Thirty to fifty years ago people even teen agers would go down to the local pool hall or pinball joints to get their game on and often times they’d get their lungs filled with smoke.

Well these days gamers might get their lungs filled with smog if they mod up their gaming computer with the latest ion cooling system.

The general idea is that the system will cool a PC with out any moving parts and do it without sucking down a lot of power. Sounds great right! Its the same type of technology that runs the air purifiers from The Sharper Image.

The down side is that those same air purifiers reportedly make air quality worse. One Consumer Reports found that they do not actually clean the air and to make matters worse they end up creating ozone (aka smog) right in your house.

Well this PC does the same thing just at a PC level. I suspect this is one of those geeky applications to see if it is possible to create the thing. Now they need to find a practical application for the ‘thing’.

Who knows maybe PC manufacturer’s will take notice and start working on a cure for smog (ozone) so that they can find a cheaper way to cool PC’s. Now wouldn’t that be a cool gimic!

Technorati Tags: ion cooling system, ionic breeze, the sharper image

Page Popularity for Site: 1% [?]

I’ve been spending a little too much time on the handheld portables lately and not enough attention on other electronics or even mapping for that matter. Tonight, I’m covering a car audio knowledge selection from Perfect 10 Car Audio.

They offer everything from car audio manufacturers to car stereo installation.

As you can see from a map of some of their knowledge points they cover a number of items in the car audio market.

Just as in computing and handhelds and MP3 players, car audio as a hub of consumer technology is changing rapidly. To say that it has gone high tech is as much of an understatement as saying that the internet has changed society. If you are going to improve your audio experience whether or not you are trying to make the daily commute more entertaining, relaxing, or even informative with an MP3 downloaded subscription to an article or podcast there are many things to consider.

The days of installing a car radio yourself are also becoming more remote for your average audiophile. Sure you can do it yourself, but are you going to get the optimal listening experience without voiding the warranty on the equipment or your car for that matter.

Technorati Tags: car audio knowledge, mapping car audio

Page Popularity for Site: 3% [?]

Microsoft isn’t out of the gates with the ‘Zune marketplace” yet and the Zune itself won’t be here until Christmas, but they are trying to spin things up with buzz about the similarities of MySpace, one of the most popular US social networks, and Zune’s wireless capability to network MP3 files from one device to another and then sync up with a common exchange in the Zune Marketplace.

TechCrunch seems to have pegged this spin the best and they have a couple decent pictures to go with the Zune and the Zune Marketplace look and feel.

Technorati Tags: Microsoft, Zune, MySpace, ZuneSpace, Social networks, Wireless MP3 Player

Page Popularity for Site: 3% [?]

Many information maven’s these days are taking the time to publish their knowledge and start to capitalize on the demand for more content.

Google, Yahoo, even MSN are getting in the Pay Per Click - Paid Search marketing game and this is a great resource for content publishers and companies of all sizes.

Before you jump in with both feet, its very important to understand the risks such they can be mitigated or elliminated. For that reason, I use and recommend that business should do some research on the topic and don’t neglect to read a white paper by Apogee, a company that specializes in managing these types of marketing campaigns. Their white paper “Avoid PPC Advertising Agency Malpractice” and even their services and facts page can arm a business with many of the due dilligence questions that must be covered to help promote the realization of a successful campaign and the lowest cost with paid search.

Technorati Tags: paid search, PPC advertising agency malpractice,

Page Popularity for Site: 3% [?]

It seems like just yesterday, I was writing about Virgin airlines not allowing Apple and Dell users to run their laptops on a plane due to the potential of a fire hazard. In fact it was just yesterday.

Later I thought to myself that all the other computer users, sitting on the plane must have had a self indulgent snicker about that I’m sure.

“Glad its not me with a faulty laptop that I can’t use on the plane.”

Well, maybe Dell and Apple won’t be alone for long. An IBM laptop caught fire or exploded in LAX sending people running away yelling ‘bomb’ and ‘terrorist’ and other such things.

The computer was a Thinkpad, and I’m writing this quivering with fear that I won’t be able to use my own Thinkpad on a trip to Ontario at the end of the month for the Podcast and Portable Media Convention.

So be careful with your battery, feel them. If they get too hot, turn that thing off and let it cool down a bit. Apple’s and Dell may be under recall, but a battery is a battery and they do get hot especially when they get older. We should probably all use a little extra safe judgement and common sense and maybe there will be one more recall battery added to the list soon.

Technorati Tags: Thinkpad explosion, thinkpad fire, thinkpads bombs aren’t just for terrorists

Page Popularity for Site: 3% [?]

Online mapping systems are one of the webs most useful applications (if we remove the browser and email from contention.) Maps have continued to evolve providing directions first and then satellite imagery.

Now maps are getting mashed up to provide more than just directions and locations. More and more online sites are essentially overlaying the functionality of a mind map with a real geographical map or satellite image. These mashups of maps is excellent for a variety of uses whether or not a person is hiking off through the woods and needs some milestones identified along the way or even if they are going out of town to a convention and want to identify the convention center, hotels, meeting rooms, restaraunts and other attractions.
Putting the information relating to pinpointed items on a map is an excellent way to provide a lot of information in a rapid manner.

I’m working on just such a map myself for my local community. My mashup will feature a pinpoint for each home in our subdivision with a listing of the vehicles that reside there with make, model and license plate. We’ve experienced a bit of a crime spree recently in the Atlanta area and the local police are advising citizens to phone in and report cars that aren’t from the neighborhood.

These days however fewer people know their neighbors let alone all the cars in the neighborhood. But arming a neighborhood watch with a map listing the cars identified with a home can readily help people identify the residents from the miscreants that might be up to no good.

You can try it yourself - Make a Map Mashups and see some great examples of what can be done and the new tools available moving beyond Google Maps.

Technorati Tags: map mash ups, online map tools, online map software, neighborhood watch

Page Popularity for Site: 3% [?]

Dell and Apple coming off of their massive laptop battery recall are receiving the type of bad press that hurts their customers first.

The Virgin Airlines (think that Branson guy in the hot air balloon) has made the connection that a piping hot battery that catches on fire would actually be a type of flamable material. They are not preventing people from taking this flamable material with them on the plane.

However, they are preventing people from putting it close to the device that enables the flame out, that is the travellers laptop.

Travelers owning Apple and Dell laptops are being required to separate their potentially dangerous batteries from their laptops and keep them wrapped up and separate.

There does not seem to be any work to distinguish whether or not the batteries are actually made by Sony, the company that provided several million batteries in total to Dell and Apple.

Page Popularity for Site: 3% [?]

I’ve come to follow a venture capital blog written by Dan Rua, a managing partner of Inflexion Partners of Florida.

Dan’s blog is definitely not your typical dry white paper format VC blog. I say this from the insider perspective of having a double major in Finance and Accounting and a Master’s in International Tax law and working with multiple firms on many different projects over the last 6 years. His VC fund blog focuses produces a parity of technology company success ingredients with venture capital fund wisdom.

His focus is on the Southeastern United States and it seems to be primarily driven towards small to medium sized companies looking to vector out of orbit into something extra special.

Having worked with VC groups in the past, I know from experience that a good VC partner is not a person that is one sided in their perspective or business knowledge. They can typically walk through a project, a product design, spot the holes in a forecast or trouble shoot the actual problem in last quarter’s Profit and Loss statement before lunch without breaking a sweat.

A good Venture capitalist has to be well rounded in many business functions and in many disciplines in addition to finance or else someone will pull the wool over their eyes and that’s not acceptable in the VC world. Knowing and quantifying the risk is the battle.

Its been my experience therefore that if a small to medium sized technology company wants to excite their company to that next valence, they have to be completely open and honest with they VC team. Everyone needs to talk a good game on the street, but it’s imperative to be honest with yourself and your investors. Short of this and the trust vanishes, and good relationships can devolve. Get the insights and perspective from your VC partners and they can typically help you identify where you need to be and when in order to make things a success.

Setting an honest baseline, honest milestones and tracking through towards them with regular planning and adjustments is about forty percent of what it takes to be a good company. The other sixty percent is split into two parts. twenty percent is a great idea and the other forty percent is hard, nose to the grind stone work leveraging every inch of technology and outsourced partnerships to get the maxim output from your entire ecosystem of organizations.

Start honest, build a solid foundation of a relationship, and nurture that relationship along with transparency and hard work and your company will do well if you’ve got a decent idea.

Technorati Tags: venture capital, VC, transparency, technology company

Page Popularity for Site: 3% [?]

Microsoft officially unveiled the Zune a contender to potentially take on the iPod. Much information and images had been linked on the Zune device over the last few months. Key to the official release today, Microsoft described an aspect of its new Zune store for music downloads and how the WiFi wireless connectivity will play an important role in differentiating the product from the iPod.

1. The Zune can transfer music files from one Zune device to another
2. Once a Zune device receives a music file from another device, the user can listen to that music file for a limited number of instances before the file is locked out. The receiving Zune can play the file a maximum of 3 times over a 3 day period.
3. Then the receiving Zune owner can download and purchase that song title wirelessly from their device, unlocking the file for continued playback in the future.
4. It comes with a 30GB hard drive (It would not be surprising for upgrades to larger drives to follow next seasons).
5. The device will interact with the Xbox 360live supporting video playback.
6. It even has an FM tuner.
7. The best part about the Zune is that it will be available this Christmas and is reported to retail for around $300.

Microsoft had been rumored to be working on a plan where iTunes owned by consumers might be converted into Zune Tunes or Zunes. This deal has not yet materialized, but might be something to keep an eye out as the product rolls out, even if its a limited time Christmas season offer. The Zune will come in White, Black and brown.

Technorati Tags: Microsoft Zune, Zune MP3 Player, Zune Wireless Player, Zunes, Zune Tunes

Page Popularity for Site: 3% [?]