Summary of this week:

Facial recognition tech did NOT help in Boston last week
Netflix has more customers than HBO
ARM is doing well in the mobile world, Nintendo is not
A Microsoft OS is on 7% of the world's tablets - up from 0% a year ago, not bad
A large chunk of a 9/11 airliner has just been found

Monday - Tuesday - Wednesday - Thursday - Friday - Saturday - Sunday

Monday April 22, 2013

The Boston bombing suspect was not read his Miranda rights. I hope those guys know what they are doing as I who hate to see this person be let off on a "technicality." "It's been said before and it'll be said again, but turning ourselves into a paranoid police state without basic rights means that those who attack us are winning."

The was much about the Boston lock-in that was disturbing. This post explain much of the problem - the government will do it all while the citizens must cower. This is not good for the country.

Facebook's Home has 500,000 users in a week. Is that a success?

Facial recognition technology did NOT help in the Boston manhunt. They did it the old fashioned way.

Microsoft's CFO is leaving the company.

I know it's over the Internet, but is it right to allow a state to tax the sale of a product in another state?

There was an earthquake in China over the weekend, and tech firms have already raised $32M in relief.

Bono on Apple: What the competitors don’t seem to understand is you cannot get people this smart to work this hard just for money.

One person's experience of one day with Google Fiber: You just get more done.

I like this post - a look at five top mind map tools. Need to look at coggle.

An infographic on the benefits of working from home.

This little filter can pull potable water out of Coca-Cola. It should be able to pull potable water out of anything.

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Tuesday April 23, 2013

Netflix now has more customers than HBO. The world has turned upside down, again.

Google's Street View now covers parts of 50 countries. This is an amazing, long-term project. There are privacy concerns, but Google is driving on public roads and listening to public broadcasts.

Marijuana is now legal in a few U.S. states. Growing and selling it is another form of farming. Farming is hard word with no gurantee of profits.

There is an odd campaign underway to oust Tim Cook from Apple.

The Senate passes the online sales tax bill. Let's see what the House does. This bill will kill small businesses that have been selling goods over the Internet. It will also kill writers who sell their own eBooks. Everyone would have to know how to collect taxes for 10,000 different government entities in the U.S. Big online sellers like the bill because they can handle the complexity. Small businesses can't. Jobs? Who needs jobs in America?

The BeagleBone Linux computer for $45. This is a competitor to the Raspberry Pi. I love it. Great for learning, even for education. Here is their web site.

The first commercial, white-space Internet access comes to rural California.

This study claims that talking is just as distracting as texting. How in the world has mankind survived a century with the automobile. According to such studies, our species should be extinct.

Just like in the old science fiction movies, SpaceX rocket does vertical takeoff, hover, and landing.

Acer introduces the first smaller Windows 8 tablet.

Just when we thought we could carry our tiny pocket knives on planes again, the TSA postpones the new knife policy indefinitely. Your tax dollars at waste.

Microsoft claims good sales of Office 365 subscriptions, but many are doubtful.

I'm always in search of the great grilled cheese sandwich. This recipe advocates grilling both sides of the bread.

Technology and the poor; we are probably on the wrong track with all this.

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Wednesday April 24, 2013

The reviews are in on the new Samsung Galaxy S4 - they are good.

Congress wants to subsidize broadband access for low-income Americans. What debt problem?

The British chip design firm - ARM Holdings - is doing quite well in this mobile world.

Nintendo is not doing so well.

IBM is using its computer cooling technology to gain efficiency in solar energy.

Lego updates its Mindstorm robotics kit. It will be here in August.

Google has bought a natural language processing company.

A security firm has found over 100,000 hackable infrastructure devices connected to the Internet. Hack away! Is everyone ready for national electronic health records?

Google may drastically change the google.com interface to appear like Google Now.

Google, and other companies, are looking less at SAT GPA and more at big data of applicants.

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Thursday April 25, 2013

It seems that AT&T is cooperating with out government to tap phone calls without court orders.

Once again, Apple's portable computers rate high as a Windows laptop.

While Microsoft's Windows 8 on tablets has been disappointing, they have 7% of the world's market, and I would settle for that much.

Expect to see about 10 million smart glasses walking about by 2016.

Think fast, move faster. At one time, IBM was famous for the phrase, "THINK." This is an update, and I think it is a good update.

A Federal Judge rules that the government cannot force a citizen to decrypt their hard drive.

A look at Pakistan and its potential for Internet wealth. I hope this happens. A strong middle class brings much stability to nations. The economy and money are not the only things in life. They do, however, allow people to provide for their families and live in peace.

The Apple Spaceship campus is behind schedule, way over budget, and the plans are being revised.

Government to the rescue: tips from the Department of Transportation about all the things we shouldn't do while driving. How did we ever survive to this point without this indispensable knowledge from our protectors?

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Friday April 26, 2013

Mark Zuckerburg continues to build his lobby group by adding Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates.

The first quarter of 2013 is over. Smartphones finally outship basic cell phones and Samsung ships 71Million of them.

The U.S. government wants all OTHER governments to be more transparent.

Intel points to Android notebook computers for $200 real soon now.

Electronic Arts has cut 10% of its workforce.

Microsoft has put a WiFi router in select issues of Forbes magazine to promote its Office 365 subscription service.

After ten years, Apple's iTunes is starting to show its age and is slipping in the marketplace.

The debate on 3D printing technology and firearms. Home-printed firearms are not here - yet. The same technology will print parts for your car engine and for your teeth and for ...

A new version of Ubuntu Linux is available today.

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Saturday April 27, 2013

The Google Glass uses an old TI SoC as a processor.

And some programmers already have broken into root access on the Google Glass.

Robert Scoble's experience of two weeks wearing a Google Glass. He won't be without it from now on.

3D printing produces a set of headphones that have no manufactured parts. The age is coming.

Marking a moment in time, Engadget's portable computer buyer's guide for the Spring of 2013.

I like George Will's editorial this morning about the possible return of adults to government.

A large airplane part was found wedged in an alley in NYC. It is from 9/11 - 12 years ago.

Oooops, LivingSocial is hacked and 50 million users are warned to change their passwords. Is everyone ready for national electronic health records?

Tickets to Apple's Developer Conference sold out in two minutes. Partly due to that, Apple will revive its travelling Tech Talks tour to let developers speak with Apple engineers.

CISPA appears to be dead in the Senate. The authors of the Constitution are shown to be right once again.

The top ten Reddit pages.

For those people who "know" that the climate is changing and that dinosaurs had colorful skins...it seems that the Earth's core is much hotter than we used to "know."

$35 a month fiber to the home in Vermont. Wow.

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Sunday April 28, 2013

From the Wikipeida people: Wikidata - a data repository of the world's facts.

Well, I am not alone. Here is a post about the war against personal photography. This goes along with my post on the war against sensors.

It seems that Intel thinks the market has turned from Microsoft Windows to Google Android for portable computers, especially in the low-cost models.

Indiana University becomes the first to completely own a petaflop supercomputer. They share it with no other organizations.

How one person went from wanting to being a writer to being a full-time writer. They sacrificed a lot for a long time.

Writers speak of their writing in past tense (I wrote...). Others speak in future tense (One day I will write...).

Writing is mostly done alone, and it is difficult to find your bad habits. Here are some good tips.

This is a wonderful post about the bother of writing and A.A. Milne (Winnie the Pooh). "The truth is that a layman will never take an author quite seriously. He regards authorship, not as a profession, but as something between an inspiration and a hobby. In as far as it is an inspiration, it is a gift from Heaven, and ought, therefore, to be shared with the rest of the world; in as far as it is a hobby, it is something which should be done not too expertly, but in a casual, amateur, haphazard fashion."

Tips on writing sermons and other speeches. Keep it simple folks. Talk to someone, that is all there really is.

This tip works (I have used it): write the first "draft" by hand. Typing it is the second draft.

If you dream, use them as story ideas.

Being organized can help you as a writer. As with all ideas, try it. If it works for you, keep it. Otherwise, discard it.

Write about the every day. It may be boring to you, but exciting to everyone else.

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