telecom

Wanted: New County Executive; Requirements: Must Be Democratic

It is important to remember that Charlie Dooley wasn’t initially elected into office, but rather he was to take over office after the sudden passing of George “Buzz” Westfall in 2003. Westfall did not live to see his 60th birthday due to a staph infection.

As much as Dooley has done a fair job picking up the reigns of Westfall, it is not without an agenda that Dooley has taken this job.

In recent years, Dooley, like so many other people in St. Louis County, has seen North St. Louis County (District 4), as this “dangerous” community. I wouldn’t call North County “dangerous” per se, but rather a tough community with a soft marshmallow center.

The past couple of years, outsiders from the City (St. Louis City and County are two different entities) thought getting away with their crimes out near the Florissant Area or in the St. Louis County Police Department’s 1st Precinct would mean that they would be getting away with their heinous crime. However, most of those criminals were caught expeditiously thanks to our outstanding tough-as-nails police force.

But in terms of respect for the area, the politicians in Clayton literally don’t understand–or care to for that matter–about the environment north of I-270.

Such is the case with two specific areas of North County: The West Lake Landfill and the Columbia Bottoms.

The Westlake Landfill was one of three places in North County where the Mallinckrodt Corporation had illegally dumped radioactive wastes. Two of these places are under the juristiction of the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) as part of the Former Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP). The Two FUSRAP sites in North County that were cleaned up by the USACE were the St. Louis Airport Site (SLAPS) and the Hazelwood Interim Storage Site (HISS). Cleanup was made possible by transferring responsibility of the cleanup from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to the USACE.

However, there is one site in North St. Louis County that has not been cleaned up: The Westlake Landfill.

The urgency of cleaning up Westlake would not have been so much of a problem, if a liner was put in place to prevent the raidoactive wastes from seeping into the groundwater then finding their way into the river. It also wouldn’t be so urgent if the Monarch and Howard Bend Levees were not reenforced, or if urban sprawl near the Monarch Levee had not occured since 1993, or if the Riverport and Earth City Levees had received the same treatment as the Monarch and Howard Bend Levees. Thanks to the breach of the Monarch Levee in 1993, the water supplies in Florissant and North St. Louis City were not contaminated. But if flooding like in 1993 were to occur again, there would be no second chances as the water would topple the Riverport Levee, wash hot particles into the Missouri River, and contaminate the water supplies in Florissant, North St. Louis City, and possibly further downstream.

A recent talk with Mr. Dooley stated that clean up of the Westlake Landfill would be “impossible” due to what he says would be the risk of kicking up hot particles. When the wind blows in a thunderstorm or a blustery day, doesn’t that just as equally kick up those hot particles?

However, Dooley is in favor of plans for building the Riverview Casino near Spanish Lake along Riverview Boulevard, an area which for years has been a quiet refuge, hidden in the farthest north part of the St. Louis City neighborhood or Riverview at the Northeastern Part of St. Louis County. This area is not only quiet country, but it is wetlands, created by the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers in the Columbia Bottoms.

Dooley’s justification for the establishment of the casino is that it would generate $400 Million in revenue, and that if St. Louis County didn’t acquire the only casino license (which belonged to the President Casino on the Admiral Riverboat), that St. Louis City would try to take it back.

But North County does NOT want a casino to be a source of income or as a place of economic development. We already have the Harrah’s Casino in Maryland Heights. The Casino is in a flood plain protected by the Howard Bend Levee, much like Boone’s Crossing in Chesterfield has been established near the Monarch Levee under the foolhearted assumption that the levee will make the floodplains into safe areas to create new neighborhoods. This is wrong!

There are far better industries that St. Louis County (particularly North St. Louis County) needs to not only generate revenue but establish sustainable economic development.

However, Charlie Dooley doesn’t want to encourage high tech companies into the St. Louis Area. It would be cheaper to build a casino in a wetlands area. He says it would be OK, because the casino would be “environmentally friendly”. I have yet to see a casino in the St. Louis Area that was considered “environmentally friendly”. Look at the Ameristar Casino, as it expands into the Missouri River. I wouldn’t call that “environmentally friendly”. The Harrah’s Casino in the flood plains of Maryland Heights, is that “environmentally friendly”?

How on God’s green Earth will putting a casino into a wetland area be “environmentally friendly”?! Because it is not!

Because if Dooley’s headstrong, foolish believes that it is too dangerous to clean up Westlake Landfill by transferring cleanup responsibility from the EPA to the USACE while at the same time believes that a wetland is a good place for a casino which he says is “environmentally friendly”, Charlie Dooley has pretty much set a course for the end of his tenure as St. Louis County Executive…if only there was someone worthy enough to replace him.

It is clear that the GOP in the St. Louis County is suffering from the same incompetence and nearsightedness as any Republican Party at this time. Bad decision making, and support for big businesses to make bad decisions, as well as a laundry list of other terrible, ignorant, and stupid platform decisions and supports had what made me cease any support for the Republican Party since 2006. Switching to the Democratic Party was probably the best decision I had made politically considering the people who are leading the GOP now both at federal and state levels.

But the County has now caught this irrational fever, and had nearly considered Chris Arps to spare against Dooley, unaware of Arps criticism of the NAACP then suddenly needing the NAACP’s help just after the Kenny Gladney incident. You could probably imagine how eager anyone at the NAACP would want to help someone who had criticized them beforehand.

The fact that the St. Louis Young Republicans even know the former staffer of Jim Talent, drop his name then decided to take it back, proves the ineffectiveness of having a GOP county executive at a time when the last thing St. Louis County needs is a fiscal conservative to derail many of the program and projects that need to be done in the area over the next few years to climb out of recession, attract real economic sustainability (NOT a casino!), protect the environment and ourselves, and to bring technological innovation to the St. Louis County region. (Thanks to Dooley, County-Wide WiFi is now off the table.).

Unless we want, Republican Bill Corrigan as the new St. Louis County Executive, a new Democratic challenger must toss their hat into the ring!

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Monday, April 26th, 2010 Local, Saint Louis City, Saint Louis County, economy, employment, environment, greenwashing, politics, telecom 1 Comment

Attention AT&T: You are not the government! So don’t tax us like you are!

There is a saying that goes “Don’t steal. The Government Hates Competition.” Well, AT&T feels obliged to challenge that by charging Missouri’s 1,000,000 land line customers a $6.10 municipal tax. The municipality doesn’t see any of that money, as proven by an angry Florissant Mayor Robert Lowery, Sr.

Here is what happened. A few years ago, there was a lawsuit in Missouri where AT&T was told to pay a $65 Million settlement back to 300 cities in the state of Missouri including Florissant, University City, and unincorporated St. Louis County. However, AT&T is taking it out on their land line customers that they are suppost to be paying back by charging them $6.10 Municipal tax that was suppost to occur once. The Missouri technology tax is only about $4 for ever $100. St. Louis County only charges about $2. But AT&T, being AT&T, has decided to charge this $6.10 tax that they made up against their land line customers FOR THE NEXT FOUR YEARS!.

So instead of paying back it’s customers in 300 cities in Missouri the $65 Million in back taxes, they will make a profit off the 1 Million Missouri customers of about $73.2 Million each year for the next 4 years. (If you think that is not that much, There are only about 5.9 Million people who live in Missouri. meaning about 1 in 6 people in our state will be paying an extra $73.20 per year.) In the end they will make up more than $292.8 Million, nearly four and a half times the value of the the initial settlement.

AT&T gets to make money off the customers they are suppost to be paying back, and there is no law against it! After this incident, customers will want laws against what AT&T is doing! The fact that private industry is create a tax in addition to what customers are paying them is concerning and should be a wake up call to how the government regulates business practices.

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Tuesday, January 5th, 2010 Missouri, Saint Louis County, corporate greed, telecom No Comments

Isn’t it about time the Cellphone industry do something about radiation exposure?

I’m really looking forward to getting a new phone next month. But the recent news about cell phone radiation is proving to be a big downer.

Clearly, studies are necessary into making sure that cell phones are safe. As radiation (be it non-ionizing (safe in low amounts) or ionizing (not safe, and not emitted by cellphones)) is a considerable health risk.

What we do know is that non-ionizing radiation is safe under certain conditions. (The biggest problem being heat, which can be control by reducing the resistance in a system.) Radio transmitters, like the ones the broadcasting industry uses for radio and television broadcasts, are safe and have not had the controversy that cellphones have had. Had the radio towers been deemed unsafe, we would have seen birds and other wild life disappear a long time ago. However, I still wake up in the morning to the sound of cardinals chirping outside my window less than a mile from a radio tower. Thus, because the radio tower is safe, we can assume that the broadcasting towers for cellular networks are indeed safe. The only complains about the towers have been from people who claim them to be eyesorse, which they can be if placed in certain areas.

The problem for the most part has not been the towers, but the cellphones themselves.

One of the siginficant contributing factors to increased radiation exposure is the continued usage of older, more radiating technology. However, this is not exactly true as a Motorola RAZR V3 has an Specific Absorption Rate of 0.89 W/kg. The Droid, according to information submitted by Motorola to the FCC, has a head rate of about 1.10 W/kg and a hip rate of 0.89 W/kg.

Anything near the maximum limit of 1.6 W/kg would be bad. Thus, according to a list compiled by CNet, the past couple of years were unkind to Moto users as the Chicago-based manufacturer released some terrible phones the past couple of years, including one phone that nearly exceded federal SAR limits.

While the mainstream media reports that “cellphone radiation causes cancer” (to which WebMD posted a story about how putting a cellphone near your hip is bad (having never read the documentation about hip rates) and some other guy claimes that cell phones AND clock radios are a “catalyists to cancer” (clock radios? Unlikely!), even after I tracked down the the source that states that excessive cellphone usage could lead to an increase in cancer risks. On the other hand, the other report hasn’t come out yet but the media has already jumped the gun.

To make sure that we don’t have the problem of possible fearmongering by the media or an actually serious health risk that is credible by several health organizations, the cell phone industry must strive to develop devices with low SAR rates.

It should be noted at that any product that advertises itself as a way to “protect you against getting brain cancer” will actually do more harm that good. Think of it as what happens when you wear a hat in the winter. Instead of letting your body heat escape through your head, it keeps it in. Thus the same concept is applied to just about any product that promises to decrease the risk when it actually increases it.

Cellphones are a tool used daily by people. The biggest let down would be if cellphone turned out to be deadlier than ciggarettes. (Which is VERY unlikely despite media groups like Fox News publishing such false information. (And they wonder why people call them Fixed Noise!))

If cellphones cause cancer, then I want to see the published reports that say that computers, regular FM/AM radios and and satellite receivers cause cancer.

If anything, you are more likely to die in a car accident while using a cell phone than getting cancer from a cellphone.

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Wednesday, October 28th, 2009 cellphones, health, techcos, telecom No Comments

Motorola Droid: OH GOD! YES!

If you’ve been living under a rock the past couple of months, Verizon has been taking shots at AT&T.

Despite my past complaints about Verzions brash behavior with customers, they now have in their posession the next big thing. So much so, that tonight I saw a commercial for the the Motorola Droid.

Verizon and Motorola have it out for AT&T and Apple! Motorola has the upperhand with successes like the MOTORAZR, which most of my family still uses after all these years! They are selling their phones to just about every provider, and have recently got on board with distributing phones with the Android operating system.

November bodes well for Motorola, with the release of the Motorola Blur for T-Mobile and the Droid (a.k.a. Scholes) with Verizion. The difference between the Blur and the Droid is that Droid will have Android v2.0 and is speculated to be less locked up that the T-Moble Android phones–something that has irked Android developers.

However, the FCC is has not yet gotten with the program, as CNET’s Kent German is reporting that the GSM (old technology) version of the Droid has been approved by the FCC but not the CDMA (new techonology) version. This is expected to change in the near future.

One advantage this time is that the FCC has a tech-friendly FCC chairman especially since there are people so audacious and willing to stand up against “those evil Silicon Vally corporations that make millions because of net neutrality” (*cough*Comcast!*cough*AT&T*cough*). The NCTA commerical demonizing the tech companies was like having the oil industry telling you that the environmental activists are making billions of dollars of of protecting the environment from the oil industries envriornmental destruction. If saving the environment from the oil industry (especially since they do the most damage) is wrong, I don’t want to be right! (Save the Internet!)

Anyway, hopefully the Droid with its “netbook level of computing power” won’t put out as much radation as the T-Mobile/HTC Touch.

We now await November with open arms in the anticipation of triple threat Verizon/Motorola/Android iPhone killer.

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Sunday, October 18th, 2009 Android, Linux, telecom No Comments

Why yes, that pink port where the microphone goes really does nothing

Skype is nothing new, but in the small niche of chatters I hang out with on IRC, it has become quite popular lately. (Perhaps someone was watching alot of Oprah. Grr!)

At any rate, until this weekend, I’ve never paid more than $20 for a pair of headphones or even a headset, until after it dawned on me. That little pink port where the microphone can be plugged in does nothing.

Perhaps it was the fact that ever computer I’ve ever owned that has had a microphone jack has had a microphone that never worked at all. But then I learned that some microphones are set up to be plugged into USB. (My, how I have fallen!)

It turns out it has been like that for years, especially with online gaming being as popular as it is now.

But the USB headsets are not cheap. I spent about $54 this weekend on a USB headset, and finally after some configuration, I finally got the sound levels on the computer and the headset to work.

With the USB head set, I really don’t need to turn my music off while on Skype. (Remember: Skype is free to use between computers but cost money if you use it to call on a regular telephone.)

So now that I have a head set working, perhaps I can start working on making a few audio recordings, maybe even figure out how to record music from my old Casio keyboard. I’m also quite sure I still have a webcam around my room some where. Hopefully now it is compatible with my computer. Many newer peripherals are starting to come around a become more open-source friendly. The PS3 controller I have still doesn’t seem to be one of those devices. It may soon though.

Anyway, I’m ready to get down to some business.

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Sunday, October 11th, 2009 Skype, audio, music, peripherals, telecom No Comments

AT&T: When Corporate Censorship Backfires

Things seemed to be working out OK for AT&T. They had the Apple iPhone 3GS coming out. Then suddenly, when all is at its zenith, disaster strikes.

ATT_watching_your_internets

Apparently, AT&T decided now would be a good time to censor the Internet, since they did such a bang up job terminating Usenet service by creating the image that pedophiles and pornographers hang out there. Nevermind that unlike the Internet, the Usenet is composed of a fixed set of news groups, which–if done properly–Usenet providers (like AT&T) could block out and report ilicit content. GigaNews, a popular Usenet provider, made that clear last year. (It is also believed that most of the fake postings solicting such garbage throughout the Usenet is being PROPAGATED by the ISPs. Not only are we not interested in such vulgar content, but what business is that bullsh*t doing in comp.lang.tcl?)

But AT&T has some bigger plans in mind, since they can use the excuses that shut down Usenet service in the same way Senator Joseph McCarthy used Communism during the Red Scare. Mainly on content that is against AT&T.

Here, AT&T can break the rules of network neutrality by making anything they see objectionable or against AT&T into contraband.

Take ATTGreed.com, for example. This website is promoting the awareness of a contract dispute between AT&T and the Communicantions Workers of America, a telecommunications union, and the Internation Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW). As far as AT&T see it, this website is objectionable.

Another opponent of AT&T has been the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). Considered to be the ACLU of the Internet (only they won’t tell you to take down your Christmas lights from the town court house or don’t pray before the big football game), the EFF has been a strong supporter of network neutrality, something that AT&T believes should be reserved for those who can pay more. Since we’ve been doing quite well without AT&T meddling with Interent traffic for the last 35 years, it is only right to see things from the EFF’s Point of View. But if you see things from the EFF’s point of view, that means you side with their causes, such as free speech and fighting against warrentless wiretapping. Stuff AT&T likes the opposite.

AT&T is going to have some reallly big problems this week as they have decided to kick the beehive known throughout the internet as 4chan /b/ (NSFW). 4chan has been seen as a wrecking ball of a website, known for its various Internet pranks. Considered the home of the Internet group “Anonymous” which has caused grief against the ChuchCult of S$cientology (Co$), Anonymous has been seen as the group on the Internet nobody messes with.

But now, Anonymous finds itself in a pickle. They can’t campaign against AT&T in the same way they do with the Co$. Desipte the upper echalon of Anonymous warning their followers to stand down (NSFW), as fighting against them would justifiy AT&T’s violation of network neutrality, there will still be that one idiot who will try to be somebody…to which Anonymous will make his life a living hell for about the next six months. Anonymous is thinking about their next move.

But why stop at cutting off the uncouth nonsense of 4chan when you can block off anyone who attempts to inform the public that AT&T is censoring websites. 2600.com, home of 2600: The Hacker Quarterly. Competitors like Sprint and Verzion. The Democractic Party (turns out AT&T has been bankrolling the Telecom industry’s status quo lobby which the GOP much appreciates). Given the money, and the request, you could probably put in a work order now at AT&T to block out something or to slow it down.

Unfortunately, AT&T picked on Anonymous. To which on Monday and Tuesday of this week, the hacker group has plans on causing AT&T grief but in some non conventional form. The group has already convinced AT&T users to switch to other networks. (Ironically, I had been waiting for an excuse to do it. But my reason, was Mashable heard a rumor that Android 2.0 may be coming to Sprint, which is pretty cool.)

Hopefully, Anonymous will find a way to give AT&T hell for upsetting the balance of the Interent.

Even this guy, who is a total badass, would not want to be around when Anonymous takes on AT&T!

Even this guy, who is a total badass, would not want to be around when Anonymous takes on AT&T!


Followup: (7/27/2009 12:00 PM CDT) Slashdot indicates that the block was pre-emptive and has ben lifted in some areas. Still a pre-emptive strike is still letting the genie out of the bottle–once it’s out, there is no way of putting it back in.

Much of the online community, and tech news sites, still see this as a brewing storm which may become “the perfect storm”. (Tech Central probably has it right: “Everybody Stand Back!”).

This could get ugly.

Followup (7/27/2009 8:00 PM CDT) shortly after that update was posted, 4chan founder Christopher “moot” Poole was able to clear the air. AT&T also posted a statement–after they saw there stock drop for most of the morning until it rebounded this afternoon. Part of it was the “vox populi”, the other part was probably the fact that Verizon’s 2Q Earning suck.

No big surprise. I recently went to a Verzion store that just moved into the neighborhood. Those guys are pushy! I just wanted to browse the phones, and they’re asking if I’ve entered my name in to a queue. What is this a restaruant or a phone store? I’m surprised this REALLY didn’t happen to me while I was there.

Anyway, back to this story.

AT&T has been know for not being surgical in their security measures. The result is the chaos that occured this weekend that in the long run will cost AT&T to see there churn rate sky rocket. (Higher the churn rate = more customers leaving. Anyone who sticks around for that will see their own rates go up so that AT&T can recoup the loss. May explain the 19 cents added to my bill since the previous month. I have got to break up with them!)

AT&T needs to be more precise with their network security. But precision cost money, like hiring American workers at their call centers cost money. (They ought to be paying people to work here. They didn’t call themselves Amercan Telephone and Telegraph just to hire people in India or the Philipines, which may explain why the CWA and IBEW aren’t happy with them.)

Outside of all that, I think that is it unless Anonymous does something.

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Monday, July 27th, 2009 Activism, books, censorship, consumerism, net neutrality, telecom, unions No Comments

Rupert Murdoch should get a free ride home from the airport complements of the FBI

Telephone hacking, or phreaking, is a common subject in hacker magazines like 2600: The Hacker Quarterly. Because most forms are illegal, they are discussed in hypothetical situations.

Unfortunately, there is nothing hypothetical about paying over $1 million in hush money to quiet victims of telephone hacking. Especially when you are a controvertial billionaire broadcasting magnate who own various media outlets around the world.

Rupert Murdoch, the man who runs the New York Post, Fox News, and MySpace, is in hot water in the UK for hiring hackers to break in to cellular telephones (which are now like mini-computers) to steal personal information. (Hireing hackers is not as rare as you think. The FBI has a page about such people who hire hackers to break the law for them.) Murdoch’s UK company News Group then tried to use hush money to cover up the hackings of THOUSANDS of cellphones.

This is a controversy that not only concerns the UK, but also the United States, where his US company News Corp may have persuaded a judge into making MySpace the victium in the US v. Drew case, where locally, a depressed teenager was bullied into killing herself due to the actions of Lori Drew of Dardenne Prairie, Missouri.

More over, how does the paparazzi manage to get into the cellphonese of celebrities? Why was Barack Obama’s cellular records being looked over by workers at Verizon last year?

Murdoch’s involvement with telephone hacking in the UK will open up alot of questions that involve privacy when the Federal Bureau of Investigation meets up with him upon his return to the United States.

A major computer crime has been committed. Not by some guy with alot of time on his hands, but by a very rich and very powerful person who does not have authorized access to pry into the personal information of people around the world.

This man does not hold any leadership in government! There is no George W. Bush to pardon his actions or to make an excuse for him to break the law.

Gordon Brown is not at all pleased that the News Group is hacking telephones. So why should we permit him to break the law here with the News Corp?

I really urge anyone to contact their telephone provider and tell them that Mr. Murdoch does not have permission to break into their cellphone.

It is probably a good idea to shoot off a complaint to the FBI’s Interent Crime Center, especially if you susspect that your phone is being hacked.

It’s time to send Mr. Murdoch where he belongs: IN PRISON!

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Thursday, July 9th, 2009 Activism, cellphones, crime, hackers, media, news, security, telecom No Comments

Why pay for the 3G when you’ll only need the EDGE?

(Quick note: Imagine the guy who announces the ads for the monster truck rally’s reading the title fo today’s article.)

The major cellphone distributors have been bragging for about the past couple of years about 3G (Thrid Generation Moble Communication).

This is great if you live in New York, Los Angeles, or Chicago. Not so much if you live in the St. Louis Area.

A simple comparison of all the major mobile broadband networks (AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, and Verizon), the one with the least coverage of advanced services being the most honest, states that the St. Louis area really isn’t in the 3G neck of the woods. However, EDGE still is.

Having EDGE instead of 3G really is not a bad thing. You still get the Internet at broadband speeds (about 1Mbps max, 400kbps avg), which really isn’t that bad of a deal. It’s not like you need to download the entire Lord of the Rings movie trillogy to you smartphone. Since there still is a cap on bandwidth on mobile networks, it really isn’t that great of an idea to do so anyway.

It is my firm personal believe that telephones, much like computers, should not be used as televisions. First of it is dangerous to watch your cellphone while driving. You shouldn’t be even watching TV while driving in the first place. The same can be said about texting. Talking on the cellphone is possible, since people usually talk to each other in the car as well as listen to music or the radio. However, if you must use you phone while driving, put it on speaker or use a headset. But TV is an absolute no-no for cellphones.

While advances in cellphone technology have made it possible to watch video even streaming broadcasts, the phone as a TV is a terrible idea, and a distraction from the real world.

The phone as a computer is much better. Even more so when ports are not restricted. Text messaging is fun, I’ll admit. Getting calendar reminders and using Twitter (@MrHacks in case you are interested) to share what you are doing and to quickly expressing your thoughts on the days events is quite fun and informative. But it is quite clear that the major telecom providers only interest in data services is to make distractions affordable and information expensive.

I’d much rather use my cellphone as a mini SSH terminal anyday over watching the crap that is on television.

Having a phone where you can replace the standard short-lived battery with one that has an extended life is also good. I used to be into notebook computers. But their short battery life only served as a back up power source if the lights went out. The rest of the time, I would be tethered to the wall.

Notebooks also have the weakness of being limited to small WIFI networks that had restrictions placed by the adminstrator. The phone’s only restruction is a cap on bandwith that varies depending on what services you use. As much as I am a critic against bandwidth caps, this problem is tollerable for the moment.

Another problem with Notebooks is the fact that the sleep and hibernate functions either don’t work or are frustrating to use no matter what operating system you use. The phone can be shut off and the user can pick up from where they left off.

Perhaps it is the fact that I am still using a Palm Treo that I have not been able to enjoy advanced features that newer cellphones have, such as the ability to multitask between programs and the ability to synch the device with the Internet instead of another computer. As I work to prepare to switch phones, as well as networks, I am beginning to contemplate how I should go about this transition.

The first step is to find a program that allows my older phone to communicate with my online calendar and contacts lists. There are some programs which could wiple out everything. When I find which program does not do this, I’ll let you know.

The HTC Dream is a very attractive phone. Marketed as the T-Mobile G1 in the United States, the Android operating system has made this phone look like a vibrant alternative to the Apple iPhone’s minimalism and restrictions against users and developers. The Dream, like any good cellphone also has a removable battery (always convenient, since no cellphone is perfect).

Then there is the HTC Magic, scheduled to come out next month, though no provider has called dibs on it yet. There is a good chance T-Mobile will probably be the one as the buzz on the Internet seems to point toward a G2 in the near future.

One of the many wishes I had for cellphone/computer development is being able to enjoy the weather as well as work. Notebooks could only make promises. And when backlights added to LCD screens came to smaller devices such as cellphones, it became hard to see the screen in daylight. At this point, the only problem that cellphones have yet to conquire is daylight visiblity.

The cellphone has unplugged the computer, unteathered us to the wired network, conquired the lifespan of the battery, and paved the way for the minimization of storage. But hardware is only as good as the software that runs on it.

Secure Shell, or SSH, is a MUST if you are into computer programming or run a website. Accessing a smaller computer to interact with a larger machine has been one of the great things about computers. The fact that you don’t have to download many programs to use them. There was a program for Palm devices called TuSSH that was pretty good but because non-Palm created programs love to suck up the battery, and because Palm’s random number generator and security features are not as tight as they are with the latest generation of cell phones, TuSSH kind of faded away.

Android has an SSH program called ConnectBot that looks very good.

IRC (Internet Relay Chat) is another thing that Palm devices couldn’t do. Android can do IRC. IRCell is a program. One of my many problems with IRC is really finding a chat room where people don’t exclude you from joining the conversation. In the future, I plan on finding and identifying IRC networks that won’t abuse you for not being part of their clique.

Finally, there are hopes that Flash will make it to the Android platform. While I can’t provide any links to software that may be available, the fact that it is on the table is exciting. Hopefully, this will be available when the G2 comes to market later this year.

I have quite a todo list going here. Let’s try to make it shorter.

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Sunday, March 22nd, 2009 Android, Flash, Palm, cellphones, hardware, irc, ssh, telecom No Comments

 

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