Now, I hate litigation, and like many would rather have companies focus on innovating for the greater good; also, I happen to like Android a lot. Nevertheless, I think many criticizers of Apple in its recent victory over Samsung are missing a key point. The argument goes, Apple sued Samsung for producing smartphones that are … Read more
Back then we had the Palm Pilot. It had a gray lo-res screen and minimal capabilities. No wireless, no GPS, no games, just basic PDA funcfions. Compared to the android phone I use now it was like a stone ax. And yet, that old Palm had a key attribute that is long lost: simplicity of … Read more
Apple Computer’s incredibly talented design team has had a major influence on the design of contemporary mobile electronics: just visit a cellular phone store and you’ll see how all the companies are scrambling to copy the iPhone’s sleek look and feel, both the hardware and the software. Well, apparently this influence goes beyond mobile devices. … Read more
Cross-posting this from my work site… a look at the original Blackberry from 1998, a winning design with different functionality, different constraints and a quite different usage model from today’s designs. Read all about it here!
I recently saw the movie Memento, whose protagonist had his ability to form long term memory destroyed by a brain trauma. The guy remembers his early life but any new memory fades in minutes. Unfazed, since he is out on a mission of vengeance, he compensates by writing notes to his future self on scraps … Read more
Here then is my sleek Nokia E71, and I really like it overall. But nobody’s perfect, right?… Take the calendar application that came on this handheld. It has a number of shortcomings (more on these later) and one amusing quirk: most of the time when you click the calendar button it displays an empty screen … Read more
These days we all have at least half a dozen gadgets whose batteries require charging, and they each come with their own charger (incompatible with all the others, of course). Now, I won’t push for standardizing the chargers – can’t aim that high – but here is a more modest goal: can we please standardize … Read more
I just got me a Nokia E71 smartphone. It looks like a particularly well-constructed gadget, though I reserve judgment until I’ve used it a while – stay tuned! However, I can already share one observation: the incredible amount of technology crammed into this tiny device. A few years ago we’d marvel at its slimness if … Read more
In the early years, when portable electronic devices were considered wonderful miracles of technology, they used to come equipped with cradles. These would at a minimum charge them – the case with the “dumb” cellular phones of the day – and later also provide cabled connectivity to a computer, as in the early Palm Pilots. … Read more
Have you had the experience, as a child, of discovering the optical properties of oiled paper? I remember it well… I was an avid reader as a kid, and when a smudge of oil from some snack would get onto my books I’d notice that the translucent oily spot that looked darker than the paper … Read more
