Innocent Bystander

Don't Stay Out Too Late...

2005-11-12T13:44:00.000-08:00

I like computer games, especially ones that you play online. I'm not talking about completing jigsaw puzzles over on shockwave.com (although that's enjoyable too). No I'm talking about something a little more action oriented, like storming a computer generated battlefied with a team of friends like in Battlefield 1942 or massacring those same friends in a holographic combat area like in Star Trek Voyager Elite Force. I even played Star Wars Galaxies for a few months, although I grew tired of the grinding monotny of trying to grow my character.

The ability to play against human opponents who think and act unpredictable as opposed to a weak computer drone has been a huge selling point for multiplayer games for quite a while now. Apparently it can even make the online gaming experience addictive.

Consider for example this story I heard about on the BBC. A Malaysian teenager was reported missing by his family, he was found 48 hours later in a cybercafe. He had been playing games there for the 48 hours he'd been missing! While that's not the big point of the story (which I'll get to in a second) the fact that he had spent the past 48 hours playing games amazes me. Being a gamer myself, I find that I can't sit for more than two maybe three hours before the repitive motions from playing games starts to make me sore and the chair I'm sitting in becomes uncomfortable... So how could he stand to sit and play for 48 hours?!?!

However in response to this story, the town of Subang Jaya outside the Malaysian capitol of Kuala Lumpur has decided to institute curfews on gaming in the towns cyber-cafes starting next year...

Oh but that's not all, if you want to operate a cyber-cafe that allows gaming in Subang Jaya you'll need to get a special license and also set aside a seperate area for gamers different from the area for other internet users. Finally, you'll need to shut down your gaming area after midnight.

Special teams will be deployed to enforce the new rules and cafes that don't follow the rules risk loosing their license. Supporters of the plan believe that it will reduce crime and help to prevent gamers from getting addicted... Gamers resent the intrusion (there's a shocker!).

I can't imagine any town in the US getting away with such an intrusion. Most people who game in the US probably do so at home on a broadband connection, and there's no way such a rule could be enforced on home users. I'm guessing that in Malaysia however there aren't nearly as many homes with broadband connections, otherwise affected gamers could just go home and log on...

The other thing that struck me about the story was down at the end. According to the article there are millions of gamers in some Asian companies, it's a professional sport in South Korea, and in China of all places there was a murder over a game...

At The Crossroads of Style and Craptacular....

2005-11-09T22:00:00.000-08:00

So has anybody actually bought the iTunes phone? You know the Motorola Rockr?

A phone that single handedly managed to embarass Steve Jobs who couldn't get it to work right when he announced it to the world. The phone that was so eagerly awaited that when the reviewers all got their hands on it they declared it to be positively craptacular! The thing is ugly, difficult to use and has a serious limit to the number of songs it can hold... oh and nobody's been really enthused with it's sound quality either...

Well, it looks like Apple and Motorola are going to try it again. Although the latest Apple/Moto frankenphone will be an update on the popular Motorola Razr... The Dutch website Am obil is reporting that the new Razr V3i will have a version that is iTunes enabled just like the Rokr phone. The phone will have a limited 12MB of memory (it is a skinny phone after all) but will be expandable using transflash memory cards, something that the Rokr boasted as well. It's unknown at this time if the new Razr V3i will be hobbled by the same 100 song limit that the Rokr is hog tied by...

Me, I'll pass. I've never been a big fan of the Razr anyway. Yeah it looked cool, but I wasn't thrilled with using the dialpad. Plus Motorola's user interface design leaves A LOT to be desired. Besides, I've already got a 60GB iPod photo, with a 20GB 4G iPod collecting dust, what do I need another iTunes device for?

But Will it Protect Me From My Id?

2005-11-07T20:20:00.000-08:00

LeVar Burton once called it the "grand-daddy of modern sci-fi movies." It's star was a very young Leslie Nielsen who was in just his second movie at the time... The movie is Forbidden Planet...

And now thanks to the folks at Hammacher Schlemmer (someplace that I can't even afford to walk INTO let alone buy anything from) you get one of the most recognized things from the movie... Why for just $49,999.95 you can get your very own lifesize replica of Robbie the Robot!
Now you don't just get a static 7 foot tall statue for your money either... Oh no, the gyros and other mechanisms in his head really work, his head moves and he's programed with some of his lines from the movie. There's more to his built in sound system though, why it's CD quality and synchronized with the neon lights, oh and you can even connect it up to your home theater system! Use him to greet your guests, you can speak through Robby with the included wireless microphone....However unlike the Robbie from the movie, your $49,999.95 won't buy you a replica that will cook, clean your house, make 50 gallons of whiskey on demand, or even walk... although stick this one in your front window and it might freak out your neighbors...

Is This Really a Good Idea?

2005-11-07T14:56:00.000-08:00

I found this over on Engadget, it seems some artists in Berlin have been cobbling together a Mac Mini with a projector and a battery. They are then taking this contraption and sticking it onto the side of subway cars with a suction cup. What happens is that the Mini + Projector then projects images onto the walls of the subway tunnels as the train rumbles through...

This is really one of those things that on the surface seems kinda cool... A few eccentric artists trying to brighten up what might normally be a dreary commute...

And then you really think about it...

Some whacko sticking a strange box with wires on the side of a subway train... In this post Madrid & London bombing, post September 11th world, if you saw something like this happen are you going to be thinking "ooohhh cool?" Or are you going to be thinking "Holy Crap RUN!!!!!"

More Vending Machine Wackiness

2005-10-29T21:10:00.000-07:00

Apparently these are big in Japan, but Vodaphone in England has just started rolling these out. It's exactly what it looks like, a vending machine that dispenses pre-paid cell phones and SIM cards.

So far it's just a pilot program, the machines have been placed just in Vodaphone stores. If they are popular then they may start appearing in public locations outside of the stores.

You know I thought that the iPod vending machine was pointless, but this is worse. Pre-paid cellphones aka disposable phones are well known to be favored not only by those who don't like contract or monthly bills, but also by those who don't want their movements to be traced. They can buy one of these phones, make a few calls to conduct your questionable business and then toss the phone and no one's the wiser. Who else needs a quick phone at 3AM?

What Can't You Get From a Vending Machine?

2005-10-29T18:55:00.000-07:00

You can remove iPod's from the list of things you can't get from a vending machine. Spotted in the Atlanta Airport:

Now on the surface this seems like a wonderful idea... Almost as great as the kiosks in the airport that rent (and also sell) movies and portable DVD players. You're hanging around the airport terminal on a 3 hour layover with nothing to do, or even worse, getting ready to hop on a trans-continental flight on an airline that doesn't have in-flight entertainment worth a crap (ummm Southwest and Northwest, I'm thinking of you two!) why not pick-up a movie or two to watch in-flight on your laptop or rent (or buy) a portable DVD player to keep you from going insane while you're crammed into the middle seat at the back of a 757 for 5 hours? That makes sense...

But pick up an iPod at the airport? Why? You won't be able to use it because that brand new iPod won't have any songs on it for starters. Well that's useless... Now maybe you keep all your songs on your laptop that you're toting with you in iTunes, well then why buy an iPod at the airport? Just plug in your headphones (or if you're in Atlanta buy a set of noise canceling headphones from the Brookestone in the terminal) and listen to your tunes...

Plus, anybody who has purchased a new iPod has already discovered that a) even a small library around 5GB takes as much as 45 minutes to transfer to the iPod, and b) a fresh iPod out of the box needs to be charged up because out of the box they only have about 10 minutes of battery life on them...

So who buys an iPod from an airport vending machine?

Coyote v Acme...

2005-10-23T20:00:00.000-07:00

Stumbled across the transcript of an opening statement the other day:
"UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

SOUTHWESTERN DISTRICT OF ARIZONA
Tempe, Arizona

Judge Joan Kujava, Presiding

________________________________
WILE E. COYOTE, §
Plaintiff §
v. § CIVIL ACTION NO. B19294
§
ACME COMPANY, §
Defendant §
________________________________

OPENING STATEMENT OF HAROLD SCHOFF,

COUNSEL FOR PLAINTIFF

By Mr. Schoff:

My client, Mr. Wile E. Coyote, a resident of Arizona and contiguous states, does hearby bring suit for damages against the Acme Company, manufacturer and retail distributor of assorted merchandise, incorporated in Delaware and doing business in every state, district, and territory. Mr. Coyote seeks compensation for personal injuries, loss of business income, and mental suffering caused as a direct result of the actions and/or gross negligence of said company, under Title 15 of the United States Code Chapter 47, section 2072, subsection (a), relating to product liability.

Mr. Coyote states that on eighty-five separate occasions, he has purchased of the Acme Company (hereinafter, 'Defendant'), through that company's mail order department, certain products which did cause him bodily injury due to defects in manufacture or improper cautionary labeling. Sales slips made out to Mr. Coyote as proof of purchase are at present in the possession of the Court, marked Exhibit A. Such injuries sustained by Mr. Coyote have temporarily restricted his ability to make a living in the profession of predator. Mr. Coyote is self-employed and thus not eligible for Workmen's Compensation.

Mr. Coyote states that on December 13th, he received of Defendant via parcel post one Acme Rocket Sled. The intention of Mr. Coyote was to use the Rocket sled to aid him in pursuit of his prey. Upon receipt of the Rocket Sled, Mr. Coyote removed it from its wooden shipping crate and sighting his prey in the distance, activated the ignition. As Mr. Coyote gripped the handlebars, the Rocket Sled accelerated with such sudden and precipitate force as to stretch Mr. Coyote's forelimbs to a length of fifteen feet. Subsequently, the rest of Mr. Coyote's body shot forward with a violent jolt, causing severe strain to his back and neck and placing him unexpectedly astride the Rocket Sled. Disappearing over the horizon at such speed as to leave a diminishing jet trail along its path, the Rocket Sled soon brought Mr. Coyote abreast of his prey. At that moment, the animal he was pursuing veered sharply to the right. Mr. Coyote vigorously attempted to follow this maneuver but was unable to, due to poor design and engineering on the Rocket Sled and a faulty or non-existent steering system. Shortly thereafter, the unchecked progress of the Rocket Sled led it and Mr. Coyote into collision with the side of a mesa.

Paragraph One of the Report of Attending Physician (Exhibit B), prepared by Dr. Ernst Grosscup, M.D., D.O., details the multiple fractures, contusions, and tissue damage suffered by Mr. Coyote as a result of this collision. Repair of the injuries required a full bandage around the head (excluding the ears), a neck brace, and full or partial casts on all four legs. Hampered by these injuries, Mr. Coyote was nevertheless obliged to support himself. With this in mind, he purchased of Defendant as an aid to mobility one pair of Acme Rocket Skates. When he attempted to use this product, however, he became involved in an accident remarkably similar to that which occurred with the Rocket Sled. Again, Defendant sold over the counter, without caveat, a product which attached powerful jet engines (in this case, two) to inadequate vehicles, with little or no provision for passenger safety. Encumbered by his heavy casts, Mr. Coyote lost control of the Rocket Skates soon after strapping them on, and collided with a roadside billboard so violently as to leave a hole in the shape of his full silhouette.

Mr. Coyote states that on occasions too numerous to list in this document he has suffered mishaps with explosives purchased of Defendant: the Acme 'Little Giant' Firecracker, the Acme Self-Guided Aerial Bomb, etc. (For a full listing see the Acme Mail Order Explosives Catalogue and attached deposition, entered in evidence as Exhibit C.) Indeed, it is safe to say that not once has an explosive purchased of Defendant by Mr. Coyote performed in an expected manner. To cite just one example: At the expense of much time and personal effort, Mr. Coyote constructed around the outer rim of a butte a wooden trough beginning at the top of the butte and spiraling downward around it to some few feet above a black X painted on the desert floor. The trough was designed in such a way that a spherical explosive of the type sold by Defendant would roll easily and swiftly down to the point of detonation indicated by the X. Mr. Coyote placed a generous pile of birdseed directly on the X, and then, carrying the spherical Acme Bomb (Catalogue #78) climbed to the top of the butte. Mr. Coyote's prey, seeing the birdseed, approached, and Mr. Coyote proceeded to light the fuse. In an instant, the fuse burned down to the stem, causing the bomb to detonate.

In addition to reducing all Mr. Coyote's careful preparations to naught, the premature detonation of Defendant's product resulted in the following disfigurements to Mr. Coyote:

1. Severe singeing of the hair on the head, neck, and muzzle.

2. Sooty discoloration.

3. Fracture of the left ear at the stem, causing the ear to dangle in the aftershock with a creaking noise.

4. Full or partial combustion of whiskers, producing kinking, frazzling, and ashy disintegration.

5. Radical widening of the eyes, due to brow and lid charring.

We come now to the Acme Spring-Powered Shoes. The remains of a pair of these purchased by Mr. Coyote on June 23rd are Plaintiff's Exhibit D. Selected fragments have been shipped to the metallurgical laboratories of the University of California at Santa Barbara for analysis, but to date, no explanation has been found for this product's sudden and extreme malfunction. As advertised by Defendant, this product is simplicity itself: two wood-and-metal sandals, each attached to milled-steel springs of high tensile strength and compressed in a tightly coiled position by a cocking device with a lanyard release. Mr. Coyote believed that this product would enable him to pounce upon his prey in the initial moments of the chase, when swift reflexes are at a premium.

To increase the shoes' thrusting power still further, Mr. Coyote affixed them by their bottoms to the side of a large boulder. Adjacent to the boulder was a path which Mr. Coyote's prey was known to frequent. Mr. Coyote put his hind feet in the wood-and-metal sandals and crouched in readiness, his right forepaw holding firmly to the lanyard release. Within a short time, Mr. Coyote's prey did indeed appear on the path coming toward him. Unsuspecting, the prey stopped near Mr. Coyote, well within range of the springs at full extension. Mr. Coyote gauged the distance with care and proceeded to pull the lanyard release. At this point, Defendant's product should have thrust Mr. Coyote forward and away from the boulder. Instead, for reasons yet unknown, the Acme Spring-Powered Shoes thrust the boulder away from Mr. Coyote. As the intended prey looked on unharmed, Mr. Coyote hung suspended in the air. Then the twin springs recoiled, bringing Mr. Coyote to a violent feet-first collision with the boulder, the full weight of his head and forequarters falling upon his lower extremities. The force of this impact then caused the springs to rebound, where upon Mr. Coyote was thrust skyward. A second recoil and collision followed. The boulder, meanwhile, which was roughly ovoid in shape, had begun to bounce down a hillside, the coiling and recoiling of the springs adding to its velocity. At each bounce, Mr. Coyote came into contact with the boulder, or the boulder came into contact with Mr. Coyote, or both came into contact with the ground. As the grade was a long one, this process continued for some time. The sequence of collisions resulted in systemic physical damage to Mr. Coyote, viz., flattening of the cranium, sideways displacement of the tongue, reduction of length of legs and upper body, and compression of vertebrae from base of tail to head. Repetition of blows along a vertical axis produced a series of regular horizontal folds in Mr. Coyote's body tissues, a rare and painful condition which caused Mr. Coyote to expand upward and contract downward alternately as he walked, and to emit an off-key, accordion-like wheezing with every step. The distracting and embarrassing nature of this symptom has been a major impediment to Mr. Coyote's pursuit of a normal social life.

As the court is no doubt aware, Defendant has a virtual monopoly of manufacture and the sale of goods required by Mr. Coyote's work. It is our contention that Defendant has used its market advantage to the detriment of the consumer of such specialized products as itching powder, giant kites, Burmese tiger traps, anvils, and two-hundred-foot-long rubber bands. Much as he has come to mistrust Defendant's products, Mr. Coyote has no other domestic source of supply to which to turn. One can only wonder what our trading partners in Western Europe and Japan would make of such a situation, where a giant company is allowed to victimize the consumer in the most reckless and wrongful manner over and over again. Mr. Coyote respectfully requests that the Court regard these larger economic implications and assess punitive damages in the amount of seventeen million dollars. In addition, Mr. Coyote seeks actual damages (missed meals, medical expenses, days lost from professional occupation) of one million dollars; general damages (mental suffering, injury to reputation) of twenty million dollars; and attorney's fees of seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. By awarding Mr. Coyote the full amount, this Court will censure Defendant, its directors, officers, shareholders, successors, and assigns, in the only language they understand, and reaffirm the right of the individual predator to equal protection under the law."

Originally published in The New Yorker Magazine, 26 February 1990 written by Ian Frazier

Your Printer is Talking to the Feds...

2005-10-19T21:59:00.000-07:00

This story was actually in today's Washington Post, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/18/AR2005101801663.html although I found out about it because it was on the front page (but beneath the fold) of the Press Democrat out of Santa Rosa CA.

If you didn't know it The US Treasury Department recently redesigned the $10 bill again (www.moneyfactory.com). One of the biggest motivations for all of the recent currency redesigns over the last several years has been because of the fantastic image quality of the average color scanner and color printer. A good quality color scanner and printer could be used to create a halfway decent counterfeit bill, and it's because of this that the latest versions of the bills in your wallet incorporate things like microprinting and security strips, both of which can't be properly duplicated with a color scanner or copier.

It seems however that the Feds have incorporated another security feature that nobody knew about until recently. The thing is this security feature isn't in the bills, it's in your very own color printer...

According to the Washington Post article, PC World magazine discovered that the printouts from many color laser printers had yellow dots scattered throughout the page, that could only be seen by using a special flashlight. The article even had comments from a senior Xerox researcher who said that these dots were actually a secret code that the Feds could use to track down criminals.

However, the code isn't so secret anymore, at least the ones coming out of Xerox printers. The Electronic Frontier Fondation has cracked the Xerox code, and while it hasn't cracked them, they say they have found similar codes on printers from every major manufacturer. The Xerox code contains the serial number of the printer as well as the date and time that the document was printed.

The Secret Service has confirmed that the markings are there, but say little more than a coutermeasure to protect against counterfiting.

ITunes Videos and 4G iPods

2005-10-19T21:46:00.000-07:00

Well I decided to try buy a video on iTunes and see what would happen when I connected my 4G Color iPod.

The answer was.....

Wait for it.....

Absolutely NOTHING!

This wasn't a huge surprise to me, I had a feeling that it wouldn't work. But I'm only out a whole $1.99 and I still have the video on my computer that I can play whenever I'd like...

BTW the video I purchased was the Pixar video short "For The Birds," which I believe was also one of the extras on the second disk of the Monster's Inc DVD.

Bizarre Tech Story of Last Week

2005-10-18T20:46:00.000-07:00

I've been a bit busy, so I didn't get to write about this last week...

I first heard about this story on CNet's Buzz Out Loud podcast and found it written about on The Register, http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/13/mp3_breast_implant/ however the story appears to have actually been broken on the UK tabloid The Sun.

The sun says that Ian Pearson over at BT Laboratories has proposed breast implants with an MP3 player embedded in them...

Take a second and digest that one...

The concept is apparently to embed the electronics in the implant and output the audio wirelessly to headphones via bluetooth. The entire setup would be controlled using a bluetooth enabled control panel.

There's a whole lot of questions to be resolved of course... How would you power this whole thing? What about transferring songs, how is that accomplished? Better yet, will a large cup size result in an MP3 player with a larger capacity?

Steve Jobs is Not a Nice Person....

2005-10-14T21:47:00.000-07:00

I've always felt that Steve Jobs and I don't quite see eye to eye. I've never met Mr. Jobs mind you, but ever since I read the book "Infinite Loop" by Michael Malone a few years ago, I've always felt that he's not the kind of person who's looking out for my best interests... Unless of course my interests were donating the contents of my bank account to Apple Computer Corporation...

Ever since the iPod was first released, I wanted one. For 4 years though I couldn't find a compelling reason to spend the money for one, until last year. We were going on a vacation to England with a transatlantic cruise home on the QM2, which meant lots of time to listen to music, perfect for an iPod. Even better was that the 4g iPods had just come out, we'd be getting the latest ones too... And just weeks later, the first iPod Photos hit the market! Urrggg!

Despite not having an eye catching color screen though, I really did like my monochome screened 4g iPod. I got a ton of use out of it, especially once I discovered podcasts.

Last month when Steve Jobs announced the iTunes Phone (aka the money sucking pile of crap... I played with one the other day) and the iPod Nano, last month I figured it was safe. That was the "big announcement" to lead us into the holidays, that was the announcement that everyone said would bring us the Video iPod, and after the announcement Steve Jobs was still saying that Apple wasn't going to do a video iPod.

I took that to mean that it was safe, we could go down to the Apple Store and pick us up some new big honking color iPods for the move accross country since I couldn't imagine anything else being released before the holidays...

I think Mr. Jobs was watching for my credit card to be processed at the local Apple Store before deciding that it was time send out the invitations for yet ANOTHER product announcement...

This time for the new 5g iPod...

Which can play video...

But it's not a Video iPod...

From what I'm reading, Steve Jobs is still saying that this isn't a video iPod. From what I'm hearing about the new iPod from those who've played with it so far is that he may be right... Yes the new iPod can play video... but that's about all you can do with the video is play it... The reports coming from people who played with the new iPod at the event last week seem to indicate that you can't fast forward or rewind your videos, just play them and pause them... Weird...

But what I want to know is this... Other than the screen and general size, what sets the new 5g iPod apart from my color 4g iPod? What's the difference in the hardware that prevents me from watching video on my color 4g iPod? So my picture would be square instead of rectangular on the 5g... We all grew up watching square TV's...

Since I'm not going to buy a new iPod anytime soon (nevermind that it might trigger yet ANOTHER product release from Apple) I'm wondering how long it will take some bored/adventurous/enterprising geek with too much money to get a new 5g iPod and use it as a base for a hack to play video on a 4g color iPod....

Although, since updating to the latest version of iTunes, I now have a playlist titled "videos" however that playlist doesn't appear on my iPod.... Is that because I don't have any videos in it yet, or because my iPod won't play them.... For all of $1.99 I might buy a video to see what happens....

Holy Crap! I Have Readers!!!

2005-10-12T10:35:00.000-07:00

Wow, and all this time I figured the only people reading this blog was my wife, me, and some spambots.

Now, I'm actually getting comments from real live peoples! Cool!!!

Hello everyone and welcome... I hope the blog doesn't suck! ;)

iWood Not, But Would You?

2005-10-11T10:56:00.000-07:00

If you've been reading the Innocent Bystander for a while then you may know that mixing wood and electronics is a sure fire way to catch my attention.

With that in mind I'd like to show you the iWood case for your iPod Nano.

Coming soon from Miniot.com http://www.iwoodnano.com/miniot/index.htm. I think this is a pretty sharp looking case for your Nano. However I think it's got a few shortcomings, the most glaring of which is the fact that it completely obscures both the clickwheel and the display. The only thing that you have access to with the case closed is the headphone jack. You need to open the case to get to the controls and to get to the dock connector.

There's one other big issue that I see here... Granted I don't own a Nano, but I would think that the big reason you'd buy a Nano is because of it's size, it's really really small. So why then would you take such a small (and light) device and stick it into a case that will probably significantly increase it's size and weight?

However, if your a Nano owner and your interested in this it'll start shipping on October 20th according to the Miniot website.

SPAMMED!!!

2005-10-07T21:19:00.000-07:00

So with the previously mentioned move the Bystander got some new e-mail addresses. That means that the widely distributed spam baiting bit buckets that the Bystander used to have no longer work.

Now I've been carefull with my addresses. I actually have used a "bait" e-mail address for web site sign-ons and such in order to minimize the amount of spam coming in to my inbox... At least for the account I actually care about. It worked pretty well for a while, although after about 8 months even my primary e-mail account started seeing spam too.

On top of that I run a great and free spam filter called Spam Bayes, this little program is a plug-in for Microsoft Outlook and it catches 95% of the spam sent to my account, with very few false positives. Now when you're getting 75 to 100 pieces of spam A DAY 95% isn't too bad.

Occasionally I do look at some of the assorted crap that's sent to me, and I can't help but laugh when I look at it. The spammers try this stuff because A)it's cheap to do, and B) somebody actually fell for this foolishness.

Take for example the e-mail I got that of course was "addressed" to an e-mail address that wasn't quite mine. The sender wanted me to know about fantastic deals that I could get on cialis and viagra at their website. The trouble is, the sender called them Ciaglis and V1agara. Hmm, even if I was inclined to buy perscription meds off a website, something tells me that it's a bad sign when they can't (or won't) even correctly spell the meds they are supposedly selling.

Or how about the e-mail from Mr. Concord Stevens the loan officer at "the bank" (quotes added by me) telling me that I was approved for $32982 in credit, and that they've been trying to contact me for days and that I had to act now! Of course, the email address the email was supposedly sent to wasn't mine, and within 30 seconds I also received 4 more identical e-mails addressed to different e-mail addresses one from Elliot Carmichal, Phineaus O'Reily, and Marcia Peterson all claiming to be the loan officer at "the bank"...

A few weeks ago I got an e-mail from a nice sounding person at a bank in Lagos Nigeria. It seems a local oil tycoon died a few weeks ago and he had no heirs. He left behind $30 Million in his bank account, and this nice person at the bank was looking for some assistance in transfering the money out of the bank since there's no one to claim the money. If I was willing to send him my bank account and routing information he'd deposit the money into my account, and then transfer $20 Million back to him. If he couldn't get the money out of the country the corrupt Nigerian government would seize the money. The $10 Million would be my fee for assisting him. I figured what the hey, it's free money right? So I contacted the friendly bank person (with a disposable address not linked to me, I'm not a fool people!) that I would be happy to assist him. All he had to do is provide me with HIS bank account and routing information and I'd take care of everything for him. Oh, and my fee is $17 Million, non-negotiable, I thought it was pretty fair since I would be handling the transfers for him and helpfully reducing his workload, I'm sure he's a busy man so it was the least I could do for him... He never got back to me...

Then there's the phishing scams... And some of these are just plain evil. I can sniff out most of these scams pretty well, but one of them that just popped up a few months ago almost caught me. First rule when it comes to detecting a phishing attempt, look at who the e-mail is actually addressed to. Just like the loan and med spam messages I get, 99% of these phishing e-mails I receive don't actually have an e-mail address that belongs to me in the To address line. That's an instant tip off, the same goes for when I receive an e-mail from a website that I have an account with but use a different e-mail address than the phishing e-mail was sent to.

There are two real evil ones that seem to be circulating now though. One seems to be from PayPal, advising you that a new user has been added to your account. When I got this the first time, I resisted the urge to click on the link in the e-mail. Instead I opened my browser and went to PayPal and checked my account. Sure enough, everything was ok, and nobody extra had been added to my account. I keep a close watch on my PayPal account and was pretty sure that nothing could happen in there without my knowledge.

The other evil spam looks like it comes from e-Bay and that a user is upset because they didn't receive something that they bought from you. The "buyer" even threatens to report you to e-Bay if you don't come up with the goods. This one freaked me out, I was really concerned that somebody was monkeying with my e-Bay account. Cruising the cell phone sections on e-Bay I've found several hijacked e-Bay accounts being used as fronts for bogus auctions, so I was concerned that I had been hit. After going into my browser and confirming on e-Bay that there were no auctions going on without my knowledge I decided to look into this one further. After cranking up my firewall to it's highest settings, I clicked on a few of the links in the e-mail. While I wasn't surprised that the website I was taken too looked an awful lot like an e-Bay signon sceen, I was very amused that the website address in my browser's address bar was some obscure server that didn't even have e-Bay anywhere in the name. I mean come on guys you go to all that work to make a reasonably authentic looking e-Bay signon screen and you can't even make the web page address have e-bay in it somewhere?

So with the new e-mail addresses from the move I've been enjoying a brief respite from the flood of spam I used to get... That is until I took at look at some of the comments here in the blog. MY BLOG IS BEING SPAMMED!!!! Not just once so far, not twice, but FOUR TIMES! (although two are on the same post). How much of a freaking looser do you have to be in order to A) spam a blog, or B) come up with a program that can autonomously spam a blog! Sheesh! I mean it's nice to see that people are finding the blog, but this is pathetic!

So in an attempt to prevent this from happening in the future, or at least to cut down on it, should you try and comment on a post you'll now have to enter a little code that blogger will provide you that proves that there's at least a live human making the post and not some spambot created by some deviant mutant miscreant.

I've Given in...

2005-10-05T20:35:00.000-07:00

I've surrendered... This long time Windows user has decided to submit to the "light side of computing" and bought a 14in Apple iBook. I think it was the purty user interface on OS-X Panther that finally did me in... Plus the display on the iBook is quite possibly one of the best laptop display's I've ever used.

I've been using the iBook a little for the last day, and so far... While I don't hate it, I'm not a disciple of the cult of Steve Jobs yet... I've also started to question just what "more intuitive" actually means.

Out of the box the setup wasn't too painful. It did take a whole lot less time to setup than any Windows PC I've gotten straight out of the box... Of course not having to deal with the stupid Windows registration wizards significantly streamlines the process. I didn't need to install AIM since iChat is already installed. Like WinXP Service Pack 2, joining a wireless network was painless as well and I'm guessing that joining a wired network will be simple too...
On the other hand I'm running a lot less software on the Mac. In particular I'm not running any firewall on the Mac, a situation I'm not particularly sure I like. Not having the firewall there definately speeds up the networking process (don't have to deal with a bazillion security alerts etc) and it's one less thing clogging up system RAM. Also the Mac users I know claim that there just isn't enough malicious software (aka malware) out there to be concerned....

On the other hand all it takes is one piece of malware to find my machine and I'm screwed. Keep in mind I'm not completely unprotected, I do have a hardware firewall that every connection to the internet in the house has to pass through.

As for the "more intuitive" line that I hear a lot of Mac people claim, that I just don't buy. Maybe it's more intuitive once you're familiar with Mac interface standards, or if you're just a novice computer user. But if you're a long time Windows user I don't think OS-X is more intuitive, actually I think it's just different enough from Windows to be frustrating. There's definately a learning curve for Windows users making the jump to OS-X. For something to truely be "more intuitive" there shouldn't be any learning curve, you should just be able to sit in front of it and know how do use it.

This won't be a total Mac conversion either.... The PC's will still be here for many years to come, I won't ever go back to a Palm PDA and Windows Mobile PDA's don't play well with Macs so I'll need the PC for that. Plus my navigation software is PC only, and there are other applications that I use that just aren't available for the Mac...

However, I'll continue to play with the iBook, I look forward to seeing all it can do...

Well, Maybe I'm not going to CTIA...

2005-10-05T20:30:00.000-07:00

What a disappointment... Due to a scheduling conflict (aka I can't read a calender) I actually didn't get to go to CTIA. I was really looking forward to it.

Well, I guess I'll just have to keep my eye out for other cool tech shows in the area...

I'm going to CTIA!!!!!

2005-09-28T20:57:00.000-07:00

I can't wait, on Friday I'm going to CTIA in San Francisco.

This is a BIG wireless data and communications show. Among the companies with exhibits at the show:
Nokia
Cingular
Intel
Navteq
Kyocera
RIM (the guys who make the Blackberry)
ESPN Mobile
XM

I'm betting that the new Palm Treo 700W (the recently announced Treo running Windows Mobile) will be on display along with a wide variety of new mobile phones, PDA's and Smartphones...

Never Underestimate The Stupidity of A Drunk

2005-09-26T21:34:00.000-07:00

I discovered this story over on Engadget, but the details are here. According to the Oconomowoc Focus, a 47 year old man walked into a Wisconsin cell phone store and demanded that they refund his money because he claimed that his phone hadn’t worked for the past six months.

As I’m sure you can imagine, the store told the disgruntled customer that they would not be refunding his money. Upon receiving the news, the customer reportedly broke his phone in half and ate the memory chip! You see he didn’t want anybody to get his personal information!

Oh, did I mention that the guy was drunk?

Blogging on the road

2005-09-26T21:33:00.000-07:00

Blogging on the road… That’s right the Bystander is on the move. Been offline for a bit as we packed up everything we owned to move it all from Virginia to Northern California.

We may be on the move, but I haven’t forgotten about the blog, today’s entries are being made from beautiful Boulder CO. Normally when I refer to a town as “beautiful” I mean it tongue in cheek, however this time I’m serious, it’s really nice out here…

Until we get settled in at our new location in California though, expect the updates to be a bit sporadic…

Hurricane Katrina Response

2005-09-06T09:37:00.000-07:00

I've avoided posting about the Hurricane for the past week. The storm has been blanketed with coverage on every conceivable media outlet. Not only are the traditional outlets like TV, radio, and newspapers covering this, but so are bloggers, podcasters and other non-traditional information sources. Even blogs and podcasts that have nothing to do with current events are taking some time to cover the devastation on the Gulf Coast. With that in mind, I didn't see a need for me to add to the noise surrounding the storm.

But some of the things I'm starting to hear are just starting to bother me.

There have been a lot of accusations and finger pointing over the response in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Many people are saying that the response wasn't fast enough, and that not enough was being done in the days after the storm. Many people were even going so far as to blame the President and insinuating that he is some how responsible for how bad things are in the effected area...

With few exceptions, I say bull...

The situation on the Gulf Coast is extremely bad, nobody is going to deny that. But I think that those who are criticizing the Federal response to the disaster don't understand the scope of the situation. Hurricane Katrina devastated an estimated 90,000 square miles along the Gulf Coast, by comparison the state of Virginia is approximately 60,000 square miles. The area affected and the number of people affected is truely immense.

But lets start at the beginning. The storm struck during the night on Monday and by early morning power was out in throughout the area. The weather didn't improve enough that it was safe for officials to head outside to start making damage assessments until late Monday afternoon, early Monday evening. By this point there were only a few hours of daylight left to make preliminary damage assessments, because without power little can be done after dark. Before aid can be requested these assessments need to be made that way local agencies can determine what kind and how much aid to request. However because the storm subsided so late in the day any real substantial damage assessment had to wait until first light on Tuesday, 24 hours after the region started feeling the worst of the storm, and after the New Orleans levees had broken.

Now also factor in that many of the roads into and around the affected areas are blocked with debris, may be damaged, or even destroyed and that slowed down the relief efforts further. On top of that, then you have to factor in the HUGE size of the affected area and the amount of time it takes for the aid workers and their convoys to transit to the areas in need.

Then there's the flooding in New Orleans. The primary way aid is delivered to storm stricken areas is by truck, but with the flooding in the city this became difficult and some cases impossible. This meant that relief agencies had to struggle to find enough government helicopters (local and federal) to try and deliver aid while at the same time not compromise the ongoing rescue operations or damage assessment operations.

Many people have tried to draw parallels to the Asian Tsunami late last year. They like to yell that we did so much, so quickly for South East Asia that they don't understand why the same can't be done for a disaster here in the US. But was the US on the scene quickly in South East Asia? I don't think so, heck it was at least 24 hours after the tsunami struck before the US media had gotten over talking about post-Christmas retail sales and started paying attention to the disaster in Asia. Based on the news reports that were broadcast, the majority of the US Government's response was centered on Indonesia... predominantly Muslim Indonesia. While there was a response to other parts of Asia, it seemed the the main focus was in Indonesia... I also don't believe the the US response was as overwhelming as people think it was. The international response definately was immense, however the US was only a small part of that response.

All of that being said, there is definately room for improvement. Take for example the USNS COMFORT, a 1,000 bed US Navy hospital ship. The ship would seem to be tailor made for situations like this, yet with a Category 5 hurricane aiming for the US, it seems the the COMFORT was ready to sail once the storm passed. The COMFORT didn't leave for the Gulf Coast until Friday and is only just now reaching the area. Why did it take so long for COMFORT to sail? The same is true for many miltary assets, with a Category 5 storm threatening why weren't they ready to respond just in case?

The last thing is the remarks that the President is to blame because he's been cutting funding to the US Army Corps of Engineer's efforts to repair the levees. First, he's not the first President to cut funding for the levees. There's just not enough money in the Federal Budget to go around, we've got to pay for increased airline security, the war on terror, tax cuts, education, health care etc... Something has got to give in the budget. Even if the money wasn't cut, would the repairs have been done in time to have been completed before the storm hit? Would they have been sufficient to withstand the onslaught of the storm? In all honesty I think saying that if the President hasn't cut funding to repair the levees the damage wouldn't have been as bad is just like saying that if the President gave the National Weather Service and NASA more money they would have been better able to predict the course of the storm...

The Best Gift Shop in Washington?

2005-09-05T12:55:00.000-07:00

I think that it's the Gift Shop at the National Museum of American History. This isn't one of the two shops located near The Mall entrance to the museum, but rather the large store located in the basement of the museum. I don't believe that the shop is the largest in all the museums, the one at the National Air & Space Museum is definately larger. But the selection of items at the shop in American History is definately the best of the bunch.

I've only been to this gift shop 3 or 4 times, and every time ended up spending more money than I expected. What do they have there that makes this Gift Shop better than any other gift shop? There's a wide variety of items there from trinkets and shirts with the Presidential Seal, magnets declaring your political affiliation, metal Andy Rooney signs, even kids toys. Everything in the store has some connection with the exhibits in the museum. They even have a great book selection which because of the somewhat ecclectic nature of some of the collections in the museums means that there are books on sale about the Presidents and Presidential history just a few feet away from books about military history which are just a few feet away from The Coca-Cola Cookbook and books about 1940's advertising campaigns...

You can find some of the items they carry in the Smithsonian Museum stores, but for some reason the store in the Museum of American History has a better selection and is just a better atmosphere...

The World is Going Insane...

2005-09-02T15:34:00.000-07:00

This picture of a Centreville VA Shell Gas Station was taken by WRC-TV (NBC-4) Chopper 4 this afternoon...
WHY?!?!?!?!?!

When the average price of gasoline in the area is in the $3.10 to $3.25 range for regular unleaded why is this gas station at $5.89?!?!?!

Yummy and Delicious?

2005-08-31T15:59:00.000-07:00

I've heard of video rentals and other snacks from vending machines, but pizza? We're not talking about a machine dropping a frozen lump of dough and processed cheese in a bin that you then have to free from it's plastic cocoon and zap in a neighboring microwave. Wonderpizza claims to offer 9 inch pizzas cooked and ready to eat in just 2 minutes, it features "delicious" (their words not mine) Connies Pizza of Chicago.

The machine is supposed to be able to hold three different varieties of pizza and is divided into two sections, one for storing and refrigerating the pizzas and the other is a high intensity toaster over to cook the pizza. Wonderpizza's pizzas have a suggested retail price of $5 to $6 each.

So, has anybody actually had a Wonderpizza?

Gizmodo Taking on The Man!

2005-08-30T16:40:00.000-07:00

Or at least Sony-Ericcson's lawyers...

It all started with a leaked photo of Sony-Ericcson's follow-up to the P910. Photos of the new phone (named Hermoine) were leaked on the web and gizmodo picked up on them and placed it here.

Well, apparently Sony-Ericcson's legal team didn't appreciate it and sent the owner's of Gizmodo a confidential Cease and Desist letter, which Gizmodo promptly posted here. You can also see the follow up letter that Gizmodo received after posting the first letter.

Honestly, I think S/E should be more concerned with beefing up their internal security and determining the source of the leak instead of going after the various sites that have picked up on the leak. Face it Sony, the damage is done here. Damage control really needs to be keeping it from happening again at athis point...

Can't Find It? Fabricate it! Maybe...

2005-08-30T16:24:00.000-07:00

I first heard about this concept a few months ago.  Wired magazine carried a short story about efforts to create Star Trek like “replicators” allowing you to essentially design and create any product or part that you might need.  The article predicted that in the next few years, you might be able to have a setup in your own home (maybe your garage) that would let you design, fabricate, and build anything that you needed.  The impression I had from reading the article was that this was total science fiction being played with at some university science lab.

The concept sounds great.  Need a new handle for your refrigerator, or may just want one that looks a little retro?  Design and fabricate it yourself.  How about a rare engine part for the hot rod that you’re building in your garage?  Not only can you design and fabricate it yourself, but you could even throw in a few customizations to make that part uniquely yours.  The article compares the process to creating a document on your computer, only instead of printing out your creation on a laser printer, you’re doing it on a laser cutter, machining the parts that you need.

In the September issue of Wired, they revisit the story.  The author claims that the future is now, and that services today allow the average person to replicate their own items.  In the story, the author visits emachineshop.com and downloads a CAD/CAM program, designs a guitar with it, has e-machine shop fabricate it, ship the parts to him, and he assembles it.  Viola! His very own custom designed guitar.

So I tried it myself, I went up to emachineshop.com and downloaded their program.  Like the Wired author, my initial experience with the software my have been much better if I had some experience with CAD/CAM software, however after some cursing and some general trial and error I did manage to get the project I had in mind going.

Now before I go on, a quick word about e-machineshop.com.  They appear to be a complete fabrication shop, able to produce parts in a wide variety of materials from plastics, to metals, to wood.  They can work on the materials you select using various methods like laser cutting, machining, vacuum forming, polishing, power coating etc.  They can even to some electronics work as well including manufacturing custom circuit boards and other tasks.

I decided for my experimental project that I wanted to do something simple I choose to make a new badge for my car. Nothing too complicated, just 7 letters and here I ran into my first issues.  I had to figure out how to get the program to place letters in my design, something I figured out, but couldn’t figure out how to change the font.  In the end since I wasn’t intending on actually producing this I decided that the font wasn’t important.

Next up was selecting the material I wanted this to be made out of.  All I knew going into this step was that I wanted metal with a highly polished chrome look, this was intended to be the badge on a car after all.  The software itself gave me a list of all of the materials that emachineshop.com works with and in many occasions gives some information on the material.  I choose aircraft grade aluminum because it was the only one that the software said was good for outdoor use.  Next was the thickness, and at this point my inexperience with design really showed, I had no idea how thick my badge needed to be, and while the software gave me a list of available thicknesses, it wasn’t much help.  In the end I just randomly selected one that I figured wasn’t too thick or too thin.

Then I had to figure out how to actually create my badge, laser cut, acid etching, milling etc… There were several options to choose from, I choose laser cutting because it seemed to be the right solution for what I was looking for.  Finally I had to choose the finish, since I knew I wanted a polished surface that was easy, but I could have also selected powder coating among other finishing options.

Now you tell the software to verify that your job is actually possible and to price it out for you as well as to project your delivery time.  At this point I had to deal with more problems, the software said I couldn’t laser cut the badge and had to come up with a different manner of making my letters, then it told me that the letters were too small to polish so I needed to come up with a different finish too…  At this point I was so frustrated I just randomly selected different cutting and finishing options to finish the exercise, at which point it the price it gave me was $226 and it would take 21 days for delivery!

In the process it got me thinking…  Just what is so revolutionary about this?  There are machine shops all over, I’m sure they can accept plans and drawings done on CAD/CAM software for parts, so what’s the difference?  Other than the fact that emachineshop.com offers more than just metal or wood what is some impressive about them that this is the wave of the future?  I’m sure I could go and get a part for my car custom fabricated at any local machine shop…

The article also mentions something that I experienced.  Just because something looks good in the program, doesn’t mean that the finished product will be as intended.  It might be too thick or too heavy, or it might just not work.  In many cases an experienced designer might be able to figure this out without sending the item to be produced, but the average person may not be able to spot these issues, and as I saw above mistakes can be costly.

The promise of being able to fabricate anything you need with just the click of a mouse is terrific.  But I just don’t think we’re any closer today than we were 10 years ago.

For the time being when it comes to do it your so fabrication… I think the future is still later…

New Fuel Economy Standards.... Big Deal!!!!

2005-08-23T16:46:00.000-07:00

This has been breathlessly hyped on a lot (maybe even all) the news outlets today, the Bush Administration via Secretary of Transportation Minetta is proposing new fuel economy standards for minivans, light trucks and SUVs. The talking heads on all the news outlets teased this story as relief from the high gas prices we're suffering from...

Bull....

The reality is that this story isn't worth the time it took for the intern to type it into the teleprompter. So why, you ask, am I bothering to write about it if it's such a worthless story? Education, to make sure that you get all the facts, and not just the attention grabbing ones that the reporters jumped on....

Reason 1 why this story is unimportant:
The new standards are for NEW cars, not the ones we're driving now. You can't retrofit what will need to be done to the new cars into your current car. Which means the new standards have no effect on you now. They won't lower oil prices and they won't help you get better mileage now.

Reason 2:
The first vehicles effected by this will be built in 2008 however the automakers don't have to be in full compliance until 2011!

Reason 3:
It actually lowers the requirements for full sized pickups and all the models by Hummer will still be EXEMPT from these requirements!

What the new proposal does:
Currently federal standards require manufacturers to have an average fuel economy of 27.5 MPG for passenger cars, that won't change.

Currently, minivans, pickups and SUVs should have an average fuel economy of 21.6 MPG (remember these number are an average across a manufacturer's entire product line in that class and not for a particular model.)

Under the new standards, minivans would need to get 23.3 MPG by 2011.

Currently light trucks are required to get 22.2 by the start of the 2007 model year, the new proposed standard would require 28.4 MPG by 2011.

While these are significant improvements, they're still many years off. Plus older cars that don't meet the new requirements will be on the road for quite a few years after the new standards are supposed to go into effect.

Wake me when they propose something for the present....

Your New Friend GIM?

2005-08-23T14:25:00.000-07:00

Another piece of Google's plans for world domination may be starting to take shape. The LA Times and MSNBC are reporting that Google may be getting ready to launch their own instant messenger program.

Why?

What could Google possibly bring to the table that isn't already offered by everything that's been out there for a bazillion years? (in internet time that is...)

File sharing? Got it.
Photo sharing? Got it.
Audio chat? Got it.
Maybe videoconferencing? Nope everyone does that too...

The only thing I could possibly think of is maybe an im program that can send an im to somebody using ANY im software? I know that there's software like Trillian out there now that does this, but it's not perfect. When I used it, I couldn't get it to transfer files to AIM users, nor could I get it to log onto Yahoo Instant Messenger... ever.

I'm sure that Trillian has gotten better since my days of agravation with it a few years ago, but there's another thing that Google would have to overcome if it was to release an IM client... They've got to get people to use it. AOL is THE leader here, and nobody's been able to touch them. Heck Microsoft has been sticking Windows Messenger (now MSN Messenger) on every Windows XP computer since the OS was released, and they're still a distant second with Yahoo scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Maybe Google can come up with another viral marketing scheme for GIM like they did with g-mail? Heck, maybe Google will refuse to publicly open up GIM and leave it as an invite only system just like g-mail? You know, only the "internet cool people" have invites to GIM... Of course if GIM doesn't talk to the other im programs, you'll be stuck just talking to the few GIM subscribers that manage to get invites.... And will any of the "internet cool people" really be people you'll want to talk to?

Your Very Own Communicator (Maybe)

2005-08-22T11:05:00.000-07:00

Up until now (or at least September 30th) die hard Star Trek fans who dreamed of having their own communicator like that used by Captain Kirk had two options.

One was to imagine that their clamshell cell phone really was a communicator, of course you couldn't do the cool wrist flick that Captain Kirk did to open his communicator with your cell phone.

Option two was to try sometype of mod like this one on the right. This one appears to have been done by disassembling a Bluetooth headset and a garage door opener of some sort, then putting the parts together into some form of frankendevice. This particular device was up on e-bay last year.

Option three appears to be coming on September 30th through a partnership with Sona Mobile and Viacom. Sona's website touts all kinds of Star Trek content for the new device... But no hardware or carrier information. For that matter, Sona is a mobile content company and not a hardware company so just what will this device look like?

Based on the story on Wired News this should be a "Star Trek Communicator Themed Mobile Device" which leads me to believe that all this content will be platform specific to a device that Viacom and Sona will be marketing. But there's no other information out there. Since there's no mention of specific carriers (at least not yet) invovled with this, I'm assuming the device will be an unlocked GSM phone... but who knows?

This is just wrong...

2005-08-17T17:44:00.000-07:00

Funny as hell... but just wrong!

You can get your own for just $7.50 on e-bay

Bizarre Tech Story of The Week...

2005-08-16T17:49:00.000-07:00

This comes from MSNBC, and is truely the most bizarre thing I've seen in quite a while...

The Henrico County school system decided to sell 1,000 iBooks at Richmond International Speedway for $50 each. These weren't last weeks models that they were selling, but 4 year old used machines. My guess is that they were used by the school system for the past 4 years, so they were running older versions of the Mac OS, outdated processors, and were probably a bit road weary too...

But that didn't stop more than 5,500 people from showing up, some waiting since 1:30 AM to try and get their hands on one of these machines. Sadly though, that's not the bizarre part...

When the gates opened at 7AM the crowd quickly became a rioting stampede. 17 people were injured and 4 of those required hospitalization as the crowd rushed inside pushing and screaming. Reports on MSNBC say that a baby stroller had been crushed, an old man pushed to the ground, somebody in a car actually tried to drive THROUGH the mob.

One woman waiting in line relieved herself in her pants instead of giving up her place in line. A 20 year old claimed that he used a folding chair to beat back people who he felt were cutting in front of him...

PEOPLE THEY'RE FOUR YEAR OLD COMPUTERS!!!!!

I've said it before and I'll say it again, people suck!

Your Windows is running on My Treo! No Your Treo is Running My Windows!

2005-08-11T15:11:00.000-07:00

There's been a lot of furor over the past several days throughout the gadget community, with a lot of passionate posts on HowardForums, PocketPCThoughts and elsewhere over these pictures...

If they are authentic, and right now there's still some debate as to whether or not they are, you are looking at a Palm Treo running Windows Mobile 5 Phone Edition. We're not talking about a hacked device either, if the photos are authentic this is looks to be an evaluation device headed to Verizon.

There have been rumors for the past several months that the recently reconstituted Palm (after re-merging Palm One and Palm Source which were created when Palm decided to split into two companies, one doing software development and the other hardware) was developing devices based on both the Windows Mobile OS as well as Linux.

The very idea that Palm was looking to move away from the OS that it developed and was looking to move to a new platform sent ripples throughout the mobile community. That Palm was looking into Windows Mobile was a bombshell.

Since Apple pulled the plug on the venerable Newton, Palm has been a driving force in the PDA market. For years there was Palm... and then there was everything else. When people thought of PDA's they immediately thought of the Palm Pilot and to this day many people still use the name Palm Pilot to refer to any PDA. Until 1999 Palm was the one and only manufacturer of PDA's. Then Microsoft and it's partner's got into the game.

Palm devices featured monochrome screens, basic sounds and really good battery life. Microsoft and company though brought color and better sound to the PDA world, at the cost of battery life. Ever since Microsoft has been slowly chipping away at Palm's market share, and Palm has been paying the price ever since.

Microsoft has licensed off it's Windows Mobile software to a variety of vendors since Microsoft doesn't do hardware. Palm licensed off it's software to two vendors, Handspring which was formed by ex-Palm engineers and later bought by Palm, and Sony who has since completely left the PDA market.

It hasn't helped Palm that in the last few years they've really only had one device that they could call a success, the Treo 600 smartphone. Their PDA only devices have taken a beating on the market, and from what I'm hearing the Treo 650 isn't nearly as stable or as well liked as the 600.

So the news that the only remaining player in the PDA OS business was possibly looking to Microsoft was a big deal. Pictures of a device have been earth shattering for some.

Typical responses on the forums:
"Windows Mobile on Palm... I'm so there!"
"It's the end of the world. Windows is going to ruin the Palm."
"Microsoft Sucks!"
"Palm Sucks!"
"I'VE GOT TO HAVE THIS! RIGHT NOW! THIS IS THE PERFECT DEVICE, THIS IS SO AWESOME! WHEN IS IT COMING OUT!" and right about now the person who typed this suffered a crippling stroke and collapsed on their keyboard...

Honestly, I'm not conviced that a Treo with Windows Mobile really is handheld nirvana.

Yes, the Treo line has been extremely popular, especially the 600. However, the 650 isn't that great, the Tungsten and Zire lines are nothing special either, which to me doesn't equal instant fantabulousness for the next Treo to be released, no matter what it's running.

Palm has ZERO experience building Windows Mobile devices. So what makes anybody think that they're going to pull off a good Windows Mobile phone right out of the gate? HTC which made the old T-Mobile Pocket PC phone did a decent job their first time, but they've been hit or miss ever since, some devices have been very good devices, and others have been just ok.

HP has been making PDA's since Microsoft first came out with the OS in 99, and completely blew it with the Ipaq-6315, the jury's still out on their latest device the 6515 which hasn't been released in the US yet. (the rumor mill has it that Cingular will be getting this in select markets soon) That phone is running Windows Mobile for Smartphones which is a derivative of Windows Mobile.

Motorola has come out with three devices so far, it's first the MPX-200 was a pretty decent device that ran Windows Mobile for Smartphones. The second the MPX-220 was an update on the MPX-200, and was an unpopular buggy dud. The third was the Motorola MPx, this promising looking device died a quick death after being released in a few Asian markets. It was underpowered, unstable, and uncheap... Needed something to keep on theme there.

It took Eten three tries before it came close to releasing a decent device. But even it's latest, the M500, has some reception problems that need to be worked out.

Since some pretty big players in the handheld market have blown it with Windows Mobile (you might not have heard of HTC, but their HUGE, Eten however is a smaller company.) what makes anybody think that Palm can pull this off?

My prediction is that the first of Treos to hit the market running Windows Mobile (if they ever do hit the market) will be ok devices. They won't suck outright, but they will be pretty buggy. If Palm is responsive, they'll release a firmware update or three and fix most of the problems and the device will be pretty good 6 to 8 months after it's release. If Palm isn't responsive, then we won't see a decent device until Windows Mobile Treo2 gets released...

Either way, if/when the first Treo running Windows Mobile hits shelves.... I won't be running out to buy it....

Yet Another Person With Way Too Much Time on Their Hands!

2005-08-09T17:52:00.000-07:00

This comes to me from boingboing.com, seems somebody has come up with a plant whose future depends on the performance of Home Depot's stock.

Ok, it's a planter with a rubber tree purchased from Home Depot (an important piece of the equation as you'll soon see), and the planter controls the fate of the rubber tree.

And now you're saying, gee now that's about as clear as mud...

In the words of creators Douglas Easterly and Matt Kenyon:
"Home Depot is responsible for the plant in two ways: first, an unconditional guarantee to replace any plant they sell, for up to one year; secondly through an implied cybernetic contract. This second responsibility is the creative content for the work, where Home Depot's economic health is transitioned through a series of physical computing techniques to a mechanism for controlling the watering of the plant. An onboard computer uses a Wi-Fi connection to access Home Depot stock quotes once per week, keeping a database of these week ending stock values. From the fluctuations in Home Depot stock, various programs and circuitry are controlled accordingly. As the company does well, so does the plant - if the company suffers losses, Spore 1.1 does not get watered. If the plant should parish, due to poor stock performance, it is returned to the Home Depot and replaced with another-at no additional cost."

If you buy this...

2005-08-09T11:47:00.000-07:00

WiFi Speed Spray

You might was well write me a check for a few hundred dollars... I mean you're just going to blow that money on worthless crap...

There's a whole community of some sort on e-Bay that seems to just thrive on posted bogus listings like these. I just don't see the attraction to it.

Yes, it's pretty sad if some schmo really is dumb enough to actually bid on and buy junk like this. But considering e-Bay charges for these auctions whether you make a sale or not, it just doesn't make sense to even bother putting something like this together...

Where Was This When I Needed it 6 Years Ago!?!

2005-08-04T18:12:00.000-07:00

So 6 years ago I lived in a little garden style apartment not far from Mount Vernon. Lived there for a year and even though we were invited to Mount Vernon, we never went.

The floors and ceilings of this place were paper thin. Luckily we couldn't hear what our next door neighbors were doing in their apartments (although from the slamming doors we knew when they came and left) however we could hear what was going on in the laundry room below very well. So well that from our bed it sounded like we were in the room next to them. While not as clear as those in the laundry room, we also could hear what our upstairs neighbor was doing too... Especially around 1:30/2:00 AM on a Friday and or a Saturday night, and honestly who ever she was... I think she didn't go home satisfied...

Well I find this via funreports.com (which seems to be a questionable site in it's own right) For around $20 you can purchase from gadgets.co.uk the "Noise CD" including earplugs. 20 Tracks of sounds intended to test the sanity of even your noisiest neighbor.

Included tracks for their irritation:
1. Drill.
2. Party (at least 200 People).
3. Orgasm (Outstanding).
4. Train.
5. Drum (Played by a Child).
6. Inhuman Screams.
7. Walking (High Heels).
8. Domestic Squabble.
9. Doors Banging.
10. Bowling.
11. Unhappy Dog.
12. Practicing a violin.
13. Traffic Jam.
14. Garbage Truck.
15. A screaming newborn baby
16. Phone Ringing.
17. Ball Game.
18. Pigeons.
19. Spring house cleaning.
20. Cock-a-Doodle-Do!

The Balloon Bazooka

2005-08-02T18:20:00.000-07:00

Now, I like a good water fight was much as the next person. Some water guns, some water balloons, women in wet t-shirts, hoses the whole nine yards...

But this, this takes the water fight to a whole new level.... A level that I'm just not sure water fights needed to go to.

Presenting the Balloon Bazooka:

As you can see, they have 3 different models for your balloon launching enjoyment...
There's the basic 6 ft long entry level model capable of launching a balloon 300 feet or 12 balloons at once but not as far.

There's the 7 foot long standard model that can launch a balloon 400 feet or 20 balloons at once.

And, if you want to fire a water balloon clean through your buddy's chest then you want the 8 foot long magnum model. This thing can shoot a quality latex balloon (they say the cheapies can't take the pressure) 500 feet or 24 ballons at once! Ok it might not really be able to shoot a balloon through a person, but then again who knows?

Should you buy one of these things... Just remember this important safety tip from the manufacturer's web page:
"Caution: Do not operate Balloon Bazooka ™ while impaired"

Check Yourself Out

2005-08-02T15:54:00.000-07:00

I really like those self-checkout things that have been popping up at my local supermarket, Home Depot, and now Costco.

It's not that I don't like interacting with a pimple faced teenager or some other minimum wage cashier that couldn't make change if it wasn't for the cash register telling them how much to give me (and even then it's a stretch). But I find that when unobstructed I can check myself out faster than most of the cashiers I've had to deal with.

I know, not everybody likes these things, many people think they're cold, impersonal and even confusing. The thing is, like most devices (computers, cell phones, PDA's, cash registers etc...) that have been out for the last 10+ years I think people would find them significantly less confusing and easier to use if they just read the screen in front of them or listen to the messages that the device is telling them.

We're not talking about complicated stuff like changing out the receipt roll or anything here (although I did once show some girl at Busch Gardens in Williamsburg how to do this many years ago.... and I've never worked at Busch Gardesn), but how about figuring out how to complete a sale with a gift card? I actually had to show a cashier at my local Target how to complete my sale when I paid with a gift card, I've never used a cash register at Target myself. Yet amazingly by reading the screen I knew how to process the transaction where the cashier didn't...

Anywho... my local Costco has completed a COMPLETE transition to these self checkouts. There's not a single human cashier other than the one at customer service in the entire place! Last time I was there, they only had 3 cashiers and the rest were self-checkouts... Now there's none.

After my experience today, I would hope that their having problems with some of the lanes. I don't say this because I wish ill of Costco, actually I say this because they only reason why I could come up with that they would have half of the self-checkout lanes closed would be because some were broken. Otherwise it just doesn't make sense to not have every single lane open whenever the store is open. You don't need to worry about lunch breaks, potty breaks etc for cashiers, so why not have every single lane open... Yet this morning, just short of half the checkout lanes were open...

WiFi Distance Record

2005-08-01T20:04:00.000-07:00

I first heard about these guys last year in Wired Magazine. A few bored teenagers took some old satellite TV dishes (the big hokin ones, not the small ones used by DishNetwork and DirecTV) and headed off to Las Vegas for the annual BlackHat Hackers Conference.

They setup the dishes outside of town and set a new world record for transmitting a WiFi signal. They actually smashed the previous record by sending the signal 55 miles, it was thought they could have gone futher, but they ran out of room. The thing is, other than the antennas, everything they used was standard off the shelf stuff. The used relatively low powered WiFi cards and no signal amplifiers.

To put this in perspecitve, the average WiFi access point is rated for a range of just 300 feet although you typically get a bit less than that. With a directional antenna you can actually get close to a 15 mile range.

This year they went back to Las Vegas and tried again, and destroyed the record they set just the year before. According to WiFi toys, this time they setup just south of Las Vegas NV and shot the signal all the way to St George UT, 125 MILES AWAY! This time they used more powerful network cards (although still pretty low power) and larger satellite dishes, but no amplifiers.

Just as amazing... This was done by a bunch of teenagers!

Who Keeps Messing With the Termostat?!!?

2005-08-01T19:32:00.000-07:00

Did the earth move a few miles closer to the sun or something? What is up with the weather?

Did the county re-zone my neighborhood as a sauna?

How hot is it?

So hot that last week there was a power outage nearby because some of the electric distribution
equipment melted!

So hot that the media is doing their stupid fluff pieces on the weather... You know the ones, where they try and bake cookies in a closed car and fry and egg on the sidewalk...

Heck it's even too hot for the neighborhood punks to head outside and vandalize stuff...

It's so hot that a goose walking along the side of the pond just burst into flames! Luckily he could just hop in the pond on put himself out, but still it could have been ugly... Flaming goose feathers everywhere!!!

Alright, it's lame... But it's too freaken hot to come up with a good post...

It's a Boat... It's a Car... I don't know, but it's made of Wood!

2005-07-28T17:30:00.000-07:00

Ok to move away from the space related posts of the past week, I'm going to instead switch gears and show some more wood stuff...

This comes to me via transittrends.org. Italian Livio de Marchi has created full sized wooden replicas of his favorite cars in order to travel through the canals of Venice. The photos of his creations come from his virtual museum.

Some of his creations:
A lifesize Ferrari F50

A lifesize 1937 Jaguar

A lifesize Mercedes 300 SL Seagull

A lifesize Fiat Topolino

How about a lifesize VW Beetle (convertible)

However if those aren't unusual enough for you, how about a paper hat (made of wood of course)?

Maybe an origami crane?

I Would Have Expected Better...

2005-07-28T17:17:00.000-07:00

The man's the leader of the free world, the most powerful nation on the face of the planet. An agency of the government you run is launching 7 humans into space... And you're watching it happen on a dinky 19 inch WalMart special TV? What's wrong with the picture? Seriously?

I'm all for fiscal responsibility in the government, but heck walk into the airport and TSA has dozens of plasma screens all over at their checkpoints displaying the same low res images and messages over and over. Go over to DOT headquarters and they have plasma screens at EVERY entrance. Couldn't they get the poor man a quality HD set for him to watch the launch on?!?!?!?!

The Future of NASA

2005-07-27T19:37:00.000-07:00

Well, even if NASA resolves the problem with debris falling off the fuel tank in enough time that Atlantis could still launch as originally scheduled there would still be only 15 or so missions before the fleet was retired according the President's plan for future space exploration.

There are parts of the President's plan I agree with... We need to return to the Moon, the fact that it's been 33 years since we've been back is tragic. I remember reading in elementry school all the books that predicted that there would be permanent space stations in orbit by 2000 and colonies on the moon by 2005. Instead we got the ISS.

Don't get me wrong, unlike the President's vision I think the ISS is important and that the station should be the jump off point for our future exploration of our solar system and not the dead end that the President's vision has made it. Ironicly, the ISS was the first President Bush's vision for the future of our space exploration, he wanted the station in orbit and operating before 2000.

When the shuttle fleet is retired in 2 or 3 years the US won't have any vehicle able to take people into space. There were be a gap of several years before a replacement for the shuttle goes into service. Given NASA's history for designing vehicles over the past 30 years, my guess is that a replacement for the shuttle won't go into service for another 15 years. Let me say that again, the US will be out of the manned spaceflight business for as many as 10 years, maybe even longer. Heck it was 5 years between the last SkyLab flight and the first shuttle flight.

Over the last 20 years I think NASA has lost it's way. The agency has plowed itself into a rut thanks to the Challenger disaster and budget cuts. Challenger scared NASA to start acting in a very risk averse manner, and as we've seen by the exhaustive inspections Discovery has undergone since getting into orbit, they've gotten even worse.

Back in the '80s NASA was working on a project called the National Aerospace Plane or NASP, this was supposed to be a "single stage to orbit" craft that would augment the shuttle fleet and act as a bridge between the shuttles when they were retired and whatever replaced them. Single stage to orbit means that the craft would be able to launch itself into orbit without the assistance of additional booster rockets and such. By comparison the shuttle is a two stage launch system stage one is the external booster rockets and stage two is the shuttle itself. The NASP was cancelled after several years of research, NASA decided that not enough of the needed technology had been developed enough to be incorporated into the NASP.

When NASP died, so did most research into any other vehicle to augment or replace the shuttle fleet, and that's where we are now. The fleet is on the brink of retirement with a replacement currently nothing more than some artists daydream.

NASA then fell into the trap that they called smaller, cheaper, better. They just left off less-risk... NASA started launching small robotic probes for exploration, it was this movement that brought about the successful Mars Rover and the highly unsuccessful Mars Surveyor (the one that crashed...). Since they were unmanned missions they were much cheaper and could move from design to launch much faster than a manned mission. Plus it's not a national tragedy if you loose an unmanned probe...

So we end up where we were just 3 years ago, with a manned spaceflight program whose mission is no longer to explore, but to build, restock, and maintain the ISS. Putting satellites in orbit? That's done by unmanned rockets now, after Challenger none of the satellite owners are convinced that the shuttle is worth the cost and risk as a launch platform... NASA has dreams of sending a manned mission to Mars, but research is moving at a snail's pace at best... The moon, forget it.

I've got to give credit to the President, after the loss of Columbia he could have shut the manned spaceflight program down. He could have decided that manned spaceflight was too risky and decided that we didn't need to go back. I know he's from Texas and the Johnson Spaceflight Center is a huge piece of the Houston economy, but still he could have called the whole thing off. Instead he came up with a plan, that while somewhat misguided, gives NASA something to shoot for again with manned spaceflight. President Bush has decided that we need to become less involved in the ISS (which I think is a mistake) and has directed NASA to get us back to the moon... eventually (i.e. 2020) and from there to Mars. Of course he didn't identify funding, but I guess it's a start...

GROUNDED!!!!

2005-07-27T18:39:00.000-07:00

Well that didn't take long... Discovery hasn't even been in orbit for 48 hours and NASA has grounded the shuttle fleet AGAIN!

According to MSNBC at a press conference this evening, NASA has announced that a rather sizeable chunk of foam fell away from the external fuel tank... It was a big enough piece that if it had hit the orbiter as it fell away it would have caused significant damage.

Talk about a blow to the program. After two years of intense troubleshooting to resolve this problem, a problem that they've been trying to figure out for probably close to 10 years before the Columbia accident, only to have it crop up again when they thought they had it resolved.

Return to Flight

2005-07-26T15:23:00.000-07:00

Well, unless you live under a rock with no connections to the outside world (in which case it would be really creepy if you came here for your information...) then you already know that the launch of the STS-114, Shuttle Discovery went well and after 2 and a half long years, NASA is back in the business of putting humans into low earth orbit. STS-114 is NASA speak for Space Transportation System mission number 114. NASA's technical name for the shuttle fleet is the Space Transportation System.

The launch went very well by most accounts, except for it appears two incidents. First, there apears to have been some debris that fell away as the solid rocket boosters seperated. NASA beleives that there may have been some damage, but probably nothing significant. The other incident is that apparently during launch there was a birdstrike suffered on the nose cone of the external fuel tank.

I always get amazed by the pictures from the launch. The fact that there are cameras so sensitive in place around the launch site that you can see the shuttle when it's over 200 miles away from the Kennedy Space Center and 60 miles up seems unbelieveable, but they've been doing this for many years now.

In case you didn't get to see the launch, we were treated to a completely new view of this launch. Out of concern for debris falling from the external fuel tank like what was the cause of the Columbia crash NASA has installed a camera on the fuel tank that looks down and back towards the wings and rear of the shuttle.

The camera gives NASA engineers the ability to monitor this area and watch to see if anything falls off the tanks and strikes the shuttle or if anything should fall off the shuttle. However, since the images were also relayed by NASA to the gathered press pool, we got to seem them as well. As far as I know, this is the first time we've ever been able to see live images from the launch vehicle. For the first time we were able to see from the launch vehicle, the solid rocket boosters seperate and fall away, previously we could only view this through super zoom cameras that were 40 miles away. We also got to see for the first time, the external fuel tank seperate from the shuttle, previously this was something that we just couldn't see at all because it occured at such a high altitude.

Discovery is on a 12 day mission, while in orbit the crew will inspect the shuttle to ensure that it's undamaged from the launch, test some repair procedures and deliver gyro and other supplies to the International Space Station...

Natural Styles for Your Desktop

2005-07-25T18:06:00.000-07:00

Following the wood iPod story a few weeks ago, I've found a company that actually specializes in electronics with wooden cases. SWEDX is a Swedish company that specializes in this sort of thing. This is their LCD computer monitor in Natural Ash, they offer monitors in a variety of sizes and woods, including Beeche, Sapele and as mentioned Ash. In addition they offer wood HDTV monitors, speakers, USB keyboards, and yes even mice!
They're actually available in the US from a company called Plasma Earth www.plasmaearth.com and as you can guess, they're not cheap. Prices start at $1,199 for the monitor, keyboard, and mouse combination...

Why Would You Buy This?

2005-07-25T17:49:00.000-07:00

I've made the mistake of reading this insane e-Bay auction, and I can't figure out what the point is. So she wants you to buy this Mead notebook that she's written down people's names in... What is the attraction to this? What possesed some knucklehead to pay $36 for this thing?

RIP Jimmy Doohan

2005-07-20T15:11:00.000-07:00

Jimmy Doohan passed away early this morning in his Redmond Washington home at age 85. Doohan was suffering from Alzheimers and pneumonia. There's not too many of the well known original Star Trek cast members left. We're down to just William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, Nichelle Nichols, Majel Barret-Roddenberry, and George Takai.

Is it your phone... or that bird?

2005-07-20T10:39:00.000-07:00

I heard about this from Cnet's buzzcast, which heard about it from boingboing.net, which heard about it from mobcast, which heard about it from... well I don't know, but the story seems to have originated from the Indo-Asian News Service.

According to IANS, German ornithologists (guys who study birds), birds are learning to imitate cell phone ringtones! The phenomenom appears to be common among birds found in urban areas with jackdaws, starlings, and jays being the best at mimicing ring tones. According to the article, some birds are so good that they have actually managed to fool experienced bird watchers!

However, the birds aren't able to imitate the complex polyphonic ringtones (the ones that sound like music) or event the simplier tones that are of popular songs. They appear to be best with the common chimes that many people use. Although I'm sure that the folks at Nokia are thrilled that German birds are signing the Nokia tone found on all their phones!

The Downside of iTunes Featuring Podcasts

2005-07-19T17:20:00.000-07:00

I first wrote about iTunes new support for Podcasts a week or two ago, this sudden change to iTunes seemed to take everyone by surprise from iTunes users to the Podcasters who with no warning found that their Podcast was now listed in iTunes.

At first glance it would seem like a godsend for the average blogger... For a few months they could be plugging along in relative obscurity, buried in some Podcast directory and only able to attract a handfull of subscribers. Then WHAM out of nowhere they're up on iTunes for millions of people to see, and overnight they go from just 4 dozen subscribers to a few THOUSAND subscribers! Now this would seem to be a good thing, unless the website you host your Podcast on has restrictions on the number of downloads you can have a month. Now to support the sudden explosive growth in subscribers many podcast owners have had to spring for more costly hosting options that can accomodate their new bandwidth requirements.

Just as surprising, iTunes managed to dredge up a few defunct podcasts as well. People who played with podcasting on a whim and quickly got bored with it all of a sudden found their podcasts listed in iTunes and have gained hundreds of new subscribers... when they haven't published a podcast in months!

I've also heard a few complaints from various podcasters as they work to make their podcasts "iTunes Compliant." In order to allow you to subscribe to a podcast, podcasters put special XML coding on their web page which does some magical things that tells iTunes or whatever software you use to subscribe to the podcast that the author has updated their podcast and it's time for you to download a new episode. Apparently there is some special coding that podcasters need to use in order to get their podcast to update and display properly in iTunes. It seems that some podcasters already happened to be using the needed code for iTunes, but a great many were not, and they've been having fits trying to get the code working properly with iTunes.

Check out this article in Wired on the issues podcasters are dealing with...

Wired also touched on something that I'm guessing many people who have started looking into podcasts have discovered.... While there are some pretty good podcasts out there, a great many of them are just utter CRAP!

Take for example this one that I've been listening to, it's the HDTV Podcast and as the name suggests is on everything HDTV. Definately a simple production, two guys talking about the HDTV news they have, defining terms, and evaluating devices. But it's well put together, has decent audio quality, and is reasonably interesting. I had pretty low expectations when I subscribed to this podcast, but I've been very surprised and will continue to subscribe to them...

On the other hand there's This Week in Tech. I had high hopes for this one, it's done by Leo LaPort and the gang that used to host "The Screen Saver's" a mildly amusing, by highly geeky show that used to be on TechTV, and with a name like This Week in Tech, I figured it had to be a good recap of the week's tech news right? These guys have traditional media experience so surely this would be a well put together show right? What it really is, is a weekly recording of a 6 way Skype conference call between these guys where they spend most of their time just chatting about... well anything! Amazingly enough, this steaming pile of crap is number two on the iTunes chart right now too!

Which has me thinking, iTunes could be just the shot in the arm to launch podcasting into the mainstream. Millions of people have access to podcasts now without having to go uber-geek and play with some arcane piece of software to do it. As many podcasters are now discovering, this can be a real shot in the arm for their podcasts...

On the other hand, with the huge number of podcasts out there that really are just unlistenable garbage, all these new potential podcast subscribers could get turned off by the whole concept. The frustration born of having to wade through all the lousy podcasts to find the few decent ones that are out there may just prove to be too much for many and turn them off to the entire concept of podcasts in general.

Cell Phone's Off....

2005-07-19T15:15:00.000-07:00

Ok, I didn't hear about this announcement myself, and it took a lot of digging to find it. I would have thought that this would have gotten quite a bit of press.

According to mobileburn.com even though the FCC has ruled that it had no objections to cell phone use during flights, the FAA has decided to keep the ban on cell phones in place. However the wording of the ruling is that the usage of wireless devices in-flight is prohibited, not just cell-phones. This means that portable GPS's, radios, TV's are still prohibited too, however a special provision was made for Wi-Fi devices.

This means that while you still can't whip out your cellphone at 36,000 feet and chat with your best friend about how wasted you got at the party at the beach last night... Soon (hopefully) you'll be able to whip out your Wi-Fi enabled notebook or PDA and IM your best friend about how wasted you got at the party last night....

Personally, I'd prefer the Wi-Fi access over the cell phone...

Bizarre Tech Story of The Week...

2005-07-14T15:51:00.000-07:00

This was sent to me by a friend, it's definately one of the most bizarre tech stories I've seen in quite a while....

In this article posted on optics.org Japanese researchers are using a laser to write data on human fingernails...

Using femtosecond laser pulses (I don't know what they are, but it reminds me of the fembots from the Austin Powers movies!) they're zapping the fingernails and getting 5mb of data on them. The article says they're irradiating the finger nails, it seems like the data is only readable with a special microscope and with the aid of a Xenon Arc Lamp. Now the data is only stored on the fingers for 6 months, by then the nail has completely grown out.

This begs all kind of questions...

What if you get a manicure?
What if you scuff your nail?
Why would you even want to do this?

What will they think of next?

Reality Check

2005-07-13T11:01:00.000-07:00

So yesterday I'm listening to a talk show on the radio... Not unusual, but I don't particularly like this show, the commentator and many of his listeners are a bit too far to the left for my tastes, however there's not much else on during the time I was in the car so I didn't have much choice...

A LOT of his callers were calling for Karl Rove's firing and arrest for treason over his possible role in leaking Valerie Plame's name to the media.

Ok reality check people. We DON'T KNOW if he broke the law yet. According to MSNBC, the law says he has to have intentionally disclosed that she was a covert agent. We have an e-mail that has been released that seems to indicate her, but doesn't mention her by name. Heck, we don't even know for sure that he knew what her role was at CIA.

However, here's the key thing. IF the results of the investigation are that he did in fact break the law, Karl Rove isn't getting charged with treason. The President should fire him, but don't expect him to be charged with treason, if anything we might see charges stemming from the unauthorized disclosure of classified information, a much less significant charge than treason.

Now before you start thinking that would be because the Republican's would circle the wagons to defend him... I think otherwise.

I think it's a matter of the scale of the crime, what he did is relatively minor. I know it doesn't seem minor, he quite possibly put a CIA agent and her family at risk and probably compromised some sources and operations.

But, what about Former Navy Chief Warrant Officer John Walker? This guy was selling classified information to the Soviets for almost 20 years. He even recruited friends and family members into his ring of spies. Countless servicemember's lives were put at risk for over 20 years as John Walker and his spy ring sold an unknown amount of classified documents and other material, this during war time and peace. John Walker and all but one of his cohorts were charged with epionage not treason, and sentenced to life.

How about Aldrich Ames? He knowingly sold the list of every CIA covert agent he knew of to the Soviets... Espionage, not treason and life in prison.

Since Karl Rove didn't sell the names, I don't think he can be charged with espionage. Since neither Ames nor Walker and his cronies were charged with treason, and what they did was substantially more damaging than Rove's leak, I don't think treason is an option here.

My prediction if charges are filed? A fine of a few thousand dollars and maybe probation or something. Definately not jail time...

Jargon Free Zone

2005-07-11T16:42:00.000-07:00

Here at the Innocent Bystander I tend to write about anything that catches my eye, which could be anything from news stories to techie stuff, to just about anything else.

Some of the things I may write about could be a little bit on the technical side filled with all kinds of jargon. The things is, I don't know who might be reading this on a given day... There might be some serious tech heads here and there might be some novices around too. Just to make sure everybody understands what I'm writing about, I'll try to make this as jargon free as possible and explain whatever I can.

Run across a term in a post that you don't understand? Leave me a comment and I'll do what I can for you...

The Phone Update

2005-07-07T18:17:00.000-07:00

Well, I made my decision. I bought the ETen M500 from Mad Monkey Boy's Gadgets. So far I'm really impressed with the device. As you can see from the pictures, it's smaller than my old Ipaq 4150, but it's quite a bit thicker. So far I've found that it has really good sound quality as a phone, and I like the interface used by Windows Mobile for phone operations. It comes chock full of applications, more than any other PDA I've had in the past, although I've got a long way to go to figure all that's on there and how to use them.

Setting up the M500 to work with T-Mobile was much easier than I thought it might be. All I needed to do was pop my SIM card into the M500 and it was ready to send and receive calls (SIM cards are only in phones on the Cingular and T-Mobile networks, if you have Verizon, Sprint, and I believe Nextel, then your phone doesn't have a SIM card.) It took just a few minutes on this website to find the settings I needed for the data connection, and viola I was ready to go!

The downside of the device: T-Mobile. The M500's biggest weakness happens to be the frequency that T-Mobile uses primarily on it's network (1900MHz). I can see both the Cingular network and the old AT&T Wireless network on a fairly regular basis, but T-Mobile can be a little challenging. It's a little frustrating, but not enough to drive me to hate the phone... at least not yet.

Now you may be wondering, what is the phone? I've never seen it at my local T-Mobile or Cingular store, or any other cell phone store I've ever been to for that matter. This is one of the cool things about GSM or Global Standard for Mobiles, GSM is a standard used by cell phone networks around the world (Hence the word Global in the name). The key piece of the GSM standard is that your phone number and assorted information is stored on the SIM card mentioned earlier, and not on your phone. This means you can take your SIM card and stick it in any GSM phone and the phone will work with your phone number. Verizon and Sprint use a standard called CDMA where your phone's ID is what identifies you on the network, you can't change phones on a CDMA network without notifying your carrier, and they may (read that will) prevent phones that you didn't get from them from working on their network. On a GSM network, your carrier doesn't know (and probably doesn't care) what phone you're using, that is as long as you don't call them for support if it doesn't work!

The M500 I bought is an "unlocked" GSM phone. Which means that I can stick any GSM carrier's SIM card in it, and the phone will work. When it comes to many electronics devices, I hate to say it, but the US doesn't get much of the really cool stuff. That all goes to Europe and Asia, we often times get the dumbed down budget stuff that's a few years behind what's new and cool in Europe and Asia. But if you can find a reliable electronics importer, you too can get some of the cool toys!

The News of The Day....

2005-07-07T15:43:00.000-07:00

First a public service announcement... Notice the top of the page, the terror alert level is now a mixed Bert/Ernie, it's Bert unless you're on Mass Transit in which case it's Ernie. What does that mean? Ummm... If you're riding Mass Transit, trust nobody and nothing. But, you should resume your normal level of suspicion once you depart the Mass Transit station of your choice. And now back to our regularly unscheduled blogging....

My morning routine is pretty set, wake up and turn on the news on TV before I do anything else.

I watch the local NBC affiliate, they have a smart witty anchor and an airheaded anchor, I like the NBC affiliate because the smart anchor is smart enough to compensate for the airheaded one and negate the airheaded effects.

Like probably everybody else, they were reporting on the events in London. Well kinda... They were re-broadcasting MSNBC's coverage of the events in London... Except MSNBC wasn't really covering the events in London themselves, MSNBC was re-broadcasting ITV's coverage on the events in London.

On the surface this makes sense, over the last 20 years or so US news organizations have drastically cut back on their foreign news staffs. Why not take advantage of local news sources then, especially if they speak the same language? The trouble is that for a half hour, ITV interviewing various eyewitnesses... but never recapped just what was going on.

MSNBC's own crawl and Flash News banner that they superimposed on the screen was of no help either... All it said was "Explosions in London." I was able to determine that a bus had blown up somewhere but that was it... 30 Minutes and no recap of what was going on and where... At least locally... Our local affiliate broke away for commercials, and again in time to switch to The Today Show.

So we move to The Today Show, surely they would give a full recap on what was going on... Not really, the best I could get from them after a good 15 minutes was just that there were multiple explosions in The Tube, and a bus bombing near Tavistock Square. At this point we're a good 3 hours after the first explosion.

Now looking at the timeline up on MSNBC's website http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8497343/ Scotland Yard didn't release the location of the explosions until 7:30 Eastern, 12:30 GMT. But, if you have reporters on the scene talking to eyewitnesses (like ITV was doing) won't the reporters also report on where they are?

I just don't get the 3 hour delay before we knew where the explosions had occured. Heck, even if they passed the locations as pending confirmation from Government sources. I don't know, maybe it's just me. I could be the only person who watched the coverage this morning thinking "Where in London? It's a BIG city!"

Another Person With Too Much Time on Their Hands!

2005-07-05T16:30:00.000-07:00

I'd love to post pictures of a working wooden iPod I found, but for some reason either blogger or flikr isn't letting me. Instead you'll have to go here to see it. He took a 4th generation iPod, removed the front face (including the click wheel) and replaced it with a wooden front, which is nicely stained and polyuerythaned I might add!

Amazingly the thing works, even the click wheel! Other than that, I don't have any details on this

What I Did on The Fourth of July

2005-07-05T15:55:00.000-07:00

I know, one of the rules was no personal stuff... but you know what, it's my blog, I make the rules, and I can break them too!

I actually had a really good Independence Day. To start off, I packed up my nearly 2 year old son nice and early and headed off to a small parade on Capitol Hill. We didn't watch the parade mind you... we were IN the parade :) We got to drive in the parade which was a lot of fun. It was a short little parade, and I think there were actually more people participating in the parade than were actually watching the parade, but whatever.

From DC we headed to Annapolis to hang out with friends for a few hours and then it was off to yet another parade. This time it was my wife, our son, and our dog in the car to drive in a MUCH bigger parade through downtown Annapolis. That was just fantastic. I've marched in a few parades before but never have I been in one that had as large a crowd as this one, and it was a blast!

Then we watched the DC fireworks on PBS... I've got to say that coverage was pretty craptacular... The music was poorly timed and the camera angles were crummy. But it was better than sitting outside with the bugs, in the humidity, and the crush of people... and then trying to figure out how to navigate our way out of that crush of people and home!

All in all, a pretty good day.

AARRGG!!! What to Do?

2005-06-30T16:23:00.000-07:00

So recently my trusty Ipaq 4150 PDA that I've grown to love has let me down in a big way. I've come to rely on the Bluetooth connectivity on the device, I tether it to my cell phone which I use as a wireless modem and surf the internet. Just as critical for me, I use it with a Bluetooth GPS receiver as part of my in car navigation system.

Recently the Bluetooth on my Ipaq quit working on me, even worse is that it did so on a trip when I was relying on it for navigation. It's not that the Bluetooth doesn't work at all mind you, it connects to devices but refuses to pass data. I've had my Ipaq for just about a year, and I've used it pretty hard so I've definately gotten my money's worth out of the device... The question is what to do now...

Convergence or combining two devices to create one device with greater functionality is a big thing in the handheld industry right now. Sales of traditional PDAs (like my crippled Ipaq) have been declining over the last several years, however sales of Smartphones (PDA/Cellphone hybrids like the Treo 600/650) are on the rise. With that in mind, my plan had been to ditch my cell phone and my PDA next year in exchange for a new Smartphone...

And then my Ipaq started misbehaving.

So, the dilemma I face now is do I stick to the original plan and spend $350 to buy a refurbished iPaq 4355 which is what I have now, but with a thumb keyboard attached to the bottom. It's a larger device but I know it's fully compatible with all I have.

Or, do I throw the plan out the window and get a Smartphone now? I'm really intrigued by the Eten M500 PocketPC based phone. One of my concerns about moving to a Smartphone with more of a PDA type of form factor is that its significantly larger than the cell phone I normally carry with me on a day to day basis. Based on how much I loathed my first camera phone because of how fat it was, I'm concerned that the increased size of a PDA sized phone might irritate the heck out of me. However, the M500 doesn't appear to be too big, if anything it appears to be about the same size as my current Ipaq.

The M500 has everything I'm looking for in a Smartphone, gobs of memory, bluetooth, apparently a small size, but it doesn't have wireless networking. It's something that my iPaq has, and while I don't use it often it has come in handy on a few occasions. With the additional memory that the M500 has I could probably get away with an SD card with the wireless networking for those urgent situations...

The other thing that's making me have second thoughts is just the thought of trying to figure out how to get the M500 fully working with T-Mobile, my cellular provider. My biggest concern is that it is a brand spanking new device, which means that there aren't too many people who have them yet. It should work, however I would need to figure out how to make the internet connection work as it's supposed to, and T-Mobile probably won't be of much help. I'm sure I can find the resources needed to do it, it's just that the thought of having to deal with a few hours of frustration concern me. I don't mind being on the leading edge of technology, however I'm concerned about being on the bleeding edge of technology. There is one person I know who could probably help me, but I'm loath to ask them... doing so is kind of like making a deal with the devil...

What to do?

Norway Takes Aim at Microsoft

2005-06-29T18:03:00.000-07:00

I found this through slashdot.com, the Norwegan Minister of Modernization (can you believe it, Norway actually has a Cabinet level position specifically for a GEEK!) has announced that "Proprietary formats will no longer be acceptable in communication between citizens and government."

I've read the article about this announcement a few times now, you can read the entry on Tatle about it, and I'm still trying to figure out the intelligence behind it. Mr. Andreas Meyer (Norway's Chief Geek) made these remarks in a press conference and seemed to be targeting Microsoft, without actually mentioning Microsoft by name.

For example he refers to "the spreadsheet almost everyone uses" and also says that this is the last time he would have IT plans broadcasted on the Internet with Windows Media.

The Minister has directed all Norwegan government institutions to have a recommendation to use open source code by the end of 2005. He wants everybody in the public sector to have a plan in place to use open source code and standards by the end of 2006.

Now here's where I have an issue with this edict. So a .xls file is in the format that Excel uses, big deal... Microsoft Office is installed on what 75% of PC's and Macs maybe more... Not only that but can't you open and work on .xls files with programs like OpenOffice? So why go through the effort to force people off of Office?

The same goes for Windows Media files which the Minister targets specifically. Why is he making a big deal about it? Send his audio as an MP3 (but don't stream it because then you'd have to use Quicktime or Real, and those are proprietary and according to him that's evil), or his video as an MPEG big deal. Unless they need Digital Rights Managment on their media files I don't see the issue here either.

The Minister is obviously trying to push his people towards Linux, and yes there are some benefits to rely on that Open Source software... But based on what I've seen using Mozilla Firefox, I don't think they are nearly as big as many people want you to believe.

I switched to Firefox a few months ago because I bought into the hype that it was faster and safer than IE in part due to Firefox's open source roots. After several months of using Firefox, I say BULL! Firefox has had several critical updates pumped out in the last several months too. Now the Firefox missionaries will argue that they've still had to put out far fewer critical updates than IE... and they're right about that... for the moment.

Let's not forget that one of the key reasons there are so many vulnerabilities found in IE and so many exploits attempted at IE is in large part because it's practically EVERYWHERE! For a hacker (or wannabe hacker) it's like shooting fish in a barrel, fire off a piece of malicious code and you've got a better than 90% chance that it'll find a machine running IE.

Right now Firefox is "safe" because there are still far fewer individual users (let alone corporate users) that are running it than are running IE. However, Firefox is gaining market share as more an more people and media stories come out touting how great Firefox is, the more people will download it. The more people that download it, the better chance it has of catching the eye of the hacker community, and when that happens, well brace yourself for the weekly critical updates that we've all come to known and love/hate/ignore already with IE.

Open Source isn't the answer to everyones prayers, and I suspect that in a few years Norway's new Chief Geek will be signing a different tune about "propriety file formats."

New iTunes

2005-06-28T19:09:00.000-07:00

You've probably heard already, but a new version of Apple's iTunes was released today along with some changes to the iPod product line.

The Fourth Generation (4G) iPods released about a year ago are just about gone. The only exception to that is the Special Edition U2 iPod. The iPod Photo is gone as well... Kinda.

Apple choose to drop the word photo from the name yet keep the color screen. So now your iPod choices are a 20GB with a color screen for $299, or a 60GB for $399 which is I believe $100 less than the 60GB iPod Photo's were selling for. Or you can get the 20GB U2 Special Edition with it's monochrome screen for $329. Now I know that sounds like a crappy deal, but if you buy the U2 iPod you also get a $50 coupon towards the $150 U2 box set that includes EVERYTHING recorded by U2 including some tracks never before released. If you're a U2 fan that should take the sting off of that price a little bit.

Now don't go running to the Apple Store just yet. If you're a college student, make sure you check out the deals their running for students. Free iPod MINI with the purchase of select notebooks, or $179 mail in rebate if you buy a notebook and select a different flavor of iPod... Apple also has a Federal Employee store for Federal Employees to make purchases for themselves, check the pricing their before buying if you qualify for either of these....

As for the new iTunes, I'm actually surprised by the amount of press that this is getting. Ok, I'm actually just surprised that's it's gotten ANY press. I first heard about this on the radio and since then have caught a few reports online about it as well.

The big change to iTunes is that it now supports podcasting through the iTunes Music Store. Since you're reading this blog I'm guessing you might have heard of podcasting, but it's possible that your not familar with podcasting, or you may not have checked it out.

Many media pundits are saying that podcasting could shake up broadcast media the way that blogging is shaking up publishing. Essentially a podcast is an audio blog, the author records his podcast in MP3 format and publishes it similar to the way a blog is published online. Prior to iTunes supporting podcasts, you needed to download a special program like iPodder to subscribe to a podcast and download it. iPodder will also link to your audio program so that you could play download podcasts to your computer or dump them to your MP3 player to listen to at a later date.

The biggest issue I had was finding podcasts that looked remotely interesting. Until now I had only subscribed to one podcast, but instead of some indie programing it's something more mainstream, NPR's "On The Media."

The biggest improvement that iTunes seems to bring to the table is better organization and presentation of all the podcasts that are out there. No disrespect to Adam Curry (who came up with iPodder and quite possibly podcasting for all I know), but trying to track down podcasts that look interesting and don't suck is a royal pain through ipodder.org. While I really don't like navigating my music library in iTunes, I do like using iTunes to check out podcasts. Especially since I can listen to a podcast and see if A) It's ever been updated and B) Doesn't suck without subscribing to the podcast, something that you can't do with ipodder.

I found two so far that I'm checking out right now, one from Disney appears to suck and one from CNET that seems to be ok...

Sam Walton Must be Turning in His Grave....

2005-06-27T12:21:00.000-07:00

Once just a sleepy little small town in northwest Arkansas, The Washington Post says Bentonville, the home of WalMart is going upscale...

WalMart has become such a driving force in the world retail that many of the largest brands in the world have opened up branch offices in Bentonville just so they can be closer to the decision makers at WalMart. We're not talking a few low level sales people either, WalMart has gotten so big that it's the high paid executives that are moving down to staff these branch offices.

These are highly paid executives who had grown accustomed to many of the post amenities found in cities like New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, who are now living in a community that just a few years ago had an average income of just $26,000 a year! So you ask, how were these well paid executives supposed to fill their need for Hummers, sushi, day spas, or doggie day care? Well, when you have the disposable income that they do, you open your own high end shopping outlets.

Sam Walton was notorious for his penny pinching, his frugality is still a large part of the corporate culture at WalMart. Wouldn't it be great to see the look on his face if he could take a drive around Bentonville now? What would Sam have to say about the million dollar mansions in gated communities on the outskirts of town? How about the high end art galleries or the Jaguar dealerships? Better yet, what would Sam Walton have to say about the fact that it's his own company that has attracted them to sleepy little Bentonville?

Getting in Touch With Your Inner Disco Geek....

2005-06-26T18:54:00.000-07:00

Ok, I think lava lamps are cool, but I'm not quite sure this lava lamp is quite as cool.

Yes, that's a lava lamp that's powered by the USB port on your computer! Although reading the description, it doesn't appear that it features the vaguely hypnotic globs of goo floating in oil that makes lava lamps so cool. This one appears to merely be some sparkly things floating in oil.

Car AL-6072 Where Are You?

2005-06-26T17:44:00.000-07:00

I've been remiss on this one... (Bad blog author, bad bad blog author!) I should have posted on this when I first heard about it earlier this week...

How do you know if your city has a problem with car theives? Anyone? Buehler? Buehler?

Answer: When the Chief of Police's city issued car is stolen!

Sometime between Friday the 17th and Sunday the 19th, Washington DC Police Chief Charles Ramsey's DC Government issue sedan was actually stolen!

The car was left on the street in Southeast Washington by an employee of the Police Motor Pool. The Chief was in Scotland for a conference (it's good to be the Chief!) and the car was left there so that he'd have it when he returned. However, Sunday morning when he went to get the car according to The Washington Post the car was gone.

Embarrassing as the situation is, there is a little good news... There were no weapons in the car, just a police radio and some riot gear.

The Chief however has been quick to point out that even though his car was stolen, the number of cars stolen in DC has actually been dropping over the last several years....

The response from the general public to the loss of the Chief's car: "BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!" Especially from those who have had their car's stolen in The District.

Personally, as funny as this is, I gotta say it couldn't happen to a better guy. Honestly I'm a big fan of Chief Ramsey, and I think he's done a great job in DC. Besides it's historical crimal problem, Washington has all kinds of screwy security issues that really challenge DC Police. Chief Ramsey always seems to be pretty calm, cool, and collected as he deals with the latest crisis (or security alert) to hit the city.

Is this guy really worth it?

2005-06-24T11:57:00.000-07:00

I think Peter Sagal host of NPR's "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me!" described John Bolton nomination as US Ambassador to the UN the best: "Extending our hand to the world in friendship... with the middle finger extended!"

I'm sorry, but what does President Bush see in this guy? He's a nut job!

This is a guy who has stated publicly that he positively HATES the UN! He thinks the organization is worthless, and shouldn't even exist! So let's send him up there to represent the US... Sure makes sense... NOT!

I know the President has said that the UN needs to be reformed and that he feels John Bolton is the right man for the job. Umm isn't the UN supposed to be about the nations of the world working together to improve the world? From what I've heard about Mr. Bolton, he's going to head up to the UN Building, kick down a few doors and bash some heads together to get what he wants! Quick warning for Mr. Bolton... I've been to the UN, the offices there have some pretty heavy doors. You might hurt your foot trying to kick them down...

We keep hearing from the administration that the UN needs to be reformed, but have we heard from them just what they want to reform there? I know, the Oil For Food Program was a joke, it was corrupt and everybody but the average Iraqi benefitted from it. But... it's over! Second, why didn't we look into Oil For Food when it was running? The only other thing I can think of is that after the UN wanted no part of our action in Iraq, the Adminstration is going to try and find some way to turn the organization into the rubber stamp for US actions.

But let's look at Mr. Bolton for a second... We've heard a lot about his management style lately. One Senator even called him a "kick down, kiss up kind of guy," in reality should the fact that somebody is abrasive and a crummy manager necessarily be a reason for them to be disqualified from a job... Well, ok maybe it should be, but I think there are bigger problems here, and it's those problems that need to be addressed. Those are the problems that should be the disqualifiying factors in my mind, not his shoddy leadership skills.

As mentioned above, Mr. Bolton has sharply criticized he UN in general in the past, including questioning whether it should even continue to exist. Strike 1. He's made allegations based on poorly interpreted or non-existant data that Cuba was persuing a biological weapons program, and tried to bully CIA analysts into supporting him. Strike 2. Couple those with his shoddy interpersonal skills and you have Strike three.

I'm no expert on foreign policy, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express once... Seriously though US Foreign Policy, especially in the UN seems to get implemented faster and with a minimal amount of fuss when we work WITH other nations to get the job done. But wait you say, what about North Korea, we're trying to work with 5 other nations there and nothing's happened. Correct, except that the North Koreans only want to deal with us and of the other 4 nations involved in the negotiations, only the South Korean's really want to be involved in the first place.

From the way I see it, the US isn't going to be able to dictate our foreign policy demands to the world much longer. We need somebody who's willing to work with both our allies and others on the world stage to reform the UN and get things done... John Bolton isn't that guy...

The person I think would be great for the job... Colin Powell! He has experience on the international stage, despite what happened leading up to Iraq he's still well respected around the world... He's a perfect fit for this administration... Of course, it would be a demotion for him considering his last position, but still...

He's Baaackkk!!!!

2005-06-21T19:04:00.000-07:00

Was he forward thinking or just creepy? We'll get to debate it again because Teddy Ruxpin is coming back!

Yes, the barely lovable bear will return for a third try on the shelves of your local toy store according to CNN. The original bear was impossible for a kid to cuddle with, I mean it had a tape player for a back, and a hard head (needed to house the machinery to move his eyes and mouth) not exactly soft and welcoming.

Teddy will feature some modern technology too, instead of cassette tapes for his programing (that's just so '80s you know) he'll be using digital cartridges instead.

I'm just amazed that CNN thought the return of Teddy Ruxpin was so important that they needed to report on it... Oh wait I forgot Tom Cruise getting hit with water was big news too... Never mind...

Aren't We Supposed to Be Trying to Catch This Guy?

2005-06-20T17:12:00.000-07:00

Ok, I can't take credit for locating this little tidbit I actually heard about it through Adam Felber's site Fanatical Apathy. According to BBC News, the CIA, or at least the Director of Central Intelligence Porter Goss has "an excellent idea" where Osama Bin Ladin is hiding.

So if the CIA has an excellent idea of where Osama Bin Ladin is... Why isn't he in custody? Why haven't we swooped in with a team of SEALs, Marines, Army Rangers, NYPD SWAT, FBI, rabid grocery baggers etc... and either blown him into little itty bitty pieces or sent him off to join his minions (and wannabe minions, people we think might kinda be his minions, and the poor saps in the wrong place at the wrong time) in the prison camp in beautiful Guantanamo Bay Cuba?

Even more puzzling is this comment: "Mr Goss said it was unlikely Bin Laden would be brought to justice until "we strengthen all the links" in the chain in the US-led hunt for terror suspects." Does this trouble you as much as it troubles me? Doesn't the President tell us that the War on Terror is going well? What's the deal here?

Here's another gem that got me thinking: "When you go to the very difficult question of dealing with sanctuaries in sovereign states, you're dealing with a problem of our sense of international obligation, fair play." Now, I supported our action in Afghanistan 100%, and still do to this day. But isn't that exactly what we did there. The man was being given sanctuary in a sovereign state an condition that didn't slow us down for a second. So why now is it an issue?

Is Osama Bin Ladin in Pakistan like some recent reports suggested? Isn't Pakistan supposed to be a key ally in the War on Terror? If so, then where's the disconnect?

Ok What am I Missing?

2005-06-20T10:46:00.000-07:00

I freely admit that I'm probably not the coolest kid on the block. Although since I live on a really short block I'm not sure what that says about me...

But what am I missing here? Why should I care that somebody squirted Tom Cruise with water? As far as I can tell he didn't melt, so why was this so important that it was on The Today Show in their first hour? If it was only on The Today Show I would have continued to ignore the story, but sheesh every media outlet appears to be awestruck with this non-event.

It's amazing how quickly somebody can make the transition from mostly private megastar that I had no interest in to mostly overexposed megastar that I have no interest in...

People With WAY Too Much Time on Their Hands!

2005-06-19T19:04:00.000-07:00

Here's the first in what I'm sure will become a regular feature here on Innocent Bystander "People with WAY too much time on their hands!"

First up, people not only with way too much time on their hands, but also apparently too much money as well... How else do you explain their decision to blow $100 on 2,000 superballs on e-Bay?

These guys spent a few hours rigging them up to create a superball tsunami. They constructed a trap door in the ceiling over an unsuspecting co-worker's desk and then without warning sent those 2,000 superballs raining down on their co-worker's head.

They were nice enough to film the entire event from start to finish from three different camera angles and post the movie on the web... Otherwise we probably wouldn't believe them...

Check it out here: A Superball Story

Does the world need another blog?

2005-06-19T18:25:00.000-07:00

With the millions of blogs already out there, does the world need yet another one?

Considering my general philosophy when it comes to publishing anything on the web (just because you can, doesn't mean you should) the world probably doesn't need another blog.

Yet here I am violating my own rule. I'm creating my own little ego trip for you the unknown masses to either enjoy... Or use as a cure for insomnia when the drugs don't work.

What's going to be here? Nothing about work, especially after what happened to Queen of Sky and nothing about family, as that could get me into trouble too.

So what's left? Well anything that catches my interest or that I feel the need write some type of diatribe about.

With that enjoy the posts to come.... Or I hope they give you a good night's sleep!