One Lap or Two?

This is one heck of a long swimming pool! I wonder how long it would take to swim one or two laps. Definitely a good work out!

Photo credit: Spluch

Also seen on Crave.

Thoughts on How to Improve Google Reader

For those who track me on Twitter and know me a little bit, you may have heard me going on about how I would like to see some form of tool that aggregates the articles coming from different feeds. My problem is that there is too much information out there and the fact is that more and more sites are covering the same news or information in general.

So I have been doing some more thinking on my ideas regarding how to improve Google Reader.

My main wish is that it be more intelligent with the feed content. As I previously have pointed out here and on my twitter, many of my feeds carry the same or similar information. My idea is that there should be some form of aggregation of this information. What is required is something similar to this diagram:

That was a simple example where the articles present the same information. The idea is that this should be extrapolatable to information that presents itself differently but is still concerning the same information. Essentially something like this:

Now this not far fetched as Google already does this in News:

Notice how this article presents one story and multiple references to similar or linked stories. This is the kind of thing that needs to be done to the multitude of articles in RSS feeds. It would considerably reduce the amount of entries to read and also cut out the noise!

So Google are you up to the challenge.
Note: The graphics are presented in this attached signed PDF: Thoughts on Improvements to Google Reader Graphics

iPhone Not so Happy for Apple in France = unlocked

It's started! The iPhone is not even officially released yet in Europe and more specifically France than Apple is already facing trouble with its selling methodology.

In fact Les Echos recently reported that Apple has forgotten one fundamental principal that stands in Europe and specifically France today: You can't screw the customer! Consumer law prohibits the sale of any good and service that are dependent on each other in France and some other EU countries. For mobile operators this translates into the fact that they can no longer tie a phone and mobile plan together.

Because of this law, Orange in France the official iPhone carrier, may in fact be forced to sell it without a data plan and carrier lock! Of course this is a big problem for Apple as the current price of the iPhone with «subsidies» is still very expensive and gives no real motivation to buy a locked version... Besides why would you want to buy such an expensive multimedia phone with no 3G+ and no video, when you can buy cheaper and better multimedia phones like the Nokias, Samsungs and others!

France may be the first place where Apple is in fact forced to sell the iPhone unlocked!

Cool New Feature in Google Spreadsheets

This morning I was perusing and updating one of my Google Spreadsheets when I discovered two new functions that make Google Spreadsheets Internet smart!
The description on Google reads:

Two new functions bring the power of Google directly into your spreadsheet. The GoogleFinance function retrieves current price and volume for stocks, indices and ETF's. For example, GoogleFinance("GOOG") returns the latest Google stock price.

The GoogleLookup function attempts to answer your question using the web, with information about people, places and things, like the population of Japan, the mass of Jupiter, or the place of birth of Abraham Lincoln. It doesn't know everything, but it knows quite a bit. For example, GoogleLookup("T Rex","length") returns "40 feet".

And this was actually quite helpful as I have a spreadsheet tracking some of my stock options and I was able to use the GoogleFinance function to have it automatically insert the current stock price!
The only thing missing now is an extension to the function to allow it to read Currency exchange rate then it will be perfect (or almost)

Halo 3 Finally at my House

Ok so I am probably jumping on the bandwagon as well! But...
I finally received my copy of Halo 3 today! w00t I didn't get it on the release date (despite my vendor putting it in the mail before) as I order from a store in the UK so I am sure I get an English version of the contents (ed. Long story and not relevant).
Yesterday after work, I fired up the game! My honest opinion its fantastic even though I have not even finished chapter one yet as I ran out of time. But the game play so far is fast paced and full of action! And its damn hard, even on Normal game play mode (ed: I always play the game at normal first and then proceed)...
More post late when I get further through the game ;-)

Full Web Browsing on Mobiles

According to this interview with some HTC folks, we could be seeing better browser support coming up on mobile devices.
The new mobile browser would support a complete set of functionalities from AJAX to XML via touched based zoom-in and zoom-out.
For example, Peter Chou from HTC indicates that:

HTC will have very good browser for full web browsing next year.

Mobile Internet is getting better and better...