Android phones outsell iOS phones so why don't Android tablets beat up on iPads?

This seems like such an obvious question I'm amazed I've not seen it addressed more often. Android promoters gloat that their "platform" leads in sales but never explain why their tablets don't do the same. I have a theory. When most people buy a smartphone, they are thinking about its capabilities as a "phone". How many minutes do I get? Which carrier do I prefer? Is there a family plan? etc. The "smart"phone, i.e. computer aspect, is secondary. They may never address the operating system or the app stores since they are thinking in terms of replacing an old phone. Starting with that premise, anyone searching for a phone would more likely end up with Android - they are everywhere and many are less expensive than iPhones.

Buying a tablet is a different proposition. Consumers have no tablet experience so they have no natural starting point. This forces them down one of two paths. A few realize they are really buying a computer and investigate all the relevant technology and many are likely to go with Android. Most people though just buy what is available in most stores (iPad) or what their cool friends have (iPad). One of Apple's stealth moves with the first iPad was to place it in major retail outlets last year - Best Buy, Target, WalMart and Radio Shack - in addition to it's own 300+ stores worldwide. This leaves precious little prime shelf space for competing tablets.

If many smartphone purchasers aren't doing much critical thinking as I've suggested - after all they're just buying a phone - the companies may be forced to sell primarily based on price - as in the PC arena. While they may sell a lot of excellent Android handsets, they may not make sufficient profit to survive in spite of the sales figures. And speaking of sales figures, remember the difference between "shipped" and "sold". Sold is what matters; shipped means sent to retailers where they might languish for months before being sold - or returned to the maker.

Android fragmentation - the elephant in the room

If there's one issue that haunts the Android "industry" it's the widely discussed problem of fragmentation. Dozens of companies (Motorola, HTC, etc.) make hundreds of Android models to be sold by numerous carriers, in retail stores and online. There are differences in the phones - different size screens, virtual or physical keyboards, price, etc. Having choices is certainly appealing - with the iPhone it's black or white, literally. However Android choices can be very confusing for someone trying to find the "right" phone - like the potato chip aisle at the quickstop - way too many choices.

Imagine if your one year old PC did not qualify

for the latest version of Windows.

This seems in some ways like the battle between Apple and Microsoft for PC dominance but there is a significant difference. If fragmentation in the PC world had been harmful, Apple would have been the logical beneficiary because there were hundreds of PC manufacturers over the years. But PCs were not all that different - they used the same processors, the same disk drives, the same keyboards, etc. so differences were either minor cosmetic factors or price. Most importantly they all ran the same operating system and most could be reliably upgraded for at least five years. 

My Social Media Survey Results Just Released

At two recent lectures on Mobile Technology I surveyed participants on their use of social media. It was a simple eight question survey not directly related to the topic I was covering. Several points concerning the participants:

• They covered a wide age range with many in the 30-50 year range.
• They were above average in tech knowledge based on their professions.
• Some were small business owners and others worked for companies of all sizes in the computer training field.

Three of the four questions ask about their use of Facebook and Twitter. The last question ask whether they owned a smartphone or tablet computer.

General results:

• Nearly 80% had smartphones but only 17% had a tablet.
• While two-thirds used Facebook weekly only one-quarter used Twitter that often.

Business application - use of Facebook and Twitter:

• Facebook was used to communicate with clients by 40% of participants but only 20% used Twitter for that purpose.
• In a similar vein 33% used Facebook to receive information from companies while 24% used Twitter to do that.

With a total of eight possible responses, a rough measure of "tech savvy" would be the number of boxes each person checked - have a smartphone, use Facebook weekly, etc. etc. Using that measure no one scored the maximum of eight while 26% checked three - typically Facebook weekly, have a smartphone and one additional item. 19% checked four or more but 7% did not check any of the eight boxes.

This was a small sample but I think the results are informative. First and foremost, even though everyone is told they have to use social medial to communicate with stakeholders, a significant majority don't do that at the present. As you might expect the few "heavy hitters" dominated the results and 38% had no business contact at all with others using social media. This is after several years of hearing how Facebook is taking over the world and "everyone" is doing it.

Like most surveys of this type, I made no attempt to assess how well these techniques worked - are people just tweeting and hoping it works or can they measure actual success in product sales or revenue results.

There are many other social media platforms I did not include - primarily to keep it simple. I assumed that a significant number where on LinkedIn but evaluating actual usage would have been somewhat more difficult. Several other lesser known services were considered and will be included in future studies. 

The Perfect Tablet for Everybody - Now There's a Dumb Idea

How often do you hear someone talk about "what people want?" Whether it's politics or technology, pundits act as if all people want the same thing and they know what it is. This leads to ridiculous criticisms of things like the current smartphones and tablets; notice I'm avoiding the political part!

You hear, for example, "the iPad and other tablets are flawed because people don't like virtual keyboards - they want a real keyboard. The reporter goes on to say "when I write my stories, I blah, blah, blah." This storyline makes it sound like a) they know what everyone wants and b) they represent everyone by talking about their personal needs in the same sentence.

I'm pretty sure "people" don't all want the same thing - whether it's in their computers or condiments on their hot dogs. This is more than just a complaint about the state of journalism - it goes to the core of how computers have been developed over the years.

Real keyboard - you want a real keyboard!

Let's look at automobiles as a starting point. There are several dozen different basic auto designs because "people" don't all want the same thing. There are compact hybrids and nine passenger SUVs and a whole crop of "crossovers". Because PC functionality has been controlled by one company for nearly thirty years, only one version of one product was necessary - the Windows PC. I don't know what "all people" want but I do know that

The Perfect Tablet will include

six card readers, firewire and

USB connectors, a mouse,

a keyboard, SLR equivalent cameras

as well as serial and parallel ports

"some people" would have preferred something different - specifically a whole lot easier to use and less prone to malware. Almost no one claims to use more than ten percent of the functions of Word or Excel - hyperbolic cotangent anyone? The fact that people do not always want the same thing requires that companies build more than one thing - at least if there are any competitors to worry about. Microsoft's only real competitor was Apple and they were not much better. Their product - although easier to use and less prone to malware - was still only one version. It ran MS Office just like Windows. Notice that both companies dropped the easy to use and cheap or free versions of their office software - MS Works and Apple Works. They did have decent alternatives to the gargantuan MS Office but no more.

As we turn the corner toward mobile devices, my hope is that companies will not try to build the "perfect tablet" that meets the needs of everyone. If they do, it will include six card readers, firewire and USB connectors, a mouse, a keyboard with numeric keypad, SLR equivalent cameras (front and back), dual game controllers, as well as serial and parallel ports - hey some people still have that 1995 dot matrix printer to hook up. And of course it must run Excel, Word and PowerPoint using any remote device purchased since 1950.

In the case of tablets the smarter decision will be to either offer several models - one with and one without a keyboard - or one product that has options - such as docks we've used for years or the wireless keyboard approach on the iPad. The primary driving force for tablets is size, weight, convenience and ease of use. I'll be terribly disappointed if they evolve into dinosaurs as PCs have done. Adding layer upon layer of functionality was no problem with desktop computers - users could just buy bigger monitors so there was some place to see the actual words in their document. Ten inch screens, limited keyboards and slower processors that characterize tablets may finally reverse the trend away from mega-applications.

The new crop of ultrabooks notable for their lack of hard drive and optical drive but with the ability to run full versions of Windows or Mac OS represent another change in direction. They are distinguished not by new features but by features that are omitted - what a refreshing change. Now only if the next version of MS Office included a version of Word with five hundred commands rather than one thousand five hundred. The Apple iWork package may indicate the new direction for productivity software.

Who's Doing What in Tech Today

There are so many products, technologies and companies involved in the rapidly evolving tech market today, I thought it would be helpful to summarize some important facts in a simple table. I made a list of twenty-four products including computers and a variety of mobile devices and software - then added several service related factors such as shelf space and the cloud.

I created a table with eight leading vendors across the top to see how these vendors competed in the twenty-four areas. I think it's going to be difficult for companies to survive with only a handful of products - desktop PCs and laptops for example. You can click on the image below to enlarge the chart. Let me know what you think.

Why Were the Experts so Wrong about the iPad 2?

Right before the iPad 2 hit the stores March 11th most pundits said it was no big deal - a minor upgrade - and thought the demand would not rival the first version that came out eleven months earlier. They could not have been more wrong. Not only did the first shipments sell out within hours but there have been lines of people every morning at every Apple store waiting with baited breath for the next truck. How could the experts have been so wrong?

They tend to overestimate the interest and knowledge of the general public. They believe everyone has the time and inclination to hang on every tweet from every tech vendor and writer. Surprise, surprise most people have real jobs and a variety of interests besides computers. In spite of all the hype about the first iPad a year ago, few people really knew much about it on day one - from the basics of how would it actually work to the more important "is it really suitable for business?" Questions like these prevented the vast majority of people from purchasing the first iPad early in the cycle.

Along the way, three things happened. First, the positive reviews came in and the early adopters showed theirs off to anyone they could corner - friends and coworkers alike. This created the buzz and the associated "cool factor." Next, businesses began to experiment and found that it really was appropriate for many tasks involving their mobile workforce - storage of sales and technical documents for example. Finally, at the end of 2010 many people who decided to buy were advised to wait because the next version would have a camera - or maybe two cameras.

Consequently, when the iPad 2 became available there was a huge demand in spite of the experts suggestion that it was not a major improvement over the original. When you think about it, what would the "experts" have required for a major improvement? It is unlikely in my opinion that any new tablet from any vendor will be considered a major advance over the preceding tablet. Just like the succession of PCs over the last thirty years, each one will be a little faster or have a slightly better screen or camera. The fact that tablets are primarily touch screens with a processor and solid state storage makes improvements primarily a matter of new and upgraded apps. There's not much you can do with the basic tablet slab except speed it up and add a new I/O port or button. I certainly am not saying there will not be better tablets in the future; I'm just suggesting that few new versions will be considered major leaps forward.

Cool Camera Apps - Part 1

No subject gets more attention in my newsletter than the apps I review. (Note: in case you haven't heard - "app" is just another name for a program. The term evolved along with mobile technology but is now being used for full fledged PC/Mac software as well.)

I've been pleasantly surprised by how much I use my iPhone camera. It's certainly not a great camera but for many purposes it's "good enough" and, most important, I always have it with me. I divide camera apps into two categories
1) apps that are primarily associated with taking pictures (photography)
2) those that are mostly used for editing pictures (editing)
This distinction is not precise since many apps do a combination of the two. I base the distinction on the primary attributes of the app and what I generally use it for. Some apps modify still and/or video images as they are being taken; others operate on images from the library and some can do both. The following two apps cost 99 cents each.

For the photography apps, you can't beat QuickCam - often described as the camera app that should have come with the iPhone. For general purpose iPhone pictures, I've switched completely to Quickcam. It's easy to use and will start up and take pictures much faster than the standard Apple app. It has a rapid fire mode where you can touch and hold the camera button and take two pictures per second. While you are taking video, you can touch the camera button and take a still picture.

ToonCamera is another favorite. It works on both live and stored still and video images to create a cartoon effect by limiting the number of colors used. This picture of a fox taken in our back yard

Cartoon Fox - original shown in inset

shows the results. If you are familiar with the GIF image format, you get the same effect. GIF works great on art and drawings with a limited number of colors but produces the cartoon effect when used with photographs - like coloring with eight crayons!

Here's a quick list of other favorites in this category (many have free and paid versions)

Timelapse - Set your camera in a window and it can take pictures at regular intervals for a specified time. Then save the results and play them back as a movie - watch a flower grow!

ExternalCamera - Monitor the iPhone camera on your iPad - watch and listen to a sleeping baby or keep an eye on your front door.

CameraFun - Variety of special effects.

SneakyPix - Set the camera to take a series of pictures while you appear to be reading email or talking on the phone - that's sneaky.
CanScan - Use this camera app to snap a picture of a document and automatically rotate, crop and adjust the lighting for a perfect "scanned" document.

Tablet Typing can be Improved

Portable devices all suffer from inadequate keyboards - inadequate in that they do not allow rapid touch typing like the "real" keyboards we're all accustomed to. There are ways to speed things up including -

1. Autocorrect features are generally quite accurate and should be allowed to work. Backspacing and correcting errors is such a natural action we waste time making corrections that are already suggested by the software.
2. Apple iPad and iPhone users should use the special key actions such as swiping the period key to enter a quotation mark. Because space is limited, some keys are relegated to secondary keyboards so these special actions eliminate the need to switch keyboards. For more info on this subject including easy ways to enter special characters see this article.
3. Android users who master the Swype app can significantly speed up their routine typing by sliding a finger from character to character and allowing the software make corrections as they go. This brief description will show you how it works.

Luxury Hotels Go Paperless and Mobile

Starting in January, the iPad tablet replaced touch panels in every guest room at The Plaza Hotel in New York City, where it provides guest services and room controls. 

Guests of the Plaza can use the touch screen to order room service, contact the concierge (or make their own dinner reservations), and control their room’s lighting and climate, plus general web browsing. Another benefit is moving away from having a guest directory in the room. 

The paperless benefit of the iPad is also being pushed by The Forty 1 North Hotel Marina Resortin Newport, Rhode Island, which puts in-room iPads on its list of eco-conscious measures. 

Directories, menus, maps, and daily newspapers are all delivered paperlessly to guests using the iPad.
(from CNBC)

Comparing Apple and Android App Review Process

There are going to be hundreds of articles comparing Apple (iPad and iPhone) with the numerous Google Android tablets and phones. Two facts may be more important than any others

• Fact 1 - At the present, there are thousands of apps available for both the iPhone and Android phones. Right now there only a couple of Android tablets that run the version of the Operating System designed for tablets and there are about twenty apps available. There are 65 thousand iPad apps available.
• Fact 2 - Apple monitors all apps to make sure they are not harmful while Google does not. In fact the entire process of updating the Android OS is handled by the carriers - the phone companies. This would be like Microsoft having WalMart responsible for updating its software.

Read this excellent article to understand the ramifications of the second fact.

Mobile Operating Systems Galore

First a little history - Some of us are old enough to remember what life was like before Microsoft Windows dominated the world of desktop computing starting in the late 1980s. For the previous ten years there were a dozen or more hardware designs and operating systems including Radio Shack (Trash 80), Commodore (Pet), Sinclair, Franklin, Timex, Altair, Atari, Heathkit, Ohio Scientific and of course the venerable Apple II. None of these survived or thrived for more than a few years. Even Apple faded into the background for a long dark night.

We are today in the middle of a similar struggle involving mobile operating systems. Early leaders included Palm and Blackberry. Now the question is: How many products can survive in the long run. In particular which operating system(s) will dominate. Once that is decided, phone and tablet makers as well as carriers will fight to differentiate their devices - all based on one of the dominate operating systems. The OS competition today involves Google Android, Google Chrome, Apple iOS, HP WebOS, MS Windows Phone 7, MS Windows Mobile, MS Windows 8 (possibly) and RIM Blackberry OS. And you thought it was a two way race.

How did this turn out in the PC world when (almost) everyone used Windows and also used basically the same hardware? It turned into a price war and there were many casualties. Hundreds of small and large companies went into and out of the PC business in the last twenty years. Technology was a minor consideration - shelf space and advertising budgets were what mattered most. PCs became commodities which meant the death of companies and the death of innovation.

There is every reason to believe this will happen in the mobile field as well. It's an issue of software developers, shelf space and mindshare. Companies can only develop apps for a limited number of operating systems; retailers have room for only a few products in their stores; and consumers and companies cannot spend countless hours choosing between dozens of platforms.

Watch this space (and every other space) for ongoing discussion of this exciting topic as the Mobile Internet unfolds before us.

About time we named these new gadgets

For several years now we've called our most popular new gadgets Mobile Devices. That's a name only a geek could love. We have smartphones and tablets of all sizes and they all share common characteristics so it makes sense to name this group. I think they should be referred to as - drum roll - Companion Computers. First, they really are computers and should be identified that way. Some are used as phones but referring to them as phones misleads the public into thinking they are primarily phones - they are not. We've had desktop computers and laptop or portable computers so it makes sense to use the word computer here as well. In fact, some survey organizations are now including iPads in computer sales statistics as I believe they should.

Companion has two meanings. First, many of these new devices will be with us constantly and will be our companions. Certainly smartphones and the smaller tablets - think smartphones without a phone - will be in our pockets, our bags and our cars. Larger tablets can be taken and used everywhere much more easily than "traditional" computers. Second, these computers will also be companions for our desktop and portable computers. They will not replace them in the near future and will coexist peacefully and perform whatever tasks each one does best.

I'd certainly like to hear what you think - other nominations are welcome.

Meet my friend the queen!

Here's a less than enthusiastic report on social media - and a really fun read by Glyn Meek in Computerworld.

"I saw a while ago that even the Queen of England now has an 'official' Facebook page! What is she going to show, "me and Phil with the grandkids at Buck House?" or "Snapshots of Christmas at Balmoral?"

In The Book of Revelations Chapter 23, verses 12-13, is written the following…
12 And it came to pass that the eighth and final sign was the Queen sending forth her messengers to the people with all manner of tidings.
13 Many rent their garments and tore their hair at this sign of evil that the common people should know their rulers in such detail, and a plague was upon the land."
(full report).

How many was that again?

It's generally claimed but probably not true that IBM president Tom Watson said the world would need five computers. In 1980 many people thought the world needed just over four billion Internet addresses - wrong again! We know they believed this because that's how it was designed. All Internet addresses are numbers. The addresses we use - www.Braley.com for example - are immediately translated into a number (the real address of the site) before they are sent whizzing off to their destination. Imagine that you were setting up the records for a small town and decided to record every resident using a three digit number - after all it was a small town. Of course when person number 1,000 moves in, you have a problem.

That's exactly the predicament faced by the Internet - the 4.2+ billion Internet addresses are almost used up. People have seen this coming for a long time and created a new addressing system  that will be phased in over several years. Internet addresses are called IP addresses for Internet Protocol. The current version is IPv4 and the new version will be IPv6. IPv4 addresses consist of a 32 bit string of zeros and ones - bits. IPv6 will be 128 bits long. Keep in mind that every bit you add doubles the size of the maximum number. The fact that everything from cell phones to printers and refrigerators may get an IP addressed assigned in the future is no cause to worry since a 128 bit address is inconceivably large - a 4 followed by 38 zeros - just shy of a duodecilion!

What's a TinyURL anyway?

Internet addresses often look like "tinyurl.com/abdef". TinyURL.com is a web site that changes long web addresses (URLs) into short ones. TinyURL.com looks like this

You can type or paste a URL into the first box. You may enter a "vanity URL" in the lower box. The vanity URL is one that is unlikely to represent an existing address. Here's an example using the address of my November newsletter. The actual address is:

http://app.e2ma.net/app2/campaigns/archived/1402118/04524839befdceac7d3801bfcf3f7292/

Since the vanity address (Braley012) has not been used, TinyURL provided the following short vanity address

You can now use www.tinyurl/Braley012 in place of the longer original version. NOTE: The first part of a web address - up to the first slash following the .com, .edu, etc. is NOT case sensitive. Anything following that slash may be case sensitive.

TinyURL is not the only game in town. You might also check out

goo.gl, is.gd, kxk.me, tiny.cc. bit.ly or tr.im

The shortened URL is an intermediary web page set up by the shortening service. When you click to go there, you are immediately redirected to the desired page (with the original longer address.) For more information go to http://bit.ly/9g6sth

Internet based TV - are you ready to cut the cable or dump the dish?

Imagine sitting with a tablet computer such as the iPad on the table or in your lap and doing the following things: 1) Write a blog entry, 2) Use the iPad Remote App to turn on your Apple TV, 3) Then use the same app to select some Christmas music from your PC or MAC to play through the TV, 4) Select photos from your computer library to display on the TV while the music is playing, 4) Continue working on the blog, reading email or the news and checking the weather, sports scores or traffic.

You don't need to imagine any longer; that's what I just did while working on this blog post. I've seen the future and it is Internet TV. Both Google and Apple are plunging full speed ahead in this exploding field. This really is the next big thing. Since the Apple TV is reasonably easy to understand I'll explain how it works.

What is the Apple TV? It's a very small computer that comes without a monitor, keyboard or mouse. It costs $99US and requires a $20US cable to connect to the HDMI port on a digital TV. It will not work on old TVs. To use it, you go through a set up process like any new computer - enter settings to add it to your wireless network, access your Netflix account, iTunes account, etc. This is all accomplished using the Apple TV remote control. Finding your account passwords may be the most difficult part.

Once it's set up, you can use the tiny remote or the Remote App on an iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch to do dozens of incredible things.
> View Netflix movies
> Choose from thousands of free podcasts
> Rent movies and download music through iTunes
> Stream music, video and photo shows from any PC or MAC on your network to your TV.
Here are a few screen shots to show the simple on screen menu.

The Apple TV is a general purpose computer that comes with a set of programs (apps) to handle this type of home media application. I'm sure within a year you will be able to download additional apps for other tasks from an Apple TV app store. Starting January 6, 2011 that's one way you will purchase and install software for MAC computers - not just iPads and iPhones. 2010 will be remembered as the year the Mobile Revolution began and 2011 will be the year of The Internet TV thanks to Apple and Google.

Favorite Apps - My Brand New List Is Here!

The Twitterverse is full of requests from new iPad users for app suggestions. NOTE: an "app" is just the new name for a program. Since there are over 300,000 apps (programs) available you can see why a newbie might be overwhelmed. I certainly haven't tried them all but I have used over 400 on both the iPad and the iPhone. Remember iPhone apps will work on the iPad; they will just use a small portion of the screen and will resemble the iPhone display. Of course most iPhone apps will also work on the iPod Touch. In many cases a company will provide two versions - one for the iPhone/iPod Touch and one that takes advantage of the large screen on the iPad. Many newspapers do this.

So - what do I like?

Travel

• The built-in Maps - for navigation and traffic displays
• Beat The Traffic - large screen version for the iPad
• GPS Drive - locating coffee shops, etc.

Voice Input

• Dragon Search - I use this for Google searches even when I'm at my computer
• Dragon Dictate - tiny keyboards be gone! it's time to talk
• Vlingo is the current alternative but I have not used it

Photo Editing (one of  my favorite hobbies!) - The iPad doesn't have a camera but editing on the large screen is fantastic

• Photo Delight - a wonderful and easy to use special effect app
• Alien Booth - a simple version of iMac Photo Booth
• Transfer - to move photos wirelessly between iPad, iPhone and iMac.
• Filterstorm
• Photogene
• Framed! - you'll love this one
• Imikimi
• Fingerdesign
• CameraFun
• ToonCamera - can't wait for the video version
• iFlashReady - compensates for the lack of flash on early iPhones (before version 4)
• dpReview - digital photography review site

News and Weather

• Fluent News - aggregates news from a variety of sources
• SkyGrid - similar to Fluent News but more organized
• Dozens of other general, technical and political news sites
• Built-in weather app
• The Weather Channel
• ESPN - for all things sports

Calendar, Contacts, Etc.

• The built in Calendar and Contact apps are integrated across platforms and the web
• Bento - this easy to use Filemaker lite database greatly improves on the standard contact app and integrates with it
• W&Y Pages - White and Yellow Pages
• MobileMe - a service that has apps for syncing contacts and calendars
• Bump - moves contact info, calendar dates and other information between Apple and Android devices - by bumping them together - you have to see it to believe it.

Presentation

• Keynote - a version of the Mac program
• Picture Frame - built in iPad photo display app

Reference

• World Atlas - National Geographic
• US Documents - text of 100 important documents from the Constitution to the Louisiana Purchase Treaty and the Gettysburg Address
• Dictionary.com
• MyConvert - thousands of conversation factors - just fun to try - did you know there were 12,152.23312 cubits in a league!

Entertainment

• Netflix - Watch movies on your iPad or stream them wirelessly to TV
• IMDb - movie database
• TV Guide
• YouTube
• Movie Vault - free movies
• Pandora - music
• Flip Clock - radio
• Several dedicated radio station apps

Stock Market

• Stocks - Built in iPhone app
• QFolio HD - A powerful iPad app

Apps for finding Apps - you'll need these!

• BestAppSite
• AppAdvice

Miscellaneous

• FlightAware - flight tracking
• Big Tipper - calculate tips and split restaurant bills
• World Clock - display clocks for numerous locations of your choice.
• TweetDeck and Twitter - for Tweeting
• Sketchbook Pro - drawing and painting
• Dropbox - file exchange

New tablets: all sizes including extra large!

Many companies are coming out with devices to compete with Apple's iPad and most of them are small with 5-7 inch screens. The iPad is 9.7 inches. Since these are diagonal measurements a 7 inch screen is a little less than half the size of the iPad. One company, however, has gone to the opposite extreme and will be releasing a 14.1 inch dual screen whopper. It will open like a book and is intended for the education market. The company, Kno, has partnered with a number of content providers to deliver textbooks for the device, including McGraw Hill, Pearson, Random House and Macmillan.

iPad comparisons are inevitable and this one has a much larger screen, a higher price and it's heavier. A single screen version will be available. The dual screen model will weigh 5.5 pounds and sell for $899 and the single screen version will weigh half as much and sell for $599. They will have touch screens but also feature pen/stylus input for making notes and marking up text. Weight would seem to be the biggest drawback since the dual screen model will be heavier than many laptops. Click here to read more.

Sign of the times: US News and World Report dropping print subscriptions

US News and World Report has been one of the three major news magazines for years. Once a weekly publication, they switched to bi-weekly in 2008 and six months later became a monthly publication. Now in another major change they are dropping subscription based printed copies and will go mostly online. They will still offer newsstand printed copies but it remains to be seen how long that will last. This is another step in the gradual but inevitable conversion to the all digital news world.

Decisions, decisions: which gadget should I buy?

You probably won't be forced to choose between a tablet or ereader or make other similar difficult decisions very much longer. One reason, of course, is that their capabilities are being merged in ways that may make a single device suitable for many uses - but that is not the main reason you'll avoid these agonizing choices. With all the uses for this versatile crop of new devices, it's very likely you'll have more than one. We certainly have numerous magazines and books on hand not to mention newspapers. If tablets, ereaders and smartphones become universal tools, a family will most likely have several.

After all, it's not uncommon to have multiple PCs in the house; it often makes sense to keep an older machine when upgrading since they have little resale value and work quite well at common tasks. Of course students regularly use computers for homework and the competition for "the computer" can get fierce in the evening.

It's important to note that we are in the early stages of the Mobile Revolution and dozens of different shapes and sizes of devices will come out soon. Distinguishing between tablets and smartphones will become increasingly difficult and naming conventions will evolve rapidly.

In any case, it is quite likely that a variety of tablets and other mobile devices will be used to replace collections of books, magazines and other publications. No matter how much we enjoy the feel of a "real book", we will rely increasingly on electronic means for much of our information and that means more electronic devices will be needed for access.