Josh Bancroft’s TinyScreenfuls.com

I have some really exciting news about my job, but I’m going to hold off a bit before sharing all the details (ooh - suspense! ;-). It affects this blog, in a good way, and I’m really excited about it.

2007 is going to be a really awesome year. Stay tuned!

We’re having the first (and likely only) snow of the year in the Portland area - already a few inches of accumulation, though it’s tapering off, and not expected to last. It will likely be melted by tomorrow.

Those of you reading this from cooler climes will wonder why this is blog-worthy, or even news worthy, but it is, and it will be the only thing the local media (Winter Storm 2007!!!11!) will be able to talk about for the next 24 hours. You see, Portland’s climate is such that snow is rare, so when it does come, it wreaks more havoc than you’d expect. Pretty much ALL of the public schools are closed today (Beaverton was a hold out until the last minute, though!), public transportation is messed up (all the buses are chained and running late, the trains are messed up, too), many businesses are closed, and non-essential things are more or less shut down all over.

Since it snows so infrequently, there are hardly any snow plows or sanders to clear the road. On my way in to Intel this morning, about an 8 mile drive on a mix of residential and highway, I didn’t encounter any attempt at clearing the road until I pulled into the Jones Farm campus parking lot (they have a front loader driving around, attempting to clear the snow, decaptiating several speedbumps, etc.). So while “it’s only a couple inches of snow”, it’s basically going to stay there, and get packed down and icy, until it melts.

The other thing that makes it scary for me to drive in the snow in Portland is the fact that many other drivers aren’t used to the snow, and they don’t know how to drive safely in it (GO VERY SLOW). I maintained a speed of about 20mph on most roads this morning, and there were more than a few people that passed me, and I cringe to think what happened the next time they tried to stop or make a turn. Which leads me to my next observation…

In my 8 miles or so, I had to pull over 5 or 6 times to let emergency vehicles pass (ambulances and fire trucks). Emergency crews are going to be busy today - hope they stay safe, and available to help those in trouble. Doesn’t it irritate you when people don’t pull over for emergency vehicles, especially on a day like today, when you know they ambulance or fire truck is going to have an even harder time getting around than you are in your little pickup or SUV?

Anyway, I’m at work now. It’s quiet around here. Lots of people working from home. Now to take advantage, and dive into the pile of things I’m going to try to get done today. Hope you’re warm and safe wherever you are!

Cringely has an article up about the iPhone (who doesn’t this week?), with what may be the first logical, convincing guess as to what Apple’s reason might be for not including 3G data capability (like speedy HSDPA) in the iPhone, instead shackling us with pokey slow EDGE:

Apple wants the iPhone to get its content primarily through iTunes, ideally by syncing with a Mac  or Windows PC. Apple doesn’t like Cingular Video and doesn’t want its customers to know it exists, much less use it. But it would be very hard to introduce a true 3G iPhone, have Cingular promote it strongly, only to say that it can’t be used to view the mobile carrier’s own video content. So instead Apple falls back to the slower EDGE network, which can support email and widgets and surfing, but which also forces iPhone users to get most of their higher-resolution video through iTunes, where Apple makes money and Cingular doesn’t. (emphasis mine)

This argument makes sense, especially if you consider that Apple is a corporation, out to make money (and, as Cringely notes, not just play in the cell phone market, but dominate it). That doesn’t mean I like it, though, and I still maintain that it would be monumentally stupid of Apple to release such an advanced “Internet Communicator” without support for the fast (and backwards compatible) network that Cingular actually has in place. Bottom line is, I don’t know if I can bear to go back to the slow barren wasteland that is EDGE after living in the land of speedy EVDO milk and honey.

The rest of Cringely’s piece is a good read - go check it out.

And I promise that at some point soon, I’ll stop blogging constantly about the iPhone. I just need to find something else that makes my geek parts feel all warm and tingly.

CBS News scored a few minutes one on one with Apple’s Phil Schiller, in which he demonstrates the iPhone in person:

Thanks to Jason for pointing me to the video on YouTube this morning. You should definitely watch if you’re interested in the iPhone - and who isn’t
My wife has admitted that she wants one, so we’ll probably get two of them when they come out in June. She actually called it “sexy” when I showed her the photos on the Apple site, which is a big thing for her. She couldn’t care less about gadgets, but is into design big time (that’s what her degree is in). I can’t wait to show her this video, and see what she has to say.

I just had a thought about why the new touch screen interface on the iPhone is so enticing, alluring, appealing: it’s just like the flat, glassy, magical computer interfaces from the 24th century in Star Trek: The Next Generation (and subsequent Treks set in the same time period).

No wonder everyone is so blown away by the idea of interacting with a (pocket) computer that way. It’s familiar, yet brand new.