In January, The New York Times wondered aloud why Apple did not make the iPhone in America. The story heaped a torrent of commentary and scrutiny on Silicon Valley’s most valuable company. Whether you think manufacturing in the U.S. is right or not for Apple, Cadillac is proving that American-made technology can compete with the best.
Tag Archives: NYT
Improvements in New York Times’ Fech Makes It Easier to Follow the Money
Having data available electronically is not the same thing as the data being useful. Campaign finance disclosures provided electronically by the Federal Elections Commission (FEC), are a good example of that. The New York Times’s Fech (not “fetch”) is a RubyGem – a packaged application – designed to help journalists and public interest…
What Technology Wants: Kevin Kelly’s Theory of Evolution for Technology
Over the past week I read Kevin Kelly’s latest book, What Technology Wants. It’s a highly ambitious and expansive book, which looks at technology from an evolutionary perspective. Over 350 pages, Kelly outlines and explores technology as a living system, akin to humanity’s biological evolution. The title alludes to this – ‘What Technology Wants…
The iPad Turns One: My Top 10 iPad Apps Over the Past Year
On April 3, 2010, Apple officially launched its much anticipated tablet: the iPad. It was the most hyped tech product of the year, but for many of us the hype turned out to be justified. My own Web browsing habits were immediately changed by the iPad. Indeed, I’m writing a whole series currently about how the iPad and other non-PC devices are…
Remembering Dennis Ritchie, Creator of the C Programming Language and UNIX Co-Creator
Dennis M. Ritchie, co-creator of UNIX and father of the C programming language, died this past weekend after a long illness. It’s no exaggeration to say that without Ritchie, modern computing would not be what it is today.
Often known as “dmr,” Ritchie was born in Bronxville, NY in 1941. He studied at Harvard University, initially focusing on…
How One Mobile Device Manager Works
I have written frequently about the BYOD trend (such as my article last week on why managing devices isn’t easy. The other side of BYOD is using some form of endpoint management product to make sure that you can track and secure all of your devices. These go under various headings, such as Mobile Device Management (MDM), endpoint security, or…
Rush to Upgrade to iOS 5 Strains Apple’s Servers, Causes Headaches
The release of one of Apple’s biggest updates to its mobile operating system yesterday was not without issues. As iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch owners flocked to their computers to upgrade their devices to the new OS, Apple’s servers were apparently caught off guard.
The first snag many noticed was the estimated download time for the software. As…
Time to “Like” Your Local Mall
You wouldn’t think that your local megaplex shopping mall is leading the way in terms of social media engagement, but you’d be wrong. Simon Property Group, owners of hundreds of malls across America, is doing it right when it comes to how they engage their store owners and consumers. Let’s take a closer look and see some of the lessons learned…
1 Million People Have Backed Kickstarter Projects
Only two years after launching, online crowdfunding service Kickstarter has had 1 million people sign up and pledge financial support for a wide range of projects of all shapes and sizes. The site has been used to help creative people get funding for everything from art projects, music videos and graphic novels to urban farms and DIY computing…
Ex-Twitter VP Jason Goldman Funds Startup That Turns Legacy Content Into Mobile Games
Mobile quiz startup Qrank will announce next week that it has raised a seed round of funding, including an investment from early Twitter VP of Product Jason Goldman. Qrank is building out a platform that will let any organization with a backlog of content use it to create smart, fast-paced mobile trivia games. The games incorporate social…
Did Google Hand a Wikileaks Volunteer’s Gmail Data to the U.S. Government? [Updated]
Gmail users got a hefty dose of reality today when it was revealed that Google may have handed over one user’s private data to the U.S. government, who requested it without a search warrant.
The contacts list and IP address data of Jacob Appelbaum, a WikiLeaks volunteer and developer for Tor was given to the U.S. government after they…
iPhone 4S Breaks Apple Sales Record by 66%, Despite Your Disappointed Tweets
However underwhelmed the initial response to its launch may have seemed, the iPhone 4S just broke Apple’s sales records. The company’s latest smartphone, which was unveiled last week, sold over 1 million units in its first 24 hours of being available to pre-order.
To put things in perspective, when the iPhone 4 launched last year, it set a…
New YouTube Contest Will Perform Your Science Experiment Live From Space
YouTube has just announced a new channel that truly deserves the overused adjective, “epic.” It’s called YouTube Space Lab, a partnership with Lenovo, Space Adventures, the National Aeronautics & Space Administration (NASA), the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).
Space Lab will allow students to…
Customer Backlash Forces Netflix to Drop ‘Qwikster’ DVD Plan
When Netflix announced its plan last month to spin off its DVD rental business into a an entirely seperate subsidiary called Qwikster, customers were not pleased. The company’s recent subscription price hike had already irked customers, causing about 1 million of them to quit the service.
Having heard those complaints loud and clear, the company…
Thanks to the Web, Homes Without Cable Will Triple by 2016
As more TV viewers watch their favorite shows online, the number of U.S. households without a cable subscription is expected to rise dramatically between now and 2016, according to a new report from Magnaglobal, a media forecasting firm.
By 2016, the number of households that do not subscribe to a traditional pay TV service will triple from…
Dalai Lama To Host Google Plus Hangout Tomorrow
The Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader in exile, has joined Google Plus, and he’s hosting a live Hangout tomorrow with Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The conversation is part of the inaugural Desmond Tutu Peace Lecture in Cape Town, South Africa. It’s an On Air Hangout, so there’s no limit to the number of viewers.
The Hangout will be held tomorrow…
This Is Your Brain on 3D Ads
What makes a good advertisement? From a consumer’s standpoint, a good ad is entertaining, helpful, and hopefully not too much of an interruption. Ads are a part of life for consumers, especially on the Web. In exchange for getting all this stuff for free or cheap, we accept the background noise of advertising.
But advertisers don’t want to be in…
Google Maps Adds New Crowdsourced Maps of Afghanistan, Iraq & Elsewhere
Google has just announced the latest class of countries to graduate from Google Map Maker and become full-fledged citizens of Google Maps. Map Maker allows “citizen cartographers” to add details like little roads, businesses and geographic features to parts of the world that Google’s staff can’t easily reach.
Today’s announcement incorporates…
LinkedIn Lets Companies Share Their Own Status Updates
LinkedIn has launched status updates from companies. Administrators of company pages can post short updates just like individual users can. This provides companies with a way to engage followers and start conversations from within the public LinkedIn stream.
Users of LinkedIn could follow company profiles since 2010. Previously, users following…
From Silicon Valley to Bahrain, the Web Mourns Steve Jobs
Following the news of the death of Steve Jobs on Wednesday night, millions of people took to the Web to mourn the founder and former chief executive of the biggest technology company in the world.
Everyone from Apple customers and admirers to other tech luminaries and the President of the United States expressed their condolences in the form of…