Gadgets Blog

The decade is almost over, and wow, what a decade it has been. The technological advancements easily set this decade apart from many others, and a lot of that has to do with Apple and Nintendo.

The world of gaming saw the creation of the motion-controlled Nintendo Wii, X-box 360 and hardware powerhouse PlayStation 3. Everyone was “bowling” with the Wiimote and fighting with light sabers until Microsoft came out with the Kinect for X-box 360 and the game changed. As graphics and sound developed far beyond those of the ’90s, televisions have kept up with them. You can now watch movies and play video games on 3D high-definition televisions and even see them in realistic 3D on the big screen.

This could easily be considered the decade of the smartphone. Perhaps, no other medium has come so far so fast. Blackberry started it all by syncing e-mail and calendar with my computer, and then Apple revolutionized smartphones by adding real Internet browsing and hundreds of thousands of apps for everything from shopping and maps to games and sexy women in bikinis. Just when you thought Apple was going to corner the smartphone market, Android came in, and while it hasn’t overtaken the iPhone yet, it’s gaining a following.

This decade put the final nail on the paperback coffin, with millions of e-readers being sold. Kindle and the like can download books directly to the reader, as well as get the daily New York Times. Entire bookshelves can be downsized to a single tablet reader.

When I was 16 and got my license oh-so-many moons ago, I was a reckless maniac on the streets. I would go down the roads at 80 or 90 miles per hour and a host of other dangerous things that should have gotten me killed, but I was lucky.

Sadly, not every teen gets the same deal, and many die in tragic car crashes because of reckless driving. Ford’s new upgrade to the MyKey technology gives parents the option to set the maximum speed limit for the car to between 60 and 80 miles per hour.

So, if your child spends all his time on the highway, then you can set the max speed of the 60 miles per hour, and if they are heading on the freeway, then you can set it for 65. This is some major parental control technology that will inevitably save lives and, at the same time, cause serious teenage tantrums. I can just hear it now: “You’re ruining my life!”

As the parent of three boys, one of which will probably try cliff jumping by the time he’s 10, I am fairly scared about the day they earn their licenses. If they are anything like me, then they will try to do many reckless and crazy things that I will never know about.

I can guarantee you that the day my oldest gets his license, I hope and pray this technology is available on the car we are driving. If I had my way, then I would probably set it for like 25 miles per hour.

One day, as I was walking into my local gas station, I saw a big poster on the window featuring electronic cigarettes. These newest stop smoking aids allow users to imitate the act of smoking, inhale nicotine and expel a smoke-like vapor.

I have never been much of a smoker I have seen too many of my family members suffer from the addiction and the health issues that came from it. Many of the people who smoke try to quit the habit at some point in their lives, often several times, and they can’t seem to break free from the addiction.

There has been nicotine gum, the nicotine patch, medication and now the electronic cigarette. I did a little research, and there are many brands and a starter pack of a cigarette, charger and nicotine vapor cartridges, all costing between $60 and $100, which is a substantial initial investment. The cartridges last about the equivalent of two packs of standard cigarettes, and over time, you apparently make it up in savings because the cartridges are less expensive.

Proponents say the e-cig is a safer alternative to smoking, because you get the nicotine, as in the gum and patch, without the other poisons that are present in standard cigarettes. They also say that the act of smoking is just as much a part of the smoking experience as the nicotine, and the electronic cigarette helps by giving people that as well.

Just when you thought it was safe to watch Harry Potter on your cell phone, industry experts are saying it’s going to starting hitting you where it counts…in the pocketbook.

Do you remember the days before 3G coverage when we were forced to use tiny screens and actually push buttons and all we could really surf was out e-mail and a few sites designed for mobile Internet browsing. You remember those days? That’s when we actually used the phone to call people.

When 3G hit and phones were able to actually surf the web in its entirety, the game changed and we grew to not only love our new freedoms but also to covet and expect them. Soon, you could watch videos and television shows on the phone all while waiting in line for your groceries.

The major networks spent billions and billions of dollars to upgrade their infrastructure all the while offering unlimited data plans at a relatively cheap price. They made their networks better so we could watch Netflix from our phones and then seemingly paid the bill. Uh, yeah. Not so much.

I earned my writing chops working for a small town daily newspaper from 2000–07. I saw firsthand the effect the Internet had on newspaper sales and watched as our circulation dropped month by month. I finally got out of the business in favor of a more digital, medium because I saw the writing on the wall.

When the e-reader first debuted a few years ago, I thought it was a concept that just wouldn’t take off. Anyone who has tried to read a book on a computer and felt the headache afterward may understand my feelings.

When a friend bought one and I finally got to see how it looked and worked, I have to admit, I was impressed. He had the New York Times downloaded to his e-reader every day and had several books already on it.

It was at this point when I realized that reading both newspapers and books was going to be changed forever because of this little tablet. Amazon.com recently sent out a press release explaining how its Kindle had surpassed Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows as its highest-selling product in the history of the company.

Tablets like the Galaxy and iPad are sure to have Kindle or other apps in the future, and the technology will only get more advanced. Soon, bookshelves of text will be converted into digital formats that will all be housed on a single server.

I have always been the smart one in the family at least when it comes to gadgets. My whole life, every time my family would get something electronic, from a microwave to a VCR or surround sound system, it was always my job to set them up. Electronics were always my gift of preference, and I could never help myself trying to figure out the present before Christmas.

As I got a little older, I began become more sneaky in my gift guessing. I would come down at night and sneak a peek in a corner of the wrapping paper, then I would lift the tape and finally, I ended up just unwrapping the present and rewrapping it.

The first year I dared to unwrap the present was the year I had begged and pleaded to get Sega Genesis for Christmas. This was Sega’s foray into the 16-bit gaming genre and came with the game Altered Beast, which was my favorite above all others in the arcade.

Halfway through December, I had already taken up the corner and realized that the Genesis was mine, but I just couldn’t stop. I was so excited to get it that one night I ended up unwrapping the present so I could see the whole box and read all about the system and the games.

It came time to wrap the present up again and I reveled in how clever I was. I had seen my present and no one was the wiser. Sadly, I did not realize how complicated it would be to wrap up a present when I was 7-year-old. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get it to look right. It was bad. Finally, I ended up shoving all the paper under the box so that the top looked flat and well wrapped, but the bottom was a mess. I just prayed that no one would move the box before Christmas.

As a writer whose clients are primarily Internet based, I spend a lot of time using Skype to talk to people and get information, etc. It’s really an integral part of the Internet business lifestyle.

Yesterday morning, Skype wasn’t working. When I could log on, it couldn’t find the other friends on my list. I couldn’t chat, and all my meetings ended up getting canceled. The outage lasted throughout the day and wasn’t resolved until I got online this morning.

This was a universal outage that affected everybody, and for an intrepid writer like me, it put a cramp in my style. The problem was a software issue that hit their supernodes. The supernodes are what the program uses to recognize who of your friends is online.

The problem was mostly mixed by this morning, and more than 10 million people were already signed in, but it may still take a little while for some people to be able to get online. The company didn’t say how long it would take for the program to be 100 percent operational, but given the number of complaints, they it won’t likely be long.

The outage forced me to use that most archaic of human devices, a phone, to talk to people yesterday. I am writer, so typing away on a Skype message is much easier for me than having an actual phone conversation. (I know you can use Skype for a phone, but I don’t use it like that.)

As a former reporter, I always hated the lack of flexibility in courtrooms for members of the media. I remember sitting in the courtroom for hours writing like a mad man to try and get the gist of the testimony, some great direct quotes and more.

It would have been much easier if I had a tape recorder; I could have used it and just went back over the tape later in the office. I understand the need for the unobtrusive nature of justice, and neither the defense nor the prosecution wants to have some stupid reason for a mistrial.

Things have suddenly gotten a little easier for reporters in Wales and England after an official proclamation that they can tweet court reporting live using silent portable devices. Reporters must first formally request the ability to use Twitter in every court case and then only if the device is silent and will not disrupt proceedings.

This is a major coup for reporters who would otherwise have to leave the courtroom periodically to live blog or tweet something outside and potentially miss important proceedings. The law is still rather new, and only time will tell how it will be used and abused. We reporters are fond of breaking or bending the rules as far as we can.

In the U.S., cell phones are not even allowed into courtrooms, at least in the ones I frequented as a reporter, so tweeting and messaging a court case is impossible. It will take sweeping changes in the sensibilities of the U.S. court system to allow such a law here in the states.

I remember the days before Google, when you went to Yahoo! if you wanted to find something on the Internet. Yahoo! was the go-to place for everything. You could get e-mail, news and more, all at a single site, and we loved it.

When Google came along, it became a battle between the two sites for supremacy, and after a few years, Yahoo! settled itself into second place and seemed content. Google came out with all their extras like documents, maps, etc., and Yahoo! tweaked its site, adding music videos and other extras, but it never could overtake Google.

Recently, Yahoo! felt the pinch of the tight economy and released 4 percent of its workforce in addition to dropping Buzz, Delicious and AltaVista. Buzz I can completely understand, because it never did take off and become what the developers wanted it to be. AltaVista, who even remembers AltaVista? The surprising cut was the social bookmarking site Delicious.

Delicious was created in 2003 as its own entity, but was acquired by Yahoo! in 2005. While still a favorite among bookmarkers, its traffic has seen a steady decline since 2005, as a number of social bookmarking sites began sprouting up, and the thrill of bookmarking began to wear off.

In was but a wee one when the original “Tron” came out in 1982, but I was mesmerized by the amazing graphics and cool special effects. It has action and light cycles, and it involved computers, something not many movies were doing at that time.

Almost 30 years later, a much-anticipated follow-up movie premieres today, and the video game Tron: Evolution is already in stories. It got me thinking about when “Tron” first came out and the arcade game that was developed to follow the movie. I frequented a lot of arcades back then, and that game got me hooked far more than Donkey Kong or Pac Man.

Perhaps the most fun about it was that it was four games in one. It wasn’t just the same game over and over again with maybe a new terrain or faster enemies; there were four completely different games. While that may pale in comparison to the Mario Party and Carnival Games of today, back then, it was unheard of.

Everybody had their favorite game, and the one that they couldn’t stand but played anyway because it was the only way to beat the game. The arcade game featured black lights and fluorescent lights, and it just looked amazing on the arcade floor.

You have to remember that arcades of the ’80s were nothing like the arcades of today. They were loud and dark and filled to the brim with people. For teens and younger, the arcade was the only place to go and play for cheap. All you needed was a few dollars in quarters.