Computer Support Blog

Sometimes, the best ideas come from the ashes of a previous idea that simply did not work out.  When ZeptoLabs began making computer games, the chief programmer worked very hard on a physics software engine.  That engine was programmed to realistically mimic how objects fell based upon a player cutting the ropes that suspended the object.  ZeptoLabs went with a different game mechanic for their first release, Parachute Ninja.  However, the programmer who worked on the initial version of the game thought there might be a way to use that game engine.  That tenacious programmer was Efim Voinov! Read more »

As more and more technology purchased and used in the United States is manufactured in China and China has one of the world’s few growing economies, relations between the United States and China are especially important.  While there are numerous government organizations and individuals that negotiate trade and commerce between the United States and China, there are very few people who are truly considered experts on trade and commerce with China.  One of the most important voices in advising both China and the United States on investing is Jing Ulrich. Read more »

With the 2012 election cycle heating up, more and more voters will be hearing about lobbyists and corporate influence in Washington, D.C.  Every industry has lobbyists, including the technology sector.  Few companies, however, keep their lobbyists in prominent positions.  Comcast Corporation, the nation’s largest cable, communications and entertainment company, keeps their principle lobbyist as one of their corporate executives!  Her name is Melissa Maxfield.

Melissa Maxfield’s official title is Senior Vice President of Federal Government Affairs for Comcast.  Comcast, as a large communications company, has a keen interest in legislation involving copyright protection, Internet distribution and manufacturing relationships with subcontractors in foreign countries.  In order to ensure that Comcast’s interests are respected and existing laws are enforced, Melissa Maxfield spends much of her time for Comcast in Washington, D.C.

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Since the fall of Napster, many legitimate digital music companies have sprouted up.  One of the most successful so far has been Spotify.  Spotify has a partnership with Facebook which allowed the company to easily promote its service and provide Facebook users with hours of free digital music each month.  The partnership between Spotify and Facebook was a great strategic move for Spotify; the digital music company attributes three million new subscribers to the Facebook connection.  Spotify is looking to build upon that by growth by spreading a similar Spotify widget throughout the Internet. Read more »

As mobile computing devices like smartphones and tablet computers begin to dominate the electronics market, an entire generation of media enthusiasts is being marginalized.  The consumers who popularize listening to music on mp3 players and watching movies on tiny screens streamed from The Cloud are eroding the high standards producers of movies, music and quality television have when they pour their hearts into their work.  Fortunately, there are still those who are interested in immersing themselves in great music or the full movie experience.  For those consumers, there are giant-screen high definition televisions and Blu-Ray players.  For their sound system, there is the Bowers & Wilkins MT-60D Mini Theatre System.

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There are some truly incredible minds working in academia today.  The best teachers can inspire the next generation and help change the world by providing the fundamentals of their given field to their successors.  But only the most jaded people actually believe the unfortunate adage “those who can’t, teach.”  In fact, some of the very best educators lead by example and continue their professional development by excelling in their field while teaching.  Louis McPhee is one such educator and his latest invention, a medical robot, may well change the world.

An assistant professor at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, Louis Phee is able to translate simple ideas into complex, working technologies.  Louis Phee is credited with the design of a new medical robot based upon a crab!  When Lawrence Ho mentioned to Phee that cancer extraction would be much easier using a crab, over a crab dinner, Phee explored the possibility of taking that outlandish idea and making it into a reality.  Louis Phee and Lawrence Ho worked together to create a surgical robot designed like a crab that is now treating cancer in the esophagus!

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There are few CEOs whose personal story is as interesting as the biography of Jason Hsuan.  Abandoned as a child in China, the Chinese government sent Jason Hsuan to a labor camp where he toiled from ages fifteen to eighteen.  When he became ill from tuberculosis, Hsuan was deported to Taiwan to be with his remaining family.  While that sort of hardship might crush a lesser man, Jason Hsuan used the experience to grow, learn and develop his corporate philosophy.  Now, Dr. Jason Hsuan is the CEO and Chairman of TPV Technology Limited, the world’s largest manufacturer of computer monitors!

Despite having spent three years in a labor camp, which robbed him of educational opportunities and was largely dehumanizing, Jason Hsuan lifted himself up.  Once in Taiwan, Hsuan began working to improve his lot in life.  While he worked for six years at General Electric, he saw it as his duty to go help his father when the Taiwan Pepsi Cola branch suffered a severe economic downturn.  Hsuan prioritized his family and went to work for Pepsi, serving as a Vice President of the Taiwan branch.  That sense of responsibility served Jason Hsuan exceptionally well when he came to the United States to pursue his education.  At Boston University, Hsuan earned his Master’s in Systems Engineering.  After earning his Master’s, Jason Hsuan went to the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn where he applied his talents to getting his Ph.D. in Systems Engineering.

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The popularity of Glee has made the music term “mash-up” a household phrase.  In case, however, you aren’t into that trend, a mash-up is when a music producer combines two songs that are not inherently alike, but share a similar characteristic either musically or thematically.  In the entertainment and corporate worlds, mergers often act like mash-ups and they have been occurring with increasing frequency over the last decade.  One of the most peculiar mergers came when Disney purchased Marvel Entertainment in 2009.  Marvel Entertainment is the parent company that oversees Marvel Comics, Marvel Studios and Marvel Digital Enterprises.  Since the buyout, Disney has been making a lot of money off Marvel, especially through summer blockbuster films like Iron Man 2 and Captain America: The First Avenger.

But fans of Marvel Entertainment’s projects have been waiting for something substantive and new to come out of the Disney buyout for years.  Marvel Studios, for example, had all subsequent projects through this summer’s The Avengers in pre-production when Disney bought Marvel Entertainment.  Finally, the results are evident and Avengers Alliance embodies just what the buyout might mean for Marvel fans.  Avengers Alliance is a new video game for Facebook produced by Playdom.

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The Internet has become a free-speech battleground.  On the one side of the argument are people who believe that Freedom Of Speech is an absolute and information should be freely disseminated.  On the other side of the argument are those who see copyright protections as essential to protecting intellectual property rights.  While the Internet has enflamed this old argument, it also provides many remedies to the conflicting philosophies.  One of the remedies is to make clear exactly what is available for free use without any copyright protections.  For people who wish to avail themselves of works that are in the public domain, there is Public Domain Sherpa.

Public Domain Sherpa is a guide to all things that you may find on the Internet for public use.  “Public domain” is a term in copyright law that refers to a work – be it a song, story, film, book, photograph or other work that usually could be copyright protected – for which there is no copyright owner.  That means that items that are “in the public domain” may be used by artists, publishers or in any other medium freely.  There is no one you would have to pay royalties to in order to use an object in the public domain.  Because works on the Internet may not be properly annotated with the copyright information, and ignorance is no excuse in the eyes of the law, you might need a guide online to what is in the public domain.  That is where Public Domain Sherpa comes in!

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Have you ever watched a television show and thought an actor or actress looked familiar, but could not quite place them?  Have you ever watched an amazing movie and instantly wanted to watch everything else that director had ever filmed?  Have you ever needed to settle a bet involving the identity of an obscure character actor?  On the Internet, there is a single source for answers to all questions involving television and movies and that is the Internet Movie Database.

The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) is the world’s most comprehensive site for all things pertaining to film, television and (increasingly) video games, at least as it pertains to work done by legitimate actors, directors, producers and writers.  The IMDb is a powerful tool that contains both the latest legitimate news about all things in the filmed arts as well as massive archives of the body of work of everyone who has ever worked in film in the United States, Canada, and United Kingdom.  The IMDb has extensive reservoirs of information for Japanese, Chinese and Indian works as well.

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