Author: Dr. Bill

Check out this article, and be sure to watch the videos with it! This is good stuff!

Understanding the New Media

“So, how does an unknown anthropology professor from Kansas make a home movie on a ‘cheap computer’ in his basement that beats out all the $3.6 million Super Bowl ads and transforms him into a Web 2.0 rock star? It begins and ends with the free and open user- generated media-scape.”

You can now visit www.DrBill.CC on your mobile phone, and the content will be auto-magically converted to PDA format. Rock on! The WordPress plugin that does it is located here:

WordPress Mobilepress Plugin

“MobilePress is a free WordPress plugin which turns your WordPress blog into a mobile friendly blog when viewed on a cell phone. MobilePress also allows you to create custom mobile themes for different handheld devices and mobile browsers such as the iPhone, Opera Mini and Windows Mobile.”

Like the old “I Love Lucy” show… it seems that I have some ‘splainin’ to do! I have had several folks ask me if I am going to “revive” the Dr. Bill podcast. Weeelllll, kinda! I plan to do a semi-occasional VIDEO podcast for the Dr. Bill show… and I hope to have one “in the can” soon. Still funny, still techie, but not as “rigid” in format. So, look for it soon. And HANG IN THERE!

We are about to crank up some exciting things here at Dr. Bill – The Computer Curmudgeon! In order to stay informed, ALL you need to do is sign up for our Email Newsletter… it is right below the video… and is called “Dr. Bill’s Newsletter!” (So simple, straightforward… easy!) So, sign up! We promise… NO SPAM!

I had left the Firefox fold for Chrome… because Firefox had gotten slower and slower… but, one thing I didn’t like about Chrome is that it didn’t handle RSS feeds like I wanted… I preferred the way Firefox did it, but I couldn’t handle the slowness anymore! Well, heewack, it’s back! It is 20% faster than it was… check it out!

Mozilla Firefox

“After months of testing, Mozilla has finally released Firefox 3.6, the newest version of its popular browser. The new edition of Firefox (Firefox) sports an array of features, least of which is an increase in speed — 20% faster than Firefox 3.5, according to Mozilla. It uses Gecko 1.9.2 web-rendering, which improves its load times, startup speed and stability. Javascript execution is faster and smoother as well. We’ve talked about some of the other new features before, but our favorite has to be Personas, which lets you customize your Firefox with a single click and without a restart. There’s also autocomplete form functionality and full HTML5 support. You can check out all of the new features here. The Firefox 3.6 beta has been in testing for several months now, but the release candidates only started coming out this month. It looks like the releases went smoothly, so Mozilla is rolling it out for everyone.”

Mashable Article on Firefox

“At an event described by members of Google’s public relations team both as ‘seminal’ and ‘anticlimactic,’ Google on Tuesday introduced its Nexus One mobile phone. The debut of a Google-branded phone is anticlimactic because so many details about the device have been made public, a sharp contrast with the fanatical message management exercised by Apple, Google’s strongest competitor in the mobile space. At the same time, the Nexus One affirms that mobile computing is where the tech industry is headed and where Google will focus its competitive energy. The war with Microsoft is going well enough that Google can open a second front. Apple’s reported plan to buy mobile ad firm Quattro Wireless, after Google snapped AdMob away from it, underscores just how important mobile devices, not to mention advertising revenue, have become. The Nexus One runs Android 2.1 — available as open source in the next few days — on a 1 GHz Snapdragon CPU from Qualcomm. It comes with 512MB of ROM, 512MB of RAM, and a 3.7-inch AMOLED 480 x 800 touch screen. It’s 11.5 mm thick — or 11.5 mm thin, as Google senior product manager Eric Tseng put it — and weighs 130 grams, about as much as a Swiss army knife. It includes a 5 MP camera with an LED flash, stereo bluetooth support, a 3.5 mm headphone jack and two microphones — one on the bottom and one on the back — for active noise cancellation. ‘The Nexus One belongs in an emerging category of devices which we call ‘super phones,” said Google VP of product management Mario Queiroz. Software represents the other half of the equation and what Google can do with software is magnified by the power of its cloud infrastructure.”

Google Reveals Nexus One ‘Super Phone’

The difference between phones and computers just keeps blurring!

What do YOU think? Will the “iSlate” from Mac (a Mac based tablet computer) be as “big” as the iPod? There is a lot of hype about it, but tablets haven’t caught on, and they have been around a loooong time! I know, I know, this one is an Apple… so it be be “cool.” But Will it? Really?

Marketing Hype and the ‘iSlate’

“While a certain amount of speculation is healthy for any industry, I believe there’s a tipping point beyond which it becomes more than a little silly. We spend so much time discussing the minutiae of what this mystery thing may or may not do that we forget the big picture of why we use technology in the first place. As I wonder about the tablet, I can’t help but think about netbooks. These diminutive, inexpensive devices were the hardware story of the year as budget-crushed consumers looked for ways to remain productive without cutting into that week’s grocery order. There was no runup of publicity surrounding netbooks. No lineups around the block. No frenzied speculation about feature sets. The netbook is the anti-tablet, then, a known device with known capabilities that consumers instantly get. The tablet? Not so much. Not that Apple should ever feel the need to make its own netbook, mind you. The company will never play in the low-margin end of the market. It doesn’t need to play the price game to compete, and the tablet will continue that premium strategy. But when the hype machine kicks into overdrive, too many consumers end up buying not because they need it, but because they feel they’ll be missing out if they don’t buy in now. It’s as shallow as the pet rock was, a purchase rationale that revolves around being part of the crowd and not around actually meeting a particular life need.”

My other “score” this Christmas! This thing is amazing! Light weight, but up to 1080p HD video, and, best for me, it has a jack that allows me to plug in an external mic, and even adjust the sound level! Look for me to restart my Dr. Bill.TV Netcast, as a “semi-occasionally” report on tech-iness! You can shoot 5 Megapixel still images, video that records to an SD card! And, it has both a “flip-out” USB connection, and an HDMI connection to hook it up to your TV. Check out the photo below; this thing is TINY! It fits right in your hand! Dewd! Rock on!