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Innovative Insight by Brian T. Horowitz (bio)

Staying ahead of tech's next curve

July 25, 2008, 5:39 PM

Direct PC vendor Gateway goes indirect

In 1997, I bought a state-of-the-art Pentium II Gateway desktop direct from the manufacturer. I was proud of myself at the time for going direct and customizing the system according to my desired specifications.

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But today, more than 10 years later, Gateway (now owned by Acer) has dropped its 1990s way of doing business and will concentrate on retail, e-tail and channel. Wasn't the Internet supposed to be the hip way to sell PCs? How things come full circle.

According to Gateway, the change in strategy should help the company cut costs.

Gateway began moving in this direction when it acquired retail PC vendor eMachines in 2004 and ran the short-lived Gateway Country store chain.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 5:39 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share

July 23, 2008, 4:15 PM

E Ink in Esquire: Magazine tech for the future

Chalk one up for print in the battle to stay alive in the world of online media.

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Esquire magazine will put out a cover featuring E Ink electronic, foldable display technology on the newsstands this October. The 100,000-copy distribution of this special issue culminates the magazine's 75th anniversary.

Ford (NYSE: F) will also participate in the project, using E Ink's Vizplex flexible display technology in an ad on the inside cover flap.

This could be a nice boon for print to stay innovative and relevant as ad dollars move online.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 4:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share

July 22, 2008, 1:26 PM

Will a GENI build the next Internet?

There's been talk of a second Internet in the works for years -- yes we do have Web 2.0 -- and just as the original Internet started at the university-level, so does a project from technology solutions firm BBN Technologies called Global Environment for Network Innovations, or GENI.

GENI is a local network infrastructure for science and research projects -- think of it as a network testbed for innovation, suggests an article by the Chronicle for Higher Education. According to the academic journal, the current Internet could fall apart from all the spam attacks and viruses.

BBN Technologies today received a three-year, $4 million grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation to build a prototype of GENI with the help of 29 university teams.

This project will provide fresh bandwidth for companies to work on experiments in all fields from economics and social sciences to computer engineering.

It will be interesting to see what form this futuristic network takes.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 1:26 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share

July 14, 2008, 3:06 PM

Startup cancels noise on mobile phones

We know about noise-canceling headsets for audio devices and mobile phones but how about noise-canceling capabilities built into the phone itself?

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An article in the July/August issue of Technology Review puts the spotlight on Mountain View, Calif.-based startup Audience, which makes the voice processors for this technology. According to Audience, mobile phone manufacturers in Japan and Korea can purchase these processors for $5 to $7 to insert into the phones.

Technology Review reports that companies such as On Semiconductor, Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) and NXP Semiconductors are developing similar technology.

The voice processor chip cancels out most other noise traveling through the microphone except for the speaker's voice.

The fact that the phone chip makes the speaker's voice clearer and doesn't totally drown out other noise for the listener alleviates a major concern I have with noise-cancellation technology -- the canceling out of sounds you hear while speaking on the phone and crossing the street.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 3:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share

July 3, 2008, 3:35 PM

RSS: really simple news-speak on the go

Have you listened to an RSS feed on a mobile phone? Well, you can.

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Jott Networks, operator of mobile voice to text service recently came out with Jott Feeds, a service that lets you listen to any RSS update on your handset on your way to work. It also handles feeds from your Twitter or Facebook account.

At the recent Digital Experience press event in New York, I tried listening to RSS feeds from InternetNews.com on a mobile phone. It's a bit awkward listening to the robotic voice at a slow speed, but it seemed handy for those with disabilities or if you're on a train and want to give your eyes a break.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 3:35 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share

June 26, 2008, 8:34 PM

Synaptics touch pad tech gains momentum

NEW YORK -- At the Digital Experience tech event here, I had a chance to see the new touch pad technology coming this fall from Synaptics (NASDAQ: SYNA).

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Picture a trackball that keeps spinning after its initial push or a child's matchbox car racing across the table after its windup.

That's what's ahead with touch pads as Synaptics' momentum functionality comes soon to laptops. This feature is already present on the Samsung Instinct mobile phone.

Scrolling momentum you create with just one flick of the finger will come in handy when slogging through long documents such as Excel spreadsheets.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 8:34 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Share

June 25, 2008, 4:39 PM

Blood pressure boils over the Web

This week the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) released a study about home health care and using the Internet to communicate with your doctors online.

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Can blood pressure really be monitored online? Apparently so. The patients test the blood pressure themselves and keep their doctors informed via the Web.

According to the report, self-monitoring of blood pressure by patients and reporting to doctors over the Web provides similar accuracy as in-office testing and costs patients less. Next up for AMA testing: diabetes monitoring.

How about monitoring of worker stress through the number of IMs and e-mails?

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 4:39 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share

June 3, 2008, 5:25 PM

Netbooks: a challenge to laptops?

netbooks.A.JPGA new category of portable PCs has emerged -- call it the Netbook, Nettop, mobile Internet devices (MIDs), ultralow-cost PC.

Whatever term you choose, Asus appears to be leading the pack with its Eee PC, a low-cost 9-inch computer selling for around $250 and featuring Intel's (NASDAQ: INTC) Atom microprocessor. Asus announced its new line of low-cost, portable models at the Computex trade show in Taipei, Taiwan.

What could make these PCs work is that they're cheap and potentially effective in satisfying the needs of small businesses starting out and users in developing countries as they learn how to make use of the Internet.

The unit comes with a solid-state hard drive, but many users will make use of the Web to store files and use online word processing and spreadsheet applications.

Asus says the Eee has a battery life of close to 8 hours, almost four times that of my year-old HP Pavilion laptop.

Will Netbooks replace laptops or notebooks as we know them today? Hard to tell, but these compact, portable systems are likely to sell.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 5:25 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share

May 23, 2008, 4:32 PM

A Decade of King Bluetooth

full_logo_blueblack.gifAccording to the Bellevue, Wash.-based Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG), yesterday was the 10th anniversary of Bluetooth technology, the short-range wireless standard that has people looking like their talking out of their ears.

In 1998, it was still innovative to simply have a mobile phone, but wireless Bluetooth headsets were already in existence.

According to the Bluetooth SIG and research firm Millward Brown, 85 percent of consumers recognize Bluetooth compared with 53 percent for Wi-Fi.

Bluetooth SIG also reports that 2 billion devices now incorporate its technology, a staggering number.

But where does the tooth come into play? Well, according to Bluetooth SIG, Bluetooth is the name of a Danish king from the 10th century, King Harald Blatand (Harold Bluetooth in English).

The company says King Blatand united factions in Norway, Sweden and Denmark, just as Bluetooth technology fosters connectivity for the computing, mobile phone and automotive markets.

A stretch? Maybe. Although its known mostly for the wireless headsets, Bluetooth can now be found in games, cars, clothing -- even toys.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 4:32 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share

May 22, 2008, 4:42 PM

On Distributing Online Video

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NEW YORK -- The word from the panelists at Tuesday's online video session at the Mediabistro Circus here was to spread online video everywhere you possible can.

Jim Louderback, CEO of Internet television network Revision3, joked that distributing content is like drug dealing: You need to "get it out there everywhere you can." He added, "If you love something set it free."

Dina Kaplan, co-founder and COO of online video site Blip.tv, stressed the importance of syndication for online video and distributing it to sites such as AOL, iTunes and Facebook.

She also predicted that her network may expand off the Web in the future and form a film division, reversing the path of technology from old media to new. She also sees TV networks forming online versions of popular shows in the future.

Kaplan said we'll be watching online shows in a year or two on our television sets, and cable companies such as Cablevision (NYSE: CVC) and Comcast (NASDAQ: CMCSA) will include online video in their offerings.

Robert Scoble, author of the "Scobleizer" in Fast Company magazine and managing director of the Fastcompany.tv site, showed off some cool tricks, such as the site Asterpix.com, which allows you to create clickable regions on top of a video.

Scoble also shared that by using Twittervision on his site, he was first to tell anyone else about the recent earthquake in China.

Posted by Brian T. Horowitz at 4:42 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Share