Are We Too Connected With Our Gadgets and Not With Each Other?

The San Francisco Chronicle had an interesting article about a week ago, one which I’ve been mulling over since then, trying to decide how I felt about it. Entitled, “Turn on, tune in, drop out — today’s motto” it discusses how many of us are becoming absorbed in our own self-contained worlds of technical entertainment, insulating us from the needs of interacting with each other face-to-face.

While I tend to feel some of the article is overblown (the writer himself concedes that he is semi-guilty of “technophobic fretting”), I do believe there are some valid points in the article.

For example, when I was a kid, I went to dinner with my parents and actually spoke to them. Nowadays I see children with all manner of distractions, from video games to portable DVD players, sitting at the table with their parents … and not paying attention to them. There are quite a few children who would rather logon when they get home and play video games or chat instead of going out and playing baseball. Plenty of them still go out and play, however, but if I look at my street on a weekday after school, there are a lot less kids out there than I recall from my childhood … and it’s not because there are less in the neighborhood.

As an adult, technology helps me stay more connected, as I’m always in touch with my cell phone and (if I wanted) could even do so with email. In fact, many people think they are too connected, especially in terms of work. Of course, none of this is face-to-face.

Some of the shying away from personal contact may actually have to do with too much contact. The author addresses things like people staying home and not going to the movies. My wife and I recently discussed this … when we go to the movies we are assailed by people talking on their cell phones, rude behavior, crowded theatres, setting off fireworks (yes, this happened once) … since we have a huge TV at home, and since theatre screens have shrunk as the stand-alone theatre has given way to the cineplex, why would we bother to go out … unless we absolutely CANNOT wait for the movie to come to HBO or DVD.

I don’t think it’s so clear-cut. Technology, as I’ve said before, can be either good or bad for us … it’s up to us as users to make sure we don’t allow ourselves to fall into the trap of hikikomori and withdraw from the world. And, as with all things, it’s important that we make sure our children don’t fall into that trap, either, and that they, and we, remember that humans need human contact … and that there’s nothing better than heading for the park on a beautiful spring day with your dogs.

Disconnected Handheld Sales Continue to Disappoint

According to market research firm IDC, sales of so-called disconnected handhelds (PDAs) dropped 8.8 percent in the third quarter of 2005 compared to Q2, and 16.9 percent year over year.

More and more, converged devices are the way to go. The traditional handheld, with perhaps Bluetooth and 802.11b connectivity, is losing attractiveness to converged devices with cellphone access. Adding things like GPS to PDAs simply hasn’t been enough.

Personally, my last PDA was a Pocket PC phone … I wanted to get rid of the extra device. And though I have found there are some negatives to the style of phone … like size … newer devices such as the Nokia 9300 Communicator are appearing that make the size difference less and less. I need a PDA to handle contacts, data, appointments, but I simply won’t go back to a standalone device.

Here’s the IDC Data from this year and last:

A Swiss Army Knife AND an MP3 Player — Why Not?

Yep, it’s the Swissbit SWISSMEMORY s.beat … combining a Swiss Army knife and a USB memory key / MP3 player.

From TrustedReviews:

The s.beat will be available in capacities of 1, 2 and 4GB and will be able to playback MP3, WMA and OGG – I’m always glad to see the latter, since so few players support this superior codec. There’s a built-in lithium polymer battery that charges directly from the USB port of your computer and gives approximately eight hours of use.

There’s also a built in FM tuner with six presets and despite its diminutive size there’s a three line, high-contrast LCD display. The player is removable from the knife body and a protective cap for the USB port is also supplied for when you use it without the knife – in case you want to take your music with you on an aeroplane.

With a blade, a pair of scissors and a nail file/screwdriver as well as the MP3 player/memory key, what more could you possibly want? The kitchen sink?

Extended Power for Any Portable Device?

I’ve seen so-called battery extenders for things like iPAQs … extenders that take AA or AAA batteries and have special connectors for the SPECIFIC device. These extenders are usually pretty inexpensive, however (I found one for $10 including shipping for my SX66 on eBay).

There are also specific extenders for notebooks as well, such as this one by APC. This particular one has a suggested retail price of $249.99 (ouch!).

This week Xantrex released a power extender, the XPower Pocket Powerpack, that reportedly works with any portable device, including laptops. It has an AC power outlet and a USB power outlet. It can plug into a regular AC outlet, a cigarette lighter or a airplane outlet (standard).

Since it can charge an iPod 20 times or maintain a laptop for 2 hours or so, it’s pretty flexible and could solve portable power issues for many people … though because of the price (119.99 suggested retail) only those with multiple devices … or at least a laptop, since compared to previous extenders it’s quite a bit cheaper.

Backup or Image? Either way, save your data …

“You can pay me now or you can pay me later.” I remember that Fram oil filter commercial from long ago. Basically, get prepared and be proactive or you’ll have a lot bigger problem on your hands.

The same thing applies to your data. Whatever’s on your hard drives, you don’t want to lose it.

There are two ways to look at it, and perhaps the way you keep copies of your data depends on what you want to save.

I hesitate use the term “back-up” your data, since this sort of implies the use of backup software. But there’s also a different type of backup, one I prefer, which allows you to restore your hard disk to a bootable condition … imaging.

So what’s the difference? Backup software requires you to reinstall the operating system, and at the very least, reinstall the backup software that you use. There are many different vendors of backup software. Some examples (note the word some) are Dantz Retrospect, Genie Backup Manager and Nero BackItUp which comes with the Nero Suite of CD/DVD burning software. Suffice it to say that they all basically do the same thing … they allow you to select files / folders or even drives that you want to backup, and make a compressed and perhaps encrypted and password-protected datastore of them. If your hard drive crashes, you reinstall the OS, reinstall the backup software, point to the datastore and restore the files.

The datastore can be on an external hard drive, a DVD or even a CD … it can even be on the same hard drive, though of course that makes little sense.

Now, imaging, which I prefer, allows you to make an image of your hard drive, which you can then use to “re-image” your hard drive. The beauty of this is that if your hard drive is unbootable, you can then slap in a new hard drive, take the old image, and restore the hard drive using a bootable CD or floppy, and the image, either on DVD, CD or external HD. The best known examples of imaging software are Norton Ghost and Acronis True Image.

Now, I’ve had a hard drive failure recently, and once I installed a new HD, it took me all of 15 minutes to re-image the drive and get the PC up and running again.

Of course, anything that changed since the last image was made was lost, but that’s not that much compared to having to reinstall ALL the applications and drivers as well as the OS.

You can, with either backup or imaging software, choose to make a full data backup or simply an “incremental” one that records the changes from the last full backup to the current state of your hard drive and files.

So, here’s my suggestion and preference. When you first get your PC, image your hard drive. Image your hard drive, perhaps once a month. Use either a full image or incremental, your choice. Use backup software to backup your important files (in your My Documents folder?), photos and MP3 files.

This way, if your hard drive fails you have an image which will allow you to restore your system to operating status very quickly, as well as backups of your important files.

Oh, and if possible, put your VERY MOST important files on a web-based system … like Yahoo! Briefcase or something. That way, you will have an alternative in case of something REALLY catastrophic.

At any rate … do something. Don’t wait until an emergency hits to realize you need to do this.

New Technology Awaits Former Prisoners

NEW YORK Oct 24, 2005 — When it comes to reading or arithmetic, Marvin Calvin is delighted to help his two children. He missed out on many of the duties of parenthood during a 10-year stretch in prison for armed robbery.

But when it comes to MP3 players, video game consoles, computers or the Internet, he is just baffled.

“I won’t even sit down with them and play that little game thing because I don’t even know how to operate it,” said the 48-year-old Calvin, who was freed in July.

He is a technological Rip Van Winkle.

More details at ABC News.

I never thought of this. I always figured those inside would be able to access PCs and keep up with changes on the outside. But this may be more true for those going in NOW. Those getting out NOW would have no clue.

Heck, I have enough trouble keeping up with the rapidly changing tech landscape … when a prisoner who served 20 years went into prison cell phones were bulky things. Now you can play games on them and take pictures with them. What a revelation it must be for those just coming out of prison.

NCsoft’s City of Villains Goes Gold

AUSTIN, Texas–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Oct. 19, 2005–NCsoft® North America announces that City of Villains(TM) has reached gold master status and will appear on retailers’ shelves in North America at the end of the month. NCsoft also confirmed that customers who purchased and registered their City of Villains pre-order boxes will receive a two-day head start for game play.

More details at biz.yahoo.com.

I really don’t need an excuse to buy another game … but City of Heroes has been one of the few games of late that I have played … and played … and played. I still remember the first time I logged into the City of Heroes beta and found myself in Atlas City … the heroic music in the background, the heroes around the City Hall. Since if you have BOTH games you still only have to pay one fee (see IGN) … well, I think I’ve found my gaming Kryptonite.

Can’t stop … must pull out credit card …

Blu-ray is the winner, Forrester declares

Forrester Research on Wednesday declared Blu-ray, a new DVD format backed by a group led by Sony, as the winner in the increasingly heated battle over next-generation DVD technology.”Two groups are competing for control of high-definition DVD formats to be launched in the spring of 2006. After a long and tedious run up to launch, it is now clear to Forrester that the Sony-led Blu-ray format will win,” Forrester Research analyst Ted Schadler said in a report.

More Details at ZDNet.

This might tip things in Blu-ray’s direction for the consumer as well. What most consumers (including me!) do not want is to end up buying the Betamax version of these two competing DVD formats.

To clear things up, these new formats will use blue lasers instead of the red currently used … since blue has a shorter wavelength, more data can be packed onto the disc.

Each next-generation DVD format comes in single-layer and dual-layer formats. For HD DVD, that means capacities of 15GB and 30GB; for Blu-ray, it’s 25GB and 50GB.

Despite Forrester’s “announcement”, both Intel and Microsoft have joined the HD-DVD camp. Those are two powerful forces, but on the other hand more studios seem to be in the Blu-ray camp, or else both, as opposed to JUST the HD-DVD camp. And Dell and HP are in the Blu-ray camp.

It’s also possible that the two sides might come together. Although DVD+R and DVD-R never did, and those two formats are BOTH alive and well.

My choice? Wait to see what happens. This story is not yet over.

Edit: less than a week after this post, HP made a few requests of the Blu-ray camp, which would bring Blu-ray closer to HD-DVD. A unification in the making? Read the full story at Ars Technica.

Windows-based Bluetooth scanner released to the public

It was only a matter of time before someone released a Netstumbler-like scanner for Bluetooth devices. Today, BlueScanner, a Windows-based Bluetooth scanner, was made available for download by Network Chemistry. The free scanner works with commonly available Bluetooth adapters and users can now “stumble around” with their laptops and find vulnerable phones, PDAs and computers.

Every ten seconds, BlueScanner scans radio frequencies for Bluetooth devices. The devices can be sorted by location, type and service. The program can categorize devices into types such PDAs, Cell-phones, Headsets. In addition, BlueScanner will discover most of the available services on the device.

Network Chemistry, a manufacturer of wireless detection and remediation devices, released the software to increase awareness about Bluetooth security. Brian de Haaf, Vice-President of product management and marketing at Network Chemistry said, “Looking back five to ten years ago, people thought the same thing about 802.11b wireless. That lack of knowledge is the same thing we are seeing with Bluetooth.

More details at TG Daily.

At first I was trying to decide if this had any real purpose besides alerting people to the security holes in leaving Bluetooth on all the time … and, really, it doesn’t. Unlike something that searches for Wi-Fi networks (so you can surf … as well as hack), this wouldn’t be useful for anything besides hacking … you gotta admit, there are probably illicit versions of this type of software already out there. It’s good to get something like this out legally to get people thinking about it.

Estonia pulls off nationwide Net voting

I realize Estonia is small compared to the U.S., but still …

A tiny Baltic nation last week became what appears to be the first country to open its its local elections to Internet voting on a nationwide level–although only about 1 percent of the votes were cast online.

More details at ZDNet.

Is it because they are more tech-savvy than us, or less litigious? Let’s face it, anytime anything new is tried in the U.S., you can expect something a lawsuit or at least serious discussion to delay it.

This from a country that has people sue over the use of “God” in the Pledge of Allegiance. I mean, seriously, don’t we have better things to spend public money on?

Let’s not even get started on how far behind the U.S. is in terms of using biometric ATMs.