Take a memo: Social networks are about communities first

Scott Mackler showed 60 Minutes what many BCI demonstrations have not been able to: that technology innovations can be, frankly, akin to miracles

Motorola's DynaTAC 8000x was used to make the first commercial cell phone call 25 years ago, and now Motorola is laying off thousands and trying to spin-off its handset division. A lot has changed, but innovation is bound to continue.

Warning: Do not brings guns into the WWDC unless you intend to shoot an iPhone.

When I covered the iPhone news on Monday, I had no idea how hard Apple would work to protect its intellectual property.

My phone knows my wife better than I do, apparently.

At Interop 2008, I realized that a visit to Vegas can be called a success if you don't get hit by a car while jogging there.

I left my cell phone in the car at the airport and proceeded to cover four days of CTIA in Vegas sans cell phone. It worked out, but it was unnerving.

Neural headsets are coming on the market to detect brainwaves to control electronic games with applications coming that go far beyond gaming. It might be too much, too soon for some of the public, however.

Tim Berners-Lee is an academic and a visionary and probably the best person to urge openness with the mobile Internet.

When Cisco Systems Inc. said it would announce the winners of a networking technology innovation contest called Connected Life inside a Second Life simulation, it seemed like the place for me to be, if only to see how major companies might use this virtual world.

Cisco has been staging virtual meetings in Second Life for more than a year with developers meeting with channel partners, but this presentation was the first time that I had heard of a reporter being asked to cover a meeting there. 

I am probably an SL noob  by most standards, but at least had already loaded the SL client on my laptop and had created a avatar named Matt2 Ultsch.  I thought I knew most of the ways to move, run, and even fly in SL, and to search out islands and events. 

An open letter to Ivan Seidenberg, Chairman & CEO of Verizon Communications Inc.:

Dear Mr. Seidenberg,

I am proud to say that I am a "Double Freedom" residential customer with Verizon, whatever that means. I hope it is a good thing.

I learned I had this designation at the end of a 90-minute marathon call to four Verizon service representatives this morning to find out why I was not getting my Verizon DSL service to provide Internet and email access to my home. The voice part of the service was fine.

Second Life includes just about everything, so it shouldn't have surprised me to encounter a group of avatars chatting about committing suicide.

A search function helps an SL visitor find the 10 most popular sites inside SL, which include places to get Linden dollars for free by filling out endless marketing surveys, as well as virtual nude beaches (there are more than one in the top 10,which should not surprise anybody). Other searches help a visitor find upcoming happenings, tons of them, including live concerts or sporting events, listed with the times when they are available.