Monthly Archives: June 2011

Android Running Perfectly on an EeePC Netbook. Totally Mad.

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This just totally blew me away. I grabbed the ISO of Android X86, “burned” it onto USB stick, booted it on an ancient 700Mhz EeepC 701 Surf and 5 minutes after the initial download, it was running. Almost flawlessly.

Only issues I’ve run into so far are Wifi giving a bit of grief (LAN fine) and some text entry playing silly buggers. There is also no Android Market but there are ways around that. 

 

The amazing thing is the speed. The EeePC absolutely flies with Android and this is on a “Live USB”, it should be even faster if I do a full SSD install. Also using a touchpad actually works fine and the lack of touchscreen doesn’t feel odd. It really makes me wonder what the point of the Chromebook is.

 

So if you have an old Netbook on which Windows crawls and Linux is just not your cup of tea, try this out. YouTube, GMail, everything works fine. I think I’ll be handing this old machine over to one of the younger kids as soon as I suss the Flash situation.

 

Turntable.fm blocks access outside the US – Nooooooooooooooooo

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We’re very sorry, but while we would love to let you in and rock out with us, we need to currently restrict turntable access to only the United States due to licensing constraints.

We are working very hard to try and and get you in as soon as possible.

If you believe this is a mistake and you are located in the United States, please e-mail help [at sign] turntable dot fm

Again, sorry, and we hope to see you soon.

Billy Chasen
CEO

via thenextweb.com

Don’t worry your pretty head. That’s what VPNs were created for. I can highly recommend BlackVPN.com in the Netherlands.

A Few Quick Thoughts on Google Health Being Canned

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Google has announced they are winding down Google Health. I'm terribly disappointed by this as I really thought they had something visionary there.

Coincidentally, Erick Schonfeld over on TechCrunch, interviewed the creator of Google Health, Adam Bosworth, a few weeks back. He said that the reason it never took off was that 

Google Health never asked, “What could they do that people would want?” Instead. “they basically offerd a place to store data.” People don’t want to store data, they want to have fun.

Hmm, I agree that the lack of any "doing" on the data was an issue but I'm not convinced Social and Fun have any place in my core medical data. I wanted doctors, hospitals, pharmacies etc all filling the data there for me so there was one place for everything. Then, do something with the data. I never want to "check-in" to my pharmacy or become mayor of my liver.

I see a bigger fundamental problem here: Google didn't get buy-in from the data providers. They failed to build the relationships. If you look at Google TV, you see a very similar problem. And if you look at the new Google Music service, the same. Until Google addresses this problem, which is oddly similar to their Social problem, many of these initiatives are going to fail. I'd be interested to see, for example, how many audio device manufacturers they have reached out to since they announced Open Accessory. But then Android is the shining example of how Google can knock it out of the park when working within an existing ecosystem.

I’ve never met an Engineer who could turn their hand to business

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With that one line by Alan Sugar on last night’s UK Apprentice, I finally realised why Amstrad was never able to grow beyond the odd burst of short term opportunism into a global company. I’d like to run a few numbers past Lord Sugar:

  • Number of Amstrad Music Devices sold last year: 0
  • Number of Apple Music Devices sold last year: 84m 
  • Market share of phones with e-m@ailer technology: 0%
  • Market share of phones with ARM technology: 98% globally
  • Dell market cap: $30.18B
  • Viglen valuation: £9.99?
  • Amstrad sale price: £127m
  • Scientific Atlanta Sale Price: $6.9B
The one difference between those companies and Amstrad? Great business people with a global vision working with great engineers with business sense.

So Lord Sugar, the next time an engineer runs a business or product idea past you, maybe stop thinking about how you can bundle a tape-recorder with it, and listen to her.

Wouldn’t it be great if the BBC dropped property developer Alan from the Apprentice and replaced him with Herman Hauser who, with the creation of the BBC Micro, is ultimately responsible for what became ARM, a technology that is in nearly every mobile phone on the planet? That’s someone I would like my kids to aspire to emulating.

Herman, by the way, is a Fellow of The Royal Academy of Engineering.