Thanks to all who died to make/keep us free!

How big is the Gulf Oil Spill *REALLY*?

This site lets you overlay the spill onto your own hometown or any address in the world. It is scary to realize just how large this thing has become.

New Jersey lauded for Bike-Friendliness

While I live in the Nutmeg State, I was born in New Jersey and the Garden State holds a special place in my heart.  That special place has only gotten warmer as I have grown to love cycling, due to the many great opportunities to ride my bike when I am visiting down there.  My trips to Wildwood, NJ are especially great for getting out on two-wheels. So, it was no surprise to see that New Jersey has been named the 8th best state in th Union for bicyclists.  And from what I have seen, things are only getting better!

Posted via email from The Bike Nomad

Irony Overload: WB Pirates Antipirate Tech

Truth is stranger than fiction, much to the chagrin of fiction writers. And you must look no further than Warner Brothers entertainment for proof. Who knew that piracy laws allowed recursion?

German firm Medien Patent Verwaltung claims that in 2003, it revealed a new kind of anti-piracy technology to Warner Bros. that marks films with specific codes so pirated copies can be traced back to their theaters of origin. But like a great, hilariously-ironic DRM Ouroborus, the company claims that Warner began using the system throughout Europe in 2004 but hasn't actually paid a dime for it.

Mod-Blog Empire Strikes Back

Thanks to Jib-Jab. Sorry, Wedge and Sean. Didn't have pictures that fit the templates. Click on the image below to see the movie.

Is the Windows Era over?

I have made no secret of my animus against the Windows operating system. I use it only at work these days - and am stuck on Windows XP for the most part. But I still find it hard to use the operating system without being constantly needled by its poor design, poor efficiency, and lack of respect for the user.

But now many are arguing that the end of the Windows Era is here with the rise of Google "in the cloud", Apple in the smartphone/iPad space, and HP's high-profile purchase of Palm for webOS. They predict that we are past the peak of the Microsoft mountain, and will be watching a slow slide to irrelevance in the next 10 years.

Microsoft lumbers along, avoiding risks, clinging to Office and Windows revenues. Meanwhile, companies without Microsoft's existing monopoly-bound customers drive change, and they are willing to take risks. The mobile-to-cloud service platform is to the PC what the PC was to the mainframe: It extends computational and informational utility to more people and places -- and for lower cost. The Windows era is giving way to the anytime, anywhere, on-anything era. The most dynamic innovations are occurring outside the Windows monopoly...
HP already has announced a WebOS-based tablet. HP's next, logical step is to release a laptop running WebOS. Losing HP is bad, but there may be more trouble coming. Sony is yet another traitor in the making. Last week, Sony announced plans to support Google TV by offering a television running Android. As part of a recent reorganization, Sony execs responsible for VAIO PCs are in charge of TVs. OS migration from Sony smartphone (the Xperia X10) or Google TV-based television to tablet or PC is logical next step. What about Dell, which already has adopted Android for smartphones? Windows is bloated and moribund compared to these lither mobile OSes pushing up into the PC market.

To be clear, the end of Microsoft's dominance does not necessarily mean the beginning of an Apple Computer era. Google is well-poised for dominance, there are a number of alternative OSes out there like webOS and Android, and with Linux it is becoming increasing cheap for anyone to start from scratch in inventing their own Operating System for their own custom device.

The few things I *DON'T* like about the iPad

A work friend asked me today if there was anything I did NOT like about the iPad.  Here were my thoughts, for those who thought I had nothing but praise for it:

 

1.  iWork apps are not truly independent.  The iWork apps are good, but they are not really well-designed to originate new content from scratch.  It is best, in my limited experience, to create your doc on the desktop (in Pages/Work or Excel/Numbers) and then use the iPad to fill in the gaps of data.  Formatting is far better on the desktop.  The way I have worked this is to create my template document on my MacBook Pro, send it to my iPad, and then create a copy each time I need a new doc.

 

(An alternative to iWork is the Office2 app which tries to provide a Microsoft Office-compatible suite in your iPad which syncs with both iDisk and Google Docs.  It is far less polished than iWork - and is missing key functionality - but it is worth a look if the iWork apps don't fufill your needs or if you do 99% of your work in Google Doc anyway.)

 

2.  Document syncing stinks.  This bell has been run before by others, but truly the document syncing features for iWork are horrible.  The "intended" method is via iTunes, but the document conversion and syncing process is slow and takes over iTunes entirely each time you drag and drop a new file onto it.  The other two methods are (1) e-mailing the file between your iPad and desktop (easiest method, but also slow as conversion has to be done in both directins) and (2) using a syncing App like DropBox or SugarSync (requires registration with free service, but keeps you in sync between desktop and iPad at all times).

 

3.  Fingerprints, fingerprints, fingerprints.  Even with an oleophobic coating that minimizes the oil collecting, your iPad screen will be full of fingerprints by the middle of the day, every day.  I have stocked up on screen wipes (the ones from Endust made for LCDs are the best, but any wipe for glasses will do) and try to clean the screen once a day.  Even then, in the wrong lighting, it looks horrible.

 

4.  I miss Folders.  The iPad, like the iPhone, is non-heirarchical.  Thus, no folders on the apps screens or within iWork or iBooks.  This is fine when your collection of Apps or Documents is small.  But if you want to make your iPad your "computer on the go", it becomes an issue quickly.  iPhoneOS 4 will resolve this on the Apps screen when it hits iPads this fall.  There is no guarantee we'll have any such solution within iWork.

 

That is about it.  I am loving the web browsing (prefer it to my PC or Mac for 95% of cases), the games, the instant-on-always-on internet connection, and I love Evernote which keeps all of my notes current between desktops, iPad, and iPhone for free.  That is a HIGHLY recommended App.