Thankful Thursday

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This is my first entry in the Thankful Thursday series. I want to clarify that this isn’t going to be in order of importance – it’s more dictated by whatever is standing out in my mind today. I’m very thankful to my parents, each of which I will go into with more detail. Right now, I want to focus on those who aren’t so obvious.

To the Allen Family – John, Marilyn, Kirk and Jeff. Jeff, Kirk and I shared many adventures as children. In many ways, it’s the kind of summer fun and silly adventures that I can only hope that my children have. I want to say thank you to the entire family for their warmth and especially their humor.

I don’t think my humor would have quite the absurdist bent it has today without the introduction of Monty Python and a host of other silliness at the Allen household.

Rest in Peace, John. You’re always missed.

It Takes a Village …

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There is an old African proverb that Hillary Clinton used as title of her book – ‘It takes a village to raise a child.’

As my children are getting older, and I see the various influences on their life I’ve come to appreciate more what a true statement this.  For my children – it’s their grandparents, teachers, tv – all teaching, informing, molding them as they learn and grow. Naturally, I’m more pleased with some of these influences than others.

It’s also allowed me to reflect on who helped to shape my world view today.  Whether it’s my values, sense of humor, or other things picked up along the way.  Starting next Thursday, I’ll be doing some cross-posting between here and Twitter.  Each Thursday will now be ‘Thankful Thursday’ as I do a brief homage to the various people who been kind enough to help me along the way.  I’ll be posting some extended background here, and a brief summary on Twitter.

Reports of Qualcomm’s Chips in Verizon bound iPhone …

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I’d like nothing more than see the iPhone on Verizon, but I’m call bullsh** on the report from MacRumors regarding Qualcomm and Apple.  Full disclosure, I work for Qualcomm in the IT department – so I have no idea what our chip division is up to or any other kinds of dealings that we have.  My speculation below is completely my own based off of simple research via Google and press releases.

First, Qualcomm all ready makes chips that support GSM/WCDMA (UMTS)/CDMA – so saying that Qualcomm couldn’t produce them in time seems erroneous. In my informal research, it looks like Qualcomm has been producing said chips since at least 2002 – google ‘gsm cdma’ and see what you get.  Now, would I believe that Apple is looking for LTE chip that is multi-mode – GSM/WCDMA/CDMA/LTE – so they can use the phone on any network including AT&T and Verizon’s future networks? Sure, I’d buy that.

Qualcomm is indeed working on such a chipset:

http://www.qctconnect.com/newsroom/news/2009/091112_hspa_plus_lte.html

Now, would I buy that these parties haven’t or couldn’t come to terms because of timing and quantity. Sure, I’d buy that too.  However, it clearly states that these chips are projected to market in 2nd half of 2010. Now I have no knowledge of Apple or Qualcomm’s roadmaps for the iPhone or chipsets – but they aren’t automagically going to line up without some partnering. So I wouldn’t expect to divine what’s happening from press releases, but the timing of what’s been announced and Apple’s usual release pattern would suggest that they’re not quite in sync.

I do think that the analyst’s report/rumor has enough errors that it cannot be trusted.

Tablets and CES

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Yesterday, Microsoft unveiled the HP Slate during Ballmer’s keynote at CES. Microsoft called it a ‘Slate PC’, which has deservedly caught the attention of the Mac faithful as that is one of the rumored names of the mythical Apple Tablet. Regardless of what they call it, I’m still disappointed. I’ve been extremely interested in tablet computing for the past few years, and been looking for the ideal device. What Microsoft and HP have rolled out is the 2010 equivalent of Windows CE machine from 1997.

They’ve crammed the desktop interface onto a tablet form factor and are leveraging the new multi-touch features in the Windows 7 OS. Yes, Windows 7 is much prettier than Windows CE – but it’s Microsoft still not understanding that different form factors require different interfaces. Why would I go to the start menu in the lower left corner to initiate any interaction on a tablet? The whole thing is touchable – it seems silly to hit a little button, then have menu that occupies 1/6 of the corner of my screen pop-up, that I then need to select a tiny shortcut with my finger (or more accurately my fingernail).

So what is it that I want? I want something that is essentially an e-reader on steroids. Kottke had a great post about e-readers not long ago that I’d like to quote:

The correct single use is reading. Your device should make it equally easy to read books, magazine articles, newspapers, web sites, RSS feeds, PDFs, etc.

Basically, I’m looking for a device that’s easy on the eyes (design-wise for sure, but I’m referring to the screen’s readability and eye fatigue), has a long battery life, that allows me to read e-books, and my normal feeds from Google Reader and Instapaper without any hackery. If I’m getting greedy, I’d like to have multimedia capabilities too – i.e. let me use it to watch video – but that’s not really what I want it for – that’s just pie in the sky gravy. I really want an e-reader that’s more flexible than the Kindle, but not a desktop OS metaphor slammed into a new form factor.

I for one am waiting to see what Apple does in this space.  I think of anything I’ve read so far – Gruber’s piece on The Tablet was the most prudent speculation any one has written up. I think he’s right on that Apple is going to tailor the interface for that form factor. If it turns out to be ‘fourth factor’ – not a desktop, not a notebook, not a smartphone – I’ll be curious to see how they tailor the experience for that medium and make it compelling versus the other form factors. They’ve done it with the iPhone/iPod Touch, so I’m giving them the benefit of the doubt.

Else, I’ll wait around for a Mirasol enabled Kindle :-)