have application developers ever looked at screen aspect ratios?

just saw a picture of the new microsoft office 2008 mac version

pretty much looks like the windows version, but what struck me was how much clutter microsoft has added to the menu. now some might say this is a mac issue, but it is the same with the windows version, there are all kinds of menu bars and galleries which are all put there above the actual workspace window. now i have seen this in many other applications, tabs is one such thing, most browser add all kinds of bars above the window (bookmark bar, favorites bar, tabs, address …) i don’t know what kind of hardware these developers are using, but from what i can tell, most screen changes in recent years have increased the width of screens not the hight. all of these new bars and menus just result in a smaller workspace view. so please why not move those bars and menus to the sides? take a look at the omni group’s browser and how they placed the tabs on the side (doens’t only look better, but also frees up vertical space adding more space for page text). the same for word or powerpoint, why not move them all to the right or left and let me have more vertical space (that is usually how text flows — top to bottom). and yes i know there are ways to move those menus to the sides, but that is anything but easy.

apple drops the iphone … and the rest of the mobile industry better put on some warm clothes

after many rumors it is finally here. the iphone. steve jobs introduced it today at the mac world in sf. and i think if i had to summarize this in one sentence … the iphone is really the most amazing phone that has entered the mobile market in at least the last 10 years. there is just nothing that comes close. while it certainly is not on the cheap side i don’t think the price is going to be a major factor in the phone’s success (remember all the people who complained about the initial prices of the ipod? well i guess that didn’t have a big impact on the ipod’s success).

so first of all, the world now finally has a mobile phone that actually has a good user interface. for years people have always pointed to nokia for having such a good user interface, but let’s be honest it is crap. it was only good or considered good because it was compared to user interfaces on phones from motorola, siemens, and samsung. if i want to change the ring tone on my E70 i have to go to profiles, not in settings which i would have expected to find it. but then settings is in a folder called tools, which also includes themes which i would consider a setting … but hey enough of all these old phones.

the design is great, the feature set amazing, and the navigation just out of this world. i can’t wait to have one of those phones in my hands.

but one aspect of the phone that seems to be overlooked a bit here is its impact on mobile internet usage. the iphone is certainly years ahead of the mobile phone competition when it comes to hardware and software. but when you look at the phone and the way it integrates web content it is light years ahead of the competition. to go back to an earlier post of mine about mobile 2.0 … if the mobile industry is still in mobile 1.0 land, apple just passed them and went right to mobile 4.0.

what do i mean with this? well, any current mobile phone has the call, messaging, email … functions and then there is the web function, or also the browser function. but what does that mean? it means i start a web browser (which usually sucks) or i have access to a list of bookmarks that i and add as i browse the mobile internet, then i find a service, then i add a request. yahoo go seems to be addressing some of this by making certain user needs quicker to access.

apple with the iphone though, while still offering a browser (though a much more capable one, plus a bookmark synch with the one device you actually have bookmarks on, your pc) ads widgets, that are quickly accessible and are clearly marked (weather, stocks … amazon search in case you want to add that or reuters news … just go to apple.com and check out all the widgets you can choose from). or maps, not a widget but a central mobile centric service, therefore easily accessible right from the main screen. again, on the nokia e70 there is an office folder, an organizer folder, an installation folder, a media folder … these are all folders … not services. users don’t have that many uses for a mobile device (apple figured that out with the ipod) but those that they need they want to access quickly (palm actually realized that and had initially those quick buttons as part of the navigation). so when you think of the iphone, don’t just think of it as an amazing phone, but as the foundation of the mobile internet. just as the ipod is not that important for being just a nice looking mp3 player, but a device that changed the electronic music distribution system, the iphone is going to be the device that, while beautiful and extremely intelligently put together, is changing the way people use the mobile internet (well actually will get people to use it). and cingular/at&t stock should soar today because they will get users that will actually increase data traffic revenues.

CES? what was that again?

it looks like apple just blew away the “bigger flat panel TV”, “smaller crap phone”, “more mega pixel” show in las vegas, which is also known as ces.

one one hour steve jobs keynote and who cares what is happening at ces?

yahoo seems to get mobile right … and then gets it wrong

so yahoo has launched yahoo go 2.0 (beta). don’t really know what yahoo go 1.0 was or why a 2.0 is a beta (i always thought that full numbers were the finals, well, these days all the beta and 2.0 stuff can drive you nuts). well, i checked out what it had to offer on yahoo’s site (http://mobile.yahoo.com/go) and it looks really promising. easy to use and navigate services. quick links, that lead to a direct service, which then leads to a quick results and answer. exactly what a mobile environment should be.

so i tried to use it and went through the sign-up process which similar to other yahoo mobile services is fairly straight forward, put in your mobile number then wait for SMS and then load mobile site, download, set up … done.

well not this time. first of all, the initial SMS took about half an hour to arrive. then i pressed the link and was told that the beta seat have been taken up but i could have them contact me by SMS when more seats become available. so i thought well, sure, that is good. i pressed yes. and since then i have probably gotten about 20 messages of which none has so far worked, each one leading to the same result “all beta seats are gone right now, but i could certainly have them notify me”.

ok, some might say this is a beta service. but if i create a web site, announce the service on www.yahoo.com and CES, it has to be better than this, i am sorry, this is not some little shop in a garage anymore, this is yahoo. so please yahoo, fix this, quickly

what are you pessimistic about? and why?

ok, so like in previous years edge has posted its year-beginning question “WHAT ARE YOU OPTIMISTIC ABOUT? WHY?” i guess there is something good in this question. but, i think that while thinking about possible optimistic scenarios for the coming year provides insight into potential opportunities, the reverse question should also not be overlooked. while there will certainly be good things ahead of us, there will also be bad things ahead of us, for which it is going to be important to be prepared for.

i guess there is the economy, the housing market, the dollar which are not looking that positive. while i find pat robertson’s prediction that “God told me of ‘mass killing’ in 2007″ and that this will come as part of a possible nuclear attack on the US, fairly unlikely, there is certainly the possibility of a smaller scale terror attack here in the US, and maybe some larger one in europe. although i think that maybe countries like japan and hong-kong might be targeted too as places that represent western capitalism just as much as new york or london. the iraq was is certainly something to be pessimistic about, since no matter what the US will do (get out, or add more troops) will have a positive impact. but i think the part i am most pessimistic about would be the area around pakistan. i think that with the strengthening of the taliban in afghanistan and the border region of pakistan pressure in pakistan will grow to be less aligned to the west, resulting possibly in a complete failure of the afghanistan operations.

well, these are some of my thoughts …

… what are you pessimistic about?

what is wrong with big city, or broadway values?

among all the press coverage about president ford’s funeral today here in DC two things were repeated over and over again. first, the former president’s integrity and his values. but it wasn’t just general values, it were his either small town or main street values.

the new york times writes in Bush and Ex-Presidents Mourn Ford:

Gerald R. Ford was eulogized today as a president and a man who embodied the best of small-town American values and whose decency made him a player on the world stage.

and cnn writes in Washington bids Ford farewell:

Former President Gerald Ford was honored Tuesday as a man who helped restore a nation’s faith while remaining true to himself and his “Main Street values.”"

i have never lived in a small town (and i assume that main street values are also meant to create a small town feel), but i think i do have a decent set of values. what does it mean to have small town values? that i clean the front yard every saturday? do people in small towns have better values than in cities? i find this obsession with values and small town america quite interesting. cities after all are the economic engine of this country, they are the places where new trends, new products are developed, where most of the country’s elite is being educated … what have small towns done? if people have a problem with large cities then they should say so. and if this is all they can say about this former president i think they should do some more research about his brief presidency. i think his focus on re-establishing the presidency is way more important than what ever kind of values he possessed.