A day in the life of a smart phone.

It’s 5 AM and the iPhone on my night stand chirps to life encouraging me to vacate the warmth of my bed and face the world.  The phone has been tethered to the charger all night so it is ready to join me for another adventure.  As I walk to the shower, I open my Pandora App and listen to a bit of Brubeck to get me moving.

Following the morning ablutions, I look at the day’s events on my online calendar app so I can decide if this is a suit day or I if can get away with something more casual.   Ah, good news, no important meetings requiring a suit, but what will Mother Nature require?  No worries, a quick inquiry to Siri indicates no rain and mild temps.  A perfect day for jeans and a light shirt.

When I looked at my calendar earlier I was reminded that I was to meet a friend for breakfast but I can’t remember if that Starbucks is on Hamilton Avenue or Colerain.  I get them mixed up as advanced age creeps up on me.  A quick Google search shows that it is on Hamilton and reviewing the Artimis camera app I see it is smooth sailing on I-74 and I-275.

Arriving at the coffee shop, I am a few minutes early so I have time to catch up on the online version of the morning paper and even watch a few minutes of the morning TV news using my Aereo app.  My friend arrives and we have a great conversation and share some family photos and video stored on our phones.  Since it was my turn to treat, I wave my phone and my Starbucks tab is paid complete with tip.

On my way to the office, I am able to listen to some voice mails using the Bluetooth system in my car. While waiting for a train I make a few phone calls and even have time to FaceTime with my wife who is out of the country.  The train passes and I am on my way to the office.

My office computer is synched with all my mobile devices so all of the files I need are available no matter where I am.  I put some finishing touches on a Power Point for use later in the week and send it on to a colleague for review.

Throughout the day I use my phone for calls and several instant messages.  A look again at the calendar shows that I promised to meet for dinner at the new eatery but forgot to make reservations.  A quick search on line provides a link and reservations are confirmed.   This is a new place so I enter the address into my phone and begin my drive following the iPhone’s directions.

I am a bit early so I have time to catch up on some personal email and review some Facebook postings.  My Power Point revisions have been sent back so I review them over a glass of merlot. My friends arrive and we have a great meal and some fantastic bottle of wine that was new to all of us.  Using Google, we were able to get some information on the vintner and even order some to be shipped home.

It's been a long day and on my way home I use my home automation system app to turn on the AC and outside lights.  Arriving home, I find the house comfortable and settle into my easy chair to read a new Kindle book I loaded on to the phone.  It is getting late so I tell Siri to set the alarm for 6 AM so I can sleep in tomorrow.

Now it is time for me and my phone to get recharged for another day.

Tell me again why I would want to have a smart phone?

Supreme Court Decision Cloudy At Best

Last week the US Supreme Court heard arguments in a case that will decide if Aereo is allowed to continue operation in a dozen or so communities throughout the United States, including the Cincinnati area.  The fledgling internet based service allows subscribers to watch live local broadcast TV channels on a variety of digital devices like smart phones, tablets and lap tops, and yes, even TVs. It also offers a cloud-based DVR, allowing the subscriber to record programs for later streaming.

As the oral arguments and comments played out in the court room, it became apparent that the ruling might have far reaching and revolutionary implications, not only for how we receive television, but for the future of the multi-billion dollar cloud computing industry.

The issue being adjudicated is whether Aereo should be required to pay TV stations for the right to retransmit their programs.  Traditional cable and satellite services pay billions of dollars each year to local stations.  Aereo counters that they are not a cable system but rather just an agent of each subscriber providing an antenna and virtual DVR for a monthly fee. They note that individuals may watch and record in their home any program transmitted on public airwaves with no fee.  They insist that Aereo is just making this easier.

Much better legal minds will need to ascertain if Aereo is cleverly exploiting a loophole in the copyright laws or standing up for the little guy.  A review of the discussion during the court’s hearing shows that the Justices were quick to realize that their ruling could have great impact on other cloud-based services.

For several years we have all heard about the “cloud” and how it is revolutionizing the way we use our digital devices. Simply put the cloud services make use of large centrally located computer storage arrays and servers to provide to subscribers many services that once resided on our individual computers.  Because most of these cloud services allow subscribers to store and remotely access most any file or program for certain they are storing and playing out movies, music, pictures that are copyright protected.  The amount of illegal content stored on Dropbox or Google Cloud most likely is much greater than Aereo and a ruling against Aereo might well have a stifling effect on these cloud services.

We will need to all stay tuned to see if our highest court in the land can come up with a King Solomon ruling.  The Court is expected to rule in late June.

Some Bright Ideas

Modern technology has brought us some awesome products, devices and services.  Many of them have made our lives better and some much brighter.  Recently new technology has exploded in the home lighting market.  The trip to the store to purchase a replacement light bulb has become as complicated and confusing as purchasing a computer or smart phone.  There are countless types and styles of home lighting and corresponding documentation, some of which is at best misleading.  So what is the best choice?

Currently there are four basic options for most home lighting needs. They are: incandescent lights, standard fluorescent lamps, compact fluorescent lights (CFL) and those that use light emitting diodes. (LED) The LED technology is the one that is getting the most current attention and you might think that it is the best option for all applications.  This may not be true.

Before choosing which type of lamp to use you need to think about where it will be installed.  For example, if you have a crawl space or attic into which you enter once or twice a year, it makes no sense to use an expensive energy saving LED or CFL to light the space.  It would take 100 years to recoup the cost. 

Some people report a less than good experience with CFL bulbs.  While most manufactures have been able to soften the light output making them give off a warmer glow then earlier designs, users report that the life of the bulbs is much shorter than advertised.  CFLs work best when they are turned on and left on.  

Applications like an often used bathroom where the light is turned on and off many times a day is not a good application for a CFL.  The repeated on and off cycles will significantly shorten the life span of the CFL lamp.

Another less than optimum application for a CFL is in any place that is very cold.  In a cold environment like an unheated garage if the temperature falls below freezing the light will take a long time to come up to full brightness.  In extremely cold, i.e. below zero environments, the bulb may never reach full intensity.

Most likely the future of lighting will be LED technology.  The energy efficiency and life cycles are measured in decades and not hours like incandescent bulbs.  Right now the unit cost is still high but is coming down quickly.  LED lamps come in all configurations and like CFLs they can be color corrected to mimic the soft glow of the traditional light bulb.  They can also be dimmed. Because they put off almost no heat, there are additional savings on air conditioning in spaces where they are used.

For applications where the light is used often like kitchens, family rooms and home offices, the LED is a good choice.  There is great debate about how efficient they really are but most agree they will save more energy and last many more years than any of the other options. I don’t suggest running out and replacing all your lights with LEDs but next time that lamp in the living room needs a new bulb, try a LED.  If you repeat this when other lights fail, slowly, over time, you will have installed enough lights to make a big difference in your energy bill.

Some Online Security Tips

Computer security and privacy have been dominating the headlines.  The most recent announcement in the media deals with a major security vulnerability named Heartbleed. This bug affects a popular encryption technology designed to protect your sensitive data on the Internet, like usernames, passwords and emails.  Unlike some bugs and viruses, there really is no protection that you can install on your computer to address Heartbleed since it exploits a programming error in the encryption software and as such requires the software developers to fix the problem. 

There are however things that you should do to assure your security and privacy whenever you go online.  I have written often about the need to be vigilant about security.  This might be a good time to reiterate some of those tips.

When you purchase a Wi-Fi router, smart phone or other device that require a password be sure to change the default password.  Many devices come out of the box with a standard password already installed.  The problem is that often these passwords are known by most every hacker on the internet.  So failure to change it leaves you open and exposed.

Speaking of passwords, don’t use obvious names and dates.  Your birthday, your kid’s name, your street address do not provide much protection.  A password with a numerals and both upper and lower case text along with some punctuation marks are best.  The password should not make a real word or phrase.

Many of us are wedded to our smartphone and tablet and use them for all types of online activity and take advantage of the proliferation of free Wi-Fi hot spots.  From McDonalds to Speedway, from interstate rest stops to public parks, it seems we can most always find a free Wi-Fi connection.  While reading a newspaper or checking the weather are fine, you should not use these public Wi-Fi spots to access online banking sites or other sites that contain important and private data.

If you use online banking many institutions will allow you to be notified when any transaction that you did not initiate gets processed.  So when a deposit or debit is made to your account, you will get an email alerting you to the activity.  This service often requires you to activate it on your account.  Be sure yours is activated.

This last tip might be an example of closing the barn door after the horses have escaped.  More and more merchants offer affinity cards allowing discounts and other perks to card holders.  When you visit the store you swipe the card.   Over and above the discount you receive you also have provided the store with a trove of purchasing information.  Some stores sell this information to third parties.   Also more and more often you are asked for your telephone number when checking out as well as the offer to email you a receipt.  Again giving out little bits of information over time can provide a very accurate profile for those miscreants looking to steal your identity and money.

Increasingly we will do more on line and as we do there will be better protections developed like voice, retina and or finger print recognition. Until these are common place, be careful out there.

It is OK not to use email but....

Perhaps one of the most revolutionary byproducts of the digital age is that it has changed forever the way we communicate.  Spoken and written communication, whether between people in the same house or separated by oceans, has been made easy, inexpensive and available to most everyone. A recent study showed an increasing number of senior citizens are embracing these technologies.  This should not be a surprise since today’s seniors were yesterday’s workforce.  If you used these tools when working 9-5 why would you not continue to use them in your private life? 

Email, voice mail and all stripes of other new ways to communicate are not embraced by everyone regardless of age.  There is nothing wrong with choosing to stay off the internet.  Unfortunately some might feel pressured to do otherwise.  This can cause some real issues.  I know that in my circle of acquaintances there are some who have eschewed email and other digital services.  The problem does not come because of this decision, it comes because they do not communicate this decision to others.

At one time having an email address or Facebook presence was seen as a sign that you were “hip” and “with it.”  Those who did not use these services may have felt out of place when asked for their email address.  So the answer for some was to get an email account. 

When you give someone your email address it is the same as giving them your snail mail address.  Most of us would not think of going for weeks without looking in our US mail box. Some however go for longer periods of time without looking in their email inbox.  So messages, invitations, questions and other messages go unanswered.  This can cause ill feelings, concern and just plain frustration.

The answer is very simple.  If you don’t plan to look at your incoming email on a regular basis don’t tell people that you have email.  Just tell them that you don’t use it and give them you phone number or regular mail address.

There is a similar issue with Voice Mail.  Most mobile and home services allow you to disable the Voice Mail.  If you don’t plan to check it regularly turn it off.  People can just call back or perhaps put a stamp on a letter and send the message in a more traditional manner.  Who knows, perhaps they will stop over for a visit.

Shortwave Once a New Technology

I recently began a new job at the National Voice of America Museum.  For many, myself included, the Voice of America is one of those institutions that we had heard about but have a very fuzzy understanding of what it is.  The very beginnings of the organization, which provides unbiased radio programming from the United States to listeners in countries around the world, are rooted in shortwave radio.  Shortwave radio is a technology that never really took off in the United States but in the rest of the world during the last half of the 1900s it was a mainstay of radio.

In the United States it has always been relegated to hobbyists.  I can remember when I was a little kid being fascinated by the old radio in my aunt’s house that had a shortwave band and emblazoned on the dial were names of cities from half way around the world that I could listen to.  When I was able to get a receiver of my own I would spend hours listening to strange broadcasts in languages I could not understand but nevertheless is was so cool. 

Who knew some 50+ years later, when shortwave is at best a footnote in the history of broadcasting, I would get a job that was so closely connected to this technology.

Shortwave broadcasts can travel great distances since they can be easily reflected off the ionosphere back to earth and thus overcome the barrier of the curvature of the Earth. Most broadcast signals, like those of all local TV stations and most radio stations, are effective only when the transmitter and receiver are in line of sight. Anyone driving across the country knows how stations come and go on our car radio as we travel farther from the transmitter.

The Voice of America, transmitting from the West Chester, OH location was an effective tool for the US during WWII and the following cold war years.  Unlike many of the shortwave services supported by other more restrictive and controlled foreign governments, VOA’s guiding principle was “Tell the truth and let the world decide.”  Even in the darkest days of the war VOA did not sugarcoat a lost allied battle or another fallen state to Hitler’s terror.  This credibility served the VOA well then and continues to do so now.  

While shortwave has been replaced with satellites, the internet and mobile phones, the messages and the unbiased programming from the VOA remains.  Radio programming is now only a portion of the offerings expanded to include TV, online streaming of video and audio and social media.

As we look at the technologies of today, I wonder what our kids some 50 years in the future will think of iPads and smartphones.   Will they be seen as old and obsolete as we now view shortwave?

Major Changes Coming for Radio

The digital revolution has had an impact on most every facet of modern media: we read newspapers on tablets and Kindles, watch television on our phones and make video telephone calls with our laptop computer.  Absent from this list is radio.  Sure there are some apps for radio stations but up until now radio stations and our consumption of radio programming today is not all that different from our great grandparents.  In fact, if you found an old radio in the attic dating back to the 1930s and you could get it to turn on, that radio could receive most every local radio station now operating today. 

We are likely to soon witness a change in how and where we receive radio programming and that change might well be more revolutionary than what we all experienced with television.  This revolution could change forever the economic model of radio broadcasting.

Radio stations have operated in such a way as to cover a specific geographic area.  Anyone driving cross country has experienced the frustration of listening to a baseball game or interesting talk program only to lose the signal as you drove further away from the station’s tower.  Radio stations based the cost of their advertising spots on the coverage area and the number of people who listen. 

Most stations have for several years streamed their programming on the internet and those with an internet connection could receive the station no matter where they were.  There are even internet radios that can receive most any streamed station in the world.  The popularity of these devices and services has been modest since most people listen to radio in their automobile and, up until now, internet access while driving down the highway has been elusive.

Close attention to advertisements for new cars will show that this is changing and changing fast.  The dashboard now is becoming a multimedia center for getting email, instant messages, map direction and, yes, internet radio.  A driver on the Santa Freeway will be able to listen to a station in Cincinnati as effortlessly as a commuter on I-75.  Services like iTunes radio, Prodigy, Spotify and iHeart Radio will show up on the dial along with WLW and WKRC.

In essence it makes every radio station a potential global station.  What it will do for the advertisers is uncertain.  Will Mr. Gilkey want to spend money to advertise his windows to thousands of homeowners who can’t buy them?  How about local news and weather? 

Managers of radio stations have a lot to think about as another facet of our media faces extraordinary change.  Stay tuned.