Tag Archives: JoshuaFruhlinger

This is the Modem World: So what’s next?

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

DNP This is the Modem World

I just spent a week in Japan, where I attended my first Japanese wedding in Tokyo. It was lovely, different and the same all at once. I've been coming here almost annually since 1998, and while most things have remained the same, I've watched Japan's pace of consumer technology innovation take a seeming nosedive in recent years. I have no solid evidence to prove this -- just some observations.

When I first visited Tokyo in 1998, Japanese mobile phones were years ahead of their American and European equivalents. Japanese mobiles were lightweight, had high-resolution -- for the time -- color screens, allowed internet access and some even had video cameras that supported real-time video chat.

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This is the Modem World: Some questions about the new Xbox One

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

This is the Modem World Some questions about the new Xbox One

Now that Microsoft has given its quick reveal of the new Xbox One game console / set-top box, we have a pretty good idea of what we should be expecting once the machine comes out. We know how it'll be controlled; we know what games we'll be playing on it; and we know how it will keep us connected and entertained.

But we don't know if people will use all these new things. Are we ready to look at our game consoles as more than a game console? Are we already there? I mean, we all use Netflix on our machines, right? May as well let them run our TV viewing too, right?

Right?

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This is the Modem World: The Great Computer Cold War of 1982

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

DNP This is the Modem World The great computer cold war of 1982

I've known my friend Jeff since I was 2 years old. He was one year ahead of me in school, but in everything else -- little league, school, girls -- we were extremely competitive. We both had two sisters and looked to one another as brothers and yardsticks for prepubescent success. He was better at baseball and I usually had better luck with the ladies. Being better at baseball helped him with the ladies and having a way with the girls made the baseball thing kind of irrelevant. In short, I was better.

I saw Jeff last week, and as we reminisced about the good old days of baseball and babes, he reminded me of what he called The Great Computer Cold War of 1982.

"The great what?" I asked him.

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This is the Modem World: Why don’t I crash?

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

DNP This is the Modem World TKTKTK

My first computer was a Commodore VIC-20. It raged with 3.5K of RAM, a high-speed cassette deck, and built-in BASIC. I used to copy game programs string-by-string from the back of COMPUTE! magazine -- tens of thousands of lines of code -- and small errors were not an option. One syntax error and the program wouldn't work. When I did make those errors, I'd go back, line by line, and check for differences. There was nothing -- at the time -- more annoying than seeing hours of code crash because of one bad POKE statement.

That digital fastidiousness has stuck with me since. I keep all my computers' files in order, keep operating systems updated, backup constantly to a remote storage device and quickly go after a machine that's behaving strangely. The net result, and I may be tempting fate, is that I have never had a computer completely fail in the thirty years I've been using them.

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This is the Modem World: Nothing is new. It’s been done before.

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

DNP This is the Modem World Nothing is new It's been done before

It's funny how things come back around. When I was growing up in the '80s, music was looking back at the '50s and '60s and re-creating it into some of the best bands the world has seen. Paul Weller wouldn't have become the songwriter he is had he not grown up on the Beatles. Likewise, Paul McCartney wouldn't have become the genius that he is had he not been raised on Little Richard. And now, bands are looking back at the '80s and re-doing that explosive era -- with both good and bad results that I will not go into here lest I make new enemies.

Culture is cyclical, and we're beginning to see that technology is bound to follow that same rinse-and-repeat formula.

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This is the Modem World: When tech can’t save us from road rage

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

DNP This is the Modem World When tech can't save us from road rage

So I'm driving home the other night after a decent day of work, looking forward to a little run, some dinner and maybe a movie. Taking my normal north-south route along Crescent Heights, I listen to Tame Impala to calm the nerves and enter another mental state.

I'm at one of those intersections in which two lanes become one because of a parked car in the right lane ahead. I, being in the right lane, gun it a bit at the start in order to get some distance from the guy on my left.

He's having none of this, apparently.

Turns out my car is faster, though, and I edge him out. I see him wave his arms frantically, shaking them and then applauding.

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This is the Modem World: When we Google too much

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

DNP This is the Modem World When We Google Too Much

Our cat Mischa is ill, and I am sad. But sadness is only one of the things I am feeling. Because of technology and the internet, I am angry, frustrated and a little bit freaked out.

Here's why.

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This is the Modem World: Why are we still texting?

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

DNP This is the Modem World Why are we still texting

"Just text me..."

How many times have you told someone that? Say you're meeting a friend somewhere: What's the first thing you do when you get there? You text him or her to announce your arrival. Why? Because that's how you're trained. You don't email, call or use some other protocol.

And you know what? You're paying for that text even though you already have a data plan, unless you're grandfathered into one of the better unlimited plans of the 20th century. Truth is, SMS texts are perhaps the most lucrative service that providers offer -- more so than data or voice plans, and they want us to keep using the outdated technology whether we need to or not.

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This is the Modem World: The dark side of Google Glass

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

This is the Modem World: The dark side of Google Glass

I want to be excited about Google Glass -- I really do. I saw Robocop as a kid and dreamed that, one day, I too could walk around with a HUD that would feed me information on call, receive messages and record the world around me.

But now that years have passed and I've witnessed humanity worship the smartphone, make prevalent voice-controlled navigation and perfect self-mounted, POV digital video cameras, I'm not so sure that Google Glass is going to be good for us as a society. There is a dark side to what appears to be a wonderful coming together of complementary technology, and I'm here to poop this party.

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This is the Modem World: The dark side of Google Glass

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Each week Joshua Fruhlinger contributes This is the Modem World, a column dedicated to exploring the culture of consumer technology.

This is the Modem World: The dark side of Google Glass

I want to be excited about Google Glass -- I really do. I saw Robocop as a kid and dreamed that, one day, I too could walk around with a HUD that would feed me information on call, receive messages and record the world around me.

But now that years have passed and I've witnessed humanity worship the smartphone, make prevalent voice-controlled navigation and perfect self-mounted, POV digital video cameras, I'm not so sure that Google Glass is going to be good for us as a society. There is a dark side to what appears to be a wonderful coming together of complementary technology, and I'm here to poop this party.

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