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by mjackman

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by j sheesley

Should be? What do you mean "Should be"?! It's up now! :)

Anyone wanting to hear the latest TechProGuild Podcast can download it from the TPG Download Center.

Great work Michael!

by mjackman

By the way, I recently won a Louisville Society of Professional Journlists award for my column Technicalities, "An irreverent, ironic column exploring the bewildering effects of high-tech on our lives." Click here for one of my favorite columns.

by mjackman

Thanks to profits soaring into the billions, journalists refer to Microsoft as "the Software Giant." Don't you think it's time the company considered a name change. "Macro"soft anyone?

By the way, TPG Podcast 5 coming today...

Update 7/31/ - due a slight delay, the podcast will be up Monday.

by mjackman

My TPG Podcast 6 is up - enjoy it at https://www.techrepublic.com.com/5138-6355-5820525.html.

This weeks topics:

  • Which browsers will pass the Web consortiums "acid test" - (hint: IE7 won't)
  • Grokster Supreme Court decision spurs creation of impenetrable "darknets"
  • Hacksters at Defcon 2005 take on RFID chips, biometric devices
  • New core-compenent security flaw discovered in Win2K

You can subscribe to the podcast using iTunes or your favorite podcast reader. Use https://www.techrepublic.com.com/i/tr/one_offs/tpgpodcast.xml.

Read more of my tech and other articles at www.mjfreelancer.com.

 

by mjackman

Two New TPG podcasts up since my last post - enjoy! Any topics you'd like me to cover, comments you'd like to make, please let me know.

TechProGuild Podcast: Tracking lost notebooks, Linux, Firefox, and DNS Poisoning

15 Aug 2005 11:02:00 PDT

In this installment of the TechProGuild Podcast, Commentator Michael Jackman covers new ways of trackng lost notebooks, new support coming to Linux and firefox, and security threats that can arise from DNS Poisoning.

TPG Podcast: IE7, File Sharing, and RFID Hacking

05 Aug 2005 11:02:00 PDT

In this installment of the TechProGuild Podcast, Commentator Michael Jackman covers incompatibilities in Microsoft's upcoming Internet Explorer 7, news from DefCon, and a major problem unearthed with Windows 2000.

by mjackman

Latest TechProGuild Podcast (#9) AOL, Virtual Server, and Low Power CPUs

In this podcast, I talk about the amazing news that AOL customer service reps were told not to let customers cancel their service. What's up with that? In the podcast you'll hear about the investigation and the results, but I have to say that I'm shocked to hear that bonuses encouraged the reps to do this . What's your reaction? Let me know.

Also in the podcast: upcoming plans for Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 & 2006, new Identity Theft ring discovered, and information about new low power CPUs on the horizon from Intel.

Enjoy! Subscribe to the podcast through the feed (https://www.techrepublic.com.com/i/tr/one_offs/tpgpodcast.xml)

or click the download page directly: https://www.techrepublic.com.com/5138-6355-5844061.html?

By the way, the counters don't work properly.

And let me know what you want to hear more of on these podcasts. Thanks and take care!

- Michael Jackman

Writer, Writing Instructor (Indiana Univ. Southeast),
Morehead State Public Radio essayist and
TPG Podcast Commentator.

More info on me at www.mjfreelancer.com.

by mjackman

Dear listeners:

This week I'm trying out something different - a commentary. The news headline that caught my attention was the Palm Treo smart-phone that is now going to be powered by Microsoft's mobile OS. What a change! It should be a huge disappointment to me, because I was once a gung-ho Palm OS supporter. But a strange kind of indifference set in when I heard the news. Was I suffering from Palm-ennui, or was it something more. I decided to explore my indifference in a commentary. You can catch it here in this week's podcast: https://www.techrepublic.com.com/5138-6355-5888742.html?tag=search.

Let me know what you think (gulp - I always get nervous asking for feedback) and let me the answer to this question:

For your podcast do you prefer:

  1. "call-in" type interviews
  2. News headlines
  3. Commentary/Essay on tech subjects
  4. Other (explain)

That's this week's poll. Enjoy the podcast and let me hear from you. And as always, thanks for listening.

Best,

- Michael Jackman

P.S. - I'm also a Morehead State Public Radio essayist/commentator. You can read more about that on www.mjfreelancer.com.

by mjackman

by Michael Jackman

TechProGuild Podcast, Oct 3, 2005--Palm, maker of the Treo phone-slash-personal digital assistant, and Microsoft, maker of nearly everything else, are teaming up. Thanks to the deal, the Treo smart phone will no longer run on the Palm operating system. Instead  the hardware will interface you with your unmanageable, hectic lives using Microsoft's mobile operating system.

Strange news indeed, because the Palm OS once ruled supreme over the empire of handheld devices. 

How did this amazing switch come about? And more importantly, why do I no longer care?

Let's start with this strange news. Because, like most of the mostly male fans of Palm's expensive and skittish thoroughbreds, I too was once a high-tech cowboy just a-longin' to own the latest breed.

And I too used to panic when my trusty Palm died like an overridden mare. Which it did often, usually in an airport. But despite frequent repairs, upgrades and replacements, for years I remained a dedicated fan. In one form or another my trusty plastic efficiency expert and I rode the ranges from Louisville, Ky. across the United States and even to the top of Mt. Kala Patar in Nepal's Himalayas. From trade show to executive lunch to mountain top, that small gray slab led me to appointments, delivered e-mails like the pony express, and even, thanks to a snap-in weather laboratory, whinnied to warn me of approaching storms at 18,400 feet.

Yes, once I considered Palm and the upstart Palm OS to be indispensable. And I guffawed at Microsoft's audacity to challenge Palm's lean and elegant OS with its bloated donkey called WinCE. The one techies nicknamed "wince." 

But now and Palm and Microsoft are interbreeding. Michael Singer, writing in a recent CNET News article, blames the Treo Phone/Mobile OS hybrid on five years of strategic blunders from Palm, including the failure of it execs to foresee the "convergence" of cellular phones and PDAs.

But when Palm's reigns finally slipped through my fingers, it wasn't due to any strategic stumble.

As I speak, two Palm devices are stabled in a desk drawer. And I have no interest in saddling them up. Why? Because I began to see a Palm hanging from my belt as, not a high-tech portable assistant, but as high-tech portable Jewish mother. Nagging me all the time, saying "When are you going to call so and so?" Guilting me into improving my career, networking, beaming contacts and arranging lunches with everyone in range, creating endless impossible ToDos. Frankly, they were getting on my nerves.

As for interbreeding a PDA with a cell phone: my favorite mode of cellular operation is the one opposite from "on." And fashion has changed, too. It's now dorky to hang your IT beer gut over a slab of plastic. That is, unless it comes with a white ear bud.

No, Mr. Singer, Palm didn't make five strategic mistakes. It made one: the trusty gray mare turned into an galloping nightmare.

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