For almost two weeks, my main computer – a ThinkPad W510 (circa 2010) has been running Windows 8. Courtesy of the Logitech Touchpad T650 I’ve mentioned here and many times on Twitter, the experience has been – to me – much smoother than when I was trying to use Windows 8 (in a VM, admittedly) with a mouse during the previews. Three things I want to say up front: I’m trying to be positive and fair, and give Windows 8 on a…
If you’ve known me long, you’ve known that I’ve been far from Windows 8’s biggest fan. For me, that’s been for a specific reason. The concessions that Windows 8 makes to being touch focused have – I strongly believe – compromised the ability for those of us damned to the desktop to really use the platform. While I believe Microsoft intends for Windows 8 to be a success both with tablets and on non-touch devices, learning to use the operating…
My iPhone and my iPad are almost always running the latest version of iOS. When the App Store icon lights up with app updates, I click it like a Pavlovian parlor trick. Sometimes to regret, but not always… My wife on the other hand? Her iPhone is running iOS 5 – she’s terrified of the new maps app. Her App Store icon read “48” last night when I went in to try and unwind the me.com/Mac.com/iCloud.com bedlam she has accidentally…
TODO: Google Search Google Reader Google Chrome Google Maps Google Analytics for the blog In my blog last weekend, I set out to discuss whether I could quit Google’s software and services. To begin, I decided to start just with using Bing instead of Google. This caused no end of amusement to friends on Twitter who mocked be because I wasn’t searching with Google, but worse, I was using their browser all the time. That, exactly, was the reason why…
If you asked me a few years ago about Google, odds are I would talk your ear off about privacy, about how Google aggregates your life together in a manner you can’t imagine. Ask any co-worker at my last job before I left Austin – it’s true. Yet while I’ve still held up my stance as someone concerned about online security and privacy… I’ve lowered my guard. I’ve used Google. I use Google a lot, actually. But Google has been…
For over a year, I’ve struggled to quantify something that I’ve felt was a truism in the iPhone vs. Android battle. I still can’t fully quantify it with evidence, but I think the market is beginning to bear out what I’ve thought was the case. For a long time, I’ve believed that the consumers who buy Android devices and the consumers who buy iOS devices (I’m talking Android phones to iPhone, primarily) are fundamentally different types of consumers. It’s not…
When you travel somewhere, especially somewhere new, somewhere eclectic – do you ever buy your airline ticket, hop on the plane, and eagerly look forward to planning your activities once you arrive? No. No, you don’t. You plan a trip, buy tickets, get everything lined up long before you go. It’s been my contention for some time that buying a new computing device – smartphone, tablet/slate or other, is just like taking a trip. Also, unlike years ago where when…
Know what a loss leader is? It’s something you give a way at or below cost in order to get feet in the door of your store or to get people clicking through to your website. Enter the word, “unlimited”. Really now. Not many things are actually unlimited. Stars and planets exist for a long time, but unlimited? No. The universe goes on for quite a long distance – as a species, we’ll likely never know the answer to the…
This evening, in lieu of a transcript, I listened a few times to Steve Ballmer’s CES keynote – specifically around the 3:06:23 mark. Given my blog post yesterday, I was most curious as to whether I was correct that there would not be any x86 application compatibility for Windows running on ARM. Steve’s words are below, emphasis is mine: “We are very excited about the full set of partners for the next version of Windows. NVidia, Qualcomm and Texas Instruments…
There has been quite a bit of recent discussion and hearsay about Windows on ARM processors – that is, a rumor that Microsoft is developing a version of Windows (full Windows, not CE/Windows Phone 7 – which already run on ARM) that supports the low-powered ARM processor preferred for mobile devices today. Windows NT, upon which all full versions of Windows today are based, was designed from day one to be a “portable” architecture. Though the Intel x86 (and the…