Columns

The Problem With Tech and Teaching

Philip Berne, Jan 20th 2012 Discuss [48]

Let me tell you a funny story about technology in the classroom. I was teaching English at a charter school in Boston a few years ago, and my classes were working on “Macbeth.” I’m always looking for new angles of attack, especially with Shakespeare, so I decided to focus on different interpretations and stagings of the play. I cut scenes from a variety of movie versions of Macbeth and showed them to my classes, so we could compare the difference. I used a Royal Shakespeare company version. I used the movie “Scotland, PA,” a wonderful modern adaptation in which Macbeth’s is a fast food restaurant. But my favorite of all was the Roman Polanski version, produced with funding from Hugh Hefner.

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Apple’s textbooks hinge on subsequent near-free iPad

Chris Burns, Jan 20th 2012 Discuss [41]

Back before the iPhone 4S was released, I suggested that it would be a free release, having Apple allow itself to instead rely solely on the software sales that came afterward – that happened, to a degree, and it’s looking inevitable that Apple’s textbooks will make the next generation of iPad devices free as well. When the iPhone 4S was released, the iPhone 3GS was made free on-contract across the USA, and across the world at this point, the iPhone 4S itself is free on contract (outside of the USA). Apple has caught a bit of flack this week for releasing a suite of Education-based announcements without mentioning how they bring the price of the textbook down to a level that would “revolutionize” the Education world as they hope they will – here’s how they will.

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Columns

Why Sony Won’t Launch A New PlayStation This Year (Or Next)

Don Reisinger, Jan 20th 2012 Discuss [71]

I’m often asked when Sony will launch its next PlayStation. Just about everyone is interested in finding out if the next console the consumer electronics giant offers up can be as appealing and popular as its predecessors. The push for Sony to launch a new PlayStation is also born out of the fact that Nintendo is launching a new console this year, called the Wii U. And if history is to be our guide for the future, most console makers launch their new devices around the same time.

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Columns

Microsoft’s Windows Phone Sales Silence Speaks Volumes

Chris Davies, Jan 19th 2012 Discuss [41]

Microsoft’s quarterly financial results today make for great reading if you’re a shareholder, with a record $20.9bn in revenue, but are less reassuring if you’re a Windows Phone fan. The big software company broke down Windows 7 licensing numbers, spilled its Bing search share and gleefully detailed Xbox 360 and Kinect sensor sales, but Microsoft’s smartphone OS merited little more than a vague mention of “a lot of excitement.” This was Microsoft’s most obvious opportunity to hammer home whatever dent Windows Phone had made in the mobile market; that it didn’t leaves us more than a little concerned.

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Columns

AT&T gets the tail end of this mobile price change, not consumers

Chris Burns, Jan 19th 2012 Discuss [6]

Since yesterday when news broke that AT&T would be changing both their prices and their data allowances on new users accounts for the 2012 season, there’s been one whole heck of a lot of dissent out there on why people “hate AT&T even more”, and so forth. What’s not showing up nearly enough is the fact that with these new price “hikes” also comes a better data to price ratio as well as the ability to keep your old prices if that’s what you enjoy more. Instead of griping about how AT&T is raising their prices, perhaps a glance at the fact that it’s not you, current AT&T customer, who will be footing the bill, nor will it be someone who previously payed less.

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Columns

Android 4.0 for Tablets shouldn’t be judged until it’s released

Chris Burns, Jan 18th 2012 Discuss [78]

Last week it was announced that the Transformer Prime would be the first certified tablet to run Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, then today the XOOM ICS update began rolling out, but there’s one judgement article out there produced by a high-ranking set of names which has passed judgement on it for those who would take their for granted that they know all about it from their 2 minutes of playtime. What they say, as it were, is that they know a guy with a Motorola tablet who has Ice Cream Sandwich on it and told them that it wasn’t very good. They then say they were at CES and spoke with a less than knowledgeable presenter who didn’t know ICS from Honeycomb.

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Columns

Alienware’s X51 puts Games Consoles on Notice

Chris Davies, Jan 18th 2012 Discuss [19]

The Alienware X51 isn’t the biggest gaming PC the Dell-owned company has ever unveiled, nor the fastest, but it’s arguably the biggest challenge to traditional consoles to-date. Packing a full PC into a Xbox-scale chassis, the X51 promises to turn its hand to everything from the latest FPS, high-def multimedia playback and even mundane Office tasks. As the central hub for a smart home, that could be enough to edge it ahead of gaming heavyweights like the PS3 and Xbox 360.

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Columns

SOPA and PIPA are the Wrong Way to Tackle Piracy

Chris Davies, Jan 18th 2012 Discuss [0]

Anti-SOPA and anti-PIPA protests have begun in force today, with sites like Wikipedia giving the internet a taste of a web without freedom of speech, as censorship and piracy take center stage for lawmakers, content-owners and users alike. The proposed acts are, we believe, a heavy-handed and naive approach toward the legitimate issue of content theft. Being against the proposed acts isn’t the same as being “pro-piracy”; that’s why we here at SlashGear (and R3 Media, the company behind SlashGear), as avid content-creators and content-consumers, believe SOPA and PIPA are the wrong way to tackle piracy online.

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Columns

Here’s the Apple textbook that’ll be presented on Thursday

Chris Burns, Jan 17th 2012 Discuss [11]

Apple is about to have an event in NYC, and by all looks and whispers, it appears that it’ll be surrounding something like a “Garage Band for Texbooks” – that sounds pretty darn interesting – let’s talk about what it’ll really be. I don’t pretend to have any inside lines with Apple, nor do I have any tip that should lead you believe that I’m quoting someone else – instead what you’re about to read is completely built on my own experience with Apple’s past and how I and my former and current student colleagues interact with books. Apple will not, if my mind is cranking out right and telling me the right answers, be revealing a new device, but a new environment where students and colleges can connect to writers in a way that’s been possible but not entirely realistic up until now.

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Columns

RIM should think Type not Touch for the new PlayBook

Chris Davies, Jan 17th 2012 Discuss [9]

2011 wasn’t Research In Motion‘s year and 2012 is shaping up to be equally dismal one, with dramatic PlayBook price cuts paving the way for an underwhelming financial quarter. It’s easy to see why RIM went down the tablet route: the iPad made slates fashionable, and the Canadian company was stinging from criticism over its underwhelming touchscreen smartphones. The PlayBook was an opportunity to show that RIM could legitimately compete and perhaps even drive some ecosystem shopping in the same manner that iPhone users often pick up an iPad, and vice-versa. Yet in the process RIM managed to forget everything that gave it unique appeal in the mobile segment.

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Columns

My CES 2012

Chris Burns, Jan 16th 2012 Discuss [0]

There’s no larger an event the entire year round for tech bloggers such as I, and at the moment, there’s no bigger trade show for Consumer Electronics than CES – this being my first full year attending the events inside and surrounding CES 2012, I thought I’d give you a bit of a look inside what it means to be on the publisher’s side of this monster storm of keynotes, meetings, and floor time. Now that the week is over, I’ve got a couple of moments to sit on the couch and attempt to put down everything that happened (viewable through our [CES LIVE Portal]) without having a heart attack over the sleep I’ve lost, and I’d like for you to snoop in on the situation from this perspective. Once you’ve read what I’ve got to say here, please feel free to ask any questions you might have as well.

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Columns

Is Skype the Windows Phone Wildcard?

Chris Davies, Jan 16th 2012 Discuss [20]

That Windows Phone lacks a Skype app is, like Apple’s fixation on the word “Magical” and the rampant popularity of Justin Bieber, one of life’s great conundra. Microsoft is desperately seeking “must have” apps to showcase its smartphone platform, and yet it already owns a VoIP company putting out what could legitimately be described as just that on iOS and Android. Delivering Skype for Windows Phone would certainly answer one great criticism of the OS, and cross a further reason off the wait-and-see list for many buyers. Still, it’s the promised deeper integration of Skype into future iterations of Windows Phone, however, that could signal the turning point for the “third platform.”