James Robinson writes in PandoDaily today about his fleeting love affair with fitness trackers. He notes that these one- or two- function bands are great at giving one a sense of quantified self, and perhaps some short-lived motivation, but not much more than that. In the long-run, they’re destined for the desk drawer, along with the … Continue reading Sitting, Waiting, Watching
Yesterday, the corporate marriage between Apple and IBM made headlines. Basically, IBM will bring its enterprise know-how and analytic engines to Apple’s hardware and customer service party. The partnership is a shot across the bow for most other firms, including Microsoft (the consummate enterprise partner ), Google/Samsung (whose Knox enterprise security feature aims to allay privacy fears in the C-Suite), and, of course Blackberry, for whom Apple’s move is less a warning shot than a nail in the coffin. Continue reading “The Prize in Enterpise”
Apparently, I was wrong about the Apple and Beats speculation. In the future, I’ll be sure to reserve my judgement for after deals are made. Next up: Uber ‘n’ Amex! Continue reading A Beats Retraction
If you listen closely, you just might hear the bass-heavy sound of the rumors that Apple will purchase Beats, the boldly-colored headphones company pioneered by Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre. Despite the pedigreed reporting by the Financial Times, I’m pretty skeptical that this acquisition is in the cards. As best as I can tell, here are the reasons why Apple wouldn’t spend $3.2 billion on Beats, as well as one reason why it might: Continue reading “Apples and Beats”
Apple did a lot right on the software front in 2013 – mostly in the form of iOS 7 on mobile and OSX 10.9 on desktops. And for better or worse, it continued the debatable trend of migrating iOS features to OS X. These changes – Notification Center, Dashboard, iMessage, iBooks, Airdrop, among others – fall into two categories: they either supplant existing third party features (Growl, Google Notifier, or the Kindle app), or supplement your desktop with an app that previously only existed on your phone. The logic from Apple’s point of view is clear: Continue reading “iMessage Not Delivered”
If The Graduate is any indication, there’s a great future in plastics, and Apple seems to think so, too. In its ad for the new iPhone 5C, “Plastic Perfected,” Apple seeks to emphasize the new phone’s “unapologetic” plasticity. Continue reading “Just One Word: Plastics”
Microsoft is acquiring the phone part of Nokia for a cool $7.2 Billion. Nokia CEO Stephen Elop is staying on board, which, I think will fuel rumors that he was a corporate trojan horse – leaving Microsoft for Nokia, only to oversee the latter’s sale to his former employer – and that he is in the running to fill Ballmer’s shoes. To that end, if will be very interesting to see if, in fact, Elop does get the promotion, because it would be indicative of Microsoft’s pivot from a PC and Office-based company to a mobile-oriented one. Continue reading “Microkia”
Here’s our first episode of the Bondcast, where, true to our mission, we “make self-aggrandizing statements on things that we’re wholly unqualified to make statements about.” A brief breakdown of the ‘cast goes as follows:
Blackberry’s chairman announced that the former smartphone heavyweight will begin exploring “strategic alternatives” to address its dwindling market share and placate unhappy shareholders. As I’ve said before, it ultimately makes sense for Blackberry to ditch its OS team, adopt Android, and just concentrate on two businesses: hardware and enterprise services like encrypted email and messaging. It seems logical for a few reasons: Continue reading “Strategic Alternatives”
IFTTT just released an iOS app, which brings all the great features of the website to iPhones and iPads everywhere. One “recipe” that the blog post mentions is the ability to automatically upload pictures from your iPhone to Dropbox or Google Drive. Pretty cool, huh?
Only thing is, many Android phones have had the feature for years, and in fact, I take it for granted that when I snap a picture on my EVO, it pops up in my Dropbox ten seconds later.
Silicon Spatula 