Gadgets Blog » 2010 » September

The world of the smartphone has also become the world of the smartphone application. Ever since folks have taken to toting around mini computers in their back pockets, developers have been creating a bevy of apps, streamlined programs intended for the pint-sized processors. Apps take on all shapes and sizes, allowing you to do everything from reading the newspaper to manipulating your voice with autotune. However, in a news story from earlier this week, a number of applications are creating risk for data theft, potentially leading to fraud and other dangers of 21st century technology.

In a joint study performed by Intel labs, Penn State, and Duke University, researchers determined that many applications perceived as secure have glaring flaws in them that can easily be manipulated by an experienced hacker. Their program centered around the development of TaintDroid, their own app intended to collect information for their research (ironically enough, perhaps). TaintDroid provides real-time updates about how apps downloaded to a smartphone collect personal information off the device, oftentimes beaming this information to other sources. The program tracks the flow of sensitive data both on the phone and to outside sources.

In the study, 30 popular applications were tested for their security. It was discovered that 15 of the 30 beamed the users current location to advertisers, likely so that better-targeted ads could be shown to the customer. Additionally, 7 of the studied apps sent other parties information pertaining to the hardware in use on the phone, including serial numbers on flash memory and on the phone itself. The final results of the study found a staggering 68 instances of information being inappropriately shared by the applications.

This Friday, The Social Network, a film detailing the rise of Facebook and its online empire, hits theaters everywhere. While some of the early reviews have been touting it as an excellent film, with Rolling Stone even granting the flick four out of four stars, the quality of the acting and directing are secondary to the remarkable nature of the story. Facebook has become a defining part of the 21st century, with millions of users utilizing the service to stay in touch with friends and family. But what if, in addition to your pictures and status updates, your network was also capable of knowing where you were at any given moment? This question, it seems, is no longer hypothetical. Facebook Places provides information to your friend list on your location, something that has some users excited and others understandably nervous.

Facebook isn’t the first company to jump on board this type of social networking. Google Latitude has been on the market for the last year for free. A Latitude-enabled smartphone kept track of your location using a GPS, broadcasting it at any given point to others in your friend group also using Latitude. While the idea had potential, the small number of users turned it into another obscure Google service offered up by the company. Additional ventures into the area have been made by startups such as FourSquare. The service, which currently has about 3,000,000 users, incorporates elements of location-based social networking as well as reviews of local businesses and hot spots. Thus far, however, only 4% of Americans have even tried such a service, according to an article at Safe and Savvy.

The tablet wars are in full swing. Even though Apple beat competitors to the punch with their iPad tablet, the rest of the field has quickly reacted to their latest product, with companies like Toshiba and Dell creating new devices as quickly as possible. This week, a new challenger to the tablet market was announced, one coming from a mobile pedigree that could boost its presence in a big way. The Blackberry Playbook, developed by the company behind Blackberry, RIM, boasts a number of features that could make it an excellent option on the market.

The specifications are impressive to say the least. A seven-inch screen boasts high-definition images, with vivid colors that pop right off the tablet. The Playbook supports 1080p video, meaning even the most high-definition films look great on its display. Other multimedia options only enhance the experience with the tablet. Dual cameras, one on the front and one on the back, allow for both picture taking and video-chatting via apps like Skype. HD video capture is possible on both cameras. In an exciting twist, an HDMI port on the side of the tablet allows you to play back pictures and images on a larger screen with ease.

The hardware inside the tablet is a lot to get excited about as well. With 1GB of RAM and a 1GHz dual-core processor, the Playbook packs some serious punch on the processing side of things. The processor supports true multitasking, enabling the user to operate multiple programs at the same time. Additionally, web browsing on the Playbook will come with the full support of HTML5 and Adobe Flash, enabling access to virtually every website on the Internet. All of the user’s favorite sites, multimedia, and games will be accessible on the Playbook.

Although it’s a regulatory agency and therefore not responsible for innovation in the field of electronics, few organizations of any sort carry the same amount of influence over technology than the FCC, or Federal Communications Commission. The government agency has overseen the development and implementation of a variety of technological advancements since its creation in 1934, as radio, television, and then the Internet became widespread means of communication. Last week, however, the FCC made an announcement that’s extraordinarily forward-thinking, and could be an indicator of what’s to come in the world of gadgets.

The FCC has opened up the broadcasting spectrum between 50 mhz and 700 mhz, setting aside this range for “super WiFi,” what will likely be the next major development in the world of computing. Initially, this range was used to broadcast television channels to receivers all across the country, but the advent of digital television has made this obsolete. Now, it’s possible that WiFi signals will use this range instead. Super WiFi routers would be able to reach for miles. This signal range is capable of going through walls and other obstacles with ease, greatly expanding the capabilities of WiFi reception.

While the technology hasn’t made its way onto shelves yet, the announcement was met with positive reception from several major computing companies such as Google and Microsoft. According to one Google spokesman, the exciting part of the announcement was how forward-thinking the FCC showed themselves to be. By implementing a regulation such as this now, long before the technology is actually in place, companies will be able to freely develop “white space networks,” which are broadcast channels operating where they do not overlap with preexisting channels.

AMC was certainly onto something when they brought the world Mad Men, a period-accurate drama set in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Providing an in-depth look at a group of people operating a marketing firm, Mad Men has done more than just take us back to a different place in history. The most startling thing for a number of young viewers is getting a look into what a large office functioned looked like in an era before computers. It just goes to show how much the 21st century technology all around us has taken over our lives, let along the actual marketing done by the office.

Targeted-advertising is perhaps the latest innovation in marketing, and it’s one that is powered by the Internet and other computer technology. Google first made this practice come into the public eye, and in the process they built a multi-billion dollar advertising empire. Firms buy advertisements from Google relating to specific keywords, with more common words costing more. Other companies have followed suit, including Facebook, who found themselves in a bit of trouble after users became concerned too much information was being placed into the hands of advertisers. Facebook’s conundrum has always been finding a non-intrusive way to sell advertising in spite of its user base that opposes intrusive ad space.

In Google’s wide array of free products, none is more impressive to me than Google Maps. With countless businesses and locations trackable both on a traditional map as well as with satellite imagery, it’s a navigational tool, a phonebook, and a time-sink all in one. The size and scope of Google’s project makes it impressive that everything works with such regularity, and that fewer instances like today’s story occur. In spite of their best efforts, a recent CNN article took a look at how Google “lost” a major United States city, thanks largely in part to a minor computer error.

The city in question is Sunrise, Florida, a city of about 90,000 located on the east side of the panhandle in roughly the same area as Miami. Searches for the city, up until yesterday, brought up results in Sarosta, FL, 200 miles away on the western side of the state. The algorithms powering Google’s search tool simply didn’t function correctly, with all businesses and addresses in Sunrise not appearing if searched for. In the past, Google has lost several other cities, including two in the greater Los Angeles area, thanks again to issues with the algorithm. These disappearances aren’t anything serious, at least to the casual observer, but other people closer to the incident don’t feel so neutral.

It’s an idea that has captured the public imagination in California, even prompting Barrack Obama’s administration to set aside money for research and development. High-speed rail is a concept that looks great on paper, but is immensely complicated in terms of implementation. The numerous factors, including distance, estimated usage, and safety, all create difficult obstacles to widespread implementation in the United States. While train aficionados might be disappointed by this slow progress, a look to the far east would reveal several successful high-speed rail lines.

Joining Japan’s world-famous Shinkansen bullet trains is China’s own demonstration line of a nationally planned high-speed rail system. Running from a station in downtown Shanghai to the large international airport, the train is the fastest in the world, reaching speeds of over 250 miles per hour. Still in the planning stages of design, the technical limitations of high-speed rail have caused a debate over what style of train to use. This airport line shows off MagLev technology, which employs magnetic energy to propel the train along the tracks.

The result is impressive to say the least. Tickets on the line cost the equivalent of about $8, with a discount being offered if you can produce an airplane ticket from the international airport at the end of the line. Two trains run on parallel tracks, with spacious seats for the remarkably short trip. The trip takes about 20 minutes on ordinary rail lines, but only 7 on the high-speed train. Within thirty seconds of departure, the train accelerates well over 150 mph, approaching its 250 mph upper limit. At certain times of the day, the train is limited to only 300 km/hr, about 180 mph.

As far as computer hardware companies go, few have the same level of brand recognition as Intel. The classic four-toned advertisements from the 1990s established the manufacturer in the public eye, and with good reason. Intel’s world of computer processors has fared well in the 21st century, with the chips being incorporated into laptop computers, smartphones, and tablets. However, if you happen to have an Intel chip in a desktop computer, upgrading to a new CPU has been one of the more difficult and technically challenging upgrades to make.

Intel, in an innovative idea, has decided to simplify this process. The Intel Upgrade Service is a new program intended to allow users to upgrade their computer without needing to make physical changes to the computer. Intel’s latest run of computer chips offered consumers a puzzling choice: pay a premium to unlock additional computing power, or do nothing and enjoy a reduction in the processing power.

The move has seen both supporters and detractors, with compelling arguments on each side. In order to make the upgrade, users purchase an online product from Intel, which then downloads an executable file to their computer. This file launches an upgrade process on the computer, unlocking the additional computing power. The entire process is simple to follow, a lot like installing any other file from the Internet.

Ever since I’ve moved off campus, my day-to-day activities have changed pretty dramatically, with the vastmajority of my time at home spent worrying I will forget something and the majority of my time away from home spent trying to figure out how badly I need what I forgot. My commute, however, has spawned a love for the bicycle that hasn’t existed since the days of riding bikes around the neighborhood. An old 80s road bike (I’m so hip) from Craigslist has managed to capture my heart, in spite of the fact that its front tire goes flat frequently enough to induce bouts of anger.

Today’s gadget, then, is fascinating in how it takes something we are so familiar with and makes ingenious changes to it. Schwinn, one of the world’s leading bike manufacturers, debuted a cycle that does away with the drive chain, one of the fundamental elements of the bike. In its place are two pairs of wires, running from the pedals to an altered real axel. The design eliminates the feelings of “slip” between pedal action and the rotation of the back wheel. Amazingly, the dismounting of the real wheel doesn’t effect the wiring at all, making this bike even more compact and easy to transport than current cycles.

The secret to this wired bike comes in two kidney-shaped discs attached to the pedals. The device rotates forward with the forward pedal stroke on that particular side, pulling a pair of wires that draw the tire forwards. As the pedal cycles backwards and towards the top of its circle, the wires similarly slide back into the ready position, and the tire is instead powered by the forward stroke on the opposite side. The pulling wires remain under constant tension, motoring the bike along and allowing the rider to change the transmission ration aka shift the gear at any point in the pedal cycle.

Way back when the original Microsoft XBox was just hitting shelves everywhere, the world first came into contact with a brand new hero. Master Chief, the warrior saving humanity in Bungie’s Halo, catapulted the franchise to international success. Never before had a first-person shooter for the console been executed so cleanly, with fast-paced action, addictive multi-player, and an epic storyline. Halo has since branched out into multiple-sequels, but developer Bungie has insisted this final entry into the saga, the prequel Halo: Reach, will be the last. And what a way to go out.

The storyline of Halo: Reach occurs before the action of any other Halo titles, when mankind first makes contact with the alien race the Covenant. A single-player campaign covers these early skirmishes as the combat goes from high-tension, suspense to large-scale battles against the aliens. The story mode has always been a highlight of the Halo experience, and Reach’s story is excellent in how it requires no prior Halo knowledge to enjoy. The campaign can be enjoyed solo or with up to three other teammates, making for a great cooperative experience.

Other multi-player modes offer up a great experience both online and off. Firefight pits up to four users against waves of enemies that become progressively stronger, allowing you to test your mettle and reach for new survival goals. The online multiplayer is perhaps the finest on XBox Live, with six different groups of games available from the main menu. There’s also a ranked-pool, something that Halo first introduced into online gaming, pitting more skilled players against each other in a competition for experience points and leveling-up. All of these modes are fully-customizable in a way few other games allow.