Category: Smartphone

BMW implementing IPv6 ?

Post author By Don Kasprzak
Post date December 4, 2007

Could BMW’s future cars support IPv6 before your next office network upgrade? Maybe. Work already underway confirms BMW developments in artificial intelligence have moved from the multiple flavors of auto-specific networking standards to internet protocol IPv6 for the next generation of auto (and person) communication.

bmw technology

Its no surprise engineers connect standard PCs to analyze engine and chassis control systems. But the opportunities to configure a multimedia server for the auto’s entertainment system is instep with tomorrow’s demands of mobile communication. Naturally it would be expected that your BMW’s diagnostics would be linked in real-time to your repair shop.

Education Globalization Rich media Smartphone

Why DRM is failing

Post author By Don Kasprzak
Post date December 3, 2007

Digital Rights Management or DRM, has been a controversial snippet of software embedded into music files for a long time. Regardless of how you feel about Microsoft’s PlaysForSure DRM wrapper or Apple’s FairPlay for iTunes it appears the coming death of DRM is from two powerhouses in online sales: Amazon and Wal-Mart.

Funny that Microsoft’s own DRM software will not run on their Zune product. Wal-Mart ditched DRM music in August and a month later Amazon’s site launched DRM free. With larger numbers of online shoppers, the control over digital rights now sit in the hands of the big resellers and not the music industry or even technology companies.

PS – The disappointment with Wal-Mart is their decision to NOT support Mac or Linux systems for downloading music. Not a good sign for a lot of users.

Tags: Amazon, Walmart, music store, music download, Fairplay, PlaysForSure, The Long Tail, trends

Education Globalization Network Smartphone Technology

Amazon’s new music store

Post author By Don Kasprzak
Post date September 27, 2007

Today Amazon opened the beta door to their new music store amazonmp3beta and as the name suggests, everything is available in mp3 format. In comparison Apple’s iTunes format is AAC for all those millions of iPods.

Amazon MP3 offers the top 100 songs for 89 cents each and the top 100 albums for $8.99, with most albums priced from $5.99 to $9.99.

amazonmp3

However I believe the breaking point will be what is available.
Search for U2 and you get:

Education Globalization Network Smartphone Technology

Text Message your next pizza

Post author By Don Kasprzak
Post date August 18, 2007

The emerging and cool method to order pizza is via SMS by Domino’s. After a successful test run early this summer.

Sound interesting? Big pizza lover? You will need to register and establish a preferred menu…but just text message “gametime” will have your favorite pizza at your door within 30 minutes.

And by gametime I mean football….well actually I mean soccer. Domino’s is making this available only in the United Kingdom.

Tags: pizza, Domino’s, SMS, United Kingdom, trends

Design Education Globalization Network Rich media Smartphone Technology

Designers: Core Animation

Lets face it: Today many graphic designers are programmers. They have been moving into the coding world for a number of years. Most cut their teeth on Web 1.0’s plain old HTML. With one foot in Flash‘s ActionScript and JavaScript were clearly the sign to jump in with both feet. This acquired knowledge and new creative energies have paid off handsomely for many designers.

CSS was the next logical choice that continues today as designers create smarter webpages and blogs with strong visual impacts. Even WordPress‘ own website correctly states: Code is Poetry. These skills have proved to be required tools for today’s successful graphic designer.

falling pins The next step may well be Apple’s Core Animation. Look closely at the new iPhone commercials – you will notice a bit of Core Animation: Google push pins drop from the sky onto a map. Good bye static pins!

This small example should really open up the interactive space for designers. Core Animation clearly shows just the tip of the graphical/animation iceberg that will become more robust moving forward.

Designers will jump on this new technology and adapt the necessary code to implement designs on phone and webpages. Apple needs to empower more than their die-hard programmers. Give designers the right tool for the job and we will see amazing interactive graphic elements on the web and our iPhones.

Tags: Core Animation, graphic design, code, iPhone, information design, trends