Profile of Richard Martin
News & Commentary Posts: 378
Articles by Richard Martin
8/12/2008
Poor connections have been reported in countries outside the United States, indicating that the problem lies in the device or the software, and not with AT&T's 3G network.
8/11/2008
Bell Internet subscribers now have access to free Wi-Fi service at more than 650 Starbucks stores across Canada.
8/7/2008
MyBizHomepage has introduced an online platform for small companies' financial records, aimed at small-business owners who need fast and easily understood insight into key accounting data.
8/6/2008
In case you haven't read the ton of comments on the story I wrote yesterday on the mobile search service ChaCha, I am giving them some added prominence here.
8/5/2008
Under the new payment system, ChaCha's premium guides who meet certain performance criteria in terms of accuracy and volume will receive 20 cents per answer.
8/4/2008
Although Beike Biotechnology's promising stem cell treatment is unproven, patients are paying to receive the treatment in China.
8/1/2008
Kevin Martin added another brick to his legacy today, with the FCC's ruling against Comcast in the net neutrality dispute. And I use "brick" in the basketball sense, as in a comically misguided shot on goal.
8/1/2008
Big Blue plans to build a data center in North Carolina and open a "cloud computing center" in Tokyo at a cost of nearly $400 million.
7/31/2008
The advent of browser-based thin clients like CherryPal and projects from Microsoft, Google, and others indicates that fully cloud-based computing will make its way to the masses.
7/30/2008
Fiserv has launched a Facebook application called MyMoney that lets users pay bills, make transfers, and check balances.
7/29/2008
There's a lot of blogosphere chatter these days about "private cloud" computing. Unfortunately, there's no such thing.
7/25/2008
Despite predictions by analysis firm J. Gold Associates, officials with Symbian, Nokia, and Google aren't positive the union would work right now.
7/24/2008
This will almost certainly go down as the worst year in the history of the U.S. airline industry. Buffeted by high fuel costs, the airlines are canceling flights -- and losing money -- in record numbers. But there's a glimmer of hope in providing in-flight Web access to passengers.
7/24/2008
Alticor is among the largest companies to acknowledge publicly that it's launching an iPhone trial.
7/23/2008
Today is the first day of Comic-Con, the huge San Diego geekfest that celebrates superheroes, starship troopers, and the fanboys who love them. And while this is not a golden age for comics themselves, never has the comics world had more to celebrate, commercially.
7/22/2008
The Windows-compatible platform can be seen as Microsoft's counterpart Amazon's Elastic Cloud Computing service, known as EC2, and to the Google App Engine.
7/18/2008
Earnings season is in full swing and it's a good moment to pause and review three tech giants that reported in the last two days.
7/17/2008
I just read that the U.S. State Department now has an embassy in Second Life. That's an inflection point if I ever saw one.
7/17/2008
By combining its Web search technologies with enterprise-specific products, Google hopes to keep up with Microsoft, IBM, and a clutch of innovative startups in the enterprise search arena.
7/16/2008
The agency has criticized the digital-records and cyber-security policies at five government agencies including the National Archives and Record Administration and the Dept. of Homeland Security.
7/15/2008
I'm a cranky traveler at the best of times, and when I get charged outrageous fees for Internet access by supposedly fine hotels I get really aggravated.
7/15/2008
Gartner lowered its forecast for mobile industry growth as it becomes apparent that the economic downturn will affect sales of mobile devices worldwide.
7/2/2008
As AT&T rolls out its own IPTV offering, it may see its satellite TV partnerships as insignificant to its overall strategy.
7/1/2008
Having been called "a lowlife piece of garbage," among other things, for my post yesterday about a Seattle radio jock's reading of a 2003 e-mail from Bill Gates, I figured some amplification is in order.
7/1/2008
The new book by Harvard law professor Jonathan Zittrain, a technology thinker and provocateur, lays out a stark, Orwellian vision for the next phase of online development.
6/30/2008
Retailer J.C. Penney has forced the withdrawal of the so-called "Speed Dressing" ad that won a prestigious advertising award at Cannes, France, earlier this month.
6/30/2008
In a now semi-famous e-mail rant in 2003, outgoing Microsoft chairman Bill Gates lamented the colossal user-unfriendliness of his company's primary product, Windows. Now that message has been given voice by a Seattle radio host.
6/25/2008
A "thought shift" is required before big business will shift core business databases to the cloud, said a Google software engineer.
6/25/2008
The first real controversy at the Structure08 cloud computing conference erupted during a panel called "Working the Cloud: NetGen Infrastructure for New Enterpreneurs." Not surprisingly, it involved Google.
6/25/2008
Opening Structure08, the cloud computing conference in San Francisco, Jonathan Yarmis of AMR Research coined an interesting phrase: Everything As A Service.
6/24/2008
A few comments and questions while digesting the news that Nokia will engulf the remaining portion of Symbian that it doesn't already own:
6/23/2008
Smartphone makers Motorola, Intermec, and Tripod Data Systems are enclosing handsets in ruggedized cases and sales are soaring. Go ahead: Rock 'em, drop 'em, and knock 'em down. They can take it.
6/20/2008
XM Satellite Radio's share price is down another 3.6% today after plunging 17% on a discouraging report from Goldman Sachs. XM rival Sirius has suffered a similar stumble.
6/20/2008
ISP MetroFi had contacted the city government last month, indicating it was looking for a buyer for the existing network, which covers around 30% of the city.
6/19/2008
Tech analysts have raved, rightfully, about the developing partnership between IBM and Google. But they're missing the real reason this linkage between tech titans old and new matters so much.
6/18/2008
For the last few months it has appeared that the federal courts would force the Bush White House to account for, and eventually turn over, the infamous "missing e-mails" from the period March 2003 to October 2005. Now the judicial tide has turned.
6/17/2008
At this point, jumping in to rescue a failing municipal Wi-Fi network seems like taking over as manager of the Mets: you're unlikely to succeed, but at least you're almost certain to do better than the last guy.
6/13/2008
In case you were distracted by the release of the newest, cheaper version of a certain popular mobile device this week, here's a recap of wireless and broadband news you might have missed.
6/4/2008
The Democratic presidential nominee has harnessed the power of technology to radically transform the way big campaigns connect with their supporters.
6/3/2008
Veoh offers a Web platform that allows users to find and watch video content from major studios and TV networks, user-generated clips, and independent productions.
6/3/2008
Striking a blow for fantasy-league owners everywhere, the Supreme Court on Monday declined to intervene in a suit involving Major League Baseball and a Web-based fantasy-league operator.
5/29/2008
The New York Times has a front-page story today about a group of monkeys who have learned to move robotic arms using only their thoughts, using tiny sensors in their brains called neural interfaces.
5/28/2008
John Chambers has been talking about transforming the way enterprises use and manage IT resources for a couple of years now. With "Cisco Motion," he's finally delivered.
5/21/2008
What if Lawrence Summers was right?
5/19/2008
Right now, among the beleaguered employees of the Tribune Co., the prevalent question (besides "Will I still have a job tomorrow?") is, "Who the hell does Lee Abrams think he is?"
5/19/2008
Troubles at MetroFi and EarthLink are leaving business needs open for collaborations from companies like Sprint and Clearwire as well as deployments by Verizon and AT&T.
5/15/2008
The Max Planck Institute released a study showing that Comcast has engaged in routine blocking or throttling of BitTorrent files at all hours of the day.
5/13/2008
In the last few weeks several big Web and social networking players have released versions of "open" platforms that allow users to port their data and their connections between sites and between devices. Does this mark a major turning point for the advent of Web 2.0?
5/9/2008
Who says the profit motive and Third World development can't work together? Wireless infrastructure giant Ericsson is trying to prove otherwise in remote areas of Sub-Saharan Africa.
5/8/2008
For example, Airspan's share price jumped by 56% on Wednesday, and Airspan isn't even involved in the WiMax build-out as a primary supplier.
5/7/2008
It's a truism that smart money finds places to invest during a downturn. Today's Sprint-Clearwire deal is a perfect illustration.
5/7/2008
The nation's No. 3 wireless carrier retained majority ownership in the wireless broadband network while spreading the financial risk across a diverse set of partners.
5/5/2008
Now that Steve Ballmer has taken his ball and gone home, three things have become clear about the failed Microsoft bid for Yahoo: 1) This deal is not dead yet; 2) Yahoo's future as an independent company is at any rate limited; and 3) Microsoft is playing in the wrong arena.
5/2/2008
Forrester Research analysts Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff call it The Groundswell. Nicholas Carr calls it The Big Switch. Tom Hayes calls it the Jump Point. Whatever it is, it's clearly going to involve major earthshaking.
4/30/2008
I've been racking my brain all day to come up with an excuse to blog about the death of Albert Hofmann, the inventor of LSD. Turns out Nick Carr already beat me to it!
4/29/2008
Breaking up an impasse as bad as rush hour over La Guardia Airport, the U.S. Senate this week is set to pass a reauthorization bill for the Federal Aviation Administration that may finally pave the way for modernizing the nation's antiquated air traffic control system.
4/24/2008
Remember the line from the great Talking Heads song "Once In a Lifetime": "Well, how do I work this?" That was pretty much what I heard today at our Over the Air Mobility Forum on mobile device management.
4/16/2008
Among the cool iPhone features touted by Apple is its "self-localization" ability: Turn it on, and it tells you where you are! Turns out, though, it's a simple matter to phool an iPhone.
4/15/2008
The acquisition of the blog content company is aimed at speeding AOL's transformation from an ISP to a Web 2.0 company.
4/14/2008
The wireless industry is expected to fight hard against repealing a rule that exempts telecommunications providers from the requirements of the FTC Act.
4/11/2008
Bristol University physicists advance the field of quantum computing with the successful miniaturization of a high-performance, optical "controlled-NOT gate."
4/4/2008
A huge "echo boom" of high schoolers is pushing college acceptance rates at top-tier schools to record low levels.
4/3/2008
Microsoft, Nokia, and Sprint advance the state of the art on the wireless Web.
4/3/2008
What a downer. I just opened the CTIA "Show Daily," from the very creditable news outlet RCR Wireless News, to find that ... Nothing Happened at the big CTIA Wireless show in Vegas.
4/2/2008
Vendors like Intel, Motorola, Microsoft, and Nokia provided a peek at the mobile Web of the future, but they couldn't say when it would be available.
4/2/2008
So what about the Mars mission volunteers who bounded up on stage with Virgin Group Ltd. founder, Sir Richard Branson, yesterday? Did they know they got punk'd?
4/1/2008
The N810 has a 4.13-inch touch screen and WiFi connectivity, in addition to WiMax, and is expected to sell for around $440.
4/1/2008
Attending the Nokia press conference to announce the new WiMax edition N810 Internet tablet today required me to break at least a couple of my rules for living. The first one was "Never sign a liability waiver on April Fools' Day."
4/1/2008
Sitting down with two executives from Symbian, provider of the world's leading mobile-phone operating system, and analyst Avi Greengart of Current Analysis at the CTIA Wireless show in Las Vegas gave me a feeling of déjà vu.
3/31/2008
Apple's iPhone, Verizon's open network, and devices based in Google's open source Android mobile platform are expected to put simple cell phones to rest.
3/28/2008
Look for a wave of new devices and services when the wireless industry gathers for a major industry conference.
3/27/2008
Maybe it's the end of Lent and the coming of spring, but despite the gloomy economic prospects there's definitely a spirit of reconciliation and conflict-resolution in the air of the U.S. tech industry.
3/26/2008
One of the ripple effects of the Motorola announcement likely will be the continued ascendance of Asian device makers like HTC and UTStarcom.
3/25/2008
Despite losing the 700 MHz auction, Google says a combination of geo-location technology and wireless protective beacons will eliminate any remaining interference concerns.
3/20/2008
The company will host a developers' conference later this spring to flesh out the development kit in order to let customers use applications, from any vendor or developer.
3/19/2008
The effort marks the company's transformation from a processor of credit card transactions to a provider of financial networks and technology.
3/19/2008
Analysts pointed to several possible reasons for the failure of the "D block" to sell, including the specter of recession and uncertainty over FCC requirements of the winner.
3/18/2008
A federal judge gave the White House three days to explain why it shouldn't be ordered to create and preserve copies of the missing e-mails.
3/17/2008
With new products and initiatives, executive Sujai Hajela predicts that his division will impress the enterprise in the transition to faster 802.11n networks.
3/13/2008
For a telecom and Web conference, the Emerging Communications Conference at the Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley this week had a lot of talk of death and extinction. Most of it was related to the big telecom carriers.
3/13/2008
Rich Miner boasts better performance numbers based on the reach of Google's partners, Motorola, Samsung, HTC, and LG.
3/13/2008
Companies like Toktumi and Ribbit compare their role and impact on the industry to the historic shift from electronic typewriters to word processors in the 1970s.
3/12/2008
The next phase of VoIP development opportunities for interactive companies is to improve applications with voice capabilities, a telecom consultant suggests.
3/12/2008
Google's Android operating system and VoIP applications like Skype will be major contributors, a panel of communications experts predicts.
3/11/2008
The company's Network Guardian product gives network operators far greater visibility into and control over the traffic on their systems.
3/10/2008
Verizon Wireless' CFO tells investors that unlimited-calling and upgrades are "game-changing voice and data plans."
3/6/2008
It's courting developers in an effort to make the iPhone a business-friendly tool.
3/5/2008
If Apple continues to keep a tight rein on the types of applications that can be run on the iPhone, analysts suggest the company will miss a big opportunity.
3/3/2008
The company hopes its common, open standards-based UC software will trump competing offerings from vendors like Cisco and IBM.
2/29/2008
Other huge media mergers, including News Corp.'s $5.6 billion buyout of Dow Jones, may quell FCC fears that a combination will constitute a monopoly in satellite radio.
2/28/2008
For an industry that saw its revenue rise 25% last year to a record high, the online advertising business is in a bit of a funk. Mostly that's because of Google, which has seen its dominance in Internet ads erode, slightly, and watched its share price slide by 38% in the last four months.
2/28/2008
The women's-interest media company set a new benchmark for the exploding online ad market and set itself up as a potential competitor to Google.
2/27/2008
This week's news that Covad Communications has stepped in as the primary network provider on the stalled Silicon Valley Wireless project may allow us, in Wall Street parlance, to "call the bottom" on the ailing business of providing widespread, low-cost municipal wireless access.
2/26/2008
Bush administration officials put some of the blame on a two-year transition from Lotus Notes to Microsoft Exchange.
2/25/2008
Scientists hope seeing how an individual electron rides on a light wave after just having been detached from its atom will help them decipher other atomic and sub-atomic objects.
2/25/2008
The company reports that 30,000 people have joined the waiting list for the information-management software, which may become available next week.
2/21/2008
On the list of all-time non-reassuring assurances, today's Pentagon statement about the downing of crippled U.S. spy satellite ranked high.
2/21/2008
In a conflict stemming from the failure to renegotiate a cross-licensing agreement that expired in 2003, the two companies traded lawsuits in U.S. district court last weekend.
2/19/2008
In a time of widespread devastation in the magazine industry, here's a bit of cheering news: the Magazine Publishers of America's latest quarterly data shows that in the free-for-all digital-media world, the dead trees guys are actually starting to hold their own with endemic Web properties.
2/19/2008
Surf Canyon re-orders search results in real time based on the users' inferred intent.