...more recent posts
Wired had an article about this guy Dean Kamen a few months ago. I'll have to go back and take a look at it. Supposedly, he is developing a top secret technology product that is going to "change the world." Unfortunately, nobody knows what it is. MSNBC has this story about journalist Steve Kemper, who has been documenting the story from the inside, selling the rights to his book on the development of the technology for $250K - even though he wasn't allowed to reveal anything about the device to the publisher shelling out the dough. Most intriguing is reports of a meeting between Kamen and Jeff Bezos, Steve Jobs, and John Doerr (super VC.) Apparently, if we are to believe Kemper who clearly stands to gain from any amount of hype, these three techno luminaries were completely blown away by the demonstration. Dig these quotes from the article:
Bezos is quoted as saying that IT “...is a product so revolutionary,
you’ll have no problem selling it. The question is, are people going to be
allowed to use it?”
Jobs is quoted as saying: “...If enough people see the machine you
won’t have to convince them to architect cities around it. It’ll just
happen.”
Kemper says the invention will “profoundly
affect our environment and the way people live worldwide. It will be an
alternative to products that are dirty, expensive, sometimes dangerous and
often frustrating, especially for people in the cities.”
O.K., I'll bite. What is this thing? Supposedly we'll know in 2002. (When I first read that 2002 date I thought, "Oh great, another thing that won't hit the market for years..." and then I realized that 2002 is next year! Damn the future is going fast.)
Still digesting yesterdays announcements. Seems like one of the biggest things was the introduction of the "superdrive" in high end desktop Macs capable of burning DVDs (regular DVDs that is, ones that will play in home DVD players, not the older, non-compatible, DVD-RAMS which are in cartridges a la zips or 3.5" floppies.) This is very cool, and represents a massive price drop considering stand alone DVD burners were going for +$5000. Now you can get a fully loaded high end Mac with DVD burning capability for less than $4000. I wonder how the MPAA is going to feel about that. And oh yeah, the "superdrive" is also a CD/RW burner! To go along with the drive, apple has some new software. iDVD (along with the popular iMovie) will be bundled with the new PowerMacs giving you the ability to burn DVD movies right out of the box. For professional use apple is also offering DVD Studio Pro which I guess is to iDVD as Final Cut Pro is to iMovie (i.e., it costs $999 instead of $0, but if you're a pro, this is still insanely cheap for serious DVD production.) The big question, for me at least since I won't be buying one of these machines, is if Apple is going to sell this drive as an external unit. Please?
In a slightly related story (or, in what would have been considered totally cool if Apple hadn't introduced the stuff above,) Roxio has unvelied Toast 5, the newest upgrade to the popular Mac CD burning software. And this new version will support burning video CDs (VCDs) that can play in most DVD players. That's good news, but I think I'd rather just burn full on DVDs, thanks.
I guess it's still unclear whether Job's vision of the everyman as multimedia producer will ever pan out, but he is sure offering the tools. They're not cheap, per se, but compared to what you would have needed a few months ago the prices are very attractive. And compared to pre Final Cut Pro days I'd say that the new high end desktop Macs ($3500 for the 733Mhz w/ superdrive, 256K, 60gigs + $1000 Final Cut Pro + $1000 DVD Studio Pro + $1500 monitor = $7000 for what would have cost...what?...close to $200K back in Avid days? More?) actually do represent a real desktop publishing revolution. But like I said, the question remains whether the average person really needs to be making movies of their life. If you just want to play Doom, a Windows 98 system is going to rock these Macs. But if you cling to the idea that computers can be used to make something akin to art, Apple is still leading the way. Now if they can just keep from going out of business...
Jobs did announce single processor 733 mhz desktop G4s, but they won't ship until February, and even then supplies will be limited. This is total vapor meant to calm Wall St. It is well known that Motorolla cannot presently make anything over 600 mhz in quantity, so this announcement basically means nothing. Or worse. I'm prepared to eat my computer if they are shipping quantities of 733 machines before March 1, and frankly, I'll be highly surprised if they are shipping before May 1. Anyway, the big news is the powerbook. Exactly as expected. 400 and 500 mhz g4 models. 15.2 inch screen! DVD, firewire, usb, irda. 1 inch thick! (This is .15" thinner than the thinnest Sony Viao!) 5 lbs. Titanium enclosure. Jobs calls it "unreasonably thin." :-) 5 hour battery life, DVD, and that wide screen are going to be turning a lot of heads on those cross country flights. Unfortunately I coudn't get the webcast (don't ask) so I am still searching for a picture of this beauty. Regardless, my pavlovian responses are in fine working order. Now if only they've made enough of these things. If so I think this could be the best selling Apple ever. And boy do they need it.
updated: here is a small, head on shot from Apple's site.
Speaking of cool notebooks, what's the deal with this Sony PCG-GT1? I don't think it's for sale in the U.S. yet (although you can maybe get one from the ever strange chuckmeister) but it looks pretty interesting.
The wide screen powerbook rumors that I thought had been debunked have surfaced again with some vigor. 15.2 inch screen, capable of 1152x768! That would be very cool. I'm still doubtful, but we'll know a little bit past noon. You can watch Steve crank up the hype machine yourself here.
Macworld San Francisco is tomorrow (well, all this week, but Job's keynote is tomorrow, so that's when the big announcements from Apple will come.) Hopefully debuting will be the powerbook g4 with its often rumored but never seen sleek new ultrathin design. Some people claim the whole machine is the thickness of the bottom half of the present powerbook. Nice. New desktops also, but I'll be highly surprised if they announce anything over 600 mhz (or if they do announce something higher, you won't be able to get one for months.) Small chance that OS X will be officially released, but I think Macworld Tokyo is a better bet (end of February.) Also possible is the long awaited 17 inch flat panel. I'll be watching.
I'm still trying to digest this article which is subtitled "how to make the free distribution of content profitable." I think he may have something here. Sort of radical, and I think the big content publishing industries are going to have to go through with (the failure of) the "trusted client" model first, but Mr. Copley has at least hit upon a scheme that could work. I wasn't sure this much was even possible. Very intriguing.
The Swiss are going to have a national referendum to decide the question of giving animals legal status as "beings" and not "assets." (from kuro5hin)
Macs in space. Using orbiting G4 Cubes to provide low cost wireless internet access anywhere on the globe.
Desktop Websites is the latest catch phrase from the userland camp. He's definitely got something here, but I wonder if it can be bootstrapped into existence. The problem, as usual, has to do with Metcalfe's law which states that "the usefulness, or utility, of a network equals the square of the number of users." Or, in other words, it won't be cool until a lot of people are using it, but how do you convince people to invest the time and/or money associated with adopting a new technology before it's cool? As always, we're watching. It's not out of the question that I would move to their platform.