2011… this is the future (according to Back to the future movie). The year when mobile computing becomes turely pervasive – iPhones, tablets, laptops, mobile broadband…
Think it’s time to get back to basic… (inspired by Kevin Kelly) Rethink what is time, what is work day, what is scheduling, planning, productivity and such… I’ll start by a trial of using a physical diary!
That should have the development of my next product…
Recommend this podcast to indies and SME owner: The Pipeline If you prefer iTunes link, here you go…
Hm… in short… this album is pretty average…
Hm… the music play is a lot better. I like the bass in this album. Generally, if you like guitar (and taiwan music), this album is still a buy.
The songs themselves… it’s not much different from his first album. I mean… I don’t feel any “growth” in the songs. They are still the similar tunes. I like his first album a lot more. You can feel the power of a rookie! The immense energy and desire to sing out his passion.
This 七天 album is like… flat… can’t pair the 早餐 power in his first album in anyway…
Maybe he is pressed too much and too hard by people around him…
This is Jamie Oliver’s speech of his TED prize wish: Teach every child about food. Think it applies to adult too. There are many 無飯夫妻 in Hong Kong. Remember… we are what we eat!
The Grammy award 2010 makes every love country music. 
Anyway… I m not that into country or R&B…
The important thing is… Greenday’s got the Rock Album of the Year. Ha… actually… don’t think award is that important to them… (I actually think Grammy award is getting more and more meaningless. You can tell from who’s got nominated and awarded)
Better America!
The iPad hype has completely blown away my attention to Obama’s State of the Union Address. Not sure if Steve Jobs has sent the tech savvy president a demo unit to White House. 
Anyways… finally got time to watch his address in youtube. With the recent victory of Republican in the Kennedy seat, you can expect try every possible means to regain people’s confidence in his leadership.
I quite like his speech. You can feel his tremendous passion to his country within each arguments against opposition parties.
He told his own party “To Democrats, I would remind you that we still have the largest majority in decades, and the people expect us to solve problems, not run for the hills. “. To Republicans, he said, “Just saying no to everything may be good short-term politics, but it’s not leadership. We were sent here to serve our citizens, not our ambitions.” (BTW, I think Hong Kong has the same problem as well)
He also dismissed Republican’s complaints to economic and government budget saying “From some on the right, I expect we’ll hear a different argument -– that if we just make fewer investments in our people, extend tax cuts including those for the wealthier Americans, eliminate more regulations, maintain the status quo on health care, our deficits will go away. The problem is that’s what we did for eight years.”
I wish politicians in Hong Kong have this ability as well! The ability to pin point problems and solutions, to dismiss accuses and show leadership, to lead the road ahead and give us hope….
I do suggest you to check out the speech. (transcript here if you prefer reading it instead )
First run of the year… haha… it’s just so-so… a little under 26 min. Think I have to train my average pace to sth between 5 min to 4 min 30 sec per minute. Lots of work ahead!!
You know what… the presentation is 9872934394875934 times better than Microsoft’s one. Though, I have to say, the whole keynote is very Apple-like. Well, it’s Jon Rubinstein. (Maybe it’s Jon who taught Steve the presentation skill )
It’s actually not important how Apple-like it is. It’s about whether the presentation tells a story. I am as much stranger to Microsoft’s product as to Palm. The result after checking out Microsoft’s presentation… I don’t know what the hack is going on… What’s the big thing? Where’s the focus? Versus, after Palm’s one, I downloaded the SDK (becos they announced free developer program and plug-in SDK and a bonus program) and tried it out.
I wanna compare the 2 presentations from my perspective.
The Microsoft one… they have a hugh stage, many big screens and lots of stuff going on.
However, the presentation is like… running around the stage from left to right. Worse, demos were short, sloppy and convoluted. Lossy demo + people running around the stage… it’s like chicken running in a farm…
If you check out Palm’s, it’s a small stage. People come up and down the stage orderly. Each one of them set the theme what they wanted to talk about. There’s a pace in the delivery. You feel like you are accepting information in a comfortable pace.
There’s nothing on the stage. Just the presenter and the screen. You won’t see a bunch of Palm Pre on the stage each with different wall paper.
I mentioned in my previous post how Microsoft present data:
I like how data is presented by Palm:
You feel the meaning of information. You grab the significance of the figure instantly.
Which one gives you better impression to the product? I don’t know who design the slides for Microsoft… it’s all noises… what the fuck that parrot is doing? Seriously, Microsoft is hopeless….
One last thing… I don’t know why Microsoft is so obsess to dump a bunch of stuff on stage and tipping every single one of them.
Show me what’s important and spend some time on them.
My conclusion is… Microsoft fails. They can’t even tell me one thing they think I have to pay attention to. Palm, on the other hand, is still struggling to make a profit. Yet, they told the world their story.
I do encourage you to check out the 2 presentations and experience the difference!
Link to Microsoft CES 2010 Keynote
The first thing of the year (in tech industry) is CES – Consumer Electronic Show in Los Vagas.
We used to have Macworld expo happening the same time of the year. But, since Apple’s departure from all trade show in 2009, Macworld expo 2010 is scheduled in Feb 12. Without Macworld, I can finally shift my focus to CES keynote. 
Honestly, this is my first time watching Steve Ballmer on the stage live (through internet webcast). He’s been famous for his public speaking style – developers, developers, developers. The CES one is a lot milder. After all, it’s a CES trade show – not his own party.
I do feel there are a lot of problems in Microsoft’s keynote. Both Steve Ballmer and Robbie Bach have committed some obvious problems. Here’s where the problems are:
300 million PCs? 3% increase? How important is it? I think a qualitative comparison in graphical format is more helpful than just this statement.
Generally, I don’t like this presentation at all. Even if they are inventing great technologies, the way they present them… make them sound dump and boring. I hate the slides too. I just don’t like having graphics and text in almost every single slide (check out the live blog entry in Engadget). This is just noisy to me.
Demos are rough and not focused. If you wanna show me cool stuff, do it slowly and tell me it’s important. The way they demo reminds me how people use windows. It’s chaotic!
This Steve is just way way way behind my Steve. You know what… if you want users think that Microsoft products are cool, do some great presentations! This one… it is exactly the PC guy in commercial.
You can watch the keynote here
(All photos are courtesy of Engadget)
Barnes & Noble unveils its Kindle killer, an ebook reader called – Nook
I had an original Kindle 2 . I use it in Hong Kong mainly and, very occasionally, the States. To me, the killer feature in Kindle is the Kindle Store. I can buy most of the books I wanna read at, usually, below USD $15. Though I can’t get wireless delivery of my book, I can still download the book from my Amazon account and transfer to my Kindle by USB. It’s 98263497239847 times better than waiting for shipment.
The Kindle platform has other great features too. You can read your books from iPhone and PC using Kindle Reader software. Your reading pace is all synchronized. (well, can’t enjoy Whispernet in HK with my original Kindle 2 )
Well… these, to me, are platform features. There are minimum innovation in the Kindle device itself.
I mean e-readers are easy to carry and can store tons of books. But that’s general merits of e-reader. It’s not unique to Kindle. So… seriously, Kindle device itself has no killer feature. The keyboard is basically useless. The navigation is confusing and annoying. The device is slow too.
Given so many problems in Kindle, people are generally happy with it. Well, after all, the e-reader is just for reading. As long as it show text beautifully, people are happy.
But there’s always good people out there who think that things can be better. It’s not Apple. It’s Barnes & Noble. This time, they have taken the Apple attitude towards the e-reader market.
This new e-reader is called Nook. The reader itself comes with a bunch of features targeting the Kindle. But they don’t stop at the device. There are some innovation on the platform too.
On the hardware end, it is a dual screen configuration – e-ink screen and a color touch screen. Most interactions happen on the touch screen. User can navigate through menus and preview stuff on a touch-sensitive color screen. This is way better than the Kindle. Think they must have watched Steve Jobs’ iPhone launch keynote back in Macworld 2007 where he addressed the problem of hardware keyboard. (Eat it, Amazon!!)
It also comes with both Wi-Fi and 3G. You know what… Wi-Fi is not just a faster media of data transfer. If you connect Nook to Wi-Fi network in Barnes & Noble store, you can read ebooks for free !! It’s very much like you can go to book store and read physical books there!!
One more thing, you can lend you ebook to others! I think this is the most requested feature in Kindle and, now, Barnes & Noble implemented it! Sweet
Amazon must be scratching their head now. It’s gonna be a bloody battle field. It’s not just on e-reader device. It’s on ebook platform as well.
Too bad… I am locked up with Kindle platform… I can’t transfer my ebook assets to Nook. Or, maybe, I should sell my Kindle and get the International version instead… hm…
Bill So - iPhone / Mac Developer in Hong Kong. His products include Clip It! and Finger and Numbric. They are distributed under his company Headnix. Bill is also the host of CocoaHeads Hong Kong. You can hire him for programming, consultancy and training.
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