The Tech Point of View

Hi folks,
The TTPOV site will be on hiatus for a short time to gear up for CES 2009.  The site will remain up and I will continue to respond to any questions or topics that are posted.  I will not however post any new articles or editorials in the interim.

Thanks for your patience and continued support.

Yesterday around 11am PDT Google announced its entry into the browser market with Chrome. Chrome is a web browser that Google has had in development for about 2 years now and has finally release it into public beta. I’ve had a chance to download the browser and experience its performance first hand, and I must say I’m pleasantly surprised. If I had to use one word to describe my overall first impressions, it would have to be “fast”. From how quickly the browser program starts up to how long it takes to render pages, there is a noticeable difference from other browsers. I would even go as far to say that it’s marginally faster than the critically acclaimed Firefox with plain HTML pages and noticeably speedier when rendering rich web 2.0 pages, thanks to its new java engine “V8”.  While using the new browser there were a couple of features I found interesting, one being “crash control.  This feature essentially treats each tab within the chrome browser as its on process separating it from the others.  Doing this protects your browser from crashing in the likely event that a page you’re looking at freezes or worst crashes and restarts your browser altogether.   This way only the tab causing the issue is closed instead of all your other tabs closing with it. I can see this being particularly useful when browsing with many tabs open at once, and one of those tabs happens to be an unfinished email your writing, see my point.

A lot of people are asking why Google is coming out with a web browser in the first place, and how it benefits them.  Well in my humble opinion Google is a web company, and anything that promotes web usage (particularly faster web usage) is a good thing for Google.  If Google is a major player in web services and applications, then anything that promotes the web as a platform and drives usage is a boon for Google, I think this new browser accomplishes that.  People like their web fast, give‘em what they want and they’ll come in droves.

Below is an offical video of Google’s new Chrome Browser, checkout the video below, and if your interested download it here and tell me what you think.

Yesterday XM and Sirius Satellite Radio closed on a merger that took 17 months and combines the only two satellite based radio companies for a total of 18.5 million subscribers. The newly formed company now goes by the name Sirius XM Radio and is the 2nd largest U.S. Radio company based on their combined annual revenues. They will offer over 300 stations of content that include most major league sports and span over most music genres. Also included in their programming will be previously exclusive content from both sides like that of Howard Stern and Oprah Winfrey. Part of the FCC’s conditions for approval of this merger was a promise by the newly formed company to freeze current prices for the next three years, and offer la carte programming which would allow customers to pick and choose which stations they could subscribe to & pay for. Another bit of good news for current subscribers of both companies is that the new programming is expected to roll out early this fall and no new equipment is required.

So what do you think, is this good news for subscribers or ultimately bad news for everyone because there’s virtually no competition in the satellite radio space now.

Funny thing happen to me two days before the 3G iPhone launch, I got a text from my current wireless carrier Sprint saying that I was eligible for a $200 discount on the new Samsung Instinct. The very next day I actually get a call from a Sprint Rep who again tells me that I’m eligible for an upgrade provided I agree to a new two year contract. The young lady goes on to say that Sprints “Simply Everything” plan would only cost me an additional $15 dollars based my current monthly bill and that the Instinct and the Simply Everything plan are made to complement each other.

All in all it was a surprisingly good sales pitch and she made a number of good points such as Sprints 3G coverage in my local area, which is somewhat better then AT&T’s right now. She also mentioned a myriad of Sprint services that accompany there “all you can eat” plan like Sprint TV, music and radio. And the Instinct to be fair is a comparable competitor to the new iPhone, it’s even got some things I personally along with alot of others wish the iPhone had (stereo Bluetooth, real turn by turn GPS), but the one mistake Sprint made with the Instinct was timing. If Samsung and Sprint had brought this phone to market a little earlier say 3-4 months earlier, that would have made all the difference.

Let’s face it, the Ring Master over at Apple aka Steve Jobs is a media Jedi and is wise in the ways of generating buzz about a new product, why would you try and compete with that. I can honestly say that I might have upgraded my phone and stayed with Sprint if this were “pre iPhone mania” 4 months ago. Why is it that the largest consumer based companies never make an effort to retain their customers before there’s a reason to leave, and only make a genuine effort after the fact.

What do you think, is hinds sight 20/20 or should Sprint have known better. Or did Sprint play the right move all along and we’re all in for a big surprise when Instinct’s sales numbers are released.

Apple and AT&T really drop the ball yesterday, during the launch of Apples newest version of the iPhone. I like many others ended that day without a shinny new 3G iPhone to play with due to a new purchasing process that requires instore activation and limited quantities from the surrounding AT&T stores.

After standing in line for about 4 hours at my local AT&T store in Germantown, MD we we’re all told by a store rep that the store had an “insufficient quantities to services everyone in line..” We were then given the option to reserve a phone today and then come to activate it when it arrives in the next 7 days. My problem is, what seems really “insufficient” is having a potential two year long customer standing outside your store for 4 hours unnecessarily. I mean really, you couldn’t have told people waiting in line that everyone from here on back will not be getting an iPhone today. The reps at this particular store arrived relatively early, Id say sometime around 7am, and I got there 2 hours prior to that around 5am. It would have been pretty easy and potential customer friendly to just inform everyone that only a certain number of people would be actually receiving an iPhone today. Afterwards, let everyone else decide weather they think standing in line for another 2 or more hours is worth a reservation for next week. One thing AT&T and Apple I’m sure already know is that really big products launches are first impressions for lots buyers, if there was ever a time not to screw up now would be it. I’ve never been a customer of AT&T’s before and if this were any other cell phone, it might have stayed that way. Not really a good way to start a business customer’s 2-year long relationship.

What do you think, should AT&T and Apple have handle this launch differently or do I just favor sour grapes over apples.