Chilled Out Bearded Man

Dear Google,

All I ever do is write nice things about you. You invent, innovate on and create such wonderful and useful products.

But I am tortured by one of your products. The G1, which I lovingly purchased as it came onto the market, is on the verge of driving me to insanity.

How can the most basic feature – email – not work correctly. I am so sick of my emails getting stuck in “Sending…” mode. How could you not fix this??!!!! I have seen endless complaints and mentions of this bug on websites and forums across the web. I don’t have hundreds of dollars sitting around to just buy another smart phone.

I am not only angry, I am also sad, annoyed, and dejected. Tonight I wrote a response to someone. It was a a full 5 paragraph thought out email. I clicked send and (I am so angry right now, I probably should not be writing) there it goes into limbo with the other 5 emails currently in limbo on my phone. I am so angry I want to curse and so sad I want to cry. I have to now, for the 100th time or so since I bought the phone, rewrite an entire email.

This email happened to be an important personal email in which I will not be able to recreate the feeling I had a the time of writing it. This is obviously more important than the many business emails that got stuck in limbo which have actually lost me money and clients.

I give up now. I hear good things about your new products, but I have plenty of friends still using the G1 and this bug drives us completely up the wall.

Please help us!!!

Your barely hanging on admirer,

The Chilled Out Bearded Man

P.S. If you are reading this article and feel the same way about it, please comment here.

P.S.S. I’m just finally starting to find good uses for Google Wave. Don’t kill it now.

Years ago, I used to type in a search engine url, load that page, type my search into the input field, and click submit. That was years ago…

Nowadays, like I’m sure most of my compatriots do, I just type my searches straight into my browser. Since my search is obviously not a URL, I get redirected to the search engine results using the search engine set as the default keywords service in my browser. That stopped working for me recently. Now, instead of the URL redirecting to Google as my Firefox is set to do, it was instead redirecting to … searchresults . rcn . com.

It finally got on my nerves today and I decided to search for a solution. At first I found this article titled RCN Hijacking Mistyped URLs by Ed Hayes which recommended calling RCN as he had done. I didn’t want to call them, so I spent a few more minutes searching for another solution. Nothing else was really showing in google search results for this problem.

Then I discovered a link at the bottom of the RCN Yahoo search results page called Search Settings. Clicking this link brings you to a page that says:

About the Search Results Page

The search results on the prior page were provided to you because you entered keywords or an improperly formatted, currently unavailable, or nonexistent domain name into the address bar. This service is designed to enhance your web surfing experience.No software was installed on your computer for this service to work.

•  Would you like to opt out of this service?

If you would like to Opt Out of this service, please click here.

When I clicked on that link I was taken to a page that said the following:

Search Service Settings

OPT-IN Opt In  (Recommended) OR OPT-OUT Altavista TM AOL ® Ask.com TM Google TM Bing TM Yahoo ® None — DNS Error Page

Note: In order for opt-out to work properly, you need to accept a “cookie” indicating that you have opted out of this service. If you use a program that removes cookies, you will have to repeat this opt-out process when the cookie is deleted. The cookie placed on your computer will contain the site name: “.searchresults.rcn.com”.

I selected Google rather than a DNS error page, and was shown the final page of the opt out process.

SETTINGS CHANGED

Your preferences have been set, and will not have to be changed again as long as your browser cookies remain intact. If you would like to change your settings in the future, simply visit optin.searchresults.rcn.com.

If you select DNS error page, you get this result when you type an incorrect url or non-url:

http://www17.searchresults.rcn.com/not_found

This is actually problematic because it is a valid URL, so the browser gets confused and thinks it has found the valid URL you were looking for. They have in effect hijacked your ability to control what to do with an unresolvable URL. You can either opt in to use their custom Yahoo RCN search page, or else choose from one of their other choices. You are not given the choice to use the settings in your browser. It is not a true opt-out. In fact, as stated a few paragraphs above in the italics from their page, it says that you actually need to accept a cookie that in effect opts you in to their opt out system. Very backwards if you ask me.

You can read more about the browser Location Bar Search and how Firefox resolves unresolvable URLs and keyword searches here:

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Location_Bar_Search

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Keyword.URL

I wonder if the Search Settings was available to Ed on the Yahoo RCN search page when he was dealing with this problem a few months back or if RCN got wise and added this solution once they started getting a bunch of complaints. Either way, hope that helps people. And perhaps RCN can make a real Opt Out option that would allow our browsers to do the URL resolving. ISPs should be giving us an http error result, not a valid url result saying that it failed.

As everyone has probably already heard today, Google placed a big eclair on their lawn next to the giant cupcake and donut. Cupcake was the first platform fix of Google’s Android and donut was second recently released update. The big eclair is a sign that the third update must be coming out into the dev world in the near future:

Is it finally here? Yes it is. Well… Almost… And what is it? Only the greatest thing since smart phones, that’s what. Its gonna turn your smart phone into a true full fledged wireless mobile media device.

Its flash video for smart phones – its the Adobe Flash Player 10.1.

And  just like last November, its almost ready, but not quite. (http://www.chilledoutbeardedman.com/2009/01/25/g1-android-and-adobe-flash-player/) But its definitely sounding a lot more realistic this time around.

It was announced earlier today on October 5, 2009 at Adobe MAX as a part of the Open Screen Project, an initiative to “Enable consumers to engage with rich Internet experiences seamlessly across any device, anywhere.” (www.openscreenproject.org)

A beta version of Adobe Flash Player 10.1 is expected to be available for some devices by the end of 2009. You can sign up to be notified about this release here: https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/entitlement/index.cfm?e=labs_flashplayer10_signup

The Flash Player is expected to be fully available for the first half of 2010, whatever that means.

You can read all of the technical details about the new Flash Player here:

http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashplayer10/features.html

I couldn’t be more excited for this.

I guess 3G service providers will have to start instituting policies for bandwidth usage, as bandwidth is already being strained without mobile devices having easy access to streaming video content.  Apple users have been complaining about bad and slow connections for quite some time now on the AT&T coverage they are required to use.

The big question for me, though, is how’s this all gonna work on T-Mobile’s Android phones?

Not surprisingly, the day before Adobe’s big announcement Google made a little announcement of their own. Google announced that they are joining Adobe on the Open Screen Project. (http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/teaming-up-with-adobe-and-open-screen.html)

I’ve been wondering for quite some time what the hang up is with getting the Flash Player to run on a wireless mobile device seeing as us Android users have had Youtube accessibility for quite some time now.

It will also be interesting to see how this affect’s the smart phone market as this version of Flash Player is not expected to run on the iPhone.  Adobe is giving developers tools in CS5 for developing iPhone video applications in ActionScript3. CS5 will be available by the end of this year. (http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashcs5/appsfor_iphone/)

Perhaps Apple is planning to come out with some new device that outshines all smart phones including the iPhone and if they can get it onto Verizon’s awesome network maybe they would be in business. But for now, I’m gonna stick with my T-Mobile G1… (Although, the up-and-coming Android based Motorola Cliq sure is sounding tempting. http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US-EN/Consumer-Product-and-Services/Mobile-Phones/Motorola-CLIQ-US-EN)

Go Adobe! We’ve been ready. We’re ready now. And when you put it out there, we’ll all be there ready with big smiles and glassed over eyes (from watching too many videos, of course).

The sun came out finally where I live, which might explain why I have been running into old friends at a shocking rate lately. These are all friends I have not seen in at least four years. Its a pleasant experience each time it happens.

Which got me thinking about what Facebook is doing to this sort of encounter.

Facebook completely changes the dynamic similarly to how other technologies changed the system in the past.  When airplanes came out the world suddenly got smaller. You were able (if you could afford it) to travel thousands of miles in hours instead of days.  This meant that you could see your family on a regular basis even though you lived far away.

The telephone did for communication what the airplane did for transportation. Now you could instantatenously communicate with distant friends and family at a whim.

Star Trek Borg

But even with these technologies, there was still room for a wonderful phenomenon – reconnection. When you are far away you lose touch with certain friends or family. Then, when you see each other again, you experience a moment of extreme satisfaction. “Distance makes the heart grow fonder.” Sometimes time apart is good for the soul. It lets you breathe and it lets your brain reorganize localized events into your more globalized memory quadrants (I’m not a “brain” scientist), making the memories seem smaller but more important as a part of your precious past.

What is Facebook doing to the art of reconnection? We never lose touch with friends on Facebook. Their events are popping up on a daily basis. We scan through faces occasionally, almost as a game. We read our friends conversations with eachother.

Does Facebook leave us room to fall out of touch? Do we get to forget about friends for awhile and then to reconnect in a burst of remembering pleasure? I would say yes. Hal Niedzviecki (Author of The Peep Diaries) tells a story about throwing a Facebook party for all of his hundreds of Facebook friends. He received quite a few confirmations for his event, but only one person attended the party. This example and similar stories and experiences lead me to believe that there is still room for losing touch with friends.

Twitter is a quicker more constant ongoing conversation than Facebook, so you might think it completely removes the falling out of touch experience. But Twitter seems to be for constant communication with closer friends, or for “following” people you don’t necessarily want to have a two way conversation with. If I read all of Guy Kawasaki’s tweets I wouldn’t have time to read anything else and I would have to sleep far less than I do now.

So I would say that we are not in danger of staying in touch too much. We can only have actual communication with a limited number of people. We can still fall out of communication with friends even if we are electronically linked.

What will the next generation bring? Thats another question. Will we slowly move toward a Borg society, always connected, never losing touch with anyone? Will cell phones merge with Twitter and will our brains get integrated into Google’s Wave?

And also, how important is reconnection? Maybe we could do without it after all.

T-Mobile’s new myTouch Google Android Phone presale will begin on July 8.

http://www.t-mobilemytouch.com/

No hard keyboard, but Android now has a touchscreen keyboard since the Cupcake upgrade. The size looks great.

Wolfram Alpha has Add-ons for their search. The add-ons come in many different flavors, from a FireFox addon to a Windows start bar search to an iGoogle gadget. An iGoogle Gadget? Aren’t Wolfram and Google enemies?

Its pretty cool that there seems to be comfortable interaction between Google and Wolfram Alpha.

This is probably a smart move considering that they could potentially end up in the same niche market in the future. Friendly competition is just so much more pleasant than all out rivalry. We could also see Wolfram get bought out by Google if the product proves its worth and Mr. Wolfram finds himself in need of a gadzillion dollars (unlikely considering that he has many other successful products on the market including the famous Mathematica).

Then the big question becomes, how does Wolfram Alpha monetize this type of search? Why would you want to click through to a website for info on a product when all you are looking for is the answer to a question? In Google you are looking for websites and ads are just another website that happens to be paid for. Perhaps Google/Doubleclick with their advertising genius will be able to help Mr. Wolfram find the answer to this advertising conundrum.

Or maybe Mr Wolfram should just install his addon and ask Wolfram Alpha:

How can Wolfram Alpha make money off of Wolfram Alpha?

Because regardless of how amazing a product is, if it can’t make money its survival comes into question.

Dowload the addons here:
http://www.wolframalpha.com/downloads.html

(I’m sure Mr Wolfram already thought of all of this. I hear he’s really smart.)

No more Vista! For everyone who has heard about Vista, but did not want to install it on their machines (ie most people), Windows 7 will be released on Oct 22, 2009.

http://windowsteamblog.com/blogs/windows7/archive/2009/06/02/the-date-for-general-availability-ga-of-windows-7-is.aspx

Apparently the Tmobile G1 Android update I got earlier (http://www.chilledoutbeardedman.com/2009/06/01/g1-firmware-upgrade-to-slick/) is the infamous long awaited Cupcake update.

Some more feature updates that I’ve noticed on my G1 phone:

The camera can now shoot video.

The browser zooming has a button to return to the standard zoom.

The browser zoom box magnifier is better.

An onscreen keyboard with autocomplete that you load by tapping on a text field.
The camera loads up a little faster than before and has two onscreen buttons. In the top left corner is a small thumbnail of the last photo or video you shot. And in the top right corner is a button that you can use for taking photos.

Still missing zoom on the camera (though technically you don’t need it cause you can crop it later and its a high enough quality photo that cropping is feasible).

If you don’t have the updates, yet, those are some of the things you can look forward to getting in the near future.

As far as when your phone will be updated with G1 Cupcake update… I received the phone the day it came out and I received this update at about 8am PST. Two of my friends who have the G1 have not yet received the update. The first friend got the Tmobile G1 in mid-November 2008 and the second purchased it in Febraury 2009.

After I wrote all of that I discovered a full list of the new Android features here:

http://developer.android.com/sdk/android-1.5-highlights.html

The firmware upgrade today on the new G1 seems to have taken the phone from cool to slick. It still does not feel as smooth as the iPhone, but lots of things are better.

The desktop widgets have nicer smooth shiny gray borders.

The screen seems to come out of standby faster than before.

When programs/apps load, they fade in and out more smoothly and quickly.

The buttons on the built-in gmail app are much prettier and not clunky like the old ones.

Also, there are now checkboxes on the gmail list of emails, so that you can apply an action (such as archive) to multiple emails. This is familiar from the traditional gmail.

And there just seems to be nice font, border and background improvements throughout.

One issue that I encountered was that on the first restart after the firmware update, all of the icons on the desktop were missing. This resolved itself when I restarted, again.

What else did people notice?