Last week’s Mobile World Congress must have sent tabulaphiles (tablet lovers, for the Latin- and Greek-challenged) to a place equivalent to Shangri-la, Nirvana, and oasis rolled into one.
I have nothing against computer games. I think these virtual forms of entertainment, which comes in varying degrees of gruesomeness and violence, are one of the tech industry's growth drivers.
Unlike the other market research firms, Canalys classifies tablet computers as personal computers or PCs, seeing them as of the same feather as desktops, laptops, and netbooks.
Last week, several tech companies released their financial results for the latest quarter. Along with those firms that complied with their corporate-reporting obligations was Microsoft.
Mac faithful will call it strategic repositioning; people who hate the Cupertino flock will call it something that would make Steve Jobs do the Gangnam style in his grave.
During the past year’s last couple of weeks, while everybody was busy preparing for the holidays, Acer did something that, at least for this stingy, penny-pinching tech lover, made Christmas a lot brighter and shinier than the usual.
Hey, just between you and me, I totally enjoy those (audio-only) videos of full music albums posted online by YouTube users for, I believe, purely entertainment and reference purposes.
As if people who drive while under the influence and people who send and read text messages while driving weren’t bad enough, along comes a report of increasing number of pedestrian sending text messages while walking.
With the rate Apple is entering and redefining market segments, we might see washing machines and other home appliances designed and marketed by the Cupertino company in our lifetime.
Some good things never last. Everything has got to end. All good runs finally run out of space. Even civilizations, even species ultimately meet their doom and vanish.
Microsoft recently opened up so.cl, the software giant’s latest experiment in social networking, to the general online public. (Don’t let its spelling worry you too much. It’s pronounced as “social.”)
I have encountered more than one philosopher and a bunch of writers who said that man has carved the world into his image, or something to that effect.
These days, when the Internet is virtually everywhere, one cannot be faulted for thinking that Ponzi and other pyramiding and fraudulent investment schemes would not fool anyone anymore.
I guess my half a dozen readers would agree with me, in every organization there will always be one or two, sometimes more, super-talented and super-capable employees who are really outstanding performers and do the job like no other else can.
Apple sold more than 2 million units of its downsized (and some critics would readily chime in "downgraded") iPad during the iPad mini's first weekend on sale.
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has announced a $50,000 bounty to kill robocalls. Anybody who dreams of becoming some sort of a John Connor, you know, the robot-killing hero from the Terminator movie franchise, may join the contest sponsored by the U.S. government.
Tom Spring is an IT writer and columnist who in a recent post on PCworld.com said too many IT writers and pundits have been predicting gloom and doom for Microsoft each time the company would launch a new version of Windows.
You are walking out of your favorite mobile phone retailer's shop, with the late-model, named-after-a-fruit or named-after-a-robot smartphone you have been lusting after safe in your arms' embrace.
After the well orchestrated peek-a-boo with the Surface tablet-cum-notebooks a few weeks ago, it’s back to being butchered in and by the media for Microsoft.
Watching an impeachment court’s proceedings, I think, can seriously damage our collective respect for the position that the person being tried occupies.
At the risk of sounding like that computer industry executive who allegedly ridiculed the idea of a computer in every home, I think the PC will be with us for quite a while.
Remember that joke about the man who became a millionaire after marrying the woman of his dreams? And how he used to be a billionaire before tying the knot with her? (Note: Please feel free to change the characters’ gender based on your preferences.)
Whether you're a newcomer to the series, or just in need of a great wrestling match, UFC Undisputed 3 has you covered with its easy-to-follow tutorials, and great gameplay mechanics unlike its predecessors.
Microsoft needs to do some serious catching up in the smartphone and online search segments, where its products and services have not registered much on the impact scale. Windows Phone 7 smartphones.
Back in the day, when you do a web search using Google, the results that were returned were rated based mostly on the relevance of the particular resources.
Two recent events have drawn world attention to the country, once again. I'm referring to the landslide at Compostela Valley, which killed scores of small-scale miners and their families, and the 22-hour Black Nazarene procession.
It’s that time of year, again, when everyone who wants to have a say in anything comes out with his or her crystal ball. And claims to foretell what the future holds.
Seems like our jubilation over the major telcos’ decision to slash the fees they charge mobile subscribers for using their short messaging services was a bit premature.
Astronomers working with NASA's Kepler space telescope project have confirmed the discovery of a planet that is potentially capable of supporting life.
Only a few weeks more and we all will be saying hello to the year’s most important holiday. Remember when we were kids, and our parents told us we better be good and nice so that we would receive those shiny gifts from Santa Claus?
Among the expected bestsellers for this year’s American great sale nirvana are the tablet computers. While the slate market is currently ruled by the iPad, there has never been a shortage of bravado-filled challengers.
Nokia plans to launch a tablet computer as early as the first half of 2012. And to nobody’s surprise, it will most likely be loaded with Microsoft’s next-generation operating system, Windows 8.
Technology improves lives. Computer technology, in particular, has made it possible for humans to eradicate some of the worst diseases that ever plagued cities and villages throughout history.
If you’re reading this column, it means we (as in the planet Earth) did not get too intimate with 2005 YU55, an asteroid about the size of an aircraft carrier. Astronomers forecast the asteroid to fly within some 317,000 kilometers (197,000 miles for our non-Metric friends) from Earth.
Sometimes, relationships end. Marriages, collaborations, mergers, and joint ventures always aim for success. There are times, however, when these alliances and partnerships turn sour.
Halloween, never mind its origins, has always been a many-sided occasion. What it stands for or commemorates terrifies most children, even a fair number of adults.
By now, we are saying goodbye to the year’s most frighteningperiod. We are now right in the middle of readying ourselves for the mostwelcome part of the year.
In about a couple of months or so, we would be into that season again when we all go crazy and buy each other gifts, both expensive and, well, not so expensive.
Microsoft’s next-generation operating system, Windows 8, is not just another version of the software company’s market-leading product. It marks a major, some would say radical, change for the computing platform.
Lately, the BlackBerry, Canada’s most famous export after the maple syrup, has been getting lots of mentions in both the IT-specific and general media outlets.
This early, some IT market analysts are concluding that the Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system is the latest in the software giant's growing list of failures.
Lately, a war of words has erupted among government leaders of China, the Philippines, and Vietnam, the most vocal among the countries claiming the Spratly group of islands.
Google said more than 20 million Internet users have joined Google+, the search giant’s latest foray (and apparently, also the company’s most successful yet) into the social networking market.
Despite the recent rash of cyber-attacks against computer networks owned or operated by corporations, organizations, and government agencies, there is no stopping the march of cloud computing.
The blogosphere is awash with rumors about Apple's alleged next moves. The next iPhone, the next iPod, the next iPad, the next MacBook, the next Mac OS, the next Steve Jobs — you name it; it is most probably there somewhere.
While Apple is fully occupied with keeping itself a step ahead of its competitors in the smartphone market — staving off so-called iPhone killers, it could suddenly find itself being swarmed by something more familiar.
Summer is supposed to be fun. Summer days are for frolicking on the sand and making love to the sun, while summer nights are for drinking yourselves blind.
Results of Nielsen’s latest study on tablet use in the United States adds some more ammunition to naysayers broadcasting the “apparent” demise of desktop PCs, notebooks, and netbooks.
Power corrupts. Our experience as a people has shown us how much truth comes with that expression, a lesson we have paid for with too much pain and sorrow in some cases.
Did you have much fun, frolicking in the sandy beaches under the sun? Or did you opt to stay put in the metropolis, and spent the holy days in pure bliss and quiet?
The 2011 edition of the world's biggest tech-industry show, CeBIT, gathered once more hundreds of thousands of IT fans, analysts, and executives in Hanover, Germany.
When my wife first came to the United States to take part in a J1 training program, one of the things that immediately caught her attention was how much food get wasted in the Land of Plenty.
Microsoft's efforts to push its Windows Phone 7 mobile OS recently suffered some jolts that could potentially prove nasty. Problems began surfacing after some unflattering mentions in mainstream media and blogs about some WP7 phones being "bricked" after receiving the updates.
It seems like some IT industry analysts, industry rivals and partners, and even consumers still would not forgive Microsoft for its role in the Wintel homogeny (some would say, monopoly) during the 1990s and early 2000s.
Research In Motion, the maker of BlackBerry smartphones, is reportedly developing software that will enable its coming BlackBerry PlayBook tablet computer to run Android applications
Last week's bombing of a bus in the country's central business district has abruptly and mercilessly shattered our make believe that we were living in a safe world. In the age of globalization, terror knows no borders.
Chinese computer vendor Lenovo plans to establish a business unit that will focus the manufacture of smartphones, tablet computers, and other Internet-connected gadgets.
Microsoft introduced at the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas the Touch Mouse, a new device that combines the features of standard computer mice with those of multitouch devices.
Online retailer Amazon said the Kindle ereader has become its bestselling item, toppling the book “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” from the top spot as of December 27, 2010.
Google’s recent Chrome OS noises are mistaken by most IT commentators and journalists as something new and revolutionary. Well, it might be or it might be not.
Andy Rubin, head honcho of Google’s Android mobile operating system business, admitted his company aimed too high when it released the Nexus One smart phone.
Sony, Japan’s consumer electronics giant, announced the death of the Walkman last week. Born in the 70s, the iconic portable music player came of age in the 1980s and kept growing in the 1990s.
Yahoo! Introduced the “Generation Safe” anti-cyberbullying program at the Digital Citizenship Summit, an event attended by about 200 people and which also tackled other dangers faced by children on the Web.
While we here on these islands have to rely on gray market channels of varying shades to get our hands on the iPad, Apple’s bestselling tablet computer, consumers in the United States might soon find themselves up-to-there deep in a flood of iPads.
Last week, Microsoft stopped playing coy and finally unveiled what everybody else already knew. The software giant, together with a number of mobile phone vendors and telecommunication carriers, launched the Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system.
Other IT companies have grown so big and are now attracting much more attention and scrutiny from governments’ competitiveness agencies and organizations.
Believing perhaps that offense is the best defense, Research in Motion Ltd., maker of the world’s dominant phones for corporate users, recently introduced the PlayBook tablet computer.
Seems that for the past couple of weeks, every IT manufacturer and its neighbor have been unveiling a smartphone or two. Or a tablet PC. Last week, in London, Nokia introduced its N8, C6, C7, and E7 smartphones.
Last week’s IFA technology show in Germany saw the coming out parties for tablet PCs from Samsung and Toshiba. Dubbed by media reports (and I guess, by some of their respective handlers) as iPad killers, these new slate computers have some tough task ahead of them.
Seattle, Washington-based Interval Licensing, a company owned by Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen, filed a patent infringement lawsuit against some of the IT world’s leading companies.
In time for this year's holiday shopping season, Japan's electronics giant Toshiba plans to introduce three models of the world's first 3D television that does not require viewers to use special glasses.
A tabloid in Sweden reported that the country issued an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange for alleged rape. Assange promptly issued a statement, saying the charges have no basis.
Watching vehicles, both public and private, that ply EDSA day and day out, one could be easily forgiven for believing that God is watching over us more closely than He does people in other countries.
According to mobile security provider Lookout, a Movie Player application is infecting Android-powered phones in Russia with a virus that sends budget-busting text messages.
Internet activists are worried that online search giant Google has changed its online neutrality stance, or requiring Internet service providers to treat paying and non-paying content owners equally.
What do you get when you throw into the mix venture capitalists eager to invest on almost anything, the absence of Western-standard retail outlets (shopping malls), millions of salaried consumers with rising wages, expanding credit-card market, and booming number of Internet users?
Advertisements of consumer goods, such as bath soaps and dishwashing pastes, constantly blare us into purchase-mode submission with the "antibacterial" properties of some of these products.
I have been a regular browser of craigslist.org as far back as 2001, way before the online ads site became notorious for those sex-solicitation advertisements and a related murder or two.
With the prevalence and widespread availability of information online and offline, you would think that everybody by now would have access to timely and ignorance-busting knowledge, which hopefully would lead us all to wisdom.
Somebody once said, “Weekends are invented to help us forget that we are all screwed for the rest of the week.” Well, he or she might have been right, or just was a tad too pessimistic.
It was either the height of arrogance or sheer stupidity. But knowing that Apple CEO Steve Jobs was involved, anybody should be forgiven for thinking it was the former.
Video calling, or the technology that allows mobile phone users to see the parties they are talking to at the other end of their handsets, is back in the news lately. Most of the credit for the media's revived attention for the mobile phone's videoconferencing feature should go to Apple's recent launch of the iPhone 4.
News reports are unkind to the faint-hearted. And with the instantaneous manner with which the Internet and those cable news networks bring these updates to the living room and bedroom, nobody is safe or can escape from news about bombings, earthquakes, killings, and other mayhems happening anywhere in the world.
Everybody has been talking about cloud computing and how it is revolutionizing IT, and forever is changing how businesses and consumers look at computers.
Character, for some people, is defined by adversities. How people act and react to difficult situations says a lot more than their words do about what or who they are. Many philosophers and psychologists have harped on this.
I am truly glad that the elections are done and over with. There is just too much we need to do, too much catching up that we should focus our attention to.
Last week’s volcanic ash cloud over most of Europe harshly reminded air travelers, and everybody else, how nature can easily play havoc on their well-planned, albeit routine, lives.
When I was a young boy growing up on an island, I would time and again hear grownup folks, especially the men who were having fun with their glasses of cheap liquor and some native brews, singing songs with on-the-naughty-side lyrics.
Media has focused on the China-Google squabble over online censorship and hacking. Often, China has been portrayed as a sinister Big Brother, fearful of losing its power over over the mind of its people.
Back in our elementary-school days, our science textbooks and teachers told us that our planet is part of the Solar System, which in turn is part of the Milky Way — just one of the billions of billions of galaxies that make up the Universe.
It seems that consumers, instead of going on vacation to faraway touristy locations, chose to splurge instead on new mobile phones, laptops, flat TVs, and other tech offerings.
When people present themselves as the country’s only solution to its most pressing problems, when they claim they alone are capable of ending poverty and corruption, expect to see more of those social evils once they are in power.
Online social networking sites are remarkable creations. They allow people to meet new friends, even though most online pals are mere bits and bytes and are not of the flesh-and-blood variety
Learning perhaps from U.S. President Barack Obama's use of the Internet and other IT tools in his campaign for the White House, our local politicians have started employing online and other IT tools in their quest for coveted government posts.
My regular readers (about eight of them) know how I dread flying. There is just something panic-triggering quality to the mere thought of getting inside a plane, and sitting there for hours, while the flying tube hurls itself hundreds of miles an hour.
The world’s largest Internet search company, tired of being required to censor itself, has finally decided to defy the world’s most populous and soon-to-be-most-powerful country.
Christmas is for children. We have heard this time and time again. So, why do children suffer from pain, hunger, and neglect as their parents and families wallow in abject poverty?
It is so funny, devilishly so, when those who perpetrate the worst inhumanities suddenly find themselves at the receiving end of a dose of their own medicine.
Way back in the 1970s or early 1980s, in Tagaytay City, a group of men and women and their children was waiting for the world to end. Their leaders told them it was just a matter of days.
The online world as an eternal, digital repository of photos and songs, is like a virtual minefield with booby traps loaded with recollections of things long gone.
Road safety is a lofty ideal. And like any other lofty ideals, it seems quite impossible to be attained or experienced by local motorists and pedestrians, especially those who call the country's largest metropolis home.
We’re picking up where we left off last time. For our kids to better understand the Internet and make proper use of it, let’s define some terms associated with it…
It’s hard not to laugh like crazy when our honorable politicians try and outdo each other in coming up with the catchiest blurbs and quotable quotes whenever some significant issues would arise.
It’s hard not to laugh like crazy when our honorable politicians try and outdo each other in coming up with the catchiest blurbs and quotable quotes whenever some significant issues would arise.
Just when you thought it’s safe to emerge from whatever hole you’ve been hiding in for the past few weeks to escape the swine flu, along come news of the virus’ resurgence.
These are the golden years of annoyances and general lack of civility. No matter how much we imagine ourselves as a caring and sensitive people, we are definitely not.
Here are some unsolicited tips for our government officials and self-appointed watchdogs and overseers of our children’s spelling ability – those who called for the pullout of LBC commercials from our TV airwaves.
Anybody less entrenched would have folded by now. Anything less widespread would have gone where the dinosaurs sallied forth eons ago. A deadly mix of global economic recession and a universally despised product should have killed Microsoft’s Windows platform a hundred times over the past couple of years or so.
For the past few months I have been seeing several television commercials hawking a certain brand of beer. Purportedly brewed for real tough men, this particular brand of beer is not for men that its manufacturer, or at least the company’s advertising agency, claims are sissy.
Welcome back to the real world. You’ve had your fun under the sun. For about a week, those days of frolicking and letting your hair down, you had your break from the constant noise and barrage you and your mates have come to call “the office.”
This Lenten season, the Catholic Church is calling on the faithful to give up text messaging and surfing the Internet as a form of sacrifice. And for sure, this will be a much bigger sacrifice for most Filipinos than abstinence and fasting.
It’s so hot. Hell cannot be hotter than this. Still, as my former theology professor would say, days like these should encourage us to look within or “inwards.” It is time to take stock of our souls, to determine where we are as far as our ultimate voyage is concerned.
A paper published last year in the online journal Archives of Disease in Childhood has claimed that “young children whose parents read aloud to them have better language literacy skills when they go to school.” Such children are also more likely to end up as booklovers. This may yet turn out more significant than the advantages in language and literacy.
Dear reader, I know you must have had lost a mobile phone or two. You might have misplaced your handset or a friendly neighborhood mugger helped divest you of your mobile phone.
These days are days of terror, anxiety and stress. Normal and logical, when markets fall and crash, when investors head for the nearest exit with their tails between their hind legs, IT manufacturers tremble in fear. And with no early end in sight to this blighted scenery, companies are cutting costs; doing everything including closing plants and laying off their employees wholesale.
Why do we always have to cram? Why do we always have to wait until the last moment before we do things? Look at our House of Representatives and Senate, the lairs of our honorable lawmakers. Why do they have to wait until the first quarter of 2009 is about to end before acting on legislative bills seeking to automate our elections?
When markets fall and demand for goods and services drops to levels lower than certain government officials’ approval ratings, it is the employees who always suffer first.
There are no atheists in foxholes. I first came across this line while reading a World War II novel. As described by that book’s author, it is hard to refrain from praying or seeking the Almighty’s intercession when bombs, mortars and shells are raining down on you.
Friends and drinking buddies always tell me they envy me for my freedom. While downing bottles of beer or glasses of our favorite brand of cheap brandy, they would narrate the reasons why they think I have the best of both worlds. They would keep on telling me how lucky I am for being a stay-home dad and earning money at the same time.
Yes, markets are falling. And yes, there is no denying, we have got some of the most corrupt leaders bar none. Oh, and by the way, don’t get mad at those Taiwanese and Koreans telling our OFWs that Filipinos have no money.
