Business

Today Google announced that Video and Voice “chat” is coming to Google Talk on Android. I just got an Acer Iconia Android tablet yesterday, and it already supports this. Understand what this means - you’ll be able to call and video chat with other Android phones, tables, and anything that can run GMail & GTalk in the browser. No need for a phone carrier. All that you need is network connectivity, which could come in the form of ubiquitous wifi. [Read More]

Any time you put an additional step in the sales process, you gain an opportunity to lose a customer. Such is the case with Free and Paid apps. It’s a common freemium pattern in the Google Android Market and Apple App Store. You’re familiar with the pattern - there’s a Free version of the app that’s restricted and then there’s a Paid version that has all of the features. As a developer, the problem is that you have to maintain two versions of the same app. [Read More]

Here are some movies I think are worth watching about our food supply Strangely, these movies also twist together some of the intellectual property and patent issues I’ve been thinking about recently. Did you know if you grow Monsanto’s patented soybeans, you can’t keep any of the seed you produce? They actually police this. Also, if you’re a non-Monsanto soybean grower next to a Monsanto grower and Monsanto’s plants naturally cross with yours, Monsanto can come and take your crop because of patent infringement? [Read More]

AlphaMixr, my game for Google Android (T-Mobile G1, et. al.), was reviewed the other day and got 4 out of 5 “droids.” You can read the review at Android Tapp. You can also read AlphaMixr user reviews on Cyrket (an online Android Market browser). In other news, AlphaMixr Demo hit the 10,000 download mark today at Android Market. I think this will pick up even more as additional Android-based devices are released globally this year. [Read More]

Google released paid apps today on the Android Market today (2/20/09) and so my game, AlphaMixr (now Syrious Scramble®) was released into the wild. AlphaMixr is a scrambled word game in the spirit of Text Twist and Jumble. It adds another dimension of Global High Scores so you can compete with other players around the world. You can read a glowing review from a friend of mine who’s been a beta tester at This and That Visit SyriousGames. [Read More]

A colleague recommended The 4 Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferriss the other day. I bit and bought the book to read on vacation. I got a little more than half way through the book when I had to take Tim’s advice and stop wasting time reading it. I’ll start by being objective. Tim makes a bunch of claims that cannot be backed up. How do we know he makes $40K-$80K a month with BrainQuicken? [Read More]