Boxee breaks TV out of the box
I have a confession to make: I’m not the best source of information about some the latest consumer technology trends. So naturally Boxee, an open-source program that streams TV and movies from the Web, caught me a little off guard.
Boxee is really cool and makes it clear that the Web will revolutionize media. Now, D-Link is manufacturing a Boxee Box for your TV. The Box has unlimited storage capacity and Wi-Fi to connect to home networks. There is a lot of media on the Web that I would love to watch on my TV; Time Warner Cable’s on-demand service isn’t so great.
Boxee is something special. The business model may not be there yet, but there is so much opportunity for it to upend that cable provider subscription model. I’d like more of what I want when I want it, and would be willing to pay à la carte. — David Worthington
Salvation for the RSI afflicted
I’d wager that a fair number of your programmers are wrestling with carpal tunnel syndrome or repetitive stress injuries (RSI). For those that can’t type without pain, there is a new idea on the horizon to help save your fingers.
The Peregrine glove will be targeted at video gamers when it ships in February, but this unconventional input device has some big potential for making typing easier. The Peregrine is somewhat like a chording glove: the tip of the thumb to the tip of the forefinger registers as a key press on the keyboard. The tip of the thumb to the side of the middle finger’s second knuckle registers a different keyboard press.
The one-handed model can almost accommodate a full keyboard, but not quite. This is a 1.0 product, and it’s not quite ready for use as a typing device, though it can be configured for anyone’s hands and gestures. But for US$149, it’s the closest you can get to putting your programmers in Neuromancer territory. — Alex Handy
Born to be social
Sometime in the not-too-distant future, developers working on a project will be able to find other people in their organization with domain expertise by locating their profile on a social network, then post to a community board a troublesome piece of code for that person and others to look at and work on, all while commenting live as they go.
Oh, wait… this can be done today!
But the integrations are not smooth, and the social software implementations are not specific to the organization. Yaacov Cohen of Mainsoft expects this to change, as companies start to build out their platforms with social tools from the ground up. “You have to be born to be social; it’s harder to pick up later on,” he said. — David Rubinstein