attentions as well. It does change the dynamic as a publisher to have a financial obligation to an audience. In this model, every player has a vested interest in the content having value.

Exclusive purple ropes are a coming necessity for online businesses to grow from the passions of artists, publishers and regular folks. The next web will be filled with independent publishers mixing their content with that of today's mainstream media.

The difference will be that it will be paid for. Think exclusivity through micropayments and the bundling of content like a cable television provider under the umbrella of larger publishers. Both of these models rely on the new web's ability to syndicate and track content effectively.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/4

Post from: TechStartups.com

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While many people stereotype geeks as only being interested in using the computer all day, the truth is that a geek is actually a person who often contemplates many of the deeper questions of the universe while busy installing the coolest new add-ons to Firefox or tweaking their mobile phone so that they can control it from their desktop. One of the universal debates many geeks have centers around an important question that involves neurobiology and the science of artificial intelligence, and that question is Does a human think faster than a computer?

What a question. Just think of the necessary evidence that one would need to produce in order to prove, or disprove, that statement. In fact, what is the question about really? Is it whether a human brain or a computer is faster, or is it which form of information processing is better? Is it even a fair comparison? Today, I'd like to engage MakeUseOf readers into a debate on this subject by first providing my own take and then asking for yours.

The Question: Does a Human Think Faster Than a Computer?

The question itself represents the fallacy of how people think about computers. When a person uses a computer, if it's slow then it's junk. But there are certainly other factors to consider when examining intelligence what about image recognition, language recognition, multi-tasking capabilities or self-learning and self-healing features?

First, to partially answer the speed question we need to examine data transmission. In the Hartford Examiner, writer Joy Casad answers the question, How fast is a thought by describing the chemical/biological propagation of thinking neurons before getting to the point in the final paragraph these neurons transmit signals at 0.5 milliseconds. That's pretty fast!

In 2006, the fastest reported fiber optic transmission rate was 2.56 terabits a second. Okay, but a bit is nothing more than a zero and a one. Well the current state of the art is the cutting edge subatomic technology created by Stanford researchers representing one bit with 35 electrons, or 35,000,000,000 electrons a millisecond. Due to the fact that axon/neuron electrical transmission depends on the chemical and biological environment it is in, data transmission of one neuron is actually millions of times slower than the fastest electrical transmission rates over copper electrical wire, and even slower compared to fiber optics. Score one for computers.

What About Processing Power?

The question of processing is a tricky one. According to the Top500 list of super computers, the fastest one as of 2009 is the RoadRunner BladeCenter at 12.8 GFlops (floating point operations per second).

A GFlop represents a billion operations per second. Now, you're thinking of that Monday morning in class when your professor asked you to perform a simple calculation and your mind went blank. You're ready to chalk up another point to computers, right? Wrong.

While the transmission of electrical impulses may be slower in the brain than over wire, the processing power of the brain is represented by not one, but thousands of processors backed into one major super computer. One example is the retina, which is sort of like your computer web cam, in that it transmits light (images) to the brain for processing. Except the retina itself has its own processing power, sort of like a subprocessor 100 million neurons packed into a one centimeter by one millimeter space.

This stunning little processor is capable of processing ten images, each of about a million light points, every single second. Not only that, the data isn't transmitted over a single fiber of nerve cells, but over a cable to the brain made up of a million of these fibers, all transmitting bits of data at the same time in parallel. If you multiply the processing power of this volume of neurons by the overall size of the average 1,500 cubic cm human brain, the overall processing power of the brain is about 100 million, million operations per second. For those of you who are trying to do the math with your super computer brain that's over 100,000 times more processing power than today's cutting-edge super computer.

Image and Language Recognition, Learning and Common Sense

If our brains are such super computers, then why do we feel so dense and so slow sometimes? I don't know about you, but I'm horrible at doing calculations in my head. The problem is that people think of computers only in terms of how many calculations it can do per second. The truth is, when it comes to intelligence there's so much more to process than calculations alone. How do you calculate what the tone of someone's voice implies they are really saying? How do you calculate the irony of a joke that, when taken literally, makes no sense at all? This is where the true power of the human brain makes itself known.

Have you ever had a friend who was such a genius that they could perform the most astounding calculations in their head, or they could fathom the most complex equations or problems imaginable yet when faced with the simplest common-sense joke, they just didn't get it? This is the major difference between a human brain and a computer.

Author Gary Marcus writes, in his book on the human mind that, The fundamental difference between computers and the human mind is in the basic organization of memory.

What he means is that a computer organizes information in a logical way. To retrieve data, the computer uses logical storage locations. A human brain, on the other hand, remembers where information is stored based on cues. Those cues are other pieces of information or memories connected to the information you need to retrieve. This means that the human mind can connect an almost unlimited number of concepts in a variety of ways, and then sometimes disconnect or recreate connections based on new information. This allows the human to step outside the boundaries of what has already been learned leading to new art and new inventions that are the trademark of the human race.

There are a lot of other ways the human mind blows computers away it can self repair itself, it can produce chemical reactions within its host body to induce instinctive reactions and protect itself from danger, it can handle every last function required to operate the machine of the human body while simultaneously processing information from outside that body, and most importantly it can continue learning and building new connections within that contextual storage array in ways that seem infinite.

In short, the answer to the question Does a human think faster than a computer? is yes. And it can also do a whole lot more than that.

Geeks out there weigh in with your opinion in the comments section below!

Image Credits: cbowns

Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section!

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Verizon reported second-quarter results this morning, and saw revenue rise while profits fell. But those of us who care about the fate of broadband should note that the carrier is ramping up its fiber-to-the-home triple play and likely stealing customers from cable providers. Verizon added 303,000 net new FiOS fiber-to-the-home Internet customers, to end the quarter with 3.1 million of them. That's a 56 percent growth in subscribers from the previous year for the super-fast service. Verizon also added 300,000 net new FiOS TV customers, bringing its total to 2.5 million FiOS TV consumers by the end of the quarter an 82 percent boost from the year prior.

FiOS, which is the driving force behind several cable operators' planned DOCSIS 3.0 upgrades that will boost broadband speeds to 50Mbps or even 100Mbps, is putting pressure on the cable industry. FiOS Internet sales penetration (sales as a percentage of potential customers) increased to 28.1 percent, compared with 23.5 percent during the same period a year ago, while FiOS TV sales penetration increased to 24.6 percent, compared with 19.7 percent from the year before. FiOS TV service was available for sale to 10.3 million premises by the end of the quarter.

Some of that penetration growth appears to be coming at the expense of cable providers, although it's hard to be sure because various cable operators don't have footprints that directly compete with Verizon's. However, Comcast which competes with Verizon in 12 percent of its footprint, has seen its video subscriber penetration fall to 47.5 percent in the first quarter of the year (it won't report second-quarter results until Aug. 6) from 49.5 percent in the first quarter of 2008. On the broadband side, it's faring better having boosted its penetration to 30.2 percent for the first quarter of this year, up from 28.4 percent for the same period in 2008. That may be in part because of cable's faster speeds when compared with regular DSL from telcos.

Cablevision, which competes with Verizon in 30 percent of its footprint and has been aggressive about countering FiOS speeds, has seen a 1.5 percent drop in penetration for video subscribers, according to its first-quarter 2009 results. (Cablevision reports second-quarter numbers on July 30.) As those cable providers start reporting their numbers, keep an eye on how penetration rates are faring. They may claim it's a lousy economy, but FiOS may have something to do with it.

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Multiplatform video company Current Media said today that Mark Rosenthal, the former president and COO of MTV Networks and CEO of Interpublic Media, will replace co-founder Joel Hyatt as CEO.

Rosenthal had been a Current board member since the inception of the company. Hyatt will now serve as vice chairman.

Rosenthal had most recently been vice chairman and president of media platforms at the troubled ad startup Spot Runner, which he joined a little over a year ago from Interpublic.

Current says its cable channel is available in more than 60 million households and its web site has more than 7 million unique visitors per month. Chairmain Al Gore said in a recent speech that the site now receives more than 10 million video views per month.

The most notable news out of Current in recent months is something it hasn't actually covered the imprisonment of two of its journalists. Laura Ling and Euna Lee are being held in North Korea after being convicted for trespassing there while they were on assignment from the network.

With no disrespect to that terrible situation, Current still has some really fantastic talent we love the folks at InfoMania (recent coverage) and some great opportunities to make the web and TV work together. But it hasn't always been smooth sailing, and the network scrapped IPO plans earlier this year, citing the bad economy. In the run-up to the IPO we had also challenged the company's claims that it was profitable.

Current's most recent management hire was Paul Levine, president of new media, who had previously been with AdBrite.

Sorry about the poor quality pic; Current hasn't updated its management files yet.

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Google makes its money mostly from targeted advertising on product searches and other narrow, directed searches. The advertising on news-related searches is not nearly as valuable. Google could remove all newspapers and journalism content from its Web search catalog tomorrow and lose very little of its revenue. The links to news it provides are valuable to its users but not terribly valuable to its advertisers.

Most galling was that The Huffington Post's use of an Associated Press version of SI's report was initially tops on Google, which meant that it, and not SI.com, tended to be the place readers clicking through to get the gist of the breaking scandal would land.... Why did The Huffington Post come up ahead of SI.com? Because, even Google insiders concede, Huffington is effective at implementing search optimization techniques, which means that its manipulation of keywords, search terms, and the dynamics of Web protocol give it an advantage over others scrambling to be the place readers are sent by search engines. What angered the people at Sports Illustrated and Time Inc. is that Google, acting as traffic conductor, seemed unmoved by their grievance over what had happened to their ownership of the story. An SI editor quoted to me Time Inc's editor-in-chief, John Huey, noting crisply that, "talking to Google is like trying to talk to a television."

Today, in 2009, all lawyers dealing with online media -- and that includes trademark lawyers -- are well-aware of the challenges of reputation management. They know that any C&D they send could wind up on a hundred Web sites, adorned with ridicule heaped upon their clients. They are able to make nuanced judgments about these things. They are able to balance the pros and cons of enforcing their clients' marks in each situation that may arise. Really, they are.

The Los Angeles authorities said John Schiefer, 27, was the nation's first defendant to plead guilty to wiretapping charges (.pdf) in connection to using botnets.

Schiefer, who went by the online handle "acidstorm," faced as many as 60 years in prison and acknowledged using a botnet to remotely control computers across the United States. Once in control of the computers, the authorities said, (.pdf) his spybot malware allowed him to intercept computer communications. He mined usernames and passwords on accounts such as PayPal and made purchases totaling thousands of dollars without consent.

The authorities said he worked by day as an information security consultant with 3G Communications. After his guilty plea, Schiefer was hired at Mahalo, the so-called "human powered search engine." Its founder, Jason Calacanis wrote that the company failed to realize that the Los Angeles company had hired a man who had pleaded guilty to being a hacker.

Calacanis point out that Mahalo users' data was not breached by Schiefer.

Note to Mahalo Users: John's work is well-supervised. Mahalo follows strict security policies and we don't store any sensitive data anyway. (Even if one of our employees did go off the deep end, the most they would have access to would be your questions and answers on Mahalo Answersnot much damage can be done there since they're all public anyway).

The defendant was among eight individuals indicted or successfully prosecuted in a crack down on black hat hackers who use armies of zombie computers to commit financial fraud, attack web sites with floods of traffic and send spam. The crimes at issue involved more than $20 million in losses, according to the FBI.

The FBI dubbed the eight cases "Operation Bot Roast II" -- the second round of its investigations against botnets, one of the most dangerous threats online today. The first FBI crackdown on botnets was announced in June, 2007.

See Also:

• Weak Password Brings 'Happiness' to Twitter Hacker
• Miley Cyrus Hacker Raided by FBI
• Pop Superstar Sting Supports Pentagon Hacker, Condemns U.S. ...
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John McCain says he was a puppet for the Republican National Committee and therefore should not be held accountable for a presidential campaign commercial that used the popular song "Running on Empty" by Jackson Browne without permission.

But the Los Angeles federal judge presiding over the copyright-infringement case was not buying it. The judge refused late Friday to remove the Arizona senator from the lawsuit in which he and the Republican National Committee are accused of violating the rights to Browne's 1977 hit.

Here's what McCain told the judge (.pdf)handling the case:

I was not involved at all in any way in the writing, creation, production, distribution or dissemination of the video, nor do I have any knowledge whatsoever of how this video was written, created, produced or disseminated or who was involved in any aspect of the writing, creation, production, distribution or dissemination of the video. I was completely unaware that this video even existed until I was informed of it after this lawsuit was filed.

Despite McCain's claims of being a hapless dupe for his party, U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner said (.pdf) the RNC and McCain's relationship were so intertwined what the judge called an "agency relationship" that McCain stays in the case. The judge wrote that, even if McCain's statement were true, "once an agency relationship is established, the principal is liable for the acts of her agent, even if the principal does not expressly authorize or instruct her agent to take any action."

The judge also did not agree with the Republicans and McCain that Browne's lawsuit was bogus. Among other things, the judge kept the lawsuit alive to give the defendants a chance to demonstrate how using about 20 seconds of the song in the commercial was a fair use.

The August commercial was broadcast on YouTube and cable television. It played Browne's music in a McCain commercial criticizing Barack Obama's energy policy. The song was purchased on iTunes.

Browne claims that the commercial falsely suggested he endorsed McCain and the Republican Party. "Nothing could be further from the truth," Browne said.

The judge scheduled an April 20 hearing to determine how to proceed with Browne's lawsuit. The ad initially ran in Ohio, but the Ohio Republican Party was removed from the case.

See Also:

• Stifled by Copyright, McCain Asks YouTube to Consider Fair Use ...
• McCain Campaign Yanks 'Obama Love' Web Video
• YouTube to McCain: You Made Your DMCA Bed, Lie in It
• McCain Uses Walter Reed Middle School, Not Army Hospital, as ...
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"Do you know, young man, how much money it's going to cost you to defend yourselves against Jones Day?"

Instead of posting "Tiedt is an associate," the site will write "Tiedt (http://www.jonesday.com/jtiedt/) is an associate."

TUAWMimo 7" USB displays originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 05 Feb 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

I was thinking about buying another radio recently, but I figured I'd check to see if I could stream Sirius over the net instead.

It turns out Sirius has two internet streaming options. You can stream for free at 32k, or pay $2.99/month (if you already pay for Sirius) to get 128k CD Quality sound. $2.99 ain't bad, so I signed up for that. If you don't have Sirius, streaming at 128k costs $12.99/month. Sirius doesn't stream every channel due to some licensing issues, but they stream about 90% including every station I listen to.

StarLightXM

In order to stream you have to use their web-based player which is pretty crufty. So I did a couple Google searches to see if I could stream it through iTunes or some other Mac app instead. That's where I found StarLightXM.

StarLightXM is a lightweight app that streams Sirius or XM through a native player instead of the crufty web players. You just enter the same login credentials that you would with the online players, and you're all set. The UI is simple and compact. It's free (donations accepted) and works great.

So now I can stream Sirius to my desktop. That works. But I wanted to stream the audio to multiple speakers in my house. I have three Airport Expresses set up to play music from iTunes in multiple rooms, but Airport Express can only stream music from iTunes. That means I can't natively stream audio from the StarLightXM app to my remote speakers.

Airfoil

Enter Airfoil. Airfoil allows you to stream any audio from any program on your Mac (or PC) to your Airport Express-connected speakers. You can stream all system sound or just sound from a specific app.

The way I have it set up is to just stream sound from StarLightXM to my remote speakers. This way I only get system sounds (beeps, new mail, etc) on my desktop, but Sirius plays on my desktop + my remote speakers. It's a simple setup that works beautifully. Airfoil costs $25.

Airfoil allows you to set volume for each location independently or you can fix volume to system volume. If it's fixed to system volume you can use your computer's volume to raise or lower volume in different rooms. If it's not fixed, you can change your computer's volume and not affect the volume of the speakers in other rooms. Nice flexibility.

A great way to save

Streaming Sirius over the net is a great way to save some money too. I currently have Sirius radios at home and at the office, but now I can cancel Sirius at the office since I can just stream it over my computer instead.

So for $2.99/month my MacBook turns into a portable Sirius Radio. Plus, I can broadcast to multiple rooms with just a single stream. So instead of paying for radios in multiple rooms, I just pay $2.99/month to stream and point the sound to whichever room(s) I want with Airfoil.

Software is amazing.

UPDATE: Rogue Amoeba, the folks behind Airfoil, have released Pulsar, a Sirius/XM client for the Mac.

The year 2008 saw the emergence of some great pocket video cameras that are no larger than your mobile phone, inexpensive, they shoot good-looking video and are almost as easy to operate as an iPod - no confusing controls, just a single record button. These pocket camcorder attach to the computer via the USB port and record video in a straight-to-web format perfect for YouTube and other video sharing websites.

If you looking to buy one this holiday season, you have three pocket video cameras to choose from - Flip Video Camcorder, Creative Vado and Kodak Zi6.

Creative Vado Pocket Video Camera ($100)

This has a 2" screen with 2x zoom and 2 GB internal memory perfect for recording upto 2 hours of video (resolution 640480, MPEG4 AVI). Creative Vado can be recharged via USB (similar to iPod or Zune) and includes removable battery. You'll have to separately buy the RCA cable that is required to connect your Vado camera to a TV. Supports both Windows and Mac.

Creative Vado HD Video Camera ($200)

This camera has the same dimensions as the previous one (slightly heavier) and lets you shoot video in High Definition format (resolution 1280720, H.264 AVI).

The internal memory is 8 GB and the HDMI cable in included with Vada HD Camcorder. Read detailed reviews of Vado HD at PC World, PC Magazine and CNET.

Kodak Zi6 Pocket Video Camera ($180)

The Kodak Zi6 features a 2.4" LCD, 2x zoom, records both HD (H.264) & standard video but can also capture still photographs at 3MB resolution. Zi6 only has 128MB of internal memory, so you'll need to buy a separate memory SD Card to record longer home movies.

The Kodak Zi6 does include both A/V and HDMI cables for connecting the camcorder to the television screen. Also include 2 Ni-MH rechargeable battery and charger included. Read Kodak Zi6 reviews at MacWorld, PC Magazine and LaptopMag.

Flip Mino HD Camcorder ($230)

FlipMino HD sports a 1.5" screen and can record up to 60 minutes of video (1280 x720 at 30 frames per second) on its 4 GB internal memory (non expandable). The camera has internal rechargeable battery that can be charged via USB port or the power adapter though you'll have to buy it separately. TV connector cable is included to watch videos on television.

The included software program is compatible with both Mac and Windows and includes basic video editing features with the option of extracting still image frames from the video - the camera itself cannot snap still photos though. Read Flip Mino HD reviews and picture samples at Macworld and PC Magazine.

Pure Digital Flip Ultra Video Camera ($150)

The Flip Ultra video camera carries 2GB of built-in flash memory and can record 60 minutes of video at 640480. The camera has a 1.5" LCD and requires 2 AA batteries that last up to 2.5 hours.

It records video in MPEG-4 AVI format at 30 frames per second. NTSC cable is included with Flip Ultra for connecting the unit to TV though there's no way to expand the memory. Watch video review of Flip Ultra at Macworld and CNET.

Conclusion: I think the Zi6 offers best value for money - you get HD quality video, it has the largest LCD screen, the memory is expandable and Kodak Zi6 is the only pocket video camera that can shoot still photographs. Authors who have used the camera seem impressed by the video quality of Zi6 if there's reasonable light and the camera is held with a steady hand.

Related: Camcorder Buying Guide: NTSC vs PAL Cameras

Pocket Video Cameras - Buying Guide - Digital Inspiration

A company called Celiocorp has launched a completely different take on the netbook phenomenon. Instead of offering a lightweight computer running either Linux or XP like today's netbooks do, this notebook PC is entirely powered by a device you already own: your smartphone. Dubbed a mobile companion, the Redfly device has an 8-inch screen, a full-sized keyboard and touch pad, and is connected to your smartphone via a USB cable or Bluetooth.

To use the Redfly notebook, all you need to do is install the Redfly driver on your phone (see supported phones here). You can then use the netbook like any computer. Its bigger screen makes it easier to read documents, write emails, or surf the web. Redfly supports remote desktop, virtualization and other cloud-based environments like Citrix, GoToMyPC, LogMeIn, Microsoft's Remote Desktop protocol, stoneware, inc., and others. The netbook also features a VGA connector so you can connect your Redfly netbook to a projector for presentations.

As you use the Redfly device, you can be charging your smartphone too, assuming it's plugged in via the USB cable. The Redfly battery works for up to 8 hours, according to the company.

Because Redfly has no OS, no CPU, no hard drive, and requires no software licenses, its cost is lower than a laptop PC (an Amazon search shows that price to be around $199). That's also slightly more affordable than today's crop of OS-powered netbooks, but not by much.

The benefit to using a mobile companion instead of a PC is that the device can get lost or stolen without any threat of losing important data. Of course, a lot of companies have already started doing this now via the use of virtualized business apps running on top of the OS installed on regular company laptops all the important data is in the cloud so laptop loss or theft isn't as big a concern as before. However, given the price ($199) of Redfly vs. that of a laptop, the replacement cost would be minimal.

in reply to Redfly: A Netbook Entirely Powered By Your Windows Mobile Phone

A company called Celiocorp has launched a completely different take on the netbook phenomenon. Instead of offering a lightweight computer running either Linux or XP like today's netbooks do, this notebook PC is entirely powered by a device you already own: your smartphone. Dubbed a mobile companion, the Redfly device has an 8-inch screen, a full-sized keyboard and touch pad, and is connected to your smartphone via a USB cable or Bluetooth.

To use the Redfly notebook, all you need to do is install the Redfly driver on your phone (see supported phones here). You can then use the netbook like any computer. Its bigger screen makes it easier to read documents, write emails, or surf the web. Redfly supports remote desktop, virtualization and other cloud-based environments like Citrix, GoToMyPC, LogMeIn, Microsoft's Remote Desktop protocol, stoneware, inc., and others. The netbook also features a VGA connector so you can connect your Redfly netbook to a projector for presentations.

As you use the Redfly device, you can be charging your smartphone too, assuming it's plugged in via the USB cable. The Redfly battery works for up to 8 hours, according to the company.

Because Redfly has no OS, no CPU, no hard drive, and requires no software licenses, its cost is lower than a laptop PC (an Amazon search shows that price to be around $199). That's also slightly more affordable than today's crop of OS-powered netbooks, but not by much.

The benefit to using a mobile companion instead of a PC is that the device can get lost or stolen without any threat of losing important data. Of course, a lot of companies have already started doing this now via the use of virtualized business apps running on top of the OS installed on regular company laptops all the important data is in the cloud so laptop loss or theft isn't as big a concern as before. However, given the price ($199) of Redfly vs. that of a laptop, the replacement cost would be minimal.

Somewhat ironic for me personally since in my past career as a legislative policy pusher, I was once responsible for the George Herbert Walker Bush administration's legislative docet for the now infamous Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac. [Note: Don't believe that this is a problem of the last eight or sixteen years, it has been a systemic threat for the last 30 years. But I digress from why you visited MOBILE Messaging today, not FINANCIAL Mess today.]

As the crises has continued to build I've started thinking about slumping tech caused by ripple effects of the impending uber recession'. Yet, in more contemplative moments I've asked myself,and others repeatedly, whether anyone thinks this cataclsym is going to hit mobile as hard as it hits everything else? The collective opinion by more than a few wireless influencers' is: NO.

Last week I spent a morning with a group of Angel investors in Washington DC reviewing potential companiestwo which had mobile components to their value proposition. At the breakfast before there was some grousing that individually the attending angels had experienced some contraction but as a group they were not running to liquidate all holdings and defending cash positions, which we should not forget is where fledgling companies get their funding from. As a groupextremely experienced as both technologists and investorsthey were still looking for investments to make, especially now with time to build out companies which can rebound higher later. No angels were running for the exits.

The same day in the afternoon, I was talking to a senior IT exec at a public company. On mobile his perspective was straightforward: All this talk from the financial pundacracy that tech is going to contract so radically is BS. Bottom line is guys like me already have 90% of our budget mandated, required, by core functionality. If we cut back on that, we cut back on core services. That isn't likely to happen. It is the 10% variance which we play with that may get affected. But even there, where do you capture efficiencies best? Automation and mobilization. There's that mobile component that can't be ignored. Depending upon how highly leveraged a tech company is, the bottom line is we are not falling back into a pre-industrialized economy, he said smartly.

The following day I reached out to a few VCs and asked them about their proclivity to invest now. As one put it, I've been successfully raising money for my next fund for over year. I'm not going to pull back on making the investments, let alone the pressure from my LPs will not subside to get the money to work. Um, guess the focus continues to be on the future. Not surprising given that VCs examine risk and opportunity all the time, at least the good ones do. Those that were pushing the alarm last week, one has to ask how many of these guys have ever really had to make payroll? That's a post for the future. Net net, full speed ahead, just look out for some adjacent storms.

Last point. Just look at the continuing trend of mobile penetration around the world, especially in developing countries. There may be lesser growth rates in the mature markets of Europe and the US, but where mobile is being fueled in China, India, Africa and South America, consumers will substitute or do without in order to get a mobile phone and benefit from it's conveniences. ARPU is already low in many of these regions, but operators there are capturing value even in these bottom of the pyramid playsdon't believe me?

Did you know that when Reliance was looking to acquire MTN in South Africa, they were willing to pay more than Microsoft had priced Yahoo? Really. If three data points constitute a trend, don't bet against mobile. Alternatively during these times, consider the consider the following.

In 1923, some of the most successful and richest men consisted of:

president of largest steel company in the US
president of largest gas company in the US
president of the NYSE
greatest wheat speculator in the US
president of the bank of international settlement

What became of these men and their fortunes?

Carol Schwabb, of the largest steel company, died as a pauper
Edward Hobson, of the largest gas company, went insane
Richard Whitney, president of the NYSE, eventually released from prison and died at home
Arthur Cougar, the wheat speculator, died abroadpenniless
C.B. Livermore, lion of wall street, committed suicide.

Yet that same year, 1923, Gene Sarazin, a professional golfer, won both the US Open and the PGA Championship. He died in 1999 at 95 years old. Played golf until he was 92, and was solvent at the time of his death.
CONCLUSION: Stop worrying about business and spend more time playing golf.

Somewhat ironic for me personally since in my past career as a legislative policy pusher, I was once responsible for the George Herbert Walker Bush administration's legislative docet for the now infamous Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac. [Note: Don't believe that this is a problem of the last eight or sixteen years, it has been a systemic threat for the last 30 years. But I digress from why you visited MOBILE Messaging today, not FINANCIAL Mess today.]

As the crises has continued to build I've started thinking about slumping tech caused by ripple effects of the impending uber recession'. Yet, in more contemplative moments I've asked myself,and others repeatedly, whether anyone thinks this cataclsym is going to hit mobile as hard as it hits everything else? The collective opinion by more than a few wireless influencers' is: NO.

Last week I spent a morning with a group of Angel investors in Washington DC reviewing potential companiestwo which had mobile components to their value proposition. At the breakfast before there was some grousing that individually the attending angels had experienced some contraction but as a group they were not running to liquidate all holdings and defending cash positions, which we should not forget is where fledgling companies get their funding from. As a groupextremely experienced as both technologists and investorsthey were still looking for investments to make, especially now with time to build out companies which can rebound higher later. No angels were running for the exits.

The same day in the afternoon, I was talking to a senior IT exec at a public company. On mobile his perspective was straightforward: All this talk from the financial pundacracy that tech is going to contract so radically is BS. Bottom line is guys like me already have 90% of our budget mandated, required, by core functionality. If we cut back on that, we cut back on core services. That isn't likely to happen. It is the 10% variance which we play with that may get affected. But even there, where do you capture efficiencies best? Automation and mobilization. There's that mobile component that can't be ignored. Depending upon how highly leveraged a tech company is, the bottom line is we are not falling back into a pre-industrialized economy, he said smartly.

The following day I reached out to a few VCs and asked them about their proclivity to invest now. As one put it, I've been successfully raising money for my next fund for over year. I'm not going to pull back on making the investments, let alone the pressure from my LPs will not subside to get the money to work. Um, guess the focus continues to be on the future. Not surprising given that VCs examine risk and opportunity all the time, at least the good ones do. Those that were pushing the alarm last week, one has to ask how many of these guys have ever really had to make payroll? That's a post for the future. Net net, full speed ahead, just look out for some adjacent storms.

Last point. Just look at the continuing trend of mobile penetration around the world, especially in developing countries. There may be lesser growth rates in the mature markets of Europe and the US, but where mobile is being fueled in China, India, Africa and South America, consumers will substitute or do without in order to get a mobile phone and benefit from it's conveniences. ARPU is already low in many of these regions, but operators there are capturing value even in these bottom of the pyramid playsdon't believe me?

Did you know that when Reliance was looking to acquire MTN in South Africa, they were willing to pay more than Microsoft had priced Yahoo? Really. If three data points constitute a trend, don't bet against mobile. Alternatively during these times, consider the consider the following.

In 1923, some of the most successful and richest men consisted of:

president of largest steel company in the US
president of largest gas company in the US
president of the NYSE
greatest wheat speculator in the US
president of the bank of international settlement

What became of these men and their fortunes?

Carol Schwabb, of the largest steel company, died as a pauper
Edward Hobson, of the largest gas company, went insane
Richard Whitney, president of the NYSE, eventually released from prison and died at home
Arthur Cougar, the wheat speculator, died abroadpenniless
C.B. Livermore, lion of wall street, committed suicide.

Yet that same year, 1923, Gene Sarazin, a professional golfer, won both the US Open and the PGA Championship. He died in 1999 at 95 years old. Played golf until he was 92, and was solvent at the time of his death.
CONCLUSION: Stop worrying about business and spend more time playing golf.

Taking part in Nintendo DS homebrew isn't nearly as maddening as the PSP homebrew scene, which still requires Job-like patience and the ability to compile and translate a thousand fragments of Internet-scattered instructions from a vast armada of nigh-illiterate Russian teenagers into a hacked PSP. Unlike a PSP, which requires custom firmware, all a Nintendo DS requires is a flash card. But with a hundred different no-name Chinese manufacturers vying for your money when they're not changing their names or going out of business, it can be hard to get a strong recommendation on exactly which flash card to buy and what you're getting yourself into.

Over at DS Fanboy, they've tried to take some confusion out of the equation with a homebrew guide that gives a summary and run-down of the perks and cons of the various flash cards on the market. The days of running DS homebrew off of a GBA flash cart are long over, thankfully: all of the current flash cards fit into the DS' Slot 1 and most of them seem to allow you to upgrade the storage by plugging in microSD cards.

As for me, I have a DS-X. Two months ago, I wouldn't have recommended it, since a year had passed since the last firmware update, despite customer's constant complaints and the fact that modern commercial DS games could no longer be played on the card due to some Nintendo changing the standard ARM7 code. They finally fixed it, though, so I'll cautiously endorse it: it's a neat card in that you can simply plug a standard USB cable into the card and mount it as a portable hard drive on your computer (most other cards require you to have a flash card reader / writer). Installing a program to it is as simple as copying it to the file. It even continues to work after I dropped it first in a cup of tea and then my toilet (don't ask). But keep in mind before you drop your money that their support is terrible, bordering on nonexistent.

DS Fanboy's (semi) ultimate homebrew guide [DS Fanboy]

Continue reading Multitouch surface made out of box, webcam, and glass

The other day, he posted an item titled, "Inaugurating the New York Times death watch." It is a very effective indictment of the Times' management and its board. The sad thing is, pretty much the same point could be made about every newspaper company: after the Internet has breathed down their collective necks for a decade, they still don't get it.

This week, then, Cisco Systems announced a new class of enterprise switches called the Nexus 7000 intended to replace its Catalyst router family, which is reaching its End of Life. To me the Nexus 7000, which costs from $75,000-$200,000, looks a heck of a lot like a mainframe computer. To Cisco it looks like a frigging gold mine.

These chances to tell customers they should throw out their perfectly fine equipment come along rarely, and in this case the opportunity to throw out the old and replace with new is particularly huge and gratifying because there is so much of the old stuff to get rid of. The equipment that will be replaced with Nexus 7000 racks was generally installed during the glory days of 1999-2000, when dot-coms and V.90 modems ruled the world, there was little streaming video, and we didn't really buy all that much stuff over the Internet. In anticipation of future growth back then (and just because they could), companies like Cisco pushed so much network hardware into the sales channel that it has taken until now for most of that equipment to finally become obsolete. So now they can push a boatload of new equipment into data centers in exactly the same way.

I'm not saying the Nexus 7000 is not needed or that it is bad in any way. Quite the contrary. Cisco has spent four years and $1 billion building a new generation of routers with new capabilities that are intended to be so compelling they'll keep customers from jumping to Juniper or some other competitor. And along with ensuring customer loyalty, the Nexus 7000s that start rolling out shortly will eventually enable whole new kinds of data services, most importantly robust IP multicasting as I described in this space a few weeks ago.

One huge difference between the Nexus and Catalyst lines, for example, is that Nexus comes with IP multicast turned "on," while Catalyst came with multicast turned "off" as a default. A Nexus 7000 chassis can pump up to 15 terabits per second, which is a heck of a lot of bits. Just for example, if we imagine a DVD-quality H.264 video stream running typically at one megabit per second, that Nexus 7000 could seemingly support 15 MILLION such data streams. In practical service, however, where the Nexus 7000 would be providing bandwidth for storage and network management in addition to pure file service, it is more reasonable to expect a fully tricked-out Nexus 7000 to support more like one million or so concurrent users. It is difficult at this point to even estimate the total cost of that tricked-out Nexus loaded with 10-gigabit-per-second network cards and hundreds of terabytes of storage, but it will undoubtedly set a new low cost point for per-subscriber hardware. Cisco is going to sell a lot of these puppies to telephone companies upgrading their DSL plants to offer IP TV.

What strikes me from reading the Nexus specs and that of the associated NX-OS operating system is how this new switch reminds me of an old mainframe. Nearly all services are virtualized, with multiple copies of the OS starting and stopping as needed. Everything is redundant, isolated, and intended for nonstop service. It is hard to imagine when, if ever, you'd even need to reboot. And while the Nexus supports network connections up to 10 gigabits per second, the really fast networking takes place in parallel between cards over a passive backplane. The Nexus 7000 is a data center in a rack, only with dramatically reduced cooling and power requirements which suggest to me that Cisco has a growth strategy for this architecture that will, over time, make it look more and more like a big computer and less like a router. Throw on a virtualized AIX or Solaris and the Nexus will eventually reveal that its true competition is less likely to be Juniper than it is IBM, HP, and Sun.

Remember this new platform has to last for a decade. From today's perspective making it still attractive 10 years from now requires subsuming as many computing services as one can imagine, not just undermining cable TV.

And speaking of undermining, many readers have been asking me to put in context IBM's recent move to cut pay for almost 8,000 service and support employees. I have resisted commenting to this point mainly because I see my job here as covering stories that AREN'T being handled well (or at all) elsewhere. But in the case of this story the Associated Press and others have done a good job of explaining the problem from the perspective of the employees, so I haven't had to.

But readers keep asking and there does seem to be an arm's length view of the situation that hasn't been well explained to date, so here goes.

If you aren't familiar with the story, IBM was sued several years ago by employees who were classified as exempt and therefore not entitled to overtime pay, yet those employees felt that had they worked at some other company their duties would have been considered non-exempt. IBM lost the case, paid a $65 million settlement in 2006, but took until now to decide that it ought to reduce by 15 percent the base pay of the affected employees in order to keep the settlement revenue-neutral for the company. If IBM had to pay overtime, it would tie that overtime to a lower base pay, thus keeping its costs steady.

While this probably makes total sense in the IBM accounting department, the change was a surprise to the affected workers, who say they are hurt by the lower base since it also cuts their vacation pay and IBM's contribution to their 401K. It might be easy to point to that $65 million settlement as making up for some of this, except that many IBM employees who were eligible to participate in the settlement for some reason didn't sign up for it and no longer can. Now there's a communication problem that needs exploration.

What the big picture shows here is the apparent end of IBM's tradition of respect for the individual. For most of its corporate history IBM has been a pioneer -- a model -- for corporate responsibility, but that era seems to be over. Maybe there is no more fat left to trim so the company is cutting muscle, instead. But I think there is more to it than that. I think this is a logical eventuality of IBM becoming a truly global corporation, not just an American company that does business abroad.

Despite the dark stories I have written about IBM over the last couple years, the company's latest financial reports were very good and the earnings guidance it gave to Wall Street was positively glowing. This makes little sense looking at the company from a U.S. perspective, where customers are upset and profits appear to be fleeting. Cutting through the recent IBM financials shows, in fa