RIM has always relied on making good with it’s business clients and the new Bold looks to build on that example. Keep it simple, add a sense of touch and style, and you have a good a pretty good phone. Deck it out with extended email features and some business software and it may even be a great phone. But is it really what people want?
Watching the video I’d say that Research in Motion still doesn’t have the interface jazzed up enough to really garner a mainstream audience like the one the iPhone commands. Still, the Bold 9800 Slider, looks pretty amazing, showing many of the features we’ve come to expect from our superphones, and is looking pretty snappy while doing it.
It’s going to take some doing to really compete with a product like the one that Apple has brought to the table in the iPhone 4G however, and I don’t know if the Bold could be truly called an iPhone killer, or just another business minded phone for a jet set minded audience.
Apple, for their part, always seems to be that much further ahead on the curve, especially with the release of their Apple iPhone 4G that debuted a week ago looking to be the product that could carry Apple for a very long time.
This is possibly one of the best internet browser commercials I have ever seen, and I’ve even made one. It may even be the best commercial I have ever seen period.
One Laptop per Child, the people behind those neon green colored nearly indestructible computers sent to third world countries to promote learning, announced last week that they are entering into a production agreement with company, Marvell, a computer manufacturer based out of Santa Clara California, to create it’s next generation XO-3 model of portable computers in a tablet format similar to the iPad.
The first models are to run around $75-$100 dollars and come with glass screens, while future models are mentioned to be spec’d with plastic screens to make them more durable.
To date, One Laptop per Child has distributed over 1 million laptops world wide, many to third world and developing countries.
It’s obvious the impact a program like this could have, since it was with the initial launch of sub $500 PCs such as Acers and E-Machines that “a computer in every household” first started to take hold in countries such as the United States in the late 90’s.
For many of these countries to be in sync with the rest of the world means having access to current trends in technology, without which, they are severely handicapped.
Something new to look at in the best perceived brands for quality category. Honda has taken the top spot by a wide margin, with Ford coming in second, Nissan came in third, Chevrolet, which has battled reputation issues for quite some time came in fourth, and Toyota, with it’s recent acceleration issues amongst other things came in fifth.
Interestingly enough, it’s the smaller to mid sized car companies that are doing the best right now. With Toyota, the number one car company by sales in the world falling all the way to fifth, while Chevrolet, the former number one by sales sitting at about the same spot. Just goes to show that it isn’t always size that counts, but the time and effort that goes into the product itself.
We’ve talked about how technology and human interaction are becoming more integrated all the time, but seeing this is pretty amazing. It’s hard to believe that technology like this is just a few short years away from becoming commonplace.
TED is system designed as a wearable computer, where the computer can be interacted with by using hand gestures in the air in front you, and the screen is projected onto any surface in front of you, including the palm of your hand or a wall. The technology is innovative, in that it allows its wearer to interact with the products and people around it by sensing the objects within sight of the camera and delivering what amounts to meta data, a descriptive language, about the objects, allowing its user to have the information available to make choices about how they interact with their environment. While this technology is still relatively new, it looks to be fairly simple, and easy to use even in it’s early stages.
Technology such as TED is really part of the next wave of future technology coming out of the tech sector and won’t be mainstream for time, but it definitely is something to watch, and demonstrates peoples desire to have technology that integrates well into their lives as opposed to technology in which we have to chain ourselves to some place or some time in order to maintain a lifestyle.
