Kirb’s Musings

Kirby Witmer’s ponderings, ruminations, and meditations of… anything.

Wow! Apple is doing the right thing this time around. They announced the new 3G version of the iPhone for the low price of $199. They also included a bunch of features that actually make it a real phone this time, including GPS, 3G, Exchange support, etc. RIM, you’ve got serious competition now!

Update: Robert Scoble says the new iphone actually isn’t cheaper:

The new iPhone is NOT that much cheaper. Yeah, it’s $199, but you have to sign a two-year-contract and the 3G network plan is $10 a month more expensive. So, do the math. It isn’t cheaper.

I did not have a very good start to my day yesterday. It involved my laptop and a glass of fruit punch. And now for some reason, my laptop keys are sticking.

Microsoft yesterday released a beta version of its WorldWide Telescope. I downloaded and installed it this morning and was quite impressed with quality of the imagery. Take a look at these incredible images.

(Click image for higher resolution version.)

You will need to have a fairly fast computer in order to even run WorldWide Telescope however. The minium requirements according to Microsoft are:

Ed Bott wrote an outstanding article on “Why do Macs need so much fixing?”. Totally true.

I was trying to install the Blackberry Desktop Manager on Windows Vista, but it kept aborting on the following error message.

error 1325 favorites is not a valid short file name

Frustrating. Turns out its a simple fix. Simply set your Favorites back to the default location. I had my favorites folder pointed to a network location and for what ever reason the installer didn’t like that. Apparently its a bug in the Blackberry installer program.

      Late last week I requested a static IP address from my web host, hostmonster. Supposedly this would be a simple change that would go off without a hitch. And it did for the most part, except for one problem. The A name record for blog.kirb.com was somehow erased, which simply resulted in this website being down. The solution of course is to update the A record. Simple, right? Take a peak at these conversations with Hostmonster Support.
Read the rest of this entry »

Microsoft has walked away from its Yahoo bid after Yahoo rejected an even higher bid this weekend. Yahoo officials reportedly high fived each other after hearing the news. I wonder how much high fiving will be going on today after Yahoo’s stock tanks.

Scott Hanselman writes:

My wife and I have been married going on eight years. We try to go to Africa every two years as she’s from Zimbabwe originally… I remember when we went to Zim for the first time in 2001… The exchange rate was US$1 to Z$55, and it was about Z$50 to ride in a combi (minibus/taxi)…
Today, whatever Zim currency you have in your pocket loses value of Z$70 a minute just sitting there…
If these numbers seem overwhelming, they are. Recently the new Z$50 million dollar note came out, and it will by three loaves of bread (assuming you can find bread) a Z$16M each.

Wow! I had no idea Zimbabwe’s economy was this bad.

First Microsoft sends another letter to Yahoo giving them three weeks to start talking or else…, and now Yahoo responds. This is getting good!

Long Zheng blogs about a leaked new Windows Vista Ultimate Extras sound scheme.

P.S. In case you are wondering this is one April Fool’s joke that I swallowed hook, line, and fishing pole. Did you get tricked into believing any?