Thumb drives maybe going out of fashion for some people but they still are very handy, especially if you carry one with you all the time, allowing you to easily share files (legally), and backup work date without worrying about an internet connection.

Unfortunately it is too easy to lose drives, we have lost hundreds of promo usbs (we do love a free things though) and drives such as the LaCie iamaKey is too easy to damage as the connection part isn’t protected very well. Verbatim’s Store ‘n Go Plus drives avoid all these issues with a handy rubber cover protecting your drive from anything it may encounter in your bag/pocket.

These thumb drives range from 4GB on up to 32 GB and should be released this quater starting from about £15

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Verbatim Store ‘n Go Plus: Rugged keychain thumbdrive

Looking at Apple’s education announcement and the later statements by McGraw-Hill CEO Terry McGraw that; 1.  school boards would have to pay the $14.99USD “pilot pricing” per year per student and. 2.a paper text book costs $75.00USD per book and is replaced once every five years or so, and that Mr. McGraw expected to make money on “volume”, I had to wonder how Apple was going to knife the publishers? There has to be a plan to take out the publishers, because it is in Apple’s corporate DNA to screw the old school content providers. They almost have to, because the scheme as presented has absolutely no cost savings to cash strapped American school boards, and the prospect of a huge investment into the Apple ecosystem.Here is how I think it is going to play out.  In the US, publicly funded schools are generally overseen by the various states and each county and or city has its own school board that is for the most part funded by local taxes. Apple is going to point out to the state oversight school boards (if the states don’t figure it out on their own) that they can create their OWN textbooks using their own state university resources (ie graduate students) Essentially, once the primary texts are done, its just  a mater of updating and revisions.  For example, the American State of Tennessee has 971,524 students enrolled in K-12. (Think of it as Grades 1-13) The cost of one Apple iTextbook at say $15.00 USD would be $14,572,680. Admittedly, the number includes the entire group of K-12, but, I could see using iPads in kindergarten even if they were not issued to students below 3rd or 4th grade. Assuming 6 courses per student per year and figure 6 textbooks (at least-don’t forget lab books in upper forms)per student, per year, doing the  iMath comes to at least $90USD a year. per student, not counting the cost of the iPads.  However, if the schools create their own content, even at market cost there is about a five year break even for the cost of an iPad. Over, $14 million  US dollars would pay for a lot of work study time to do the basic research and writing of the texts All that has really stopped many state school boards from doing their own textbooks was the economies of scale for for publication.Take out the printing costs and its a whole new match. One the textbook publishers are likely to lose.

Commentators have mentioned that nothing was said about university level textbooks. I suspect not only that was deliberate on Apple’s part, it is where textbook publishers will start feeling the heat. Uni professors love to inset their own spin on the texts they use, even to almost writing their own. In the US, college textbooks are hitting $200USD a book in many subjects. Whilst UK textbook costs are usually 20-50% lower in the US, everyone is looking to cut costs.  Not to mention the potential savings on classes where you get a lecturer who almost never uses the book, but often has other material to read.  In the college setting, an iPad based textbook ecosystem could pay for itself in the FIRST TERM.  The idea of updated content is particularly appealing for technical subjects. From  the university’s perspective, there would not be any real need to issue iPads, students would be expected to buy them.

Where is Apple in all this? Selling a lot of iPads. Where are the textbook publishers? Trying to steal the pudding of the record companies at the home for obsolete business models.

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Is this Apple’s plan for the textbook market?

Thursday, Apple announced the release of iBooks2  and iBooks Author; new and free textbook reading  and authoring tools.  Apple also revealed a partnership to create and sell low cost interactive textbooks with the big three textbook publishers that account for 90% of the sales of textbooks to the first 13 grades of American schools, known as K-12. Finally, Apple expanded its iTunes U uni lecture series to the K-12 market.   Missing from the announcement was any price break for the beleaguered American school system and that it was a closed Apple hardware only system. Also absent was the fact that if you create content with iBooks Author, you have to sell it in the Apple store.

Apple has not indicated any similar arrangement with UK publishers, but as I mention here, that may not be Apple’s scheme in any case. Stay tuned, there may be a bit more to this story as it plays out.

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Apple announces iBook 2 for US schools. Will the UK follow?

Tech blog site Know Your Mobile recently reported that Amazon is getting ready to roll out the Kindle Flame in the UK according to the inevitable “source close to the launch”. The 7 inch tablet has been taking the US by storm, selling for about half the price of the Apple iPad. In fact, the American tech pundits speculate that Amazon takes a loss on every tablet sold.  The reason for this is that the Kindle Fire is really nothing more than a device to read books and watch videos with that just happens to be a tablet as well. Like game console makers, any loss on the hardware is more than made up by inducing customers to buy into the Amazon ecosystem of Kindle format books, Amazon movie and video rentals and even Audible audiobooks.

In all likelihood, the Fire has not been released in the UK as yet because Amazon needed more time to strike the UK content deals required to make the new tablet viable in the UK market and to beef up their UK data center. While Amazon has Loveflims, the licensing  for the Fire would require additional arrangements. Further, compared to what Amazon has on offer for US customers and especially US Amazon Prime customers, Amazon would have to line up far more content to compete with say, Netflix.   For example, I would be quite curious if the Fire supports the Android version of the BBC iApp player or BBC content will somehow be folded into the Amazon player.  Much of the Fire’s content is optimized via use of cached copies of internet pages that are located in Amazon’s data centers, all of which are reported to be in the US.  For the Fire to work effectively it would follow that location based services be served in the UK.

One thing is for sure, the advent of Nexflix in the UK should get Amazon to move things along for the Fire.

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Kindle Fire about to light up in the UK?

The recent flooding reported in Thailand is definitely going to impact the computer hard drive supply for at least the next six months, with Western Digital reporting that as much as a fifty percent reduction in production.  Western Digital’s main facility is mostly under water, and precision tools and clean rooms do not respond well to large quantities of muddy water.  Since many of the component suppliers for hard drive manufactures are located in the same general area, the entire industry will be affected as companies clean up, purchase new equipment and retool.

What does this mean for the consumer? Because computers are assembled largely in the Pacific Rim nations and work on a “just in time” supply basis, expect greater delays in receiving new machines and higher prices. In fact, be prepared to not be able to get certain size drives at any price.  There have been reports that the supply chain is already starting to increase the price on existing stocks.  The smart money would be to go ahead and purchase a new hard drive now, especially the higher capacity drives, even if you don’t expect to use it for a few months.  The other alternative would be to simply wait out the shortage, as often industries that suffer a supply chain problem over build and create excess product and prices drop accordingly.

The growing push toward cloud computing coupled with the price reductions in solid state drives (SSDs), at least in the 120 to 150 gigabyte range may push some PC laptop vendors to offer SSD drives while marketing cloud solutions to access user data. A lot will hinge on SSD suppliers willingness to cut prices further, possibly in exchange for significant order commitments from laptop OEMs to justify ramping up production.  It is a big gap to consider. A 120 gigabyte SSD drives costs anywhere from $99 to $140 USD.  $70 USD can buy one a top of the line two terabyte SATA drive.  For most users, it is not even a question.  Bear in mind while these are retail prices, the gulf between the respective cost per gigabyte is almost prohibitive.

Unless you don’t have a choice, which is where the PC OEMs are or you see a chance to really gain a foothold in the market, which is the opportunity that the natural disaster in Thailand has created for the SSD makers.

We shall see.

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Hard Drive Shortages Lead to Higher Prices-And SSDs in the Cloud?

Lost in the meda frenzy over the passing of Steve Jobs was Microsoft killing off the Zune HD. No, that was a mistake its alive. Yes, it is dead. Nope, that was another error. Apparently, at least as of this writing, the Zune HD is in fact discontinued.

“We recently announced that, going forward, Windows Phone will be the focus of our mobile music and video strategy, and that we will no longer be producing Zune players.”

Bear in mind that this is found on the Microsoft’s Zune support page. You can find a big  BUY NOW button at the entry for the Zune HD. Following that link takes one to the American retailer Wal-Mart. The Zune UK web site has nothing on offer, nor does Amazon. Further complicating matters is that whoever runs the Twitter account for Zune support seems to have missed the memo as well.

The story here is not so much that the Zune HD has been discontinued, its not surprising as sales have been lackluster at best and Microsoft wants to steer users to Windows Phones as their all in one media consumption device, but that the announcement was so badly handled. It is quite obvious that the left hand did not know what the right hand was doing here. The timing was also interesting in that the original announcement was made the same day that Apple announced the iPhone 4S.  That was a good move on Microsoft’s part as the ending of the Zune HD was pretty much lost in the iPhone coverage.  However, the “red light, green light” of the days after not only ruined that, but given that journalists were looking for something to move on from the death of Mr. Jobs, Microsoft’s indecision has become more newsworthy with each change in direction.

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“Its dead Steve”

The worldwide press is saturating all media with the death of Steve Jobs, who passed away Wednesday from complications of pancreatic cancer. Rather than repeat all the typical reporting of his passing, it is better to focus on a celebration of his life and his many, many accomplishments that has shaped and changed the world everyone lives in today.  The list is long, the Apple I, the Apple II, the Macintosh, the Lisa during his first stint at Apple. During his time away from Apple he founded NeXT Computing and created Pixar out of pieces that he bought from LucasFilms. Pixar under Jobs became the gold standard for animated films, and is widely credited as revitalizing the genre and the fortunes of Walt Disney Studios when Disney subsequently purchased Pixar for almost ten billion dollars.

All this seemed to be only a prologue for the return of Mr. Jobs and what was arguably his and his teams greatest contributions to the way the world consumed its music, media, and used its phones. Starting with the iMac, Mr. Jobs and the people he surrounded himself with, went on to revolutionize the way we consume music, the iPod and the Apple Music Store.  Starting in 2001, the iPod completely changed the music industry and in all likely hood stated the death spiral of music CDs.  Moving from that the iPhone in 2005, and then the iPad in 2009. It is easy to forget that Apple did not found any of those product categories. Music players, smart phones and tablets all came about well before Apple entered the scene. The tribute that should be rendered to Steve Jobs and his team was that in each product area, Apple came along and arguably perfected the category.

What are your thoughts of your experience of Apple and thoughts on Steve Jobs?

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A Celebration of the Life of Steve Jobs

The most one can say for Leo Apotheker at this point is that he lasted longer at HP than he did at his prior gig at SAP. After less than eleven months on the job, the HP board sacked Mr. Apotheker stating that HP needed an executive who could execute on the details.  The fact of the matter the Apotheker reign, brief as it was saw several executions:

-the Web OS hardware and smart phone business, while making vague statements about doing something with the web os operating system.

- business confidence in the Personal Systems Groups’ ability to sell and support  personal computers and printers was executed by the pronouncement that HP was looking at either spinning off or selling the PSG.  Businesses put a hold on, or canceled outright, purchasing decisions and opened the door to inroads by Dell and Lenovo to take lucrative purchases from HP.

-the execution of the purchase of Autonomy, a UK software company for well over its market value. In fact this purchase was the cornerstone of Apothekers’ stated vision of turning HP away from hardware into a software and services group, much as IBM did in late 2004. However, IBM did not telegraph its intentions before a buyer was found and certainly did not tell industry analysis’s that they wanted to dump the business because it was not making the kind of profits HP wanted to see.

-finally, Mr. Apotheker  presided over the execution of over forty percent of HP’s share value.  When a publically traded company’s share value tumbles like that, shareholders want either a human sacrifice or new leadership.

Lest anyone accuse the HP Board of slipshod incompetence, the board quickly threw Leo out of the sled and to the wolves. Or so it appears. More on that later. The HP board them embarked on an exhaustive search for a new CEO. Provided that taking a quick look around the boardroom and noticing that board member Meg Whitman was not going to be governor of the US state of California after all and was at loose ends was exhausting.  In addition, ex-Oracle COO and non-executive chairman of the HP board, Ray Lane became the Executive Chairman of HP. In plain English, that means that Mr. Lane would become involved in day to day corporate decision making, rather than the broad oversight that most corporate boards exercise.

In subsequent interviews, it has quickly become apparent that Mr. Lane may well share at least equal power with Ms. Whitman.  Interviews and communications to HP staff have for the most part been of a joint nature and Ms. Whitman seems to be adopting more of a communicator role, while Mr. Lane does the heavy lifting as it were.  There may well be very good reasons for this. Ms. Whitman, former CEO of Ebay is widely seen as having little tech experience but a lot of consumer expertise.  HP desperately needs to develop a consistent message and execute on it.  This may be the board’s answer.

As for the timing of the termination of Mr. Apotheker, apparently Mr. Lane has admitted in interviews that the wheels for that decision started turning over eight months ago. Which raises the question, which has been asked quite often, what kind of vetting process was used to hire Leo in the first place? According to the New York Times, not much as it was reported that most of the board voted to hire Mr. Apotheker without ac tually meeting him. Since the gentleman in question was terminated after a bare seven months as CEO of SAP, reasonable people would think that a personal meeting was in order. Of course, Mr. Lane is quick to point out that this is not the same board that hired Apotheker, that there have been eight board members replaced since that decision was taken, including Mr. Lane and Ms. Whitman to name two.

What does all this mean for HP? First, innovation is going to suffer, as anyone who can is going to be looking for more stable pastures. Second, it is by no means certain that HP’s personal hardware business will be able to recover from the doubt and uncertainty.   Finally, there is an excellent chance that if things do not turn around fairly quickly at HP, Ms. Whitman may be the next one to walk the plank.

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More drama at Hewlett-Packard

Intel have recently demonstrated a future generation architecture codenames Haswell and personally it sounds like one of the most important advances in years, assuming it isn’t just marketing BS, and it should be out by 2013!

Intel’s Haswell has been developed using a 22-nanometer 3D-Haswell architecture that apparently will consume so little power that it can possibly be run on a solar cell (in standby), which is about 20 times less energy than current technology.

This apparently could allow for a notebook to be in sleep mode for 10 days at the same time it is still connected to the internet allowing it to fetch emails, check twitter etc). A single charge should also allow the notebook to work for 24 hours ours.

It certainly sounds like it could be a lot of BS but it is worth noting that this leap ahead in terms of power consumption is due to the movement from traditional 2D planar transistors to the new 3D transistor (Tri-Gate transistor) Intel recently announced. The flat two-dimensional "planar" gate is replaced with a thin three-dimensional silicon fin that rises up vertically from the silicon substrate. The gate wraps around the fin and then the current is controlled by using a gate on each of the three sides of the fin–two on each side and one across the top–rather than just one on top, as is the case with the 2D planar transistor.

According to Intel “The additional control enables as much transistor current flowing as possible when the transistor is in the ‘on’ state (for performance), and as close to zero as possible when it is in the ‘off’ state (to minimize power), and enables the transistor to switch very quickly between the two states (again, for performance)."

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Intel Haswell Architecture shows us the future. Skynet next.

Steve Jobs  today informed the Apple Board of Directors that he was resigning as Chief
Executive Officer effective at once and recommended to the board that Tim Cook,
Apple’s Chief Operating Office be named as has successor. According to an Apple
press release issued at the same time as Mr. Jobs letter, the Apple board not
only named Tim Cook as Apple CEO, but also named Steve Jobs as the new chairman
of the board of Apple.

In the  letter, addressed not only to the Board of Directors but the “Apple Community”,
Mr Jobs stated:

I have always said if there ever came a daywhen I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know.Unfortunately, that day has come.

I hereby resign as CEO
of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the
Board, director and Apple employee.

No reason was given for Jobs stepping down.  While there has been recurring rumors of
declining health since his transplant surgery in 2009, it is equally possible
that he has simply elected to leave the day to day operation to others. Not
only was Mr. Jobs a co-founder of Apple,  but he also has led Apple from the shambles
the iconic co-founder found upon his return in 1997 to create perhaps the most dominant
tech company in the world today. Further, it seems clear that he will still be
playing an active role as Chairman.

Tim Cook has been with Apple for the last thirteen
years and stepped in to run day to day operations during Mr. Job’s prior leave
of absence when dealing with his illness. With his elevation to CEO, Mr. Cook
also will be joining the Apple board.

Source: Apple via
Tech Meme

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Letter from Steve Jobs