WiFi for Road Warriors

It has always aggravated me when I stay in a hotel and they charge for wifi. This is a standard service these days, and should be rolled into the cost of the room, not tagged on as nickel and dime tactic. It's even more aggravating when you pay for the service, it is extremely slow, down, or the hotel blocks certain services like VPN connectivity. Apparently I'm not the only one who feels this way as this article from The New York Times points out. Check it out.

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iPhone - Now With Ninja

So I updated my iPhone apps this weekend. Like any self-respecting nerd, I read the release notes for all of the software updates. I was pleasantly surprised to see that Google had added a new feature - Ninja. I'm not sure what the functionality of Ninja is, but Ninjas are pretty stealth and secretive, so we may never know. Either way, you can never have enough Ninja in your iPhone.

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Google Measures the Effectiveness of Advertising

The reach and intimacy of Google's ability to collect and interpret data never ceases to amaze me. This video has incredible relevance to everyone at SRG. Fascinating!

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Goats Get Goggle in Trouble with PETA

Being in downtown Boulder, us SRGers don't get to see a lot of grass around our building. Google employees on the other hand, have plenty of grass. Instead of using the old fasioned lawn-mower to trim the grass, they decided to get back to their roots and thought about what their ancestors would use...GOATS! It's perfect! Hire several hundred goats to eat up the grass. Grass gets mowed and goats get fed. Ahhh being green can be so rewarding.

Well, PETA is pretty pissed at Google about it, saying that the goats didn't get enough water and that the transportation wasn't comfortable enough for them.

It doesn't sound like a goat was harmed throughout the whole process, so I am going to go ahead and give Google props for feeding the furry little friends.

Next time, I propose Google uses fainting goats:

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New Kindle DX

The new (Star Trek-esk) reader that your kids will be using sooner than you think...

Amazon recently announced an addition to its line of Kindles dubbed the Kindle DX. Several weeks ago Amazon released the new Kindle 2 which sports a 6" e-ink display, 1/3 of an inch thick, 3G wireless access, and a slew of other features I'll leave up to you to discover. 

The new Kindle 2 and the Kindle DX differ only on the price tag, a larger hard drive and a larger 9.7" screen; making full page documents much easier to read! 

But that's not even the best part...

What makes this new device really interesting it that schools like Princeton, Arizona State, Case Western Reserve, Reed, and the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia have all agreed to distribute "hundreds" of Kindle DXs to students this coming fall. Soon enough college students wont have to worry about buying individual text books and lugging them around to class; all their books will be on one device. Publishing companies like Wiley Higher Education, tomes from Addison-Wesley, Longman & Prentice Hall and many more have partnerships with Amazon already setup and ready to go for digital textbooks.

Why couldn't CU Boulder be up with the times like the rest of these colleges!?

I wouldn't mind being on the test group for one of those babies!

Check out the new Kindle DX at the link below:

Amazon Kindle DX

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Sweet App Coming to Windows Moble 6.5 & Blackberry

*chime chime*
"Ohhh! A new text message" |You want to meet up?|

"Ack I am driving. Oh well, I will risk my life to text my friend." |Yes I want to meet u--|

*honk honk, screeeeech*
"Ok, almost died there, but I got the text off, woot! Meeting up with my friend, la la la. Happy days..."

Does this sound familiar? Well, next time you may not be so lucky!

Thankfully, in just a few weeks (and if you get the Windows Mobile 6.5 upgrade), you won't have to deal with this scary and unsafe situation.

Introducing: Tellme.
Tellme is a free program by Microsoft that is included with Windows Mobile 6.5 that allows you to easily text, call, search and more all by voice. It will be coming to Blackberry as well, but a date hasn't been set.

*chime chime*
"Ohhh! A new text message" |You want to meet up?|
All by voice - "Text Bob" "|Yeah, lets meet up!|"
... *silence.*

No longer will you have to risk your life trying to type out text messages while driving.

Check out the link to watch a video demo of what it's capable of here: http://www.tellme.com/you



Sent from my Windows Mobile phone

Just kidding :)

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Nintendo Game Boy Celebrates 20th B-day

Whether you're a gamer yourself, or a parent of someone who plays games, chances are you've heard of the Nintendo Game Boy. If you aren't a gamer yourself, you probably have even mistakenly yelled at your kid to "turn off that Game Boy" or "turn off that Nintendo" and didn't care enough to find out that they were really playing a PlayStation or an Xbox... Who cares?! They should have been setting the dinner table half an hour ago and you got sick of hearing their excuses! "I just need to get to a save point!" or "One more minute!!!!"

Ahhh, those words slip off my tongue like it was only yesterday... Sorry again Mom.

In any case, Nintendo (specifically the Game Boy) really revolutionized handheld technology. Sure it's graphics weren't top notch, nor was the sound, but it gave people a glimpse into the future. It was a tiny handheld device that could play hundreds of games, even with other people with the right connection cord.

Now handheld devices are color, widescreen, wifi capable for multiplayer, can browse the internet, get mail, output high quality music and so much more. You can't help but to think Nintendo had a huge effect on todays devices.

Here is the original Game Boy commericial:


"Comes with the outrageous new game Tetris!"

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