I forgot to post a link here on the blog when the article went up on Newsweek.com. My take on how the media helped Apple cover up for Steve Jobs and his health problems is...
Learn MoreMy article on this, from the latest Newsweek, is here. HP, the biggest tech company, is ringing an alarm bell about the future of science and technology. It’s scary stuff. We’re already starving science and engineering students of funding. That may only get worse if we spend billions bailing out banks and automakers. Money quote: Nobody at HP wants to come out and say we should let automakers die. But it must gall them to see bright, aspiring scientists starved of funding while Detroit gets rewarded for its...
Learn MoreGeeks are raving about Palm’s new Pre phone and Linux-based Web OS, which is looking like the hit of the show. I was fortunate enough to get a sneak peek at the device last month and my write-up on it for Newsweek is here. The Pre is a slick looking slider phone with an OS that leapfrogs the competition and features that iPhone users have been craving. Some specs from my Newsweek piece: The phone has 8 gigabytes of storage, which is decent but not great; it can run Adobe Flash, and can cut, copy and paste, which iPhone can’t; it supports multimedia messaging service (MMS) so you can send text messages with photos attached, which iPhone can’t do; it has a 3 megapixel camera and a flash, which iPhone lacks. There’s a button that lets you buy music from Amazon’s download store. Then there’s the multitasking. Want to talk on the speakerphone while browsing the Web and entering stuff in your calendar? No problem. Palm expects people will keep 15 to 20 applications open at the same...
Learn MoreI’ve been filing a lot out of Macworld and will have more coming later in week from CES. (Groan.) Latest is “Macworld, MacBoring,” describing the sad-ass spectacle that was yesterday’s Macworld keynote by Phil Schiller and wondering, “Is Apple’s golden era over?” Left out of this article (because I filed fast) was the fact that despite the lameness of the keynote, and the lack of anything really exciting, there was no shortage of bootlicking fanboys in the audience, cheering over every little thing and sometimes moaning orgasmically. There’s only one word for this: scary. Even worse were the hardcore Mac hacks who were sitting in the press pool and cheering too. (While most of us were just bored out of our minds.) I’ve never seen hacks actually clap and cheer at a press event unless it was an Apple event. Also check out a post I did for Newsweek’s tech blog, “What would Apple be without Steve Jobs?” Twitter length version: Apple needs to do something about a succession...
Learn More