I love tech. Never before can you be in touch with what is going on in the world. The other hand with an ability to know so much elsewhere, that around us drops off. I really would like the ability to easily filter out the news I don’t care about. The Mac has wonderful ways to do this, but it is still like programing. I just want to mouse click thinks together with blocks like the 12blocks gui environment for the Parallax Propeller chip.
So on to Apple’s iPod touch. Never before can so much be done in places people won’t bother you, such as a bath or on the toilet. As time has gone on, it has gotten better with ios upgrades. This last upgrade was free for the touch. Before that, apple liked to make touch users pay for upgrades. So now I can record voice memos if I have a mic attached, such as Apple’s newer headphones include. I can even use Dragon’s free speech to text app, as long as I’m connected to the net. The location feature now can find me in many places in Humboldt County reasonability good. That itself was a neat update. It used to be unable to find me at all in Humboldt County. I have used this in many places, sometimes as a flashlight, other times as a level.
The screen is showing spots from abuse. It has survived relatively well from a dunk in water except for the sound output.
I still wish for built in camera and mic. Overall it is very good.
Filed under: Electronics and Computers
Wireless Oligopoly Is Smother of Invention | Epicenter | Wired.com.
If the people who brought us television had played by the same rules that today’s wireless carriers impose — we’d probably all be listening to the radio.
Which is a nice way of saying the wireless industry — AT&T, Sprint, Verizon and T-Mobile — needs some ground rules that make clear they are common carriers that get the right to rent the airwaves by abiding by fair rules.
It is amazing what people will say. For instance today a couple of interesting incidents.
A) Person went and asked how to charge their solar lights.
B) Another person wanted to have their computer’s cup holder fixed.
These are real people!
Filed under: Electronics and Computers
The Federal Trade Commission wants to make sure the public knows an important truth: if you photocopy your butt on a modern copier, it’s probably still there, safe on the copier’s hard drive. It exists there along with medical forms, financial documents, and that list of gang members your police department was just about to arrest.
CBS News did a story last month on secrets kept by digital copiers. Most digital copiers produced in the last five years archive copied documents on internal hard drives, and those hard drives are easy enough to obtain once the copiers are resold or their lease expires. By examining the hard drives of several used copiers, CBS found “a list of targets in a major drug raid” from the Buffalo Police Narcotics Unit. It also scored Social Security numbers, medical documents, and “$40,000 in copied checks.”
via That old copier still holds a picture of your backside.
Filed under: Electronics and Computers
Even without cookies, popular browsers such as Internet Explorer and Firefox give Web sites enough information to get a unique picture of their visitors about 94 percent of the time, according to research compiled over the past few months by the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
via EFF: Forget cookies, your browser has fingerprints – Computerworld.
to test this with your browser, run by EFF.
Filed under: Electronics and Computers
The SolarPump Electric Charging Station is an urban intervention; it is designed to help people re-imagine the future of transportation by showcasing solar electric charging stations as part of the future for carbon-free cities, leaving gas mobility as a thing of the past. Imagine turning the corner and instead of your local gas station and convenience store, people are playing music and charging their electric bicycles and cellphones at a solar-powered charging station, while lounging in the shade of the solar roof on furniture made from recycled street signs.
via Make: Online : MFBA: SolarPump Electric Charging Station interview.
Filed under: Electronics and Computers
If you’re not in to electronics stop now. This is a project I’ve been working on for a little while now, due to the need to fit it in the allowed time, by my little tike. The basic idea is to randomly turn on and off the outputs. The idea came from someone trying to find such a circuit in a model railroad forum.
It can use 8 or 24 outputs. True random(as possible), or controlled random. Controlled random, ensures each cycle uses an unused output.
It has four modes, all on, all off, flip, and twinkle. All on, turns all outputs on. All off, turns all outputs off. Flip, turns off outputs on, then off, and repeats endlessly. Twinkle randomly toggles each output.
I’m working to make this a kit.
Filed under: Electronics and Computers, Eureka, Humboldt | Tags: CREG, Nea Latt
I’ll give you a hint, it should of fell down in the earthquake, if you believe everything Neal Latt says.
Filed under: Electronics and Computers
DeLorme is proud to announce a line of universal remote controls that can be tracked wirelessly with the Earthmate PN-60w.
Features include:
* See the location of the remote control directly on the PN-60w screen!
* PN-60w 3-axis digital compass and accurate GPS antenna lead you right to the remote. No need to lift every couch cushion, which often leads to unwanted vacuuming.
* Track up to 8 remotes at one time throughout your entire home, including the remote under your teen’s bed, the one that got tossed in the trash by your toddler, and the one that was left by the television (even though that’s the last place a device designed to operate the television remotely should go).
“The idea for this product began after some frustrating evenings at home,” says product development manager Chip Noble. “I have a bad habit of taking the remote to the kitchen to get a snack but then forgetting it there. After several minutes of digging though my recliner and being forced to watch Dancing with the Stars, I’ll remember where I left it. Now, I quickly find the remote and go back to watching manly shows. One time I found it in the fridge!”
DeLorme will be releasing 4 different models of trackable universal remotes this summer, priced from $20 up to $100. We are also creating a $400 remote that will just find itself.
via DeLorme Announces Remote Tracking System for the Earthmate GPS PN-60w « The DeLorme Weblog.
If only it were real…..
Filed under: Electronics and Computers
Amid all the furor over the Bush administration’s warrantless wiretapping program a few years ago, a mini-revolt was brewing over another type of federal snooping that was getting no public attention at all. Federal prosecutors were seeking what seemed to be unusually sensitive records: internal data from telecommunications companies that showed the locations of their customers’ cell phones—sometimes in real time, sometimes after the fact. The prosecutors said they needed the records to trace the movements of suspected drug traffickers, human smugglers, even corrupt public officials. But many federal magistrates—whose job is to sign off on search warrants and handle other routine court duties—were spooked by the requests. Some in New York, Pennsylvania, and Texas balked. Prosecutors “were using the cell phone as a surreptitious tracking device,” said Stephen W. Smith, a federal magistrate in Houston. “And I started asking the U.S. Attorney’s Office, ‘What is the legal authority for this? What is the legal standard for getting this information?’ “
via FBI Tracks Suspects’ Cell Phones Without a Warrant – Newsweek.com.
