Category: News

Long before the advent of the Jawbone Jambox, there was a portable speaker that was decently rugged, had tremendous battery life and amazing sound, and that was the Tivoli PAL. The PAL boasted an audiophile peidgree and an auxiliary input that made it a good partner for early iPods, but the introduction of decent stereo Bluetooth streaming made it fall behind somewhat in convenience when the Jawbone and its ilk came around.

Recently, however, Tivoli has updated the PAL with the PAL BT, a model that does offer A2DP Bluetooth stereo streaming, alongside the built-in AM/FM radio and auxiliary inputs found on the original. And if you’re in the market for a portable, powerful speaker with great sound, there’s nothing quite like it out there.

• Rated for 16 hours max battery life
• Built-in AM/FM tuner
• Bluetooth/Auxiliary connections
• Weights 1.92 lbs
• MSRP: $299.99
• Product info page

The PAL BT is frankly the best looking portable speaker available, in my opinion. My review unit was in glossy white, so the faceplate matches the rear casing, but those looking for a splash of color can opt to get it in a gloss black, blue or red finish up front, too. The styling is somewhat retro without feeling kitschy, and the ports and antenna are all easily accessible on the back, and protected by water and dust-resistant flaps.

The face of the speaker is dominated by the speaker grill itself, and also the large tuner dial for the built-in AM/FM radio. These are visually appealing, but more than that, the knobs and dials are actually very pleasantly textured and turn with a very satisfying amount of resistance. It sounds silly to complement a speaker based on the design and build of its controls and knobs, but when you use the PAL, you’ll notice immediately that attention was paid to their design.

The rectangular form factor isn’t the most portable among portable speakers, but it’s still a small, light device that is easily thrown into a carry-on or larger luggage.

Tivoli has a great reputation for delivering high-quality sound in a relatively affordable package. I’ve seen other reviewers knock the PAL BT for its sound quality-to-price value ratio, but to my ear, after extensive use and comparison with the Jambox and other Bluetooth speakers, the PAL still defends the reputation of its non-Bluetooth predecessor very well.

The Tivoli PAL BT is a mono speaker which might cause some potential buyers to hesitate, but that shouldn’t be a factor in anyone’s decision-making process. Sound separation in most portable Bluetooth speakers is dismal as it is, so they’re hardly “stereo” anyways. And the high-quality mono audio from the PAL BT even holds up pretty well when you crank up the volume (and it goes a lot higher than most of its competition, too, which is why it’s well-suited to backyard BBQs and other outdoor activities).

Battery life is another place where the previous PAL excelled, and the PAL BT is great there, too. Rated for 16 hours, you’ll get less depending on volume and whether you’re actively connected over Bluetooth, but no one would be disappointed by the duration of its battery no matter how you’re using it. I’ve been using it as my workday soundtrack next to the computer, and I often forget it’s a wireless speaker because of how long-lived it is. Plus, Tivoli equips the PAL BT with a user replaceable internal rechargeable battery, so you could theoretically carry a back-up.

The Tivoli PAL BT is pricier than its non-BT version, and for bass-heads who actually like the exaggerated lows of companies like Beats and Bose, the sound might disappoint. But for audiophiles looking for a speaker that’s relatively affordable, long-lasting and still a category leader in terms of sound quality, this is a perfect device, especially as we head into beach, park and picnic season.

A new Google patent application demonstrates a method for connecting weather information with a device’s camera application. Besides the camera app and a connected weather app, the method makes use of GPS coordinates. Grabbing location data using the GPS of a device, coordinates are transmitted to a server to retrieve local weather information. When the weather data is returned to the device, ambient light info is fed into the camera to adjust the settings to optimize the picture. Some of the settings that may be adjusted include white balance, hue, saturation, sharpness, or contrast.

It is not clear how this may be better than the sensors already present in a camera, though many photographers find those to be inadequate and resort to manual settings or process their photos through software to make corrections. We also don’t know whether this concept will ever find its way into an actual product. If it does, Android users may enjoy an edge in the photography department compared to other platforms.

source: USPTO
via: Engadget

Come comment on this article: New Google patent application could produce better photos using weather info

As 2013 gains steam, the big data and analytics world is radically changing. Just these past few weeks, I’ve spent time with industry thought leaders including Mayank Bawa, Mike Olson and Scott Yara, talking about the emergence of a new analytics stack that displaces the current BI-ETL-EDW paradigm. This new stack fundamentally rethinks the data management, analytic transparency and user consumption elements into a more-cohesive platform that removes the enormous latencies and waste in how analytic software is designed and deployed today.

Here’s how.

Data management

Hadoop has become the foundational underpinning of managing big data for organizations large and small. The amazing pace of innovation has only been accelerated with recent announcements concerning Greenplum Pivotal HD, Hortonworks Stinger and Cloudera Impala. The trajectory of these projects is crystal clear: the major Hadoop distribution providers are introducing real-time, interactive queries on top of Hadoop HDFS. This brings the best of both worlds together — well-known SQL-based query processing with the exponential scale-out ability of HDFS’s storage architecture.

Analytic transparency

Predictive analytics are essential for data-driven leaders to craft their next best decision. There are a variety of techniques across the predictive and statistical spectrums that help businesses better understand the not too distant future. Today’s biggest challenge for predictive analytics is that it is delivered in a very black-box fashion. As business leaders rely more on predictive techniques to make great data-driven decisions, there needs to be much more of a clear-box approach.

Analytics need to be packaged with self-description of data lineage, derivation of how calculations were made and an explanation of the underlying math behind any embedded algorithms. This is where I think analytics need to shift in the coming years; quickly moving away from black-box capabilities, while deliberately putting decision makers back in the driver’s seat. That’s not just about analytic output, but how it was designed, its underlying fidelity and its inherent lineage — so that trusting in analytics isn’t an act of faith.

User consumption

Even after achieving analytics transparency, challenges remain in a number of places: rolling out repeatable applications, creating best-practices, collaborating across organizations, evolving what was built, seamlessly recombining models, and eventually either sharing the strongest content back to the broader community or securely maintaining higher analytic intellectual property. This iterative, responsive approach to user consumption is key to modern analytical success. This is where something like an app store for analytics can really drive user adoption.

This brings me to the new analytic stack. The need for a modern, purpose-built analytic stack is critical. This is a stack that doesn’t worry about the source or shape of the data that is coming into it, but one that is able to ingest structured, unstructured and semi-structured sources seamlessly. One that can create meaningful output, can deliver clear-box predictive analytics and can quickly deploy analytic applications for broader user consumption.

Recently, Gartner released the 2013 BI and Analytics Magic Quadrant, while Wikibon released its 2013 Big Data Market Forecast. Both reports point to a clear signal that even as analytics is taking center stage, yesterday’s BI-ETL-EDW stack is wrong-sided for tomorrow’s needs, and quickly becoming irrelevant.

GigaOM’s Structure: Data conference in New York last week was an even clearer sign that this shift to a new analytic stack is happening. We saw an incredible, yet humbling validation that this future is already here:

• Hadoop (and NoSQL) are significantly disrupting in how we manage data, especially at petabyte scale.
• The rise of R and Stata over black-box analytics in academic circles is a strong leading indicator of where the commercial world is headed.
• Analytic consumption is beginning to move away from just data scientists to analysts and end-users via pre-packaged content and applications.

As this new analytic stack emerges, the big data community will continue be an exciting place for the decade to come.

George Mathew is president and CEO of Alteryx. You can follow him on Twitter at @gkm1.

Feature image courtesy of Shutterstock user ramcreations.

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As expected, after AT&T announced this week they will be opening pre-orders for the Samsung Galaxy S 4 in April, other carriers are following suit. U.S. Cellular has announced they will start taking pre-orders for the device on April 16th, the same day as AT&T. No pricing information was provided by U.S. Cellular. Hit the source link if you want to sign up for reminders from U.S. Cellular.

source: U.S. Cellular

Come comment on this article: US Cellular to take Samsung Galaxy S 4 pre-orders starting April 16th

Early backers of the OUYA game console got a nice surprise this week when Julie Uhrman, the project’s founder, announced consoles had shipped already. If you were one of those supporters, your unit should be arriving any day now. When the units arrive, new owners will find:

• 104 titles will be immediately available with many more on the way
• OUYA will require an update on first launch but it will be ultra quick
• You’ll need a credit/debit card to download games… even free ones
• OUYA supports up to 4 controllers and although you can buy more, it’ll work with Xbox/PS3 controllers among others

The folks at OUYA indicate they will be launching at retail locations starting June 4th. In an interesting little twist,they also announced plans are available for anyone who wants to 3D print an OUYA for themselves.

source: Phandroid

Come comment on this article: OUYA shipping to early backers, retail launch on June 4th

HERE Drive Beta, Nokia’s navigation app for Windows Phone, is currently nowhere to be found inside the company’s exclusive app collection for Lumia devices. A number of users report that the problem occurs both for new smartphones or after factory resetting another. HERE Drive Beta is missing, despite the app being previously available.

I can attest to that latter scenario after performing a factory reset yesterday on my Lumia 920. Heading to the Store to install the app (practically to update Nokia Drive to HERE Drive Beta) now results in very-cryptic error code, 805a0194, whereas performing a manual search lists HERE Maps instead, among other results.

Moments before displaying the error code, inside the Store the app listed my device, location or settings as being incompatible. After a couple of searches and going through some recommended steps, the same error persists less than a day following the software reset. Scanning the QR (Quick Response) codes for HERE apps indeed provides a link to HERE Drive Beta on the Store, but users still cannot install or update the corresponding software.

On Nokia Discussions, the manufacturer’s forum, user guestlumia822 describes the problem as following: “Just received a new Lumia 822 that has Nokia Drive. When I open Nokia Drive I receive the landing page that sends me to the marketplace to download HERE Drive Beta. However, I get the 805a0194 error in the marketplace and it will not download. I do have the ability to download other apps including Nokia apps”.

Similarly, madapo confirms the behavior after restoring the device to its factory default. The user says: “Same problem here. I have resetted my Lumia 920 three times and HERE Drive cannot be installed anymore”.

The issue affects users worldwide, from the United States, Malaysia, Slovenia as well as other regions.

Photo Credit: SkillUp/Shutterstock

If you’re a Porsche guy and haven’t yet heard of Magnus Walker, well then I’m sorry, but there’s no hope for you. Walker was the subject of the documentary short, Urban Outlaw and is one of the best Porsche 911 customizers out there. Jay Leno recently invited him up to his garage with his 1972 Porsche 911 72STR, a car that he crafted out of bits and pieces of old 911′s. Click through and check it out after the jump.

Source: JayLenosGarage.com http://youtu.be/D9lAsSZNVnU

March 31 is World Backup Day. It’s when you’re reminded of the importance of having a backup for all of your precious data and settings. Anyone who’s confronted the horror of data loss full on should know the importance of having at least one backup copy of all their key documents, photos and other files and settings, but why wait until you’re faced with the prospect of losing irreplaceable data or shelling out hundreds, even thousands, of dollars to get it back?

Windows ships with a relatively effective backup tool, but it’s blunt and not particularly flexible to your exacting needs. Instead, you should turn to the plethora of third-party backup utilities if you’re serious about protecting your data from harm. And to celebrate World Backup Day, we’ve put together a selection of amazing deals on backup software that could save you money as well as put your data in a safer place this Easter.

Our headline deal this World Backup Day gives you the chance to purchase O&O DiskImage 7 Professional for just $9.95 this holiday Sunday and Monday. The powerful tool provides you with everything you need to back up both selected data such as individual files and folders, plus take a drive image of entire partitions and drives for complete peace of mind.

While’s it’s still not a tool for complete beginners, O&O DiskImage does provide some hints and tips to guide you towards protecting your data, and version 7 makes things friendlier with a redesigned dashboard-style interface.

The $9.95 price represents a massive 67-percent discount on O&O DiskImage’s normal MSRP of $29.95, and is available for just 48 hours from 00.01 GMT, Sunday March 31 to 23.59 GMT, Monday April).

More Great Offers

If O&O DiskImage doesn’t tempt you, why not check out some other great deals from our comprehensive backup range? If you’re looking for a backup tool that does things with the minimum of fuss, check out Genie Timeline Professional 2013 at just $29.95, which is half its MSRP.

Your purchase gives you a 1-PC, non-expiring lifetime’s license to one of the simplest and fuss-free backup tools on the market. Launch the program, select your backup drive and then simply choose between ticking category boxes like Documents, Email and Bookmarks from the Smart Selection tab, or manually choosing individual files and folders to back up via the My Computer tab.

Once done, that’s it: just leave Genie to do the rest of the hard work for you, updating your backups as files are changed and your PC sits idle. A built-in Restore tool makes recovering individual files as well as your entire backup a doddle too.

If you like the basic concept, but want that little bit more control over your backups, such as being able to back up the Registry or key Windows settings, then check out Genie Backup Manager Home 9.0 instead. It’s also available for $29.95, a 40 percent saving on its MSRP.

Imaging your entire hard drive doesn’t just allow you to recover data, it also enables you to restore your entire system quickly in case of disaster, even if you’re forced to replace your PC’s hard drive. We’ve got some great deals on drive-imaging tools this Easter weekend: get the renowned Norton Ghost 15 for just $39.99, a saving of 43 percent on its MSRP for a single-computer, single-year licence.

Alternatively, you can pick up Paragon Backup & Recovery 11 Home for $31.96, a saving of 20 percent. Or if finances are extremely tight, check out our fantastic deal — 46 percent savings on MSRP — on True Image 2013 by Acronis.

For just $26.99, True Image offers comprehensive backup tools covering individual data and entire drive images, plus comes with a Try&Decide feature for testing software without affecting your main PC installation. There’s also file-sync support for keeping files updated across several PCs and access to True Image Online, a subscription-based cloud backup service for storing your files securely over the internet.

Speaking of cloud-based backups — a great complementary way of creating a backup that’s stored securely away from your computer — we finish our roundup of selected deals with an amazing offer on AVG LiveKive. Until 23.59 on Monday, you can pick up AVG LiveKive 25GB, which offers up to 25GB online storage space for a whole year, for the amazing price of just $16.95, a saving of 66 per cent on its MSRP. By way of comparison, that means you’re paying the equivalent nominal sum of just $1.42 a month for the security of keeping your precious files protected (and synced with all your other devices).

All of these great deals mean there’s no excuse not to mark World Backup Day by taking the plunge and investing what is a very small sum on keeping your precious files and settings backed up. Particularly when you consider the potential cost of actually having to pay to have your data recovered.

Photo Credit: Andy Harbin/Shutterstock

Great UX, thwarted by walled gardens

Readmill is a great reading environment. That their designers obsess on visceral user experience makes it a true pleasure to use. It may very well be the best “feeling” ereader application out there. This is a critical attribute for an environment in which you can spend hours a day.

But it suffers from the thing that any book-related company or product or startup that is not a Kindle suffers from: It a slog to get content into it.

This is a discussion less about DRM (although, it is that, too) and more about seamless user experience. Sure, you can hunt down a copy of “Gone Girl” on a website you’ve never bought a book from before. Enter your credit-card information. Download it. Then upload it to your Readmill account. Or, you can click “Buy now with 1-Click” on Amazon.com and have it on all your devices in 10 seconds, ready to be read in the Kindle reading application. You have to be really persuasive to beat that kind of convenience.

Since Amazon would never allow its library to be accessed by reading applications other than Kindle, this is a non-trivial problem for a startup like Readmill to surmount.

A community to challenge Amazon

Goodreads has always been a bit of an enigma. Truth be told, I’ve never been an avid user. There’s a number of reasons why, but the biggest is simply that the distance between my books — and the activity that happens within them — and Goodreads has always seemed ginormous. That is, updating reading statuses for books on a website always felt odd and forced. It felt odd in 2007 when I was mainly reading physical books, and it feels odder still in 2013, where I’m mainly reading Kindle books. That said, 16 million people clearly don’t agree with me.

So why did Amazon buy Goodreads? Well, the promise of a collaboration between Goodreads and a great reading platform (like Readmill) loomed large. A combination like that had the chance of being the Last Great Stand against Amazon. Goodreads is many things but most defensibly it is a community. A strong community. An engaged community. (And now, a slightly enraged community.) Sixteen million users is nothing to dismiss. It’s not Facebook or Instagram levels, but 16 million excited people is a firehose to be reckoned with. What Goodreads didn’t have was a reading application.

It also should be noted that publishers love Goodreads. No surprise there; it’s just as one would imagine. Goodreads is an amazing platform for promoting books to an avid, core readership. So if Goodreads were to develop a reading application, it doesn’t take much imagination to see them signing up the catalogs of the big five and launching a Goodreads store for the Goodreads reader. And were that reading application to plug seamlessly into the Goodreads ecosystem — the community — then getting those 16 million users to switch from Kindle to Goodreads Reader would have been one of the easier platform sells in publishing.

Goodreads users already want to hang out at Goodreads. If they could read there too — in an app — I suspect many would.

Kindle flaws present opportunity

Despite the maturity of the market, the tablet reading space is still weirdly under-polished. Kindle reading environments have hardly changed in the last three years. The Kindle app has seen some improvement — mainly in support for complex KF8 formatted titles — but the polish around the reading experience, that visceral component, for novels and other mass-market books has remained largely unchanged. Books in the Kindle applications still don’t hyphenate. And page slides still stutter ever so slightly. These are small details that add up.

Certain polish aside, Kindle’s strengths are manifold. It has a vast catalog and transactional trust. It has all our credit-card information, making purchasing seamless. It is also supremely good at cloud data — consistent and reliable storage and retrieval of our books across devices. What it doesn’t have — and no inkling or iota of — is community.

What might have been

So you can see, there was a combo here. A curious matchup. Take one of the most polished, most satisfying digital book reading applications and merge it with one of the most engaged reading-specific communities. A marketplace could have developed that might have been the first real competition against Kindle. Not one built around competing with Kindle toe-to-toe as Barnes & Noble and Kobo have attempted (and failed at), but competing on ground on which Amazon has no footing: community.

It’s a certainty that Amazon, too, saw this. Which is why the sale this week comes as little surprise. I’ve always imagined that secretly, deep down in the murky stacks of Amazon headquarters, they had a crackerjack team making kindle.amazon.com the best social reading network in the world. Maybe they did. Or maybe they just realized it would be easier to buy the one that already existed.

Craig Mod is an independent writer, designer and publisher focused on publishing and storytelling. You can follow him on Twitter @craigmod.

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Photo courtesy Vitchanan Photography/Shutterstock.com.

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It is always good to know what files or folders take the most space on your computer. This sort of detail is not difficult to find out, since all respectable file managers offer the possibility to sort the items in a location according to their size.

However, for a detailed perspective that involves learning the exact size of the largest file along with additional in… (read more)

If you’re the sort of person that wants to wear a smartwatch every day, then I’m sorry but we can’t be friends. I should likely be polite and say the same overused line, “It’s not you, it’s me”, but frankly I don’t care for such folks to tell a blatant lie. I’m the sort of person that loves gadgets so much that I can’t get enough of them at least 10 hours a day, but I draw the line at wearing one on the wrist. I’m a gadget lover who doesn’t like smartwatches.

I’m not a fool nor reject the idea. I understand why someone would want to wear a smartwatch, but only on a certain occasion. I certainly wouldn’t take anything but a beater climbing, hiking, playing sports, running and so on. A smartwatch might be useful there, without having the fear of scratching or ruining an expensive timepiece. But aren’t there better tools for the job? And, in real-life, a smartwatch makes even less sense as it’s not a replacement for anything, really, not even a real watch.

Nature Gets in the Way

The Pebble is one of the best known smartwatches on the market. The maker says the battery should last around seven days, which is decent compared to mechanical watches but not as good as quartz ones. The case is water-rated at 5 ATM (practically around 50 meters under water), which is rather unimpressive. Don’t be fooled by the depth, because as any watch lover would tell you 50 meters is only good enough for a splash, and not a dive.

I know the water-proofing is just a bonus, but there are better watches suited for this job if you assume that Pebble can work for diving. As an added bonus, those watches can be better built and have a much longer battery life, like a $50 Casio. You can head into the mountains or some remote place for a week and not worry about battery life or having to carry a USB cable and charger with you. I wonder if Bear Grylls would take aPebble in his adventures, let alone carry a smartphone or tablet for the smartwatch to work.

Not that Smart

Fact of the matter is that the Pebble is a companion device that needs a smartphone or tablet to get the best results. And, of course, there’s no support for anything other than Android and iOS. This smartwatch needs another smart device to tell you and me about emails, texts, tweets, weather and other such things. Well, what’s so special about that? I always carry a smartphone or tablet anyway in day-to-day life, the former of which is always as close to me as any smartwatch, and I can also use it to make calls and jot down notes, for instance.

Another problem is that Pebble and other similar gadgets connect via Bluetooth, which adds to the already poor battery life that some smartphones get. I assume for the best results a tablet should be carried at all times, of course, with a data connection. A spare charger is not out of the question either, you know just to be safe.

Friends? No, Thanks

What also bugs me is what smartwatches are marketed for. On its SmartWatch website, Sony says: “At a concert or other similar environment, it is easy to miss a call or notification. SmartWatch vibrates when something comes in. Trust it”. Of course, Sony’s SmartWatch only works with Android. The limited platform compatibility is a nuisance that I just don’t get at this point, and this affects other brands of smartwatches as well.

Aside from the obvious — smartphones vibrate, too — I don’t really understand why I’m at a concert and want to talk to someone over the phone or look at notifications. Unless that someone is dying — at which point why is he or she calling me when I’m at a concert and not the emergency services? I want to be left alone and enjoy the music. Too much intrusion for my taste, on top of the usual notifications, calls and texts.

If by smart, manufacturers mean that smartwatches can bug me in smarter ways then they’ve succeeded in making a case for the gadgets but otherwise I’m not sold. I’m continuously trying to cut back on using too much technology in my day-to-day life because I want to function as a sane and healthy human being.

That means enjoying the music at a concert without any disruptions, talking to friends without me having to check emails on my devices or looking at a movie without having something vibrate on my hand to ruin the experience. For the very same reasons I don’t want any friends with smartwatches. If someone can’t enjoy heading out for a drink without having to look at Facebook messages or some tweets then that person shouldn’t be heading out in the first place to, practically, waste and ruin my time.

Grandpa, What is This?

I rejoice at seeing young people like me and especially older folks wearing a good old-fashioned watch. A timepiece tells you something about its owner, be it through the brand, size, looks, movement, strap or bracelet, heritage and even age. A real watch is a powerful thing and gives someone character, even though he or she might not be the most interesting person in the world.

Don’t get me wrong, a watch has plenty of technology built into it but that technology is of a different sort. We’re talking about the engineering processes that go into molding a piece of metal into something that may live for many decades and be passed along for generations. I like that. I want to give my future children or grandchildren a little piece of history, something to remember me by. Can a smartwatch do that?

No, they’d think of me as an antiquated nerdy or geeky father or grandfather that gave them 50-year old technology that has no appeal, similar to handing the first Sony PlayStation in 2013 to a youngster. They’re just things we’ll all soon forget and throw inside a box for eternity once new gadgets take their place. On the other hand, a timepiece will still look interesting 50 years down the road from now.

When Google announced its shutdown of Reader two weeks ago, it led to an outpouring of emotion few could have predicted. Amid the anguish were some healthy conversations about Reader, Google, and RSS, but the process also gave rise to a number of myths and assumptions that deserve a second look.

Myth: Google could have sold or open-sourced Reader

Reality: De-tangling Reader from Google’s infrastructure was just not worth the effort.

With companies like Digg declaring they will build an alternative, you have to wonder if Google could have salvaged its goodwill among Reader fans by spinning it off. After all, the company is frugal by its own admission, so an “exit with benefits” would have to be more appealing than an outright shutdown. It wouldn’t be the first time either, as SketchUp was spun off last year. The difference is that SketchUp sold for a lot more than Reader probably would, if rumors of $90 million are to be believed.

Where SketchUp was a desktop app and a recent acquisition, Reader is a relatively old web service, one we can assume is deeply ingrained in Google’s systems. This would include services like login and the fundamental feed crawling that would be difficult to detangle into a standalone, open-source product. Exporting all that data to another company would again open the company up to more legal and privacy risks than it presumably would care to deal with. It’s possible users would have to explicitly agree to the arrangement, which would damage the value of the deal, and it’s also possible Google would be lambasted if it chose the “wrong company” and would be blamed for any subsequent mishandling of Reader.

Instead, Google has provided the alternative of a straightforward data export, meaning users can migrate to other services in a matter of minutes. If the primary reason to sell would be goodwill among users, the data export probably serves that purpose better.

Myth: Google cares more about Orkut than Reader

Reality: Orkut is on the way out too.

“We need to focus. Keep the self-driving cars, magic glasses, laptop, handheld OS, and Brazilian social network. Ditch the feed reader.”

— Pinboard (@Pinboard) March 14, 2013

Four-thousand retweets can’t be wrong, right? Surely if Orkut is still alive and kicking, then Google must care more about that nine-year-old social network that never took over the world, but somehow gained a foothold in Brazil. The reality is that Reader was purged as part of an overall “spring cleaning” effort that began a few months after Larry Page took the reigns in 2011, promising “more wood behind fewer arrows.” If you think Orkut doesn’t fit into that pithy worldview, you’re probably right, and Google probably does want to shut it down. It’s just a matter of timing and shutting things down in the right sequence, as you can’t just pull the plug on a large product overnight.

Another issue is that Orkut, in particular, is sensitive, as it’s the closest thing in Google’s catalog to Plus. Google’s already closed down other social products – Wave, Jaiku, and Buzz – so there’s still a perception that Plus is “yet another experiment” Google will probably tear down in a year or two. In fact, Plus is different because it’s a social layer on all of Google’s products. Google wants it to be your online identity, used when leaving Play store reviews, YouTube comments, or Spreadsheet edits. But until Plus earns users’ trust, many will continue to anticipate a shutdown and be cautious about embracing it, which may explain why Orkut has outlived Reader and many other defunct products.

As for self-driving cars and magic glasses, they emerged as part of Google’s forward-looking X Lab. Google’s new focus doesn’t rule it out from its tradition of experimenting with new products; it just makes sure that products either evolve or die. Moving sideways is not an option. So while its tempting to lump Google’s more exotic services together, it really makes more sense to think of Google’s portfolio as having three buckets: legacy, experimental, and core.

Myth: This is really about content lock-in

Reality: This is about scale.

To many mourning the loss of Reader, RSS symbolises freedom. Anyone with a web server can set up as a publisher and syndicate to readers who care enough to subscribe to the feed. If Google moves to a world of curated news like Currents, there’s a risk that freedom is lost, cutting off the long tail and making it hard for readers to get the news that matters to them. This is a realistic concern and one Google will have to address.

However, it shouldn’t be confused with a conspiracy against all things RSS. Google provided a pretty good product for eight years, but it only enjoyed a luke-warm reception at a time when Facebook and Twitter were growing exponentially. Flipboard, likewise, is on a path towards mainstream adoption, which Reader simply never achieved. So it doesn’t take a lock-in motive to explain the move toward a world of Plus and Currents – just a recognition that while Reader served millions of users admirably, Google is more interested in going after billions.

Myth: Google is destroying the RSS ecosystem

Reality: This is a net positive for the RSS ecosystem.

Google’s move is a double-edged sword for RSS. On the one hand, Reader was such a big part of the ecosystem that it held the standard together in many ways. As long as Reader could parse a feed, the publisher could find an audience. (And even get a reasonable measure of the audience just by tracking audience numbers on Reader.)

However, Reader also choked the field of innovation. It’s hard for niche products to find an audience when the elephant in the room is busy providing a free service. And this was not a service that was actively improving. As Reader’s former manager has famously pointed out, management has been trying to pull engineers away from the project since 2008 and decided to kill it in 2010. Better for third-parties who care about RSS to pick up the reigns.

And pick up the reigns they have. Some 500,000 people migrated to Feedly in the 48 hours after Google’s announcement. Digg’s upcoming implementation are in direct response to this announcement. Sites like ReplaceReader have been busy documenting dozens of Reader alternatives that are gaining traction right now. So we are starting to see companies innovating in a space that might otherwise have dwindled.

“RSS is dead” memes are about as old as RSS itself. The standard remains tenuous. But with Reader out of the way, and under the guardianship of companies that care deeply about its values, the RSS model has the best chance in years to flourish and gain new users.

Michael Mahemoff previously worked at Google and is founder of cloud podcasting service player.fm. Follow him on Twitter @mahemoff.

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Jon Ronson speaks at TED2012. Photo: James Duncan Davidson

At TED2012, Jon Ronson wove a mind-bending tale that asks: How can we truly tell who is a psychopath? What’s the line between crazy and sane? Jon Ronson: Strange answers to the psychopath testAnd is it something we can truly delineate, or are we trying to discern black and white in a color-soaked world?

Today’s TEDWeekends on the Huffington Post picks up this question, using Ronson’s talk as a jumping-off point to talk about the concept of “normalcy.” Here, three essays from the weekly HuffPo feature to pique your interest.

Jon Ronson: The Story of a Man Who Faked Insanity

Whenever someone comes on TV or the radio sounding potentially like a psychopath — Lance Armstrong, etc. — we all get drunk with our psychopath spotting powers. I get millions of tweets asking me if they are one. I also get offers to be a talking head on TV. I try to always say no because whilst it would be nice to make hay while the sun shone, it’s quite morally corrosive (not to mention massively unethical) to diagnose someone off the TV.

I tell you who would be even more unethical than me if they went on TV to diagnose someone from afar as a psychopath: any forensic psychiatrist or psychologist or anyone who works in that field as an expert. The Psychopath Test is a cautionary tale to not do that, in fact. It’s as much a book about confirmation bias as it is about psychopaths. Read the full essay »

Dr. Harold Koplewicz: Defending Psychiatrists and the DSM

In Jon Ronson’s rather entertaining TED Talk, he has a little fun at the expense of psychiatrists. That’s fair, but let’s look at what he says. He asks: “Is it possible that the psychiatric profession has a strong desire to label things that are essential human behavior as a disorder?”

To which I would answer: The psychiatric profession has a strong desire to find a way to help people who are suffering — and the family members who struggle alongside them. Suffering is, of course, “essential human behavior,” but when people are miserable, and suicidal, and dangerous to themselves and others, we have an ethical obligation to try to help them. And to alleviate their suffering, we need to understand it. Read the full essay »

Laura Cococcia: Psychopathy, a Cultural Reality?

Stalin, Draper, Caulfield, Salander. No, it’s not the latest name of Mad Men‘s pivotal ad agency. It’s part of a list of people one could classify as psychopaths.

“Strange answers to the psychopath test,” the TED Talk by journalist Jon Ronson, explores the nature and definition of psychopathy. As research, Ronson visits a tough-as-nails CEO he suspects of psychopathy as well as an inmate of a psychiatric facility who claims he pretended to be a psychopath to avoid going to prison. Through the talk, he questions whether psychopathy is a legitimate category of mental illness, or if it’s just a construct we use to explain away actions in our fellow humans that are less than nice, less than normative, that make us non-psychopaths feel uneasy. Read the full essay »

In case you didn’t notice, it’s the golden age of enterprise startups. And some investors believe it will continue for another seven years or more. No one is completely sure what will come after that, but it’s worth reflecting on what brought us here and what the dynamics are of this enterprise golden age.

The pattern has become clear with recent funding deals for application-performance management (APM) provider New Relic ($80 million), APM player AppDynamics ($50 million) and data-copy reducer Actifio ($50 million), to name a few. Last year, VCs made 164 investments in big data startups (more than ever before), passing out $1.39 billion in total.

Earlier this month, a big-data startup, SiSense, demonstrated its product by releasing figures — from CrunchBase, Wikibon, Nasdaq and other sources — showing that enterprise startups captured 40 percent more venture dollars per round in 2012 ($9.85 million) than they did in 2011. Meanwhile, consumer-focused web startups captured 45 percent less per round last year ($5.6 million) than then did in 2011.

“What we found is enterprise startups definitely are more in vogue per round than in 2011,” said David Feinleib, a GigaOM Research analyst who looked at the findings. “Web startups are out of favor or falling out of favor.”

Causes of the golden age

Venture capitalists disagree about the exact set of disruptions or trends that set the stage for the golden age. But most agree on the big ones: bring your own device (BYOD), the adoption of cloud computing, and the growth of data sets and the need to make sense of it all.

There are smaller trends, too, including software-defined networking (SDN), flash storage and cyberthreats. Just one would be enough to let in a bunch of new investing. But add them together and mash them up — such as BYOD and cyberthreats, or big data plus BYOD — and you have entirely new sets of funding opportunities.

The rise of the enterprise accelerator

A related development is the slow but steady rise of accelerators specializing in preparing enterprise startups for growth and investments. Current programs include Acceleprise, the Citrix Startup Accelerator, the Microsoft Accelerator for Windows Azure, a similar program in Israel and TechStars Cloud. Plus, Upstart Labs, the startup accelerator based in Portland, Ore., is starting to focus mostly on enterprise this year and now has venture backing.

In the past few months I’ve attended the first and second demo days of the Alchemist Accelerator, a enterprise accelerator in the San Francisco Bay Area. Ravi Belani, its managing director, said enterprise-focused VCs are excited about the events because until now, there hasn’t been a place for them to go when their consumer-oriented colleagues have attended Y Combinator events. “Finally there’s a place they can go where they can fund and meet entrepreneurs,” said Belani, a former associate at DFJ. With programs like Belani’s, it’s easier for VCs to find companies that are more prepared to take on funding, so they can spend more time making bigger deals and meeting their own objectives.

The programs also have helped founders who have loads of talent but less knowledge about business strategy and fundraising. Of the nine startups that went through the first class, five have made venture deals, he said.

How long will it last?

Belani and most other investors I spoke with believe the enterprise golden age started in or around 2010 and will last until about 2020.

It’s only natural to expect the trend to last for at least a decade. ”The 1980s was about the whole PC era,” said Navin Chaddha, managing director of the Mayfield Fund and the lead in the firm’s $6.1 million Series A investment in software-defined storage company SwiftStack. “The 1990s was about the internet. The 2000s was about virtualization.”

Now Chaddha sees Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications taking over, mobile devices entering the workplace, IT moving from on-premise hardware to cloud computing and big data adding up and needing strong analysis. With those megatrends, IT needs to spend. And so VCs are excited about funding enterprise startups “for a decade or the next two decades,” Chaddha said.

What comes next?

Lots of people want to know what will come after the golden age of enterprise startups. Shirish Sathaye, a general partner at Khosla Ventures, thinks it’s possible that blends of consumer and enterprise technology will become the next big thing. “We already see that happening with the consumerization of enterprise IT,” he said.

But really, he can’t be sure. The year 2020 is a long time from now. Call him in 2017, and he might have a better idea.

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Like Harley-Davidson motorcycles, today’s modern muscle cars can be customized to reflect the owners personality. Paint, wheels, interior and engine modifications can be addressed and there is no shortage of parts from the aftermarket. The following Dodge Challenger comes to us from the guys over at Jonsibal Design Works, and is nothing short of sinister. Flat bronze wheels set perfectly in the fender wells give the car and evil stance, and that matte-black paint finishes off a stunning machine. This particular design may not be for everyone, but as far as we’re concerned, it looks outstanding!

Source: Jonsibal Dodge Challenger

The GLBenchmark site is one of the best resources for finding out about phones in the pipeline. A new LG phone (D801) showed up in the database that is most likely the Optimus G 2. It’s powered by a 1.7GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 MSM8974, an Adreno 330 GPU, an FHD display, and Android 4.2.2. It has been rumored that the Optimus G 2 would carry an Odin Octa-core CPU, but this news doesn’t mean that it won’t. Just like the Galaxy S 4, it’s very likely that LG will offer variants with different processors for different regions. I would expect to see this phone to get announced at IFA 2013 later in the year, so expect a lot of rumors and leaks in the meantime.

source: GLBenchmark

Come comment on this article: LG Optimus G 2 shows up in GLBenchmark database

President Obama uses his weekly address to mark a sacred time for the millions of Americans celebrating Easter and Passover, and he calls on everyone to use this time to reflect on the common values we share as a nation. The President says that this is a chance to embrace loved ones, give thanks for our blessings, and help those less fortunate as we celebrate our individual traditions as well as the thread of humanity that connects us all.

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