On February 24, 1955, Steve Jobs was born in San Francisco. Some years later, he and Steve Wozniak created Apple, Inc and the world was changed forever. Wherever you are Steve, thank you for the innovation and for inspiring us all. Happy Birthday!
Archive for the ‘iPad’ Tag
Happy Birthday Steve Jobs
Are You Recycling Your Electronics This Year?
Christmas is finally over and you’ve mastered that new mobile device, Blu-ray player, wide-screen TV, or whatever other electronic piece of equipment you found under the tree. Now, somewhere tucked away in the garage or a closet is all the antiquated electronics stacked in a precarious pile that seems to grow every year. If it’s like my pile, then it’s time to do something about it.
Recently, I moved which gave me the opportunity to go through my ever-growing pile of electronic and clean house. I still had several Compaq DeskPro 4000s which are probably over ten years old, a few laser printers, some old digital cameras, and a DVD player or two, not to mention the few boxes of spare parts and small items. I had to do something. I didn’t want to carry all this old junk with me to my new house.
Unfortunately, I was unable to re-gift any of my electronics, they were just too old. However, if your equipment is still in usable and fair condition, it might be worth it to hand it off to someone else in your household or a relative to extend its life. My sister often replaces items before their lifecycle is complete, giving them to other members of her family. Her children have laptops, iPads, and iPhones that were once hers.
It use to cost to have your electronic recycled but because of the money to be made and newer technologies that separate the materials more effectively, most recycling organizations and companies are doing it for free now. Some companies have drop-off points where you can take your electronics and some offer free pick-up. Free pick-up is great for businesses that have large quantities, especially after a recent hardware refresh. There are also many organizations that offer monthly or special occasion recycling. Churches, schools, and waste disposal companies often have electronics recycling days.
Printer cartridges, like batteries often find their way into the trash because they are small. Unfortunately, the chemicals left in them and the plastic used to make them not good for our landfills. So if you are near an Office Depot or a Staples, they both offer printer cartridge recycling. Just bring in your old cartridges when you are purchasing your new ones and get $2.00 on your reward card. Office Depot also gives you a free pre-paid mailing label to send in your old toner cartridges. Staples allows you to bring in your old rechargeable batteries.
Recycling responsibly is more important than ever. We urge you to recycle your electronics for a safer and cleaner environment.
Here is a small list of electronics recycling resources for you.
http://www.allgreenrecycling.com/
http://earth911.com/recycling/electronics/
http://www.electronicsrecycling.org/Public/default.aspx
Related articles
- Are You Doing Your Part To Recycle? (wdok.radio.com)
- The Gadget Afterlife: Sell, Donate or Recycle Old Electronics (blogher.com)
Microsoft Office on iPad?
Yes, it’s true, or so says the rumor, I’m still waiting for the rapture, but that’s another story entirely. According to The Daily’s Matt Hickey in an article posted on November 29, 2011, and several articles and posts referring to his Matt’s post, Microsoft is working on a version of its popular Office suite for use on the iPad, as well as an updated version of Office for OS X Lion. If rumors are true, Microsoft would release the Mac version at the end of 2012 and the iPad version possibly sooner.
Although, Microsoft has several apps on iPhone and iPad, none would be as useful as MSOffice which have been missing from both devices since their releases. Realistically, this is an untapped market for Microsoft which could bring huge amounts of additional revenue as MS Office has been the dominating office suite since it toppled WordPerfect. Remember them? If Microsoft uses the same price point of $9.99 each as Apple does for its office suite for iPad, Keynote, Pages, and Numbers, then the software giant could realistically make a killing selling Word, Excel, and Publisher in Apple’s App store.
What does this actually mean? Well for business this puts the powerful MS Office suite on a device that is becoming more popular in offices, schools, and even on the road. This lack of MS Office has either kept businesses from using the iPad or searching for expensive third-party apps that let you make changes to and save files such as Word or Excel. If Microsoft actually does release MS Office for iPad, this changes everything. Businesses running a Windows Enterprise environment will have the added power and portability that the iPad tablet offers with the combined productivity and functionality MS Office gives. This could truly be a marriage made in heaven as businesses begin to adopt this technology combination strategy.
Strangely enough, putting MS Office on the iPad could help save Microsoft, especially if Windows 8 fails to perform as hoped. MS Office has traditionally been Microsoft’s bread winner with the Windows operating system pulling in second in their revenue. Not that Microsoft will fall apart, but a Windows 8 fail could definitely hurt them. Adding MS Office to the iPad and iPhone would surely raise their revenue.
As a writer and blogger, and for personal use, this would raise my productivity tenfold. Generally, I’m sitting down at my desktop (yes, I still have one,) or using my laptop, which has become a clumsy big device that I no longer want to carry around anymore. I love the portability of the iPad and its simplistic ease of use but it’s not efficient to write with. When I do write on my iPad, each article must be written on a third-party app, transferred via Dropbox, copied into a Word file, proofed, then saved and posted. Using MS Word and saving directly to my SkyDrive would certainly streamline things a bit.
I’m hoping this rumor is true. I could see the benefits businesses and personal users would gain from having MS Office on their iPads. What’s you take on it? Do you use Microsoft Office? Would you purchase the iPad version?
View Matt Hickey’s article: http://www.thedaily.com/page/2011/11/29/112911-tech-news-ms-ipad/
Related articles
- Microsoft Office Is Apparently Coming To The iPad (gizmodo.com.au)
- Microsoft Office Heading to the iPad? (socialtimes.com)
- Is Microsoft Office coming to Apple’s iPad? (latimesblogs.latimes.com)
- Microsoft Office for iPad in pipeline claim insiders (slashgear.com)
- Microsoft reportedly readying Office for the iPad (news.cnet.com)
Scott
TecWhat? 
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