No Kings!

Author: Mike Pihlman

  • Inauguration Online Video Viewing Stats

    According to this report on CNN, the Internet broke some records during the Inauguration yesterday.   Really quickly:  1. Akamai says that 7.7 million people watched at the same time ( I suppose that means the peak simultaneous usage was 7.7 mil).   2. Over a time span of hours, CNN hosted almost 27 million…

  • SmartShopper Review

        Rating:  3 WaterTowers I was browsing through the Amazon web site looking for something cool for my wife for Christmas when I stumbled upon the SmartShopper. It struck me that this could be the perfect product, and that if it worked as well as the reviews said it does, the SmartShopper could change…

  • Digital TV Conversion Feb 2009

    Assuming the change does not get delayed (see this NY Times article), in about a month, the analog TV signal from TV stations will be turned off.   If you have an old TV connected to an outside antenna or rabbit ears, you will need to make some changes to prepare for the change.  I…

  • First Desktop Videoconferencing System

      Answer, Jan 18, 2007:  The Cameo from CLI was the first.  Second, was Visit.  Both were based on the Mac.  The made up name is MeetMe….NUTS was an actual product!       A little bit of fun while I write up my trip report to Polycom HQ today.  I saw some great stuff…

  • Videoconferencing 101, Chapter 2

      Chapter 2:  Videoconferencing Endpoints for Casual Users and Telecommuters An essential part (actually, THE most essential part) of videoconferencing is the endpoint.   The endpoint is that piece of hardware, or mixture of hardware and software, that you use to make the call. There are many options available to you. In this chapter, I…

  • Access Grid Videoconferencing

    Rating: 2 WaterTowers Results Overview The Access Grid is loaded with features and capabilities for collaborating, for free, with remote colleagues.  Unfortunately, it is a bit complicated to install and use, and, in fact, I have not yet been able to get two way video and audio.  As a comparison, every commercially available videoconferencing application…

  • CES on YouTube

    Can’t make it to Las Vegas for the CES Show? Not to worry, you can still catch up on many of the happenings with live video feeds and stored video on YouTube. Here is an example of what you can find there.  An interview with Chris Brogan (sorry, I must be out of it, but…I…

  • LG HDTV to Stream NetFlix Movies

      OK, here it comes.  The battle for streaming movies over the Internet has taken the turn that I have been waiting for. This article on CBS tells us that LG will embed a streaming player in HDTV sets.  No additional box will be needed.  How quickly this is happening! I have been covering this exciting…

  • Proclaim by NetBriefings Update

    Proclaim by NetBriefings Update

    UPDATE August 2023: Consider this a HISTORY lesson in videoconferencing and collaboration. Enjoy! 🙂 Last year I posted a couple of entries (here is my review) on Proclaim by Netbriefings.  Today, I decided to grab another Free Trial and give it a quick whirl for all the new readers to this blog. After I signed…

  • Update on Steve Jobs

    UPDATE, Jan 14, 2009:  Not good news here.  This is starting to be a concern. A quick story:   Way back in the early 1980’s my wife and I worked at AT&T Bell Labs in Holmdel, NJ.  We had this great new personal computer called the Apple II.  Worked great…but it had no applications at…