fm984.net

The app is the creation of AJNAG.com, which describes itself as a “cannabis lifestyle network.”

According to Cannabisapps.com, AJNAG.com “will donate 50 cents for every ‘Cannabis’ purchase to a cannabis nonprofit reform fund, which will be set up once the application reaches 1,000 subscriptions.”

If your medical condition is deemed to be sufficiently pressing, the app then directs you to the nearest medical-marijuana facilities. Yes, it offers precise directions, just in case you aren’t feeling at your most alert.

(Credit: CC R0bz/Flickr)

It even offers you the finest and most responsible locations of marijuana coffee shops in, say, Amsterdam, should you happen to have wandered to those parts.

Meanwhile, as if anticipating an uptick in demand, the folks at Apple have approved a new
iPhone and
iPod Touch app that will allow a little more mobile access to the soothing properties of marijuana.

Should you find yourself in some untoward legal kerfuffle in relation to your marijuana use, a quick sideways glance at the Cannabis app will find you the location of the nearest and finest lawyer who specializes in marijuana-related cases.

There is something to be enjoyed in the language the organization uses: “Our goal is to put the power of cannabis change in your pocket while you enjoy the most sticky and potent iPhone application available!”

Called “Cannabis” it is, according to Salem-News.com, an app that allows you to hold between your fingertips everything you need to facilitate your marijuana experience.

The Cannabis app’s first step, therefore, is helping you find a doctor who can approve your deep medicinal need.

Your legal marijuana experience, that is.

Some states–California being in the surprising vanguard–have made the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes legal.

However, it doesn’t stop there.

States that are low on funds are steadily inhaling the idea of taxing the sale of a substance that gets you high.

Sticky and potent. Yes, exactly the words to describe the finest iPhone apps.

Rupert Murdoch, media baron

In late 2007, well before the market collapse last fall, Murdoch had said pretty much the exact opposite, claiming that a free and ad-supported model would be more beneficial than a subscription model for The Wall Street Journal.

Robert Iger, the CEO of new Hulu partner Disney, said at a conference last month that he does not believe Web content needs to be offered for free, and that consumers will be willing to pay for it.

The Financial Times reported the news Thursday, adding that Murdoch had spotted “some good signs of life” in the battered advertising sector.

It’s a goal that some in the digital-media space will bill as ludicrous–and some as inevitable.

(Credit:
Dan Farber/CBS Interactive)

He’s already got most of The Wall Street Journal, which News Corp. acquired two years ago, behind a pay wall. But he also owns the rest of Dow Jones & Company, the Fox television and film empire, the New York Post, and the U.K.’s The Times. News Corp. is also a partner in Hulu, the joint video venture that offers a big chunk of Fox television content (as well as NBC and ABC) for free on the Web.

Presumably the new paid-content strategy wouldn’t apply to News Corp.’s digital-only assets, like social network MySpace.

In a move that makes him seem a bit like Dr. Evil wanting to be paid one hundred billion dollars for Austin Powers’ ransom, News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch has said that he will charge for all the online content associated with the newspapers and television stations he owns.

“We intend to charge for all our news Web sites,” Murdoch said, according to the Financial Times. “If we’re successful, we’ll be followed by all media.”

(Credit:
Microsoft)

Another group–large businesses with volume license deals for Windows–will get access to the code on Friday, while other large businesses will be able to get the software starting September 1.

Consumers and small businesses, meanwhile, will have to wait until the product’s official launch on October 22, when the product will start shipping on new computers and hit retail shelves.

The wait for Windows 7 will soon be over–at least for those in Microsoft’s MSDN and TechNet developer programs. Members of those two groups will have access to the new operating system starting on Thursday.

Another date worth pointing out is August 20–the last day to download the free “release candidate” version of Windows 7. Although it won’t last forever, it’s a good way for those with some technical know-how to try out Windows 7 for free.

Microsoft finalized the code for
Windows 7 late last month. CNET colleague Seth Rosenblatt’s official review of the operating system can be found here, and I’ve embedded his video review below.

Maybe if I didn’t have to use Windows I wouldn’t have to bother with all this security stuff—maybe. But I do have to use Windows, and I do have to use the Internet, so taking precautions is just part of the workday. Fortunately, if you do it right, it doesn’t have to be a big part of it.

More disappointing was that the PC Flank scanning service I described appears to have gone belly up last month. When I returned to the site, Norton Safe Search identified it as dangerous. According to discussions on various forums, such as one on DSLReports.com, PC Flank went dark sometime this summer.

Some longtime PC users have never bothered with antivirus software, see no need for such programs, and have never encountered a virus. Some of these people even use Windows.

One of the “Five simple PC security tips” I wrote about last June was to use antivirus software. The two freebies I cited in that post are Avast Home Edition and Avira AntiVir.

The cold, hard reality of the computer world dictates that most of us require multiple layers of protection from malware. Last week, I described how I removed dozens of Trojans and viruses from the family PC. The free program I used, Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware, is intended to be used in conjunction with a real-time antivirus program. Based on several comments, this point wasn’t clear in the original post.

Still, nearly every major antivirus vendor offers a free online malware scan. It’s best to stick with well-known brands in this regard because the scanner will access many sensitive areas of your PC. Some such scans are more intrusive than others, and most will detect but not necessarily remove malware.

Another commenter suggested I write about online virus-scan services. I did that very thing back in May 2008 in “Your one-stop shop for online virus scans.” I was glad to see that most of the services I linked to in that post are still available and still free. Unfortunately, you now have to register to view the results of Virus Bulletin’s most recent tests of antivirus apps.

The app can, however, use 3G and EDGE data connections for non-call-related activities such as signing in and sending Skype instant messages. There are also competitive rates for calling out to a landline or mobile phone. Call forwarding has been implemented, as has Skype Voicemail and Skype-generated texting.

Related story: Sold! eBay jettisons Skype in $2 billion deal

Skype for iPhone handles the basics of its desktop PC-to-PC and PC-to landline calling service. It offers free calls between Skype users over a Wi-Fi connection; Apple won’t allow 3G-based data calls.

(Credit:
Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)

Besides English, Skype is also available in Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Swedish, and Traditional Chinese.

Good news for Canadian
iPhone owners. On Wednesday, Skype for iPhone finally crossed the border into Canada, where it is now available for download from the App Store. The well-known voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP, app first became available for the Apple smartphone about five months ago, on March 29.

Semiconductor manufacturer Silicon Storage Technology was among the first company to provide bromine-free chips to companies like Apple.

With its resignation, Apple becomes the fourth company to leave the Chamber of Commerce in the last several weeks, according to the Washington Post. The others–Pacific Gas and Electric, PNM Resources, and Exelon–have all been power companies.

While Apple was the only computer manufacturer to make the list, the report praised six other companies for their environmental efforts, too.

“Apple supports regulating greenhouse gas emissions, and it is frustrating to find the chamber at odds with us in this effort,” Catherine Novelli, Apple vice president of worldwide government affairs, wrote to in a letter to chamber President Thomas Donohue.

With its products 99.9 percent free of brominated flame retardants (BFRs), Sony Ericsson will have no PVC components in its products by the end of 2009, according to the report. ChemSec and Clean Production Action praised the company for “not only removing substances of concern from their products but also taking on the complicated task of establishing full chemical inventories for all their product lines.”

Apple’s environmental Web site is broken down into several categories, including Life Cycle Impact, Product Usage Impact, and Product Environmental Reports. There is also a section for Apple to post its own updates.

Apple on Monday resigned its membership to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in protest over the organization’s environmental policy, according to a report on the San Francisco Chronicle.

Apple won praise for its latest efforts to rid its products of harmful chemicals in a new report released Tuesday from environmental organizations ChemSec and Clean Production Action.

“Apple established an innovative program that restricts the use of nearly all bromine and chlorine compounds across all their product lines,” the report says of Apple. “As such, Apple now offers a wide range of PVC and BFR free consumer products including iPhones and iPods, as well as computers that are free of BFRs and most uses of PVC.”

Hard drive manufacturer, Seagate, eliminated chlorine- and bromine-based chemistries from its disk drives, and Netherlands-based DSM Engineering Plastics is one of the first to offer engineering plastics that are free of bromine and chlorine.

Nan Ya and Indium were added to the list for their efforts to produce bromine- and chlorine-free components for printed circuit boards, while maintaining the reliability of the products.

While Greenpeace downplayed Apple’s environmental advances in its latest report, ChemSec and Clean Production Action’s report, “Greening Consumer Electronics: Moving Away from Bromine and Chlorine,” highlights Apple’s efforts as one of seven companies who have come up with solutions negating the use of harmful chemicals. Apple was the only computer maker to make the list.

Apple recently unveiled a major overhaul of its environmental Web site, allowing users to see exactly what it is doing to help the environment. Not only does it show the individual products, Apple calculates the impact of its products from mining the materials and use to recycling.

(Credit: Sega Genesis 1 w/Sega CD 1-Wikipedia, Sega Genesis 2 w/Sega CD 2-Wikipedia, Sega CDX-Wikipedia, Sega Nomad-Wikipedia)

So is it normal to release a heavily revised version of a gaming system within three years of the initial release? It depends on who you are. Let’s take a look at some notable shrinkage from the last three generations of consoles. I think that you’ll notice a trend.

Sega Genesis/Sega CD
Released: Genesis-August 14, 1989; Sega CD-October 15, 1992 (North America)

Lessons learned

PlayStation 1
Released: September 9, 1995 (North America)

With a smaller version of the Genesis out, Sega had to create a smaller version of its CD-ROM peripheral, the Sega CD to match it. Thus, the Sega CD-2 was born. Instead of sitting underneath the Genesis, it plugged in to the right of it. It was also able to work with the first generation of Genesis hardware via an extender plate.

As for Sega’s own hardware, the first and only major change for the 16-bit Genesis was to shrink in size. In 1994, roughly five years after its launch, Sega released a square version of the console which did away with the headphone jack and volume control slider on the front of the unit.

Super Nintendo
Released: August 1991 (North America)

Interestingly enough, the CDX was not the end of the line for the miniaturization of the Genesis. In late 1995 Sega released the Nomad, which was a handheld version of the Genesis. It played regular-sized Genesis cartridges and had a 3.25-inch color LCD and button controls that mimicked the Genesis controller. It could also be connected to a TV, so that players could play their games on a normal-sized screen.

Sony’s first major revision was actually its ninth. Sony frequently changed internal components as circuit boards were streamlined, and parts were moved around to deter people from modifying the hardware. The revision, which came less than three years after the launch, added an infrared port to the front of the device, which would allow users to control the built-in DVD player without an IR dongle. It also ran quieter than older versions, which was Sony’s nod to the fact that many were using the system primarily as a DVD player.

(Left) The original PlayStation 2 design next to (Right) the Slimline model.

In 1994 Sega released the CDX, which was a combination of the Genesis and the Sega CD in one piece of hardware. It fizzled with a high price tag ($400) and the impending release of Sony’s PlayStation, along with the imminent release of Sega’s 32-bit console–the Saturn–and incompatibilities with Sega’s third system add-on, the 32X.

Note: We’re not including handheld consoles in this story, but parallels can be made between revisions to Nintendo’s Game Boy and DS products, as well as Sony’s PSP.

In 2004, Sony released the Slimline version of the PS2, which moved the power supply outside of the machine, which shrank the size of the device down considerably. It also did away with the tray-loading disc mechanism, and had users place discs inside the device using a flip-up panel. Other changes included the addition of the once-optional (and not free) network adapter inside of the machine so that users could connect their machine to play online matches.

(Credit: Super Nintendo 1-Wikipedia, Super Nintendo Jr-Wikipedia)

(Credit:
Sony / CNET)

(Credit:
Sarah Tew/CNET)

Sony PlayStation 2 (PS2)
Released: October 26, 2000 (North America)

(Credit:
Sony / CNET)

This generation of game console warfare is also much fiercer for Sony. It has had to defend its once-dominant spot against Microsoft’s Xbox 360, which had a one-year lead to market, and Nintendo’s family-friendly (and once $250 cheaper) Wii. The new $299 price tag for the PS3 Slim is proof enough of that.

Three generations ago:

Three years after that, Sony began shipping a version of the Slimline that was a third lighter, followed closely by a version that brought the power supply back into the unit, and did away with the external power brick entirely.

The
PlayStation 3 was physically the largest of the three current-generation home consoles, followed by Microsoft’s
Xbox 360 and Nintendo’s
Wii. With never-ending lust by consumers for smaller gadgets, the current configuration was just not cutting it.

Does that mean it’ll creep even lower, into two-year or even yearly cycles between major revisions? Quite possibly, yes. It’s worked very well with handheld gaming devices, and even some consumer electronics devices like iPods. Apple has turned out slimmer, more powerful versions of the iPod every year since 2001, and yearly events like E3 put continued pressure on console makers to show off something big.

The closest either Nintendo or Microsoft has come to a redesign since is Microsoft, which began including an HDMI port and increasing the included storage, alongside a major revision to the system software which allowed games to be played off the hard drive.

(Left) The original PlayStation next to (Right) the PSOne.

What’s surprising about the Slim, though, is that Sony was the second-most recent of the three companies to have released its console, yet it’s the first to offer a completely new form factor. Microsoft was the first out of the gate with a North America release of the Xbox 360 in late November 2005. Sony and Nintendo followed suit with the PlayStation 3 and Wii, respectively, which were released a week apart from each other in mid-November 2006.

Out of all the console makers, Sony is the only one to completely revise its hardware every few years. What’s interesting is that those revisions are coming closer together. In the case of the PlayStation (versions one through three), the time between initial launch and major revision has gone from five years down to just three:

In the case of the PS3 Slim though, it could just be that the PS3 had to be pushed out to meet its launch window, and that the Slim is what Sony was going for in the first place. Advances in the PlayStation 3’s core technology, like the cell processor, also underwent changes since the console launched, including changes to fabrication that have taken the chip down from 90 nanometers to 65, then 45–the size that can be found inside the Slim. These changes meant less power consumption, smaller components, and easier cooling.

While most of the changes were internal parts, its biggest external change was the release of the PSOne in July 2000. This was a much smaller iteration of the hardware and had all new system software and a circuit board that featured smaller chips.

In the case of the PS3 Slim, it’s actually the fourth generation of the device. During that three-year period, things like the included storage space jumped from 20GB to 120GB. And a recently unearthed patent at the FCC filing shows that a 250GB model is just around the corner.

Just last week Microsoft released a new version of its Xbox 360 system software that added even more features. And at E3 the company announced and demonstrated Natal, a motion-capturing camera that tracks player movement and tacks it onto games. Shortly after that, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer supposedly told an audience that the camera would be built into a new version of the hardware shipping in 2010; a rumor which was squashed by Microsoft days later.

Two generations ago:

To fight some of the attention that had been taken away by Sony’s PlayStation, in late 1997 Nintendo released a smaller, simpler, and less-expensive version of the Super Nintendo. It did away with the ejector button for cartridges, and simply let gamers pull them out with their hands. It also featured a slightly different version of the A/V port in the back that was unable to run S-Video or RGB signals. At $100 it also cost close to what a single game did at the height of the system’s popularity.

Just don’t expect it to get any smaller…at least until next year.

The original PlayStation had the most hardware revisions of any home gaming console due mostly to the fact that it was produced for 11 years and sold more than 100 million units.

Sega’s console combination underwent several distinct revisions over the course of its existence, all of which brought smaller sizes. It’s also worth nothing that Sega was not the sole creator of some of its systems, since it allowed licensing to third parties that could build its technology into other pieces of hardware. (For the sake of simplicity we’re not including those.)

Last generation:

As for Nintendo, new hardware is less of a reality than a good old-fashioned price cut. For $50 more, Sony is now offering a game system that out-matches it on graphical prowess, and doubles as a spiffy Blu-ray player. For new gamers that’s a hard sell–especially when new games that are coming out require extra hardware. Nintendo’s sales are also slumping. Recent numbers from the NPD Group show that in July the console sold less than half the units that it did the year before, and with the holiday sales season right around the corner, a price cut is very possible.

Previous generations

The same goes for the blue-violet laser that reads game and Blu-ray movie discs. When the PS3 was first released, it was one of the few players to feature the technology. It was also the cheapest. Blu-ray players have since dropped in price dramatically, and can now be had for under $100.

Sony’s announcement of the PlayStation 3 Slim on Tuesday was no surprise for most gamers and industry experts. Parts that once cost a small fortune, such as hard drives, processors, and special disc-reading lenses, continue to fall in price and take up less space. It’s only natural the machines that use them would shrink as well.

The PS2 was the only console from the last generation to undergo a major facelift. Neither Microsoft’s original Xbox nor Nintendo’s GameCube underwent any physical changes.

So will Nintendo and Microsoft follow suit with new hardware this year? Not likely.

One message spotted by The Seattle P-I from Microsoft employee Luis Bitencourt-Emilio says “Bing 2.0’s upcoming search visualization is pretty sexy…” It’s not clear whether Microsoft is actually thinking of these changes as a version-style upgrade or a series of gradual tweaks, which seems more common in this market.

Mary-Jo Foley at our sister site ZDNet spotted a few eager Twitter users spilling the beans on Bing 2.0 following Microsoft’s annual company meeting, where employees were apparently given a preview of some new features that will be rolled out over the coming weeks. Some attendees had the changes coming next week, while others thought it would be more of a gradual rollout, but expect changes to Bing shortly.

Microsoft had no official comment on the potential changes, according to ZDNet, other than saying “We’re very excited about some of the new Bing features set to roll out over the next few months, but have nothing to announce today.”

What might be coming? One attendee said “imagine seeing maps plus pics from the neighborhood of a restaurant to try.” That tweet has since been deleted. Another said “bing + silverlight in maps = amazing !! goodbye google.” In what is likely not a coincidence, that tweet has also been deleted.

Microsoft is getting ready to launch the next iteration of Bing, according to some wayward tweets.

In the last three years, September has become a busy time for Web start-ups and other new companies looking to make their mark. Warring start-up conferences TechCrunch50 and DemoFall take place within mere days of one another, leaving a wake of more than 100 companies that are launched within just a week’s time, all vying for media and consumer attention.

Not surprisingly, TechCrunch50 had a better showing of consumer-oriented products and services. That’s to be expected though. The show is pitched at this audience and as a place for companies to pitch new software and services. Very little hardware is chosen to present–and what is has historically been for consumers. Demo on the other hand had more than a third of the companies aiming their products at businesses, or business users.

What’s often more impressive is how quickly some of these companies that aren’t live, go on to sort things out and open up. Although last year that wasn’t necessarily the case. Just seven months after the conferences many of the companies that were not yet live or open were still shut (including a few that shut themselves down). Will it be the same with this year’s crop? Check back here in six months.

Worth noting is that there are a few sites that are on the verge of being open but that were not ready to go in time of this article going live:

We’ve also sorted out which ones are aimed at business users versus consumer use. All of this information can be found in a spreadsheet embedded at the end of this post. But before we get there, let’s take a look at the makeup of launches that were open versus closed:

This year, there were slightly less products launching at Demo, although that’s not including the 14 “alpha pitch” companies, which are neither part of the main program, or by definition supposed to be live at the time of presenting. That said, there was a higher percentage of companies that were live and ready to go in the days following the show than the year prior, which came in at 75 percent compared with last year’s 67 percent.

This scramble to get things ready often leaves companies not ready for the users they hope will flock to use their product. So, as a service to you, we’ve gone through and sorted out which of the products you can use right now. These are sites with open registration, and no special beta or invite requirements.

• HealthyWage, a company that launched at TechCrunch50 will be opening up to beta users on Monday.
• Spawn Labs, the video game place-shifting service that demoed at TechCrunch50 will be available in November. We played with a demo unit at the show and everything worked great. The company is just working on production ramp-up to get it ready for the holiday season.
• Twirl TV, a DemoFall launch is currently open, but will close after the first 10,000 users sign-up. We marked it in this list as open, since we were able to register.
• Weels’ site said it would launch on Thursday, however it was having problems with Amazon’s EC2 service, and was expected to launch later in the evening.

Note: We considered sites that were listed as having “private” or “invite only” betas as closed. This is because there is no guarantee that you could get immediate access once you signed up to use them. For physical products, we counted whether or not you could purchase or download them. All data was gathered Thursday.

Tech trade shows are never likely to have a 100 percent live at launch factor, nor should they. Many of the companies that made their debut at these shows are coming out of stealth mode and have worked very carefully to keep information about their service secret, both for a competitive advantage and to iron out last-minute kinks. Others have services that just plain aren’t ready for big audiences and need a small and eager test group to help see if their creation scales.

Previously:

Post-launch frenzy: What can you actually use? (from 2008’s show)
TC50/Demo revisited: What’s alive, what’s dead? (seven months later)

TechCrunch50, on the other hand, stayed around the same as the year before. Last year’s show had just 42 percent of the 52 launching companies open for public use, compared with this year’s 48 percent.

Also of interest, and something we didn’t do when comparing open and closed companies for last year’s shows, is the make-up of products that launched at the show. Were they for consumers or businesses?

Last year it was even worse, as both conferences happened at the exact same time.

How important is being open?

Consumer vs. Business

In the meantime, check out another party video where your grandparents and their friends drink lemonade and edit photos. Seriously.

Right now, the Windows brand doesn’t have a huge amount of momentum behind it, even if Microsoft itself and Bing do. Getting momentum behind Windows 7, regardless of the methodology should be Microsoft’s main goal right now. And the company is pulling out all the stops, from commercials to launch parties to getting the OS out into the channel sooner than retail, it is trying to gain back the lost mind-share.

Microsoft’s launch party videos have proven to be entertaining to viewers even if not for the reasons for the marketing department had hoped for. There were a great many comments on my post that provided context to their release, but generally speaking most industry-watchers have been confused as to the goals behind the program, questioning the target audience not just for the videos, but for the launch parties as well.

But the target customer for Windows 7 may actually like the experience of a launch party simply because it humanizes the operating system and allows them to ask silly questions like how to burn a CD. These were not made for sophisticated tech buyers and that may not be a bad thing.

One of the biggest issues Windows Vista faced was consumer confusion as to why they should buy an upgrade at all. Microsoft did a very poor job of communicating why anyone should care and added such a complicated set of offerings that people simply couldn’t figure out what to buy. (Note that
Windows 7 also has a very complicated pricing scheme.)

The challenge is that companies like Apple, with a significantly smaller share of the operating system market, have developed such sophisticated and stylized marketing, that Microsoft has a very hard time competing with the overall effect. So, Microsoft has instead gone after the mythical “every-man” (or every-man, woman and racial/gender/ethnically diverse party in the world), which falls way short for we Valley media types that will mock anything and everything.

I personally found the most recent video weird, but after thinking through things a bit I think this is a case of a good idea hampered by poor execution. The videos are well-done and professional and try to connect with consumers in a humanistic tone. The fact that it feels like you stumbled into a shiny-happy Windows world filled with sit-com throwaways is the problem. Even if this is a training video to show others how to throw a launch party, it’s hard to connect with the vapid characterizations of party guests.

This is the crux of Microsoft’s marketing problems. It’s not that they aren’t good at technical marketing issues, it’s that the brand itself is so voluminous, it’s very hard for people to connect to specific products like Windows. And the efforts to persuade consumers isolate the tech media and confuse IT shops.

I reached out to Microsoft for comment but they withheld at this time as the videos are apparently just one step in a much larger integrated marketing campaign.

The point is that PC manufacturers need people to buy more computers and really only Microsoft can make that happen until vendors (and consumers) embrace Linux or switch to Macs.