Foul Tech Sours

Here we go again. More speculation about Facebook getting their hands dirty in hardware.  This is a subject that people should not get their hopes up for.  Last year, consumers hoped for a Facebook phone and forced Mark Zuckerburg to shut that idea down during an interview. He clearly stated that "he couldn't emphasize enough that there will be no Facebook phone".  Then consumers got excited again January of this year when Facebook held a press conference. The mysterious invite simply said "Come and see what we're building". After all the excitement and speculation about a Facebook phone, consumers and tech geeks got a search tool.  The search tool (referred to as Graph search) allows the nearly 1 billion Facebook users to search data and metadata about photos, people and other things of interest. This is impressive, but it is still not a Facebook phone. Today Facebook has done it again. Facebook sent out several invitations to members of the press for an

The concept of electronic cigarettes, or e-cigarettes, is growing rapidly. Although the number people that puff on these smokeless, tarless, nicotine fixes is still relatively small compared to the number of real cigarette smokers, there are several people that are on board for this "new" phenomena. The concept of e-cigarettes has actually been around for years.  The earliest concept was actually conceived in 1963 when a man patented a "smokeless non-tobacco cigarette".  His concept replaced the tobacco with paper. That paper was then heated with moist flavored air.  Although various generations of the e-cigarette have been developed, the concept still remains the same.  The modern e-cigarette uses a small battery to vaporise a mixture containing nicotine and an organic solution similar to alcohol.  This produces a "smoke-like" vapor that smokers can inhale, providing the same delivery and effect of smoking a traditional cigarette. Although no cigarett

I am one of the few people I know that was actually excited about the release of the Blackberry Z10 in the United States last Friday. I believe that there is a smaller demand for the Blackberry device because it was evident that, at one point, they were not keeping up with the fast paced world of smart phones. This was due largely in part to the release of the Apple iPhone, and in my opinion, the fact that the original co-founders have been running the company for the last 30 years. When running a company in an industry that is advancing at such a fast pace, it is important to remain current and to make it a priority to, at minimum, keep up with competitors. Granted, Blackberry (which I think was still Research In Motion at the time) released two touch screen Blackberries, but made very little improvement to the interface and OS overall. The retirement of co-founders and co-CEOs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie has given the company an opportunity to move away from its traditional wa

Okay. I was going to wait until tomorrow to talk about this, but I just HAD to express myself after coming across several articles and pictures about Google, this Project Glass nonsense, and the selection process.  As many of you may have already heard, after inviting 8,000 people to their "Explorer Program", they ended up having to disqualify several of the invitees.  Both parties, Google and the applicants, are at fault here. First, it is the fault of the applicants for not looking for further information concerning the terms of the application process. These idiots simply saw that they could tweet and post to Google+ using the hash tag #ifihadglass and began tapping away at their keyboards and phones.  Many of the applicants failed to realize that this is NOT a free trial or give away, and were surprised when they learned that they would be expected to pay full price ($1,500 from what I've read) for the "Glass" product. But how can you blame google for ch

North Korean is widely known for their lack of liberation. They have some of the strictest government control in the world as far as media, freedom of speech, telecommunications, and several human rights in general.  A major problem in North Korea that has also been a concern to me (and a reason why I prefer to stay away), is the ban on cellular devices. Often times, when people visited North Korea their phones were confiscated upon entry. Although several phone lines are installed across North Korea technically they were only made available to government officials which, in my opinion, is a typical government practice. In recent years, the country has began to allow more people own own mobile devices. Although there is still a pretty strict process to obtain it, I guess its better that they are moving forward than standing still. Although 3G capability is available for mobile devices, the functionality is rather restricted, not allowing North Korean citizens to the Internet. It wa

Although this is an exciting new technology that I'm sure EVERYBODY is looking forward to, I would have to say that people shouldn't be so quick to jump on the bandwagon. The technology I am referring to is goggle's newest concoction called "Glass". I'm sure you’ve read about it, heard about it, whatever. I remember even seeing a YouTube video about it a while back. Like most new technologies, I am pretty skeptical about a few things. The first being that I am blind as hell. I already wear corrective vision. What happens if I decide one day that I want to wear my glasses as opposed to contacts? Will I just have to avoid my Google glass that day? I need answers. Second, how convenient is it to always have something blocking your view? I assume not all the functions are as transparent as they would need to be in order to remain functional throughout the day. Can I look and do ANYTHING at the same time? Sure, this functionality is great for taking pictures an