Thursday July 8th Show Notes

UStream

On tonight’s show The guys had their first vidcast over the UStream network, a platform for live media streaming. UStream launched in 2007 allowing anyone with a webcam and access to the internet to broadcast their own channels on Ustream network or on a third party site such as this site. Tonight was a live beta test with initial viewing figures peeking at 32 viewers.

Foursquare

James chatted a little further about Foursquare the geo-location based social network that is primarily used for letting your friends know where you are and figuring out where they are. Secondarily, it’s for collecting points, prize “badges,” and eventually, coupons, for going about your everyday business.

Guess the Gadget

Reintroducing an old segment on the All New Technology Show, Simon presented us with 5 clues to the mystery gadget of the week. Clues and information provided below.

Clue 1

A patient for a similar device was originally applied for in 1979

In September 2007, during a lawsuit with patent holding company Burst.com, Apple drew attention to a patent for a similar device that was developed in 1979. Kane Kramer patented the idea of a “plastic music box” in 1979, which he called the IXI. He was unable to secure funding to renew the US$ 120,000 worldwide patent, so it lapsed and Kramer never profited from his idea

Clue 2

It hides it’s files away from the user, but the user can still access them.

Media files are stored on an iPod in a hidden folder, along with a proprietary database file. The hidden content can be accessed on the host operating system by enabling hidden files to be shown. The media files can then be recovered manually by copying the files or folders off the iPod. Many third-party applications also allow easy copying of media files off of an iPod.

Clue 3

It’s trademark name was inspired by 2001: A Space Odyssey

The name iPod was proposed by Vinnie Chieco, a freelance copywriter, who (with others) was called by Apple to figure out how to introduce the new player to the public. After Chieco saw a prototype, he thought of the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey and the phrase “Open the pod bay door, Hal!”, which refers to the white EVA Pods of the Discovery One spaceship

Clue 4

It launched in 2001, but was not the first of it’s kind

The iPod launched in October of 2001. There were many other mp3 players on the market before Apple entered the marketplace with the iconic iPod with a mechanical scroll wheel and 5Gb of memory.

Clue 5

The computer software that accompanies the device has become the World’s biggest retailer in music.

The software is iTunes. The device is The iPod

Android OS 2.2

Wayne came into the studio to talk to posse about Google’s Android operating system update to 2.2. Lots of information on it’s new features and increased functionality.

Gadget Grandad

GG went back to when he was a lad and his favourite gadget being the Sony MiniDisc. Some interesting facts about the Minidisc follows:

Released in November 1992 in Japan and December for Europe and USA
It was a magneto-optical disc-based data storage device initially intended for storage of up to 80 minutes of digitized audio. Kind of like a mini CD in a case.
Sony avoided the mistake that it had made in the 1970s with the Betamax video recording system, and this time licensed the MD technology to other manufacturers, with JVC, Sharp, Pioneer, Panasonic and others all producing their own MD systems. So it gained reasonable popularity. More so in Asia than Europe and USA.
Recordable MDs can be recorded on repeatedly; Sony claims up to one million times. They’ve got a lot of fingers.
Originally only 80 minutes on a disc. But Sony later introduced a compression format that increased this to 4x capacity.

Technology Driven Tracks

Rich spoke about Technology driven tracks, tracks that have been influenced by our use of technology and played us the Official World Cup song, Waka Waka (This time for Africa) by Shakira.