Final Blog!!! / New iPhone

First, I would like to take this opportunity to scream: FINALLY, THIS IS MY LAST POST...EVER!!!!! Okay but seriously I thought this day would never come. When Professor Drake gave us this task back in January, I told myself there is no way I will be able to write something consistently every week. But I am glad that I did instead of just slacking off and then having to scramble to get in 5 posts in one week. Overall, I thought the whole blog idea was really fun. I usually spend my time anyway finding cool information on the internet and this allowed me to share my findings with others. As well as seeing other interesting information found by my classmates.

My last post is about a very, very unlucky young Apple Software Engineer. Gray Powell was given a 4th generation iPhone prototype to test in the real world. Well he had it in a special case that disguised it as a iPhone 3GS. Unfortunately, he went out with some of his friends, drank many beers and ended up leaving the prototype iPhone on his bar stool.

Well the story goes, a near by fellow bar patron found the phone, not knowing that it was a prototype, and waited for Gray to come back (he never did). Next day he discovers that it is something special and tries to call Apple to let them know that he has something that they might want back, but no one took him seriously. Before you know it, he ends up selling the phone to online tech blog giant, GIZMODO, for $5,000. Gizmodo then ends up leaking many, many pics and videos showing off the prototype of the iPhone that will be unveiled in June. There were many doubters that this could be the real deal, but then Gizmodo received a letter (shown above) from Apple's legal team asking for the phone back. This all but confirms it real.

This is really crazy to me. Imagine how you would feel knowing that you single handedly led to Apple's next great product being leaked out to the world? Hopefully Gray gets to keep his job because anyone could of made that same mistake.

Original story found on GIZMODO

MacBook Pro update/First FourSquare User to Check In At North Pole

First, I want to talk about how excited I am about the news Apple dropped this morning. They released the long awaited refresh of the MacBook Pro line. I know they are a lot people out there that are saying that it isn't that big of a change or difference between what was previously out. The only "real" upgrade was the 15/17 inch models now sport Intel's current i5/i7 processors instead of the outdated core 2 duo's and now there is an option to add a high res screen to the laptops. I know thats not a big deal to others but to me this is what I have been waiting for. If you guys remember I think I mentioned in my first post of the semester that my apartment was broken into and one of my prize possessions stolen was my MacBook Pro. Well I have purposely waited four months without jumping the gun and buying a new one because I knew a refresh would be coming soon and didn't want to pay the same amount of money on soon to be outdated hardware. Now I'm glad I have waited.

My feature story is about the 15 year old pictured above. His name is Parker Liautaud and for at least a little while, he is going to be known as a big deal. Why you ask? Well thanks to social media/networks becoming so big in todays world, Parker was achieve a feat that has not been attempted in the growing Foursquare universe.

Parker will go down as the very first person to check-in from the North Pole and the Last Degree Badge. Now I'm not too familiar with Foursquare but after reading up a little bit on it, it can be describe as almost a game of tag, using Google Latitude approach. You can see where your friends are and get little messages (Twitter Style) from them and also "Check-In" at all kinds of different locations around your area. Although I guess its pretty cool for this 15 year old to get his 15mins of fame from this, but it was a pretty dangerous way to spend your Spring Break. Hopefully he had more motivating factors to accomplish this other than "Checking In" on Four Square.

Story from Mashable

Lil Wayne blogging from Jail??

No one can deny that Lil' Wayne is one of the greatest musicians out right now. Not only did he sell over 1million albums of his last rap album "The Carter 3" but he's so bold that he released a rock album in February which landed him on the cover of Rolling Stones. He is also the president of one of the hottest record labels right now call Young Money.

There are so many other achievements and accolades that I could mention, but the only thing that matters right now is that the famed rapper is currently in prison, serving a year long sentence for weapon possession. But recently a new website http://weezythanxyou.com/ has been launched and if you go to the site right now, you will see its first blog post from Lil Wayne.

In it he describes how much he loves his fan (I've been to many of his concerts and think that he is sincere when he says he does) and reminds them that he will be no where with out them. He states that he will be writing from time to time and will try to reply to as many fans as he can. Well you may be asking yourself how is this possible? Is he getting special "star" treatment in jail? The answer is no. Simply answered, his record label knows how important social media is now a days to be able to draw more fans to their artists. That is why Lil Wayne will actually be writing and receiving messages the old fashion way, through handwritten letters in the mail. Then a team at the label will be converting the messages from Wayne into blogs on the website.

This is really a first to me. And another "feature" of todays world where I couldn't of imagined happening 10years ago. But it is really cool that if your such a huge fan of someone and they are put in jail, you don't have to forget about them for 8-12months while they are away. You can just look forward to the next blog update from them and see how their mood is or what is going on in their new environment. Who knows if this will last or if the jail might come up with a reason of why this type of communication breaks some kind of rule or law.

Via Mashable

Apple and Google Together Again??

First let me start off with talking about the great time I had at Menlo on Friday. Surprisingly not that many people showed up from our class (opportunity to get inside a great company and extra credit). But I felt like Menlo was just an overall "cool" place to work, they had the type of creativity that you would think only Google had in its work place. Basically the programmers were writing coding that you would find in IS315 (a bit more advance) but in pairs of twos. And every week you would be paired up with another partner.

On to my article of the week. Well after all my numerous articles about Google vs Apple. And the fact that the two CEOs, Steve Jobs of Apple and Eric Schmidt of Google, have had a public fallout, GIZMODO has posted pictures showing the two enjoying a cup of coffee last FRIDAY the 26th in Palo Alto, CA. A reader of the web blog saw the two and snapped these pics. The reader aslo overheard a little bit of their conversation. "Enthusiastically, "They're going to see it all eventually so who cares how they get it." Which seemed to be about web content, said the tipster. And, "Let's go discuss this somewhere more private," after they noticed the crowd gathering around."

I think this would of been a really cool site to see. I would of probably went right up to them and pitched my 30sec speech of why I am the perfect hire for either company lol But all joking aside, I think this might be the first step to maybe the two companies making amends. They probably realize that business might be better for the both of them if the two giants get a long.

Full Story can be found on Gizmodo

Google "leveraging" with it's Services?

First a little update on the Global IT Club. We missed many of you guys at are last meeting on Wednesday. It's very rare for Professor Drake to give out extra credit and many of you guys missed out on the opportunity as well as an awesome speaker, EMU's new CIO Carl Powell. Dr. Powell was very entertaining and had a lot of advice from his years holding high level IT jobs. Well I know its a little late, but there is another opportunity for extra credit today, Friday March 26th at 2:30pm as we go to Menlo Innovations. Meet us on the 2nd floor of the COB.

Now for the main story. First off, I love the Android platform. Just the ability to be able to download almost any kind of app you can think of and its ease of use. I figured that has to be one of the reasons why every other day I hear of a new Android phone made by this or that phone maker and on this or that carrier. But now multiple sources are coming out with a new reason to why there seems to be an explosive rise of Android handsets.

Google has been enticing manufacturers with a cut of revenue from their other services such as Maps or Search. This is almost the complete opposite of how Apple is bringing the iPhone to AT&T. AT&T pays Apple $400 for every iPhone it sells. So in a way Apple is making money while Google is giving money away. But if you look at it another way, Google has the money to give and this could be a very good investment because people have many, many options of Android handsets to choose from.

Via ENGADGET

Co-Inventor of XML goes in on Apple

First I want to give you guys an update on what's happening with the Global IT Club. Well as everyone knows this is Ethos Week and today former Vice President of Intel Corporation, Ken Fine, will be speaking at 5:30pm. Next week, we will be making a field trip to Menlo Innovations. This is a great opportunity for anyone that is interested in the company to get an up close look at what happens on the inside. The field trip will be next week Friday, March 26th. If you are interested in attending or have any questions, let Jenelle, Chris, me or Professor Drake know.

Now for my main feature story, the punches between Apple and Google just keep rolling. Yesterday, newly hired Android developer, Tim Bray, went off on Apple on his blog. Bray who recently left Window Mobile to join Google, expressed his dislike for the way Apple handles its app store and developers. He explained that Apple's "vision" of its internet future "omits controversy, sex, and freedom, but includes strict limits on who can know what and who can say what. It's a sterile Disney-fied walled garden surrounded by sharp-toothed lawyers. The people who create the apps serve at the landlord's pleasure and fear his anger."

Those are some really harsh words. But Bray did say that as much as he hated that aspect of Apple, he still thought that the iPhone's hardware and software were both great. I really have to agree with everything he said. Recently Apple removed thousands of apps from the App Store that they felt were inappropriate. Some just showed women in bikinis or had names such as iBoobs but didn't actually show any nudity. They removed such apps but kept the ones made by "Big" companies such as the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit App and the PlayBoy App. Why keep some and get rid of ALL others? I just don't get it and thats why I feel Android has a leg up on the Iphone.

This Article can be found on MACWORLD via Macwold UK

Experimental APIs Extensions for Chrome

A little over a month ago Google announced that their browser, Chrome, would not be able have extensions added to it. Extensions add to the functionality of a browser and allow the user to kind of customize their browser to their needs. Well last week a Google software engineer announced that there are a couple of experimental extension APIs that are being tested.

The first is a history API that allows developers to modify the user's browsing history. When the API is complete, develops will be able to replace the user's history with their own. The second API is more of a processes API. This API gives third party developers access to Chrome's process model, such as information on the CPU usage for each tab.

To me this sounds like it could be a security risk to home users but I know that Google does monitor extensions that attempt to access files from your computer. These APIs are available now in Google's Dev Channel and they encourage people to play with them a bit and then give some feedback.

Post can be found here at The Chromium Blog

API's bringing big cash to Mashery

Now a days every website is cashing on using APIs to become a platform. Mashery, a company that has hosted APIs for companies and helped manage them, was rewarded with a $5.5 million series of funding. The huge technology company, Cisco, as well as some other companies are the investors in this round of funding.

CEO of Mashery, Oren Michels, stated in the article that so many companies are beginning to test the waters of API and are seeing significant raises in revenue as well as the growth of their companies. Michels goes on to say that companies are seeing the importance of letting their customers interact with they services instead of forcing them to do everything at the companies website. I would say that companies willingness to develop APIs are also very important to education, such as the students of IS449w being able to complete there projects for the course!

Mashery will use this new money to hire more people in sales and marketing to be able to expand their product. Currently there are 40,000 developers connected to the website. Some of the bigger names being: Bestbuy, Netflix and New York Times. I think this is another great website, other than programmable web, that we can use to gather information of our APIs. Also check out 3scale. The article lists them as Mashery's competitor.

The Original article was Posted on TechCrunch

Google, Google, Google!

Really, sometimes I think that Google's main objective in life is to take over the world. Seriously lol I only say that because it seems like everyday Google is on the news for release this or adding that. But hey I'm not complaining because I'm definitely a Google fan and I don't think I will be jumping off their bandwagon anytime soon.

This brings me to my blog for today about a new feature that Google has released. In Google Apps, enterprise admin policies have been added for iPhone, Nokia and Windows Mobile Devices. Google Apps Premier and Education Edition administers will not be able to manage the phones of their users without using additional software or managing dedicated enterprise servers.

Some of the settings that admins will have access to are: being able to remotely wipe data from lost or stolen devices, require each phone to have a strong password, and lock idle devices after inactivity. All this will be accessible under the "mobile tab" in the Google Apps control panel.

Even though this is more for businesses, I just think that it is very cool that Google has added it. I work at a medium size corporation and it took me a very long time to organize all the Blackberry's being used by employees and it took me a while to really grasp how to use the Blackberry Enterprise Server to manage the phones. This seems like a very easy and clean interface for businesses that do not want to spend a lot of money to buy the expensive software but want a way for their IT administrators to have control of access to corporate data on devices. You can read the full article at yet another on of Google's Official Blogs: Official Google Enterprise Blog

On a side note, if you have an iPhone and use exchange, did you know that there is a way to remotely wipe your lost or stolen phone? You can find the How-To guide HERE. I find this pretty cool.

You have to take bad with the good when dealing with "Faster" information

First let me start by saying: WOW! I can't believe that Eastern Michigan actually gave us a snow day. That is really rare around here. For all the years that I have been going to EMU I would say there has only been one, maybe two other times that classes were cancelled for the WHOLE day. The sad part is that our Global IT Club tour that was scheduled for yesterday was cancelled as well, but don't worry we will let everyone know when the rescheduled day will be.

Now on to the story that I thought I'd share with everyone. I'm sure everyone has woken up on their birthdays to find their phone blown up with text messages and phone calls from family and friends wishing them a happy birthday. And then logging into Facebook to find that your wall has double in size from all the comments of people wishing you the same thing. It kind of makes you smile knowing that old friends are thinking of you and what not.

Well twins in Sydney, Australia woke up on their 20th birthday expecting much of the same thing. But they logged into Facebook that morning only to posts written "RIP Chris Naylor" and "RIP Bobby." They quickly realized that the Bobby everyone was talking about was their 17 year old brother. They then called his cell phone but there was no answer. Next they called their mom and asked where Bobby was because people were saying he had died. Their mom knew that Bobby was out with his friend Chris the night before so she called the police to find out what happened. That is when they found out that Bobby, his friend Chris and another teen were killed in a car accident the night before.

I really feel bad for the family but the twins especially, because that is a terrible way of finding out that your brother was killed. The police said they had trouble identifying the victim and that is why they didn't get to the family before it spread around to friends and then ended up on Facebook. But thats just how things are now a days, everyday a new service is coming out that gives us ways to interact/connect to each other faster. So its just bound to happen that bad news would follow just as fast.

Story was originally posted at CNET

Looking for an Extracurricular Activity?

This week I thought I'd share an exciting opportunity with the class. More specifically it's group of your peers that come together every other week to talk specifically about IT-related issues. Still not sure about what I am eluding to? Well of course it is the Global IT Club!!!

I am the Public Relations Officer for the club and thought this would be a good place to inform some of my fellow classmates that are unaware that the club exists. Actually our class is very lucky because there are three other officers in the class besides me. Chris being our President, Jahnavi our secretary and Jenelle our Vice President. Also Professor Drake happens to be our faculty advisor.

Our club is all about helping us IT students learn more about careers and actually gives special opportunities to talk to employers in a more casual setting compared to a high stressed Career Fair. Last semester alone we had employees/recruiters from Google, Switchback, Michigan Department of Information Technology, and Deloitte come and answer questions about career opportunities at their companies. We hope to have even more employees come in this semester. And we have a field trip planned to go to Menlo Innovations on March 26th. We also have done some community service. A group of us helped out Meals On Wheels a couple of weeks ago and it turned out to be a really great time. We will be looking to do at least one more type of community service before the end of the semester. If you have any questions about the club, you can ask any one of our officers in class. We plan on having our next meeting next week Wednesday. Also look for us on Facebook and join our newly acquired webpage on the EMU Student Orgs website.

Google Blog For Students

While exploring the Official Google Blog that Professor Drake recommended to us, I came across something very cool. There was a directory that displayed all the different type of blogs that were officially from Google. Some of the ones that stood out were the official Chrome blog by the Chrome team and the Public Policy blog which gives Google's views on politics.

But there is one that really caught my attention and I think would be very useful to the rest of my classmates. It is called the Student Blog and gives the description: "Google news and updates for students".

Perusing through the first two pages and I already found some very helping posts in the blog. The very first post on the page talks about the new Google Docs page for students and give links to five different examples of students from different backgrounds/stages in the college careers using Docs to achieve different tasks. Things aren't posted everyday, but when they are it is something very valuable or informative. Many Google scholarships and how to apply for them are posted throughout the blog. As well as extensive walkthroughs and guides like "Using Google Apps to make the most out of Group Work"

FaceBook Employees having too much fun?

I’m pretty sure everyone in our class has used facebook. Even our beloved Professor Drake has a page (good luck getting him to accept your friend request if you’re a current student). Anyways, to some facebook has A LOT of personal info stored on there accounts. Thats why we all set different privacy settings to protect ourselves from our Bosses, parents, or just plain stalkers. Well this past weekend I was doing my usual surfing of the web and came across this interesting story that I didn't know how to feel about it. It was an interview with a previous employee of Facebook who spilled the beans on some secrets. The biggest being that everyone who worked for Facebook had one password that would allow them to log in as anyone.

Guess what the password was….Chuck Norris!!! Seriously, that seems a little to childish to me, almost like it was one huge joke to everyone at the office. Other than the ridiculous password, I was more mad at the fact that the employee also mentioned that they could see any information that you have ever deleted or which profiles you visit. Just imagine dating someone who works at the Facebook office, they would have you on lock down lol. Or if its some creeper that you met at a party on a Saturday and that you ended up shooting down. They could do some serious damage to your profile the following Monday. The person could write made up things on other peoples profiles as you or just get sensitive information like where you live.

I guess the part of the ex employee interview that put my mind most to rest was them saying that the "Chuck Norris" password could only be used on computers inside of Facebook offices. This still doesn’t make it totally alright. I’m definitely all for technology and love how facebook has given me a way to reconnect with all my past friends/teammates from high school and college. But can we get a notice or disclosure when we sign up for Facebook of what employees are allowed to see or do to our accounts?

I guess this is just a remainder to everyone: Don’t ever put anything on the internet that you wouldn’t mind sharing with everyone!!

Origanially posted on Gizmodo via The Rumpus via The Awl

Google G-Drive??

(Credit: Google)

Tonight has been a very stressful night for me. People kicked in my door when me and my roommates where out of the apartment and basically took everything. And because I'm such a tech geek, I was hit the hardest. So I really considered not doing this post at all, but I'm sitting at my mom's house late at night about to try to do the best that I can.

One thing that really interests me is checking out what is going on in the technology world. Google being one of the companies that is always in the news about their latest innovations, makes me read up on anything that mentions their name. Well while surfing the net during some downtime at work, I stumbled across a story about a major improvement to Google Docs that will be coming to all users in a few weeks. There will now be an option to upload files that are non-Google Doc files such as music, videos, pictures and zips to be held on Google's servers. All users will be give 1GB of storage for free, with the option of adding additional storage for a small fee. (Picture above shows how the app will tell you the amount of storage you have left)

While the sudden addition of being able to add non-Google Doc files is nice, this may not be the long awaited G: Drive that sparked rumors last summer. Some say that when it Google official storage space is added, that it will be more tied into it's properties and will be available to all users. I personally like this idea very much. How many of us have had to email ourselves a paper that we worked on all night and had to print it out at the lab? This eliminates all that. Basically upload anything, your favorite songs or photos to the Google storage and it will always be available where ever you go. And I'm sure they will find a way to implement this into other Google Platforms like Android and play a major role in Google Chrome OS.

The original Story can be found on

CNET

(Credit: Google)