CEPro:
Softbank is offering the 3G 16GB iPad for free, that is, of course, with a new two-year contract. Engadget:
You see, there’s no built-in monthly surcharge for this one; rather than paying off your iPad over 24 months, you’re actually getting it for nothing as long as you’re kosher with forking out ¥4,725 ($56) per month for that 3G goodness.
Softbank’s promoting deal as “iPad for everybody” and starts on December 3rd.
Why does Microsoft use publicity shots with a bunch of bored employees and no customers in the Microsoft Store?
Good question.
Level 3, who recently signed a deal to become the primary provider for streaming Netflix content, was pressured by Comcast to pay a “recurring fee” “to transmit Internet online movies and other content to Comcast’s customers who request such content.” After a few days of negotiating, Level 3 paid the fee, ensuring uninterrupted service for Netflix subscribers.
What’s the big deal? Companies like Comcast that own a lot of Internet infrastructure can levy extra fees depending on the type of content that is being sent through their pipes. That’s why net neutrality is important.
There’s another important consideration: didn’t Comcast and other similar companies receive massive amounts of government assistance in the form of tax breaks? In other words, citizens like you funded the connecting pipes that Comcast operates. I am glad I’m not a Comcast customer anymore.
Reuters reporting on the results of a GfK smartphone loyalty survey:
The survey found that just 25 percent of smartphone owners planned to stay loyal to the operating system running their phone, with loyalty highest among Apple users at 59 percent, and lowest for Microsoft’s phone software, at 21 percent.
Of users of Research in Motion’s BlackBerrys, 35 percent said they would stay loyal. The figure was 28 percent for users of phones running Google’s Android software, and 24 percent for users of Nokia Symbian phones.
Let’s put it more simply:
It isn’t surprising that Microsoft is lowest. Why? Microsoft is in a major transition from suck to quite good. BlackBerry users tend to be loyal because a good portion of their loyalty is to a portrait QWERTY keyboard and universal accessibility to their emails. I don’t know what to say about Android other than that there might be a good chance that its users might become loyal to Google’s cloud syncing capabilities. Google is way ahead of the pack when it comes to cloud-syncing email, calendar, documents, photos, etc.
What more is there to say about the iPhone that hasn’t been already said? The iPhone makes your life easier. As long as you’re in an area with strong AT&T signals.
Cadence & Slang Chapter 4: Managing expectations:
Many designers are now considering something called goal- oriented design. Through this, designs are framed in terms of the user’s goals. We dictate the steps that users should go through to complete a task, and design from there.
A major premise behind goal-oriented design is that users don’t care about what makes technology work. When users sit down with a computer, for example, they think “I need to send an email,” not “I need to click these buttons in order to send an email.” And when users see your product, they should say “it helps me deal with this problem I have.”
Quite challenging. But a good challenge. As of this writing there are only 400 copies remaining.
Foreign developers of applications for phones didn’t give the Japanese market a second thought because of its insularity. But that is changing as the iPhone, for which tens of thousands of applications have been created, dominates Japanese smartphone sales.
How many iPhones are sold in Japan?
Apple doesn’t give iPhone sales breakdowns by country. But Japan makes up a significant chunk of the 70 million iPhones sold worldwide so far, including a record 14.1 million last quarter.
That sounds incredibly high. Nonetheless Japan is and will continue to be an important market for Apple.
Jason Bell, a UC Davis graduate student doing research on single molecule biophysics and the biochemistry of DNA repair, shares his views on the safety of TSA’s Advanced Imaging Technology (AIT) at My Helical Tryst:
According to the TSA safety documents, AIT uses an 50 keV source that emits a broad spectra (see adjacent graph from here). Essentially, this means that the X-ray source used in the Rapiscan system is the same as those used for mammograms and some dental X-rays, and uses BOTH ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ X-rays. Its very disturbing that the TSA has been misleading on this point. Here is the real catch: the softer the X-ray, the more its absorbed by the body, and the higher the biologically relevant dose! This means, that this radiation is potentially worse than an a higher energy medical chest X-ray.
Photograph by Menno Alberts
MacRumors: It is rumored that Apple will be launching its first retail Apple Store in The Netherlands at the Hirsch building near Leidseplein in Amsterdam. Coincidentally Apple’s corporate headquarters in the Benelux region is on the third floor at Hirsch.
Sprint today officially unleashed the power of 4G – enabling fast mobile downloads, wireless video chat and turbo-charged mobile Web browsing up to 10 times faster than 3G service1 – in Los Angeles, Miami, Washington D.C., Cleveland, Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio.
There are 68 4G markets in the US including New York City. The San Francisco area will be doused with 4G signals starting on December 28th. Sprint 4G downloads are rated at 6Mbps. Quite fast. So far only the HTC EVO 4G and the Samsung Epic 4G smartphones can take advantage of Sprint’s 4G.
Andrew Kim on Design Fabulous regarding the Samsung Galaxy Tab:
- The perfect size for reading a book. But if reading books is your key need, get a Kindle.
- Too small for comfortable web browsing and reading magazines.
- It’s too large to carry without a bag and if you’re going to carry it in a bag, wouldn’t you want something larger?
- Some people say that the 9.7″ display is too large on the iPad. However 7″ definitely not the right size. Maybe 9″ is.
Just like Apple has stuck to 3.5 inches for all four iterations of its iPhone, I think the company will stick to 9.7 inches for its iPad for some time. I am looking forward to when Apple announces the next-generation iPad.
DisplayBlog is written and produced by Jin Kim. Subscribe via RSS.