Flash games have been popular on the Internet for years, but rarely do you see them take on a serious subject like the Hudson river landing of flight 1549.
Every one was amazed by the landing of the A320 in the Hudson river back on January 15th, and just slightly over 2 weeks later, there is a Flash based game that will let you try your hand at landing the plane yourself. You start your descent at around 1500 feet, and using just the left and right arrow keys on your keyboard, you attempt to keep the plane level for the inevitable splash down in the river.
As games go, it is mediocre at best, I mean I successfully landed the plane on the first try, and even I thought my angle was a bit off. When I intentionally brought the plane in at a severe angle, I did indeed “lose”, but the animation still showed people piling out on to the wings with the plane sitting at a 180 degree angle in the water, with the nose straight up in the air. It’s amusing to play once, but it’s nothing you’re going to get addicted to.
We’ve embedded it below for your convenience if you’d like to give it a try and see if you can perform your own Miracle on the Hudson. Click “Read More” to go to the game.
In one of the oddest marketing moves we’ve ever seen, Google has added one of the most popular features of their Chrome browser to their Firefox toolbar.
One of the most intriguing features of Google Chrome is the thumbnails you see of the sites you visit most often when you open a new tab. Now, in the most recent update to their popular toolbar for the Firefox browser has been updated and they have included this feature with it. Why they would want to do this is a mystery to us as it feels like you are giving away one of your most popular features without the growth of your own product.
You can download the latest version of Google Toolbar here, and you can read more about the updates at the Google Blog.
What exactly is Gears, and why is it something you need?
Originally named Google Gears, Gears is a small bit of open source software launched on May 31st, 2007 by Google that enables Firefox and Internet Explorer to run small pieces of code that improve your Web browsing experience. In some instances, as with the recent announcement of using Gmail offline, Gears will allow you to do some things on your computer without an Internet connection that used to be online only activities. It can also be used to speed up certain activities that you do online such as it to cache images used by WordPress in the administration section to speed up page loading times, and decreasing the strain on your server.
Though the software is closing in on its second birthday, it seemed to go relatively unnotice until just the last few months of 2008. While the name has been mentioned numerous times, and what potential it had, no one seemed to be using it in their everyday lives. In just the past week, I have added two new systems to it that I use every day, so maybe it is time for Gears to finally bust out of being a niche product into a part of the average Web user’s life.
While “cloud computing” is a marvelous tool, it leaves you without the ability to work on things when you are without Internet access. Luckily Google is slowly looking to remove this hurdle from their products.
While they have already offered the ability to take your Google Docs with you on the go, but now they have added the same support for Gmail. According to the Official Gmail Blog, the support is rolling out across the service, and may not be available for all users yet, but it will be soon. For those who haven’t seen it activated yet, the new feature will make use of Google Gears, a tool to run small programs, and itwill store a cache of your email you can read even when you have no Internet access.
You will simply open your browser, go to the usual gmail.com address, and you will find all of your email waiting for you. You will be able to label emails, star them, write replies, delete and everything else you normally do. The next time you are connected to the Internet, all of the changes you have made will be automatically synched with the online version of your account.
If you are dying to try this out, simply click on the “Settings” tab in the top right corner of the Gmail window, then select the “Labs” tab, locate the “Offline” option, choose “Enable” and then scroll to the bottom of the page to click on “Save Changes”. With that, you’re done, and you will be able to read all of your emails anytime, anywhere you want.
It seems the stories of analog TV’s death have been greatly exaggerated.
While we’ve all seen the endless number of ads on television about how analog TV signals were going away on February 17th, it seems that isn’t the case any more. Due to the actions of the Senate of the United States, it seems the stay of execucution for the old style over the air television signal will be extended until June 12th, 2009. This new date has also been supported by President Obama, and many others in the government.
The reason for the delay is that there have been many problems with the $40 vouchers to get the necessary converter boxes. Extending the deadline will keep millions of people from losing their television signal come the day of the transition. Although, we here at StarterTech are a little befuddled that there are still that many people receiving their television signals this way.
As always, please remember that if you receive your TV via a cable company or home dish system, you do not need a converter box, and this change over will have absolutely no effect on you.
Other tidbits of information that have been revealed is that it will handle up to four calls at once, there will be individual and family plans for service (meaning Verizon is alone in not having you pay a monthly fee to use their device), will cover the standard 5,000 square feet of space and more. The biggest omissions in the information is the release date, the cost of the unit and the costs of the different monthly service plans.
Soon everyone will be able to have one of these cell phone extenders in their home or office, meaning companies will never need to build another tower at this rate.
Verizon has officially launched their Network Extender femtocell device to increase cell phone coverage in your home or office.
We reported the other day that it looked like January 25th would be the day that the Verizon Network Extender would be launched, and it turned out that date was correct. Using your existing broadband Internet connection, the device will increase your mobile phone signal inside your home or office, routing the calls over your connection as opposed to the traditional cell phone bands.
Also correct was the price we reported of $249.99, but the difference between this and the $99 Sprint AIRAVE is that there is no service plan with the Network Extender. The current Sprint device costs you $99 up front and then either $4.99 a month for limited service, or $24.95 a month for up to 3 phones and unlimited calls. While the initial investment for the Verizon device is higher, you can easily see how it is the better bargain over the long haul.
You can read more about the device, as well as order it, at the Verizon site.
Yesterday, Paisano shared the following video on his Twitter account, and we just couldn’t resist sharing it with you also for what it teaches us about modern day computers.
While this may be funny to look back at now, it is startling in how close to correct they were. True, online shopping doesn’t involve a camera in a store, and you don’t write out emails on your “electronic correspondence machine”, but the basic ideas are all there for what you are reading this very article on now.
Why is this important to a blog about simplifying technology? Can you imagine how overwhelming this would seem to someone watching it in 1969? The idea that their lives would be overtaken by computer screens and monitors, letting them shop from home, print out documents, sending electronic letters to one another, banking online and so on? Now think about how today’s technology seems overwhelming to you at times.
Get it yet?
All new technologies seem like something you’ll never grasp when they first appear, but later on they become so common place that you don’t even think about it. Sure it can be scary when you first hear about them, but could you imagine life without the “electronic corrspondence machine” now? Doubtful.
This video is a perfect example of why we started StarterTech.com, and that is try to make technology more accessible and a little less scary.
It seems that the biggest competitor to the popular Apple iPhone may be… the Apple iPod Touch.
With the release of the Apple sales figures for the holiday period this week, it showed that iPods were up 3% over the same period last year, but iPhone sales were down from 6.9 million units in the third quarter, to 4.4 million in the fourth. While that is still a respectable number of units to move, it didn’t meet expectations from Wall Street.
While Apple doesn’t break iPod sales figures down by the various units, web traffic for the mobile version of Safari, the built-in browser, tripled on Christmas day. There was also a 100% increase in downloads from the App Store, that, again, serves both the iPhone and iPod Touch users. While these numbers aren’t concrete since we do not have explicit iPod Touch sales figures, it does leave one to wonder if this device is cannibalizing some of the sales from its bigger brother.
The iPod Touch is lacking two things that the iPhone offers: a built-in phone and an exclusive contract with AT&T.
The phone part has partially been solved by the second generation of Touches having the ability to use a microphone/headset combination. Because of this new feature, you can now use various VoIP apps to make and receive phone calls with it whenever you are near an open Wi-Fi network. That is one major hurdle overcome.
As for the AT&T contract, well, while iPhones may appear cheaper in the short term, when you add in the service plans they require you to buy to make your device work, the Touch is an absolute steal at $399 for the 32GB version.
We here at StarterTech are huge fans of the iPod Touch, even to the point that our very first post was about the device. While we would love it even more if we had a fully functioning phone, and didn’t have to rely on Wi-Fi, we also are not big fans of AT&T service. For now we carry our first generation Touches and BlackBerrys, and are quite happy we don’t need to deal with AT&T. We are not alone in this feeling as it was also stated by CNet News.
The iPod Touch: everything great about the iPhone, minus AT&T.
That pretty much sums up how we feel too, and it also appears to be how a lot of consumers are beginning to also feel.
Have you given any thought to how to protect your child as they navigate the wilds of social networking?
This is something I have talked about numerous times on my personal blog, SeanPAune.com, and something I can’t help but wonder how many peopel actually think about it. It came to my attention again today when Linda Furrier wrote an article on Furrier.org about how she had recently attended a panel at her child’s school about safety on Facebook that was even attended by an employee of that popular social network. I will quote the most imporant section:
The event l was billed as an event to increase your knowledge of your kids’ cyber culture on Facebook. The Facebook employee panelist was informative enough, but I couldn’t help feel that he really didn’t “get it”. His youth was indicative of the Facebook employee culture, but I am guessing he has never worried about a child getting home safely or being stalked on the Internet.
Questions were answered relating to privacy settings & Facebook procedures for blocking inappropriate posts and or members. The slide show was informative, but didn’t really reach the heart of the matter. The high school principal spoke with us about how the administration disciplines kids who post inappropriately in the high school network. The two high school age panelists spoke to their methods of protecting and sharing their information on Facebook. Yes, interesting, but I still left the event feeling hungry for more parenting tools.
I was left wondering, who is monitoring cyberspace outside of school hours? Whose responsibility is it? Should Facebook default to the most restrictive privacy settings for minors? Wouldn’t restrictions to spreading networks be highly counter to their business goals. Is Facebook’s sharing and connecting utility and business growth plan in conflict with the best interest of the kids?
This is a common issue that I hear time and time again about parents wondering why more wasn’t done to protect their children while they are online. I always pose the exact same reply, “Why didn’t YOU do more to protect your children?
I applaud this school for trying to educate parents, and I also applaud Mrs. Furrier for trying to get more educated on the subject, but I always wonder why people bring up the idea it is the social network’s responsibility to protect their children. Why should the school even be involved in anything a child does off of school grounds? The whole point is that you are ultimately responsible for what happens inside of your own home, and this includes how your children interact with the Internet.
There are some very simple steps you can follow to watch over your child is they wander through cyberspace:
The cheapest, and easiest, solution is no computer in their room. If they have a computer in their room, simply don’t allow it to connect to the Internet. Computers should be kept in a common room until you feel that your child has proven to be responsible enough to surf the Internet on their own.
Install parental control software that limits when they may access the computer, the Internet or even just specific sites.
Most routers have the ability to block access to certain sites based on address.
Essentially it all comes down to educating yourself and setting rules for Internet usage just like you do anything else in your house. Your child’s safety is ultimately your responsibility, and not that of schools, the social networks or anyone else. Always make sure that you are fully aware of what your child is doing online, no matter how much they may complain about it.
Flash games have been popular on the Internet for years, but rarely do you see them take on a serious subject like the Hudson river landing of flight 1549.
In one of the oddest marketing moves we’ve ever seen, Google has added one of the most popular features of their Chrome browser to their Firefox toolbar.
What exactly is 
While “
It seems the stories of analog TV’s death have been greatly exaggerated.
Verizon has officially launched their Network Extender femtocell device to increase cell phone coverage in your home or office.
It seems that the biggest competitor to the popular Apple 
Have you given any thought to how to protect your child as they navigate the wilds of social networking?
