Year: 2005

Video iPod Released

Post ImageAt long last it has happened. The oft-rumored and much ballyhooed video iPod was unveiled by Apple’s Steve Jobs today along with a new iMac and an updated iTunes that includes music videos, movies and TV shows:

The iPod has “been a huge hit for us, so it’s time to replace it,” Apple CEO Steve Jobs said as he showed off the new video-capable MP3 player at an event here. “Yes, it does video.”

The music players, which come in black or white with a 2.5-inch screen, will be available in a 30GB model for $299 and a 60GB version for $399. The new devices hold up to 15,000 songs, 25,000 photos or more than 150 hours of video, Apple said.

Pay attention to the media coverage this device will get in the coming weeks. What’s significant is not that Apple has released a video version of the iPod, but that no one seems to care about the Portable Media Centers that have been out for months from companies like Creative. Seems as though Apple can do no wrong!

Perhaps Microsoft and Real set aside their differences for the simple reason that they can’t beat Apple if they are trying to beat each other. It has been suggested that Apple and Google would make good partners in the fight against Microsoft (and now Real perhaps). I don’t think they would, for the simple reason that Steve Jobs never releases anything into beta!

Even though the video iPod has been a long time in the making, I have to admit I am still somewhat surprised. Given the recent bickering between Jobs and the record label executives, I expected it to be harder for Apple to add movies and music videos to their iTunes store. On the other hand, Jobs is much more powerful in Hollywood (Pixar, etc) than he is in the eyes of the RIAA.

The Apple domination of media continues…

Read: CNET News.com

.NET Wizards October Meeting

Post ImageEarlier tonight was the October meeting of the Edmonton .NET Wizards User Group. We usually have one of our members present a topic, and tonight Dickson did an excellent presentation on Visual Studio Tools for Office. He’ll be posting the code and materials he used on the wiki soon.

I also got around to fixing up the .NET Wizards redirects today. That means that all of our old domains now point to the Edmonton site at http://edmonton.dotnetwizards.org, and my former .NET blog is no more – it simply forwards here. I figured that I really didn’t need a separate blog after all, as I don’t post about .NET often enough to warrant it, and most people simply read this blog already anyway.

If you’re in Edmonton and you’re into .NET, you should come to one of our meetings! And be sure to register for the Launch Tour 2005 event taking place on November 15th – it’s going to be huge! If you want to get on the mailing list, drop me an email at mack@dotnetwizards.org.

Read: Edmonton .NET Wizards

Xbox 360 Revealed

Post ImageThe November 22nd launch of the Xbox 360 is now in plain view, so naturally more and more details are emerging. Microsoft is opening up too, as evidenced by it’s recent press event that CNET News.com reporter Daniel Terdiman attended:

For all the talk about whether there will be enough games available when the Xbox is released on Nov. 22, few doubt that the games that will be ready will be a cut above anything available for current-generation consoles. And after seeing a handful of Xbox 360 games Monday, I can say with confidence that it’s true.

Over plates of olives, endives, red peppers and other snacks at Dogpatch Studios in this city’s somewhat rundown Dogpatch neighborhood Monday, Microsoft finally pulled back the curtains on the new Xbox for a small crowd of journalists and invited us to try our hands at 12 titles expected to be ready in time for the console launch next month.

Seems as though Daniel left the event feeling confident in the Xbox 360: “I’d tried about five or six games, and have no trouble reporting that the Xbox 360 was the best console experience I’ve ever had.” He also left wondering about the one question those in the gaming industry, and fans of games for that matter, rarely ask:

Yet in the end, I came back once again to wondering if it’s all really necessary. When it comes to enjoying a video game basketball experience, just how real does the sweat have to be?

There’s no question the new Xbox will produce the most realistic games ever. The question then becomes, do more realistic games make for better games? I’m inclined to say yes, but I suppose time will tell. I’m also willing to bet the answer will vary with each person, and each type of game.

Read: CNET News.com

Notes for 10/10/2005

Dickson and I spent many hours trying to solve a programming challenge (there are no problems or impossibilities, only challenges!) last night, part of the 14 hour marathon of work that was my Sunday. As a result, I didn’t get a chance to post my weekly notes, so here they are on a holiday Monday instead!

  • Happy Thanksgiving!
  • Congratulations to Violet & Vincent on your engagement! Pictures from the ceremony are now up on Flickr. Also congrats to Mark & Kim (also recently engaged), my new favorite couple to photograph – they are just so photogenic!
  • I tried the new Starbucks Maple Macchiato yesterday, and I must say it’s pretty good. I don’t think it’ll replace my favorite (Caramel baby!) but it’s very good. And very Canadian now that I think about it. Yep, just checked, it’s not on the lineup on the American site.
  • This Microsoft job posting sounds like my ideal job! I would be quite happy doing what Scoble does!
  • Found this quote from Larry’s blog today – Google’s Sergey Brin: “The No. 1 factor that contributed to our success over the past seven years is luck.” There’s some more good quotes from his talk here.
  • I missed my SOC 300 class last Thursday morning as I took my Grandma to the hospital (she’s fine!) but I talked to some classmates later that day. Apparently the entire class did very poorly on the midterm and there was a big discussion. At one point, the entire class of 400 students was booing and the prof got quite agitated, as you can imagine. I’ve never heard of a class booing the teacher before! I guess I’ll find out more tomorrow morning. For the record, his exam was terrible. Multiple choice questions with answers A through H for some, recorded on a scantron (which only goes to E) and on paper for the others. Ridiculous options too – “all of the above”, “none of the above”, “only a, b, and f” (where F is “none of the above”), etc.
  • Here’s the website for the Toyota Echo’s replacement, the Yaris. Dickson and I decided it looks like a mix of the Echo Hatchback, the Prius, and the Matrix.
  • I’m really digging the new Ricky Martin song “I Don’t Care” which features Fat Joe and Amerie. Maybe it’s just because I love Amerie! She can definitely sing, and let’s face it, she’s beautiful. Ricky Martin and Amerie performed the song on Oprah today.

Yahoo! Podcasts

Post ImageI’ve been so busy lately that I missed the launch of Yahoo’s new podcast directory. I had read about it last week, but only got a chance to finally look today. What can I say? It is very much a directory and nothing else – but at least it’s a very good directory.

The directory has a section where Yahoo! editors pick the podcasts they like and display them. There is also a “what other people like” section that can be viewed by “Most Popular” or “Highly Rated”. Finally, you can browse around on your own if you’d like by category and tag. Once you find a podcast to look at, you can either listen to it or subscribe and download (using a third party application or Yahoo’s Music Engine). You can rate the podcast, add comments and reviews, and also tags.

Yahoo’s Podcasts directory is put together very nicely, I think. The layout and organization make intuitive sense, and the search functionality seems to work quite well also. They currently have an information section called “Publish a Podcast” which contains information on how to get started. Makes me wonder if they might one day add some sort of publication tool.

I’m not sure how many podcast directories we need, but I’d have to say that Yahoo’s is a welcome addition to the bunch.

Read: Yahoo! Podcasts

Google Reader

Post ImageGoogle has released another long awaited and much talked about product into beta – Google Reader. I am not a big fan of online news readers, mostly because I like to be able to take posts offline to read in class, or other places that I don’t have Internet access. That being said, Google Reader is actually quite nice. From the website:

Reader automatically gets the latest news and updates for your favorite sites. You can sort your reading list by relevance, which will guess what’s most relevant to you based on how you use Google Reader (such as which items you decide to actually read).

The amount of information on the web is rapidly increasing. Use Reader to discover new content you don’t want to miss. When you come across something worth sharing, quickly email or blog it from within Reader. Star or labels items you want to save for yourself.

I don’t think it’s as obvious as it should be to add a subscription, but once you have that figured out, the interface is very friendly. I especially like how Reader cycles up and down through the items in a subscription – very cool.

Read: Google Reader

DARPA Race Won!

Post ImageMaybe the title should say “finished” instead of “won”, as DARPA’s race for robots has never before been completed. At least three robots have now completed the harsh race:

Stanford University’s Racing Team has accomplished a historic feat of robotics, finishing first in the DARPA Grand Challenge, a 131.6-mile driverless car race that no artificially intelligent machine has ever conquered before.

“We had a great day,” said Sebastian Thrun, director of Stanford’s artificial intelligence lab and head of the racing team. Stanford’s “Stanley,” a modified Volkswagen Toureg with sensors and radar mountings, crossed the finish line within eight hours and 14 minutes, under the 10 hour requirement, according to times posted on the DARPA race Web site.

Director Dr. Tony Tether had this to say in the press release:

“Its incredible what Stanford and the two Carnegie-Mellon teams did today, and what the
other two teams can still achieve,” Tether said. “We had anticipated from the beginning that we might
have to carry the competition over to a second day.”

“When the Wright Brothers flew their little plane, they proved it could be done,” Tether
continued. “And just as aviation took off after those achievements, so will the very exciting and
promising robotics technologies displayed here today.”

Truer words have never been spoken. I remember how difficult it was to get our robot to move when we were building it, so I have great respect for all the entrants of this competition. I can’t imagine how much ingenuity it would take to build a robot that can travel that distance, all by itself.

Read: CNET News.com

Gennux

Post ImageToday was a busy day for events. This evening Dickson and I attended a presentation at the University of Alberta by Gennux Microsystems Corp., a relatively new Edmonton-based company. They make an anti-spam product called eW@LL Mail which they say is unique in that it does not use content filtering like the vast majority of anti-spam technologies. They describe the product as a messaging firewall.

The developer who wrote most of the application and started the company is Sam Wong, and he gave the majority of the presentation tonight. He seems very smart, and excited about the work he is doing. Sam led us through some reasons for why spam exists, the numbers around how much spam is sent and recieved and the dollar value for related-costs (like lost productivity), the competition, and finally the Gennux solution. Dickson and I asked a bunch of questions about the technology, trying to find ways around it, but the product does seem very solid. They mentioned some statistics about how well it works, but I very much think that it’s one of those “you have to see it to believe it” things.

We didn’t ask them how much it costs, but I would imagine it’s not cheap. If it works like they say though, it would probably be worth it. They have quite a few installations already, including a fairly high profile one with an ISP in Taiwan. It’s good to see an Edmonton software company doing so well!

Read: Gennux

Upside Software

Post ImageThis afternoon the Faculty of Science hosted the first ever Executive Business Seminar for Computing Sciences. These seminars bring real executives from the computer industry to talk to students and faculty about their business, the challenges they have faced, and of course the technology they use. The Faculty of Science has been hosting similar seminars for other disciplines, like Chemistry, and they have apparently been quite successful prompting the start of seminars for CS. The seminars are around an hour in length, and include free pizza and pop.

Today’s speaker was Ashif Mawji, founder, president and CEO of Upside Software Inc., a very successful Edmonton-based software firm. They create software tools that help companies manage contracts. Ashif also brought Rob Brown along for the talk, who is the company’s Director of Team Development. The presentation was really quite interesting, and the success that Upside Software has had is quite impressive. Indeed one look at their customer list will give you an indication of how successful they have been!

After the presentation there was time for Q&A which was probably the most beneficial part of the seminar. Upside Software is looking to hire around 40 people in the coming year, so that was the pitch to students. All of their development is done on the .NET platform using C# – technologies which as you probably know are what I use and promote.

At the end of the session I introduced myself to Ashif and Rob, and invited their developers to attend the .NET Wizards upcoming events. It would be great to have their experience and leadership in our user group! I’d say today’s session was worthwhile, so I am planning to attend the next one too when it is announced.

AOL Buys Weblogs Inc.

Post ImageNews has been circulating since late last night that AOL has purchased Weblogs Inc. which publishes an entire network of blogs, including the very popular Engadget. Terms of the deal aren’t yet known, but various bloggers have been suggesting anywhere from $25 to $40 million USD, which certainly makes sense as the company makes at least $1 million in annual revenue from Google AdSense alone:

Weblogs, a privately held Santa Monica, Calif.-based company, operates 85 blogs with subjects ranging from parents to technology to film. AOL said Thursday that it will integrate the blogs throughout its network, such as within its television, travel and personal-finance channels.

“This…combination allows our audiences to be able to do a ‘deep-dive’ into a vast array of compelling topics that keep them interested and entertained on our network of properties, day after day,” Jim Bankoff, executive vice president of AOL’s programming and products, said in a statement.

While I think it’s a smart purchase for AOL, I am surprised quite frankly. My thoughts are more in line with Nick Denton’s:

Nick Denton, publisher of blogging site Gawker.com, was skeptical of the deal. “The whole point about blogs is that they’re not part of big media. Consolidation defeats the purpose. It’s way too early,” he said, adding that Gawker is not for sale.

That said, the deal will give AOL a very heavily trafficked collection of content properties, which of course is great for advertising dollars. What does this mean for the rumored Microsoft-AOL deal? My guess is that if anything was on the table, this deal won’t have much of an impact.

The downside to the deal is that Engadget and others will probably be peppered with Netscape and AOL advertisements. Not looking forward to that!

Regardless, as Weblogs Inc. founder Jason Calacanis posted:

You’ve got…blogs!

Read: CNET News.com