I’ve heard all sorts of chatter about the Google foray into spreadsheets, and none of it resonates with me. Here are 3 key aspects of this worth thinking about:
1. Strategically, Google is shooting at half of the Microsoft franchise
Microsoft, despite alot of hoopla you have heard about all its other product offerings, makes the vast lion’s share of its money via its Operating System and via Office. Nothing else it does is generates nearly the profitable cash flow as those two money printing presses do.
Think long term strategy: From a military perspective, Google is opening a second front in the war Microsoft launched against them. You want to come after our core busines? Allow us to return the favor.
Category: Technology
Email Addresses to Steer Snail Mail?
The U.S. Postal Service was recently asked to start delivering packages and letters based on someone’s e-mail rather than street address.
he request is from Los Angeles-based Inventerprise LLC, which wants to conduct a trial run of its so-called Shelmail e-mail-to-snail addressing system sometime in 2008.
The Shelmail proposal is noteworthy because it suggests that e-mail addresses are a better means of delivering physical mail than what the postal service uses now.
Put another way, Shelmail questions just what constitutes someone’s “address” nowadays. For now and probably decades going forward, it’s a description of a physical location, in the form “101 Second Street, San Francisco, Calif., 94105.”
An answer in search of a question?
Vivisimo Criticizes Search Engine Personal Data Collection
Mr Valdes-Perez is also a critic of the behavioral technologies that the large search engine companies use to try and improve the search experience by collecting personal data. Clusty.com does not collect any user data which means that there can be no privacy breaches, accidental or subpoenaed.
“Users search based on their whims at the time, and not on past behavior. It is much better to provide a user with several options on what they are searching for and allow them to choose,” he says.
Mammograms: Digital vs Film
For the 23 million U.S. women who get mammograms each year, there is an increasingly urgent question: digital or film?
Interest is growing in the digital version of the breast-cancer screening test, driven in part by a study last fall in the New England Journal of Medicine that said digital was better for some women. The findings quickly became a marketing tool for makers of digital-mammography machines and hospitals that have them. Sales of the machines have been rising, with one major manufacturer citing digital equipment as the driving force behind record second-quarter revenue.
But some hospitals and doctors are concerned that the advantages of digital are being overestimated and may be causing women to delay getting a mammogram until digital machines arrive in their area. Still only about 11% of the 8,800 U.S. mammography facilities are estimated to have digital.
The advice from doctors: Don’t wait, especially if you are in one of the groups for whom digital has no demonstrated advantages. The study found that digital was better at detecting cancer only for premenopausal women, those under 50 years old, or those who have dense breasts. The majority of women who get mammograms are over 50, and looking at the 40,000 women in the study as a whole, the new technology was found to be no better than film overall.
Honda Civic GX: A Real, Available Car, Powered by Natural Gas
Speaking of Honda:
Recognized by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as the cleanest internal-combustion vehicle on Earth, the Civic GX is perfect for getting around town and running everyday errands. In fact, the California Air Resources Board gave the GX an AT-PZEV emissions rating, which means it’s still the “Cleanest on Earth.” And it’s been completely redesigned for 2006 with a new modern, aerodynamic exterior, and ergonomic, supportive seats. The GX has everything you’d expect from a Civic, like a roomy cabin and proven performance. And because it uses compressed natural gas, the GX achieves remarkable fuel-cost savings, and helps decrease the world’s dependence on oil. The Civic GX promises to lead the way to the advancement of fuel-cell vehicles, sooner than you might expect.
via autoextremist:
More on Phill, via email:
The price of Phill is $3400 US plus shipping ($150) plus installation. An indoor installation will also need a mandatory external gas sensor for $120. A “typical” installation can range from $1000 to $1500. Your actual cost of Phill could be reduced depending on where you live, and what incentives are offered in your area.
Please note that at the moment Phill is only available for purchase if you live in California, Arizona, Maryland, Washington D.C., New Jersey, Oklahoma, Nevada, parts of New York, and a select few other cities such as Salt Lake City (UT), Milwaukee (WI), Dallas (TX), Denver (CO), Chicago (IL), and Knoxville (TN).
To continue with the purchase process we will need some basic information from you in order to put your name on the waiting list. If you are interested, please contact Phill Customer Service at 1-866-697-4455 (toll free), or let us know the best way to reach you.
Bill Would Prohibit Mandatory Microchip Implants
Former Gov. Tommy Thompson was one of the first high-profile supporters of tiny microchips implanted in people’s arms that would allow doctors to access medical information.
Now the state he used to lead is poised to become the first to ban governments and private businesses from forcing such implants on employees, privacy advocates say.
A proposal moving through the state Legislature would prohibit anyone from requiring people to have the tiny chips embedded in them or doing so without their knowledge. Violators would face fines of up to $10,000.
The plan authored by Rep. Marlin Schneider, D-Wisconsin Rapids, won approval in the Assembly last month. The state Senate on Tuesday is scheduled to consider the measure, which would allow for the implants if the person gives consent.
Gov. Jim Doyle would sign the bill, a spokesman said.
Schneider aides say the legislator wants the law in place before companies and governments could use them to keep track of their employees.
Internet Injects Sweeping Change into Politics
The transformation of American politics by the Internet is accelerating with the approach of the 2006 Congressional and 2008 White House elections, prompting the rewriting of rules on advertising, fund-raising, mobilizing supporters and even the spreading of negative information.
Democrats and Republicans are sharply increasing their use of e-mail, interactive Web sites, candidate and party blogs, and text-messaging to raise money, organize get-out-the-vote efforts and assemble crowds for a rallies. The Internet, they said, appears to be far more efficient, and less costly, than the traditional tools of politics, notably door knocking and telephone banks.
Analysts say the campaign television advertisement, already diminishing in influence with the proliferation of cable stations, faces new challenges as campaigns experiment with technology that allows direct messaging to more specific audiences, and through unconventional means.
Those include Podcasts featuring a daily downloaded message from a candidate and so-called viral attack videos, designed to trigger peer-to-peer distribution by e-mail chains, without being associated with any candidate or campaign. Campaigns are now studying popular Internet social networks, like Friendster and Facebook, as ways to reaching groups of potential supporters with similar political views or cultural interests.
No Doubt.
A380 Super-Jumbo Jet: 7 Minute Video of the 12 Month Assembly Process
I doubt that flying with 550 to 900 people packed into a large plane will be all that enjoyable. The plane, is nevertheless, being built and will fly late this year or early next. The brief assembly video clip is rather interesting.
DRM Based Trusted Computing – Why We Should Care…
“We’ve always know that Trusted Computing is really about DRM, but computer makers always denied it. Now that their Trusted Computing chips are standard on most new PCs, they’ve decided to come clean. According to Information Week, Lenovo has demonstrated a Thinkpad with built-in Microsoft and Adobe DRM that uses a Trusted Computing chip with a fingerprint sensor. Even worse: ‘The system is also aimed at tracking who reads a document and when, because the chip can report back every access attempt. If you access the file, your fingerprint is recorded.'”
Lessig on Network Neutrality
Larry Lessig, testifying before the Senate Commerce Committee this week [pdf]:
To answer that question, this Committee must keep in view a
fundamental fact about the Internet: as scholars and network
theorists have extensively documented, the innovation and explosive
growth of the Internet is directly linked to its particular architectural
design. It was in large part because the network respected what
Saltzer, Clark and Reed called “the ‘end-to-end’ principle” that the
explosive growth of the Internet happened. If this Committee wants
to preserve that growth and innovation, it should take steps to
protect this fundamental design.
Lessig makes sense, while the incumbent telcos do not. Cringely has more.