Things are looking up for Google Glass

GoogleGlassRemember when Bluetooth phone headsets came along and suddenly there were all these people loudly talking to themselves in public? Schizoid behavior became, if not cool, at least somewhat tolerable. Well expect the same experience now that Google Glass is hitting the street, because contrary to nearly any picture you can find of the thing, when you actually use it most of your time is spent looking up and to the right, where the data is. I call it the Google Gaze.

Only time will tell how traffic courts will come to view Google Glass, but having finally tried one I suspect it may end up on that list of things we’re supposed to drive without.

Another suspicion […]

Why elite marathoners don’t (yet) wear wristwatch mobile phones

GPSwatchesThirty years and 50 pounds of blubber ago, between various teaching jobs and being fired from computer companies, I wrote for a New York-based magazine called The Runner, which was long ago absorbed by Runners World. I took the gig to force myself to get in shape and it worked, which is why one year I ran the Boston Marathon. Understand that my editor at the time, a guy named Amby Burfoot, had won the Boston Marathon, so my finish well back in the pack was professionally meaningless, but that memory gives me some sense of the scene yesterday in Boston when those bombs went off. I know what the air was like, what the […]

Stop sending me pennies — more bad news for PayPal

paypal1I got a call this week from PayPal Executive Escalation, which I didn’t even know existed and certainly wouldn’t have guessed would be based in Omaha, Nebraska. This was either in response to my PayPal account being restricted as I described in my last column or — much more likely — to the simple fact that I’d made such a stink about it in print. The guy who called was very polite and helpful, too, but what I learned was also disturbing enough that I feel the need to share it with you.

“Do you use an anonymizer?” asked the guy from PayPal. I don’t use an anonymizer, which masks IP addresses, and told […]

We’re PayPal immortals whether we like it or not

paypalogo

Update #2 — After a few hundred people had their penny payments to me bounce, PayPal mysteriously freed my account yesterday. Since then dollars and dollars have poured-in, all to be refunded next week, I promise. So please stop sending me money now, okay? Mission accomplished.

My favorite transfer by far was this one for a $0.01 eCheck (below), which I will make every effort to refund before I receive it, thanks:

Screen Shot 2013-04-11 at 10.09.04 AM

 

Have you ever canceled a PayPal account? I tried to cancel mine today and the company wouldn’t let me.

In one sense it’s hard to imagine why anyone would want to cancel […]

Accidental Empires, Chapter 17 — Do the Wave

surf_board-legAnd so our two month retrospective comes to an end with this 17th and final chapter, circa 1996. I hope you have enjoyed it. Tomorrow I’ll be back to talk about the eBook version of this work as well as what I’ve been up to for the last eight weeks. It’s more than I ever expected… and less.

ACCIDENTAL EMPIRES

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

DO THE WAVE

We’re floating now on surfboards 300 yards north of the big public pier in Santa Cruz, California. As our feet slowly become numb in the cold Pacific water, it’s good to ponder the fact that this section of coastline, only fifteen miles […]