David Lidsky's Blog, page 4767

Google Adds Buzz to Mobile Gmail: Try to Control Your Joy, iPhone Owners

[image error]There aren't all that many mobile applications for Buzz. Despite both products coming from Google, Android only got a Buzz widget a couple weeks ago. The iPad, given its advanced capabilities and large screen, has the usual Buzz tab in web-based Gmail.

But the iPhone, Palm's WebOS phones, BlackBerry, and Windows Mobile were all forced to go to a separate Web app (buzz.google.com), which kind of takes away the whole benefit of Buzz--the reason it caught on so fast (which turned out to be a...

Object of Desire: Yves Béhar's Mission One Motorcycle

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Courtesy of Fuseproject

Mission Motors, which is now taking reservations for the bike and is slated to start delivery in mid-2011, has another goal in mind: to show off technology that it believes can easily be transferred to all manner of electric vehicles.

The Mission One motorcycle is undeniably sexy. With a design by Yves Béhar and a top speed of 150 miles per hour, it's meant to drop jaws. (At $68,995, it should.) But Mission Motors, which is now taking reservations for the bike and is...

Apple Admits iPad Wi-Fi Connection Troubles, Suggests Fixes

The problems aren't incredibly widespread, but it's not exactly an isolated problem, either: Users have hit the Apple support forums in droves, for one thing. For some users, the problem manifests itself in the iPad proving unable to hold a signal, even while standing in front of the router, and some iPads need to be reconnected to the Wi-Fi network every 10 minutes or so.

Today Apple confirmed that they're aware of the problem (which is a blessing in itself--Apple has, in the past, simply...

Is Pressure at iPad Maker Foxconn Behind Four Recent Suicide Tries?

Four suicide attempts in four weeks: That's apparently the tally at China-based high-tech manufacturers Foxconn. If that name rings a bell, it's because it's the company that makes big chunks of Apple's iPad hardware.

The most recent incident happened yesterday, with an 18-year-old new worker called Rao jumping from factory buildings. A tree broke her fall, so she survived but is reported to be severely injured. On March 29th, a worker called Liu leaped from his dormitory window, wearing his...

Is Facebook Becoming the Whole World's Social Network?

Facebook's growth, which we already know is massive, is truly a global phenomenon, it turns out. And nations with the fastest membership growth rate are in South America, and Asia. Is Facebook becoming the global phone book?

The data's surfaced at InsideFacebook.com, with detailed analysis of both the numerical growth rate of members per nation for the month of March 2010, and the penetration Facebook's achieving among each nation's population. Check out the table above--some of those figures...

Crib Sheet: Michael O'Leary, CEO of Pay-per-Pee Airline Ryanair

Last year, Ryanair, the budget airline run by Michael O'Leary, announced it was considering introducing coin-operated toilets on its flights. Hilarity and shock ensued, along with some great graphics--most notably on the b3ta.com website. Today, it announced that, along with hiking the cost of checking in bags to the hold during the school holidays by 25%, it is making good its threat, along with losing two of the three existing toilets to make room for another six seats. Yes, frequent...

$175 Book vs. $19.99 App: Trying Out Phaidon Design Classics for the iPad

The three-volume, four-ton Phaidon Design Classics can double as an end table, but aren't the most convenient design reference materials: That's why a slightly cheaper, smaller version was released last year. But do you need those 3,300 yellow-bound pages at all now that all 1,000 iconic design projects--from the paperclip to Lockheed's SR-71 Blackbird--have been packed into a tiny iPad app? We gave it a test drive.

The app may still be in its infancy since search and shuffle features were...

Apple Rumored to Announce Mobile Ad Platform at Thursday's iPhone 4 Event

Peter Kafka at All Things D has some sources that tell him Apple's somewhat unexpected iPhone 4 event this Thursday will be heavily focused on advertising. Allegedly, Apple will announce an entirely new mobile ad network, probably the product of their deal with mobile advertiser Quattro Wireless. According to this oddly prescient story from MediaPost, Steve Jobs has described the new mobile ads as "revolutionary" and "our next big thing."

The platform is supposed to be called "iAd," although...

Google Adds Buzz to Mobile Gmail: Try to Control Your Joy, iPhone Owners

[image error]There aren't all that many mobile applications for Buzz. Despite both products coming from Google, Android only got a Buzz widget a couple weeks ago. The iPad, given its advanced capabilities and large screen, has the usual Buzz tab in web-based Gmail.

But the iPhone, Palm's WebOS phones, BlackBerry, and Windows Mobile were all forced to go to a separate web app (buzz.google.com), which kind of takes away the whole benefit of Buzz--the reason it caught on so fast (which turned out to be a...

FTC Prepares Litigation Team for Possible Blocking of the Google-AdMob Deal

The Wall Street Journal hears from people familiar with the matter that the Federal Trade Commission has already assembled a litigation team to investigate Google's recent (and very pricey, at $750 million) attempt to acquire mobile ad leader AdMob. The concern is that with Google's entrenched dominance of search ads on both desktop and mobile platforms, the incorporation of AdMob would create an impossibly powerful entity in which no competitors could survive.

So far, the FTC has taken...