06:08 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Lounge

Did you ever ask yourself what would be the perfect form factor of your favorite mobile device? Russ did some nice drawings depicting how form factor varies among popular mobile devices today.

We've converged just about everything we can converge into a single device (computers, gameboy, audio, video, GPS, etc.). Now they're just going to get better and more usable and "more converged."

Having read Russ's insightful thoughts, I came to one conclusion: there will never be a converged device that could offer all the benefits of mobility such as currently offered by individual dedicated devices.

05:49 AM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Portable Audio/Video

In a NYTimes rant headlined How the iPod Ran Circles Around the Walkman, historian Randall Stross analyzes how Sony, the electronics giant that more or less created the modern portable music market with the successful Walkman cassette-tape player in the 1970s, failed to prepare for the digital audio player.

Sony introduced several new Walkman MP3 players this week, causing Apple's share to down more than 7%. Nevertheless, it remains to be seen if Apple has anything to worry. According to Phil Leigh, analyst with Inside Digital Media, "if these new entrants come in and accelerate the growth of the market, there will be no adverse consequence to Apple, even if its market share slips." Leigh forecasts 100% growth rates up to the next four years in digital music sales and in digital music players. Apple commands between 60 per cent and 70 per cent of the digital music player market, having sold about 10 million iPods to date. Piper Jaffray forecasts Apple will sell nearly 22 million iPods in 2005, and about 27 million in 2006.

05:19 AM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Portable Audio/Video

I am not sure if this "hack" defeats the purpose of the iPod. Because really, what could be more wonderful than carrying a 3.5" hard drive in your pocket?

Quote from hackaday.com:

flamingballofwreckage sent us a link to instructions for using a standard 3.5” hard disk withyour ipod. after making the adapter, there is another howto for formatting the drive so that it will be correctly recognized by the device.

‘but j,’ you say, ‘that 3.5” drive would make my ipod simply ginormous!’

yes. yes it would. but with a proper case, a small power supply, and an rca plug adapter, the ‘ipod super’ could be a really cool 300gb audio station that isn’t much bigger than a portable cd player. that’s an awful lotof music and data storage in a tight package.

think car audio. think brick sized dance party. think media pc case mod. or think different — and tell us about it.

05:14 AM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Globe and Mail reports that software for AOL Instant Messenger and Yahoo Instant Messenger will be pre-installed on new RIM BlackBerrys in the coming months.

Another neat feature beside the "always-on" e-mail. When I am in need of a new mobile phone again, I might as well consider a BlackBerry.

07:17 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | News

Dawn Murphy posted her thoughts on e-books at palmaddict.typepad.com:

6th March was the start of e-book week. I often wonder why I don't see more about e-books on PDA sites, productivity, gaming, etc but nothing about books. Is it because statistically most readers are women and most people with PDAs are male? I'll assume so, though I haven't personally researched it, but it seems likely on the basis of anecdotal evidence.

Dawn, you should definitely join Mobileread, which is a place that talks a lot about e-books! Anyways, read the rest of her thoughts especially if you are a newbie to e-books.

PS: Interesting thought on gender statistics. So fellow Mobilereaders... are we predominantly male or female?

07:10 PM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Egress 2.1.0 is one of the better RSS readers for Pocket PC and can be downloaded from pocketgear.com. The latest version adds support for Bloglines synchronized channels.

07:02 PM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Lounge

Here are some collected newsbits from me this Sunday. Handhelds can cause tendinitis flare-ups (anyone here having problems already?), and Singapore is going to have live TV on its flights beginning June 2005 (Connexion at its best).

• Treo Bluetooth Wireless Headset [engadget.com]
• More Nintendo Revolution News [i4u.com]
• iPlagiary [metafilter.com]
• Dell's 10 Days Of Deals -- Axim X50v $399CDN Today [pocketpcthoughts.com]
• Handhelds pose risk to hand health [indystar.com]
• Singapore Airlines to offer live TV in-flight from June [thestandard.com]

11:32 AM by Colin Dunstan in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Pitney Bowes invented a system (Patent US2005048956) helping cell phone owners to receive directions by doing a single phone call.

First the user calls a specific service center. With the received call, the operator at the center can automatically obtain the location of the mobile user from the communications network using a triangulation method. With this knowledge, he can give the appropriate directions to the desired destination, which could be anything from a gas station to a restaurant.

I don't have to tell you that sophisticated triangulation could be easily abused. Even today, cell phone providers can determine their customers' location when they dial an emergency phone number. A mailbox bomb suspect was once tracked because of his mistake to turn on his cell phone. Which seems fine in this particular case. But what if someone uses the same technology to track individuals he just doesn't like for personal or political reasons? Where are the limits and who is in control of using triangulation techniques?