Memex 1.1

In my garden. Sunday evening.

This has to be a clever in-joke, doesn’t it? I mean, to put such a typo in the heading of the obit of the paper’s most fastidious copy editor, ever.

The phrase “it isn’t rocket science” has become such a cliche that I eventually began to wonder what it meant. What is rocket science? And is it really so difficult?

The answer to the first question was provided by my esteemed colleague Tony Nixon, who is a physicist and knows about these things. “Wait here”, he said, and reappeared a few minutes later brandishing his copy of Space Dynamics, Volume 1 by Prof. Ir. Dr. J.M.J. Kooy, opened at the page which gives the equations for “powered flight of rocket through terrestrial atmosphere with prescribed thrust direction as a function of time, considered as a system of reference rotating with the earth”. So here, in summary form, is the central piece of knowledge of ‘rocket science’.

Nothing to it, eh? Wouldn’t it be nice if everything could be summarised so succinctly.

… but it still comes with a battery that users cannot replace. This from TimesOnline:

News that Apple has upgraded the iPhone ahead of its US launch next Friday (June 29) helped add $2 billion (£1 billion) to the market value of the company in early trade today.

In a statement that seemed designed to counter mounting fears that the iPhone would be hampered by a lacklustre power supply, Apple said that the finished gadget will feature up to eight hours of talk time, six hours of internet use, seven hours of video playback or 24 hours of audio playback.

Previously Apple had specified five hours of talk time – though some technology commentators had put the figure as low as 40 minutes.

The device, already dubbed “The God Machine” by Apple aficionados, will also feature up to 250 hours – or more than 10 days – of standby time, the company claimed.

The news helped send the shares up more than 2 per cent in New York.

The company added that the entire top surface of the iPhone has been upgraded from plastic to optical-quality glass “to achieve a superior level of scratch resistance and optical clarity”.

Stock markets are such funny organisms. Deeply erratic. Like elderly maiden aunts.

Apple’s news release here. Good Morning Silicon Valley reports a survey which claims that 19 million Americans are ‘seriously considering’ buying an iPhone. I guess they’re also the people who believe in Intelligent Design.

Well, maybe. here’s today’s New York Times take on it…

“We have to make sure our old users stay with us, but we’re going to be more bold around product changes than we’ve been in the past,” Ms. Whitman said in an interview last week in Boston at eBay Live, an annual conference for the site’s sellers. “I think people expect more from eBay.”

Certainly, analysts do. As the company has expanded beyond its auctions business into Internet telephone service (with its acquisition of Skype), event ticketing (with StubHub) and comparison shopping (with Shopping.com), auction volume has slowed considerably from years past. As of early this month, the volume of eBay’s United States listings was down by 3.8 percent compared with a year earlier, according to Citigroup.

Analysts said sellers were moving to other places on the Web in search of buyers who had grown weary of an overwhelming array of product choices on eBay.

“You could go to the site looking for Star Wars items and get the same results as you’d have had in 1999 — a thousand results all sorted by what auction is closing first,” said Mark Mahaney, an analyst with Citigroup. “Are you looking for a Star Wars pendant? Poster? DVD? It doesn’t matter. You’ll see everything.”

Ms. Whitman said that chief among the changes was a new home page design. The company is testing simplified layouts that are less likely to confuse shoppers than the old version, which analysts said was among the most cluttered in the e-commerce industry…

Lorcan Dempsey (whom God preserve) posted a link to Dave Winer’s perceptive comment on deficiencies in the options Facebook allows when responding to a request for ‘friendship’. I’m likewise dissatisfied by the limited set of options available for explaining why one is friendly with a given person. If Dave Winer requested my friendship I’d gladly confirm, but my reasons for doing so (I’m a long-term admirer of his work and courage, a former user of his software — Userland blogging tools and the wonderful More! outliner — and someone who was relieved that he survived his health scare some years ago, etc.) are not permitted by the check-boxes provided by Facebook.

Another deficiency is that one can only respond to a request for ‘friendship’ by accepting, rejecting or sending a message to the person. I don’t feel like sending messages to total strangers saying, effectively, “do I know you?” A richer repertoire of responses is needed!