Because of this incident, I decided to give external hard drives as gift this Christmas. Although, external hard drives don’t have the luster of iPhone 4S or Kindle Fire they are one of the most useful presents that “keeps on giving”. I have brought a few tips for those who are planning to gift external hard drives or docking stations to their loved ones this Christmas.
Times are tough for Mozilla and its flagship web browser Firefox. Last month Firefox lost its number two position in the web browser usage to Chrome. Corporate users are mulling over abandoning Firefox as their preferred web browser because of its accelerated development schedule. Mozilla’s three year old contact with Google, from which it earns the majority of its revenue, may not be renewed. And, now that a study by research firm Accuvant has rated Firefox as the least secure among the top three browsers, seems to be the last clout they need at this moment. It seems – while the present is tough, the future is tougher.
Google Chrome, probably Google’s most widely used desktop application, has for the first time become the world’s second most used browser on monthly basis overtaking Firefox. According to web analytics company StatCounter, 25.69% of internet users have accessed the web through Chrome during November 2011, while 40.63% used Internet Explorer (IE) and 25.23% used Firefox.
Till now, we knew that the war for mobile phone market share was limited between the OS developers and mobile phone makers. The biggest players in this war were Apple, Google, Samsung and the distressed angel Nokia. But a recent report, appeared in Telecoms.com, suggests that there is also an elite group of players who works also as catalysts in this war – the telecom operators. But it seems, though the users are in love with iOS based Apple iPhones or Android based Samsung Galaxy phones, the operators are in favor of the emergence of a new player in the market which can corner these two players, Apple and Google. And, their only hope is Nokia.
The most heated topic on the internet is the US Stop Online Piracy Act or SOPA, in short. Most of today’s internet savvy people already know what this act is all about. For those who still don’t know about this development – it is a bill, presented in the United States House of Representative on 26th October 2011, which expands the ‘ability of U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods.’
Yesterday, we have seen how two recent innovations in the SIM card technology, the plastic card which identifies and authenticates a subscriber uniquely within a network, paves the way for thinner and better mobile devices. Today, I will focus the light on another concept that has the potential to affect the telecom space far greater than the nano-SIM or virtual SIM – a converged subscription model.
It is more than two decades since mobile phone technology started its journey, and it is growing stronger, faster and smarter every day. We have seen many philosophical changes in the network designs. However, some basic things, like subscriber identification process and SIM card design, have changed very little – philosophically. Networks still use a relatively large physical SIM card to identify a subscriber. In an age, where an average consumer is expected to have multiple’ web enabled devices’, each device is identified by the network as a separate subscriber gadget. But, these philosophies seem to be challenged by a few recent technological innovations.
A recent research report published by the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) uncovered an unprecedented growth of global public Wi-Fi hotspot deployments which is predicted to rise 350% by 2015. A finding that will broaden the smile of Wi-Fi gear makers and solution providers.
The web sphere is heated up ever since Adobe declared that it will stop developing Flash Player for mobile devices and will focus on developing new Flash features for PC browsing and mobile apps. Most of the developers, who have been habituated of developing codes and contents around Flash, seem to be very agitated after hearing the news. However, some people are also supporting Adobe’s decision recognizing the performance issues of Flash Player on mobile devices and HTML5’s universal presence in mobile browsers.
The most hyped topic of yesterday in the tech news sphere was probably the ‘leaked’ slides revealing some details about Intel’ Haswell architecture, an architecture that will succeed its yet be marketed predecessor – Ivy Bridge. The presentation, available at Chiphell and spotted by Techspot, looks like an internal document from Intel, though its authenticity is yet to be confirmed. I have tried to understand, what it really means for the consumer aside from the technological advancement of the processor architecture.
Lately, we had been noticing some major changes in the screen technologies. Large display makers are showcasing new screen technologies which promise to greatly enhance the user experience. We will review the recent industry trends and try to analyze what these really mean to the consumers.
Earlier today an article titled ‘Eric Schmidt Is Right: Google’s Glory Days Are Numbered’ caught my attention on TechCrunch. The author argued how Siri, a virtual personal assistant incorporated with iPhone starting from 4S generation, is going to be the next big thing on search engine business by transforming devices from “passive” participants in the search process to “active” ones. It is when I was reading that article the question hit me – what is really going to be the next big thing in the information & communications industry? Will it be the mobile apps, the cloud, the internet of things or something else?
. . . Suddenly your mother called and you added her into a group conversation. But your phone screen is too small to accommodate them both. So you turned on your TV and moved the call from your phone to the TV set, and continue talking to your family.’ – What you just read is an example of an ambient network where a user can switch a live call or connection between devices or networks totally unaffected. How implausible this may seem at this moment, a new solution based Alcatel-Lucent’s (ALU’s) IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) and 4G Consumer Communications solution has made this plausible. The solution enables ALU’s 4G network to offer subscribers a unique experience where one can spontaneously switch between voice, video, messaging and group calling and effortlessly move live calls to their preferred devices such as a smartphone, tablet, laptop or TV.
Almost everybody in the computer industry know the controversial story about how a pioneer like Bill Gates once misjudged the potential of memory space by saying “640 k ought to be enough for anyone”[Factoids]. Well, it is no different in case of the internet or the more hyped mobile broadband. It may sound like a stupid question now, but when the internet came around the question was would be good enough to be a communication service? During the standardization of GSM, the most successful mobile technology in the planet, people argued that no channel would ever need data speeds more than 2.4 Kbps. Yet, the race for faster networks continues. But, how much is fast enough?
What do you expect the future to behold? How would you think the world will be shaped by 2020? What opportunities will it bring? Will it be able to realize the dream of a brighter future? How would technology play a role in it? How would we play a role in it?
 |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |  |
| Copyright© 2009-2012 TheTechJournal.com | All Right Reserved. Privacy Policy | About | |||||
CDN By MaxCDN Powered By | |||||
|
|
|
