We all have done it,used our mobile phone while driving and know that there are accidents by the boat load over doing this.

BOSTON (CBS) – There’s a new push to ban hand-held cell phones while driving in Massachusetts.

The Joint Transportation Committee unanimously approved the latest version of the bill Thursday.

…

“The technology is really changing. I think it’s important that we have the discussion and we’ll see where the Senate goes. I can’t speak for my colleagues, but I know there was support in the Senate, it was a close vote and I think the committee felt it was an important step to move the bill forward,” he told WBZ NewsRadio 1030 Friday.

Nine other states already ban hand-held cell phone use while driving, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association.

The National Transportation Safety Board recently recommended a total ban on hand-held cell phone use in cars in the United States.

full story here

 

I hate the thought of a nanny state for us but I personally know several that have wrecked over mobile cell phone use .There are now some amny FM transmitter type devices for your auto that gives you a hands free calling,texting and so forth.Seems making those the mandtory would be more the ticket than punishing those who are responsibly using a mobile phone while driving.

Photo by Des Moines Register

One of the more frightening things I can think of is losing my iphone, as I have so much information on it that would be hard to get back.

Theres just no beating the build in GPS chip for locating your lost phone

The story appeared in The Chicago Tribune
Allison Peterson couldn’t find her phone last Friday and realized it most likely had fallen out of her pocket and into an old green recycling bin she’d tossed out, The Des Moines Register (http://dmreg.co/zSaSR1) reported Wednesday.

Peterson, 39, had downloaded a “Find My iPhone” app to her computer, so she clicked on the app and watched the blip zip through her neighborhood.

Peterson tracked down the garbage truck, and driver Brent Klaassen called the phone, which was later discovered to have its ringer turned off.

Klaassen offered to let Peterson look for her phone at the landfill. She declined — but called her husband, Mark.

“Once she told me that it would cost around $700 to replace the phone, I said I’d drive up and see what I could do,” he said.

Yep I can see that $700 well if your going to put it that way then..
Thats another good reason I hate the thought of losing my iPhone the replacement costs! :0

Its got a happy ending:
Several workers for Metro Waste Authority and Waste Management joined in his search.

“The actions of these folks saved me a large amount of money, got me some brownie points with my wife . and made me appreciate how people who didn’t even know me, had nothing to gain and probably thought I was crazy, took the time to help,” Mark Peterson, 46, wrote in a two-page thank-you letter.

Klaassen and his co-workers have been through similar situations, as people have called in a panic about lost diamond rings, wallets and other valuables. But this time, the GPS chip let Klaassen separate the trash from the rest of the landfill.

“If this had been dumped with all the other trucks delivering the garbage, there’s no way this would have been found,” said Reo Menning, spokeswoman for the Metro Waste Authority.

Workers found the slightly damaged iPhone on their second pass. Mark Peterson picked up the phone and called his wife.

“I found it,” he said.   From the The Chicago Tribune

Thats an amazing story that she even found her iPhone,thanks to the tracking finder.

Well whats changing?

 

 

According to Foxconn
4+ inch display (made by LG on at least one of them).
No teardrop-shaped devices, as rumored in the lead up to the iPhone 4S. Samples so far have been symmetrical in thickness (also longer/wider).
Neither of the sample devices have the iPhone 4/4S form factor.
Neither of the devices are the final versions.

They need it as I age it is getting a little more difficult each year to read the screen with out the “pinch”

The 4s has been a record breaker for the 1st quarter:

Over the summer of 2011, analysts and pundits appeared certain that the company would release an iPhone 5 with a radically altered design and powerful new hardware. In October, however, Apple executives unveiled the iPhone 4S, whose exterior seemed virtually identical to the iPhone 4. However, a collection of new features—including Siri, a voice-activated “digital personal assistant”—quickly helped the new smartphone become a bestseller.

Sales of some 27.04 million iPhones contributed to Apple’s record-breaking fiscal 2012 first quarter, which ended Dec. 31. During the Jan. 24 earnings call, Apple CEO Tim Cook attributed the iPhone’s robust sales numbers to a combination of what he called “breathtaking customer reception” as well as pent-up demand from a particularly long gap between new iPhone releases. Overall, quarterly revenue totaled $46.33 billion, with a net profit of $13.06 billion.

eweek  full story here

 

 

No date set yet on the release of the iPhone 5

in the  NY TIMES  Obama …

joined Silicon Valley’s top luminaries for dinner in California last February, each guest was asked to come with a question for the president.But as Steven P. Jobs of spoke, President Obama interrupted with an inquiry of his own: what would it take to make iPhones in the United States?Not long ago, Apple boasted that its products were made in America. Today, few are. Almost all of the 70 million iPhones, 30 million iPads and 59 million other products Apple sold last year were manufactured overseas.

Why can’t that work come home? Mr. Obama asked.

Mr. Jobs’s reply was unambiguous. “Those jobs aren’t coming back,” he said, according to another dinner guest.

The president’s question touched upon a central conviction at Apple. It isn’t just that workers are cheaper abroad. Rather, Apple’s executives believe the vast scale of overseas factories as well as the flexibility, diligence and industrial skills of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts that “Made in the U.S.A.” is no longer a viable option for most Apple products.

Full story here

Yes we have been out maneuvered in mfg for quite some time. Flashback to the days  after WWII and the USA was helping Japan (and others) rebuild.The Americans were THE Masters of manufacturing  not the folks oversea on either side. We taught Japan how we did the mfg process. They were also masters at copying and this they did to a “T”. We were all about quality and value which was again passed on to the Japanese.My father  served  as  a paratrooper  in Japan in the afore mention days and tells the story of giving a few Japanese men  two beer cans and a zippo lighter, and in a few days came back with a replica of that lighter. They were very smart people and willing to learn new things.They just need someone to teach them how to do it.

This is going somewhere and yes I do realize that Apple is a China product but am answering the question why Mr Jobs would make such a statement “industrial skills of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts ”

Now that type of  manufacturing in the USA went out from us  because of the need (really called greed) to not make things of such high quality anymore. The thinking was that if a car only lasted 7-10 yrs  instead 20 yrs plus, then we could have these folks back in our buying line shortly and of course make even more money… and the time keep getting reduced to where now if you can get a 90 day warrenty on a household product you good a good deal.

Could the USA once again be a mfg giant of the world?  Yes but it would take alot of effort and at times I am not so sure that we “all” are willing to pay that price. Its a crying shame but lets not just bash presidents,congressmen and so forth,as it must start in our own homes 1st., in the products we buy.

The following is ABC News video of a story about Made in America Please take the time to view this.

Here is a another page from ABC NEWS about same with many stories

iBooks 2 Digital Textbooks is for the new version of iBooks for the student to  interact with , digital textbooks ,ect  which will give student/teacher a way to interact online.

 From ABCNEWS :

“The textbook is not always the ideal learning tool,” said Schiller. “Yet their content is amazing.”

He showed how different lessons — in biology, math, literature and other areas — could play on an iPad. The new interactive books would cost $14.99, far less than most of today’s paper textbooks. They could be updated continually, said Apple. And it will not take a programming wizard to create one.

Students will be able to “mark up” their iPad books electronically, creating the digital equivalent of note cards as they go through lessons, said Apple. And they will be able to keep the iBooks, since they are digital files, after the courses are over.

Schiller said Apple was forming partnerships with three of the biggest publishers of school texts: Pearson, McGraw-Hill and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, which are responsible for 90 percent of the textbooks used in the U.S. today. DK Publishing, which publishes vividly-colored books for younger kids, is joining in as well. Apple said a first offering would be an iPad-only book, “Life On Earth,” by E.O. Wilson, the famed biologist and professor emeritus at Harvard.

Full story here

Perhaps we are starting to enter into a “new interactive age” with this type of releases. Text books made of paper could or rather may become a past item like wringer washing machines… but not yet as only Apple is marketing this.

With all the problems trying to get the attention of our younger folks and keeping them engage them on a scholarly  level  the  iBooks 2 Apple  Digital Textbooks could have just been made alittle easier if not down right helpful!

This Australias 1st 4G Android phone has been selling in the US as  the Raider HTC and also in South Korea.

The touch-screen HTC Velocity 4G smartphone will have super-fast mobile internet access between 2MB and 40MB per second while inside 4G network areas.

Currently only Telstra has made its 4G network available for phones, with the Velocity to be the first commercially available.

It will run on an Android (Google) Gingerbread operating system combined with HTC Sense 3.5.

Featuring a 4.5 inch HD super LCD screen and 16GB memory, with room to add a microSD card for further space, it is geared for fast processing with 1GB of RAM and a 1.5GHz dual core processor.

The Velocity weighs about 163.8 grams and also includes an eight megapixel camera with a 28mm wide-angle lens.

It also features high definition video capture with a 1080 pixel video recorder and can play video back in slow motion.

The phone will be available for $79 a month on a 24 month plan with $800 included calls and MMS, unlimited SMS and 2GB of data.

4G phones will allow for faster than ever before video and music streaming on phones as well as super-quick web navigation.

 

More here from The Heraldsun.com.au

 

Here is a peek at it:

Some of the features listed by PCworld website are:
HTC Velocity 4G has a large 4.5in qHD touchscreen with a resolution of 540×960, a 1.5GHz dual core processor, 1GB of RAM, 16GB of internal memory and an 8-megapixel camera with dual-LED flash. The phone is coated in a gloss black finish on the front and has a silver battery cover on the rear. It will ship with the 2.3 “Gingerbread” version of Google’s Android OS, though Telstra hasn’t revealed if it will eventually be upgraded to the latest 4.0 “Ice Cream Sandwich” version.

We are glad and I am sure our down under friends are too.Seems to me the 4g is still lagging behind here in the states too

But now theres DataVault Password Manager which  thru encrypting secures your info/passwords

Password manager handles the job well enough
by Kyle Baxter, Macworld.com

Your personal data can never be too secure, especially when it’s on a device that’s with you everywhere you go. DataVault Password Manager is a $10 app for both the iPhone and iPad that stores all of your bank account, credit card and log-in data, encrypting it using the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). DataVault has Mac and Windows clients, too, which it syncs with using MobileMe, WebDAV, WiFi and file sharing.

With so many different websites, web applications, and services, it’s difficult to create strong passwords for each, remember them, and enter them on an iPhone or iPad keyboard. DataVault tries to make this easy by storing all of your passwords, and generating secure ones, too. DataVault allows you to store almost any kind of data you want, but accessing the app from Ascendo requires entering a password to keep out anyone who might be using your phone.

Full story here

They have made this app so easy with the use of templates for the end user

Macworld says:

The app includes a large selection of templates for data, such as a checking account, credit card, login, and insurance information. That helps make entering data a bit quicker.

Features that would impress anyone

From Ascendo website

DataVault for iPhone, iPad & iPod Touch

Display information in Tree View for intuitive organization by Category and Type.
Display information in List View to maximize the number of Items per screen.
Define an unlimited number of Categories such as Personal, Business, etc. and Types such as Credit Cards, Bank Accounts, Logins, Memberships, etc.
Choose from 25 pre-defined Templates or make your own, 100 icons to choose from.
Customize Screen Colors and Backgrounds by selecting from 6 Themes.
Generate Strong Passwords using options for Length, Letters/Numbers, Uppercase, Lowercase and Punctuation Marks.
Set advanced security settings such as password masking, master password hint and security time out.
Synchronize data to Ascendo DataVault Desktop (see below).
Backup and restore using iTunes.

At $9.99 a pop its also easy on the pocketbook.
Check out DataVault Password Manager  in the app store

Who would have thought Apple would ever release its grip on its products ? I am now you can possibly use something besides Apple products with out Jailbreaking iphone 4

They are reporting that the iPhone jailbreak

has left the sandbox stage of development
According to a tweet picked up by iDownloadBlog, hacker “planetbeing” has announced that the iPhone 4S/iPad 2 jailbreak has left the sandbox stage of development. He also states that the jailbreak is “turning out to be more complex than X-Gold 618.”

X-Gold 618 was the baseband chip in the iPhone 4 that was cracked by planetbeing and “MuscleNerd.”

The complicated nature of this particular jailbreak is not a surprise considering Apple blocked one of the popular methods of jailbreaking with the release of the iOS 5 update.

With the iPhone 4S and iPad 2 jailbreak on the horizon, are you planning on jailbreaking your device? Why or why not?

Read more at CNET

This will open up the market for iphones against androids,where they are getting theirs stomped

Camera+ improves upon key functions of the iPhone’s camera interface, and speeds things up at the same time. It allows the shooter to choose a different area for exposure determination than focus, which is crucial for managing a shot in difficult lighting scenarios. It also provides an on-screen slider for zoom if you happen to not be a fan of iOS 5′s new pinch-to-zoom function in the camera app. Camera+ also allows some control over the automatic white balance function, and adds shooting modes for burst, self-timer, and digital image stabilization.

All of the functions that the native camera app on the iPhone are present in Camera+ too, including a grid for composure, geotagging, control over the flash (including a continuous, always-on flash mode), capture with the volume-up key (a feature pioneered by earlier versions of Camera+, but initially banned by Apple until it added it to iOS 5) and access to the front-facing camera. Camera+ is noticeably faster at snapping photos than the stock app as well – a bonus that can be appreciated by any smartphone photographer.

The features in Camera+ don’t end after you take the picture, either. Built in to the app are editing tools for adjusting color, effects, borders, and more. All of them are super easy to use and the user can see the effect in real-time as they tweak the sliders for each effect. By default, Camera+ saves all pictures to its own “Lightbox,” where the user can then choose the best of a series and edit them accordingly. You can also set it to save images directly to the iPhone’s Photo Roll, and then import the photos back into Camera+ for editing later.

 

 

 

Its also great for bad lighting.I was in NM and took pics in the low light of the sunset. Using this iPhone app I very simply corrected them,and it also works with “washed out” pictures.

The move to mobile across the board is being a difficult one in making the transition as  not all  have mobile phones and  those that have them don’t always have a signal.

The mobile phone blackspots are everywhere.They can reduce the “911″ ability and effectiveness such as in our down under friends of Gippsland where a new emergency alert system via mobile phone

A State and Federal Government initiative to send emergency alerts to all mobile phones within a declared danger area was announced on Friday and will be introduced in time for the next summer bushfire season.

The alert system differs from the current practice which allows alerts to be sent to residents whose phone billing address is within an area where there is a danger.The new system has been welcomed, but it has renewed calls for action to fix mobile phone blackspots in many parts of the Gippsland region.

Ralph Cooper, the owner and operator of the Best Friend Holiday Retreat near the Tarra Bulga National Park, says the emergency alert telephone warning system would be useless in his region which has no mobile phone reception.”It just wouldn’t happen because we’ve got no reception. It (the new alert system) has got to be applauded. It’s a step in the right direction, but where there is no mobile coverage it’s useless.”Mr Cooper says thousands of tourists visit the Tarra Bulga region every year and he is concerned about the lack of mobile phone reception in times of natural disasters or medical emergencies.

Full Story here  ABC Gippsland

 

If mobile providers dont using each others towers then it will hinder (perhaps) the growth of  the mobile market as is the case being stated in the UK:

Government asks mobile providers to advise on ‘not-spots’

The UK government has called for mobile network operators to identify areas that currently do not receive any mobile signal, known as ‘not-spots’ and provide advice on how they could be irradicated.
At present there is a woeful lack of investment in rural fixed-line and mobile broadband services. A simple search of Orange broadband reviews, for example, brings up results that show connectivity in rural areas is poor, if not non-existent
Complete story here mobile broadband news