Musings

I’ve noticed in the past few months many people using netbooks. I define them as the ones that Nicholas Negroponte first came out with as UMPC – ultra mobile PCs – with a 6 inch screen. The size has in the last 18 months changed from 6- to 10- to 12-inch screens.

Made popular by Asus and Acer, these netbooks were touted to be good for surfing, emailing and maybe skyping and little else. It’s just too small to work on it for a long time. I just find the shoulders would be too pinched from having to hold your hands close together to type on the small keyboard.

Increasingly, I’ve seen a lot of kids using them, not for school work but for viewing YouTube video clips and movies. Mothers would leave the kids with the netbook in McDonalds or a cafe and go off and do their errands or supermarketing. The kids would access Youtube or watch the movie that’s been downloaded into the netbook. Not a bad idea.

There’re quite a few nice ones on the market. I’m attracted to the Sony Vaio which are really nice and cool. But I’ve no reason to buy one. In today’s tough times, better to have cash in pocket.

• An iPod shuffle that talks?
• Reserve a restaurant by sending a text
• My last Macworld
• helsinki
• Bonding with dogs