Author Archive | Ed Oswald

Kindle: It's a Certifiable Hit

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 16, 2009 at 3:21 pm

Well, if the sales figures being reported by TechCrunch’s Mike Arrington are indeed correct, the Kindle is a hit. Since February, a source indicates 300,000 Kindle 2’s have been sold, and the device is shipping out at a rate twice as fast as the original model.

Extrapolating that out through the rest of the year, that suggests 1.7 million Kindles will sell in 2009, and at a $359 retail price generate a staggering $592 million in revenues for Amazon. This isn’t even considering an uptick in sales as we approach the holidays: so in all likelihood the figures could be even rosier than this.

Amazon is much more conservative, estimating sales of 800,000 during the year. But still, that would mean a quarter billion in revenues would come from its e-book efforts — not too shabby.

It’s not clear whether demand has dropped, or production has increased, but Kindles are finally back in stock on Amazon after being backordered nearly since the original device’s release.

You have to credit Amazon: it saw an untapped market for electronic books and was able to capitalize on it. And with consumer’s increasing hunger for things digitally, it may have answered an inevitable problem with its business: what happens when people stop buying paper books?

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Too Early to Judge the "Lauren" Effect, But Mac Grows

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 16, 2009 at 11:13 am

Analyst firm IDC’s quarterly report on the state of the PC industry was released Wednesday, and it shows Apple was able to gain market share even in light of declining computer shipments overall.

Cupertino’s market share increased .2% year over year in the US to 7.6 percent, while overall PC shipments in the US fell 3 percent. Another winner here was HP, who took the lead in US shipments from Dell during the quarter.

Worldwide, things were quite a bit worse. The market contracted some 7.1 percent, although it was better than the 8.2 percent IDC had expected. The firm speculated that the US market’s resilience may be a sign that consumer spending isn’t as depressed as feared, and that even in a deep recession there may be opportunities for growth.

A lot of the growth will probably come in the portable computer market, which still is quite strong overall. “Tight credit and economic concerns have certainly taken a toll on PC shipments in the last couple quarters, but the move to portables, fueled by Mini Notebooks and falling prices, has mitigated the impact,” study head Loren Loverde said.

The “PC Hunters” ads came too late in the quarter to register any impact that could be gauged in the survey. It will be until July or so before we get any solid data on whether Microsoft’s price argument made any difference.

My guess is probably not. The worst of this recession spending-wise was last quarter in my opinion, and look how Apple fared. Could it be the Microsoft-leaning press is just a bit too eager to see Apple fail? What do you think?

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The Race to 1,000,000 Followers: an Update

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 15, 2009 at 3:56 pm

Some of you may have heard about Aston Kutcher’s Twitter challenge to CNN: that he would punk Ted Turner if he beat the network to a million followers. That prompted network stalwart Larry King to shoot back at Kutcher in a funny-but-slightly-uncomfortable-to-watch video:

Well, here’s where we stand: EA’s now gotten into the action according to TechCrunch’s MG Siegler:

EA tweeted out earlier today that if Kutcher beats CNN to a million, it will put Kutcher’s 1 millionth follower in a future EA game. The Twitter community is bound to eat this up.

It gets better: EA later sweetened the pot even further, the game maker will now give that lucky Twitterer every single game made this year. So will Aston be able to do it?

Probably yes. As of Wednesday at 6:45pm ET, @cnnbrk has just short of 947,000 followers. @aplusk stands at about 915,000 followers. Aston has been gaining a couple thousand followers per hour, and a Twitter user has created a spreadsheet (wow, a lot of time on their hands) to calculate the time to 1 million.

If it’s right, Aston will reach the goal about 16 hours ahead of CNN sometime tomorrow afternoon. And somebody out there in Twitterland is going to be a very happy camper and a video game star.

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Pandora Goes Set-top With Livio Radio

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 15, 2009 at 9:00 am

Up until now, Pandora was pretty much exclusively an computer-based product. While the company moved past the PC with the launch of its iPhone application, not until now has it been available in a more traditional form.

Enter Livio Radio. Along with being able to receive about 11,000 Internet radio stations, it is the first Internet radio device to be fully compatible with Pandora. It even features the “thumbs up, thumbs down” rating system the service uses, both on the device itself and the remote.

Users can use their own Pandora account with Livio, and a Wi-Fi or Ethernet connection is required. The device is now available at will retail for $149.99.

Getting Pandora off the PC is something the company has apparently been considering for awhile, considering off-PC use is on the rise. “We’re always looking for new products that make that easy to do, and have a wide appeal for listeners,” business development chief Jessica Steel said.

I’m certainly excited to see Pandora making a move outside the box (although I guess it’s inside the box this time? I digress). For those of us that listen to a lot of Internet radio, myself included, devices like Livio are useful.

The price though is a little steep. I’d personally like to actually see it to judge whether the quality — construction and sound — is worth $150. I’m not seeing any retail availability yet, however.

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Twitterers are Heathens!

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 14, 2009 at 1:02 pm

In yet another installment from the crazy study department, research conducted by the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California seems to suggest that twittering may lead to immorality. Remember that the next time you are trying to describe your feelings in 140 characters or less.

Before you say, “what the …”, let me explain their premise. Institute Director Antonio Damasio along with his research group argue that moral decision-making requires more time to ponder ones options. In this status-update driven world, that apparently doesn’t happen.

They set to prove their point by sharing stories that would invoke certain emotions with study participants. Brain scans indicated it was taking 6-8 seconds for those emotions to register.

From this I’m guessing Damasio and Co. inferred that the high speed inflow of information that status driven websites like Twitter just doesn’t give us enough time to properly feel an emotion about what we’re taking in.

USC media scholar Manuel Castells chimed in on PhysOrg, where the study originally appeared. “Lasting compassion in relationship to psychological suffering requires a level of persistent, emotional attention,” he reasons.

This has to be the oddest study I’ve seen in a long time. Whereas the Facebook study just seemed to state the obvious, this just seems to create unnecessary concern over the path society is taking.

Twitter was never meant to invoke emotion. It’s premise was to let people know what you are doing, or what is happening. Take natural disasters. When the tweets start rolling in, are these people suggesting there is no reaction at all to learning people have perished, or are in trouble?

Sorry, but this takes a huge leap of faith to believe we’ve become that callous.

One last point, I was discussing this with a friend, and he said “wow its kind of funny you’d take on neuroscientists.” Yes, these folks are smart. But I think the big issue here is that some type of problem with social media was inferred.

I know when I infer something that could be interpreted a multitude of ways, I am usually criticized by readers. How is this different?

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Facebook Rots Your Brain!

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 14, 2009 at 8:41 am

No doubt we’ve heard from our grandparents how television appartently makes us stupid. Enter Facebook, the latest scorn to our intellgence. A study from Ohio State University of 219 students gauged their school performance against their Facebook usage.

While 79 percent of students expressly denied that Facebook was interfering with studying, there may have been some tangental evidence it does. Users of the site generally studied less (1-5 hours a week), and averaged GPAs between 3.0 and 3.5. However those that didn’t use Facebook studied more (11-15 hours), and had GPAs above 3.5.

Call me crazy, but researchers may have only found the obvious: the more you study, the better grades you’ll get. But continuing on…

“There’s a disconnect between students’ claim that Facebook use doesn’t impact their studies, and our finding showing they had lower grades and spent less time studying,” co-author of the study and a doctoral student Aryn Kapinski said of the study.

Kapinski and crew also found that students were less likely to use Facebook if they had a job, and more likely to if they participated in extracurricular activities.

Science, technology, engineering, math and business majors were most likely to use the service above other discliplines.

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Times Isn't Just Your Everyday RSS Reader

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 13, 2009 at 11:00 am

Let me start by welcoming you all to a new weekly feature here on Technologizer. We’re calling it Mac Monday, and each week I’ll tackle a new piece of software, hardware, or other topic related to the Apple community.

I’m a visual person…which means that I’m not a big RSS fan. To me, the whole RSS revolution has taken the style out of the Web: while the content remains, the design that encapsulates it is taken away. Sometimes the way information is presented is just as important as what it says. So I’ve preferred to keep my routine of actually visiting Websites in lieu of using a RSS reader. Until now.

Enter Times, a new RSS reader from the folks at Acrylic Software. This software aims to put back into RSS what got taken out: a sense of design. Instead of the bland list design used by competitors, Times lays out RSS in a more visual format, akin to that of a newspaper website.

Continue Reading →

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Buy.com Selling Officially Unlocked iPhones

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 13, 2009 at 8:53 am

Who needs a jailbreak? In a fairly shocking move considering AT&T’s stranglehold on the iPhone market here in the US, Buy.com has begun selling unlocked iPhone 3G 16GB for $799, a $500 premium on the carrier price. These phones are not jailbroken: they were merely never locked to a carrier.

Apple will warranty these phones just the same way as they do the locked models. They will never lock: iTunes will update the phone normally. The only negative to Buy.com’s phones is the fact that instructions may come in a foreign language since they were likely made for overseas use.

So why the change of heart from Apple? It’s not too out of the question to think that the company is probably clearing out inventory ahead of a new iPhone release. Then again, it didn’t do this for the first-generation model, so thats something to consider as well.

Maybe, just maybe, Apple may have a change of heart on one-party rule in the US, but we all can dream, no?

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Confirmed: Zune HD is Third Generation Model

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 10, 2009 at 4:28 pm

Technologizer has learned that rumors surrounding the fourth third generation Zune model are indeed true, and Microsoft’s music player would be getting a high-definition upgrade sometime in the fall, most likely in September or October. Sources close to the Zune team indicate that Engadget’s shots of the marketing materials are indeed authentic, but are fairly tight lipped on exactly what the player may have.

What we do know is this: the size of the device is set to come in smaller than the iPod touch (although we believe in size, not in thickness). Capacities should be competitive with that of the iPod touch, and like the touch, it would sport a touchscreen interface. The old click wheel would be replaced with a single-button as the pictures show.

We’re still trying to source out more information on it, but we do know with a good deal of confidence that this information is correct — these sources have accurately called the launches and specs of two previous launches (see my stores at Betanews: here and here).

More as we get it…

New Details: We’re being told that the Engadget marketing materials are likely not the final art for any advertising. So while the device is real, this art is probably just a draft.

Update 2: We made a bit of a mistake. While generally every year since their launch there has been some type of revision, this is technically the third gen model, not the fourth.

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ISPs Should Lead in Curbing Internet Defamation

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 10, 2009 at 1:27 pm

A friend once said to me, “the internet is good for two things: slander and porn.” For those who have been the target of electronic harassment and bullying, that sentiment could not ring truer.

Too often, individuals and groups on the Internet abuse the free flow of thoughts that is the promise of the Web to turn around and attack or demean others. Oftentimes, those affected can do little to protect themselves, and find themselves on the short end of the stick.

Why does this occur? Simply put, the US has made it easy for ISPs to skirt any responsibility when it comes to what is posted on their servers. Thus some providers will turn a blind eye when a victim comes a-complaining.

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