more iphone nano speculation

There's a good article in Fortune discussing Apple's urgency to convert iPod users to the iPhone. I think this is absolutely true. They need to grow adoption of that OS as quickly as possible or else they will get overrun by Android, and repeat the mistake they made on the desktop. It's not clear how this will be done. The article suggests an "iPhone Touch", which would be an iphone minus 3G, GPS, and data plan. I think the problem with this is that it would be more popular than the iPhone 3G. I also wonder how this would go over with AT&T. 

General complaint: can people stop talking about the $199 iphone price tag like it's somehow a meaningful figure. It is just part of the overall price of the phone + service. In Hong Kong you can buy the phone without contract for HKD5400 (that's $700!). This is the price of the phone.

Taking a break from GTD in order to accomplish something

I decided to give the Things.app a rest today and actually accomplish some stuff. Basically, I'd moved too far in the "Getting Things Done" direction and not far enough in the "Four Hour Work Week" direction. In the latter, he recommends choosing 2 things to get done at the beginning of the day and then working like a maniac to get them done. This is a sensible approach. You won't get everything on your list done, but you also won't context switch so many times that you get nothing done.

Today's noteworthy tech things that happened...today

Google has released a stalking tool. In-pants penis cam can't be far behind.

Windows Mobile 7 to be released in 2010! Apparently windows mobile will team up with Motorola to deliver a killer one-two punch. Does it seem like MS is more and more lost every day?

Apple working on allowing background apps. What's not clear is how they are going to do it. Will there be one small processor that uses almost no power handling the background funcionality while a beefier one fires up to handle the active stuff? I'm interested?

New 43folders Podcast on Creating Blocks of Uninterrupted Time

After a long break, there's a new 43folders.com podcast on creating time to do what's important to you. I'm not sure there are many new ideas here, but the author Merlin Mann, packages it in such an engaging way. He's mentioned on the site that he's no longer interested in productivity porn, except as a way of getting to creative work. Here, he talks about tricks for freeing up blocks of uninterrupted time to work on creative stuff. And he's right, there's some work that requires a block of time, and if you don't get that block of time, you'll never be able to do it. Now I'm off to lock my wife and daughter in the closet so I can build that ship in a bottle...

Blogging harder than it looks!

It seems you can't just read a few articles and write something interesting in a few minutes. Hopefully I will improve without taking 6 hours a day to do it!

Exciting stuff today

New version of google earth. Sci-fi stuff! Enhance!

IBM offering to move laid off workers to India. The alternative is being turned into Soylent Green.

Gmail tasks finally available on the iPhone. Google announces this with the trademark (terrible/arrogant/annoying) sense of humor. The task wars are heating up! 

IE losing further share at the hands of Safari and Firefox. MS has really blown this lead and everyone wins!

iPhone Video Calling

An article in Information Week talks about an apple patent alluding to video recording, video calls, etc. I think most of us are expecting a front facing camera and the ability to record movies in the next version of the iphone, but this reinforces the notion that Apple is working hard on it. This is reassuring. 

It's tempting to think that this will enable us to use skype video on our iphones, but Apple will probably try to use this to expand the not so popular iChat service. Things are really getting insanely heated in the mobile device/mobile OS/mobile service market. It really seems like Apple and Google are squaring off for a ten years war, with the other players on the periphery. Things would heat up further if Google bought Skype from eBay!

This also got me thinking about the next version of iPhone and the improvements we can expect. A front facing camera and video recording is a definite. I would think that a compass sensor will be added, as each new sensor seems to open up a world of new possibilities. I think the really exciting changes will be enhanced horsepower. There have been rumors of multi-core ARM processors, enhanced video subsystems, etc. Certainly Apple has amassed an impressive army of chip designers and they are up to something. They know the iphone can be the platform of the future, but that it's going to need as much horsepower as possible to get there.

arsenal sign arshavin

It looks like the Arshavin deal is finally going through. I don't know if this is the optimal move, but at least Arsenal have another player. The fact that Song and Eboue get so many games is beyond worrisome. Hopefully his games come at their expense.

When Fabregas, Walcott and Rosicky become healthy, there are some exciting possibilities for Harlem Globetrotter stuff. This still doesn't solve Arsenal's biggest problem: replacing Flamini, but it's a good start.

First Post

This is where I will write down whatever I can think of, in a total unstructured way, at the expense of the reader!