Today, we happen to live in the world of the phablet. It is time to hail the large 5.5”+ displays. These phones have been the holy grail of our generation, and they are going nowhere, though they seem to have settled at 5.5 inches. Samsung has supported the phablet revolution since 2011 with their Note series lineup, but it wasn’t until 2.5 years ago that Apple jumped on board as well with their iPhone 6 Plus, and currently their iPhone 6s Plus. Each are rocking a 5.5” display, but are slightly unyielding to me due to the fact that they have super fat bezels compared to phones like the slim 5.5” LG G4.
However, prepare, because times are a-changin’! Out with the new, back in with the old, as they say! Small phones are making a comeback! Sony, for some time, has had their 4.0” Sony Xperia Z Compact line, a very small phone lineup, as the name implies. Samsung has also taken part in the mini phone lineups, with the Samsung Galaxy SIII and S5 Minis. However, Apple has joined this movement as well, now, with the its upcoming iPhone 5SE.
In my mind, using any tiny phone would be completely distasteful and nasty! Never mind using a tiny iPhone! Just NO!!!!!!!! But I do understand that some people want tiny phones. Some people, such as the tech-god Linus Sebastian, are doomed with tiny, minuscule hands, and must bend to that will to be able to live their sad, pitiful, daily lives out with minimal joint and hand pain. It is just the fact of life. God does not bless all. But why do I think the idea of an even smaller iPhone is a suicidal mess? Well, for one, it will be a repeat epidemic of the iPhone 5C, a cheap plastic iPhone that did pack good specs, but overall, for $50-$100 more, people were better off choosing the newest, latest and greatest model, the iPhone 5s, with its complementary fingerprint scanner and metal body that didn’t chip out from one tiny drop. However, it's not just the plastic I have problem with. As screen size grows, battery size increases at an exponential rate. This is due to the fact that a motherboard and camera module, as well as other bits such as volume rockers, charger ports, 3.5mm jacks, lock buttons, and silence switches take up space! But they only take up a finite amount of space in every device, leaving the rest to the battery. But if these components take up 10cm^2 of space, and we double the size of the iPhone, we suddenly have more space available for batteries, since the logic boards still only take up 10cm^2!
So where a super tiny iPhone will go wrong is not just plastics, but also battery life, as these phones will just be too thin and too tiny to last long on such anorexic batteries!
-479 words
Sunday, May 1, 2016
Saturday, April 30, 2016
Fake Reviews = Problems for the Internet
The internet is a great place to purchase items. It is convenient, and with fast shipping though services such as Amazon Prime, Amazon has been a great online buying center, full of anything and everything from toilet paper to refrigerators. Amazon tries its best to provide many services in an all-in-one package, and does a great job with it. However, to provide a great shopping experience, Amazon has to start some lawsuits.
Amazon first noticed hundreds of thousands of fake reviews, either 1 star or 5 star, springing up over the place, and to solve such issue, started by suing corporations such as BuyAmazonReviews or Fiverrr. Companies such as these take in money from companies wanting good/bad reviews distributed, and they proceed to pay workers to write anonymous fake reviews to raise products up or bring products down in Amazon's satisfactory ratings.
However, suing these companies has not worked, and thus, Amazon has started a lawsuit against 1,114 people that have been acused of writing hundreds of fake reviews each. While Amazon does not yet know the names of these anonymous users, Amazon hopes to lead by example in showing that people leaving fake reviews will be punished when found. Amazon hopes to keep its Garden of Eden pure for customers to make easier purchasing decisions through this seemingly harsh enforcement, and I agree with their decisions. If I am buying a really expensive product, every 1-star review I see greatly sways my decision, so knowing that there are only legitimate reviews on Amazon will help me make the proper, unbiased decision, and I'm sure many more buyers will side with Amazon's decision due to the straight-forward experience it brings to shopping at their site.
-264 words
Amazon first noticed hundreds of thousands of fake reviews, either 1 star or 5 star, springing up over the place, and to solve such issue, started by suing corporations such as BuyAmazonReviews or Fiverrr. Companies such as these take in money from companies wanting good/bad reviews distributed, and they proceed to pay workers to write anonymous fake reviews to raise products up or bring products down in Amazon's satisfactory ratings.
-264 words
The Meaning of Technology's Existence
Sometimes I stop and ask myself a small question. What is the point of technology? Why do we treat it like it like it's amazing, but sometimes undervalue its existence on a daily basis. Is it a godsend, or a curse? Does it make us smarter and more analytical, or dumb as rocks, reliant on our tech and the internet like a life support system?
These are the questions that have arisen over the past decades as technology has slowly engulfed our entire lives. It first started with the calculators that engulfed entire rooms. Costing millions upon millions of dollars, and taking up entire rooms, they were slower than potatoes at calculating answers. Sure, it came in handy when crunching huge numbers, but otherwise, you could beat this machine out multiplying 324*293 anyway! It was at this point that some saw technology take two divergent paths: either a wasteland of circuitry, or a vast land of potential.
Now, prior to this point in time, the television had came along to replace the radio, and was also met with criticism: it was deemed by some to be a melting pot for the brain, offering little more than a time waster to the human life, but others realized the leisureful activies the television could bring. However, with TV/Netflix times peaking to an average of hours per week for teenagers, it seems that some of the grumpy grandpas of the past may have been right on that one….But it keeps coming back to whether or not a technology is making us smarter or burning our brains out like Rambough burning his brains out in Paris over a thousand poems. I guess the internet, smartphones, and smartwatches are the latest arrivals to the game, so we should give them their shots to duke it out in the ring to figure this one out. Lets start with the internet.
The internet allows us to have access to a wealth of information, We can Google when someone died, what someone did, who to vote for, when the next solar eclipse is, and read blog articles on the web to learn about the positives and negatives of technology. Seems legit, so lets give one point to Gryffindor…..but wait. Hold on there jockey, a little fast on the starter gun. While we can look up and find information, it also opens a world to billions and billions of hours of useless YouTube videos completely non educational, social media sites such as reddit to just layer comment upon comment on a photo of Justin Bieber being made fun of, an ever-abundance of nudity, online bullying, and enough selfies to wrap a canvas of them around the earth several hundred times. However, despite all of this, I would say it has united the world in a whole new way, and the idea of having information at our fingertips, while making us less likely to memorize who was the first president of the United States, gives us more power than ever at our fingertips.
Smartphones tie into this realm of forever being connected. While they provide the fastest portal to information via the internet, they also provide the fatest portal to distractions: Snapchat selfies, Twitter surfing, and...well, never mind, no one uses Facebook but old people. Smartphones, while being “smart”, I think they have pushed social media over its edge with looping 7 second videos of kittens, and therefore, I think smartphones, while a tool for me every day, have been devices that have made us just a tad more….non smart. as if the “smart” in smartphone has taken the word from us. It's a fair fight, with evidence on both sides, but it ultimately takes the distraction award for me.
Finally, the brand new smartwatches step into the ring. Smartwatches are different, because they are either seen as overpriced, a gimmick, or a fad of the dying watch, due to phones with time being everywhere. However, since 2011, they have started working their way into peoples’ lives, and for the reason that they not only tell the time, but offer better map directions, sport tracking, and call/text/app notifications right on my wrist. While most activities will alert me with a notification, still requiring me to pull my phone out, many activities can be responded to with voice, or even better, I can just swipe them away, without pulling my phone out. So while this is just a digital accessory to my phone, I believe its most valuable function is to pull me away from my phone. No longer will I have to check my phone for phantom vibrates that I wasn’t sure about, or I can save time by swiping away useless texts in class without pulling my phone out. Its a time saver, and I believe this one gives a point to using technology smarter instead of becoming addicted to it, even though the idea behind it sounds like the opposite. Using a crippled piece of technology to get basic tasks done pulls us away from the temping world that is our smartphone on the internet.
So I guess the conclusion is, it kinda depends. Technology can make us smarter and grow with information, but it can also pull us into its depths that cause distraction and disconnection. Its up to its users to steer the car towards the direction they wish to take.
-894 words
These are the questions that have arisen over the past decades as technology has slowly engulfed our entire lives. It first started with the calculators that engulfed entire rooms. Costing millions upon millions of dollars, and taking up entire rooms, they were slower than potatoes at calculating answers. Sure, it came in handy when crunching huge numbers, but otherwise, you could beat this machine out multiplying 324*293 anyway! It was at this point that some saw technology take two divergent paths: either a wasteland of circuitry, or a vast land of potential.
Now, prior to this point in time, the television had came along to replace the radio, and was also met with criticism: it was deemed by some to be a melting pot for the brain, offering little more than a time waster to the human life, but others realized the leisureful activies the television could bring. However, with TV/Netflix times peaking to an average of hours per week for teenagers, it seems that some of the grumpy grandpas of the past may have been right on that one….But it keeps coming back to whether or not a technology is making us smarter or burning our brains out like Rambough burning his brains out in Paris over a thousand poems. I guess the internet, smartphones, and smartwatches are the latest arrivals to the game, so we should give them their shots to duke it out in the ring to figure this one out. Lets start with the internet.
The internet allows us to have access to a wealth of information, We can Google when someone died, what someone did, who to vote for, when the next solar eclipse is, and read blog articles on the web to learn about the positives and negatives of technology. Seems legit, so lets give one point to Gryffindor…..but wait. Hold on there jockey, a little fast on the starter gun. While we can look up and find information, it also opens a world to billions and billions of hours of useless YouTube videos completely non educational, social media sites such as reddit to just layer comment upon comment on a photo of Justin Bieber being made fun of, an ever-abundance of nudity, online bullying, and enough selfies to wrap a canvas of them around the earth several hundred times. However, despite all of this, I would say it has united the world in a whole new way, and the idea of having information at our fingertips, while making us less likely to memorize who was the first president of the United States, gives us more power than ever at our fingertips.
Smartphones tie into this realm of forever being connected. While they provide the fastest portal to information via the internet, they also provide the fatest portal to distractions: Snapchat selfies, Twitter surfing, and...well, never mind, no one uses Facebook but old people. Smartphones, while being “smart”, I think they have pushed social media over its edge with looping 7 second videos of kittens, and therefore, I think smartphones, while a tool for me every day, have been devices that have made us just a tad more….non smart. as if the “smart” in smartphone has taken the word from us. It's a fair fight, with evidence on both sides, but it ultimately takes the distraction award for me.
Finally, the brand new smartwatches step into the ring. Smartwatches are different, because they are either seen as overpriced, a gimmick, or a fad of the dying watch, due to phones with time being everywhere. However, since 2011, they have started working their way into peoples’ lives, and for the reason that they not only tell the time, but offer better map directions, sport tracking, and call/text/app notifications right on my wrist. While most activities will alert me with a notification, still requiring me to pull my phone out, many activities can be responded to with voice, or even better, I can just swipe them away, without pulling my phone out. So while this is just a digital accessory to my phone, I believe its most valuable function is to pull me away from my phone. No longer will I have to check my phone for phantom vibrates that I wasn’t sure about, or I can save time by swiping away useless texts in class without pulling my phone out. Its a time saver, and I believe this one gives a point to using technology smarter instead of becoming addicted to it, even though the idea behind it sounds like the opposite. Using a crippled piece of technology to get basic tasks done pulls us away from the temping world that is our smartphone on the internet.
So I guess the conclusion is, it kinda depends. Technology can make us smarter and grow with information, but it can also pull us into its depths that cause distraction and disconnection. Its up to its users to steer the car towards the direction they wish to take.
-894 words
Saturday, April 23, 2016
Internet Stardom Gone Wrong
Over the course of time, people change. People and their interests change, rather. Who a person fundamentally is changes throughout time. Just think about where you were 10 years ago. Who your friends were, what your passions were. For most people, a lot of change can occur in a decade, and while I am young, I can admit that a lot has changed between when I was 7, and when I was 17! But what if I wasn't allowed to change growing up? What if people yelled at me, called me names, got furious by my act of growing up? I would feel a sense of being shamed. I would feel like what I was doing was wrong, but I would also feel wrong not pursuing what I felt was right in my life.
This is how PewDiePie feels right now. For those what are unaware, PewDiePie is the largest YouTuber on...well, YouTube. He made $7 million dollars off the platform last year, but when he started making video game videos back in 2006, he never anticipated he would be so famous one day. He was just an average Joe, looking to just share some fun with the internet. But thats what he still does to this day. Or, at least, is trying.
You see, PewDiePie is loyal to his fans. However, over the last 10 years, his taste for video games, and the vulgar humor, has changed. His fans, however, still want the same thing that he had years ago. So while PewDiePie wants to change how he runs his career and life, the people on the internet rebel against such change. Millions of people do. That type of pressure would be too much for me. Its enough when my sister, or someone at school says something I'm doing is stupid, but to have millions of people actively commenting, saying that they don't like what you're doing would be extremely hurtful. Paraphrasing PewDiePie's explanation video, PewDiePie stated that it wasn't just mean trolls telling him they want change. It was his actual fans. The people he cared about most. So what does one do in this predicament, where the internet dictates how you live your life? Would you bend to the will of millions of people, or continue living your life the way that makes you the happiest? At what point did YouTube change from a video viewing platform, to a social media that dictates one's life?
-403 words
This is how PewDiePie feels right now. For those what are unaware, PewDiePie is the largest YouTuber on...well, YouTube. He made $7 million dollars off the platform last year, but when he started making video game videos back in 2006, he never anticipated he would be so famous one day. He was just an average Joe, looking to just share some fun with the internet. But thats what he still does to this day. Or, at least, is trying.
You see, PewDiePie is loyal to his fans. However, over the last 10 years, his taste for video games, and the vulgar humor, has changed. His fans, however, still want the same thing that he had years ago. So while PewDiePie wants to change how he runs his career and life, the people on the internet rebel against such change. Millions of people do. That type of pressure would be too much for me. Its enough when my sister, or someone at school says something I'm doing is stupid, but to have millions of people actively commenting, saying that they don't like what you're doing would be extremely hurtful. Paraphrasing PewDiePie's explanation video, PewDiePie stated that it wasn't just mean trolls telling him they want change. It was his actual fans. The people he cared about most. So what does one do in this predicament, where the internet dictates how you live your life? Would you bend to the will of millions of people, or continue living your life the way that makes you the happiest? At what point did YouTube change from a video viewing platform, to a social media that dictates one's life?
-403 words
The Tech Bubble is Bursting
We aren't buying enough new iPhones. That's why Apple is expected to tell investors something it's never had to say before during its quarterly earnings call: iPhone sales likely dropped for the first time since the game-changing device went on sale in 2007.
That drop isn't a surprise to those who've been listening, however. Apple CEO Tim Cook and his team in January predicted a slide in total revenue and cautioned that iPhone sales would see their first-ever slump in the three months ended in March. The company reports fiscal second-quarter results Tuesday.
Analysts think iPhone shipments tumbled nearly 20 percent from the same quarter a year ago. Analysts, on average, expect Apple to sell about 51 million iPhones in the three months that ended in March, according to Morgan Stanley. That's down from 61.2 million units in the March quarter of 2015.
The bigger worry is whether this signals a tough year overall for the world's largest public company. Analysts who cover Apple think that's exactly what it means, citing the ho-hum reaction to last year's iPhone model, the 6S.
"Given the similar form factor for the iPhone 6S and softer smartphone global demand trends, we anticipate down year-over-year iPhone sales for the remainder of [fiscal] 2016," said T. Michael Walkley, an analyst with Canaccord Genuity.
Walkley's not alone. Most analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expect Apple's revenue to slide about 3 percent this year as fewer people buy iPhones. The reason for that concern is simple: More than two-thirds of Apple's sales come from the iPhone. One bad quarter of phone sales translates into a bad quarter overall.
Revenue could drop about 10 percent in the second quarter to $52 million and slip about 4 percent to $47.4 billion in the quarter ending in June.
The year is off to a tough start for many tech companies. Intel, the world's biggest provider of chips for computers and servers, is cutting 11 percent of its workforce as it grapples with a steep drop in PC sales. IBM reported a 14-year low in quarterly sales. And Netflix raised concerns about winning over fewer subscribers in its overseas and US businesses. Even Alphabet, the parent company of Google, reported disappointing sales and profit.
That drop isn't a surprise to those who've been listening, however. Apple CEO Tim Cook and his team in January predicted a slide in total revenue and cautioned that iPhone sales would see their first-ever slump in the three months ended in March. The company reports fiscal second-quarter results Tuesday.
Analysts think iPhone shipments tumbled nearly 20 percent from the same quarter a year ago. Analysts, on average, expect Apple to sell about 51 million iPhones in the three months that ended in March, according to Morgan Stanley. That's down from 61.2 million units in the March quarter of 2015.
The bigger worry is whether this signals a tough year overall for the world's largest public company. Analysts who cover Apple think that's exactly what it means, citing the ho-hum reaction to last year's iPhone model, the 6S.
"Given the similar form factor for the iPhone 6S and softer smartphone global demand trends, we anticipate down year-over-year iPhone sales for the remainder of [fiscal] 2016," said T. Michael Walkley, an analyst with Canaccord Genuity.
Walkley's not alone. Most analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expect Apple's revenue to slide about 3 percent this year as fewer people buy iPhones. The reason for that concern is simple: More than two-thirds of Apple's sales come from the iPhone. One bad quarter of phone sales translates into a bad quarter overall.
Revenue could drop about 10 percent in the second quarter to $52 million and slip about 4 percent to $47.4 billion in the quarter ending in June.
The year is off to a tough start for many tech companies. Intel, the world's biggest provider of chips for computers and servers, is cutting 11 percent of its workforce as it grapples with a steep drop in PC sales. IBM reported a 14-year low in quarterly sales. And Netflix raised concerns about winning over fewer subscribers in its overseas and US businesses. Even Alphabet, the parent company of Google, reported disappointing sales and profit.
For Apple, the problem is that people just aren't excited about phones. The devices haven't really changed that much over the past few years -- at least not enough to get you running to the Apple Store and buying a new model every year or two. Apple's current flagship phones, the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus, didn't add enough new features to persuade most iPhone customers to trade up.
And the economy in China, one of Apple's most important markets, has been struggling
Apple's first smartwatch -- the Apple Watch, which hit the market a year ago -- hasn't sold in high-enough numbers to boost the company's sales, and its iPad business has dropped every quarter for the past two years, even with the introduction of the 12.9-inch iPad Pro in late 2015. So its not to go without saying that the tech world as a whole is in a large bubble.
-524 words
And the economy in China, one of Apple's most important markets, has been struggling
Apple's first smartwatch -- the Apple Watch, which hit the market a year ago -- hasn't sold in high-enough numbers to boost the company's sales, and its iPad business has dropped every quarter for the past two years, even with the introduction of the 12.9-inch iPad Pro in late 2015. So its not to go without saying that the tech world as a whole is in a large bubble.
-524 words
Friday, April 22, 2016
4K: meh
Those "expensive" (but coming down in price) televisions in Best Buy that look so damn good. You look at one and immediately notice the colors are rich, saturation is perfect, glare is minimal, the focus and image is crisp, and they're commonly so thin and premium looking. But they're overhyped, and for all the wrong reasons.
Lets start with what 4K is. Its a display with a resolution of 3840 pixels × 2160 lines, adding up to a pretty large 8.3 million pixels. Each of these pixels must be updated each time the image changes, which takes stronger horsepower, or Graphics Prossessor Unit, to push all of these 8.3 Megapixels. So immediately, there are two more costly components to manufacture: a higher resolution panel, and a faster GPU. Alright, so these are the only differences between 4K T.V.s and 1080p ones? No, and that is where the blur between what truely makes 4K great, and what many people look over.
The colors. They look so vibrant, so rich, so lucious. Watching the gazelle dash across a rich golden meadow has never looked nearly as good as it does when you look at it on that Sony 4K television. You take a gandering look over at the 1080p T.V. to the left and are immediately struck by how dull the colors look. Everything has a shade of white to it, and there is even a slight glimmer of the bright flourescent lights flashing on the screen, with no such case occuring on that fancy 4K T.V. What's the deal? Well, as I explained earlier, 4K just refers to the number of pixels on the screen, and has nothing to do with colors at all. So why are the colors better? Well, for two reasons mainly. When you buy a 4K T.V., the main reason it costs so much is because of three main reasons: you're paying for a new technology, so the cost upfront to manufacture runs higher. It also costs more for the increased resolution and processing unit. However, what makes those colors so good? Well, you know all of that extra cost you'd be paying? Well, a large part of that goes into a plastic front panel. On top of every display panel (the panel that contains the pixels), a plastic panel sits on top, but unfortunately, this panel, which is quite cheaply produced to keep costs down in 1080p T.V.s, can cause glare and a loss of color accuracy. However, since you're paying sooo much of a premium for a 4K T.V., manufacturers such as Sony and Samsung can afford to put a very expensive plastic piece inbetween you and the display panel, and this minimizes nearly all glare and color loss. So next time you are looking at 4K T.V.s, you, the educated reader, will know that its not the pixels that make it pretty looking, but that there is a nice, glare-free, expensive piece of plastic making everything gleam with bright colors.
-509 words
Lets start with what 4K is. Its a display with a resolution of 3840 pixels × 2160 lines, adding up to a pretty large 8.3 million pixels. Each of these pixels must be updated each time the image changes, which takes stronger horsepower, or Graphics Prossessor Unit, to push all of these 8.3 Megapixels. So immediately, there are two more costly components to manufacture: a higher resolution panel, and a faster GPU. Alright, so these are the only differences between 4K T.V.s and 1080p ones? No, and that is where the blur between what truely makes 4K great, and what many people look over.
The colors. They look so vibrant, so rich, so lucious. Watching the gazelle dash across a rich golden meadow has never looked nearly as good as it does when you look at it on that Sony 4K television. You take a gandering look over at the 1080p T.V. to the left and are immediately struck by how dull the colors look. Everything has a shade of white to it, and there is even a slight glimmer of the bright flourescent lights flashing on the screen, with no such case occuring on that fancy 4K T.V. What's the deal? Well, as I explained earlier, 4K just refers to the number of pixels on the screen, and has nothing to do with colors at all. So why are the colors better? Well, for two reasons mainly. When you buy a 4K T.V., the main reason it costs so much is because of three main reasons: you're paying for a new technology, so the cost upfront to manufacture runs higher. It also costs more for the increased resolution and processing unit. However, what makes those colors so good? Well, you know all of that extra cost you'd be paying? Well, a large part of that goes into a plastic front panel. On top of every display panel (the panel that contains the pixels), a plastic panel sits on top, but unfortunately, this panel, which is quite cheaply produced to keep costs down in 1080p T.V.s, can cause glare and a loss of color accuracy. However, since you're paying sooo much of a premium for a 4K T.V., manufacturers such as Sony and Samsung can afford to put a very expensive plastic piece inbetween you and the display panel, and this minimizes nearly all glare and color loss. So next time you are looking at 4K T.V.s, you, the educated reader, will know that its not the pixels that make it pretty looking, but that there is a nice, glare-free, expensive piece of plastic making everything gleam with bright colors.
-509 words
Saturday, April 16, 2016
Adblock: Slowing Turning Positive
For a while, I have been a hypocrite. I want people to not use adblock to help fund websites and Youtubers, to support to those that work hard to keep the web free that we take for granted. However, the idea of a free web is at risk. And I continue to use adblock. Because I hate intrusive ads. But I have recently found a fix to this in adblock, and I now feel better about my use of it. Inside adblock, there are settings to both disable adblock on certain YouTube channel pages, and also disable it on certain websites.
Under adblock's settings, one can "Allow whitelisting of specific YouTube channels". Click this box. Then, when on a Youtuber's channel, clicking on the adblock button can reveal an option to allow ads on a certain channel.
Also in this menu, there is an option to "Don't run on pages on this domain", to allow all ads from a certain website. Using these options, as well as "Allow some non-intrusive advertising" on the previous settings menu, one can continue to support many of their favorite websites, but also stay free of annoying, intrusive ads.
-195 words
Under adblock's settings, one can "Allow whitelisting of specific YouTube channels". Click this box. Then, when on a Youtuber's channel, clicking on the adblock button can reveal an option to allow ads on a certain channel.
Also in this menu, there is an option to "Don't run on pages on this domain", to allow all ads from a certain website. Using these options, as well as "Allow some non-intrusive advertising" on the previous settings menu, one can continue to support many of their favorite websites, but also stay free of annoying, intrusive ads.
-195 words
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