Gordon Moore's apple

The Apple Tree, by Klimt
Used with permission, CC: www.awesome-art.biz

Gordon Moore is in the news again today, this time for his philanthropy.

You know Gordon Moore. He's the founder of Intel Corp. And he's also the famous 1965 oracle of the self-fulfilling prophecy that computing capability will "double every two years until at least 1975."

That famous prediction came to be known as "Moore's Law." Debate continues as to whether he was a visionary who foresaw the future, or merely a legendary leader whose authority is so compelling that scientists feel obligated not to prove him wrong.

In any case, he's important.

I have a personal connection with Gordon Moore. Granted, he doesn't know it, but today's as good a day as any for me to celebrate it.

On October 11, 2006 (a short time after Apple announced it was switching to Intel processors), my younger sister arrived at my house for dinner. With her, she had a bag of fresh apples.


Me eating a new Intel core. Well, sorta.
October 11, 2006.

I bit into one. It was the crispest, juiciest, most flavorful apple I'd ever tasted, clearly the work of a master grower. I thought all the best apples came from Washington, China, and Iran.

I asked her where it was from, and she told me that a friend of hers works for a non-profit environmental preservation organization. Invited for an afternoon to a major benefactor's home, her group was welcomed to pick some apples to take back with them.

My sister added that his name was "Something-or-other Moore."

"GORDON Moore?" I asked.

"Yeah, that was it."

I predict that every two years I will be twice as amazed as I was in 2006 that I ate fresh apples from Gordon Moore's yard.

If everything you try succeeds,
then you are not trying hard enough.
Gordon Moore

Read: Top 10 Billionaires Saving the Planet

Question: What indirect brushes with fame have you had?

DragonDictate frees your hands to drive while you write

DragonDictate is my new best friend. All I do is talk, and it types for me. As a blogger, I'm always looking for new ways to blog effectively. I'm using this application in hands free mode, and making a post as I drive.

I'm not sure how we ever blogged without it. What could be easier? Sure I may sound like an idiot talking stilted to my iPhone. But I'm alone, and it gets the point across, and you get to read the post.

DragonDictate is a free application available from Apple's app store. You can download it and be up and running in a few seconds.

I'm using my Apple earbuds. That seems to give me the best quality, easily eliminating the background noise of driving, and effectively identifying my words.

With only a few small edits this entire post was constructed in DragonDictate.

You'll need a network connection while using DragonDictate. It sends the recorded file out for analysis, freeing up your phone's processor for other tasks. It has the result back typically in a few seconds. I found it occasionally timed out in weak network areas, unfortunately losing whatever I'd just spoken. I'm otherwise astounded by how accurate it is (most of the time).

When you try it out, keep in mind that you can say things like:

• comma


• period


• new paragraph


• exclamation point


• question mark

Questions: Are you already using Dragon Dictate on your mobile device? What do you think of it? How can Dragon Dictate help you?

Read another review from phonedog.com here.

It is not necessary to sin

Practically perfect in every way
Image used with permission, CC frangipani photograph

I have another guestpost out today. It's here on Jason Stasyszen's blog.

It follows some others that I've written.

Today's is about sin. If you're not of a theist or spiritual sort of ilk, feel free to call that "making mistakes." The idea still applies.

The question on the table is simple: is it inherently necessary that we sin? The short answer is no. There may have been some point at which the identity of every human was "sinner" by requirement, but this time, if it ever existed, has passed. We are empowered not to sin. The identity may still be there. The requirement is not.

Here's the gist:

• We make mistakes because we make the wrong decisions before we act.



• We wouldn't have made the mistakes if we'd made the right decision.



• We're allowed to make right decisions.



• We have an example of a human being who always made the right decisions (as well as many others who learned to, to varying degrees). We can follow these examples and take them as role models.



• We don't have to make wrong decisions.

In short, it's our responsibility to make right decisions, and to accept the consequence for wrong ones. It's a convenient (and wrong) cop-out to blame our failures on the weaknesses of humanity. It's an individual issue, not a corporate issue.

The good news: Humans can improve. Whether this is with outside intervention or of our own initiative is an issue for moral and social philosophies to debate.

Happy World Humanist Day.

Read Becoming Who You Are
on Jason Stasyszen's blog.

Human-computer interfaces ready for next level

Used with permission, CC Hongchang Lin

I repackage knowledge to adjust the way people interact with their environment and perform their tasks. That's what Instructional Designers do. It's my job to change the way you do your work. I'm supposed to help you improve.

So, who helps me?

Inventors like John Underkoffler dream how we should be gathering and organizing knowledge in the first place. Easily. Seamlessly. Immediately.

This video represents the next fundamental leap in how people like me will be able to perform our craft. And that, obviously, means that the next small baby step about three minutes after that is to show all of the rest of you how to do it, too.



In five years, this is how we will browse the web, sort thru email (tossing junk mail right into the recycle bin just like we did twenty years ago!), program our DVRs, choose books and music to put on our iPad, pass a document to a colleague, Google what to use in place of the buttermilk when the sauce is already cooking, make reservations for Friday's date (and perhaps even start the date if we're running late at the office), check on the status of our car repair with the mechanic, and schedule the lights, sprinklers, appliances, and heating/air-conditioning that we forgot to turn off before we left for northern Kamchatka a couple hours ago.

Any of you who've ever used Cover Flow in Apple's iTunes, Safari, or Finder probably saw this coming. The mouse could have died with the 20th century. I want this interface today. I want it for PowerPoint, Google Calendar, and iPhoto. I would use it now. Generously.

Question:

What would you use it for?

How to see if you can get your iPhone upgraded

So you broke out in a sweat a few minutes ago when Steve Jobs announced the features of the iPhone 4, right?

Sure you did. If you didn't, you weren't paying attention and you need to go back and think about it again. Go do it. Hurry back.

So NOW that you broke out in a sweat, you want to know the status of your AT&T contract to see if you can upgrade yet, right?

Yeah. Oh yeah, you do.

Turns out it's real easy.

1. Go to your phone app and dial *639#.
   
   



2. You'll immediately get a pleasant message on your screen.
   
   



3. And it doesn't take too long for them to respond.
   
   (Actually, if you pay close attention, notice that the text message arrived before they told me they were sending me a text message. Yeah, lame, but polite.)
   
   



4. Not sure what the $18 upgrade fee covers, but there I am. I'll do that for $18!
   
   

See also Why AT&T getting rid of the unlimited data plan is good news for you.

Top posts

This blog just passed its half birthday. Thank you for your readership.

Whether faithful or new, I welcome you. As a guide to some things you might enjoy, here are the top ten posts from May:

10. Six things to do while you're unemployed

9. Your brand needs to be simple, or, how Dyson sucked me in

8. Lazy wind

7. How babies learn: implications for how we tell our story

6. Lisa Telford: A eulogy

5. Be totally sure that you're not sure if you're sure

4. Five great YouTube distractions

3. Seven reasons why you (yes, YOU!) should have a blog

2. How social media changed the world

1. How Steve Jobs and Apple keep me coming back for more



And the top posts overall for the past six months:

10. Why do I blog?

9. How Steve Jobs and Apple keep me coming back for more

8. Lisa Telford: A eulogy

7. Your brand needs to be simple, or, how Dyson sucked me in

6. My beloved is mine and I am his: a spiritual look at lust

5. Is Church about itself, or is it about something else?

4. A little kindness goes a long way

3. Love (or How to destroy the world)

2. Six things to do while you're unemployed

1. Seven reasons why you (yes, YOU!) should have a blog


Also, let me throw a couple at you that I wish had made the list, just because I like them.

1. Mary DeMuth's Thin Places is a phat book

2. Leadership lessons learned from my Father-in-Law

AT&T's new rate plans offer most iPhone users a consumer benefit

Used with permission. CC DerkT.

AT&T announced new data plans today. The new plans do not include their former unlimited data plan.

Fists began flying as irate users claimed AT&T was trying to squeeze more dollars out of consumers for overages.

I consider myself a higher-than-average user of data. I use a few social media networks, watch the occasional YouTube video, do plenty of web surfing and maps/navigation, and listen to a bit of online radio over 3G. Apparently, AT&T considers me a higher-than-average user, too. Nonetheless, the company claimed they were providing new, discounted plans that would benefit 98% of their users. They proposed that the remaining 2% of the users (likely jailbroken tetherers) are stressing their maxed-out network, saturating it, and ruining the experience for the rest of us.

After briefly reviewing the details, I am forced to concede. AT&T appears to be doing us a favor. Take a look at our usage trends for the past six months:





My wife and I currently pay $30 each, per month, for unlimited data. But the most either of us has ever used in a month is around 0.5GB. We're well within the 98% of users. AT&T's new plan would provide up to 2GB per month, per line, for $25.

If I'm reading this correctly, that means we can switch from the unlimited plan to the 2GB/mo. plan, save $120 a year on the family budget, and still watch our data usage increase by almost 4x before we have to rethink things.

There's also an even more-discounted, "ala carte," 200MB/mo. plan for $15. They say this will cover 65% of users. I can believe that. You'll pay an additional $15 for each 200MB you go over that, but for 65% of users, they're only getting dinged by AT&T if they don't take advantage of the deal.

If you are a current AT&T unlimited data user, and you disagree with this post, you are still "grandfathered" in to your unlimited data plan if you so choose. AT&T currently has no roadmap to eliminate this plan for existing unlimited users.

And that's good news.

Want to see your data usage for the past six months?

1. Log in at http://wireless.att.com.



2. Go to Usage & Recent Activity.
   
   



3. Look for a link that says View Past Data Usage and click on it.

More news on the same thing:

• Cautious: AT&T Drops Unlimited Data Plan, Impacts iPhone Owners, from Tom Kaneshige at CIO.com


• Indifferent to Negative: AT&T phases out unlimited data plans, from Ben Patterson at Yahoo! News


• Positive...ish: New AT&T data plans milk data gluttons, lower costs for most, from Ars Technica

Questions:

1. Are you an iPhone user who will benefit from the new plans?



2. Are you upset by the announcement?