New iPod Nano will add to the long success of Apple

When Apple unveiled a new batch of digital music gadgets this month, the major release was supposed to be an "iTunes phone" that could play songs downloaded from Apple's iTunes Music Store. But its big news turned out to be something a lot smaller - the iPod Nano.

This tiny digital music player, barely 1/4-inch thick and weighing a scant 2 ounces with its headphones, is roughly the size of a candy bar and about as hard to turn down. It packs in almost all the functions of the model it replaces, the iPod Mini, while adding a bright, sharp color screen and a few extra programs.

The Nano comes in two colors, white and black, and two sizes: a $199, 2-gigabyte model and a $249, 4-gigabyte version. (A 4-GB unit actually clocked in at just over 3.7 GB.) Its ingenious "Click Wheel" control lets you select commands and whirl through hundreds of tracks - tunes ripped from CDs or purchased from iTunes Music Store, as well as podcasts and audiobooks downloaded from iTunes - with a tap or wiggle of your thumb.

The Nano's flash-memory storage, unlike the hard drives used in regular iPods, has no moving parts to suffer from skips. The Nano even kept playing after suffering a fall hard enough to cause half of the iPod's screen to go blank.

Apple advertises the Nano's battery life as 14 hours, but my test unit ran one hour longer.

This gadget's color screen, 1.5 inches diagonally, reproduces enough detail to make viewing album cover art or your digital photos - automatically copied to the iPod by Apple's iTunes software - pleasant. Unlike full-size iPods, however, the Nano can't plug into a TV to show your snapshots on a larger screen.
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The iPod Nano carries a bag of other tricks beyond music playback. Like other iPods, it can store addresses and appointments (although the test Nano took its time opening a calendar that spanned several years), plus text notes. It also includes a world clock and stopwatch/timer programs and a nifty utility to lock and unlock itself.

People who see and touch the Nano tend to fall into something of a swoon. But some may not find as much to like - and not just the executives of Apple's competitors.

For one, music can be transferred to a Nano only via a USB connection - which means that FireWire users or those whose computers have only the older and slower USB 1.1 ports will spend a long time waiting for their music to transfer from computer to Nano. (Apple was still shipping computers without the faster USB 2.0 ports in spring 2004.) It took most of an hour to copy 1.5 gigabytes of music via an iMac G4's slower USB 1.1 link.

The iPod Nano is also pickier in its stated system requirements, Windows 2000 or XP and Mac OS X 10.3 or 10.4. Older iPods also accept OS X 10.2. (Note that the Windows iPod software defaults to sharing your e-mail address with Apple.)

Because the Nano lacks a remote-control jack, many iPod accessories won't work with it - although it does use the same dock connector as other iPods.

And the iPod Nano's rechargeable battery, hidden inside its sealed case, can't be easily replaced by users. Apple charges $59 for battery replacement - although by the time any iPod Nano will need that service, after a few hundred discharge-and-recharge cycles, Apple will probably be selling versions that store 20 or 30 gigabytes of music.

Since the first iPod, Apple has maintained an impressive winning streak in the music business. And as long as this company can invent products with the art and utility of the iPod Nano, it should continue to be successful.

(Source: RelishNow)

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Wired says"Making Free IPods Pay Off"

Unless you're extremely gullible, the promise of getting a free iPod from FreeiPods.com looks extremely dubious.

But surprisingly, the site appears to be legitimate. The program almost certainly isn't a dodgy pyramid scheme; it's a new form of online marketing supported by companies like eBay, AOL and Columbia House.
And while lots of happy customers are popping up all over the internet brandishing new iPods, analysts are skeptical of the economics.

Here's how it works: FreeiPods.com promises an iPod or a $250 gift certificate to anyone who signs up for various online promotions and persuades five other people to participate.

Subscribers are given a choice of 10 different offers, including a 45-day trial of AOL and a two-week trial of Ancestry.com's genealogy service. Typically, the offers are free and easily canceled.

Once the trials are over -- for both the main subscriber and the referrals -- the free iPod is dispatched.

"Of course I was skeptical, but I didn't see any harm in trying," said Collin Grady, 22, from Salem, Oregon, who received his free iPod earlier this month and wrote about it on his blog.

"They never once asked for a credit card number and I didn't have to pay shipping," he said. "I just told them where to send it.... All in all, a very painless process."

Indeed, some customers are so delighted that they've set up affiliate websites, called "conga lines," to persuade others the program isn't a swindle.

"So many people on the web think FreeiPods.com is a scam; I just wanted to prove them wrong," said John Sauer, a 19-year-old student at Boston's Berklee College of Music, who runs Free iPods and FlatScreens .com.

Another site, 17-year-old Tyler Derheim's FreeiPodGuide, features pictures of the delivery truck outside his house, his receipt and, of course, his new iPod.

FreeiPods is one of several websites run by Gratis Internet, a Washington, D.C., "customer acquisition" company owned by Peter Martin and Rob Jewell.

"I can definitely understand the skepticism," said Martin. "A lot of people believe there's no free lunch, but it's definitely not a scam. It's 100 percent legitimate. We're shipping (iPods) every day."

In a joint interview, Martin and Jewell denied the site is a pyramid scheme, like the myriad matrix schemes advertised on eBay, which also promise free iPods.

Instead, they explained, Gratis Internet is paid a bounty for sending potential customers to sites like AOL, eBay or RealNetworks.

"We're a marketing firm," said Jewell. "We're sending these people to our advertisers. We cringe when we hear 'pyramid' or 'scheme.' We're more closely associated with viral marketing, with the subservient chicken, than Amway."

They declined to specify the bounty, and said the firm doesn't deal directly with the companies involved. Rather, Gratis Internet is commissioned by third-party marketing agencies, such as San Francisco's Adteractive.

For the last four years, Gratis Internet has operated customer-acquisition programs through FreeCDs.com, FreeDVDs.com, FreeVideoGames.com and FreeCondoms.com.

The company has sent out more than $3 million worth of free merchandise, Martin said, including 5 million to 6 million condoms.

Since the launch of FreeiPods.com in June, the site has dispatched more than 2,500 iPods, Martin said, worth more than $1 million.

But in the last few weeks traffic has exploded. Martin claimed nearly 1 million people have recently enrolled in the program, though he said the majority are using phony names and/or addresses.

Apple's New MP3 Player Drives Down Market Prices

Hit by the successful launching of Apple’s iPod nano, the prices of local MP3 players have fallen by up to 30 percent over the last two weeks.

The price drop is most apparent in the flash-memory models with storage capacities of from1 gigabyte to 4 gigabytes. The nanos, Apple’s newly introduced sleek music players, are being sold at 230,000 won for a 2-gigabyte model and at 290,000 won for a 4-gigabyte one, which are much lower than those of rival products with similar storage capacities and functions. Samsung Electronics is reportedly supplying the flash memory chips to Apple at specially discounted prices.

According to danawa.com, a price-comparison Web site, an online shopping mall sold Cowon System’s 2-gigabyte model at 209,000 won early this week. The price of G3s had been set around 290,000 won before the arrival of the new iPods two weeks ago.

Two leading South Korean brands, Samsung’s Yepp and Reigncom’s iRiver, also saw drops in price of their flash-memory devices. The price of Samsung’s 2-gigabyte player YP-T8QB has been cut down to 324,000 won from 380,000 won as of mid-September, and Reigncom’s 1-gigabyte T20 also is being sold at 209,000 won on the Internet, 6,000 won lower than two weeks ago.

The manufacturers, however, deny that they intended to lower the prices of their products, and said that it was the distributors’ decision in order to get rid of their stockpiles.

``It seems that the online vendors sold their outdated stocks at really low prices. We have no control over the retailing prices, because the market is so complicated and there are so many sales channels,’’ said Ham Yun-ho, Cowon’s public relations manager.

``It is an open market as in other countries, and the sellers can set the price as they want and we are not related to it,’’’ said Samsung’s official Hwang Jin-oh.

The Korean brands will feel more pressure from next week, when the second shipment of the iPod nanos arrives from the United States. So far, experts estimate that around 10,000 nanos have been sold since Sept. 26 in South Korea, and there are many orders on the waiting list so customers have to wait two to three weeks to get the product.

Google localizes online maps service

Google Inc. is combining its popular online maps with its local search features, continuing a quest to increase its already rapidly rising advertising revenue.

The new features are expected to be available Thursday at either http://maps.google.com and http://local.google.com.

With the change, Google's local search tools for the United States and Canada are being taken out of the "beta," or testing, phase, said Bret Taylor, the product's manager. The company's local search engines for the United Kingdom, Japan and China remain in beta — a label that technology companies attach to products that don't have all the bugs worked out.

The hybrid service blends addresses, phone numbers, maps, driving directions and other details, like user reviews and credit card information, on the same Web page. Google also offers a satellite-mapping option that provides an aerial view.

By combining maps with local search, Google is following its rival Yahoo Inc., which already provides a similar package, said industry analyst Greg Sterling of the Kelsey Group.

"Yahoo has been in the local (search) space a little longer than Google, so it has some things that are a little more developed," Sterling said.

Mountain View, Calif.-based Google remains the most widely used search engine with a 37.3% share of the U.S. market through August, according to comScore Media Metrix, a research firm. Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Yahoo ranked second with 29.7% share followed by Microsoft Corp.'s MSN at 15.8%.

The heavy volume of inquiries is crucial for Google because its financial health depends on the ads displayed beside search results. The company earned $712 million on revenue of $2.6 billion through the first half of this year.

Google's maps also have made significant inroads since the company began testing the service early this year.

In August, Google's maps attracted 14.3 million unique U.S. visitors, ranking second behind America Online's better established Mapquest, which drew an audience of just under 39 million, according to Nielsen/NetRatings, another research firm. Nielsen stopped tracking Yahoo maps after company fused the navigation tools with its local search features.

Google's maps have proven so popular that some developers have used them to chart crime patterns in local neighborhoods or pinpoint places selling the least expensive gasoline.

All the search engines are striving to make it easier for visitors to quickly find helpful information about local businesses as more consumers turn to the Internet instead of the Yellow Pages. The Kelsey Group expects the trend to generate $3.4 billion in local advertising sales by 2009.

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Google's New Feature

As we all know google always surprises with new features in time to time. Now this time Google has released its new freeware software Google Earth.
Here is some Information taken from Google Earth Page

The idea is simple. It’s a globe that sits inside your PC. You point and zoom to anyplace on the planet that you want to explore. Satellite images and local facts zoom into view. Tap into Google search to show local points of interest and facts. Zoom to a specific address to check out an apartment or hotel. View driving directions and even fly along your route. We invite you to try it now.

Features:

* Free for personal use.
* Sophisticated streaming technology delivers the data to you as you need it.
* Imagery and 3D data depict the entire earth - Terabytes of aerial and satellite imagery depict cities around the world in high-resolution detail.
* Local search lets you search for restaurants, hotels, and even driving directions. Results show in your 3D earth view. Easy to layer multiple searches, save results to folders, and share with others.
* Layers show parks, schools, hospitals, airports, shopping, and more.
* KML – data exchange format let your share useful annotations and view. thousands of data points created by Google Earth users.

Use it for:

* Planning a trip
* Getting driving directions
* Finding a house or apartment
* Finding a local business
* Exploring the world

You can download Google Earth at http://earth.google.com/

After you have read this you might just say "Go Google Go" thats what i thought. :)

Credit- This information is taken from Google Website. We are not affiliated with Google. Google Earth is Trade Mark of Google Co In.

The Nobel Prize for Physics

It takes a nominee to understand how the Nobel Committee works. It is a secret committee within the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences comprised of eminent scientists. Its deliberations are supposedly secret for 50 years but there is a loop hole: by tradition, information is leaked to the nominee and, through him, to the media if needed.

When a potential nominee is spotted a group of nominators is formed within the Academy to take care of the formalities. I had three principal nominators and it appears they were not members of the Nobel Committee. That makes sense to allow objectivity on the part of the Committee. However, they all used pseudonyms to avoid breaching the rules of the Committee when they had to leak information.

They were supposed to have read my work but they asked for a single paper on the topic, Grand Unified Theory. I had to have my website fixed to selectively display only non-strictly confidential messages before the formal announcement of the nominees or winners. Another channel of communication is the Internet chatroom.

Apparently, copies of my entry paper were made available to the members of the Academy although some asked for an advance copy and a short essay on why I think I deserve the Nobel Prize. Comments from members of the Academy were all favorable. There were other experts who made some comments on my work in general and they ranged from very favorable through "controversial but imaginative," "somewhat controversial" and unfavorable. One comment by a famous physicist says.

"You have beaten me in the race to define the Grand Theory of Everything. Although you have made a couple of bold assumptions and some mistakes [particularly in the nature of the prima] in your theory, I submit to the superiority of your thesis . . ."

Another said, "Congratulations for being a frontrunner for the Nobel Prize for physics."

From Norway came this message: "I have read your submission and I share my colleagues’ praise for your work. You truly are a genius. Good luck on your Nobel Prize nomination!"

A local expert said, "Your work is all imagination. Why do you publish in journals nobody reads? You will never be nominated, not in a million years!"

The next message has a mixed tone, "I am an admirer of your work and I am among many who have nominated you for the Nobel Prize for physics. However, I am concerned of certain rumors in the academy that pressure has been put by the University of the Philippines Math Department to strike your nomination.

I have received, as have many members of the academy who support you, very strongly worded letters on why you should not receive the Nobel Prize. I am also sickened that the Philippine media have been harshly asking for interviews regarding the Nobel ‘hoax.’"

I think someone here misrepresented the Philippine media and posed as their spokesman.

Then comes this optimistic note, "It appears that you are a front runner for the Physics Prize having garnered nearly 40 percent of ballots cast. I do not wish to divulge this as early as now with the official announcement in October, but it is tradition to congratulate the winner in secrecy. It normally takes 35 percent to win the award. Your nominators, lead by Academician Hieber certainly made a good case for the merits of your work . . ."

It appears that no one outside the Nobel Committee really knows its decision until the winners are announced as the next message shows:

"Warm greetings. I am aware that members of the academy have leaked the results of this year’s Nobel Prize. It is a secret tradition for nominators to congratulate their nominees but everything should be kept under wraps until after the official announcement.

"No one actually knows for certain who has won, even if the front-runner is known.

"Please exercise restraint in prematurely announcing anything related to the Nobel Prize."

Of course, I did not win the prize and the inevitable question is: did my detractors have a hand on the outcome? I don’t think so. For one thing, they don’t affix their signatures on their statement but simply identify the source as "University of the Philippines Mathematics Department." Another reason is: if the Academy members checked their website, they wouldn’t have found a single name they could recognize. In contrast, my over two-dozen papers in mathematics and physics reached every region of the world.

I think the Nobel Committee went for the more traditional results in quantum mechanics and that this is not the right time for my work yet. My other sources say that many winners missed the Prize the first time around and that some won it on the fifth nomination. Another said that he knows a nominee who had not won it after having been nominated five times.

My sense is that physics cannot reach the final theory without breaking the present limits set by quantum mechanics and astronomy.

Credit: ABS-CBN News

Google's small steps, giant leaps

or years, Microsoft has been able to use its money and size to muscle aside its competitors.

Now it’s facing a competitor it can’t push around so easily – Google.

The popular search engine is mounting what may be the most serious challenge yet to Microsoft’s desktop dominance.

While most everyone agrees the battle is shaping up to be epic, the front lines aren’t clear yet. Microsoft traditionally makes desktop software. Google is known for its search engine. But both sides are quickly encroaching on each other’s turf.

Jordan Rohan, an analyst for RBC Capital Markets, said Google has larger ambitions than most people realize. And those ambitions will put it squarely in Microsoft’s path.

“Google has pulled off the greatest obfuscation in the history of Silicon Valley: Everyone thinks they’re a one-trick pony,” he said, referring to the firm’s search engine roots. “They’re going after Microsoft in a big way.”

The two firms are converging on the Internet and on the desktop. Microsoft, which has made most of its money by selling software, is increasingly embracing the Internet by creating its own search engine and online advertising service. As such, it will be competing with Google for people’s attention as well as corporate ad dollars.

Google, which makes its money from Internet advertising, is rolling out new products at a furious pace, many of which would traditionally be viewed as software. Basically, Google aspires to offer many of the same capabilities Microsoft does, except it wants to deliver the software over the Internet rather than sell it on a disk. In many ways, the competition boils down to the old way of selling software and the new way of selling, or more accurately, “distributing,” software. Microsoft sells shrink-wrapped boxes of software. Google delivers it to you over the Internet.

It’s expected to be a classic business brawl that includes personal animosity, evidenced by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s promise to “bury” Google after the Mountain View firm seduced away one of the Redmond, Wash., firm’s top technologists, according to court documents.

Google’s accelerating growth and widening ambitions were recently in the Bay Area spotlight. First, the firm inked a surprising deal with the NASA Ames Research Center, in which Google will build an enormous corporate campus next to the former military base at Moffett Field. The agreement should help the firm accommodate its hyper-growth while collaboration with the space agency on far-reaching research should help Google take on its nemesis to the north. That was followed by a proposal in which Google offered to blanket the city of San Francisco with free wireless Internet access, called Wi-Fi. San Francisco is reviewing the offer along with more than a dozen others.

What Microsoft is up against is nothing less than a supercomputer, according to Stephen Arnold, author of the new book, “The Google Legacy: How Google’s Internet Search is Transforming Application Software.” He believes that Google, which was founded by former Stanford students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, has up to 170,000 servers to help return results for user queries in a fraction of a second.

The partnership with NASA will give Google access to even more supercomputing expertise from rocket scientists.

Google has used its computer network to introduce a succession of new products this year, including instant messaging, Internet telephone calling, blog search, maps and a video download service. Arnold, a technology consultant, believes that much more is possible.

Google’s ambition, he said, is to have its supercomputer take over an array of jobs now performed on desktops. All users have to do is plug into Google over the Internet to take advantage. The idea, called network computing, isn’t new. At its essence, it dates back to the earliest mainframe computers. More recently, efforts to bring back network computing by companies such as Oracle and Sun Microsystems, have failed to catch fire.

If Google’s strategy succeeds, it will transform how computing is done, Arnold said. Microsoft could be left scrambling because fewer people would need to buy its software.

“I don’t think Microsoft has figured out how to replace the desktop business,” Arnold said.

This year, Google has introduced some software hybrids that mix data from the desktop and the Web, including a search engine that scans computer hard drives. A product called Google Sidebar, a small panel that appears on desktop screens, offers quick access to news, photographs and a scratch pad for making notes.

Arnold argues that Google could ultimately introduce its own, free, Internet version of Microsoft’s Office, used by millions for word processing, among other things. Computer security software could also be on the horizon, he said.

Such products aren’t far-fetched, according to Arnold, who points to other features that he said lay the groundwork.

Google quietly introduced security software for wireless Internet users recently that could be made to work with other kinds of connections, Arnold said. Code that allows users to write on Google’s e-mail offering, G-mail, could be reused for a program similar to Word, he added.

As a policy, Google doesn’t discuss future products.

That Microsoft, along with its founder, Bill Gates, may have finally met its match is a frequent topic of technology executives. Rightfully so or not, Microsoft has carried the stigma of being technology’s “evil empire” for nearly two decades. Google, with its exuberant “Don’t do Evil” corporate motto, is being held up by many as a white knight.

The smart money realizes neither stereotype is true. But many take pleasure in the possibility that Microsoft – a company at the top of the U.S. corporate food chain – is on the defensive.

“For most people, it’s interesting to see Microsoft have a rival,” said Jim Voelker, chief executive of InfoSpace, a Seattle company that licenses an array of online directories, entertainment and search to other companies.

Microsoft shouldn’t be placed in a casket just yet. With $37.8 billion in cash and nearly 14 times Google’s 4,200 employees, it’s still the most powerful technology company.

And, as usual, Microsoft is fighting back against its latest challenger with two fists.

Last month, Microsoft started rolling out a rival to Google’s lucrative search engine advertising business. Executives are also banking on an internal reorganization for help. In an effort to become more nimble, the company recently said that it would streamline its business from seven divisions to three.

Analysts widely believed the move was in response to Google, which is known for pivoting like a startup, identifying hot, new market opportunities, and getting products to market quickly. In contrast, Microsoft is considered a lumbering Goliath that can take years to put out new versions of its products.

Adam Sohn, a Microsoft spokesman, responded to his company’s skeptics by underscoring that it has a huge base of users. He emphasized Google’s inexperience in building online communities and the possibility that it could lose its focus on search.

“The more interesting question is whether Google can compete with MSN (Microsoft’s Web portal) and other industry leaders in communications and information services other than search,” Sohn said.

Irrelevancy for Microsoft is a long way off, if it ever happens at all, analysts said. Microsoft has a stranglehold on the desktop software market, helped by deals that ensure its Windows is bundled with new computers.
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Tensions at Microsoft

Microsoft, if court documents can be believed, is especially sensitive to Google’s poaching of Microsoft employees, the subject of a lawsuit currently being litigated by the two companies.

Microsoft’s Ballmer erupted into a tirade after being told by an employee that he was resigning to join Google, according to a sworn declaration. Ballmer, who was said to throw a chair during the exchange, then vowed to “bury” Google’s chief executive, Eric Schmidt.

“I have done it before, and I will do it again,” he said, according to the declaration, referring to Microsoft’s success in surpassing Novell and Sun Microsystems, two of Schmidt’s former employers.

Ballmer called the account a gross exaggeration.

Microsoft executives acknowledge failing to recognize the importance of search early on. Only this year did the company release its own engine instead of using a partner’s.

So far, the new engine has failed to catch on. Microsoft’s share of the U.S. search market has dropped to 15.5 percent in July, down half a percent from January, just before the new engine’s launch, according to comScore Networks, a consumer behavior consulting business.

Google’s market share, in contrast, has edged up over the same period by nearly 1.5 percent to 36.5 percent.

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Good Morning.
Welcome to my Blog. In this blog I will try to post information on techonology. I'm just a bored person who has nothing else to do, hehehehe. So often come to visit this blog. Thanks for visiting my blog.