Like last March, I’m off with my parents driving south until we hit sunny warm weather, likely coastal California.
Month: March 2011
shameless Barbecue guru flogs with Barbecutie
A fabulously wealthy cookbook author uses supermodels to promote his chemicals and sizzled flesh.
… No doubt he holidays in Hawaii with the ill gotten booty.
This Canadian Life
One of my favourite audiocasts is This American Life with Ira Glass.
One recent episode I loved.
#426:
TOUGH ROOM 2011
Originally aired 02.04.2011This week we bring you backstage with comedy writers at The Onion. They start with over 600 potential headlines for their fake-news newspaper each week, and over the course of two days, in the very tough room that is their editorial conference room, they select 16 to go in the paper. …
It’s now airing on CBC Radio One on Sunday nights. I’m hoping that increases the Canadian audience.
The CBC, of course, is a great symbolic sacrificial lamb for conservative politicians. It may be cut in coming budgets.
you want an iPad 2
The iPad 2 was announced on March 2, 2011. It will be in stores soon.
Click PLAY or watch the promo on YouTube.
It’s the little details that make Apple great.
Click PLAY or see the iPad Smart Cover on YouTube.
2010 was the year of the iPad.
Click PLAY or watch how people use them on YouTube.
Tech pundit Leo Laporte bet fading tech pundit John Dvorak it would sell 5 million units in 2010. It sold nearly 15 million, even more than Apple projected.
Steve Jobs says 2011 will be the Year of the iPad 2.
He’s right. But competitors will begin to catch up as they have in smart phones. Catching up to Apple in profits will take years longer.
Eventually Google Droid devices will surpass Apple in sales and popularity. The only question is, how long will that take?
related – The best take on the iPad 2 launch I’ve read was by the unofficial blogger for Apple, John Gruber – The Chair
Note: The Kindle sold about 10 million units in 2010. But it’s really not an iPad competitor. Many folks have both a tablet and Kindle.
Xoom vs iPad 2
Dave and I did a little comparison shopping after the launch of the iPad 2.
If you want to be cool, get the iPad 2.
If you like fit and finish, get the iPad 2.
But you kind of have to hold the iPad 2 to really get the redesign. It’s thinner by a third, plus its edges taper to a thin line of metal. It’s almost inconceivable that this thing you’re holding is a multicore tablet computer. The Xoom tablet is trim, light, and very pretty … but when you place it next to the iPad 2, it looks as though it was designed and built by angry Soviet prison labor instead of by Motorola.
If you’re an annoying Apple fanboy, get the iPad 2.
_____
I’m an annoying Apple fanboy and there are some things superior with the Xoom.
Click PLAY or watch the Xoom promo on YouTube.
OK it’s not as friendly as an Apple device:
… The Xoom is not a tablet you would hand to your mother; it is cold and complex and industrial and vaguely foreboding, the look and feel resembling a glossed up slice of Blade Runner. Everything is black, with glowing blue accents. …
The operating system (Android 3.0 Honeycomb) is arguably more powerful. And within a few months will be much more powerful.
The built in Chrome browser is as good as the Safari browser on the iPad, and getting better, faster.
The Xoom has an SD card slot (function coming soon), something I really miss in Apple devices.
Overall, for a brand new product … it’s amazingly ready to compete with the iPad 2.
By summer, as apps roll out, the software will be as good. Or better.
And far more customizable. I’d change the dark theme to a light one, ASAP.
I have faith in Google to throw millions into the operating system until it’s superior to the iPad. That might take a year. It might take 6 months.
Motorola Xoom Review: The Future Of Tablets (Whether You Like It Or Not)
Click PLAY or watch a comic comparison on YouTube.
hiking Iceland in June
Locked and loaded.
I fly out of Halifax (after Gymnastics Nationals) on the red eye June 2nd one way direct to Reykjavik. ($315 on Iceland Air)
There are even cheaper fares out of Boston and Chicago on the discount airline, Iceland Express, but I had no luck contacting them by email or phone.
It’s not my style to book a flight so early … but both the last two summers I found that airfares skyrocket around June 1st. And those flights fill quickly.
I understand weather is a factor.
more interesting Iceland photos
I’ll be in Iceland a couple of weeks. Then likely fly on to Europe.
Pike Place Market, Seattle
I take the ferry over to Victoria Friday morning.
Walking through historic Pike Place Market en route to the 8am departure, I’ll grab a Pike Roast at Starbucks. The original opened here in 1971.
Dad’s 80th birthday
I’m heading today to Parksville, BC. My Dad turns 80 on Friday.
Snow in Idaho
At the Adlards cabin in Athol.
the future of computers
Graphene is an allotrope of carbon, whose structure is one-atom-thick …
… a stack of 3 million sheets would be only one millimeter thick.
The Nobel Prize in Physics for 2010 was awarded to Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov “for groundbreaking experiments regarding the two-dimensional material graphene …
Here’s the future.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Thanks Maureen. Thanks Rocco.
Rick McCharles 