by Christopher Paul on January 8, 2013 I’ve talked about SpareOne before. I’ve considered getting these phones for my father-in-law and my grandmother – who don’t need much out of their cell phones. They run on regular AA batteries, can keep a charge for years (so they say), and allow free calls to the US’s national emergency call system, 911.
At this year’s CES, they announced the SpareOne Plus which adds GPS support. It’s a great and intelligent addition to a phone that could be given to children and the elderly and, if it’s unfortunately needed, can be used to help track down the missing. An iOS app is coming to help locate SpareOne Plus users.
After Hurricane Sandy, I thought about getting two of these since I had plenty of batteries but no power to charge my iPhone. Now that they’ll have GPS support, I think getting these are no brainers.
h/t TUAW
by Christopher Paul on January 8, 2013 
Graham Spencer at MacStories has a fantastic look at Apple’s iPhone and iPad rollout timelines. The pattern, when you look at it, makes it somewhat obvious that Apple has their iPhone rollouts down to a science. And based on what he’s seeing with the iPad, they’re getting better at Day 1 availability. Check out the full post for more graphs and maps which supports some great commentary.
One thing I’d like to point out is how the iPhone’s rollout has been relatively stable for the past several years. However, the iPad’s rollout has grown dramatically in the last two iterations. I’m confident it shows how important the iPad is to Apple’s continued growth in a Post-PC world and a comment to how low the barrier to entry the iPad has compared to the iPhone where carrier approvals can get in the way.
by Christopher Paul on January 8, 2013 When we think of drones, we often think of their use in the Middle East. They carry out recon and attack specific targets all from the safety of a desk somewhere at a central command station. Increasingly, they’re being used in the US but only for recon (so far). But smaller drones – the size of a radio controlled toy – could be the newest disruptive technology to change the way we live.
Think of them as replacements (or supplements) to delivery services like FedEx and UPS. Messenger companies wouldn’t have to employ “runners” which use bicycles or the Subway to quickly transport documents or light objects from one place to another intracity
Here is John Robb who came up with the idea:
It’s an approach that uses “uncontrolled airspace” and incremental purchases of cheap, standards compliant pads/drones to roll itself out (very similar to the way the Internet was able to piggy back on the old telephone system).
As a result of this open approach and decentralization, it’s something that could grow VERY fast.
Here’s a simplified version of what I’m talking about:
- I put package onto a landing pad at my home.
- Drone arrives, takes package and flies away.
- Drone delivers package to landing pad at delivery location.
There’s almost nothing technically in the way of this happening right now.
Of course, the FAA and other regulators could get in the way. But the idea that, with an iOS app, I can schedule a bot to come deliver the gloves someone left at my house the other day to their apartment across the river and get notifications on when it arrived is awesome. Just think about how that could change shopping at Main Street? Even big box retailers can benefit.
Here’s my example:
- I order something online from a clothing retailer who has an internet presence and a brick and mortar store close to me.
- They ship it from stock that’s in a store.
- I get it an hour later.
- I try on the item and it doesn’t fit right.
- I schedule an exchange and a robot comes and drops off a different size and takes away the old one.
I could do all my shopping from my iPad and get everything I ordered that very day without having to interact with a single person. It’s the introvert’s dream!
via Kottke
by Christopher Paul on January 8, 2013 by Christopher Paul on January 7, 2013 For this year’s CES, the Associated Press is going to publish two sponsored tweets a day from Samsung. A few other tweets from Samsung might show up from one of it’s reporters. As MG notes, it could be tricky for the AP and Twitter alike. AP could make some money from Twitter’s backbone cutting off sponsored tweets at the knees.
Personally, I’d rather see sponsored tweets come from a person/company on Twitter rather than Twitter itself. That way, I can control who I see in my feed if they spam me with too many ads. In fact, I see this as a monetization opportunity for Twitter to allow it’s users to sell ads and it get take a cut – much like Apple does with iAds. If Twitter could develop the tools to allow ad brokering for it’s users, it could be a good balance and further increase the adoption of the service.
Since I haven’t read the ToS for Facebook or Twitter (despite using them), I don’t know if this isn’t allowed. But assuming they aren’t expressly forbidden, a Facebook page could do the same. Again, I find this idea very interesting. On Facebook’s mobile app, I’m bombarded with sponsored posts and I can’t do anything about them. I don’t want to see that with Twitter. Allowing this as an alternative advertising platform could be a better delivery service where relevance is key.
via parislemon