In a follow up to our earlier story on ViaSat and NRTC, ViaSat have announced their new 12 Mb/s satellite broadband service, exede. The high speed service will launch on 16 January beginning at $50 per month, offering 12 Mb/s down and 3 Mb/s up, using the new ViaSat-1 satellite.

The exede service will be welcomed by rural communities that have been unable to get high speed Internet connections because of the lack of infrastructure and the distances involved. Satellite broadband overcomes these issues to offer a “feels like fiber” experience.

“With our new exede broadband service, customers across the United States will have a way to get exceptional speed whether they live in a city, suburbs or a more rural area,” said Tom Moore, senior VP of ViaSat.  “Our new exede service speeds make us very competitive with both wireless home broadband service as well as legacy DSL and many cable services.”

The exede residential broadband packages all feature the same high speed but with higher data allowances at each price point. 

Overall, this looks like a great new service for people who were poorly served in the past, but users will have to watch out for those data limits.

At CES in Las Vegas, Withings has announced its wireless Internet-connected baby and toddle scale, winner of a 2012 CES Innovations Award. Developed by the French company, the Smart Baby Scale incorporates WiFi, Bluetooth and the low power Bluetooth Smart connectivity and allows parents to accurately record their child’s weight from birth.

Using the Smart Baby Scale, parents can view the weight readings from any net connected device, such as PC, laptop, iPad, iPhone or iPod touch using the already available WiScale app. Parents can easily pass on their child’s weight profile to their doctor, family and friends and the scale can also update Facebook and Twitter. Messages can be sent to email addresses with new readings and, if desired, parents can put together a scrapbook with notes and photos to create a story of their child’s growth.

Cédric Hutchings, Withings co-founder says, “We are very excited to announce our Smart Baby Scale and offer parents an amazing new way to take care of their newborn or young child. The success of our WiFi Body Scale has proven the benefits of connected weight tracking on adults and we were eager to also bring these benefits to babies and children. We are thrilled that our Smart Baby Scale was awarded the prestigious CES Innovation Award and this further reinforces our vision of designing smart communicating devices that help families take better charge of their health”.

The Smart Baby Scale complements other Withings products such as the adult Withings WiFi body scale and the Withings Blood Pressure Monitor. Parents are able to monitor their child’s weight on the same dashboard they view their own weight and blood pressure. (Hmm, I wonder if parents are as inclined to put their own weight on Facebook!)

No news on pricing but the Smart Baby Scale will be available from Q2 of 2012. The WiScale app is available now for iOS devices from the App Store for free.

At CES, TRENDnet has launched the world’s smallest 500 Mb/s Powerline adapter with the new TPL-406E model. Look at the picture below to see the difference in size between a standard Powerline adaptor and the new model on the left. When trying to get all the modern gadgets plugged in and networked, this will certainly help where there is limited space or close electrical sockets.

“Consumers are looking for solutions to help connect their TVs to the Internet and TRENDnet Powerline products couldn’t be easier-with no complicated CD installation required,” stated Sonny Su, technology director for TRENDnet. “The TPL-406E defines a new category of ultra-compact high performance 500 Mbps Powerline adapters.”

More and more audio-visual equipment needs to be networked. In my living room, I think there are three ethernet devices (TV, satellite decoder and Bluray player) and I use a 100 Mb/s Powerline device to take the network to them. For this kind of equipment, Powerline is much more convenient than trying to setup a wireless bridge.

Available from April at all good retailers, the TPL-406E will be $60 on its own or $100 in a twin pack, TPL-406E2K.

The National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative has partnered with ViaSat to offer NRTC members faster 12 Mb/s satellite broadband through ViaSat’s WildBlue service. The NRTC represents the telecommunications and information technology interests of around 1500 rural utilities and affiliates in 48 US states.

The new ViaSat-1 high-capacity Ka-band spot beam satellite was launched back in October and includes coverage over North America and Hawaii, enabling a variety of new, high-speed broadband services for WildBlue in the U.S., Xplornet in Canada, and JetBlue Airways on its domestic U.S. fleet. Capable of 140 Gb/s, this one single satellite has more capacity that all of the other North American satellites put together.

“NRTC’s electric and telephone members were the first distributors of WildBlue service, and they remain committed to ensuring that rural Americans have access to robust broadband,” said Tim Bryan, NRTC CEO.  “The enhanced satellite broadband service will make significant contributions to the communities we serve, so we are very happy to continue our relationship with ViaSat and offer the new service.”

Pricing wasn’t announced, but current WildBlue customers pay between $50 and $80 per month depending on service.  Outside of ViaSat-1′s coverage area, the NRTC will also offer 5 Mb/s broadband service through a range of delivery mechanisms. Based on figures from WildBlue, between 10 and 20 million American households are unable to get broadband through DSL or cable and for them, fast satellite broadband at a reasonable price will be warmly welcomed.

Todd and his team will try to get a demo of the satellite service at next week’s CES.

Kred Score

If you’re like me, you might have been frustrated with how Klout is scoring your online presence. It seems like score nose-dives for no reason. However, there is a new program on the block in Kred.

What is Kred / Klout?

Just like Klout, Kred is an influence scoring system. It measures how much reach you get on Twitter. If you post, it notes it; if you get re-tweeted, it notes that.

Your Kred can be broken down. On the graphic to this post, you see my global Kred. However, I can choose the drop-down and find out what my Kred is for Social Media, tech, podcasters, and other keywords.

Kred is in beta and only connects to Twitter at this time. It looks like they will be adding LinkedIn and Facebook soon. Klout, on the other hand measures to those three plus Google +, Foursquare, YouTube, and a host of other sites (if you participate on them).

How Kred Measures Score

From the Kred Blog:

Kred gives Influence Points every time there is an exchange that indicates someone inspired another person to take action: replying to them, mentioning them in a post, retweeting their content, or following them or their list.

Kred assigns 10 points for the most common actions like being @replied, retweeted or mentioned in a conversation. More points are given for events that have bigger impact, like having a message retweeted by someone with more than 10,000 followers.

Klout Perks

From time to time, Klout offers perks like gift certificates, gifts, and invitations to closed betas (like when Google Plus was in beta). You can check the Klout perks to find out what you can participate in.

Why Should We Measure Kred / Klout Score?

You might think it’s vein to check your score, but it’s no different than a marketing company checking production on their sales or work. Once you know what your reach is, you can work on improving it. For instance, I have high marks in podcasting, but lower marks in Social Media. I can now focus on building that area.

Kred states it’s the “Nielsons of online”. If people can find your influential in an area, they may just call you up to give you work. For those of us who work for ourselves, getting jobs handed to us sounds like a very delightful thought.

It’s a good idea to see what people recognize you as. If you want to break into a specific field, you want to follow those who are leading. You might even become a leader yourself. Just like a good marketing department follows sales through a third-party company, you can do the same with these two programs.

Many people are likely familiar with the radio/television on-air personality Glenn Beck. His television career included both CNN and the Fox News Channel. On Fox News, Glenn Beck had the most-watched nightly show of any of the cable TV news networks.

Recently, Glenn Beck left Fox News to form his own online streaming television network, GBTV, available at http://www.gbtv.com.

About a month ago, after viewing a few of the free Glenn Beck highlight clips from his two-hour nightly streaming television show, I took the plunge and subscribed.

I am very impressed with the production quality. GBTV, LLC currently has 120 employees. This is a genuine, highly-professional high definition television network that has a spectacular set and world-class production facilities that is just as good if not better than anything that Fox, CNN, etc. are capable of doing. Like any genuine television network, live streaming shows start and end right on time and incorporate a number of regular breaks. GBTV is creating genuine television programming that is broadcast directly to the Internet as opposed to satellite or cable distribution. As such, it removes the filter between the content creators and the end viewers, yet high broadcast standard production values are maintained throughout which lends what GBTV is doing an aura of genuine excitement. Real multi-camera live HD broadcasts can be sent directly to subscribers, thus eliminating the cable/satellite middleman.

There are a variety of subscription plans, including monthly and yearly plans. One can subscribe for $4.95 per month, or $49.95 per year. I subscribed to “GBTV Plus” for $99.95 per year, which includes the 6 camera HD shoot of the daily Glenn Beck Radio Show along with other streaming television programs that are coming onto the streaming service. GBTV is in the process of becoming a full-fledged streaming television network that has ultra high production values along with impressive content. Subscription plans include a 14-day free trial.

GBTV currently can of course be viewed on a computer. Other devices include the Roku, as well as iPad and iPod/iPhone apps. All programs remain available for streaming any time for a period of 30 days before dropping off.

I cut the satellite cord more than a year ago, because I felt I wasn’t getting $100 dollars per month worth of value out of my satellite programming. I am more than willing to pay for good content, but I want it on my terms, on a variety of devices, and on my schedule. GBTV offers a tantalizing glimpse at the future of high production value TV content.

Yahoo!

Dear Yahoo!:

It’s time. Time to make a decision. Time to stop holding onto the past. Time to realize you were on the top of game in 2000, but now it’s 2011. Time to see that Yahoo! is Yahover.

Can you turn the company around as Jerry Yang talked about during AsiaD in Hong Kong? Anything can happen. But you are not willing to put the money in to do that. Investors are weary and you have no leadership.

If I was your business analyst (and that isn’t even my profession), I would tell you what I tell other companies that choose not to sell:

1. Change your name
2. Set a new 2-year business plan
3. Get a CEO that knows Social Media
4. Re-build your look and feel
5. Re-build your clientele

Did I just say “Change your name?” YES! When I hear Yahoo! I think of a company that was on top of their game back in 2000. Eleven years later and I don’t associate Yahoo! with today. I associate Google, Microsoft or Facebook. I even have a better chance of associating AOL  with 2011 over Yahoo!

Even the best business person will buy land just for the land. They’ll strike down the building and create a new epicenter. If the roof leaks and the foundation is shaky; if the building takes more energy to keep going, then rebuilding might take less money than repairing.

I wouldn’t fret, though. You really helped shape the Internet. You should be proud of that. Now it’s time to save what’s left of the company and maybe put together a new venture. I hear Microsoft is putting together a bid, among others. It’s not going to be $31 a share as in 2008, but I would guess it will be comparable.

If you are going to keep it, then find someone that can turn this company around. Get a CEO that knows what’s going on in the new media space. Someone that is active in Social Media. Someone that will bring new blood into the company.

Sincerly:
Someone that doesn’t want to hear about this anymore.

Admittedly I’m coming in late to the party. I had all sorts of excuses – I already have a MacBook Pro, as well as the latest generation of iPod Touch. Why would I need an iPod with a giant screen to run mostly the same apps I can already run on my iPod?

After buying an iPad 2, I understand what all the fuss is about. It has also become immediately clear to me why there is a booming iPad market but currently not much of a tablet market. The reason is staring everyone in the face, yet few seem to see it, particularly large tech companies that are struggling to compete in the wrong arena.

The iPad is admittedly an incredibly nice piece of hardware – however, that’s not why it is so successful. The reason for the iPad’s overwhelming appeal and success is very simple – it revolves in large part around being able to run well-written targeted iOS iPad-specific apps that take advantage of the iPad’s screen size and svelte form factor. At about the size of a traditional magazine, it takes the best elements of the multimedia computer and puts them into a highly-readable, touch-interactive color screen that will easily fit into places and situations where even laptop computers don’t work so well.

In short, it’s all about the content and being able to easily consume it anywhere. The content isn’t just about browsing, listening to music or watching videos. The content in large part is the iPad-specific apps themselves, some of which are incredible, such as the 100% free Flipbook RSS reader app.

Amazon has a chance at success with the 7” Kindle Fire, not so much because of the $200 price point, but because Amazon has a lot of ready-made content hanging out in its cloud. Many people pooh-poohed the original Amazon Kindle, only to witness it quickly morph into a success. The Kindle was not and has never been a success because of the Kindle hardware – the plethora of Amazon ebook content is what caused the original Kindle rise to stardom. The availability of the content finally got the ebook ball rolling in a huge way, and the mass market finally realized the incredible convenience and advantage of having a cloud-connected ereader.

Would-be iPad competitors will never effectively compete with hardware alone, no matter how sexy or inexpensive they are able to make it. To borrow part of a phrase from an early 1990’s presidential campaign, we would all do well to paste this sign on our wall:

“It’s the content, stupid.”

Huffington Post

For anyone that wonders why AOL got into bed with Huffington Post, here is your answer. People use the site. At least, that is what HuffPo says and we believe.

Last month, Huffington Post claimed they hit 1 billion page views in the month of August. With as much diversity that the post has, I wouldn’t be surprised. With the growth of the site in the last 30 days, I wouldn’t be surprised if it hit 2 billion a month by early next year.

So how are they doing this right?

Sites with Communities

This seems to become a new trend – divvy up a site into several niche markets. Make the site feel like it caters to what you like. If you cannot group people in one big circle, make little circles and put all the numbers together in the end.

The announcement also talked about the purchase of “Localocracy” – an “online town common where registered voters using real names can weigh in on local issues.” This could bring the HuffPo to your local community. Get news and comment on it.

The HuffPost 50 is another good example. They call it the “Internet Newspaper”. You can get a little bit of everything on this page. You can scan the front page, find the one thing you like, read it, and move on.

Top Name Site Hires

This is how part of the press release reads:

The Huffington Post Media Group announces today the launch of four destination sites: Huff/Post50 (www.huffingtonpost.com/50), HuffPost Gay Voices (www.huffingtonpost.com/gay-voices) and HuffPost Weddings (www.huffingtonpost/weddings). Each offers HuffPost’s unique combination of real-time news and opinion, and passionate communities powered by a leading social news platform.

HuffPost/50 — whose Editor-at-Large is actress, producer and writer Rita Wilson — covers the challenges, complexities and joys facing the boomer generation, now 77 million people strong. It spotlights boomers who fearlessly tackle new challenges in the spirit of reinventing themselves, regardless of age, and encourages boomers to question conventional wisdom about aging. Topics being covered include: longevity, relationships and sex, politics, the intense “sandwich” pressure of simultaneously taking care of aging parents and children, retirement, spirituality and religion, friendship, politics and dying.

Not only did it announce new communities in LGBT and Wedding categories, it also put a staff together that includes comedian Margaret Cho, Heidi Klum, and other celebrities in their respected fields.

Engagement

It’s amazing to see how many people “Like” an article. Whereas a site has a good day with 34 likes on an article, HuffPo good post would see 1000x the traffic. For example – their “Arrested Development is back” post produced 79,000 likes.

Integrating the Facebook Factor really helps. Then again, their social comment section also adds community response, which – in turn – can be posted back to the social networks. I guess the day of the forum is really dead.

So in a nutshell, Huffington Post is a community site. You can go to get your tech fix, political fix, LGBT fix, and more. It  has news, commentary, pictures, video and so much more. Of course, it’s staff of bloggers and reporters is pretty impressive. So 1 billion page views is not surprising. With addtional website acquisitions, the 2 billion view mark a month is very possible.

Old Delicious Toolbar App - Broken

I use Delicious to put together my show notes. I have the toolbar on my Chrome browser that I select and put in keywords. However, yesterday the toolbar sat on “Loading”. I first thought it was a internet connection problem, but soon found out that the new owners of Delicious have changed the website. But it broke the toolbar in doing so.

It made my show note collection a little harder to do. I ended up putting all my links in Google docs. When I called them up during the show, I didn’t get the pages, but the Google “You are being redirected” message. That meant I had to select each link redirect message.

A little about Delicious

Delicious is a bookmark cloud service. The program was on the chopping block by Yahoo! After public outcry, Yahoo! decided to sell the website. The new owners - Chad Hurley and Steve Chen saved it from extinction. But they also knew that Delicious was on Yahoo!’s list because the service wasn’t making the right amount of revenue. Therefore, it’s time for a change.

I read the GigaOm talking about losing their bookmarks. That was a case where they didn’t update their profile when told Delicious was switching servers. I remember the email on April 27th – it stated that if you didn’t update, your bookmarks will be gone. So no sympathy:

Yahoo! is excited to announce that Delicious has been acquired by the founders of YouTube, Chad Hurley and Steve Chen. As creators of the largest online video platform, Hurley and Chen have firsthand expertise enabling millions of consumers to share their experiences with the world.Delicious will become part of their new Internet company, AVOS.

To continue using Delicious, you must agree to let Yahoo! transfer your bookmarks to AVOS. After a transition period and after your bookmarks are transferred, you will be subject to the AVOS terms of service and privacy policy.
Reasons to let Yahoo! transfer your bookmarks

• Continue uninterrupted use of Delicious.
•  Keep your Delicious account and all your bookmarks.
• Enjoy the same look and feel of Delicious today plus future product innovations.

What happens if you do not transfer your bookmarks

• Delicious in its current form will be available until approximately July 2011.
• After that, you will no longer be able to use your existing Delicious account and will not have access to your existing bookmarks or account information.

I do agree with one thing the GigaOM article stated – Delicious might not fully know how people use the service. If they don’t fix the problems quickly, they are going to lose users to StumbleUpon and Reddit. But is it about fixing problems, or educating the users with the new features?

What I Really Like about the Redesign – Stacks

new delicious bookmark tool with Stacks

This is actually a really nice addition to Delicious. It lets you have a visual list of your bookmarks, rather than just links. I have options to view in list or grid mode. I can even see in video mode – which my video show can be on the top of the list. If I create a stack for each show, it becomes a new set of show notes with a visual view.

Request – Bring Back the Chrome Extension QUICK

Right now they want you to drag a link to your bookmarks toolbar. Only problem is I don’t have my bookmarks showing (The hotkey to bring up the bookmark bar is “Shift-CTRL B”). I might get used to using it that way, but if there is an easier way for me to catalog my bookmarks, I will.

With a little learning, I think I will really enjoy the new Delicious site. It’s too soon to tell, but it could also become a great reference.

Yahoo!

It’s another chapter in the failing Yahoo! book. Yesterday, Carol Bartz – then CEO of Yahoo! got an ceremonious firing from the board. Now, with the dust settling, and Jerry Yang saying the company is still not for sale, where does the now-less diminished company go from here?

Rebuilding Phase – a Name Change, perhaps?

I get told time and again – If you want a fresh start, infuse with a new name. Yahoo! is pretty much a name dragged in the mud. Yahoo! represents the internet from 1999. It’s 2011 – Time to get with the times. Put away the preppy clothes, the teased hair and go with something a little more modern.

A new name could bring confidence back in the company and the customers. A fresh logo that means “The future of computing is here”. Then, of course, you will have to back that statement up…

Fire the Board of Directors? Including Jerry Yang.

Jerry Yang says "Yahoo is not for Sale"

Om Malik said it best – Fire the Board. If you’re gonna shake up things, do it right. The board has been flailing since the Microhoo! days. Get a new cast to make decisions and get things done. Om has a great list of who should be on this board.

I am going to take it one step further. Jerry needs to step back even more. The new board has to have free-thinkers with no pressure from Yang. They have to take a major left-turn to keep their businesses satisfied.

Get Back in the Game

During Bartz’ 2 year CEO run, a lot of programs were shut down or sold. Whatever is left should also get some type of a face-lift. Collect the patents and figure out a new plan.

Yahoo might even want to start talks with Facebook. Put a new presence in this social network (since they’ve pretty much destroyed all their social network opportunities). Since they also have a partnership with Microsoft, this might be a really nice fit overall.

Open Up to Everyone

Google does this so well (ok, maybe not with YouTube, but everything else) – Open up to the community. Ask what you want. It worked with Linus Torvolds in creating Linux. Take the information and create something around that.

With items like business email, you cannot do that, but with consumer products like search and home page, open it up and let the consumer feel they have a hand in sculpting.

There has to be 3 items that people are clambering for in the last few years that could be easily integrated. Show the people that you are listening to them.

These are just a few ideas. In thinking of it more, the name change most likely be the best move. After all – if you think Yahoo!, what do you think of? A website that is the future, or a company that represents the past?

craigslist

This last week I wanted to look for a couple people to help with some video work I’m doing. There was a possibility of not getting paid for the video, so I needed to find others that would help for trade of service. I decided to post on Craigslist.

I will preface this by saying I have never had a real positive experience on posting to Craigslist. Their “Rules” make it almost impossible for you to post something that won’t get denied. Unless you are running a garage sale, giving away a TV or looking for a lead singer to their band, the service is just horrible.

What is worse is their customer support. Opening it up to anyone that wants to type on a computer, you might not get support, but yet get belittled by some idiot that doesn’t even represent Craigslist.

Compensation options on Craigslist

So I went to post in the “gigs-crew” area. Now when I post to Craigslist, I like to be very open. You know who I am and what I am doing. I log in, I don’t use anonymous email and put my name in the post. I put the information in the post with all detail.

The next morning, I got email saying the post was rejected.

I went up to the forum to find out why. They said it was not a “Gig” but a Job (because it was recurring). While I can dispute this reason (Dictionary defines “Gig” as “A Job”), I was more upset at the fact they were saying “No Pay posts will get denied”.

What? You have an option on your website that offers no pay but yet if someone uses it, you slap their hands? I even offered a trade of service if they choose so, and they said that wasn’t acceptable.

Trolls on Craigslist Help Forums

What gets even more frustrating is I went up to the forums to find out why my post got rejected. I ended up getting harassed by those people that are not Craigslist help agents. Not only that, but one person had the gall to say this:

Why don’t you pay people and stop being a little worm.

EXCUSE ME!?! When does belittling someone who is trying to get understanding an ok support practice? Why is this person even replying?

It was safe to say that I was really p*ssed off.

Time for Customer Support Changes Craigslist

I am not going to vent on the fact you have a “No Pay” option on the site that is misleading – only to say that if you are going to reject posts for an option you provide, that is misleading. This is about the customer support experience. I think it’s time to get away from a forum support. Having trolls in your support area not conductive to getting good support.

I saw a post underneath mine that not only went into a flame war, it also was a series of titles that had words like S*** and “F*** You” in them.

When is this good customer support? In this day and age, using vernacular like this in any support area is really not accepted.  There was no one saying “I understand and apologize”. They were just throwing words back.

I come for understanding, not to be told I’m a little worm from someone who has no idea who I am or what I do. Yes, it’s a free service, but there should still be a level of professionalism involved. I would never call you a name if you emailed me for support, why do I have to hear it from you?

Maybe someone can approach a company like Get Satisfaction. Get some seed funding to have a more accountable support area. They just a boost in their latest round of funding.

With continued negative experiences, I’ll continue to  stay away from Craigslist. Especially since I was up on the site today and someone posted almost the same thing (anonymously) two days ago, saying there is no pay involved and have not been rejected.

Hypocrites.

Google Plus

Facebook’s problems are slowly becomming Google+’s problems.

A link showed up a few days ago on Facebook for a Google+ application invite. Little did people know it wasn’t a Google+ invite, yet a malware site that tried to get your personal information. Sophos reported the scam on their blog on the 13th.

When you select the link, you will be told you have to go to a third party site to complete the invitation. That is where they phish you.

Facebook has since pulled the malware site. But this is another reason why we should use caution in whatever social network we use. Just because you are implementing familiar screens doesn’t always mean someone cannot find a new way to get the information they desire.

If you want a Google+ invite, just ask me or anyone else that is on Google+. Invites have been open for over a week now.

More important – If you are not 100% sure about something, then don’t go forward. If you do put in password information, then it’s time to change up your passwords.

I’ve had my Nook Color Android-powered e-reader for a few weeks, long enough to really get a feel for not only the e-reader experience but a bit of a tablet experience as well.

I have to admit I was initially somewhat dismissive of tablets. My feeling was though they would be useful in many situations, I personally had little use for one. I spend the majority of my time in my truck, where I’m already equipped with an iPod as well as laptop computers. I felt that the iPod had most of the functionality of an iPad, and that since my MackBook Pro was running most of the time when my truck is parked I really wouldn’t have much use for a tablet.

Since having the Nook Color I find myself spending quite a bit more time on it than I initially thought I would. I use the iPod for listening, and I’m using the MacBook for tasks such as recording my own podcast as well as email and iTunes. However, a great deal of the time I find myself using the Nook Color to browse and consume web-based content.

I believe the adoption of tablets is going to change the content that people consume from the Internet. The change isn’t going to be dramatic or overnight, however it does seem to me that if I’m browsing on a tablet I’m much more likely to read certain types of articles and/or news stories that I probably wouldn’t read in a laptop of desktop browser.

In other words, tablets are turning the Internet into the equivalent of a digital book or magazine as opposed to something that is best used sitting at a desk. The effect of this change in consumption psychology is likely to be subtle but relatively substantial over a period of time.

Today June 8th is IPV6 Day, I know that most people are thinking that’s nice, what is IPV6 and why should I care. The reason you should care is that IPV4 which is the current protocol we are using is running out of IP addresses. When the Internet was first conceived the idea that we would need more than the 4.3 billion IP address that is available under IPV4 seemed ridiculous. However now that everything from our computer to TVs have their own IP address there are more than 4 billion IPV4 addresses in use. In fact ICANN which allocates these numbers issued the last blocks in February of this year to the five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs). IPV6 is the protocol that is replacing IPV4. While IPV4 is based on 32 bits of information, IPV6 is based on 128 bits, which means the number of address available will be 3.4 X10 to the 38th power.

For the near future IPV4 and IPv6 will coexist and as new devices come online they will be IPV6 capable and IPV4 will be faded out. Actually Windows 7, Mac OS X, and Linux all support IPv6 as does iOS 4.1+, Windows Mobile and Android 2.2 (and above). Most consumers will not notice a difference, other than they may be provided a new router by their ISP. The biggest problem will be with businesses that depend on the internet for their daily business. They need to make sure they can communicate with both IPv6 and IPv4 devices. If they can only communicate with IPv4 then they may have problems reaching their customers using IPv6 devices. So it is important for businesses to make sure their networks are IPv6 ready as quickly as they can. The other advantages that IPv6 has over IPv4 are:

* Auto Configuration

* Built in Security

* Improved Quality of Service

* Routing Improvements

* Simplified Packet Header

*  Improved Mobility

One of the companies that is participating IPv6 day is D-Link. D-Links is helping to test IPv6 to discover and address any problems that come up. All new D-link products including routers, switches and access points are IPv6 ready. There is a page which list D-Links products that are IPv6 ready. D-Links can also offer complete solutions for companies who are trying to go from IPv4 to IPv6. They have a good step by step guide on how to be prepared. Other companies that are participating in IPv6 day include Google, Facebook and Yahoo.

There are some questions on how much of an emergency it is to go to IPv6, there are some who think that the rush to IPv6 is unnecessary, while others think it’s happening to slowly. Whether you think going to IPv6 is necessary or not, really doesn’t matter it is happening and you need to make sure your business is ready. D-Links offers to help business transfer to IPv6 at their web-site

We seem to be moving into the age of the apps. Are apps just a passing fad, or is something more substantial afoot?

We have come to think of the Internet itself as being synonymous with the World Wide Web. However, that’s a wrong perception that may have many of us caught in a perception trap making it difficult for us to “get” what is happening.

The Internet itself is a platform on which to run applications, a fact we would do well to remember. In the early days before the Web, there were data moving applications such as Gopher, IRCP, Telnet, etc. along with many others. HTTP just happened to be one of the major protocols that in combination with other protocols gave foundation to the websites we are all now familiar with. The Web itself is not the end of the story, but just a data delivery application.

Though we don’t think of it this way, many websites themselves are really applications.

The apps that seem to be taking over our smartphones and have given rise to tablet computing are more than what they appear to be. Though today the best of these apps seem to be giving concentrated bits and pieces of the full-blown functionality of websites, I believe a larger fundamental trend is going on than we currently realize.

The apps themselves are in the process of evolving into new Internet applications and will ultimately give rise to new services that go beyond computers and browsers. One day in the future, apps may well eclipse the Web as the data delivery applications of choice. Applications follow the form of the devices on which they are executed.

Apps are just now beginning to invade televisions. We are still in the earliest stages, and things are still clunky. Moving beyond the clunky stage, imagine what form these new web-based TV apps might look like in the future. Forget about browsers, and forget about existing web services that run inside them. For example, think in terms of a networked app running just on a connected TV – what could be done with that? Would it be possible to create an app that just delivered a live IPTV network stream (or a bunch of them)? Of course it would, and it would be an advantage over having to scroll through clunky, often near-useless lists and near-worthless descriptions because that’s the way websites running on computers seem to work best.

It could be argued that connected gaming consoles are data delivery apps, delivering specialized services to the end user that go well beyond browser-based or browser-conceived functionality. The Microsoft Kinnect attached to a connected X-Box with end-users using their bodies to interact with the games and ultimately other Kinnect users is moving data back and forth that has nothing to do with the Web.

Ultimately we must begin to think about the Internet as a global data retrieval/delivery system that is independent of computers and browsers. Computers and browsers are just one application of potentially thousands, hundreds of thousands or even millions that have yet to be thought of. Therefore, apps must conform to the devices, machines, or appliances they are running on. App designers would do well to forget about computers and browsers and begin thinking outside the computer/browser Web perception trap.

Once in a while, a book comes along that contains ground-breaking insights.  Such is the case with a book I’ve listened to over the past couple of days, the Audible audio book version of ‘The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires” by author Tim Wu.

“The Master Switch” is a compelling look into the history of major information industries such as the telegraph, the telephone, commercial broadcast radio, the commercial movie business, and commercial broadcast television. The book points out an identifiable, slowly-repeating cycle obviated by the fact that these industries were able to gain and hold monopoly status. Each in turn became quite adept at retarding disruptive technological innovations that threatened their respective business models.

Today we take an open Internet for granted, but these same and other forces are looking to take over control of the Internet and turn it into a closed, much more tightly-controlled system.

The book is extremely well written and well researched. The Audible audio book narrator Marc Vietor brings the book to life in a wonderful way.

Mr. Wu does a fantastic job of laying out the often-fascinating histories of companies such as Western Union, AT&T, NBC, etc. As consumers, we think we know these companies through their consumer advertising. The real history of these companies is often quite different and very eye opening.

If you enjoy stories about technology and business, you will almost certainly enjoy “The Master Switch” by Tim Wu.

Y Buzz

Yahoo! continues to condense the Yahoo! Giant. This time, it’s Yahoo! Buzz – the Digg-like site that aggregates news articles. In a statement made on the website, it says:

Yahoo! Buzz will be discontinued as of April 21, 2011. As of this date, you will be unable to access the Yahoo! Buzz site. This was a hard decision. However this will help us focus on our core strengths and new innovations.

We appreciate your patronage.

The Yahoo! Buzz Team

In the last 6 months, Yahoo! has continued to close down properties. Yahoo! 360, MyBlogLog, AllTheWeb and more. All put in mothballs.

Some properties continue to thrive – for now. Delicious almost saw demise, but Yahoo! corrected by stating the bookmarking site is actually “For Sale” (unless it did get sold. Last time I heard, the sale was unofficial news). Other sites we saw for sale were Yahoo! HotJobs (sold to Monster) and it’s search engine (to Microsoft).

No word why Buzz isn’t getting sold. Maybe they tested the market waters and no one wanted it.

Do You have the Buzz Widget on your Website?

One thing to note – if you installed the Buzz widget on your site, you might want to take it off.

No, not the Google Buzz widget. That’s still around.

Yahoo! Buzz launched Feb 26, 2008 to tepid fanfare. They launched to counter Digg. Earlier this year when content farms got hit with a new Google algorithm, Digg had to restructure. I guess Yahoo just wanted to be done with it.

In a press release today, Virgin Media announced that it was trialling 1.5Gb/s cable broadband connections with four media companies in London. Offering 1.5 Gb/s down and 150 Mb/s up, if successful it would be the world’s fastest cable broadband and about 240 times faster than the UK average connection speed.

The technology will use the same infrastructure as delivered to residential customers, so in theory, if it works in this trial it should work just about everywhere Virgin has a cable network. Virgin has already successfully trialled download speeds of 1Gb/s in its fibre network but currently offers 100Mb/s as the maximum speed. Virgin has connections to 12.6 million homes, mostly in urban areas, making them one of the largest residential broadband providers in the UK.

Jon James, executive director of broadband at Virgin Media, said: “Demand for greater bandwidth is growing rapidly as more devices are able to connect to the internet and as more people go online simultaneously. Our growing network provides a highly competitive alternative to the fastest fibre networks of the future and, with our ongoing investment plans, we can anticipate and meet demand as it develops over time, ensuring Virgin Media business and residential customers continue to enjoy world-class broadband.”

The four companies involved in the trial are all in “creative industries” working with on-line video, broadcasting and interactive applications. Sam Orams, co-founder of BespokeBanter.com, one of the companies testing Virgin Media’s 1.5Gb broadband, said: “While the average home might not need these speeds quite yet, we certainly will. The internet is critical to what we do and intrinsically linked to our future growth so it’s exciting to be working with Virgin Media at the forefront of broadband innovation in the UK.”

The Virgin Media network uses DOCSIS3 and can bond several channels together to provide the data speed bought by the customer. Consequently, there’s a choice of different speeds (10 Mb/s, 30 Mb/s, 50 Mb/s, 100 Mb/s). Virgin currently offers 100 Mb/s in cabled areas for £35 per month. Regrettably, I’m not in one of those cabled areas and I’m stuck at about 3 Mb/s. Bah!

Since the advent of the VCR, the adage has been to look to the pornography industry to see what would happen – which formats would take off, what business models might work, etc., etc., etc. While the pornography industry did seem to be the first on the block to figure out how to make e-commerce work, do they still lead the way today when it comes to the future of video?

While there is a certain profession that perhaps lays claim to be the oldest, right up there with it is the art of the sale, and the pastime of shopping. The shopping experience itself if done well can be a pleasure.

QVC, HSN and other home shopping channels excel at making the shopping experience itself the content. They make no pretense – they are right up front with the fact that their channels are all about advertising.

Many people claim to hate ads, but I’d contend I that it’s really bad ads that most people despise. Advertising that is well done is informative and entertaining and can even be enjoyable. Watching QVC, HSN, ShopNBC, etc. product presentations (particularly electronics, gadgets and sometimes cooking) can for me easily fall into the guilty pleasure category. These people are masters at the art of the sale. Who doesn’t enjoy (or cannot learn from) watching a master ply his craft?

So how are the home shopping channels handling their all-important online presence? QVC and HSN both have iOS and Android apps that make it possible to watch their current live video streams, as well as easily search their catalogs, as well as place and track orders. The ShopNBC app is a fail in that it doesn’t allow you to watch the live video stream. I’d give the nod to QVC’s app as being the most advanced and usable overall.

Like millions of others, I’ve been glued to news sources to get as much current information as I can about the ongoing disasters in Japan following the massive earthquake, tsunami and ongoing nuclear plant disasters. This has to be the biggest natural disaster that has occurred in my lifetime.

In pre-Internet days, we had to rely on newspapers and television for news. Those forms of information have their problems. This is the Internet age. I want current information directly from the source NOW, not later. I want current information of my choice, not what news agencies that aren’t directly on the scene think is or is not important for me to know. If I want 24/7 disaster coverage, in the Internet age that becomes possible, allowing me to completely bypass limited conventional coverage.

It took a while for me to find, but there’s an iPhone/iPod/iPad/iOS app from Japan’s NHK called NHK World TV Live. The app is free. Once the app is installed, it operates very simply. You simply open the app and the live video directly from Japan’s NHK World news service immediately begins streaming. Search iTunes for NHK World TV Live.

The service has an English translator that talks over the lowered volume of the original Japanese broadcasts. The English translators aren’t slick and you can hear them become a bit confused from time to time.

There’s also an app from the Al jazeera TV English news network that operates live out of Doha, Qatar. Al jazeera TV English is highly produced from a beautiful state-of-the-art studio. The on-air newsreaders seem to be British nationals. Though Al jazeera gives more news from the Arab world than the typical American is used to, they do a pretty good job of covering international news, including the situation in Japan. Search iTunes for Al jazeera English Live.

Savvy TV news agencies in today’s world have to make themselves available if they want to continue to be relevant. News agencies such as the BBC, CBC, CNN, Fox, etc. seem to be dragging their feet regarding available-to-anyone-anywhere 24/7 Internet TV broadcasting. I believe they are already losing world market share.

Sean and Lynn from Recom Technologies demonstrate the programmable LCD video name tags. The name tags use OLED screens and have two gigabytes of internal memory that can be accessed via USB. The video name tag sells for $198 and can be purchased from their website.

Interview by Andy McCaskey of SDR News and Esbjorn Larsen of MrNetCast.com.

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Francie Bauer from Dish Network describes Dish Network devices that are enabled via Sling technology to allow consumers to watch their programming content from anywhere in the world via the Internet on computers and other mobile devices.

Interview by Todd Cochrane of Geek News Central.

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The Internet Gives and the Internet Takes away is probably how I can sum up the situation in Egypt. What is crazy about the internet shutdown in Egypt was the absolute cut-off that has occurred. When drafting this 90% of Egypt is disconnected from the rest of the world.

Makes you want to make sure you hold on to some old school modems and hope that some ISP’s in other countries have services you can connect to with dial up have that list of ISPs handy. With the precedence the Egyptian Government has made in shutting down mobile and Internet service it really makes you think.

Not saying it could happen here in the United States, but if I was a doom and gloom type person these actions would make me want to hang on to some modems and keep a land line, things would have to get pretty bad for any government to shut down regular telephone service. Keep this in mind, if they are willing to kill the Internet I am sure it will not be long before they would kill international calling as well.

The only sure fire way to stay online would be to have a Satellite Internet connection connected to a service provider in another country.  I am sure what we see post shut down is going to shock us, as the digital age where everyone has a camera in their pocket is going to record everything that happened. The news is going to get out regardless but this crackdown is Egypt’s way of trying to prevent people from organizing.

Can you imagine this happening in America? People would be exercising their rights to carry and bear arms.

One of the classic methods of marketing centers around the idea of bundling; i.e. getting people to pay for lower-quality merchandise by pushing sheer quantity over quality. This strategy isn’t always successful, but when it works it can work brilliantly.

When I was a teenager growing up in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, music was sold via vinyl records. The “hit” songs were played on the radio, thus creating artist familiarity and product demand. Radio stations of the day would sometimes play the “B” side of the record but most often they only played the “hits.” In other words, they weren’t playing the “misses” on the radio.

In a stroke of marketing genius, however, someone somewhere got the idea to bundle the musical misses and missteps on the “B” side of the vinyl records. When 33-RPM records came along, this trend was amplified because there was more room than ever. Make consumers think they were buying not only the artist’s latest hits, but throw that filler material in there too. Sometimes with certain artists the filler material could be brilliant too. However, most of the time it was just filler material.

This strategy mostly worked until digital recording and playback techniques, combined with the Internet, caused massive changes in the way people manufactured, discovered, marketed, and purchased music. For a variety of reasons, today people tend to only want to buy what they consider to be the very best “hits” from services such as iTunes, and there’s little to no market for the “filler” misses.

The same marketing concept has been used via bundling to get people to pay for “filler” cable TV channels. Want a “good” channel such as Discovery, TLC, or History? Sorry sir, that sandwich only comes with pickles, mustard and horse radish – take it or leave it.

What consumers often fail to realize is that substantial portions of their cable TV and/or satellite bills are paid directly to bundled channel providers that they probably never watch. Bundled mediocrity gets rewarded.

Why are you mindlessly paying good money for bundled channels you probably don’t know the names of? Stop rewarding bundled mediocrity. Turn off your cable or satellite subscription. I promise you – your heart won’t suddenly stop beating. The world won’t suddenly come to an end.

Sometimes things no one ever thought of simply seem to come together. Services and devices end up being used to do things the individual inventors and designers couldn’t have imagined.

For some time now, I’ve been thinking about attaching one of the new Mac Minis to one of my TV’s and utilizing it as a home theater PC as well as an over-the-air DVR to record high definition digital broadcasts from the local TV stations. A late Sunday afternoon trip to my local Best Buy and a Mac Mini was mine.

I sat the Mac Mini up with Eye TV and a USB HD tuner attached to my outdoor antenna. Depending on how I have the antenna rotated, I can receive upwards of 17 or more HD and digital broadcast channels. Of course, keep in mind that the Mini is on my home network, so I’ve got complete remote access in a number of different ways.

The Eye TV 3.4.1 software has easy iPhone/iPod/iPad/Apple TV file conversion, so I’m easily able to convert the files to the format of my choice.

A thought popped into my head. What if I converted the files to the iPhone format and put them into my Dropbox? I also have the Dropbox app for Android installed on my Sprint HTC Evo phone. Since I have an 8 gigabyte SD card installed with the possibility of going all the way up to a 32 gigabyte card if I wish, could I synch the exported iPhone files from my Dropbox on the computer to Dropbox on my phone?

To my surprise, I don’t even have to synch the exported iPhone videos to my phone – once they are synched to the Dropbox server, all I have to do is open the file from Dropbox on my phone and the file immediately starts streaming. If I’ve got a decent 3G Sprint cell signal, the video plays perfectly without a glitch.

So, I’m taking multiple different technologies, and using them in a way no single inventor or designer ever envisioned. I can record local TV programming from home, export it as an iPhone format file into my Dropbox folder, and stream the files to my phone. Pretty phenomenal stuff if you ask me.

For sure, there are other ways to accomplish the same end result, particularly if one has adequate bandwidth. For situations where bandwidth is limited and more variable, this solution works surprisingly well.

Google has setup the Family Safety Centre to help parents and teachers keep their children safe online.  After spending a little time in the resource, it seems to be a good introduction to online safety for children from a parent’s point of view.  If you need to know more, you can then take it further through some of the links.

The Centre has four main sections:

i) Google Safety Tools – information on Safesearch, which stops inappropriate material being returned in searches, and YouTube Safety Mode, which similarly stops age-restricted videos from appearing.

ii) Advice from partners – information from children’s organisations on cyberbullying, privacy, talking to strangers online, adult content and malware.

iii) Reporting abuse – if you find inappropriate material on any of Google’s properties (YouTube, Buzz, Picasa, Blogger), here’s how to flag the material to Google.

iv) Video tips from Google parents – a set of videos on YouTube from parents to parents.  In this section there’s also six basic tips for on-line safety.  Frankly, I think these tips should be more prominent as they’re good.
- Keep computers in a central place
- Know where your children go online
- Teach internet safety
- Help prevent viruses
- Teach your children to communicate responsibly
- View all content critically

Each country has its own slight variant, including Australia, Canada, New Zealand, US and UK versions – there are probably others for non-English speakers. The main difference seems to be the list of partner organisations that Google has worked with (and spelling).

If you are a parent, you should spend a few minutes having a read of the information here.

We’ve been hearing quite a lot about Internet-delivered video content lately. Trends sometimes seem to advance slowly over a long period of time but then tumultuous market shifts seem to happen overnight.

Blockbuster just filed for bankruptcy. Blockbuster was unable to reconfigure their business structure to compete effectively with Netflix. It seems that Netflix has won the ongoing war.

Streaming video and video podcasts have been around for several years – these are not new ideas. However, what is new is the proliferation and increasing popularity of set-top boxes.

Back in the 1980’s backyard satellite TV dishes were a hobby among people that were looking for something different and as many choices as possible. That quest for choice ended up going mainstream in the form of commercial cable and satellite providers offering hundreds of channels.

Starting in 2004 people began experimenting with Internet-delivered content in the form of podcasts. I believe that podcasting happened as a direct result of broadband availability getting to a certain critical mass, combining the existing elements of RSS, MP3’s, etc. into a new form of communication. This new form of communication offered something very different along with unprecedented levels of choice.

Internet-delivered content of all kinds is rapidly becoming mainstream.

I believe 2010 is the year of the app. Apps suddenly seemed to have come out of nowhere to seeming to pop up on every device imaginable. Why the sudden popularity of apps? Desktop and laptop computers have been around for a long time, along with full-blown applications. What has really happened is that computers have now shrunk down to the point where they not only are in our pockets in the form of smartphones, but they are also showing up in HDTV sets and plenty of other devices. These devices we are running these apps on are actually quite powerful computers in their own rights.

There is now a wide variety of content that is heading for every computer-enabled screen you own, especially your HDTV.

In the world of blogging, podcasting and social networking, much has been said about the so-called “long tail.” The concept of the “long tail” revolves around the idea that available content living on the Internet gets a lot of extra audience over a long period of time, as opposed to traditional print and broadcast content which has a much more limited lifespan.

As services such as Netflix gain popularity, yet another form of content is experiencing the benefits of the long tail – movies and TV shows that are available for long-term streaming. An excellent example of how the “long tail” benefits movies in particular are obscure documentaries that in the old pre-streaming days would have a limited initial audience and then end up on a shelf somewhere or be sold in consumer video release one at a time.

Now more obscure movies and TV shows that had a limited lifespan and limited impact are able to take a new lease-on life that used to simply not exist.

I am particularly enjoying streaming documentaries on Netflix. There are some real gems out there. One documentary I really enjoyed in particular that I’d never heard of before I found it on Netflix is called “Cowboy Del Amor.” It’s about a Texas matchmaker who specializes in matching up American men with Mexican women. If you haven’t seen this gem, I highly recommend it. “Cowboy Del Amor” is but one example of movies that have a very limited promotion budgets and therefore are unable to make much of a publicity splash when they are released, yet they can be absolutely fantastic movies to not only watch yourself but to share later with friends and family.

I dropped my Dish Network account in July 2010 and have not looked back. Streaming videos via services such as Netflix forces me to take a much more active role in selecting something good to watch. Having literally tens of thousands of movies and videos available for instant streaming on demand is a far superior way to find and consume commercial content.

Now that about a week has passed since we had our broadband scare here in Hawaii when a Fiber Cable between two islands was cut, it got me to thinking about all the things we are missing out in here in the land of Paradise.

We have no real competition to Road Runner, several ISP’s offer DSL but their is no high speed competition to Road Runner.
Verizon only has a Federal Business presence here, and does not to my knowledge have plans to offer FIOS here.
Clearwire is here with 4G, but its not much better than DSL for speed.

So the question I keep asking Oceanic Cable, the Time Warner / Road Runner affiliate is when do we get DOCSIS 3.0 and the long awaited upgrade in speed? I have been here in Hawaii now going on 14 years, and the cable service has only barely improved from the days when I first signed up for service. My understanding is that their is no plans to roll out DOCSIS 3.0 to the islands of Hawaii anytime soon while Time Warner in the lower 48 has been deploying it at a snails pace.

The potential answers to why they have been so slow in rolling out DOCSIS 3.0 is simple, no competition. There is no pressure from competitors to upgrade or improve the service. Another reason could be that they have not invested enough into the infrastructure over the past few years to support the upgrade and are simply dragging their feet because not enough people are demanding it.

I would gladly pay for more speed, but the increment increase has to be on both the download and upload speed. Like 10′s of thousands of other customers here in Hawaii, we better get used to waiting because I have a feeling DOCSIS 3.0 will be delivered on Unionized Hawaiian Time.