Just picked up a used Toyota Sienna van and I’m pretty psyched about it - lots of room and it’s really comfortable to drive - but I’m not sure how to pair my Apple iPhone 4 with the navigational system from Toyota. Any help or tips? Before you ask, yes, the car does have Bluetooth as far as I can tell.
Ever since Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), the coverage I’ve read has been far more excited about the forthcoming alert upgrades in iOS, Apple’s mobile operating system, than the iCloud launch or hundreds of other updates. As more prominent alerts lead to even faster adoption of various mobile services and technologies, mobile social media should be disproportionately affected.
I was trying to join a Facebook fan page for my favorite TV show, Game of Thrones, and was disturbed to see a warning message that I needed to “switch to a regular connection” that wasn’t secure so I could proceed. Are they trying to hack my account? Should I proceed on Facebook?
I have my iPhone set up as a personal hotspot through AT&T but suspect that using it via wifi slows me down and that if I could plug it directly into my computer, it’d work faster. Is that true, and if so, how can I tether my iPhone via USB to my MacBook and gain faster access to the Internet?
Dave’s Answer:
Google continues to be dismissive over the public’s concerns regarding the ability of its mobile devices to send precise user locations back to its servers. Google has been collecting the location information from millions of mobile phone and devices stating that the information was “extremely important” to the direction of the company’s future.
My friend Pete Warden does a splendid job of data mining, of analyzing the information that companies make available and/or track, but without telling us exactly what they’re doing. His last adventure was with Facebook, where his data analysis got him into hot water with the notoriously lax company (see his blog post I got sued by Facebook).
This time he and fellow researcher Alasdair Allan have stumbled into something rather astonishing: a time-based archive of iPhone lat/long locations where you’ve used your phone. Better yet, they wrote an open source app called iPhoneTracker that lets you visualize the data so you can understand what’s going on. A caveat: iPhoneTracker is quite clearly not intended to be a polished application with a fully implemented interface but rather a tool to let you see your own tracking information. It reveals alarming data pulled out of your primary iPhone backup file.
Google’s dream of creating a mobile payment facility is one step closer with Google close to finalizing a deal with MasterCard and Citigroup that will see Android powered devices embedded with technology that allows customers to make purchases directly through their phone at the check-out.
By using near field communication technology (NFC), Google hopes to make credit and debit cards a thing of the past. If the deal goes ahead then customers with a android powered phone will simply wave their phone in front of a small reader installed at the cash counter and the payment will be processed. The idea is to turn the phones into a kind of electronic wallet.
You all know I really despise AT&T, even though I continue paying them thousands of dollars per year for three cell phones. Since getting my Verizon iPhone I haven’t dropped a call and I can actually hear the other party. Steve Gillmor got one on Friday and, wow, what a difference. Not to mention that the world’s toughest dead zone: Devil’s Slide is non-existent for AT&T and TMobile, but works the entire way on Verizon for me.
Oh man, when will they get it? That’s what I find I’m asking myself once again. Here in the Pacific NorthWest (Victoria BC Canada) we’ve been hit with another snow storm. Once again that meant that the roads are a mess and in particular, public transit is in turmoil. What I find very interesting is that I’m getting the impression that many people, in particular the local social media junkies, seem to think that Twitter is THE solution for getting the word out about buses, including interruptions in service, delays, etc… I guess Twitter serves as a fine band-aid solution but come on… Twitter as the answer to BC Transit communicating with the public?
Man, my email has been flowing ever since yesterday morning with lots of responses to my “Nokia Fans: you’re nuts!” post.
Most say that the newly-joined Microsoft/Nokia still has no shot getting them to write apps and that RIM is even worse off.
group.