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Switched On: Amazon's Puzzling Prime Directive
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. More Info Amazon likely to announce media streamer at April 2nd event Showtime's Anytime app arrives on Roku Amazon will reportedly launch a free video streaming service Apple makes its money by selling devices. As such, it's incentivized to have content -- or at least the delivery of it -- exclusive to its devices. For years, the company implemented DRM (digital rights management) on music sold through iTunes. It fought such restrictions, but nonetheless benefited from them. Even today it proclaims its leadership position in the number of applications available for its platforms; many of these arrive on the iPhone exclusively, at least for a while. Netflix, on the other hand, makes its money selling content subscriptions. As such, it's incentivized to have its content available on all suitable devices that consumers use. Indeed, the streaming company has covered an unmatched number of displays. One can access the service from PCs and Macs; iOS, Android and Windows devices; nearly every connected TV and Blu-ray player; major game consoles; Chrome devices; TiVo; and Apple TV. The Roku broadband video box began as a product that ran only Netflix.
Switched On: Return of the digital hub
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. In the heyday of Palm organizers, when even the speeds of 3G data seemed like a distant fantasy, a debate raged as to whether the future of pocket devices could belong to one or two devices. Those who favored two devices argued that you didn't really want all the bulk and battery consumption of a pocket computer in a small device that you wanted to use primarily to make calls. They failed to anticipate that technology's relentless integration would enable these "pocket computers" to become the minimal-millimeter smartphones of today and that data networks would support access to apps ranging from social networking to mobile video that would trump voice for many users.
Switched On: Birth of a platform
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. Regardless of what one may think about the potential for smartwatches, one of the most exciting things about a new device category is that there is so much experimentation with form factors and capabilities. We've already seen products with different display technologies (Memory LCD, LCD and OLED) and varying screen sizes. Some have various combinations of microphones, speakers, cameras, touchscreens, WiFi or cellular radios. Their prices have ranged from less than $100 to $400 and beyond and their battery life has varied from a day to a year. And then, of course, there are many of the factors that differentiate traditional watches -- size, design and materials.
Switched On: Understanding crowdfunding's caveats, part 2
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. The last Switched On discussed how many of the Risks and Challenges sections of Kickstarter campaigns fail to portray an accurate picture of what might go wrong. This was true in the case of the Auris Wily. It, like many campaigns, used this section of the campaign page in the exact opposite way it should be used; they allay concerns about risks and challenges. If the Risks and Challenges section of Kickstarter campaigns reflected reality, they might include some of the following things you should keep in mind for any device project you back:
Switched On: Understanding crowdfunding's caveats, part 1
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. Crowdfunding has been a boon to companies that are bringing some of the most exciting and innovative devices to market. But sometimes things go wrong. Last March, the first of a two-part Switched On discussed some of the foibles about crowdfunding in the wake of Kickstarter proclaiming that it was not a store. The column highlighted three products, two of which (the Syre Bluetooth iPod nano watchband and the Jorno folding keyboard) had seen long delays, but still seemed to have hope of shipping. Nearly a year later, neither has. And there is no telling when or if either will. To the credit of Scott Starrett, the creator of the Jorno, he has kept posting updates about his product, although perhaps not as frequently as backers would like. The last one came earlier this month and contained auspicious news about several critical problems with the prototype being fixed. The Syre update page, on the other hand, has gone dark; the last update was in August 2013. A genuine Apple watch is likely to appear before the Syre.
Switched On: Android (tablet) inside
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. Inexpensive 7-inch tablets were everywhere in 2013 and became, as Switched On noted in December, a populist platform that fulfilled the promise of the sub-$100 PC. But despite their exceptional portability, aided by light weight and slim profiles, some may find the mere act of dragging them within range of something like their boombox, television or car to be too daunting a chore. Worry not, lazy but intrepid crowdfunders. Kickstarter has recently debuted a trio of products that integrate an Android tablet experience for your enhanced enjoyment, productivity and mobility.
Switched On: The leader, the bleeder and the reader
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. Sony recently bid farewell to three device categories. The long-struggling Japanese consumer electronics giant is selling off its PC division, spinning out its TV group into a separate company and getting out of the e-book business by handing it over to Kobo. While each has a unique history, they all demonstrate the difficulties Sony has had in dominating any one category. Sony's introduction of the Trinitron in the 1960s accelerated its ascent to the top of the consumer electronics food chain in the following decades. By the 1980s, virtually any TV buyer knew that nothing compared to Sony and the company's big-screen offerings were bolstered by the arrival of CRT screens that lacked the convex curve of the time. (Back then, curved screens were passé, not leading edge.)
Switched On: The next steps for digital wellness, part two
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. The last Switched On discussed many of the limitations of today's fitness monitors and how input regarding other lifestyle variations could create a more complete picture of how we control our health. But there are other health factors that change infrequently and can have a profound impact on our well-being.
Switched On: The next steps for digital wellness, part one
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. Some of today's leading wearable devices are, at their core, little more than souped-up pedometers. Their once-dim monochrome LCD screens have migrated from atoms to bits that connect to the internet, allowing them to display information in a more engaging way and track it over time. They have been a big win for output, but with essentially the same input. Indiegogo in particular has been a fertile launchpad for alternative wearables for the fitness enthusiast. One has been the Push band, which measures things such as force, power and velocity for activities like weightlifting. And the impact of that might be measured by the Skulpt Aim, which tracks muscle health. Another alternative to run monitors in development is the Atlas, which includes a digital footprint of 30 different exercises for more intelligent exercise analysis.
Switched On: The 2013 Switchies, Part One
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. It's that special time of year between holiday sales and the pre-CES hype cycle that presents an opportunity to consider some of the most innovative devices of the year. Switched On is proud to present the 2013 Saluting Wares Improving Technology's Contribution to Humanity awards, also known as The Switchies. This installment marks the eighth annual Switchies, which are decided based on a rigorous examination of the opinion of me, and do not reflect the opinion of Engadget or its editors. For that latter honor, nominees will need to win an Engadget Award. Now, then, let's stroll past the red carpet and tear open those envelopes.
Switched On: The desktop dashboard, take two
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. The last Switched On discussed the contrast between the $100 laptop concept of 2006 and the $100 tablet reality of 2013. In that case, an idea that didn't bear fruit was succeeded years later by a different approach. However, what's even more rare is to see a failed idea by one small company tried many years later by another small company. This recently occurred with the introduction of the Quirky Nimbus, a physical desktop dashboard that offers four customizable displays that keep track of your digital information, like the weather, commuter traffic, email and calendar updates. The product concept is very similar to the Ambient Executive Dashboard that a yearling Switched On addressed way back in 2005 with two columns focusing on the device and its content. Contrasting that product to the Nimbus reveals that much has changed about technology in the past eight years, but there are still a few things that plague this particular niche product.
Switched On: What's become of the $100 laptop
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. Back in 2006, at the height of interest in the One Laptop Per Child-fueled $100 computer, I embarked on a quest to find such a device on the market -- with a catch. Since there were no such computers readily available in retail channels, the search was conducted via eBay for used, but still-capable PCs that cost less than $100. (It was a lot easier to find one that ran Windows than Mac OS.) The past seven years have seen a lot of changes in the broader personal computing market. The Hisense Sero 7 LT, which arrived at Walmart earlier this year, exemplifies the kind of product that can now be considered the "$100 laptop" for the American mass market. Since then, others have followed. What it delivers, though, varies widely from what we thought such a device might look like.
Switched On: Expunging Xbox
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. The last installment of Switched On discussed the merits of Microsoft divesting itself of Bing. While Bing is still firmly embroiled in a duel with a company that has seen tremendous momentum in the past decade, the case is very different for Xbox. Few products within Microsoft have as colorful a history as its home video game console. While Xbox stands out as an exception at the company today, it is in many ways a model of its future: an internally controlled hardware platform that supports a robust library of software titles from first and third parties with tight integration to Microsoft services.
Switched On: Banishing Bing
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. Much like George Orwell's classic 1984, wars continue in the technology industry without seeming regard for who the enemy is or who it once was. Take, for example, Nokia's embrace of Windows Phone and Microsoft's subsequent embrace of Nokia. The once global smartphone leader initially championed Symbian as a countermeasure to the threat of phone domination by Microsoft. However, Nokia ultimately joined Microsoft in a bid to prevent the same from happening with Android.
Switched On: Taming Evernote's paper tiger
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. In April, Evernote CEO Phil Libin announced his company was getting into the hardware business -- gradually, at first, by partnering with others. Carrying through on that intention at the company's third developer's conference in September, Evernote rolled out its first electronic product as part of Evernote Market. Amidst a number of bags and personal accessories (including what must be the most famous technology-related socks since the ones Apple offered as iPod cases), it introduced the ScanSnap Evernote Edition scanner. The sheet-fed paper ingester boasts a sleeker, more modern design than the Fujitsu original. However, it is already a bit behind the times when compared with, say, the latest cloud-centric WiFi models, such as the Brother ADS-1500W, Doxie Go and the new, high-end NeatConnect.
Switched On: A wristed development
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. It is difficult enough to turn around one niche product category and make it successful, as Apple did with the iPad. But combining two marketplace failures is almost certainly a recipe for disaster. FiLIP, the new kid-tracker, is part connected watch, part smartphone. Prior attempts to optimize these devices for children -- or at least for the parents who want their kids to wear them -- haven't been well received. On the wristwear side, there was the Wherify Wireless watch, a monstrous wrist-locked GPS device. It was so optimized for the kidnapper-concerned that it sent an alarm message over the cellular network if it was removed without authorization.
Switched On: The Yoga Tablet does kickstands with a twist
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. If one takes a narrow view of the tablet market, the largest PC makers have fared especially poorly as a group. At the launch of the iPad, HP, Dell, Acer and Lenovo had little experience with the Android ecosystem, which itself was not optimized for tablets. And Windows, their go-to operating system, was still not available in a version that would show off bold, finger-friendly tiles and yield long battery life in a slim form factor. Even now as these companies have experimented with all kinds of hinges and accessories on Windows, their Android efforts can be hard to differentiate as with HP's Slate 7 and Dell's recent 7- and 8-inch slates. Into this spiritless landscape, Lenovo has dropped the Yoga Tablet, available in 8- and 10-inch sizes. Unlike its namesake Windows laptop, which reveals no obvious signs of its differentiation at first glance, the Yoga Tablet has a silver, cylindrical side that is reminiscent of extended laptop batteries. Indeed, it contains the battery here as well as making for a grip that is at first unfamiliar, but which allows the rest of the tablet to be very thin.
Switched On: If it ain't broke, fix it
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. In a Microsoft strategy that embraces contradiction -- licensing software while trying to build its own devices -- it is unsurprising that goals for the Surface support competing priorities. On one hand, it is a showcase, a pure Microsoft experience in a role that the Nexus phones and tablets serve for Google. On the other hand, it is part of a line of business that must deliver profit over the long term. It is a product that Microsoft has bet big on in terms of development, marketing and inventory. And when its first iteration failed to meet sales expectations, Microsoft felt the pain. Surface has had a third, subtler role as well. In the world of traditional personal computing, it is one thing for Apple to do away with a modem or an optical drive. It is another for Intel to enable longer usage times and thinner form factors. But Surface has enabled Microsoft to set trends for a product's design in ways it could not when it was simply dictating hardware from the sidelines. Remember, for example, the SideShow second screen it advocated with Windows Vista?
Switched On: Behind enemy lines
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. This week marks the ninth anniversary of the column. A decade ago this month, and a year before the debut of Switched On, Apple made the decision to release iTunes for Windows following what was reportedly a profanity-laced debate among Apple's executive team. The decision cemented the iPod's place as the best-selling portable media player and started the company's string of successes beyond the PC.
Switched On: A marriage of conveniences
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. A general love of the new notwithstanding, it has always been a bit odd that new flagship phones from Apple have dramatically outsold previous generations. Mostly because so much of the iPhone's value comes from software and Apple tends to preserve nearly all of the functionality in OS upgrades for previous years' models, making them a relatively good value. However, in the case of the iPhone 5s, Apple has implemented hardware in Touch ID that nicely complements the efficiency of its new mobile operating system, iOS 7. Now, even with the removal of many user interface accoutrements, such as digitized green felt in Game Center that Apple itself has mocked, there are still some whimsical excursions in iOS 7, including the slow-mo video mode and the parallax feature. There are also a few "aha!"-inspiring additions, such as support for the M7 coprocessor that will serve to save battery life by handling motion detection and the two-tone flash that results in more natural-looking photographs.
