The Compact Disk turns 30!

Whether it is for music a DVD or any other product the CD has been a major factor in the lives of many people throughout the world. This product has been around for 30 years, this is truly amazing considering CD's are constantly used in this day and age. When thinking about products that have been around for a while there is always a newer and improved item that comes out and replaces the original. Disruptive Technology has not influenced a change or the decline in a product such as the CD. An example would be CD's themselves, they were a new source of disruptive technology that replaced the cassette tapes. Like most items the CD did not completely overtake the cassette tapes right away, it took some time like most new technology does.

The CD will always be an important part of technological history, just the fact that a product such as the CD could make it in the industry for this long just shows its importance. "The compact disc changed technology, and went on to be used for data and video storage, evolving into re-writeable media and Blu-Ray DVDs." The CD truly opened up the doors for other uses that continue to make it a commonly used product in this current day and age. The CD had several improvements and advantages compared to the products that they replaced. The CD was able to hold more space than the cassette tape. In this current time, digital files are slowly overtaking CD's which is taking away from CD sales. Websites such as Pandora are also taking away from CD sales, Pandora allows listeners to listen to music anywhere they want as well as whatever they want to listen to as well.

I find it incredible that the CD has been around for 30 years, it seems to me as a innovative product that has been around for a while. I do not use CD's really that much at all anymore, if anything I burn music on a CD and throw it in my car just to have something to listen to. But I really am surprised with all the iPods, and other MP3's that are around that CD's are actually frequently used all over.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/28/tech/innovation/compact-disc-turns-30/index.html

You won’t need a driver’s license by 2040

A popular topic to talk about in CIS 600 is disruptive technology, this article talks about a disruptive technology relating to the no longer needing to carry a drivers license. The article talks about the new development of autonomous cars that will be around in the next couple of years. Companies in the auto industry are trying to take steps to get ahead of their competitors by releasing these autonomous cars. “GM's Cadillac division expects to produce partially autonomous cars at a large scale by 2015, and the automaker also predicts it will have fully autonomous cars available by the end of the decade. Audi and BMW have also shown self-driving car concepts, with the former working with Stanford to pilot a modified TT up Pikes Peak.” So this shows already the increase in competition for a product that will not even be around for a couple of years.

The thought of self-driving cars is something we have all thought about as something that would develop in the future. There are studies out there that believe that autonomous cars will be more frequent by the year 2040. “The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) recently released predictions that autonomous cars will account for up to 75 percent of vehicles on the road by the year 2040.” This is something that really surprises me, the year 2040 is not that far away and just visioning self-driving cars is just something that I would not be able to believe it until I see it.

Google is also looking into investing into this industry, they have a license to operate driver less cars in Nevada. This is one step into allowing self-driving cars on the road. They believe that the biggest obstacle is “building the infrastructure.” I would not be surprised if Google released an autonomous car which will lead to their competitors (Apple) to come out with a car that would be truly innovative. We will never truly know what is going to be made of for autonomous cars, we are going to have to wait and see.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/18/tech/innovation/ieee-2040-cars/index.html

World’s hottest smartphones

The world is now fixed on a certain type of device that we use on a daily basis, and they are called smart phones. These days it is hard for a market to decide what kind of smart phone device they want to invest their money in. In this article it provides information regarding which device is most popular. This information is crucial in figuring out who are the major players in a huge market. Apple’s iPhone is an industry leader with all the major developments as well as the large amount of demand people have for their products. This article lists the big players and their current devices as well as products that will be coming out in the near future.

Here is a run down of the other players in order of their popularity. The largest competitor of the iPhone is the Samsung Galaxy S III, it is larger and faster than the iPhone. The next is the HTC One X, this smart phone is the most popular of the Android devices. It is a new and improved device that is gaining in popularity throughout the smart phone market. The next s the Nokia Lumia 920 and 820, this product was once a top product in the industry. Now their products cannot compete with the technologically advanced products such as the iPhone. The Motorola Razr is ranked 5^th, it is a smart phone owned by Google that is cheaper than the competitors, which helps it in the smart phone market.

The point being made here is that these products are all a similar product to the Apple iPhone but all are so behind the ball in the industry that there is no surprise that I cannot identify all of these smart devices. That just shows the power of Apple, its not only the industry leader but it is the smart phone industry.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/10/tech/mobile/smartphone-gallery-text-mobile/index.html

The iPhone 5 Maps app

The iPhone 5 has hit the stores, and the demand for the product is through the roof. Everyone is trying to get his or her hands on this amazing new and improved smartphone. I mentioned before that the improvements to the device will be minimal and not an overwhelming change that will separate this iPhone 5 from the previous iPhones. One of the improvements besides tweaking the Siri system would be adjustment to the Maps app. The size of the phone is another change, the dimensions have decreased which has resulted in several issues as well. One issue is that the new connector will not work with older dock-connectors. The article talks about how the small change of dimensions results in a high price for something that is not very significant.

The maps app is one topic that a lot of people are talking about, the Maps app was originally provided by Google maps. The Google Maps app was very helpful on one that was easy to understand. The author of this article talks about how he was typing in certain locations in the iPhone 5 and they were not coming up in the Maps app. “Finally, there's Maps. I don't mean to pile on, but this replacement for Google Maps is embarrassingly inept. It doesn't list the new Yards Park and 11th Street Bridge in Washington, D.C.. It put the Kennedy Center and Dulles Airport at incorrect addresses; its directions to the latter could get a driver arrested and possibly run over by a 747. And it suggested a route into the District on a bridge that a construction project has temporarily removed.” From reading this article I believe that there are a lot of things that Apple missed the target with, I believe that we will not truly know how great this product is until it is released to the public.

http://money.cnn.com/2012/09/22/technology/iphone-5-review-maps/index.html

All the TV News Since 2009, on One Web Site

This something that I find to be truly innovative and something that could be of the norm in the future. An internet website that has all the news programs of the last 3 years on one search site. "As of Tuesday, the archive’s online collection will include every morsel of news produced in the last three years by 20 different channels, encompassing more than 1,000 news series that have generated more than 350,000 separate programs devoted to news." Being able to go back and reflect on certain story's of the last couple of years and seeing them as it happened would be a key and important learning device for many. I can see this being a new source of disruptive technology in the future. The current way of looking back or looking up certain events would be something that one would go to the library for. Now everyone would have the ability to go to a certain search engine where they could look up all the important information relating to the event. Say a couple of years down the line you need to do a research project on the day we killed Bin Laden, a good source of information would be the news feeds of major channels during that night.

We have video search engines such as Youtube, but I believe in the near future we will have something that will be able to show us videos of major events when we look up a particular topic. In the movie iRobot, Will Smith's character looks up the news feeds of events that were important to him in the movie. The point being made here is that there have been so many news feeds of major events in history, so why not use these news feeds as an educational tool? The fact is that being able to see these events as they happened will be key and important educators down the line. “You could turn all the books in the Library of Congress into a stack of disks that would fit in one shopping cart in Best Buy,” Mr. Kahle said. He estimates that the Internet Archive now contains about 9,000 terabytes of data; by contrast, the digital collection of the Library of Congress is a little more than 300 terabytes, according to an estimate earlier this year." This is a perfect idea for a possible development in technology as well as a form of disruptive technology. 


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/18/business/media/internet-archive-amasses-all-tv-news-since-2009.html?ref=technology

Google buys Nik

Whether its Facebook, twitter, or any other social networking site, this is an up and coming industry that companies want to get their hands on. This industry has been mostly dominated by Facebook who recently took over Instagram. Instagram is a social networking site where you follow people that post pictures. It was a competitor of Facebook, so Facebook being a an industry leader was capable of buying their competitor. The other major player in the industry is Google. Google has had serve issues when it comes to being able to compete with an established player in the industry such as Facebook. As a result of this issue, Google bought a social networking program similar to Instagram called Nik. Google is hoping that the addition of this program that it will help cut the gap between Facebook and Google.

I am not a huge fan of Instagram, but I believe that the addition of the program to Facebook is a key and important move in the social network industry. Google cannot compete with a major player such as Facebook to begin with, but now adding Instagram to the fold will only put them miles ahead of Google. To be honest I could not even tell you what the social networking site is that Google offers, but the one thing that I know for sure is that it cannot be as successful as the program Facebook offers. Nik is another program that I have not heard of, so I do not think that the addition of this program will really affect the industry in a major way.



http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/17/google-buys-nik-to-lure-photographers-to-google-plus/

Despite a Slowdown, Smartphone Advances Are Still Ahead

In recent months the newer and cooler technology stemming from the newest and coolest smartphones have slowed down in recent months. According to an article by the New York Times, advances in smartphones are going to progress. When looking at the current technology there has not been major innovative ideas, mostly improvements to a already created idea. The article points out that when the first Apple iPhone was released to the market, people were stunned that a device you could carry in your pocket could do such a thing. With the recent release of the iPhone 5, the industry has mostly slowed down. There has not been any major leaps or major improvements made to any device. "Faster chips, bigger screens and speedier wireless Internet connections are among the refinements smartphone users can count on year after year in new models, most of them in familiar rectangular packages" (New York Times). Like the article mentioned there has not been any catastrophic differences between models but they have tried to make corrections their products. To me, when the first iPhone came out I was extremely shocked at the device, now I have a small vision or idea of what Apple might do for the next version.

Apple has looked at improving the Siri feature on their iPhone, while Google is looking to find an innovative idea to try to help them compete with Apple. There has been reports out there that they have looked at a method of paying through a smartphone. " As Apple continues to improve Siri, Google, the maker of the Android phone operating system, improves on its voice search products. Google and some of its mobile phone partners have also moved toward replacing the credit card with the smartphone using a technology called near-field communications that lets users make payments wirelessly at cash registers." This "new" technology would really help Google in their efforts to be able to compete with Apple and their products.

The recent slow down in smartphone technology does not mean that the new ideas have stopped, this only means that the development has only slowed down. It will be interesting to see what Apple and the other players in the smartphone industry will release in the future.


 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/17/technology/despite-a-slowdown-smartphone-advances-are-still-ahead.html?ref=technology

More News about new iPhone 5

We are all waiting for the new iPhone 5 to hit the market soon enough, so people are starting to evaluate what improvements are going to be made to the already stellar product that Apple has created. There is news coming out that the iPhone 5 will have improvements to Siri as well as a maps update. Having an iPhone, I would be the first to admit that I really do not use Siri as much as other people. I find it to be more of a challenge, because if it does not process or Siri thinks its something other than what I said than I am going to be directed somewhere that I have no interest in being. The maps part of the iPhone is something I use very frequently. When going to work the first couple of weeks and not knowing where I had to go, the maps app really helped me get to where I needed to go. There is a option where you are walking in the app so it could tell you how much time it will take etc.

"Apple's new Maps application will have a voice navigation feature. It will have real-time traffic data and offer alternative routes as traffic conditions change. It will also include "flyover" three-dimensional images taken by helicopters hired by the company to fly over major cities. Google has been dispatching its own planes to produce similar 3D images." This is something new to the iPhone and is something that I am very interested in experiencing once I get the chance to get the new iPhone. It is really amazing to believe that it will be able to display images to the place that you need to get to. All of the innovative technology advances that Apple continues to create is only going to make an already flawless product better and something that is impossible to compete with. In regards to Siri here are the new developments: "Apple says it is partnering with Yelp Inc. so that Siri can include ratings and prices of restaurants when you ask her about places to eat. The company is also partnering with OpenTable Inc. to make reservations. Siri will now be available in more languages and more countries." So again Siri has improvements that could let it provide additional information when asked. 

Link: 

http://news.yahoo.com/apple-mobile-software-maps-siri-211346359--finance.html

Gaming with Wall projections?

In this recent day and age, gaming is something we all very much enjoy. Whether it is Madden, Call of duty or Halo, we all play some type of game. As the years have gone on, there has been newer and newer devices coming out to the market. When I was younger it was a hard decision to pick between Game Cube or Xbox. The gaming industry is a highly competitive one where everyone is going to try to gain an advantage over the other. The Wii system was innovative because it involved movement by the gamer.

Microsoft is an industry leader in the gaming industry, with the development of Xbox and the Xbox 360. Microsoft has a large number of consumers that are interested in buying their products in both the gaming industry as well as the technological industry. With this in mind Microsoft has recently put a patent on gaming with wall projections. This is an innovative way of playing games and one that has not been thought of before. Since this is an innovative way of playing games, the patent was put in place to keep the competitors away from the idea formed by Microsoft. For a better description of the device, this is a quote from the article below: "Microsoft has been approved for a patent that could take gaming to a whole new dimension, allowing images from the TV to be projected around the room to create a 360-degree virtual display." Again this is an innovative way of playing games, and it is something that many people will be interested in purchasing. This system could be an advanced version of the Xbox Kinect. In this industry it is important to get a step ahead of your competitors so this could be huge for Microsoft down the line.

The question is would you be interested in purchasing a gaming device that involves a wall projection? To answer this question in the easiest way possible, I would say yes. I really enjoy gaming and getting an opportunity to see everything as if it was around me is something that I find to be appealing. The future will tell whether this was a successful idea or one that will crumble. Only thing we can do now is wait and see.  

Verizon launches mobile security app for andriod phones

In recent years there have been many corrupt applications that are put in place to get important information from a specific person. In recent years, Android devices have actually been a platform for these "corrupt" applications. Smartphones are now key locations to store our important information, such as passwords and usernames. I am one of these people for an example, I store several passwords that I have in my iPhone as well as my computer. Hackers see this opportunity to get into the system and try to get important information. Verizon, a key factor in the development and sales of Android devices, decided to take a step and try to eliminate the corrupt applications.

The way they were able to achieve this was to create a application to protect your phone as well as the information that is enclosed in it. I find this to be something that Verizon should have had in place before this current time. Phones are mini computers that store lots of important information for the owners of the devices. Not last summer but the previous two, I got the opportunity to work at a cell phone insurance company called Asurion. Asurion was the leader in their industry, and was the key carrier to all of the major cell service providers. I was asked to look up if there was such a thing as a app that would be able to detect suspicious applications on your Android phone. It was clear that this was not only affecting the carrier (Verizon) but the insurance company who had to provide their customers with devices that could not continue to be used as a result of corrupt applications. So providing customers with an application that could help them avoid issues relating to the phone which would be beneficial to Verizon as well as the cell phone insurance company, is important.

It was cool to see that I was put in position to research something that was shown to be a key issue at the time. And I hope that the information in the deck I provided was helpful in helpful to Asurion.



http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/technology-blog/verizon-launches-mobile-security-app-android-phones-215555320.html

Robots NFL Refs?

A recent development in the sports world is the recent strike by NFL officials, making the NFL use replacement officials to referee very important games. When thinking about the issues relating to this it just brings up a possibly example of disruptive technology that we might experience later on down the line. A position, such as referee, is a position where the human error is a large and crucial factor. There have been several instances each game that shows how many mistakes are made as well as the calls that are missed. People constantly complain about the missed call as a result of the loss on Sunday. My question is: Why deal with the constant factor of the human error in these games? There has to technology out there that will be able to keep track of all the important stats when it comes to the game.

Spotting the ball, a missed penalty call, a bad penalty call, are all examples of things that would be avoided as a result in this new form of disruptive technology. As a big football fan, the biggest thing that bothers me is the fact that other fans pin a loss or the result of the game on these officials. I am guilty myself, with robots as referees everything will accurate since they could look at everything when the six officials can only look at certain spots of the field. This could not only be used in football but in every sport, baseball is another example. All umpires have different strike zones which is not very reasonable in the eyes of some but all the plays at the bases are easily determined if this new disruptive technology ever gets implemented. In recent years in all sports, video reviews are being used more frequently. This is important mostly because they expect the human error, so using the video review could reverse the mistake. When a coach challenges a play and gets the call reversed its another way of saying, "well we messed up sorry." To me its unacceptable to use this system, why constantly deal with the human error when there is an easier replacement. The leagues can avoid these labor issues as well as saving money.

As a big sports fan I would endorse the use of robots as officials mostly because I would know that all the calls on the field would be correct. I do believe over the next couple of years they will expand their use of technology, using video review was just one step. Now I believe for the good of the game the human mistake factor should be taken out and be replaced with something that we know for sure is right every single time. Other fans on would look at it differently and would want that human error mostly because that is the way the game has been played forever. In the end having everything right would only be fair to both teams. So on the eve of the NFL season I believe the addition of this new disruptive technology would be very beneficial to not only football but every sport.

Analyst Predicts 10M iPhone 5 Sales During First Week

What!!! Wow 10M in the first week of sales is something that is quite unbelievable. Apple like I talked about before, is an amazing company that truly is the perfect example of what other companies what to be. But 10M in sales in one week!!? Is that really necessary? Its almost stunning how much money they will make off of this elite product. Being able to get 10M on any product in one week is insane but it is just a walk in the park for Apple. "Analysts have been predicting that the iPhone 5 could be one of Apple's biggest product launches of all time." Seeing that really shows a lot about Apple as a whole. Accomplishing such a feat is something that is quite remarkable and it really shows the rest of the world how a company should run their business.

As an Accountant, I cannot help to think about the amount of revenue Apple will make in the first couple of months off of their new and improved products. The amount might be through the roof but it is still something that is remarkable. Yes costs might be high but the ability to have 10M sales of a product that is known not to be cheap is something only Apple can pull off. Can anyone really think of another store where people camp out to make sure they get the newest and coolest product? Black Friday does not count mostly because its getting amazing top of the line sales. These people are waiting for days just to spend the $500+ to get the item they want. "Each new iPhone model has logged stronger first weekend unit sales than the last. The iPhone 4S, for example, sold more than 4 million units in its first three days on the market, while the iPhone 4 sold 1.7 million, and the iPhone 3GS sold more than one million." This information is amazing, they constantly improve the amount of sales after they release the newest and improved item. Apple should not even advertise or have a marketing department. Everyone knows what they sell and they know people will buy it. 

Apple Strikes Again. 

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2409305,00.asp

iPhone 5

As you probably heard, Apple has come out with the newest and coolest new iPhone that will be the hot product in the next couple of months. Apple can constantly deliver a top of the line product to their consumers, and coming out with a newer version of an already amazing product is not something many other companies can do. A few years ago Blackberry was the hot product, but now these days everyone has an iPhone. Apple's brand is a high quality one so this promotes a version of customer loyalty, where customers become loyal to an elite product such an the iPhone.

When I was first asked if I wanted an iPhone I was hesitant at first because I thought it was a product that was far and beyond something that I wanted. A product that is too complicated is not something I really have a lot of interest in. I decided to get it anyways and I was amazed that a device was capable of doing what my iPhone was doing. My thought is why would you release the same product over and over again with just minor changes? Its mostly because Apple can just do that. Yeah they are that good. We are gonna sell you the same product over and over again with a couple of upgrades. Yes, the difference from the iPhone 1 to 5 is very different but still the overall product remains the same. The question is whether it is worth it for you to go out and buy the newest and coolest product available. If you were to ask me, I would say yes. Apple is a company that I would always buy products from mostly because their products are the best. Like I said before the constant reselling of a similar but small difference in versions will result in such a large demand. The differences are things that are material, there are things we will notice and enjoy. This is why a customer like myself will go out and buy the iPhone 5 just simply because of the joy of seeing the newest product. I am caught in the Apple "Twilight Zone," truth is, lots of people are.