beat

Interesting insights from MobileBeat 2008

On Thursday, I attended MobileBeat 2008, a new conference here in Silicon Valley focused primarily on cell phones broad enough to encompass closely related gizmos like Apple's iPod Touch and--at least in theory--mobile Internet devices.

The event was hosted by VentureBeat, where a great many blog posts can be found that go through all the sessions and significant announcements from the conference. (My thanks to VentureBeat writer Dean Takahashi, who invited me to the conference.)

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Facebook virtual goods turning into real money

Who would have thought that virtual pets would be the thing that lets independent developers monetize the Facebook audience.

Over on VentureBeat, Eric Eldon pulls in some great stats on users and monetization of Facebook apps.

Like grizzled miners panning for gold on a river high in the Sierras, Facebook applications developers have been toiling away, trying to figure out how to make money from the millions of people who use their apps every day. Those developers who focus on games are starting to find gold -- by which I mean revenue gained from doing things like selling virtual goods … Read more

My speakers can beat up your high-end A/V receiver

Are high-end A/V receivers, which for the purpose of this blog is any receiver with a MSRP over $1,500, worth it? True, they're loaded with features, stuff like all of the latest surround formats like Dolby TrueHD and DTS Master Audio. But wait a sec--Denon's soon to be released $649 AVR-1909 receiver has them, too. It's got three HDMI inputs and all of the latest Audyssey auto speaker set up and equalization doodads.

Let's take a look at Sony's $1,699 STR-DA5300ES. What does the extra $1,000 buy you? Not so much. … Read more

Google's little g. Does it allow for a conversation about the big S?

Sometimes, apparently unrelated events are really part of a strategy.

You trim your eyebrows. You visit a shrink. You suggest a late meeting with an attractive co-worker. Only afterwards do those around you see the connection between the three.

I am getting the same feeling about Google.

Google always wanted everyone to believe that it would never change. That it was a fine and spiritual body, eager to do good, while taking charitable donations on the side. (the side of the page, to be precise)

A sort of Mother Teresa with sideburns and a poetic songbook.

Now, as Bronski Beat … Read more

Ray tracing for PCs-- a bad idea whose time has come

Dean Takahashi sent me an e-mail pointing to a piece he wrote on VentureBeat describing statements Wednesday by Intel's Chief Technical Officer Justin Rattner targeted at NVIDIA. CNET's own Brooke Crothers covered the same story and provides additional background here.

The technology at issue relates to 3D graphics for PCs. All current PC graphics chips use what's called polygon-order rendering. All of the polygons that make up the objects to be displayed are processed one at a time. The graphics chip figures out where each polygon should appear on the screen and how much of it will be visible or obstructed by other polygons.

Ray tracing achieves similar results by working through each pixel on the screen, firing off a "ray" (like a backward ray of light) that bounces off the polygons until it reaches a light source in the scene. Ray tracing produces natural lighting effects but takes a lot more work.

(That's the short version, anyway. For more details, you could dig up a copy of my 1997 book Beyond Conventional 3D. Alas, the book is long since out of print.)

Ray tracing is easily implemented in software on a general-purpose CPU, and indeed, most of the computer graphics you see in movies and TV commercials are generated this way, using rooms full of PCs or blade-server systems.

Naturally, Intel loves ray tracing, and there are people at Intel working to… Read more

Metronome teaches music by fingertips

If the human ear is to survive the forces of evolution, it may not be getting any help from music.

There are already a number of technologies that use other parts of the anatomy to conduct soundwaves, most notably bones, and some would even have us singing directly from vocal chords and bypassing the mouth altogether. Now Peterson has introduced the "BB-1 BodyBeat," an electronic metronome that sends beats pulsating through the fingertip.

It actually makes some sense, especially for musicians who find themselves in venues where they can't hear themselves think, let alone play. The idea, … Read more

Blinkx launching video screensaver

Blinkx makes very slick video search technology that has been available for quite some time to consumers through Blinkx.com. One of the site's cool features is that if you enter in a search term, it will play in succession all the videos it finds that term in.

Now Blinkx is popping that idea out of the browser and putting it in a downloadable screensaver app. Blinkx Beat lets you create your own channels that automatically play when your screensaver pops on (or whenever you want, providing Blinkx Beat is configured as your PC's default screensaver). You can … Read more

Sega raises your heart rate, without games

The Wii Fit may have grabbed all the headlines for combining games and exercise, but it should be noted in fairness that other companies have been working on that mashup as well. Lately their efforts have focused on physical activities for kids, whether on stationary bikes or jet skis, but maybe that's just the beginning.

The latest evidence of the trend comes from Sega Toys, though it hardly looks like something aimed at your average adolescent. The "Body Trainer" sounds a lot like Yamaha's "BodiBeat," which chooses songs that supposedly match your heart rate, … Read more

Where Bakalar isn't just his name...he's actually Back-a-lar

EPISODE 39

Today, we actually get it right! We sucker in Tom Merritt to talk about Amy Winehouse's drunken badness, a guy gets denied an all-star game marriage proposal, unlimited cell phone minutes, and N+, like stick figure lemmings...but for Xbox 360, and Pimp My Ride for Wii. Listen in on the fun!

Listen now: Download today's podcast