As other manufacturers respond to the iPad, Viziononline hunted out some of the better “iTernatives” out there, and also made a promise to readers stop thinking up any more iPuns!

Being a world first, from Apple, the iPad was never going to be a flop. Being Apple though, it was also going to be copied and improved upon – and just before Apple fans start snorting with derision about the concept it can be improved, just think back to how long it took the iPhone OS to enable copy and paste capability, a function that all other smartphones had for years before..

Our tip for the unlikely outsider to watch is the Samsung Galaxy Tab which has form, function and style in equal measure. Whilst no official pricing is out from Samsung yet, leaks of retail pricing suggests it could be more expensive than the iPad. Have Samsung gone mad? Probably not, because it runs Android, which is fast becoming the OS of choice for the tech community – the same community who like to distance themselves from Apple and won’t mind paying a premium. It also comes with built in 3G meaning internet and apps everywhere you get a phone signal..

Need something more main-stream, running Windows? Fear not, our tip here is the HP Slate, which once out of prototype phase will be running Windows 7. Not as stylish as either of the above, but big name PC brand HP + tablet formfactor + Windows 7 = guaranteed seller.

Another one to watch is from the people who started the ‘netbook’ trend, ASUS with their Eee Pad also running Android. ASUS expects to ship at least 300,000 Eee Pads by the end of 2010 – ambitious numbers, but they did it before with netbooks and T91/T101 tablet models.

The good news is, whatever your persuasion here – Applephile, or Applephobe, there is something out there for everyone. Phew!

Vizion thought it about time to sum up what’s going on currently with the undisputed king of social networking.

How big?

With 250 billion pageviews a month, FB is bigger than Yahoo which boasts ‘only’ 96  billion (remember these are American billions, not UK ones which have one more zero). Site rank people Alexa.com rate Facebook as the world’s 2nd largest site; 1 behind Google and one ahead of YouTube who are in at number 3. Not bad for a site launched in Feb 2004..

Next development?

As hinted out in the last Vizion blog, Facebook and geolocation technology have been courting each other in the form of 8 months of development of “Facebook places”.  Simply ‘check in’ on your mobile phone and FB Places will tell the world where you physically are. Great for finding out if someone you know is at the same concert or nightclub, and perfect for stalkers everywhere. Expect excitement and privacy fears in equal measure as Places gets rolled out globally.

FB places is initially only available in the US, but geeky rumours abound the techier parts of the internet about it being briefly ‘leaked’ to Toronto in Canada (denied by Facebook and soon shut down), and Places ‘trails’ of founder Mark Zuckergberg visiting our very own London.

Facebook quirk?

Talking of boss Zuckerberg, remember that if you have befriended him, blockzuck.com has pointed out you block anyone except him. If you try to block him you’ll get a message saying “General Block failed error: Block failed.” Maybe safest not to befriend him in the first place then..

Facebook’s future?

Vizion’s prediction is that the FB future is both app-tastic (see appbistro.com for examples of a miriad of plugins) and that Facebook Places will explode as its rolled out in key markets like the UK. Alas there will be inevitable issues with users being over zealous with publishing their exact location and attracting unwanted attention, but on the upside Facebook plus geolocation will make the world even smaller than it is now..

As TV and blu-ray device manufacturers quietly back-pedal on “3D enabled” technology, 2010 is shaping up to be about TV with web-based ‘apps’ instead. Shiny “3D ready” stickers and might sell a few of these devices, but the main vendors now seem to have cottoned-on to copying the Apple/Blackberry “app store” model, for extra features and revenue.

Not that this is a bad thing. Every time two big technologies converge, the world gets more exciting; think how the world changed when wheels met the engine, mobile phones mated with video cameras, or as currently: social networking is finding geolocation..

Samsung’s offering is “Internet@TV”.  All you need is a network cable to connect your TV and broadband modem (or Samsung dongle) and the main apps delivered straight to your stylish flat-panel TV are: LoveFIlm, BBC iPlayer, YouTube, Skype for video calls, Twitter and Betfair gambling.

Panasonic’s Viera Cast launched in 2009 with “leading content providers” such as YouTube, Google Picasa, Eurosport, Bloomberg for financial news, and local weather information. Since then they’ve added, Skype, YouTube and Twitter.

Sony still pushes 3D technology above its TV-delivered web widgets on the Bravia range but does have content from the usual suspects: YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and some unlikely ‘addons’ like Yahoo News and Weather – although for most of us, news and weather on TV isn’t exactly cutting edge any more..

Approaching things from the opposite angle is Google TV which aims to squeeze out set-top boxes and unify search across web, TV and PVR (personal video recorders – like a Sky+ box), although the Wall St Journal suggest Google is having a hard time convincing the main US broadcasters to hop on board, because they are all worried Google will cannibalise their business like Google Adwords and spoilt the party for the traditional advertising industry.

Remember not everything Google touches turns to gold (they quietly phase out then drop the failures), so don’t count on Google TV just yet – but at least in the mean time, you can have the net on your TV and TV on the net!

External links:

Samsung internet@tv

Panasonic Viera Cast in 2010

Google TV

The innovative wii controller opened up a new market for games consoles when it revolutionised things back in 2006. Since then, gamers of new ages, demographics and backgrounds to the usual 15-25 year old male profile have been gaming, waving their arms around and looking silly in equal measure.

Microsoft have recently taken the next step though, in the form of “Kinect”.  With Kinect for the xbox 360, you don’t need to hold a controller, you are the controller.

Once ‘connected’ (don’t worry, it isn’t painful!), your entire body is observed by your Kinect device, and all your limb movements translated onto the screen. Luckily the Kinect device doesn’t need sensors on your forehead or some sort of human USB port – it sits above or below your TV, and has no wires other than those to connect it to your xbox 360. Inside the Kinect are an RGB camera for facial recognition and video capture, depth sensor (an infrared projector plus a 2nd monochrome camera) to track your movements and, microphones for voice recognition. It also has a motor to rotate the device quietly if needed.

Unlike first thought, this isn’t just a wii clone. There are games for young females (Kinectimals) and groups (Kinect Adventurous & Kinect Sports) but later, the hard-core gamers market will be served too.  For those who want to go on shooting rampages around virtual apocalyptic  worlds, Metal Gear Solid and Star Wars Kinect games are already in development. Good news for teenage boys then..

According to some guy in the US called Mr Spielberg, “This is a pivotal moment”, which Microsoft seem to think is a good enough quote to put on their official xbox 360/Kinect site (http://www.xbox.com/en-GB/kinect).  Whoever he is, Vizion Online can’t help wondering when such technology will enable us to interact with web content – and hopes it will be soon. The only other question is will Kinect gamers look more or less ridiculous than wii users as they play?!

Amazon have released a new version of their e-book reader – the Kindle. The slimed down, lighter and faster machine will be available in a 3G or wi-fi versions each competitively priced. It seems that Amazon are sure that the future of books lies in the digital realm rather than the traditional printed form and indeed claim that it sells 180 kindle books for every 100 hardcover books (it would be interesting to see how many e-books are sold in straight comparison to books of any format)

Kindle face strong competition from Apple’s iPad and whereas apple are happy to laud their sales figures around, Amazon are a little more coy. The phenomenal success of the iPad is, of course, due to the iPad being much more than just an e-book reader and this is reflected in it’s cost (nearly three times that of a Kindle) but as sales increase for the iPad, the price is sure to come down.

The Kindle is not alone in the ’standard’ e-book reader field though, there’s the Sony Touch and Iliad to name but two. Interestingly there’s likely to be more competition from India. The Indian government have been working on a ‘$35′ touch screen computer and showed a prototype which runs the Linux operating system, has built in video conferencing, word processing and web browser. It can even run from a solar panel. Without internal storage it uses ‘cloud’ technology to store data on secure servers, rather than on the machine itself.

It’s hard to see how dedicated e-book readers can stand up to the competition in the coming years, it might just be, however, that their simplicity is their strength in that they do one job very well.

For us, there’s nothing like a real book though it’s an object that we love to hold, feel, browse and treasure. Then again we said that about vinyl records and now our music collection is virtual, on Spotify … so who knows what will happen to all those books!

For more information on Amazon’s Kindle: click here

For information on the Indian Touch Screen computer: click here.