Here in the United States and other fully developed countries, it's easy to get accustomed to always-available computing infrastructure. In other parts of the world, that's not always the case.
That's why on a recent excursion to Peru, including visits to Lima, the Amazonian rain forest, and (of course) Machu Picchu, I was particularly interested in the local computing infrastructure and how people used it. So I paid close attention to the technology around me. Some of these facts may seem obvious to veteran travelers, but I thought they were worth noting.See also: 5 things I learned living with just a smartphone for 2 weeks
Almost everyone has a mobile phoneTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
I recently returned from a 12-day vacation in Peru and, because I was going to be moving around a lot, I decided to brave the trip with just my iPhone 6 Plus. No laptop. No tablet. And only the lowest-level AT&T Passport international roaming plan: $30 for 30 days of $1/min phone calls, unlimited texting, and a minuscule 120MB of data.As it turned out, I did pretty well. Since this was a vacation, I wasn't planning on doing any real work, just monitoring email to make sure nothing important was blowing up back home, and passing along urgent (and semi-urgent) emails that couldn't wait for my return.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Last week, the Federal Aviation Administration awarded Amazon an "experimental airworthiness certificate" to test its plans to use drones to deliver purchases to customers. The certificate allows drone use only within line-of-sight of a certified pilot, but that's not the only problem with the concept.See also: FAA deems Amazon delivery drones 'airworthy,' with heavy regulations
In fact, the quest for FAA approval is just a sideshow. The real problems with drone deliveries are practical, not regulatory. Don't believe me? Let's think about it for a moment (you won't need much more time than that…I came up with this list in just a few minutes, with only marginal help from a Google search):To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Last week, the Federal Communications Commission released a 400-page document laying out the official orders for how it plans to regulate net neutrality under Title II common-carrier provisions. Not surprisingly, reactions to the document's specifics immediately separated out along ideological lines, with supporters of the doctrine praising the rules while opponents attacked them for leading to "years of litigation, serious collateral consequences for consumers, and ongoing market uncertainty."Stay flexible, my friendsTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
It doesn't take perfect vision to see that smartphones and mobile computing are the hottest part of the modern technology infrastructure. Open your eyes almost anywhere in the world and it's instantly obvious that mobile devices are continuing to revolutionize…well, just about everything.Still, those of us who work in technology may sometimes be too close to the situation to fully understand how much the industry continues to tilt away from legacy PC and server platforms—and even wannabe platforms like tablets—toward building everything around the ubiquitous smartphone. We still live and work with older categories—and in many cases still rely on them to run our businesses—and so may not always see how much the global center of gravity is shifting to the devices in the palms of our hands.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Rich people regularly spend thousands of dollars—sometimes tens of thousands of dollars, or more—on fancy watches. For their "investment" they get classic timepieces expected to function as well as the day they there were made for generations. In some cases, these luxury devices become family heirlooms and collectors items, worth even more than they were when they were brand new. New versions of these watches come along fairly rarely, and may sport design changes, but are unlikely to perform significantly better than the ones they replace. Watches—the regular kind, anyway—are a very mature market.
Smartwatches, not so much.
Apple today announced that prices for its new Apple Watch Edition in 18K gold will top out at a whopping $10,000, putting it in a league with legendary timepieces from companies like Tag Heuer, Rolex, and Breitling.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
I didn't attend Mobile World Congress in Barcelona last week, and I don't know what I missed more, the yummy Spanish ham or all the cool new smartphones that were introduced.But the thing that many attendees and press reports, even from those who did attend, also seemed to miss was the increasing importance of a big change in who pays for mobile bandwidth.See also: Five takeaways for CIOs from this year's MWC
Whether you call it – "zero rating," "toll-free data," or simply associating it with Facebook's Internet.org initiative – the idea is that carriers make a certain amount of bandwidth available free for specific apps or use cases. The idea, according to Mark Zuckerberg's keynote presentation at MWC, is that by making a baseline amount of mobile net access free, more and more users will be enticed online, see the value of the internet, and over time become inspired to pay real money for additional access to mobile data.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
In the wake of the FCC's landmark decision last week to classify broadband internet access as a public utility, it was easy to see the battle over net neutrality as a conflict between Democrats and Republicans, between the companies that provide content over the internet and companies that supply the "pipes" that deliver that content.But according to Dane Jasper, CEO and co-founder of California-based ISP Sonic, that would be far too simplistic an analysis. In reality, Jasper says, the warring principles behind net neutrality cut across those lines in surprising ways. As chief executive of a company competing with the big carriers, Jasper clearly has an agenda. But his viewpoint also makes it clear that the carrier industry is not uniformly opposed to net neutrality and Title II regulation.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
If you still harbored any doubts that the web is now driving the future of IT, last week's announcement that HP will offer disaggregated products for web-scale data centers via deals with Cumulus and Accton should be enough to convince you.See also: HP latest to unbundle switch hardware, software
The deal itself is hardly monumental. HP inked a pair of "partnerships that will produce a branded white box switch capable of running multiple network operating systems." And it comes on the heels of HP's deal with Foxconn last year to build inexpensive cloud computing servers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
In most IT departments, the very words "shadow IT" conjure visions of out-of-control users merrily spreading sensitive data on insecure services and unapproved devices, risking huge losses and costing IT personnel lost sleep. From the CIO to the help desk, IT folks typically make their disdain clear to any user who will listen.But most users aren't listening. They're too busy riding the wave of slick cloud-based apps and services and powerful consumer-oriented devices to do their work faster, easier, and cheaper than they can with the outmoded enterprise offerings available through official channels. They see shadow IT as essential to achieving maximum productivity.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A pair of fascinating yet utterly predictable news items crossed my desk last week. Both concerned how Apple's product decisions affected the behavior of millions of mobile users—and others—around the world.I'll explain why they're fascinating in a moment, but it's easy to show how predictable they were. I pretty much predicted both them myself!The two items I'm talking about are:
iPhone thefts drop after "kill switches" installed
iPhone 6 Plus owners use twice as much data as iPhone 6 users
Kill switches change potential thieves' behaviorTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
It's becoming the biggest question in wearable computing – will the future of smartwatches be determined by tech companies making watches or by watchmakers adding technology?Last week, Swiss watch giant Swatch revealed that it's planning to release its own smartwatch within the next few months. Known for cheap, colorful designs, Swatch is hardly a high-end luxury brand, though it owns a few of those (including Tissot, which has some smart-ish watches in its line).According to what Swatch CEO Nick Hayek said to Bloomberg, the device will communicate via NFC and won't have to be charged (most likely powered by a replaceable watch battery). It will also support mobile payments and work with Windows and Android smartphones (no word on iOS).To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Fredric Paul