Author Archive | Harry McCracken

The “Facebook Phone” I Want is a Facebook iPhone

Posted by Harry McCracken on September 20, 2010 at 1:24 pm

The weekend’s big tech rumor was the possibility that Facebook was working on a Facebook-branded phone of some sort, presumably one with super-tight integration with the social network’s online services. Seems utterly plausible–the scuttlebutt came from decent sources such as TechCrunch and Cnet, and Facebook’s denial was artful rather than comprehensive. Could be cool, too: Joe Hewitt, who’s supposedly working on it, was responsible for the excellent Facebook app for iPhone until he quit that project in disgust over Apple’s App Store policies.

Thinking about Hewitt, though, made me ponder the current state and future of the Facebook iPhone app. It’s seen some tweaks since he left for less restrictive pastures, but nothing radical. And there’s just a ton of undone stuff left that could make Facebook better on an iPhone.

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Got Any Questions for Zappos' Tony Hsieh?

Posted by Harry McCracken on September 20, 2010 at 10:48 am

I’m not a customer of shoe/fashion/housewares superstore Zappos, but I’ve never met anyone who was and didn’t rave about the site. So I’m pleased to have been invited to guest-tweet a live Webcast with Zappos founder/CEO Tony Hsieh this Friday, September 24, at 2pm PT.  I’ll watch, listen, and tweet some thoughts as I do.

The topic of the Webcast is “Service and the Evolution of the New Customer,” and I doubt that there’s a merchant on the Web who knows more about the subject than Hsieh. (He recently wrote a New York Times bestseller about it.)

You can participate (and share your own questions and impressions via Twitter) by joining us here on Friday. In the meantime, if you’ve got any questions for Hsieh, feel free to share them as a comment on this post–we’ll round ’em up for the Webcast.

(Full disclosure: Like other Webcasts I’ve observed and tweeted, this one is sponsored by HP and hosted at one of its sites. The hashtag for the event is #hpio.)

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Google Apps Gets a Second Layer of Security

Posted by Harry McCracken on September 20, 2010 at 2:36 am

Passwords may be by far the Web’s most common form of security, but they’re far from airtight: some get stolen, and others are alarmingly easy to figure out. Two-factor authentication, using both a password and something else–preferably a something else that’s tough for an intruder to determine–is much safer.

So today, Google is announcing two-factor authentication for its Google Apps suite of online productivity tools. A new feature lets businesses which use Apps add another layer of security by generating random codes which employees get on their phones–Google is making apps available for Android, iPhone, and BlackBerry . To get into your account, you’ve got to enter both your password and a freshly-generated code.

The new feature is free and optional, and users who adopt it can specify certain PCs as trusted machines, permitting them to access their accounts with only a password. It’s available for paid, education, and government accounts starting today; users of the freebie Standard edition will get it “in the months ahead.”

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New HP Printers: One's Got a Tablet. One Looks Like a VCR. And One's the World's Tiniest Color Laser

Posted by Harry McCracken on September 20, 2010 at 1:56 am

Many things have changed about printers over the past fifteen years or so. One that hasn’t is the basic form factors. Both inkjets and lasers may have gotten slicker, sleeker, and more space-efficient, but most of the change has been evolutionary rather than revolutionary.

Today, however, HP is announcing a bunch of new printers and all-in-ones–and three of them are strikingly new, in three strikingly different ways. I was recently briefed by the company and saw the new models in person.

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Hallelujah! Google Voice Returns to the iPhone App Store

Posted by Harry McCracken on September 17, 2010 at 7:28 pm

The saints be praised. After loosening and clarifying its App Store policies last week, Apple is proving that things–some of them, at least–have changed. A third-party Google Voice app called GV Connect is in the App Store, almost fourteen months after Apple removed all third-party Google Voice apps and refused to approve Google’s own one. Sean Kovacs, developer of GV Mobile, one of the programs bounced last year, says that Apple has told him his app will return tomorrow.

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Most Android Users Still Don't Have Froyo

Posted by Harry McCracken on September 17, 2010 at 1:11 pm

For owners of iPhones and iPod Touches, the latest major upgrade to the OS is version 4. For Android users, it’s 2.2 “Froyo.” Every iOS user with a compatible device can upgrade to 4.x at will, but Android types must wait until the wireless carrier they bought their phone from releases the Froyo update. And while every new iPhone and iPod Touch ships with iOS 4, there are still new Android devices arriving–such as Dell’s Streak–that run old versions of the software.

So how does that translate into percentages of users who get to enjoy the benefits of a current mobile operating system versus. those who are stuck on something at least slightly stale? Online advertising network Chitika, which publishes stats based on aggregate data about visitors to sites on its network, shared some relevant numbers with me.

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New and Improved Flipboard

Posted by Harry McCracken on September 17, 2010 at 10:43 am

Flipboard–the “social magazine” that’s one of the very most interesting new apps on the iPad or another other platform–has a new version in the App Store. It lets you add more sections, has some basic offline functionality, and lets you add a comment when you retweet a story. If you have an iPad, you need to try this program…

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