Thursday, July 01, 2010

Internet Privacy Revisited

If you haven’t heard, Google is under investigation for capturing internet traffic from unsecured WiFi access points via their Street View cars all around the world since 2006. Please note that the WiFi was unsecured: any secured WiFi hotspot was protected.

Until recently, Google has claimed that the traffic they captured by accident was not sensitive in nature. However, it has now been found that Google has been gathering more than just random internet traffic from its Street View cars. It has been reported that the information that Google collected contained email passwords and other more sensitive information. So basically, Google can have your email password right now, and that is a scary thought.

The internet world has been harassing Facebook for an extended length of time over privacy concerns, but Facebook never drove to your house and snooped on your home network’s traffic. And so I say that this is a further invasion of privacy than what Facebook has ever committed (yet), but to the average person, Google can do no wrong. I have written a blog post about how Google is going to take over the world, and while that was in jest, when stories like this break, you just wonder how true it could be.

So please, for everything that’s good: secure your WiFi! Here are some resources for doing this yourself:

Securing your Wireless Network

How To Secure Your Wireless Network

How To Secure Your Wireless Home Network

How To Secure Your Wireless Network Connection

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

My Take On 3D Television

The new big thing in television is 3D. And, I mean, if you only look at the press and what all of these technology companies such as Sony
and Samsung are saying, you would be absolutely sure that 3D is going to be the greatest thing since sliced bread. They make 3D TV sound like it has already achieved “Minority Report” level already (which I can not wait for, and could be closer than we think).

However, after watching Avatar, which was quite good, I thought the graphics were breathtaking but I just wasn’t impressed with the 3D effects: they seemed pop up book-like and not really necessary. And those glasses! My word, I just couldn’t deal with those glasses throughout that whole movie.

And now, you are telling me that not only do I have to buy another flat screen TV but then I am going to have to wear glasses while I watch it as well? So I’m supposed to watch the World Cup or whatever with everybody else in ridiculous glasses? I mean, it’d better be hologram-like for me to even bother with the setup. Honestly, if this is going to work, I must not have to wear glasses.

And that is why I am keeping a close eye on the new Nintendo 3DS. Remove the glasses requirement for the television, and maybe I’ll watch my sports in 3D. Let’s make it happen, technologists; it would be a great feat to accomplish that on a large screen.

Thursday, June 17, 2010

Why I still hope for a Verizon iPhone

I watched Steve Jobs’ two hour keynote at the Apple Development Conference for one reason and one reason alone: to hear news on a potential Verizon iPhone.

Don’t get me wrong, my Blackberry Tour has done a lot for me… that is, when the trackball actually works. But I’m looking at all of these large screen phones and it is making my Blackberry look more and more inadequate. I get annoyed when I see a website that I use on a daily basis come out with a mobile app and then it is only available on… the iPhone. And if the company is really devoted to the mobile platform, the next one up is… the Android OS. Blackberry is a distant third, and sometimes the Blackberry app comes crippled with limited features; examples at the time of this writing include Dropbox and Mint. This makes me very sad.

Everybody knows that a Verizon iPhone would make sense on a lot of levels for Apple: 80 million potential customers, and a more reliable network, to name a couple (some people will disagree, but well, I stand by my statement).

There are also a few reasons for Apple not to go to Verizon: the need to make a CDMA phone in addition to the current GSM-based phone they have, the need to negotiate terms for Verizon that may not be as lucrative as their deal with AT&T, and so on.

And so I wait.

No word from Apple probably means the earliest launch date would be mid-2011, if ever. I could just go ahead and get an Android phone, especially when the HTC Droid Incredible, Motorola Droid Xtreme, and the Motorola Droid 2 are going to be/already are available; and to be honest, the reasons to choose between Android phones and the iPhone become more and more only a matter of preference. If the new iPhone doesn’t come out soon enough for Verizon, I may go and get my own Transformer and never turn back.

But I’m not at that point yet… here are rumors on the Verizon iPhone coming out at the end of the year. And with that, I maintain my hope.

Monday, June 14, 2010

On Adobe Flash and HTML5: does anybody care?

If you bury yourself in the tech world as I do on a regular basis, you will hear about this war between Apple and Adobe, between HTML5 and Flash, and how the iPad does not support Flash. The battles have been riveting, with Adobe executives writing biting comments to Apple on their blogs, and Apple writing a specific article on why they chose HTML5 over Flash when it is usual Apple practice to not comment so actively on major technological decisions.

My question is: does the regular consumer care? The Apple iPhone launched without Flash, and that device seems to have done well. The iPad came out, and has sold more than 2 million units since April (which is beyond my comprehension, but that’s besides the point). It seems to me that as long as the most important Flash websites write apps for the iPad (i.e. YouTube), the typical user will continue to use products like the iPad. I believe it is on Adobe to show Apple how much they have missed out on by omitting Flash. But as long as big Flash websites are willing to write an iPad/iPhone app based on their services, I don’t think Adobe has a chance in this war.

Friday, June 11, 2010

The Post PC Era?

During the “All Things Digital” conference, Steve Jobs talks about how the PC (Mac and Windows included) as we know it will not be as prevalent as it was in the past.

He makes this somewhat grand statement that devices like the iPad will soon take the place of full fledged PCs. And as I listened to this interview, the first reaction was to say that this notion is ridiculous; but then you have to think about the rather controversial moves that Apple has made in the past that was before its time and they were right on:

• 1988: Apple IIc Plus removes 5.25 inch floppy disc in favor for 3.5 inch floppy drive
• 1998: Apple iMac G3 removes floppy disc in favor for a sole CD-ROM drive and the introduction of the USB port
• 2005: Apple scraps native support for its Mac OS 9 operating system with the move to Intel chips, which forced many software developers to rewrite their applications

And all of these moves proved to be pivotal for the company. But I digress: the reason why I think I agree with Steve Jobs right now is that I believe that user experience is the most important thing right now in computing. Users want to be able to use their computer and have it perform the way they want to. Processing speeds and specs matter up to the point of ensuring that quality user experience. And hardware technology has gotten to a point where you don’t need the fastest processor to get that level of user experience for the tasks most people do day by day. There are many people today whose computing needs are satisfied by mobile phones right now, arguably revealing the beginning of this Post-PC era. There will always need to be application developers and content providers that will need full fledged PC’s to do their work, but what about everyone else? What do you think?