Mobile & Wireless

Augmented Reality (AR) is not new, but thanks to Pokémon Go it is newly relevant. The game has broken every record for adoption, users, and time spent, and it has given Nintendo a much-needed boost in both buzz and market cap – oh, and it's super-fun to play. Even if you never download the game or even look at a screenshot, here are a few things about Pokémon Go's epic launch that may move you from "I couldn't care less" to "Hmm … that's interesting." Continue Reading →

In the 1770s, America was a relatively low tech, agrarian society. But all that was about to change. So here, for your Independence Day reading pleasure, are the eight hottest tech trends circa 1776. Continue Reading →

Sometimes I walk into a room and say, “Alexa, what’s the temperature outside?” She answers by speaking the current temperature followed by an abbreviated weather report. She’s so human-like, I have to resist the temptation to say “Thank you” when she finishes. Importantly, Alexa is not a she; it is a component of Amazon's Echo natural language processing system. Amazon has anthropomorphized Echo with a female voice and a feminine name, which makes it easy to call Alexa a “she.” Should we be polite when we speak to it, or is it OK to be abrupt or even abusive? The device won’t care. It doesn't have feelings; but how will we teach our children to differentiate between machines that sound and act like people, and other disembodied voices that actually are people? Continue Reading →

Tay is a combination chatbot and AI system designed by Microsoft to "engage and entertain people where they connect with each other online through casual and playful conversation." It was specifically "targeted at 18 to 24 year olds in the U.S., the dominant users of mobile social chat services in the U.S." If the words "designed" and "targeted" are off-putting, then you're really not going to care for one of the system's recent, now infamous, tweets ... but, there is much, much more to learn from Microsoft's mistake. Continue Reading →

With 20,000 new product announcements and 2.1 million square feet of floor space, it was hard to find the signal in the noise at CES 2016. Here are my top 10 favorite products (with one honorable mention). Continue Reading →

Tablets were supposed to be laptop killers. To hear Apple tell it, with the introduction of its new iPad Pro, we are one step closer to a tablet-centric world. But the facts don’t support the optimism. Using Apple as a proxy for the entire tablet market, since it basically invented the category back in 2011 and still accounts for the highest percentage of sales, the market is shrinking fast. Continue Reading →

Apple's iOS 9 (the new iPhone operating system) contains a very special feature that enables third-party app developers to develop Ad Blocking tools. These tools, which have been around for PC-based web browsers for years, are probably better described as "content blocking" because they allow you to block all kinds of noncommercial stuff (also because there is a heated debate as to whether or not ads are "content"). Pundits and students of the commercial advertising business have identified this technological achievement as the beginning of the end of days. Others cite history and say the industry will get past the problem. After all, content blocking is not new; it's just newly relevant. Right? Continue Reading →

I just scheduled an appointment at my local Apple Store to purchase an iPhone 6s Plus on September 25th using Apple's new iPhone Upgrade Program. It's right for me, but is it right for you? And, is it good or bad for the carriers? Continue Reading →

The smartphone industry (Apple included) is suffering from innovation fatigue and the law of diminishing returns is fully on display. In practice, Smartphones are over. The marginal increases in capabilities and features offer only marginal increases in productivity. This trend is likely to continue until the industry reinvents how we connect to our devices, and how the devices connect to each other. Continue Reading →

Even though my phone number is listed in the National Do Not Call Registry, I've started to receive Robocalls on my mobile phone. It's more than a mild annoyance. On a bad day I'll receive two or three of them, and about once a day I receive an unwanted Robotext. Continue Reading →